Life Of Elie Metchnikoff, 1845-1916 - free ebook by Olga Metchnikoff

LIFE OF ELIE METCHNIKOFF

1845-1916 BY OLGA METCHNIKOFF WITH A PREFACE BY Sir RAY LANKESTER K.C.B. F.R.S. LONDON CONSTABLE AND COMPANY LTD. 1921...

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PREFACE

It has been a great satisfaction to me to carry out the wish of my dear friend Elie Metchnikoff, and arrange for the production of an English translation of his biography. The account of his life and work written by Olga Metchnikoff is a remarkable and beautiful record of the development and activities of a great discoverer. It is remarkable because it is seldom that one who undertakes such a task has had so constant a share in, and so complete a knowledge and understanding of, the life portraye

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INTRODUCTION

On a calm summer evening we were seated together on our terrace. On the preceding day, one who hardly knew my husband had come to ask him for information concerning his life, with the object of writing his biography. We were saying to each other how inevitably superficial and incomplete such a biography was bound to be; how difficult such a task is for a biographer, even when fully informed; how necessary it is to be thoroughly acquainted with a man and with every phase of his existence in order

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CHAPTER I

Panassovka — Metchnikoff’s parents — Country life in Little Russia. In Little Russia, in the steppe region of the province of Kharkoff, is situated the land of Panassovka, which belonged to the Metchnikoff family. It is now sold, it has passed into strange hands, but it was once the patrimony of Ilia Ivanovitch, father of Elie Metchnikoff. The country around Panassovka is neither beautiful nor rich: steppes, hillocks covered with low grasses and wild wormwood; a poor village, meagre vegetation,

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CHAPTER II

Metchnikoff’s brothers and sister — Childish characteristics. The two elder children, Ivan and Leo, were educated at Petersburg, whilst Katia, the only daughter, was brought up at home. Like all other girls of noble family, she was educated with the object of being suitably married. She was a slender, pretty brunette, like her mother, but less beautiful. Though sensitive and intelligent, she interested herself in nothing but the reading of French novels. There was a great difference in age betwe

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CHAPTER III

Journey to Slaviansk — The coach attacked by peasants. In 1850 the children were taken to the baths of Slaviansk. On a warm summer day the heavy “berlin” coach, drawn by six horses with a postilion, rolled along the high road, across the steppes, followed at a distance by a “tarantass.” [3] In the spacious, antique coach, with its dusty hood, sat Emilia Lvovna, with her three children; the valet, Petrushka, dozed on the box, next to the coachman. The tarantass was occupied by Dmitri Ivanovitch a

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CHAPTER IV

Departure for Kharkoff — Town life. The following year was to be spent at Kharkoff. Katia was now seventeen and her marriage had to be contemplated. The boys’ life was still quite a childish one, made up chiefly of games and mischief. Kolia had been taught to read by the great-aunt; Ilia had learnt by himself, asking people now and then for the name of some letter. He was able to read fluently quite early. The departure for Kharkoff was a great event, prepared long beforehand. The children, deli

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CHAPTER V

Leo Metchnikoff’s illness — Private tutors — Botanical studies — A memorable birthday. In 1851, in the middle of the winter, the Metchnikoffs heard that Leo, their second son, was suffering from hip-disease, and the doctors advised that he should be taken away from Petersburg. Poor Emilia Lvovna was in great despair and shed many tears; her brother-in-law, Dmitri Ivanovitch, calmly announced that he was going to fetch Leo. He took his great fur coat, his fur cap and fur-lined boots, and started

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CHAPTER VI

Ancestors of the Metchnikoff family — The Great Spatar — Leo Nevahovitch. The Metchnikoff family made no show of family pride; one old aunt, however, was extremely proud of one of their ancestors, the Great “Spatar” (sword-bearer). The following is the account given of this ancestor by E. Picot, after a Moldavian chronicle. [5] Few men led such an adventurous life or made themselves glorious through such varied gifts as did Nicholas Spatar Milescu. His name is connected with the history of Molda

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CHAPTER VII

The Kharkoff Lycée — Bogomoloff and Socialism — Atheism — Natural History studies — Private lodgings — Private lessons in histology from Professor Tschelkoff — A borrowed microscope — First article — Italian Opera — The gold medal. In 1856 Dmitri Ivanovitch took the boys to Kharkoff in order to make them enter the Lycée. They passed their entrance examination quite satisfactorily; Kolia was admitted into the fifth class and Ilia into the one below it. They were day boarders and lived in the hous

