M. S. Tswett's Correspondence With John Briquet I. Review of Tswett's Ph.D. Thesis by Briquet, And...

This month, we are celebrating the 125th anniversary of the birth of M. S. Tswett, the inventor of chromatography. On this occasion we decided to publish the correspondence o f Tswett with Dr. John Briquet, his former thesis advisor at the University o f Geneva and director o f the Ge- neva Botanical Gardens. Until now this correspondence was unavailable to those who were in- terested in the life and activities o f Tswett, although it contains important information about his first years in Russia, his frustrations in feeling to be a foreigner in his ancestors' homeland and finally, about the start of his settlement in the Russian scientific establishment. This correspondence is complementary to that Tswett had with his friend Clapardde which had been published ten years ago.

M. S. Tswett's Correspondence with John Briquet I. Review of Tswett's Ph.D. Thesis by Briquet, and Tswett's Letters from Simferopol

I. M. Hais11 - / M. Niang 2 / L. S. Et t re 3.

1Faculty of Pharmacy, Charles University, Hradec Kx~lov6, Czech Republic 2Department of Medical Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Hradec Kr~ilov6, Czech Republic 3Department of Chemical Engineering, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520-8286, USA Mailing address: P.O. Box 6274, Beardsley Station, Bridgeport, CT 06606-6274, USA

Introduction In understanding somebody's life, feelings and activities, the letters written by the person always represent an important source. This is particularly true when dealing with people who were living in a time before telephone, fax or e-mail, when correspondence represented the main means of communication. Letters were valued much more than today: they were collected and kept for decades, to remember the writer, an esteemed acquaintance or a highly valued friend. At that time, letters were not simply hastily written notes: they were composed very carefully, taking great care about style and format. The readers of the chromatography journals are ac- quainted with the life and activities of Mikhail S. Tswett, I the inventor of chromatography. It had been well documented and discussed in a number of articles and books [1-13] and therefore, we only give a brief summary here as a background to the subsequent dis- cussions. Born on May 14, 1872, in Asti, Italy, Tswett spent the first 24 years of his life in Switzerland, where his father, Semen Nikolaevich Tswett (1828-1900), left him after the death of his mother, soon after his birth. Michel was

~r Deceased on October 25, 1996.

studying first in Lausanne and then in Geneva, and attended the University of Geneva, majoring in botany, where in 1896 he obtained a Docteur ds Sciences degree, with a thesis on cell physiology [14].

In the first ten years of Michel's life his father was still living in Russia but visited frequently his son in Switzer- land. However, in 1882, Semen Tswett and his family moved permanently to Geneva. Finally, in 1895, his father returned to Russia and Michel joined him toward the middle of 1896. He had problems to obtain a permanent academic position because foreign degrees were not accepted in Russia (and although this seems to be unbelievable, evidently, he was not aware of this problem when moving there). After some months of uncer- tainty, he found a low-level temporary position in St. Pe- tersburg, where he then prepared a Russian magister's thesis, submitted it to the University of Kazan' and de- fended it on September 23,1901 [15]. Soon after that, M. Tswett moved to the University of Warsaw, in Russian- occupied Poland, apparently on the invitation of Profes- sor D. I. Ivanovskii, 2 who just became the head of the botany chair there and whom he had met and be- friended in St. Petersburg. Tswett spent the next 14 years in Warsaw, first at the University, then, in 1907, at the Veterinary Institute and finally, from 1908 on, at the Polytechnic Institute. It was at Warsaw that he devel-

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Figure 1 John Briquet, director of the Botanical Gardens in Geneva. Statue at the Botanical Gardens.

oped the method of adsorption chromatography, carried out his investigations on plant pigments, particularly chlorophylls [16, 17], and published in 1910 his funda- mental book on Chlorophylls in the Plant and Animal World, representing his thesis for a Russian Doctor of Science degree [18]. For this book, in 1911, he received the M. N. Akhmatov Prize of the Imperial Russian Academy of Sciences?

