AmMTayU""iJih9arm' )  Ltfe  and  Hr°rk  °f  Charles  T anret.  267 
sequent  work  even  astonished  his  old  master.  Young  Tanret  was 
of  an  analytical  turn  of  mind  and  after  mastering  the  simple  sub- 
stances of  the  French  Codex,  threw  himself  into  a  study  of  the  most 
complex  compounds  contained  therein.  He  read  diligently  and  soon 
found  out  all  that  there  was  to  know  concerning  the  preparations 
and  chemicals  which  were  dispensed  in  this  pharmacy. 
At  the  age  of  twenty-one,  he  was  looking  around  for  a  large 
field  and  applied  for  an  interneship  at  the  hospital  of  Paris  which 
appointment  he  received.  Tanret's  love  of  country  was  coeval  with 
his  ardor  in  pursuit  of  knowledge  and  when  the  war  of  1870  was 
declared,  he  gave  up  his  position  at  the  hospital  to  fight  the  invader. 
He  served  in  the  infantry  throughout  the  war  and  took  part  in  the 
siege  of  Paris.  At  the  conclusion  of  the  war,  he  applied  again  for 
the  position  of  interneship  at  the  hospital  of  Paris  and,  passing  the 
examination,  received  the  appointment  the  second  time.  By  holding 
his  hospital  position  he  attended  the  course  of  instruction  at  the 
College  de  France  and  was  particularly  impressed  with  the  teach- 
ings of  Berthelot,  for  whom  he  acquired  the  most  profound  admira- 
tion and  who  offered  him  an  assistantship.  The  latter  position  he 
could  not  accept  on  account  of  his  meager  finances  and  it  seems  a 
great  pity  that  one  with  the  initiative  and  brilliancy  of  Tanret  could 
not  have  been  permitted  to  pursue  his  scientific  studies  and  continue 
at  one  of  the  great  schools  in  Paris.  He  had  won  a  silver  medal 
at  the  Ecole  de  Paris  and  thought  it  was  not  required,  presented  a 
thesis  entitled  "  D'Albumine."  The  work  in  connection  with  this 
dissertation  was  unusually  thorough  and  contrary  to  what  is  usually 
the  case,  this  thesis  was  one  of  his  most  important  scientific  con- 
tributions and  the  reactions  described  bear  his  name  even  at  the 
present  time. 
He  had  worked  himself  up  to  the  position  of  senior  interne  at  the 
hospital  and  as  the  work  was  becoming  more  or  less  routine  to  him 
he  opened  a  pharmacy  shop  at  Troyes  at  the  lower  end  of  the  la 
Rue  Thiers.  I  imagine  that  he  was  rather  happy  in  this  little  store, 
that  his  clientele  was  rather  small  during  his  first  few  years,  so  that 
it  gave  him  considerable  time  to  pour  over  the  books  in  the  library 
of  his  little  village.  During  this  time  he  carefully  read  all  of  the 
volumes  of  the  Annales  de  Chimie  et  de  Physique  and  the  Comptes 
rendus  de  UAcademie  des  Sceinces.  The  more  he  thought  about 
pharmacy,  the  more  he  felt  the  lure  of  the  study  of  the  active  prin- 
ciples of  important  drugs.    His  first  work  which  entitles  him  to 