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CHAPTER VIII

An early love — A schoolfellow’s sister — A pretty sister-in-law. In spite of his precocious vocation, Elie was in no wise indifferent to his surroundings. His mind was sensitive and impressionable and his affections deep and tender, especially where his mother was concerned. He never undertook anything without consulting her, a sweet habit which he preserved even in his maturity. It was already at the age of six that he received his first love impression: a lady came on a visit to Panassovka wi

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CHAPTER IX

Journey to Germany — Leipzig — Würzburg — A hasty return. During his later years at the Lycée, Elie had attended several courses at the Kharkoff University and had realised the inadequacy of the teaching and the impossibility of any personal research work in the laboratories. His greatest desire, therefore, was to go abroad to study. At that time, the German universities, being nearer, chiefly attracted Russian students. Their laboratories were widely opened to foreigners, and lectures were bein

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CHAPTER X

Kharkoff University — Physiology — The Vorticella — Controversy with Kühne— The Origin of Species — The Gastrotricha — University degree. There was now no choice and he had to resign himself to the Kharkoff University. There is not much to relate about this period, which was but a fugitive episode in the course of Elie Metchnikoff, for the “Alma Mater” did not have upon him either the influence or the prestige which it generally exerts upon youth. Whilst the stream of new ideas had already reach

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CHAPTER XI

Heligoland — Giessen Congress — Leuckart — Visit to Leo Metchnikoff at Geneva — Socialist gatherings — Metchnikoff’s discovery appropriated by Leuckart — Naples — Kovalevsky — Comparative embryology — Embryonic layers — Bakounine and Setchénoff — Cholera at Naples — Göttingen — Anatomical studies — Munich; von Siebold — Music — Return to Naples — Intracellular digestion. Elie still had his Licentiate thesis to prepare. In order to do so, he decided to spend two months in the island of Heligo

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CHAPTER XII

Petersburg — Baer prize — Return home — Friendship with Cienkovsky — Odessa — Naturalists’ Congress at Petersburg — Departure from Odessa — Zoological Lecturer’s Chair at Petersburg — Messina — Enforced rest — Reggio — Naples — Controversy with Kovalevsky — Visit to the B. family — Mlle. Fédorovitch — Educational questions — Difficulties of life in Petersburg. During his stay abroad, Metchnikoff had successfully carried out several researches, and this allowed him to apply for a post of docent a

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CHAPTER XIII

Slight illness — Engagement to Mlle. Fédorovitch — Marriage — Illness of the bride — Pecuniary difficulties — Spezzia — Montreux — Work in Petersburg University — The Riviera — Cœlomata and Acœlomata — St. Vaast — Panassovka — Madeira — Mertens — Teneriffe — Return to Odessa — Bad news, hurried journey to Madeira — Death of his wife — Return through Spain — Attempted suicide — Ephemeridæ. It was only in the house of his friends the B.’s that Elie felt at his ease. He was devotedly fond of their

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CHAPTER XIV

Anthropological expedition to the Kalmuk steppes — Affection of the eyes — Second expedition to the steppes — The eggs of the Geophilus . After the misfortune which had befallen him Metchnikoff placed his only hope in work, and the condition of his eyes was therefore for him a source of great preoccupation. He applied to the Petersburg Geographical Society for an anthropological mission in order to undertake researches less trying to his eyesight than microscopical work. As he went deeper into a

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CHAPTER XV

“As to thee, Hector, thou art to me as a father and a revered mother and a brother, and thou art my husband.”— The Iliad. Studies on childhood — The family in the upper flat — Lessons in zoology — Second marriage — Private life — Visit and death of Lvovna Nevahovna — Conjugal affection. Metchnikoff’s anthropological researches led him to the study of childhood, which in its turn suggested reflections on questions of Pedagogy. His eyesight was still weak and his hunger for activity very great; in

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CHAPTER XVI

Metchnikoff at the age of thirty — Lecturing in Odessa University, from 1873 to 1882 — Internal difficulties — Assassination of the Tsar, Alexander II. — Further troubles in the University — Resignation — Bad health: cardiac symptoms — Relapsing fever — Choroiditis — Studies on Ephemeridæ — Further studies on intracellular digestion — The Parenchymella — Holidays in the country — Experiments on agricultural pests. Elie Metchnikoff was now thirty years old, and his personality was fully character

