2IO 
Emil  Scheffer. 
Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
May,  1902. 
22d  of  this  year,  scarcely  a  week  passed — unless  prevented  by 
absence  from  the  city — during  which  we  failed  to  meet  in  friendly 
intercourse  and  conversation,  in  the  course  of  which  I  soon  gained 
an  insight  into  a  mind  as  beautiful  and  simple  as  it  was  lofty  and 
generous.  An  intimate  friendship  was  thus  cemented,  and  we 
confided  to  each  other  much  that  is  ordinarily  revealed  only  to 
those  connected  by  ties  of  blood.  It  is,  therefore,  to  me  a  welcome 
task  as  well  as  a  sad  duty  when  I  respond  to  the  request  of  the 
editor  of  the  American  Journal  of  Pharmacy  to  write  a  sketch  of 
the  life  and  career  of  my  departed  friend  and  colleague,  in  which  I 
propose  to  give  such  details  as  have  come  to  my  personal  knowl- 
edge, and  that  may  be  published  with  the  sanction  of  the  bereaved 
family. 
Emil  Scheffer  was  the  youngest  of  the  seven  children — three 
sons  and  four  daughters — that  blessed  the  union  of  Carl  Ludwig 
Frederick  Scheffer  and  Marie  Maurer.  He  was  born  at  Stuttgart, 
the  capital  city  of  Wurtemberg,  on  July  7,  1 821,  but  it  was  not 
allotted  him  to  experience  the  loving  care  of  a  father,  who  died 
when  Emil  was  scarcely  two-and-one-half  years  old,  during  the 
month  of  December,  1823,  in  the  prime  of  life,  being  barely  forty- 
four  years  of  age.  With  but  a  slender  fortune  remaining  for  her 
maintenance,  one  may  well  conceive  of  the  straits  the  widow 
encountered  in  providing  for  and  educating  her  seven  children  after 
the  death  of  her  husband.  Fortunately,  the  education  of  the  elder 
children,  notably  of  the  daughters,  had  been  well  advanced ;  they 
had  become  proficient  in  the  arts  of  drawing  and  painting,  and  of 
fine  needlework,  which  now  served  them  a  good  turn,  so  that,  when 
in  1848  the  good  mother  also  closed  her  eyes  in  eternal  sleep,  they 
were  able  to  eke  out  a  comfortable  existence  as  teachers  of  their 
respective  arts  and  accomplishments — in  fact,  were  so  engaged 
until  in  their  advanced  age  they  were  able  to  retire  comfortably 
from  active  occupation.  It  was  under  conditions  of  adversity,  then, 
that  Emil  Scheffer  grew  to  manhood,  but  under  the  beneficent 
influence  and  loving  care  of  a  good  mother  and  affectionate  sisters. 
Of  these  he  always  spoke  with  touching  tenderness,  and  when,  at 
ages  approaching  and  exceeding  ninety  years,  all  but  one  of  the 
sisters  were  claimed  by  the  Great  Reaper,  he  mourned  them  as 
sincerely  as  though  they  had  been  his  daily  companions.  His 