In the summer of 1915 Tswett left Warsaw before its occupation by German troops, leaving all his belongings and books behind. In 1916 he resumed his duties at the evacuated Polytechnic Institute of Warsaw, located now in Nizhnii Novgorod, and finally, in the spring of 1917, he was appointed professor of botany and director of the Botanical Gardens at the University of Yure'ev (today: Tartu, in Estonia). After the German occupation of Yu- re'ev he left the town with the Russian professors who then became the founders of a new state university in Voronezh. Tswett died there on June 26, 1919. After moving to Russia 4 Tswett maintained an apparently regular correspondence with two of his Swiss friends, Edouard Clapardde, and John Briquet. His letters are preserved in Geneva: the letters to Clapar~de at the D~partement des Manuscrits, Bibliothdque Publique et Universitaire, and the letters to Briquet at the D~partement des Manuscrits, Bibliothdque du Conservatoire Botanique. These letters represent a valuable information about Tswett and his life.

Among the two persons with whom Tswett corre- sponded, Eduard ClaparOde 5 (1873-1940) majored in medicine at Geneva University and became his closest friend: together they attended a number of classes and were active in the Swiss students' Soci~tO de Zofingue. After graduation in 1897, Clapar~de joined the Univer- sity as an assistant, advancing to the head of the Labora- tory of Psychology, associate professor, and finally professor of psychology.

The second friend of Tswett was John Briquet (Figure 1). He was born on March 13,1870, in Geneva and studied at the local university, obtaining a B.S. degree in 1889. He then continued his studies at the University of Berlin, Germany, finishing it in 1891 with a docteur dt sciences degree at Geneva University. Between 1892 and 1905 Briquet was associated with Professor Marc Thury 6 at the Laboratoire de Botanique G~ndrale of the university as a Private Dozent; in this capacity he super- vised Tswett's work on his thesis. In 1890 Briquet became sous-conservateur (deputy director) and in 1896 conservateur (director) of a relatively small botanical garden (the Herbier Delessert) which he greatly expanded into Jardin Botanique, the botanical gardens of the city of Geneva. From 1905 on he devoted his full time as the director of this institution. In the first decades of the 20th century, Briquet was one of the most in- fluential botanists in Switzerland. He died on October 26, 1931 [21].

Although there was only about one year in age between Tswett and his friends, it is interesting to note the differ- ence in the tone of his letters to them. With Clapar~de he was on terms of "tu", and called him "my dear friend" (bien cher ami) or "my old chap" (bien cher vieux), ending his letters very informally (see [19]). At the same time he wrote very formally to Briquet: the letters always start with Cher Monsieur, and have the long, for- mal French ending of Recevez, Monsieur, rues plus em- press~es et cordiales salutations ("accept, sir, my most thoughtful and cordial greetings"), or something similar.

Table I lists the letters on file in the Geneva collection] As seen they are complementary. The letters to Briquet were written by Tswett in the early period when he did not yet have any permanent position, and thus, they are extremely interesting in describing the mood and frustrations of the young scientist. On the other hand, almost all the letters to Clapar~de are from the Warsaw period, when Tswett already had settled down. It looks as Tswett's connections with Briquet were interrupted by the end of 1898 although, naturally, it is quite possible that not all of his letters were preserved by Briquet.

In addition to Tswett's letters to Clapar~de and Briquet, the collection in the library of the Geneva Botanical Gardens also contains two additional items: the draft of Briquet's review of Tswett's doctorate thesis and copy of Briquet's note (written on January 22, 1896), rebuk- ing some criticism about Tswett's thesis.

546 Chromatographia Vol.44,No.9/10, May 1997 Historical Paper

Table I. Tswett's letters to Clapar~de and Briquet a

to Clapar~de b

from date

to Briquet

from date

St. Petersburg 17.VIII. 1897

Warsaw 30.III.1909 Warsaw 23.VI.1909 Warsaw 16.V.1911 Pfirg (Austria) 27.VI.1914 (card) Aigen (Austria) 24.VI1.1914 (card) Warsaw 24.XII.1914 Warsaw 18.III.1915 (card)

Niznii Novgorod 14.1.1917

Simferopol 6.VII+1896 Simferopol 18.VII.1896 Simferopol 29.IX.1896 (card) ~ Simferopol 9.X.1896 (card) ~ Simferopol 15.X.1896 Simferopol 13.XI.1896 St.Petersburg 30.XII.1896 St.Petersburg 22.11.1897 (card) St.Petersburg 10.111.1897 (card) c St.Petersburg 30.II1.1897 St.Petersburg 19.VI.1897 St.Petersburg 1.VII.1897