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CHAPTER XVII

Death of his father- and mother-in-law — Management of country estates — Agitation and difficulties — Departure for Messina with young brothers- and sisters-in-law. In the spring of 1881, Metchnikoff having recovered from relapsing fever, we went to stay with my parents at Kieff and found my father dying. He entrusted Elie with the care of the family, and they came to live with us at Odessa. But, the following year, we had the misfortune to lose my mother also. From that moment my husband took u

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CHAPTER XVIII

Messina — Inception of the phagocyte theory — Encouragement from Virchow and Kleinenberg — First paper on phagocytosis at the Odessa Congress in 1883 — The question of Immunity — Article in Virchow’s Archiv , 1884. At Messina, we settled in a suburb, the Ringo, on the quay of the Straits, in a small flat with a garden and a splendid view over the sea. We did not have much room, and the laboratory had to be installed in the drawing-room, but, on the other hand, Elie only had to cross the quay in

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CHAPTER XIX

Ill-health of his wife and sister-in-law — Journey to Tangiers through Spain — Villefranche — Baumgarten criticises the phagocyte theory. In 1884, Metchnikoff’s work was interrupted by the ill-health of my eldest sister and of myself; physicians considered that we had weak lungs and advised that we should spend the winter in the South. Elie, full of anxiety, hastened to take us there. My younger brothers were now old enough to remain at school in our absence so as to go on with their studies; we

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CHAPTER XX

A Bacteriological Institute in Odessa — Unsatisfactory conditions — Experiments on erysipelas and on relapsing fever. The results of Pasteur’s antirabic inoculations were published in 1885. The Municipality of Odessa, desirous of founding a bacteriological station in that town, sent Dr. Gamaléia to Paris to study the new method. Metchnikoff was appointed Scientific Director of the new institution, and Drs. Gamaléia and Bardach, former pupils of his, were entrusted with the preparation of vaccine

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CHAPTER XXI

Hygiene Congress in Vienna — Wiesbaden — Munich — Paris and Pasteur — Berlin and Koch — Failure of anthrax vaccination of sheep — Decision to leave Russia. In 1887 we went to Vienna, where a Congress of Hygienists was held, in which, for the first time, bacteriologists took part. Metchnikoff thus had the opportunity of becoming acquainted with many of them and to make inquiries concerning bacteriological laboratories. Professor Hueppe, of Wiesbaden, very kindly invited him to come to work in his

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CHAPTER XXII

The Pasteur Institute — Dreams realised — Metchnikoff at fifty — Growing optimism — Attenuated sensitiveness — The Sèvres villa — Daily routine. Having decided to settle in France, we hastened to make ourselves acquainted with contemporary French literature, thinking to find in it a reflection of the soul and manners of the nation. But the realistic literature of the time, in spite of the great artistic worth of many of the authors, gave us an erroneous idea of life in France, of which it repres

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CHAPTER XXIII

Opposition to the phagocyte theory — Scientific controversies — Experiments in support of the phagocyte theory — Behring and antitoxins — The London Congress — Inflammation. As long as Metchnikoff was but a zoologist, the scientific atmosphere around him remained calm and serene. But everything changed suddenly when he entered the domain of pathology with his theory of phagocytes and phagocytosis. Here was the realm of secular traditions, deeply rooted, and of theories generally admitted but res

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CHAPTER XXIV

Cholera — Experiments on himself and others — Illness of M. Jupille — Death of an epileptic subject — Insufficient results. The acute period of the struggle in defence of the phagocyte theory now seemed to have come to an end and Metchnikoff turned his thoughts towards a new field of ideas. Having elucidated the essence of inflammation, he wished to study the origin of another pathological symptom, i.e. the rise in temperature which constitutes a feverish condition. To that end he undertook a su

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CHAPTER XXV

Pfeiffer’s experiments, 1895 — The Buda-Pest Congress — Extracellular destruction of microbes — Reaction of the organism against toxins — Dr. Besredka’s researches — Macrophages — The Moscow Congress, 1897 — Bordet’s experiments. Metchnikoff had scarcely recovered from all the emotions caused by his experiments on cholera, which he was still studying, when, in 1894, a work appeared by a well-known German scientist, Pfeiffer, bringing out new facts in favour of the extracellular destruction of mi

