July 29, 1922] 



NA TURE 



T 57 



it had charged as an enemy, are given in one of the 

 recently published volumes of " Accounts Rendered " 

 bv Mr. J. Y. Buchanan, who was a companion of the 

 Prince on several of his expeditions. 



There is another oceanographic investigation which 

 will always be connected with the Prince of Monaco's 

 name, and that is his distribution, commenced so far 

 back as 1885, of floating or drift bottles over wide 

 areas of the Atlantic, starting from the Azores as a 

 centre, in order to determine the set of the currents. 

 The knowledge acquired from such experiments extend- 

 ing over many years enabled the Prince to write what 

 is probably the latest of his own personal contributions 

 to science, a paper and map communicated to the 

 French Academy, in 1919, on the future of the floating 

 mines which, having gone adrift as the result of opera- 

 tions in the recent war, may be a danger to navigation 

 in certain parts of the Atlantic for some years to come. 

 He showed how mines from the European coasts will 

 graduallv be drawn into the various currents associated 

 with the " Gulf Stream," and how some will, in all 

 probability, continue to circulate in the great whirlpool 

 of the Sargasso Sea, while others will eventually find 

 their way to the Norwegian fjords and the Arctic 

 Ocean and be destroyed ultimately in their encounter 

 with the ice. 



The inauguration of the Musee Oceanographique, 

 towards the end of March 1910, brought together at 

 Monaco such an international gathering of men of 

 science interested in the exploration of the sea as 

 had never been seen before. Official representatives 

 of many countries, delegates from the great Academies 

 of the world, and others invited personally by the 

 Prince, were united in celebrating the progress of 

 oceanography and in launching an institution unique 

 in character and of first-rate importance for science. 

 This great museum with its laboratories and other 

 workrooms rises sheer from the Mediterranean on the 

 southern side of the rock of Monaco, the lower three 

 stories facing towards the sea being below the level 

 of the old town and palace, and the main entrance to 

 the museum, from the streets, being half-way up the 

 building. From the seaward side the appearance is 

 especially striking, the masonry appearing to be almost 

 a part of the rock and to grow up in a series of arches 

 from the ledges of the cliff itself. This, the first 

 Museum of Oceanography, demonstrates the methods 

 of investigation and the results obtained. It contains 

 the extensive collections made on the Prince's ex- 

 peditions, and also shows the various types of dredges, 

 trawls, tow-nets, deep-sea thermometers and water- 

 bottles, current-meters, and other apparatus used by 

 the different nations in their explorations of the 

 ocean. 



The museum at Monaco is, however, only one part 

 of the foundation which the Prince has provided for 

 the study of the sea. With the object of arousing 

 interest in scientific marine studies in France, he 

 instituted a series of lectures at the Sorbonne in 1903, 

 and in 1906 he gave permanence to these by means 

 of an endowment, and presented to the French nation 

 a building specially devoted to university instruction 

 in oceanography. In connexion with this " Institut 

 Oceanographique" at Paris three professorship-, have 

 been established — one of physical oceanography, one 



NO. 2752, VOL. I 10] 



of biological oceanography, and the third of the 

 physiology of marine life. As was said of him at one 

 of the inaugurations, " By his researches the Prince 

 <it Monaco has won for himself a distinguished place 

 in the ranks of men of science, and by enshrining the 

 results in the monumental buildings at Monaco and 

 Paris he has invested his labours with permanent 

 value for all time." 



The third great scientific benefaction of tho Prince 

 is the Institut de Paleontologie Humaine at Paris, 

 where again, as at Monaco, there is a museum and 

 a laboratory with professors devoted entirely to the 

 investigation and demonstration of one special subject 

 — the early history of man. The Prince's personal 

 interest in prehistoric archaeology has been shown for 

 many years by the explorations he has conducted or 

 promoted at the Grimaldi caves near Monaco and 

 at other caverns and important sites in France and 

 Spain, with Prof. Boule, the Abbe Breuil, and others — 

 and the results, as in the case of the oceanographic 

 investigations, have been published at his expense 

 in princely style. It has been reported in the daily 

 press, since his death, that he has bequeathed a million 

 francs, as further endowment, to each of these three 

 research institutions. He has certainly put to a noble 

 purpose for the advancement of science the ample 

 funds which have come to him under the conditions 

 of the concession granted many years ago to the 

 proprietors of the Casino at Monte Carlo. It is well 

 known that the Prince has expressed publicly his 

 strong disapproval of the pigeon-shooting competitions 

 at Monte Carlo ; but considers that as he is not an 

 autocrat, under the terms of the concession, he has 

 no power to interfere with vested interests at the 

 Casino except by the support his name and influence 

 can give to public opinion. 



None of those who were present at Monaco as the 

 Prince's guests, during the four days of conferences 

 and celebrations at the inauguration of the Musee 

 Oceanographique, will be likely to forget his gracious 

 hospitality, his gravely courteous manner, his evident 

 interest in all the scientific questions raised, and his 

 keen desire to secure co-operation between the different 

 nations in the further exploration of the oceans. In 

 recent years, since the war, he has played a prominent 

 and most helpful part in such international co-opera- 

 tion. He was appointed president of the " Commission 

 internationale pour l'Exploration scientifique de la Mer 

 Mediterranee " at the meeting in Madrid in 1919, and 

 at the recent international conference in Rome he was 

 chosen as president of both the physical and biological 

 sections of oceanography. In all such meetn 

 in the subsequent work he was no mere figurehead, 

 but took a prominent part in the proceedings. His 

 death, in Paris, on June 26, will leave a great gap in 

 many important organisations, and be felt as a real 

 loss by all interested in the promotion of the science 

 of the sea. He was a natural centre in organisation 

 and a leader in work. In his independent position 

 he stood apart from all international rivalries and 

 showed only a single-minded devotion to the pursuit 

 of truth. As he once said of himself, modestly ami 

 truthfully, in an address on his work at sea, in July 

 1891, to the Ro\. 1 1 Soi i< i\ of Edinburgh, " I uni 

 the mission thai ia\ before me because i was al once 



