One of Pasteur’s earliest friends, who, in 1862, had greeted with joy his election to the Académie des Sciences, and who had never ceased to show the greatest interest in the progress due to the experimental method, entered the Ecole Normale laboratory with a beaming face. Happy to bring good tidings, he took his share of them like the devoted, hardworking, kindly man that he was. “M. Grandeau,” wrote Mme. Pasteur to her children, “has just brought to the laboratory the news that Roux and Chamberland have the Cross and M. Pasteur the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour. Hearty congratulations were exchanged in the midst of the rabbits and guinea-pigs.”
Those days were darkened by a great sorrow. Henri Sainte Claire Deville died. Pasteur was then reminded of the words of his friend in 1868: “You will survive me, I am your senior; promise that you will pronounce my funeral oration.” When formulating this desire, Sainte Claire Deville had no doubt been desirous of giving another direction to the presentiments of Pasteur, who believed himself death-stricken. But, whether it was from a secret desire, or from an affectionate impulse, he felt that none understood him better than Pasteur. Both loved Science after the same manner; they gave to patriotism its real place; they had hopes for the future of the human mind; they were moved by the same religious feelings before the mysteries of the Infinite.
Pasteur began by recalling his friend’s wish: “And here am I, before thy cold remains, obliged to ask my memory what thou wert in order to repeat it to the multitude crowding around thy coffin. But how superfluous! Thy sympathetic countenance, thy witty merriment and frank smile, the sound of thy voice remain with us and live within us. The earth which bears us, the air we breathe, the elements, often interrogated and ever docile to answer thee, could speak to us of thee. Thy services to Science are known to the whole world, and every one who has appreciated the progress of the human mind is now mourning for thee.”
He then enumerated the scientist’s qualities, the inventive precision of that eager mind, full of imagination, and at the same time the strictness of analysis and the fruitful teaching so delightedly recognized by those who had worked with him, Debray, Troost, Fouqué, Grandeau, Hautefeuille, Gernez, Lechartier. Then, showing that, in Sainte Claire Deville, the man equalled the scientist:
“Shall I now say what thou wert in private life? Again, how superfluous! Thy friends do not want to be reminded of thy warm heart. Thy pupils want no proofs of thy affection for them and thy devotion in being of service to them! See their sorrow.
“Should I tell thy sons, thy five sons, thy joy and pride, of the preoccupations of thy paternal and prudent tenderness? And can I speak of thy smiling goodness to her, the companion of thy life, the mere thought of whom filled thy eyes with a sweet emotion?
“Oh! I implore thee, do not now look down upon thy weeping wife and afflicted sons: thou wouldst regret this life too much! Wait for them rather in those divine regions of knowledge and full light, where thou knowest all now, where thou canst understand the Infinite itself, that terrible and bewildering notion, closed for ever to man in this world, and yet the eternal source of all Grandeur, of all Justice and all Liberty.”
Pasteur’s voice was almost stifled by his team, as had been that of J. B. Dumas speaking at Péclet’s tomb. The emotions of savants are all the deeper that they are not enfeebled, as in so many writers or speakers, by the constant use of words which end by wearing out the feelings.
Little groups slowly walking away from a country churchyard seem to take with them some of the sadness they have been feeling, but the departure from a Paris cemetery gives a very different impression. Life immediately grasps again and carries away in its movement the mourners, who now look as if they had been witnessing an incident in which they were not concerned. Pasteur felt such bitter contrasts with all his tender soul, he had a cult for dear memories; Sainte Claire Deville’s portrait ever remained in his study.
The adversaries of the new discovery now had recourse to a new mode of attack. The virus which had been used at Pouilly le Fort to show how efficacious were the preventive vaccinations was, they said, a culture virus—some even said a Machiavellian preparation of Pasteur’s. Would vaccinated animals resist equally well the action of the charbon blood itself, the really malignant and infallibly deadly blood? Those sceptics were therefore impatiently awaiting the result of some experiments which were being carried out near Chartres in the farm of Lambert. Sixteen Beauceron sheep were joined to a lot of nineteen sheep brought from Alfort and taken from the herd of 300 sheep vaccinated against charbon three weeks before, on the very day of the lecture at Alfort. On July 16, at 10 o’clock in the morning, the thirty-five sheep, vaccinated and non-vaccinated, were gathered together. The corpse of a sheep who had died of charbon four hours before, in a neighbouring farm, was brought into the field selected for the experiments. After making a post-mortem examination and noting the characteristic injuries of splenic fever, ten drops of the dead sheep’s blood were injected into each of the thirty-five sheep, taking one vaccinated at Alfort and one non-vaccinated Beauceron alternately. Two days later, on July 18, ten of the latter were already dead, most of the others were prostrated. The vaccinated sheep were perfectly well.