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CHAPTER XXVI

1900. Immunity — Natural Immunity — Artificial Immunity. For centuries the question of immunity has occupied the human mind because the prevention of disease has ever been one of the greatest preoccupations of Man. Savages had already observed that man can become refractory to the venom of serpents, either through a slight bite or by the application of certain preparations of that venom on scarified skin. It was also a popular and very ancient notion that the contact of a slightly scratched hand

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CHAPTER XXVII

Private sorrows — Death of Pasteur, 1895 — Ill-health — Senile atrophies — Premature death — Orthobiosis — Syphilis — Acquisition of anthropoid apes. Metchnikoff’s health had suffered from the numerous emotions provoked by the struggle in defence of the phagocyte doctrine and also from a series of sad events. In 1893, sickness and death fell upon our family; I lost a sister and a brother at a short interval and had myself to undergo a serious operation. My husband nursed me night and day, as a m

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CHAPTER XXVIII

Researches on intestinal flora — Sour milk. The problem of our intestinal flora is so vast and so difficult that it demands years of research. Numerous facts had already been accumulated by Science on this subject, but it was still far from being elucidated. Certain scientists affirmed that microbes favour digestion by decomposing food residues in the intestine and are therefore not merely useful, but necessary to the organism. Others entertained a diametrically opposed opinion. The first thing,

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CHAPTER XXIX

The Nobel Prize — Journey to Sweden and to Russia — A day with Léon Tolstoï. In 1908 Metchnikoff received the Nobel Prize, together with Ehrlich, for his researches on immunity. According to the statutes of that prize, the laureate is invited to give a lecture in Stockholm. Metchnikoff chose for his theme the “present state of the question of immunity in infectious diseases,” and, in the spring of 1909, we went to Sweden and thence to Russia. The whole journey was a series of fêtes and reception

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CHAPTER XXX

Intestinal flora — Infantile cholera — Typhoid fever — Articles on popular Science. When he returned home, Metchnikoff immediately resumed his work. He continued, with his collaborators, researches on the normal intestinal flora and on the microbian poisons which provoke arterio-sclerosis. They were able to ascertain that certain microbes of the intestinal flora, such as the bacillus coli and Welch’s bacillus , produce poisons (phenol and indol) which are reabsorbed by the normal intestinal wall

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CHAPTER XXXI

A bacteriological expedition to the Kalmuk steppes, 1911. During his preceding journeys in the Kalmuk steppes, Metchnikoff had often heard it said that tuberculosis was almost unknown there, but that the Kalmuks took it very easily when brought into contact with foreigners. As all means of combating this disease had hitherto given very unsatisfactory results, Metchnikoff thought that researches should be started along a new path. He had long thought that observations on the extreme liability of

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CHAPTER XXXII

Further researches on the intestinal flora— Forty Years’ Search for a Rational Conception of Life. Since Metchnikoff had conceived the idea that a considerable part was played in human life by the intestinal flora, his thoughts had centred around a study which he thought profitable: that of the influence of intestinal microbes on the normal and on the pathological organism. So, on his return from Russia, he took advantage of the fact that an epidemic of infantile cholera had broken out in order

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CHAPTER XXXIII

Shelley. Unpleasant incidents — The fabrication of lacto-bacilli — St. Léger-en-Yvelines — Return to Paris — First cardiac attack — Evolution of the death-instinct — Notes on his symptoms. The end of 1912 had some unexpected emotions in store for us. Metchnikoff had always been able to congratulate himself on the cordial hospitality which he had found in France, and to the end of his life he remained deeply grateful for it. But, in any country, incidents may occur about which it would be unjust

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CHAPTER XXXIV

Return to St. Léger-en-Yvelines — Norka — Studies on the death of the silk-worm moth — War declared — Mobilisation. The drawback of the holidays consisted, for Metchnikoff, in coming away from his laboratory and in the impossibility of following his diet in a hotel or a boarding-house. We therefore resolved to hire a cottage in some quiet place, to organise a small laboratory, and to continue our usual mode of life. St. Legér-en-Yvelines, where we had spent part of the preceding summer, answered

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CHAPTER XXXV

Return to Paris — The deserted Institute — Memoir on the Founders of Modern Medicine — Metchnikoff’s Jubilee — Last holidays at Norka. This was but the beginning of the war; soon it spread with vertiginous rapidity, and made its cruel destructive force felt. On our return from Norka, we found everything on a war footing. The very next morning, Metchnikoff hurried to the laboratory. He only reached Paris with some difficulty, all means of communication being encumbered by soldiers. He had left th

