252 LIFE AND WORK OF SIR JAGADIS C. BOSE 



deemed, in 1901, to be dubious and obscure was, in 1920, 

 acknowledged and acclaimed. Bose's former opponents 

 had now become his warmest and staunchest friends ; 

 and in the Royal Society, physicists, physiologists, and 

 psychologists united in according the honour of the Fellow- 

 ship to their fellow-worker and revealer from the East. 



Two things in particular seem worthy of clear state- 

 ment in this connection. The first is that among men of 

 science full recognition conies earliest to those whose 

 labours lie in clearly defined paths and well within the 

 frontiers laid down by the orthodox classification of the 

 sciences. It comes last and most hardly to men like Bose, 

 who find themselves impelled over the frontiers as drawn, 

 moving among the conceptions of different sciences and 

 pursuing experiments in territory where, inevitably, they 

 are looked upon as intruders. 



The second thing is this. There are some who regarded 

 the prolonged delay in the grant of official recognition by 

 the high court of scientific judgment as due to prejudice 

 against a stranger. In Bose's case any such hypothesis 

 would be absurd. From beginning to end he has stood 

 among his fellows simply as a man of science. In the 

 discussions over the nature and final value of the extra- 

 ordinary results with which his name and fame are identi- 

 fied, there has never been any hint of misunderstanding, 

 or collision between East and West. His great work has 

 won for him the enthusiastic admiration of scientific men 

 all over the world ; and this became strikingly evident 

 on a recent occasion. A persistent opponent of his wrote 

 to The Times questioning the reliability of the crescograph 

 and suggesting that a demonstration should be given at 

 a physiological laboratory before leading experts. Bose 

 accepted the challenge, and the result of his demonstration 

 was the occasion of a conjoint tribute so remarkable that 

 it probably stands by itself in recent science. The following 

 appeared in Nature, May 6, 1920 : 



