 In 1783, after leaving Mézières, he was, on the death of É. Bézout, appointed examiner of naval candidates.Although pressed by the minister to prepare a complete course of mathematics, he declined to do so on the grounds that this would deprive Mme Bézout of her only income, that from the sale of the textbooks written by her late husband.In 1786 he wrote and published his "Traité élémentaire de la statique".