I. Edouard Rene Lefebvre

I. Edouard Rene Lefebvre, a French author, born in Paris, Jan. 18, 1811. He studied law, and became known first by his Histoire du droit de propriete fonciere en Europe depuis Constantin jusqu'a nos jours (8vo, Paris, 1839). In 1842 he published Essai sur la vie et les doctrines de Frederic Charles de Savigny, and the same year he became an advocate of the royal court of Paris. Two other elaborate works followed, Recherches sur la condition civile et politique des femmes, depuis les Romains jusqu'a nos jours (1843), and Essai sur les lois criminelles des Romains concernant la responsaoilite des magistrats (1845). In 1845 he was elected a member of the academy of inscriptions, and in 1849 he became professor of comparative legislation in the college de France. Under the empire Laboulaye took part in various attempts of the liberal party to direct public opinion, and was several times an unsuccessful candidate for the corps legislatif. A firm friend of the United States and of republican institutions, he took a deep interest in our civil war, and publicly expressed his sympathy, both in his writings and his speeches, with the federal government.

In 1870 he was a member of the commission of inquiry into the administrative organization of the city of Paris and of the department of the Seine, and some weeks before the plebiscite of Napoleon he publicly advocated the necessity of an affirmative vote. In July, 1871, he was elected to the national assembly, and was made president of the commission for the reorganization of superior instruction. In March, 1873, he was appointed director of the college de France. Among his works not already mentioned are: Histoire politique des Etats-Unis, 1620-1789 (3 vols. 8vo, 1855-'66); Les Etats- Unis et la France (1862); L'Etat et ses li-mites (1863); Paris en Amerique (18mo, 1863); Les memoires et la correspondence de Franklin (1866); and Lettres politiques (1872). He has published also a number of tales and translations, and contributed numerous articles to the leading periodicals.

II. Charles Pierre Le-Febvre

II. Charles Pierre Le-Febvre, a French industrialist, brother of the preceding, born in Paris in 1813. He entered the army as lieutenant of artillery, but resigned in 1836 and devoted himself to the industrial arts. He turned his attention specially to the founding of metallic type, and he is the inventor of many ingenious and valuable processes and machines for type making. He was also the editor and principal writer of the Dic-tionnaire des arts et manufactures (2 vols. 8vo, 1847; 3d ed., 1867), and the author of a number of valuable treatises on mechanics, industrial art, the mechanical equivalent of heat, etc.