418 THE SCIENTIFIC MONTHLY 



of these proteins, involving breaking them down and identifying the 

 products, Fischer played a great part, his greatest contribution being 

 the development of a method which enabled others to expedite the 

 solution of the colossal problem. Difficult as the analysis has been 

 Fischer was at the time of his death in a fair way of accomplishing 

 the reverse, the synthesis or reconstruction of a highly complex protein 

 from its split products, a tremendous conquest of the world of the 

 unknown. 



One more glimpse and we shall leave the subject of Fischer's work 

 and place our label on the man. Combined with certain proteins in 

 that mysterious portion of the living cell which apparently governs the 

 latter in its chief actions, the nucleus, is a substance called nucleic acid, 

 characterized in part by the presence of certain bases, the purines. The 

 familiar uric acid is a member of this group. Fischer, working on 

 uric acid and the related substance, caffeine, synthesized both, and not 

 only them but all other members of the group. It was a work of prime 

 importance chemically and brings up for our consideration a special 

 point. Fischer commercialized his artificial synthesis of caffeine, that 

 substance both praised and reviled, and made many thousands of dol- 

 lars. The emphasis placed upon this associated his name in many 

 minds, especially those of medical men, with the substance caffeine, and 

 in superficial biographical treatment it has been customary to list its 

 synthesis along with his other great accomplishments and on the same 

 plane. As a matter of fact it must be thought of as purely by the way. 

 Beyond question what really counted in Fischer's mind was not the 

 synthesis of this isolated substance but the unshrouding of the relations 

 of that whole group of compounds of which caffeine was but an 

 ordinary member, making the previously confused subject as clear as 

 the light of day. 



Fischer was an aristocrat in scientific work if there ever was one. 

 No man can explain this devotion to his science. We can perhaps say 

 that the ability created the desire, but most men work for rewards, and 

 what was Fischer's? Fischer made money, but no sum of money could 

 be adequate pay for the superhuman accomplishments of the man, nor 

 did he make a tithe of what he might have made had he tried. He 

 saw himself in the front rank of scientific men, but the contemplation 

 of that spectacle must have palled upon his cold judgment. The only 

 thing that remains is the thing itself. Pushing back the horizon of 

 knowledge was its own reward. 



Scores of other pairs might be cited to illustrate the grouping over 

 and over again. A fascinating book might be written by plagiarizing 

 a method from Plutarch and setting down side by side the biographies 

 of great scientific men, laboring on similar lines, devoted to different 

 points of view. We could thus pair off contemporaries, and going 



