[8]I quote, as an example, a letter addressed to Pierre Curie by A. Paulsen, thanking him for radioactive products loaned him in 1899:
"Den Damke Nordl's Expedition
Akureyi, 16 Oct. 1899.
Monsieur, and most honored colleague,
"I thank you warmly for your letter of August 1, which I have just received in the north of Iceland.
"We have abandoned all the methods hitherto employed to establish in a fixed conductor the potential that exists at certain points in the mass of air that surrounds it, and are using only your radiant powder.
"Accept, Monsieur, and most honored colleague, my respectful salutations and my renewed thanks for the great services you have rendered my expedition.
"ADAM PAULSEN."
CHAPTER VI
THE STRUGGLE FOR MEANS TO WORK. THE BURDEN OF CELEBRITY. THE FIRST ASSISTANCE FROM THE STATE. IT COMES TOO LATE
In spite of our desire to concentrate our entire effort on the work in which we were engaged, and in spite of the fact that our needs were so modest, we were forced to recognize, toward 1900, that some increase in our income was indispensable. Pierre Curie had few illusions about his chances of obtaining an important chair in the University of Paris, which would, even though it meant no large salary, have sufficed for the small needs of our family, and enabled us to live without a supplementary revenue. Since he was neither a graduate of the Normal School nor of the Polytechnic, he lacked the support, often decisive, which these big schools give their pupils; and the posts to which he might justly have aspired, because of his achievements, were given to others, without anyone's even thinking of him as a possible candidate. At the beginning of 1898, he asked, without success, for the Chair of Physical Chemistry left vacant by the death of Salet, and this failure convinced him that he had no chance of advancement. He was appointed, however, in March, 1900, to the position of assistant professor (répétiteur) in the Polytechnic School, but he kept his post only six months.
In the spring of 1900, there came an unexpected offer, that of the Chair of Physics in the University of Geneva. The doyen of that University made the invitation in the most cordial manner, and insisted that the University was ready to make an exceptional effort to secure a scientist of such high repute. The advantages of this position were that the salary was larger than the average one, that it carried the promise of the development of a Physics Laboratory adequate to our needs, and that an official position for me would be provided in this laboratory. Such a proposition merited a most careful consideration, so we made a visit to the University of Geneva, where our reception was the most encouraging possible.
This was a grave decision for us to make. Geneva presented material advantages, and the opportunity of a life comparable in its tranquillity with that in the country. Pierre Curie was, therefore, tempted to accept, and it was only our immediate interest in our researches in radium that made him finally decide not to. He feared the interruption of our investigations which such a change must involve.
At this moment the Chair of Physics in the physics, chemistry and natural history course at the Sorbonne, obligatory for students of medicine, and familiarly known as P.C.N., was vacant; he applied, and was appointed, due to the influence of Henri Poincaré, who was anxious to free him from the necessity of quitting France. At the same time I was given charge of the physics lectures in the Normal School for Girls at Sèvres.
So we remained in Paris, and with our income increased. But we were at the same time working under increasingly difficult conditions. Pierre Curie was doing double teaching; and that in the P.C.N., with its very large number of students, fatigued him greatly. As for myself, I had to give much time to the preparation of my lectures at Sèvres, and to the organization of the laboratory work there, which I found very insufficient.
Moreover, Pierre Curie's new position did not bring with it a laboratory; a little office and a single work room were all that he had at his disposition in the annex (12 rue Cuvier) of the Sorbonne, which served as teaching quarters for the P.C.N. And yet he felt it absolutely necessary to go ahead with his own work. In fact, the rapid extension of his investigations in radioactivity had made him determine that in his new position at the Sorbonne he would receive students and start them in research. He therefore took steps to find larger available working quarters. Those who have taken similar steps realize the wall of financial and administrative obstacles against which he was throwing himself, and realize the large number of official letters, visits, and of requests the least success entailed. All this thoroughly wearied and discouraged Pierre Curie. He was obliged, too, constantly, to keep traveling back and forth between the laboratories of the P.C.N. and the hangar of the School of Physics where we still continued our work.
And besides these difficulties, we found that we could not make further progress without the aid of industrial means of treating our raw material. Fortunately certain expedients and generous assistance solved this question.