THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



365 



Photograph hy TT. C. Ellis 



TIIK TOWN GATlv AT PROVINS 



Note the sturdy strength of the French peasant woman trundling a heavily loaded wheel- 

 barrow and the two men in the cart riding toward her. The quaint old town of Provins in 

 the middle ages was a great industrial center, having a population of 80,000, of whom 60,000 

 were workmen. At the beginning of the world war it had scarcely 8,000 inhabitants. 



he likes to be shown how ; he admires ac- 

 curacy; he worships reason. The result 

 is that today this nation holds leadership 

 in Europe in the sciences, especially the 

 applied sciences. 



The French peasant has been accused 

 of lacking imagination ; but the imagina- 

 tion of the French scientist leaps to meet 

 the correct solution, while the German 

 scientist plods toward it. 



TH^ GlPT OP PRpNCH SCIENCE} TO MAN'S 



weppare: 



What marvelous skill has the French- 

 man shown in the application of science 

 to human diseases and deformities ; what 

 marvelous research has been his in bac- 

 teriology, neurology, and pathology ; what 

 patience, what accuracy, what insight, 

 has he displayed in clinical observation 

 and description ! 



To realize what French science has 



done for man's welfare, one has simply 

 to recall the names of Ampere, the inves- 

 tigator of electrical dynamics ; Pasteur, 

 the master of bacteriological research, 

 conqueror of rabies, and founder of the 

 famous institute that bears his name ; 

 Roux, discoverer of diptheria serum ; 

 Chantemesse of anti-typhus serum fame; 

 Yersin, discoverer of the bubonic plague 

 bacillus and its curative serum ; Claude 

 Bernard, marvelous worker in vivisec- 

 tion; Berthelot, founder of thermo-chem- 

 istry, inventor of smokeless powder and 

 aniline dyes ; Pierre and Madame Curie, 

 discoverers of polonium and radium ; and 

 Flammarion, master and interpretor of 

 astronomy. The list has but begun ; it 

 might fill a score of pages. 

 ' But let us turn once more to the more 

 strictly human side of French life. What 

 shall one say, for instance, of what we 

 Puritan descendants consider so vitally 



