TITLE: DUMONT d'URVILLE AND HIS IRONIC DESTINY
1999 23 X 31 INCHES

Jules Dumont d'Urville:
1790-1842, French naval officer, explorer, linguist, botanist.

"I always declared that I would rather spend three years under the blazing
skies of the equator, than two months amid the ice".

His intellect was keen. His interests were wide ranging including astronomy,
languages, (he mastered English, German, Spanish, Greek, Italian and Hebrew),
geology, entomology and his favorite, botany.

Fame had always been his muse. He was the discoverer of the ancient statue
Venus de Milo in Greece and a founder of the Paris Geographical Society. In
1837 he led a voyage of anthropological study to the Pacific. During this
voyage, gout and migraine afflicted the elegant and cantankerous explorer as he
sailed into Antarctic waters. In 1840 he named a portion of Antarctica, as well
as a classification of penguins for his wife, Adélie. In 1842 he perished
with her and their son. They were burned to death in a train wreck while returning
from a picnic to see the fountains at Versailles.