And really why do we study as if we were to rival the ante-diluvians in age. Then wake up to the facts. I have been assured, by those who know, that but a small proportion of college graduates are successful or even heard of. They appear at commencement, sure that they are to do great things, make big money, at least marry an heiress; they are turned out like buttons, only to find out how hard it is to get anything to do for good pay. One multi-millionaire of Boston, whose first wages he told me were but four dollars a month, said there was no one he so dreaded to see coming into his office as a college man who must have help,—seldom able to write a legible hand, or to add correctly a column of figures. There is solid food for thought.
Lowell said that "great men come in clusters." That is true, but it is equally true that once in a great while, we are vouchsafed a royal guest, a man who mingles freely with the ordinary throng, yet stands far above them; a man who can wrest the primal secrets from nature's closed hand, who makes astounding discoveries, only to gladly disclose them to others.
Such an unusual genius was Professor Robert Ogden Doremus, whose enthusiasm was only matched by his modesty. In studying what he accomplished, I wonder whether he was not sent from the central yet universal "powers that be" to give us answers to some of the riddles of life; or had he visited so many planets further advanced than our own—for as Jean Paul Richter wrote "There is no end"—that he had learned that the supposedly impossible could be done. He assisted John W. Draper in taking the first photograph of the human face ever made. Science with him was never opposed to religion. His moving pictures and spectral analysis were almost miracles at that time. He delighted to show how the earth in forming was flattened at the poles, and he would illustrate the growth of the rings of Saturn. As a lecturer he was a star, the only chemist and scientist to offer experiments. His lectures were always attended by crowds of admirers. As a toxicologist he was marvellous in his accuracy; no poisoner could escape his exact analysis. His compressed cartridges, made waterproof and coated with collodion, were used in the blasting operations at the Mont Cenis tunnel through eight miles of otherwise impenetrable stone, solid Alpine rock, between France and Italy.
When the obelisk in Central Park showed signs of serious decay, he saved the hieroglyphics by ironing it with melted parafine. He makes us think of the juggler who can keep a dozen balls in the air as if it were an easy trick, never dropping one.
PROFESSOR R. OGDEN DOREMUS
But I forget to give my own memories of Dr. and Mrs. Doremus in their delightful home on Fourth Avenue between 18th and 19th Streets,—a home full of harmony, melody, peace, and love. Vincenzo Botta called Dr. Doremus the "Mæcenas of New York," and his beautiful wife, the ideal wife and mother, was named by her adoring husband the "queen of women." Mrs. Doremus was prominent in New York's various societies and charities, but the interests of her own family came first. One of her sons said: "She never neglected her children; we were always loved and well cared for." Both Dr. Doremus and his wife were devoted to music, always of the best. He was the first president of the Philharmonic Society who was not a musician by profession. All the preceding presidents had been selected from the active musicians in the society. One evening he was serenaded by the Philharmonic Society under the leadership of Carl Bergman, the recently elected president of the society. After the classic music had ceased, Dr. Doremus appeared and thanked the society for the compliment. All were invited into the house, where a bountiful collation was served and speeches made. If you could see the photograph of the Philharmonic Society serenading Dr. and Mrs. Doremus at their home, you would get a rare insight into the old New York life, as compared with the present, in which such a thing would be impossible. He said that his mother used to take a cup of tea at the Battery afternoons with her sons.
He was a lifelong friend of Christine Nilsson whom he considered the greatest vocal and dramatic genius of the age. He wrote: "Never did mortal woman sing as she sang that simple song that begins: