474 CHEMICAL DISCOVERY AND INVENTION 



course, but was ultimately led to adopt a purely scientific career. 

 His first paper, on a simple method of demonstrating the lique- 

 faction of gases, was presented to the Academy of Sciences in 1850. 



Beginning with the humble appointment of lecture assistant to 

 Balard, the discoverer of bromine, then Professor of Chemistry in 

 the College de France, he became in succession Professor in the 

 Ecole Superieure de Pharmacie, Professor of Organic Chemistry 

 in the College de France, a post which he held till his death, and, 

 finally, he succeeded Pasteur as Perpetual Secretary of the Academy 

 of Sciences in 1889. In 1900 he became one of the forty French 

 Academicians. 



Berthelot lectured before the Chemical Society in London, June 

 4th, 1863, " On the Synthesis of Organic Substances," and a few 

 years later was elected an Honorary Member of the Society. He 

 received a large number of marks of honour from various academies 

 and learned societies. It is only necessary to mention here that he 

 was elected a Foreign Fellow of the Royal Society in 1877 and re- 

 ceived the Davy Medal in 1883. The Copley Medal, the highest 

 distinction the Royal Society has to bestow, was awarded to him in 

 1900. 



Berthelot was an extraordinarily prolific investigator and writer. 

 The great variety and extent of the subjects he attacked are indi- 

 cated by the following brief summary : 



1. Synthesis of fats and characterisation of glycerol as a poly- 

 hydric alcohol. 



2. Synthesis of hydrocarbons, acids, etc. 



3. Action of mass, and study of the law of equilibrium. 



4. Thermochemical researches embodied in two large volumes 

 entitled Essai de Mecanique Chimique. 



5. Explosives, and especially the explosion wave in gases. 



6. Fixation of atmospheric nitrogen and its relation to vegetation. 



7. Study of Greek and Arabian alchemistic writings. 



In November, 1901, Berthelot's seventy-fifth birthday and the 

 jubilee of his first appointment in the College de France was cele- 

 brated by a public ceremonial at the Sorbonne, where he was received 

 by the President of the Republic. It was in harmony with the 

 public sentiment of respect that on the death of the great chemist, 

 which followed on the same day that of his wife, a State procession 

 with military escort, conveyed the bodies of husband and wife to 

 final rest in the Pantheon. " They order these things better in 

 France." 



For details see the Memorial Lecture given by Professor H. B. 

 Dixon to the Chemical Society, 23rd November, 1911 (Trans. 

 Chem. Soc., II, 1911, pp. 2353-2371). 



