PASTEUR 



Je suis cMmiste,je fais des experiences et je tdche de comprendre ce 

 qu'elks disent. — Pasteur. 



As one walks down the Rue des Tanneurs, in the 

 small provincial town of Dcle, where the main line 

 from Paris to Pontarlier sends off a branch north-east 

 towards Besangon, a small tablet set in the facade of a 

 humble dwelling catches the eye. It bears the follow- 

 ing inscription in gilt letters : ' Ici est ne Louis Pasteur 

 le 27 decembre 1822.' 



Pasteur came of the people. In the heraldic mean- 

 ing of the term, he was emphatically not ' born.' His 

 forbears were shepherds, peasants, tillers of the earth, 

 millers, and latterly, tanners. But he came from 

 amongst the best peasantry in Europe, that peasantry 

 which is still the backbone of the great French nation. 

 The admirable care with which records are preserved 

 in France has enabled [Pasteur's son-in-law and latest 

 biographer to trace the family name in the parish 

 archives back to the ■ beginning of the seventeenth 

 century, at which period numerous Pasteurs were 

 living in the villages round about the Priory of 

 Mouthe, 'en pleine Franche-Comte.' 



The first to emerge clearly from the confused 

 cluster of possible ancestors is a certain Denis Pas- 

 teur, who became miller to the Comte d'Udressier, 

 after whom he doubtless named his son Claude, born 

 in 1683. Claude in his turn became a miller, and died 

 in the year 1746. Of his eight children, the youngest, 



lOI 



