Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustration. See 44194-h.htm or 44194-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44194/44194-h/44194-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44194/44194-h.zip) Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive/American Libraries. See https://archive.org/details/lifeofeliemetchn00mechiala Authorised Translation from the French [Illustration: DR. METCHNIKOFF IN HIS LABORATORY.] 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 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 portrayed as in the present case: seldom that the intimate thought and mental "adventure" of a discoverer presents so clear and consistent a history. It is beautiful because it is put before us with perfect candour and simplicity guided by rare intelligence and inspired by deep affection. Madame Metchnikoff has drawn the picture of the development of a single-minded character absolutely and tenaciously devoted to a high purpose--the improvement of human life. It is a story of "struggles and adventures," but they are wholly in the field of the investigation of Nature. We read here little or nothing of the quest for personal advancement, for fortune or official position. These things had no attraction for Metchnikoff. He left Russia and took an unpaid post in Paris in order to have a place to work in. He had many devoted friends in whose company he sought refreshment and relaxation, but all his immense energy and industry were concentrated on the development and establishment of his great biological theory of "Phagocytosis" and its outcome, the philosophy of life called by him "Orthobiosis." This volume tells truly of a simple life--a life in which the social incidents which fill so large a space in most lives were either non-existent or unnoticed because, by the side of the great purpose which dominated Metchnikoff's every thought and action--namely, the advancement of Science--he was not touched by them. He was affectionate, kind-hearted, and truly considerate of others, but was, in a way which is traceable to his racial origin, a practical idealist concentrating his whole strength and reason on the realisation of what he held to be the highest good.