LOUIS PASTEUR 147 



treatments; but the highly intelligent understanding 

 and tremendous responsibility and hope of Pasteur 

 made sleep and rest almost impossible for him until the 

 crisis had passed, and he felt sure that the boy's life 

 had been saved. 



Soon Pasteur institutes appeared in available centres 

 throughout the civilized world, and to-day it is very 

 rarely that a human being need die from hydrophobia. 

 Superstitious and ignorant fear of hydrophobia has 

 given place to the intelligent guidance of modern 

 science. 



On Pasteur's seventieth birthday (1892, three years 

 before his death) delegates from the scientific societies 

 and public bodies of the civilized world met in France, 

 in the great theatre room of the Sorbonne. The band 

 of the Republican Guard of France played the triumphal 

 march. The President of the Republic was the escort 

 as down the aisle came one of the greatest heroes and 

 benefactors in human history. Gounod directed a 

 choir which sang his Ave Maria. Coquelin recited 

 verses written by him especially for this occasion. The 

 Minister of Public Instruction among other things said: 



Who can now say how much human life owes to you and how much 

 more it will owe you in the future? The day will come when an- 

 other Lucretius will sing, in a new poem on Nature, the immortal 

 Master whose genius engendered such benefits. 



Joseph Lister, when called upon said: 



Your researches upon fermentations have thrown a powerful light 

 which has illuminated the baleful darkness of surgery and has 

 changed the treatment of wounds from an uncertain and too often 



