THE SOVEREIGNTY OF GENIUS 139 



Paget and Lister, had rallied to the support of 

 the Pasteur methods. 



Upon returning to France, he set forth imme- 

 diately for Bordeaux, where he hoped to have a 

 chance to study yellow fever, which had broken 

 out among the crew of the Conde, just arrived 

 from Senegal. Yet, at the same time that he 

 was anxiously concerned regarding these sick 

 sailors, among whom he hoped to find subjects 

 for experiments, he was profiting by his leisure 

 moments to visit the Bordeaux library, where 

 he read the works of Littre assiduously, and 

 with pen in hand. The fact was that certain 

 members of the Academic Frangaise had asked 

 Pasteur to present himself as candidate for the 

 place of the learned linguist, then recently de- 

 ceased. 



We have seen that Pasteur, the great revolu- 

 tionist of science, had a deep respect for de- 

 grees, hierarchies, social orders and honorary 

 distinctions, and it seemed to him that this was 

 an honour out of all proportion to his own liter- 

 ary claims. He hesitated, and it needed all the 



