98 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



publication in Poggendorff's Annalen, but the manuscript was not 

 published nor was it returned to the author. 2 Thirty-six years later 

 it was found among the papers of Poggendorff. In 1842 Mayer pre- 

 pared a second short paper of seven pages and had the satisfaction of 

 seeing it printed in Liebig's Annalen der Chemie. This was a happy 

 time in his life, for at the very hour when he learned of the acceptance 

 of his manuscript, he was bringing home his bride and presenting her 

 to his aged parents. 3 But it is one thing to secure the publication of 

 a manuscript and quite another thing to get scientific men to read and 

 study it. A new discovery necessitates a new language. A new lan- 

 guage is not generally understood. The curse of Babel fell upon 

 Mayer's paper : " Confound their language, that they may not under- 

 stand one another's speech." Other papers were printed by Mayer as 

 pamphlets in 1845 and 1848. 



Something of the personality of Mayer may be gained from the 

 following stories. 4 During a hurried meeting with Mayer in Heidel- 

 berg once, Jolly remarked, with a rather dubious implication, that if 

 Mayer's theory were correct water could be warmed by shaking. Mayer 

 went away without a word of reply. Several weeks later ... he rushed 

 into the latter's presence, exclaiming, " Es ischt so ! yj (It is so, it is 

 so). It was only after considerable explanation that Jolly found out 

 what Mayer wanted to say. Of metaphysics Mayer had no apprecia- 

 tion. Biimelin narrates that in 1841 Mayer borrowed from him a 

 copy of Hegel's " Logik " and Hegel's " Naturphilosophie," but re- 

 turned the books a few days later with the remark that he did not 

 understand a word, and that he could not understand any part of it, 

 were he to study it a hundred years. 5 



For years Mayer was unable to bring his great discovery to the 

 serious attention of scientific men. Later there followed controversies 

 on his rights of priority. A gloom fell upon him through the death 

 of two of his children. His mind became seriously affected, and on 

 May 26, 1850, he unsuccessfully attempted suicide by jumping from a 

 second-story window. In 1851 he was placed in an insane asylum, 

 where he was cruelly treated. Two years later he was set free, but he 

 never again regained complete mental equilibrium. Such is the 

 pathetic story of the first discoverer of the conservation of energy. 6 



2 "Mechanik der Warme," von R. Mayer (ed. J. J. Weyrauch), Stuttgart, 

 1893, p. 16; "Kleinere Schriften u. Briefe," von Robert Mayer (ed. J. J. 

 Weyrauch), Stuttgart, 1893, V., p. 99. 



3 "Kleinere Schriften," p. 379. 



4 Mach in the Monist, Vol. 6, 1896, p. 171, copied in Cajori's "History of 

 Physics," New York, 1899, p. 210. Several passages in this address are taken 

 from this " History of Physics." 



B G. Riimelin, " Reden und Aufsatze," Freiburg i. B., 1881, p. 380. 



8 For a statement, by Clausius, explaining the manner in which Mayer's 



