THE PRUSSIA.NS IN 1870.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR,—) came across this passage in the Life of Pasteur. It occurred in the Franco-Prussian War, and shows that even then the German was incapable of a fine generosity in spite of his " Regnault had left his laboratory utensils in his rooms at the Sevres porcelain manufactory, of which he was manager. A Prus- sian, evidently an expert, had been there. Nothing seemed changed in that abode of science, and yet everything was destroyed : the glass tubes of barometers, &c., were broken : scales and other instruments had been carefully knocked out of shape with a hammer. In a corner• were a heap of ashes; they were the regis- ters, notes, manuscripts, all Regnault's work of the last ten years. ' Such cruelty is unexampled in history,' .writes J. B. Dumas. ` The Roman soldier who butchered Archimedes in the heat of the onslaught may be excused—but with what sacrilegious meanness could this work of cold destruction be accomplished! "
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