THE DARK DAYS OF THE WAR 145 



In the old home his eye fell at almost every turn 

 upon busts, pictures, or other souvenirs of the first 

 Napoleon, which his father had collected with de- 

 voted zeal. Not improbably, in common with many 

 of his countrymen, he wished that the little cor- 

 poral might be recalled to life and lead again the 

 now disorganized armies of France. "I wish," 

 Pasteur wrote, "that France may fight to her last 

 man, to her last fortress." The brother-in-law with 

 whom Pasteur shared the old home continued the 

 trade of a tanner and Pasteur began some studies 

 on the fermentation of tan. As Radot states, "He 

 enquired continually seeking to learn the scientific 

 reason for each custom and routine procedure. 

 He excelled in devising projects for research from 

 the most common and apparently insignificant 

 facts. Everything about him became a subject for 

 study. When his sister made bread, he studied the 

 rising of the dough, the influence of the air in the 

 kneading of the dough, and his imagination pro- 

 ceeding always from a small point to problems of 

 great import sought to obtain a more nutritive 

 bread and consequently a bread of lower price." 



The bombardment of Paris stirred him deeply. 

 Prussian shells had crashed into the Ecole Normale 

 and the Museum of Natural History. In 1868 the 



