164 LIFE AND EXPERIENCES CHAP. 



by my wife, my son, and my nephew, Edmund Potter, 

 I spent some time in Paris. It was on this occasion 

 that I became acquainted with the celebrated chemist 

 Dumas, then the doyen of French science. I dined 

 with him, and after dinner he led me to a sofa and, 

 smoking his cigar, said : " I have seen many phases of 

 life ; I have moved in Imperial circles, I have been 

 Minister of State ; but if I had to live my life again, I 

 would always remain in my laboratory, for the greatest 

 joy of my life has been to accomplish original scientific 

 work and, next to that, to lecture to a set of intelligent 

 students." Dumas was quite the grand seigneur y 

 an impressive personality. He came over to London 

 to deliver the first Faraday lecture and charmed his 

 audience by his eloquence. 



The work on the jury was somewhat fatiguing, but 

 I think that on the whole our awards gave satisfaction. 

 The heat in Paris was intense, and the relief from that 

 high temperature when crossing the Channel was a 

 thing to be remembered. 



My frequent visits to Paris gave opportunity for 

 meeting many eminent French scientific men. First 

 and foremost among these I put Wlirtz, both as a 

 friend and as a man of science. I often visited him 

 both at home and in his laboratory in the old Ecole 

 de Medecine, long since demolished. He, like many 

 distinguished Frenchmen, was an Alsatian in fact, a 

 German by birth. His family name was Wirtz, but 

 this is unpronounceable in the mouth of a Frenchman, 

 and so he was re-christened Wlirtz. His mother, he 

 told me, could not speak a word of French. He was 

 as great an expositor as he was an experimentalist, 

 and those who heard his Faraday lecture will long 

 remember the striking play of voice and feature so 

 characteristic of French oratory. 



