354 ACADEMIC LABOURS. 



reception into the Academy I seldom got so far as 

 the publication of a piece of scientific work, and 

 usually contented myself with the enlargement of my 

 own knowledge not without subsequent vexation, 



if my results were discovered and then made public 

 by others - - I was now obliged every year to finish 

 and publish one or two contributions. To this state 

 of things is also to be ascribed the circumstance that 

 in my academical lectures I dealt less with matters 

 of my special department, electrical technology, than 

 with subjects of general scientific interest. They were 

 partly detached thoughts and reflections, jotted down 

 in the course of my life, which were now brought 

 together and scientifically worked up, partly novel 

 phenomena, which aroused my particular interest and 

 called for special investigation. I shall once more 

 return to these purely scientific publications at the 

 close of these reminiscences. 



Although since my reception into the Academy 

 I had been far more occupied than heretofore with 

 purely scientific problems, which stood in no relation 

 to my business calling, I did not omit to continue 

 to devote the needful time to the latter also. The 

 superior management of the Berlin firm, and the 

 technical work connected with it, usually claimed 

 my whole working time during the day. The diffi- 

 culty of my task was much augmented by the in- 

 creasingly multifarious character of the firm's opera- 

 tions, and the great dimensions they had assumed; 

 and although able coadjutors relieved me of a con- 