Simferopol 17.IX.1897 a St.Petersburg 20.IX.1897 St.Petersburg 3.X.1897 St .Petersburg 10.X. 1897 St.Petersburg 27.VIII.1898 St.Petersburg 30.IX.189g St.Petersburg 29.X.1898 (card) ~

Moscow 28.XII.1915 ~

Vladikavkaz 8.VII.1917

aIn the table, the month is indicated by Roman numerals. In the letters written from Russia, the date corresponds to the old Julian calendar still used there at that time, while the two postcards from Austria have the date in the Gregorian calendar used in the rest of the World. bPublished by Hais [19, 20]. ~The date as given by Tswett is obviously wrong. aWritten by Semen N. Tswett, Mikhail's father. elncluding his curriculum vitae.

One may ask the question, what happened with the letters written by Claparbde and Briquet to Tswett. Most likely, these were preserved by him for a long time. Ac- cording to Tswett 's niece, the late Elizaveta Lyash- chenko (1913-1979) - the daughter of Tswett 's half- sister, Nadezhda - "Uncle Misha" had a big bag full of his most cherished items, containing some letters, manu- scripts, photographs and other material, which he carried with him from one place to the other, even after his forceful evacuation of Warsaw. After his death, his widow left this bag with his sister Nadezhda, and it was kept first by her (who died in 1936) and then by her daughter Elizaveta until her evacuation from Moscow during World War II. She was unable to save the whole bag and took from it only some photographs that later were included in the biographies written by Sakodynskii [3-7] and Senchenkova [8]. Our photos are also from this collection.

The existence of the two collections was known for some time. Dh6r68 in his 1943 article [1] already quoted from a

few letters, and brief quotations can also be found in the small booklet of Hesse and Well [22]. In the seventies Sakodynskii also published excerpts f rom a limited number of letters [4, 7].

The suggestion that Tswett 's full correspondence should be published in a scholarly edition originated from Hais [23]. In the 1970s the two Geneva libraries were kind enough to provide copies of the original letters and gave permission for their publication: for this we would like to express our gratitude to the libraries and particularly to Drs. Ph. Monnier and H. M. Burdet. Finally, in 1988, Hais published Tswett 's letters to Clapar~de [19, 20] in both the original French and in English translation, with critical comments explaining their background and the meaning of some of the remarks in them. However , for various reasons a similar publication of the Briquet correspondence never materialized.

It was finally decided in the summer of 1994 to fill the existing gap and publish Tswett 's full correspondence with Briquet and Briquet 's two notes about Tswett 's

Historical Paper Chromatographia Vol.44, No. 9/10, May 1997 547

Figure 2 Marc Thury, professor of botany and head of the Laboratory of Ge- neral Botany at Geneva University.

thesis, now based on new transcripts and new translations. This became particularly important after investigating the existing texts and comparing them to the original letters: it was evident that there are a number of inconsistencies and inaccuracies in the translations published as excerpts. The aim of this project was to publish this new collection in the spring of 1997, on the occasion of the 125th anniversary of the birth of M. S. Tswett. Here I (LSE) would like to give a personal account on the fulfillment of this project.

Professor I. M. Hais (IMH) - who ten years ago already prepared the publication of the Clapar~de letters [19, 20] - agreed to serve as the coordinator and as the senior author, responsible for the translation. The transcripts were prepared by his colleague, Professor M. Niang: it was a real deciphering job because of the difficulty to read Tswett's handwriting, requiring somebody with in- timate knowledge in the French language. The letters were translated by IMH and Professor A. E Fell (De- partment of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, University of Bradford, United Kingdom) helped in brushing up the English text.

In the case when letters from a bygone area are published, mentioning persons and events which are not familiar anymore to the readers, the addition of explanatory notes is of crucial importance. We already started to collect this information while translation was still in progress. Particularly Professor K. L Sakodynskii (Asso- ciation of Chromatographers, Moscow, Russia) was of

great help in providing some background material, biographical sketches and the photos used here for Figures 1-4. Unfortunately, his sudden death on May 10, 1996, prevented him from further cooperation in our work.