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CHAPTER XXXVI

Bronchial cold — Aggravated cardiac symptoms — Farewell to Sèvres — Return to the Institute — Protracted sufferings — Intellectual preoccupations — Observations on his own condition — The end — Cremation. If in this sad last chapter I occasionally dwell on details which may seem insignificant in themselves, it is because, at this supreme moment of Elie Metchnikoff’s existence, everything was full of significance, for everything converged to emphasise the powerful unity and the ascending and cont

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EPILOGUE

The life and work of Elie Metchnikoff are so intimately bound together that, in a biography, it is impossible to separate them. That is why the description of his work necessarily has been dispersed along the story of his life; but, just as, in order to judge of a work of art, one has to draw back and contemplate the whole, we must also, after following the evolution and successive stages of E. Metchnikoff’s scientific works, take a full view of his work as a whole. He was a born biologist; ever

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BIBLIOGRAPHICAL APPENDIX

WORKS OF ELIE METCHNIKOFF Note. —Sources consulted: British Museum Catalogue; English Catalogue; American Catalogue. FOOTNOTES [1] He received an honorary degree at Cambridge in 1891, and also attended the International Medical Congress in London in that year. In 1901 he gave a lecture at Manchester on the intestinal flora. In 1906 he gave a course of three lectures in London on “The New Hygiene.” I translated them for him, and they were published as a little volume by Heinemann. [2] By Prof. He

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MEN OF MEDICINE AND SCIENCE

THE LIFE OF PASTEUR. By Réné Vallery-Radot . Translation by Mrs. R. L. Devonshire . New Edition with a Preface by Sir William Osler , Bart., M.D., F.R.S. Demy 8vo. Portrait, 10s. 6d. net. “A classic of scientific biography.”— Saturday Review. “The translation of M. Vallery-Radot’s admirable biography of the great Frenchman is a book which every English-speaking admirer of Pasteur will desire to possess.”— The Athenæum. “Pasteur’s career is set out in the fullest detail, making an absorbing narra

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I. Military Biographies, Autobiographies and Reminiscences.

FIRST WORLD WAR, 1914-1918. By Lieut.-Col. Charles À Court Repington, C.M.G. Demy 8vo. 2 vols. 42s. net. “Few if any two-guinea books have had such a sale as the First World War .”— Evening Standard. “Colonel Repington’s fame as a military critic is world-wide. He now gives us his personal experiences of the war in the form of a Diary which will compare with the most famous diaries in literature.... Few diarists show keener observation or greater power of description than Colonel Repington here

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II. Political and Social Biographies and Reminiscences.

AN ENGLISH WIFE IN BERLIN: A Private Memoir of Events, Politics and Daily Life in Germany throughout the War and the Social Revolution of 1918. By Evelyn, Princess Blücher . Portrait. Demy 8vo. 19s. net. “If there are any other diarists who managed to preserve as much fairness and coolness as Princess Blücher displays in this book they need not be ashamed to publish their records. If she had a just mind she had a stalwart one.”— Spectator. “This is a book apart. Nothing yet published gives so cl

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III. Literary, Artistic, Philosophical and General.

THE LIFE OF SIR E. T. COOK. By J. Saxon Mills . Frontispiece. Demy 8vo. This is the authorised life of the famous journalist and publicist, friend and biographer of Ruskin, who became during the War one of the chiefs of the Press Bureau. Sir Edward Cook was in his time editor of the Pall Mall Gazette , the Westminster Gazette , and the Daily News , and Mr. Saxon Mills’ book throws much valuable light on the political and social England of the last thirty years. Contents:—Parentage and School; Ox

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IV. Scientific and Medical.

THE LIFE OF ELIE METCHNIKOFF. By Olga Metchnikoff . Translated by Mrs. R. L. Devonshire . Frontispiece. Demy 8vo. Reviewing the French edition of this book in January 1921, The Times Literary Supplement said: “Madame Metchnikoff’s excellent analysis of her husband’s scientific theories does not hinder her from showing us the living, the lovable, the extraordinary human being who conceived so many ideas, who developed so many theories, inventions, innovations.... Mme. Metchnikoff has made us admi

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