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over. What there is great of them is an annoyance to their fellow
scientists and a mystery to the general public, and what is not is
evident.
There is no doubt about what is not great, no race of men have such
obvious littlenesses. They live in a narrow world so far as their human
intercourse goes; their researches involve infinite attention and an
almost monastic seclusion; and what is left over is not very much. To
witness some queer, shy, misshapen, grey-headed, self-important, little
discoverer of great discoveries, ridiculously adorned with the wide
ribbon of some order of chivalry and holding a reception of his
fellow-men, or to read the anguish of Nature at the "neglect of
science" when the angel of the birthday honours passes the Royal Society
by, or to listen to one indefatigable lichenologist commenting on the
work of another indefatigable lichenologist, such things force one to
realise the unfaltering littleness of men.
And withal the reef of Science that these little "scientists" built and
are yet building is so wonderful, so portentous, so full of mysterious
half-shapen promises for the mighty future of man! They do not seem to
realise the things they are doing! No doubt long ago even Mr.
Bensington, when he chose this calling, when he consecrated his life to
the alkaloids and their kindred compounds, had some inkling of the
vision,--more than an inkling. Without some such inspiration, for such
glories and positions only as a "scientist" may expect, what young man
would have given his life to such work, as young men do? No, they must
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