The translation of the letters into English was finished by IMH at the beginning of October 1996, and he sent it together with the French transcripts to me (LSE) on a diskette, which I received almost on the same day as the news about his unexpected sudden death, on October 25, 1996, reached me. However, the explanatory texts and notes were missing: IMH planned to write them after the translation was finalized. Thus now, the final edit- ing as well as the task of writing the introduction and compiling the notes were left to me. Fortunately, our ex- tensive correspondence during the translation period, Professor Sakodynskii's notes, the existing literature, as well as my knowledge of the life and activities of Tswett provided me with the information needed to finish the project. I also would like to express my gratitude to Pri- vate Dozent Dr. Veronika Meyer (University of Bern, Switzerland) for helping to clean up some loose ends.

There is one potential shortcoming in the present notes. IMH planned to also consult some botanists to be sure that the botanical names were correctly transcribed, and to explain some of the botanical remarks in Tswett's letters which are not familiar to us. I could not follow these plans: thus, botanical remarks are not elaborated further, and the (Latin) names of plants are given as deci- phered from Tswett's letters. I apologize for any error which may be due to possible incorrect reading of Tswett's difficult handwriting. How difficult it was for us to read Tswett's letters can be judged from the few examples to be included in our series. The difficulty was even aggravated by the poor quality of the copies.

Originally we planned to also include the full French texts of the letters besides their translation, but we finally decided to abandon this plan because of the exten- sive volume of the material. However, whenever its con- tent is particularly important, we always give the original French text either in the introductory remarks or in the notes.

We believe that the availability of Tswett's complete correspondence with his Swiss friends can help in our better understanding of the life and activities of this re- markable scientist who has changed the way we investi- gate complex natural substances. We also believe that this posthumus publication will serve as a lasting memo- rial to Professor Ivo M. Hais who initiated this project 25 years ago and whose personal involvement and labor made its fulfillment possible.

General Remarks

Some general remarks are necessary to explain the con- siderations we followed when preparing the publication of these letters.

In translating the French text, we tried to follow it as close as possible. We deviated from the original only in

548 Chromatographia Vol. 44, No. 9/10, May 1997 Historical Paper

Figure 3 The Laboratory of General Botany at the University of Geneva, in 1896. Left to right: R. P. G. Hochreutiner/6 doctoral candidate; John Briquet, assistant; Professor Marc Thury, and Michel Tswett, doctoral candidate.

two places: we always spell out the month (Tswett indicated them by Roman numerals), and simplify the for- mal end sentence to "sincerely yours." On the top of all letters, d John Briquet is written by a different hand (most likely, the librarian) and we omitted this. On most letters there is also a note of R or Rdp (for Rdpondu, "answered": indicating that he answered the letter), written by Briquet, and we also omitted this in the translations.

Any publication indicating names of Russian persons or towns has a problem of the proper transliteration of these names from Cyrillic to Latin characters. Tswett generally spelled the names in the French way (e.g., "Borodine", "Moscou") but he was not consistent. Therefore, in our text, we consistently follow the con- vention of Chemical Abstracts (CA) concerning transliteration from Cyrillic. We deviated from these rules only in the case of towns which have well-established names in English: examples are Moscow (instead of "Mo- skva"), St. Petersburg (instead of "Sankt-Peterburg" and Odessa (instead of "Odesa"). We also deviated from the CA transliteration rules in the case of the name of Tswett.

Correctly, it should be Tsvet; however, he preferred to write it in the German way, with "w" and double "t" and we follow his usage here (although it should be noted that sometimes, he wrote "v" instead of "w").

With regard to major towns in Western Europe, we write their names in the well-established English way ("Ge- neva", "Florence", etc.) and not according to the language of the particular country (Gen~ve, Firenze, etc.). Since the readers of this journal are generally not ac- quainted with the scientists who are mentioned in

Tswett's letters, we did our best to give each time a very brief biographical sketch. For Russians, we always give their first name and patronym ("middle name").

There is one more interesting observation we can make when investigating Tswett's letters: he often gives his address in Simferopol and St. Petersburg in Cyrillic letters, and even his father, in his letter of September 17, 1897, (see Part II) gives his address written in Cyrillic. Could it be that Briquet could read and/or write in Cy- rillic?

A special comment is necessary with regard to the dates. In Russia the old Julian calendar was still in use until January 31, 1918, while the rest of Europe already had changed to the Gregorian calendar in the 16th-18th centuries. To convert from the Julian ("old style": OS) to the Gregorian ("new style": NS) 12 days are to be added in the 19th century and 13 days in the 20th century. (This is the reason that the Great October Revolution which actually took place on October 24, 1917, OS, has been celebrated on November 7.)

