BONPLAND, Aime, French traveller, born in La Rochelle, France, 22 August 1773; died in Santa Anna, Uruguay, 11 May 1858. He studied medicine in Paris, was surgeon on a war vessel, afterward studied under Corvisart, and been, me intimate with Alexander yon Humboldt, whom he accompanied in the explorations described in "Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent." The collections made during his five years' travels in Mexico, Colombia, and the Orinoco and Amazon valleys were presented by hint to the French government, which rewarded him with a pension, and appointed him superintendent of the gardens at Malmaison. He collected and classified about 6,000 plants, for the most part previously unknown, which he afterward described in "Plantes equinoxiales" (Paris, 1806-'10). After endeavoring to persuade Napoleon to retire to the United States, he departed for Buenos Ayres in 1816, taking with him a number of European plants. In Buenos Ayres he was appointed professor of natural history, but this office he soon resigned in order to explore the central parts of South America. In Paraguay he was arrested as a spy in 1821 by order of Dr. Francia, and was a prisoner for ten years, during which period he devoted his services as a physician gratuitously to the poor. On regaining his liberty he settled at San Borje, in Corrientes, where the government of the province presented him with an estate. In 1853 he removed to Santa Anna, where he gave his attention to the cultivation of the orange-tree, which he introduced, as well as to scientific research. His principal work was "Nova Genera et Species Plantarum" (Paris, 1815-'29).