A PILGRIMAGE TO BIU'NN 7 



J went in company with Doctor Iltis to the rooms of the Natural 

 History Society, where in 1SG7) Mendel read the account of his 

 experiments with peas. The room in which the scientific meetings 

 are held is a plain second-floor room with simple seats and desks, 

 resembling somewhat an ordinary school-room. Doctor Iltis en- 

 deavored to find a copy of the report of that momentous meeting, to 

 present to me, but the very limited supply had doubtless been 

 exhausted. He then accompanied me to the station, where I took 

 train about 4:00 P. M. for Vienna, feeling that my day in Briinn 

 had been well worth all my effort. 



In recognition of his great service to science, and regretful that 

 lis service should have been so long unknown and unappreciated, 

 biologists of the whole world united in 1910 in erecting in the 

 mblic square beside the Konigskloster a marble statue to the mem- 

 >ry of Gregor Mendel. This statue is of heroic size and represents 

 Mendel in his priestly robes standing before a wall against which 

 pea vines are growing. On the pedestal are the kneeling forms of 

 a man and woman clasping hands to symbolize marriage and 

 human heredity, and the words "To the Nature-Student P. Gregor 

 Mendel, ls-> 2-1884. Erected by friends of science." At the same 

 time a memorial volume was issued containing Mendel's Original 

 memoirs and fourteen papers by investigators who are at the pres- 

 ent time engaged in following out the lines of work suggested by 

 those memoirs. The contributors to this volume belong to seven 

 nations and have been written in three different languages, thus 

 bearing witness to the present wide-spread and eager interest in 

 the work so well begun by a keen-minded Moravian monk more 

 than fifty years ago. The name of Mendel will soon be as familiar 

 a household word as that of Darwin, and as knowledge of the laws 

 of heredity become generally diffused his name will be revered as a 

 benediction to the human race. 



