Not only did the Committee of Hygiene approve of Pasteur’s project, but they asked him to choose some young men whose knowledge would be equalled by their devotion. Pasteur only had to look around him. When, on his return to the laboratory, he mentioned what had taken place at the Committee of Hygiene, M. Roux immediately offered to start. A professor at the Faculty of Medicine who had some hospital practice, M. Straus, and a professor at the Alfort Veterinary School, M. Nocard, both of whom had been authorised to work in the laboratory, asked permission to accompany M. Roux. Thuillier had the same desire, but asked for twenty-four hours to think over it.
The thought of his father and mother, who had made a great many sacrifices for his education, and whose only joy was to receive him at Amiens, where they lived, during his short holidays, made him hesitate. But the thought of duty overcame his regrets; he put his papers and notes in order and went to see his dear ones again. He told his father of his intention, but his mother did not know of it. At the time when the papers spoke of a French commission to study cholera, his elder sister, who loved him with an almost motherly tenderness, said to him suddenly, “You are not going to Egypt, Louis? swear that you are not!” “I am not going to swear anything,” he answered, with absolute calm; adding that he might some time go to Russia to proceed to some vaccination of anthrax, as he had done at Buda-Pesth in 1881. When he left Amiens nothing in his farewells revealed his deep emotion; it was only from Marseilles that he wrote the truth.
Administrative difficulties retarded the departure of the Commission, which only reached Egypt on August 15. Dr. Koch had also come to study cholera. The head physician of the European hospital, Dr. Ardouin, placed his wards at the entire disposal of the French savants. In a certain number of cases, it was possible to proceed to post-mortem examinations immediately after death, before putrefaction had begun. It was a great thing from the point of view of the search after a pathogenic micro-organism as well as from the anatomo-pathological point of view.
The contents of the intestines and the characteristic stools of the cholera patients offered a great variety of micro-organisms. But which was really the cause of cholera? The most varied modes of culture were attempted in vain. The same negative results followed inoculations into divers animal species, cats, dogs, swine, monkeys, pigeons, rabbits, guinea-pigs, etc., made with the blood of cholerics or with the contents of their bowels. Experiments were made with twenty-four corpses. The epidemic ceased unexpectedly. Not to waste time, while waiting for a reappearance of the disease, the French Commission took up some researches on cattle plague. Suddenly a telegram from M. Roux informed Pasteur that Thuillier had succumbed to an attack of cholera.
“I have just heard the news of a great misfortune,” wrote Pasteur to J. B. Dumas on September 19; “M. Thuillier died yesterday at Alexandria of cholera. I have telegraphed to the Mayor of Amiens asking him to break the news to the family.
“Science loses in Thuillier a courageous representative with a great future before him. I lose a much-loved and devoted pupil; my laboratory one of its principal supports.
“I can only console myself for this death by thinking of our beloved country and all he has done for it.”
Thuillier was only twenty-six. How had this happened? Had he neglected any of the precautions which Pasteur had written down before the departure of the Commission, and which were so minute as to be thought exaggerated?
Pasteur remained silent all day, absolutely overcome. The head of the laboratory, M. Chamberland, divining his master’s grief, came to Arbois. They exchanged their sorrowful thoughts, and Pasteur fell back into his sad broodings.
A few days later, a letter from M. Roux related the sad story: “Alexandria, September 21. Sir and dear master—Having just heard that an Italian ship is going to start, I am writing a few lines without waiting for the French mail. The telegraph has told you of the terrible misfortune which has befallen us.”