Louis PASTEUR (1822-1895). Autograph letter signed... Lot 48

Louis PASTEUR (1822-1895). Autograph letter signed to M. Genteur. 2 pp. ½ in-8, École Normale Supérieure letterhead. Paris, July 25, 1864. Some parts underlined in red ink. Very fine eulogy of the zoologist Henri de LACAZE-DUTHIERS (1821-1901). "M. Lacaze-Duthiers, a zoologist of recognized merit, twice laureate of the Académie des Sciences, most recently for a fine work on coral, and author of a large number of highly esteemed memoirs which earned him the honor of second place on the presentation list of the zoology section at the last vacancy. Finally, Mr. Lacaze-Duthiers taught natural history at the Lille Faculty of Science for nine years. But he is not yet a Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur, and has been attached to the École Normale for too short a time to be promoted to this title. "In the presence of these facts, I thought, Mr. Secretary General, that it was my duty to informally bring to your kind attention the particular situation of Mr. Lacaze-Duthiers, all the more so as, as Dean of the Lille Faculty from 1854 to 1857, I was able to appreciate Mr. Lacaze's merit as a teacher and as a scholar". But if he still had any doubts about his merit, "you could take the advice of Messrs Milne-Edwards and de Quatrefages, who are more particularly familiar with the scientific work of their young colleague [...]".