We have a total of five postcards sent by Tswett from Russia to Briquet, which have the Russian post office cancellations as well as the arrival cancellation of Ge- neva post office. These enable us to check Tswett's dates. It seems as his letters from St. Petersburg were definitely dated according to the Julian calendar, but sometimes, he made an error in the date. However, in the first months of his stay in Simferopol, he was some- what mixed up with the date. We have two postcards written by him to Briquet in September/October 1896 from Simferopol. The first (Figure 5) was dated by Tswett as September 29 (29. IX.), while the actual post office cancellation has the date of September 16, and the

Historical Paper Chromatographia Vol.44,No. 9/10, May 1997 549

Figure 4 M. Tswett in Geneva, in 1896.

( ~ BCNIIIIPItI~Ii~I HOqTOBIaI~I COIO37a. POOCI}L ~ , ~ ]~,! r 1D~ION POSTALE LrNIVEliS'EL~ RU$SLI~ / ~ ~ - ~ . . . . ~ ~ I ~ OTt;,PIATOE IlUCbat0.- CAIt'rE POS'I'X~:~[~'~li~,[

" ' z '~ <̀~ i <,> - " ~ ' 1 S " "t ~ - - - ~ ! ( l ~ 7 J . . . . / "

t i - , / : - , . , ,-'- t L - --eL 7 <" "--=-D

[ . . . . x z c T - ,!

Figure 5 Postcard, mailed by M. Tswett from Simferopol to Briquet, in Ge- neva. While Tswett indicated the date as 29. IX. 1896, the Simfero- pol post office canceller has the date of 16. IX. 1896 (OS), which corresponds to September 28 in the Gregorian calendar. The card arrived in Geneva on October 4, i.e., six days later.

card arrived in Geneva on October 4. September 16 OS,

corresponds to September 28 NS, which means that it took only six days for the card to travel from Simferopol to Geneva: this is very fast, but possible. Tswett definitely wanted to give the date according to the Gregor- ian calendar used in Switzerland, however, he made a one-day error in recalculating the date: September 29 N S corresponds to September 17 O S (and not 16 as indicated by the post office canceller).

In the second postcard from Simferopol Tswett indicated the date as October 9, 1896, (9. X.), while the Sim- feropol post office cancellation has the date of Septem- ber 27, and the card arrived in Geneva on October 15. Again, Tswett gave the date in the Gregorian calendar, but now his date was correct: September 27 OS, the post office canceller's date, corresponds to October 9 NS, the date given by Tswett.

We also have three postcards written by Tswett from St. Petersburg, and - as ment ioned - there, he followed the Julian calendar; however, he made obvious errors in writing the date, e.g., giving III. (March) instead of II. (February), and 29. X. instead of 19. X. (see Part II).

In our t reatment we always identify the letters and cards according to the date given by Tswett, even if it seems to be incorrect.

As shown by these postcards, mail to Geneva was sur- prisingly fast: it took 6--7 days from Simferopol and as fast as three days from St. Petersburg. Today, with air mail, one would be surprised to be even close to the speed they achieved 100 years ago.

For better organization we divided the correspondence into three parts. Part I. includes Briquet 's evaluation of Tswett 's thesis and Tswett 's letters written in 1896, during the first months after his arrival in Russia. Part II. deals with Tswett 's letters written from St. Petersburg, between December 30, 1896, and October 29, 1898. Fi- nally, Part III. includes two late letters written by Tswett in 1915 and 1917. In each case we give a general introduction followed by the translation of the letters and then, the specific notes and comments.

Briquet's Reviews of Tswett's Thesis

As mentioned earlier, the Geneva collection also contains - besides the letters - two notes by Briquet concerning Tswett 's Thesis. Since these predate the actual correspondence, we start with these.

