Lucia - Andrea Di Robilant [124]
Lucia had never felt so free to organise her life as she did in the late spring of 1813, after settling in her Paris apartment. The combination of her independence and her exposure to so many people of talent energised her; at the age of forty-three she yearned to engage her mind more fruitfully. Conversations in prominent salons, however agreeable and stimulating, no longer seemed enough. She was attracted by the rigour that only an academic community could provide, and she eventually found what she was looking for at the Jardin des Plantes, the botanical gardens where many of the great French scientists gave public lectures.
It all started quite by chance. One afternoon, Lucia went to the Collège Duplessix to hear Jean Charles de Lacretelle, a renowned historian of the French Revolution, only to be turned away by an unpleasant clerk who told her the lecture was “for men only.” Instead of going home in a huff, she walked over to the nearby Jardin des Plantes, where women were evidently welcome. She heard Geoffroy de Saint Hilaire, an eminent zoologist, give a fascinating talk on quadrupeds. Lucia was hooked. Soon she was attending Saint Hilaire’s courses on fish, butterflies, shells and corals. Next, she enrolled in Jean-Baptiste Lamarck’s course on invertebrates, learning all she could possibly want to know about molluscs and giant squids. Professor Havy introduced her to mineralogy, and Professor Des Fontaines to botany. She became an assiduous and attentive student, took copious notes and revised every evening at home, while Alvisetto struggled with his homework.
Lucia chose not to share this part of her life with Paolina—there is no mention of lectures in her letters to her sister. It is hard to understand why she was secretive about an experience that was obviously so important to her, especially with her sister, whom she usually kept informed about every detail of her life, down to her bodily functions. But she evidently felt protective about this new development. In reading her brief diary entries, one senses a coyness about the whole enterprise of a late education, as if she did not want people to know about it back in Italy because she feared their condescending remarks.
By mid summer, Lucia was a familiar figure at the Jardin des Plantes, hurrying to her lectures, staying on after class to make a query or ask for some clarification, fetching a sample in the herb garden or checking the mushroom beds in the dank underground cellars. Professor Havy grew so fond of her he gave her a small collection of his quartzes. Professor Des Fontaines took her for educational walks in the garden, pointing out the most exotic trees and telling her their history. Professor Saint Hilaire called on her to assist him each time a shipment of specimens—reptiles, butterflies, insects—arrived from the Americas.
Every morning Lucia took Alvisetto to early mass, saw him off to school, then headed to the Jardin des Plantes following the banks of the Seine. She had given up her carriage soon after arriving in Paris to reduce her running costs, and she actually enjoyed the long walks along the river. In the afternoon, on her way back, she took the habit of stopping at the flower market to pick up some buttercups and bluebells, and popping into Félix’s, her favourite pâtisserie, to buy a small pastry or two. On those rare occasions when she headed home earlier than usual, she idled in the streets of Faubourg Saint Germain, gathering along the way the most eclectic collection of goods: a set of drawing pencils, for example, or a sou of nails, a set of candles, a pair of socks, a couple of pigeons to roast for dinner, some bottled water and always a good