LIFE OF ELIE METCHNIKOFF 263 



Though keeping to his bed, he worked a great deal, 

 read, and received not only his friends but other 

 visitors. At the beginning of March and at the end 

 of April he again expectorated blood, and the terrible, 

 tragical nights began again. Yet the days were 

 fairly good. 



During that period, he had the pleasure of seeing , 

 some of his pupils again, and of receiving several ^ 

 Eussian deputies and journalists. They talked to 

 him of political events, of the war, of the moral state 

 of Russia. All that interested him immensely ; he 

 plied them with the most varied questions. It must 

 be remembered that, before that interview, we had 

 lost all touch with Russia. 



During the whole of May he again had ups and 

 downs, but the progress of the disease was indisput- 

 able. 



Tachycardia was constant, urine more and more 

 scanty, the swelling of the legs never decreased, cough 

 and oppression occurred frequently even during the 

 day. Elie awaited his seventy-first birthday with 

 impatience. Often during the night, after a painful 

 attack, he would count the days, hours, and minutes 

 which separated him from that date. At last it 

 arrived. Here are the lines which he added to his 

 notes on that day : 



16th May. Against all expectation, I have lived until 

 this day. I have reached my 71 years. My dream of a rapid 

 death without a long illness has not been reahsed. I have 

 now been bedridden for five months. After several crises of 

 tachycardia, following upon a slight grippe with asthma, I 

 had congestion of one lung with pleuritic exudate. Though 

 some improvement followed after that, nevertheless I am 

 tormented by fits of sweating followed by cough and oppres- 



