LIFE OF ELIE METCHNIKOFF 79 



had been presented in manuscript instead of being 

 printed. In reality, the German party had wished 

 to give it to a fellow-German. 



A friend of his, who sent him the bad news, offered 

 to lend him 300 roubles, and Metchnikoff accepted ; 

 he could now think of nothing but holding out till 

 the end. 



One morning the patient's condition suddenly 

 became much worse. The doctor was sent for in a 

 hurry and declared that it was now a question of a 

 few hours. . . . When Metchnikoff went back to his 

 wife he found her with eyes wide open and so full of 

 mortal anguish and utter despair that he could bear 

 it no longer and went out hastily, not to show her 

 his dismay. 



This was his last impression ; he never saw her again. 



Only half conscious, he walked up and down the 

 drawing-room, opening and closing books without 

 seeing them, his mind full of disconnected pictures ; 

 he wondered to himself how his family would hear 

 the news. Time passed without his realising it. 

 Then his sister-in-law came to tell him that all was 

 over. This was on the 20th April 1873. 



Metchnikoff's feelings were complex : a mixture 

 of crushing despair and of relief at the thought that 

 the terrible agony was at last ended. . . . During 

 the whole of the sad first night he sat with his sister- 

 in-law in a distant room, talking of those things 

 which are only mentioned in moments such as these. 

 When Dr. Goldschmidt came in the morning to offer 

 Metchnikoff his sympathy and help he found him 

 apparently almost calm. Metchnikoff asked him to 

 make a post-mortem examination of the deceased 

 and to look after her sister. A Scottish minister 



