It was easy to organize a series of devoted nurses; all Pasteur’s disciples were eager to watch by his bedside. Every evening, two persons took their seats in his room: one a member of the family, and one a “Pastorian.” About one a.m. they were replaced by another Pastorian and another member of the family. From November 1 to December 25, the laboratory workers continued this watching, regulated by Dr. Roux as follows:—
Sunday night, Roux and Chantemesse; Monday, Queyrat and Marmier; Tuesday, Borrel and Martin; Wednesday, Mesnil and Pottevin; Thursday, Marchoux and Viala; Friday, Calmette and Veillon; Saturday, Renon and Morax. A few alterations were made in this order; Dr. Marie claimed the privilege. M. Metchnikoff, full of anxiety, came and went continually from the laboratory to the master’s room. After the day’s work, each faithful watcher came in, bringing books or notes, to go on with the work begun, if the patient should be able to sleep. In the middle of the night, Mme. Pasteur would come in and send away with a sweet authority one of the two volunteer nurses. Pasteur’s loving and faithful wife was straining every faculty of her valiant and tender soul to conjure the vision of death which seemed so near. In spite of all her courage, there were hours of weakness, at early dawn, when life was beginning to revive in the quiet neighbourhood, when she could not keep her tears from flowing silently. Would they succeed in saving him whose life was so precious, so useful to others? In the morning, Pasteur’s two grandchildren came into the bedroom. The little girl of fourteen, fully realizing the prevailing anxiety, and rendered serious by the sorrow she struggled to hide, talked quietly with him. The little boy, only eight years old, climbed on to his grandfather’s bed, kissing him affectionately and gazing on the loved face which always found enough strength to smile at him.
Dr. Chantemesse attended Pasteur with an incomparable devotion. Dr. Gille, who had often been sent for by Pasteur when staying at Villeneuve l’Etang, came to Paris from Garches to see him. Professor Guyon showed his colleague the most affectionate solicitude. Professor Dieulafoy was brought in one morning by M. Metchnikoff; Professor Grancher, who was ill and away from Paris, hurried back to his master’s side.
How often did they hang over him, anxiously following the respiratory rhythm due to the uræmic intoxication! movements slow at first, then rapid, accelerated, gasping, slackening again, and arrested in a long pause of several seconds, during which all seemed suspended.
At the end of December, a marked improvement took place. On January 1, after seeing all his collaborators, down to the youngest laboratory attendant, Pasteur received the visit of one of his colleagues of the Académie Française. It was Alexandre Dumas, carrying a bunch of roses, and accompanied by one of his daughters. “I want to begin the year well,” he said: “I am bringing you my good wishes.” Pasteur and Alexandre Dumas, meeting at the Academy every Thursday for twelve years, felt much attraction towards each other. Pasteur, charmed from the first by this dazzling and witty intellect, had been surprised and touched by the delicate attentions of a heart which only opened to a chosen few. Dumas, who had observed many men, loved and admired Pasteur, a modest and kindly genius; for this dramatic author hid a man thirsting for moral action, his realism was lined with mysticism, and he placed the desire to be useful above the hunger for fame. His blue eyes, usually keen and cold, easily detecting secret thoughts and looking on them with irony, were full of an expression of affectionate veneration when they rested on “our dear and great Pasteur,” as he called him. Alexandre Dumas’ visit gave Pasteur very great pleasure; he compared it to a ray of sunshine.
As he could not go out, those who did not come to see him thought him worse than he really was. It was therefore with great surprise that people heard that he would be pleased to receive the old Normaliens, who were about to celebrate the centenary of their school, and who, after putting up a memorial plate on the small laboratory of the Rue d’Ulm, desired to visit the Pasteur Institute. They filed one after another into the drawing-room on the first floor. Pasteur, seated by the fire, seemed to revive the old times when he used to welcome young men into his home circle on Sunday evenings. He had an affectionate word or a smile for each of those who now passed before him, bowing low. Every one was struck with the keen expression of his eyes; never had the strength of his intellect seemed more independent of the weakness of his body. Many believed in a speedy recovery and rejoiced. “Your health,” said some one, “is not only national but universal property.”
On that day, Dr. Roux had arranged on tables, in the large laboratory, the little flasks which Pasteur had used in his experiments on so-called spontaneous generation, which had been religiously preserved; also rows of little tubes used for studies on wines; various preparations in various culture media; microbes and bacilli, so numerous that it was difficult to know which to see first. The bacteria of diphtheria and bubonic plague completed this museum.
Pasteur was carried into the laboratory about twelve o’clock, and Dr. Roux showed his master the plague bacillus through a microscope. Pasteur, looking at these things, souvenirs of his own work and results of his pupils’ researches, thought of those disciples who were continuing his task in various parts of the world. In France, he had just sent Dr. Calmette to Lille, where he soon afterwards created a new and admirable Pasteur Institute. Dr. Yersin was continuing his investigations in China. A Normalien, M. Le Dantec, who had entered the Ecole at sixteen at the head of the list, and who had afterwards become a curator at the laboratory, was in Brazil, studying yellow fever, of which he very nearly died. Dr. Adrien Loir, after a protracted mission in Australia, was head of a Pasteur Institute at Tunis. Dr. Nicolle was setting up a laboratory of bacteriology at Constantinople. “There is still a great deal to do!” sighed Pasteur as he affectionately pressed Dr. Roux’ hand.
He was more than ever full of a desire to allay human suffering, of a humanitarian sentiment which made of him a citizen of the world. But his love for France was in no wise diminished, and the permanence of his patriotic feelings was, soon after this, revealed by an incident. The Berlin Academy of Sciences was preparing a list of illustrious contemporary scientists to be submitted to the Kaiser with a view to conferring on them the badge of the Order of Merit. As Pasteur’s protest and return of his diploma to the Bonn University had not been forgotten, the Berlin Academy, before placing his name on the list, desired to know whether he would accept this distinction at the hands of the German Emperor. Pasteur, while acknowledging with courteous thanks the honour done to him as a scientist, declared that he could not accept it.
For him, as for Victor Hugo, the question of Alsace-Lorraine was a question of humanity; the right of peoples to dispose of themselves was in question. And by a bitter irony of Fate, France, which had proclaimed this principle all over Europe, saw Alsace tom away from her. And by whom? by the very nation whom she had looked upon as the most idealistic, with whom she had desired an alliance in a noble hope of pacific civilization, a hope shared by Humboldt, the great German scientist.