2l6 
Emil  Scheffer. 
Am.  .Tour.  Pharro.. 
May,  1902. 
c  >mmon  property.  During  the  years  of  his  experiments  on  pepsin 
he  freely  spoke  with  me  both  regarding  the  difficulties  encountered 
and  of  his  intention  in  the  event  of  success.  He  never  for  a  moment 
considered  the  propriety  of  withholding  his  process  from  the  public;; 
and  while  my  own  views  on  this  subject  were  in  perfect  accord  with 
his,  I  do  not  think  that  he  would  have  adopted  a  different  course  if 
he  had  never  met  me  at  all.  To  give  a  further  insight  into  the 
lofty  character  of  the  man,  I  need  perhaps  only  mention  that  after 
definitely  relinquishing  the  manufacture  of  pepsin — which  had 
drifted  into  the  hands  of  the  "  pepton-pepsin  "  manufacturer — he 
absolutely  declined  to  accept  a  highly  lucrative  offer  made  to  him 
by  a  most  responsible  firm  for  the  right  to  manufacture  pepsin 
under  his  name.  When  speaking  of  this  to  me,  he  explained  that 
he  did  not  wish  his  name  coupled  with  a  product  which,  in  all  prob- 
ability, would  eventually  be  "  pepton-pepsin  " — however  honest  the 
present  intention  of  the  applicant  might  be  :  that  "  pepton-pepsin  " 
was  more  popular,  because  more  easily  prepared  and  apparently 
more  powerlul.  Its  absolute  superiority  as  a  digestive  agent  over 
his  precipitated  pepsin  he  denied  emphatically,  and  he  died  under 
the  conviction  that  "  absolute  pepsin  "  can  only  be  prepared  by  his 
own  process,  or  by  one  essentially  conforming  to  it. 
Naturally  of  a  modest  and  retiring  disposition,  Scheffer's  inter- 
course with  his  fellow  pharmacists  was  chiefly  limited  to  the  courte- 
ous expedition  of  the  demands  made  on  him,  and  it  was  probably 
due  to  this  natural  reserve  that  he  was,  from  some  quarters  at  least, 
misrepresented  as  being  cold  and  unapproachable.  But  his  inti- 
mates knew  better  ;  they  valued  him  for  his  congenial  and  sympa- 
thetic disposition,  the  earnesuness  and  sincerity  of  his  character,  and 
his  loyalty  to  his  friends;  and  these  qualities  manifested  themselves 
eventually  to  the  less  intimate  of  his  acquaintances,  when,  at  the 
close  of  the  sixties,  the  Louisville  College  of  Pharmacy  was  called 
into  existence.  He  had,  in  common  with  some  of  his  professional 
friends,  long  deplored  the  absence  of  organization  among  his  fellow 
pharmacists,  and  therefore  entered  with  heart  and  soul  into  the 
scheme  of  organizing  and  maintaining  a  college  and  school  of  phar- 
macy ;  becoming  one  of  its  founders,  and  serving  it  as  one  of  its 
directors  and  professors,  as  treasurer  and  as  president,  during  a 
period  covering  more  than  a  score  of  years  :  director,  continuously 
