Source note

PICOT (Nepomucene), astronomer and mathematician, friend of Biot after 1807, author of a "Treatise on Differential Logarithms," and especially of a "Theory of Perpetual Motion," four volumes, quarto, with engravings, Paris, 1825; lived, in 1840, No. 9 rue du Val-de-Grace. Being very near-sighted and erratic, the prey of his thieving servant, Madame Lambert, his family thought that he needed a protector. Being instructor of Felix Phellion, with whom he took a trip to England, Picot made known his pupil's great ability, which the boy had modestly kept secret, at the home of the Thuilliers, Place de la Madeleine, before an audience composed of the Collevilles, Minards and Phellions. Celeste Colleville's future was thus determined. As Picot was decorated late in life, his marriage to a wealthy and eccentric Englishwoman of forty was correspondingly late. After passing through a successful operation for a cancer, he returned "a new man," to the home of the Thuilliers. He was led through gratitude to leave to the Felix Phellions the wealth brought him by Madame Picot. [The Middle Classes.]