1844—1849 37 



as colonel of the regiment. Enrolled with his fellow students, 

 Pasteur wrote thus to his parents : " I am writing from the 

 Orleans Eailway, where as a garde national 1 I am stationed. 

 I am glad that I was in Paris during the February days 2 and 

 that I am here still ; I should be sorry to leave Paris just now. 

 It is a great and a sublime doctrine which is now being un- 

 folded before our eyes . . . and if it were necessary I should 

 heartily fight for the holy cause of the Republic." " What a 

 transformation of our whole being ! ' ' has written one who 

 was then a candidate to the Ecole Normale, already noted by 

 his masters for his good sense, Francisque Sarcey. "How 

 those magical words of liberty and fraternity, this renewal of 

 the Republic, born in the sunshine of our twentieth year, filled 

 our hearts with unknown and absolutely delicious sensations ! 

 With what a gallant joy we embraced the sweet and superb 

 image of a people of free men and brethren ! The whole nation 

 was moved as we were ; like us, it had drunk of the intoxicat- 

 ing cup. The honey of eloquence flowed unceasingly from the 

 lips of a great poet, and France believed, in childlike faith, 

 that his word was efficacious to destroy abuses, cure evils and 

 soothe sorrows." 



One day when Pasteur was crossing the Place du Pantheon, 

 he saw a gathering crowd around a wooden erection, decorated 

 with the words : Autel de la Patrie. A neighbour told him 

 that pecuniary offerings might be laid upon this altar. Pasteur 

 goes back to the Ecole Normale, empties a drawer of all his 

 savings, and returns to deposit it in thankful hands. 



1 Garde Nationale. A city militia, intended to preserve order and to 

 maintain municipal liberties ; it was improvised in 1789, and its first 

 Colonel was General Lafayette, of American Independence fame. Its 

 cockade united the King's white to the Paris colours, blue and red, and 

 thus was inaugurated the celebrated Tricolour. 



The National Guard was preserved by the Restoration, but Charles X 

 disbanded it as being dangerously Liberal in its tendencies. It re-formed 

 iteelf of its own accord in 1830, and helped to overthrow the elder 

 branch of Bourbon. It proved a source of disorder in 1848 and was re- 

 organized under the second Empire, but, having played an active and 

 disastrous part in the Commune (1871), it was disarmed and finally 

 suppressed. [Trans.] 



1 February days. The Republicans had organized a banquet in Paris 

 for February 22, 1848. The Government prohibited it, with the result 

 that an insurrection took place. Barricades were erected and some 

 fighting ensued; on the 24th, the insurgents were masters of the situa- 

 tion. Louis Philippe abdicated (vainly) in favour of his grandson, the 

 Oomte de Paris, and fled to England. [Trans.] 



