CHAPTER VI 



THE PRINCE OF MONACO AND THE OCEANO- 

 GRAPHIC MUSEUM 



Not infrequently in the past have princes and nobles been 

 munificent patrons of science and done much for the advance- 

 ment of knowledge ; but it must be rare, indeed, for a reigning 

 prince to attain recognition and distinction as a practical 

 working man of science. The late Prince of Monaco was 

 both. He has given to France and the world of science at 

 least three research institutions of first-rate importance ; and 

 throughout many years of his life, during the lasthaK-century, 

 since on one of his early expeditions his little yacht lay 

 alongside the " Challenger " in the Tagus, in January, 1873, 

 he has himself planned and carried out many notable 

 investigations in oceanography. 



His Serene Highness Prince Albert Honore Charles, a 

 descendant of the ancient house of Grimaldi, was born in 

 1848, and succeeded his father, Prince Charles III, as 

 sovereign ruler of Monaco in 1889. He died in 1922. 



In his early youth he served as lieutenant in the Spanish 

 Navy, and since then has shown a lifelong devotion to the 

 sea and its exploration, and consequently both nature and 

 training conspired to make him an accomplished navigator, 

 competent to take command of his own ship. Probably the 

 most characteristic representation of the Prince is the statue 

 in the Oceanographic Museum at Monaco, showing him in 

 plain sailor's uniform standing at the rail on the bridge of 

 his yacht. (See also the photograph on Plate IX.) 



He must have spent a large portion of his life, and much 



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