1885—1888 215 



ominous cracks were heard. This first shock lasted more than 

 a minute, during which the sense of solidity disappeared alto- 

 gether, to be succeeded by a feeling of absolute, hopeless, impo- 

 tence. No doubt, in every household, families gathered 

 together, with a sudden yearning not to be divided. Pasteur's 

 wife, children and grandchildren had barely had time to come 

 to him when another shock took place, more terrible than the 

 first ; everything seemed about to be engulfed in an abyss. 

 Never had morning been more radiant ; there was not a breath 

 of wind, the air was absolutely transparent. 



An early departure was necessary : the broken ceilings were 

 dropping to pieces, shaken off by an incessant vibration of the 

 ground which continued after the second shock, and of which 

 Pasteur observed the effect on glass windows with much interest. 

 Pasteur and his family dove off to Vintimille in a carriage, along 

 a road lined with ruined houses, crowded with sick people in 

 quest of carriages and peasants coming down from their moun- 

 tain dwellings, destroyed by the shock, leading donkeys loaded 

 with bedding, the women followed by little children hastily 

 wrapt in blankets and odd clothes. At Vintimille station, 

 terrified travellers were trying to leave France for Italy or 

 Italy for France, fancying that the danger would cease on the 

 other side of the frontier. 



' We have resolved to go to Arbois," wrote Mme. Pasteur 

 to her son from Marseilles; "your father will be better able 

 there than anywhere else to recover from this shock to his 

 heart." 



After a few weeks' stay at Arbois, Pasteur seemed quite 

 well again. He was received with respect and veneration on his 

 return to the Academies of Sciences and of Medicine. His best 

 and greatest colleagues had realized what the loss of him would 

 mean to France and to the world, and surrounded him with an 

 anxious solicitude. 



At the beginning of July, Pasteur received the report pre- 

 sented to the House of Commons by the English Commission 

 after a fourteen months' study of the prophylactic method 

 against hydrophobia. The English scientists had verified every 

 one of the facts upon which the method was founded, but they 

 had not been satisfied with their experimental researches in Mr. 

 Horsley's laboratory, and had carried out a long and minute 

 inquiry in France. After noting on Pasteur's registers the 

 names of ninety persons treated, who had come from the same 



