Page 30 - Ethel D. Hume - Bešam ili Paster: Izgubljeno poglavlje u istoriji biologije

ANTOINE BfiGHAMP 27
qualified in music and drawing, the arts being as easy to
him as the sciences.
We will now return to Antoine Bechamp at the point
where we left him at Havre, suddenly bereft of the gifted
son on whom not only his family affections, but his
scientific hopes were placed. Antoine Bechamp was indeed
experiencing the rigorous discipline of which the Chinese
—
philosopher, Mencius, thus speaks: "When Heaven de-
mands of a man a great work in this world, it makes his
heart ache, his muscles weary, his stomach void and his
mind disappointed; for these experiences expand his
heart to love the whole world and strengthen his will to
battle on where others fall by the way."
Havre had become a place of sorrowful memories, and
Professor Bechamp was glad to move to Paris. Here he
could continue his biological work in the laboratory of the
Sorbonne, generously put at his disposal by his old col-
league, M. Friedel, who, with another old friend, M.
Fremy, had never ceased to deplore his patriotic unselfish-
ness in abandoning his great work at Montpellier. Up to
1899, that is to say, until he was eighty-three years of age,
this grand old man of science never ceased his daily
labours in the laboratory. After that time, though no
longer able to continue these, he worked no less diligently
to within a few days of his death, collecting and arranging
the literary results of his long years of toil, while he con-
tinued to follow and criticise the course of modern science.
Up to the very end his brilliant intellect was undimmed.
Patriarchal in dignity, he was always ready to discuss old
and new theories and explain his own scientific ideas.
Though sorrow and disappointment had robbed him of
his natural cheerfulness, he was in no sense embittered by
the want of popular recognition. He felt that his work
would stand the test of investigation, that gradually his
teaching would be proved true and that the verdict of
coming centuries could not fail to raise him to his proper
place. Even more indifferent was he to the lack of riches.
For him, labour was its own reward and success dependent