160 BIOGKAPHIES OF SCIENTIFIC MEN 



THE FINALE! On 18th March 1907 a terribly 

 dramatic event occurred, for both Monsieur and Madame 

 Berthelot died within a few minutes of each other. 



On the afternoon of 18th March he attended a meeting 

 of the Academic des Sciences. Returning, he went to his 

 wife's bedside, and devoted himself to cheering her in her 

 suffering. At half-past five he withdrew with his sons 

 to his study. There, with tears in the old man's eyes 

 and trembling voice, he said to them : " My boys, if your 

 mother were to die I could not survive her." His sons 

 returned to their mother's room while the savant set him- 

 self resolutely to work in an effort to forget his troubles. 



A quarter of an hour later Madame Berthelot's illness 

 came to a sudden crisis, and before her husband could be 

 called she had passed away. The eldest son went to his 

 father's study and informed him of Madame Berthelot's 

 death. The scientist, who was sitting writing, turned 

 round in his chair as his son entered. Hearing the 

 terrible news, he gasped " Mon Dieu ! " and fell back in 

 his seat with his hands clasped over his eyes. A minute 

 later his hands fell limply to his side. Berthelot was 

 dead ! The great chemist succumbed to heart failure in 

 the eightieth year of his age. 1 



1 Berthelot and his wife were passionately attached to each other, 

 and their married life was one of the most beautiful on record. As 

 Monsieur Leygues said, addressing Berthelot : " Durant ces sombres 

 jours (1870), votre courage fut soutenu par la femme eminente qui est 

 la grace et le charme de votre foyer." 



