have endured the strain so long. The entries in my diary are concerned 

 chiefly with the progress of my investigations, and the record of half a 

 century ago still breathes the exhilaration of discovery and pioneer work. 

 Strange to say, the significance of this work did not appear until Kiaer's 

 discovery in 1923 of the wonderfully preserved fossil fishes, to call them 

 so, of the Silurian of Norway. Throughout this time, Gegenbaur was 

 extremely encouraging, expressing his gratification over my results. 

 He wished me to publish a series of papers and then bring out a mono- 

 graph in book form and was much disappointed, when I had finally 

 to abandon the scheme. 



When, at last, the dissertation was finished and ready to present to 

 Professor Biitschli, of the Philosophical Faculty, Gegenbaur suggested 

 that I should let him look it over, before I handed it in, and he would 

 correct the German. This was really an extraordinarily kind thing for 

 him to do, for, being a member of the Faculty of Medicine, he was not 

 officially concerned at all. Of course, I gratefully accepted the offer 

 and was much cast down when, after a fortnight or so, he returned 

 the important document with the remark : "Your style is not clear and 

 some of your sentences are bad; I have marked the worst of them and 

 those you must change." I thanked him warmly for his kindness and 

 began the revision in all humility. However, my spirits gradually rose 

 as I discovered that the corrections, one after another, referred to sen- 

 tences quoted from German writers and not one of them marked a 

 sentence of my composition. In great glee, I hurried to Gegenbaur 's 

 private room and said to him: "Herr Geheimrath! I am infinitely ob- 

 liged to you for the trouble you have taken with my thesis, but, unfor- 

 tunately, all the passages you have marked are taken from German 

 works and one is not permitted to correct quotations." He laughed 

 heartily and replied: "Ah! I didn't notice the quotation marks. But don't 

 flatter yourself on that account, German scientific style is verdammt 

 schlecht." To which I, inaudibly, rejoined: "And yours is one of the 

 worst." 



Ciis] 



