84 THE LIFE OF PASTEUR 



How was it that he desired to leave this Faculty at Lille to 

 which he had rendered such valuable service? The Ecole 

 Normale was going through difficult times. " In my opinion," 

 wrote Pasteur with a sadness that betrayed his attachment 

 to the great school, "of all the objects of care to the authorities, 

 the Ecole Normale should be the first ; it is now but the shadow 

 of its former self." He who so often said, " Do not dwell upon 

 things already acquired ! " thought that the Lille Faculty was 

 henceforth sure of its future and needed him no longer. Was it 

 not better to come to the assistance of the threatened weak 

 point? At the Ministry of Public Instruction his wish was 

 understood and approved of. Nisard had just been made Di- 

 rector of the Ecole Normale with high and supreme powers ; his 

 sub-director of literary studies was M. Jacquinet. The adminis- 

 tration was reserved for Pasteur, who was also entrusted with 

 the direction of the scientific studies. To that task were added 

 "the surveillance of the economic and hygienic management, 

 the care of general discipline, intercourse with the families of 

 the pupils and the literary or scientific establishments fre- 

 quented by them." 



The rector of the Lille Faculty announced in these terms 

 the departure of the Dean : " Our Faculty loses a professor and 

 a scientist of the very first order. You have yourselves, gentle- 

 men, been able to appreciate more than once all the vigour and 

 clearness of that mind at once so powerful and so capable." 



At the Ecole Normale, Pasteur's labours were not at first 

 seconded by material convenience. The only laboratory in 

 the Rue d'Ulm building was occupied by Henri Sainte Claire 

 Deville who, in 1851, had taken the place of Balard, the latter 

 leaving the Ecole Normale for the College de France. Dark 

 rooms, a very few instruments, and a credit of 1,800 francs a 

 year, that was all Sainte Claire Deville had been able to obtain. 

 It would have seemed like a dream to Pasteur. He had to 

 organize his scientific installation in two attics under the roof of 

 the Ecole Normale ; he had no assistance of any kind, not even 

 that of an ordinary laboratory attendant. But his courage was 

 not of the kind which evaporates at the first obstacle, and no 

 difficulty could have kept him from work : he climbed the stairs 

 leading to his pseudo-laboratory with all the cheerfulness of a 

 soldier's son. Biot — who had been grieved to see the chemist 

 Laurent working in a sort of cellar, where that scientist's health 

 Buffered (he died at forty-three) — was angry that Pasteur should 