After receiving his bachelor 's degree in science, in 1893, Tswett continued his studies at Geneva University, ma-


joring in botany. First he has worked in the laboratory of professor Robert Chodat ~ at the Botanical Institute (In- stitut de Botanique), carrying out some research on the anatomy of Solanaceae, for which he was awarded the Humphry Davy Prize TM of Geneva University, in 1894. '1 However, in 1895 - according to Dhdr6 [1] "as a result of some incidents at the University which followed the ap- pointment of E. Yung to the zoology chair, ''n Tswett left the laboratory of Chodat and joined the Laboratory of General Botany (Laboratoire de Botanique Gdn~rale) of Professor Marc Thury. 6 (Figures 2-3). We do not know what these "incidents" were. However, it should be noted that an obvious animosity was formed between Chodat and Tswett (or maybe between Chodat and Thury?). This is clear from Briquet's letter of January 22, 1896 (the translation of which is given below). It is also interesting to note that while in the preface of his Thesis [14] Tswett acknowledges the help he received at the University from his professors, advisers and colleagues, 13 Chodat is not mentioned at a l l ) 4

Tswett finished his Thesis work in Professor Thury's laboratory around the end of 1895 and then he compiled a draft of his Thesis. Evidently this was reviewed by Bri- quet who then prepared a report the draft of which is in the Geneva files. It is unsigned, but the handwriting is identical to Briquet's letter of January 22, 1896, which we also give here. This draft is undated, but it had to be written prior to January 22,1896, because in his letter of that date, Briquet already refers to it. Apparently what happened was that Tswett wrote a pre- liminary text of his Thesis which he submitted to the Faculty (or to Thury); however, for its customary publication in the University periodical - the Archives des Sciences Physiques et Naturelles de Gendve (the "Ar- chives") - and in the periodical just started by Thury and edited by Briquet, the Bulletin de Laboratoire de Bo- tanique GOn~rale de l'Universit~ de Gendve (the "Bulle- tin"), he wanted to further improve it. Meanwhile Bri- quet left for an extended trip ~~ and Tswett was also leaving Geneva, for his grand tour in Italy, ending in Russia. Tswett's intention was - to which Briquet evidently agreed - to improve and edit this draft during his trip, and mail the final text to Briquet as soon as possible. The January 22, 1896 letter of Briquet is addressed to Cher Monsieur et Maitre (it is translated here as "Dear Sir and Teacher"). It is not stated who this person was: however, it had to be Professor Thury. The address "maRre" is used toward a teacher, somebody at a higher academic level than the writer, and in Briquet's case, only Thury would fit this criterion. Also, we should note that he speaks about "our joint report" of Tswett's The- sis. Since the Thesis work was carried out in Thury's laboratory, with Briquet serving as the Thesis adviser, it would be most logical that the review (which obviously was written by Briquet) was finally signed by both Thury and Briquet.

D r a f t o f t i l e r e p o r t o n M . S. T s w e t t ' s

Tf tes i s

(undated and unsigne 6nt o6vious y w r i t t e n fry J o f m B r i q u e t )

The Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Sciences 6y Mr. Michel Tswett is entitled "Contrtfiutions to the ~nowfexhje on tile cffforop fasts andpfasmic membranes." The subject is

6oth very 6road and extensivdy studieA, 6ut tile questions

which are put here are so diffic~t that the most contradic-

tory solutions were sucjgested and ooreement on them is far from be/n 0 reached. This exTfains why the research be/no

carried out at present must essentially aim at stdnnittiru d data ofm~ined by tile a~hors to experimentas criticism. In searching less for new facts and theories in favour of a care-

fur verif/r.ation of what the previous worriers have done and said, the author has, in our opinion, understood the re- quirements expressed afiove and has responded according to his caFadifities. - In order to res0fve the question as to whether tile cffforopfasts possess their own mem6rane, he

m ino a s ay of vhys a and V ysiofogico erope es of e mic membranes.

The account which he 9ave is dear and shows a Frofound

s of the German literature and especially of the

studies fry Pfeffer, de Vries, Van't Heft etc., which have been very fittf.e Enown to French authorsff The resuhs od-

mined permitted him to prove exTerimentoSs the ~sence of a proper membrane around the cfis SFecid studies of the fatter, which is covered in Chapters III and IV, are especiaffy orhdinaf in the Last chapter, where the cfdoropfasts are studied 6y the merotomic metho~ which, until recenffy, has only 6een a~fied to the ceff nucleus. This method consists of the isofatiort and artificiaC cuftivatiort of cffforop~ts outside the ceff trt soft~ttons, whose osmotic

power can 6e varied accordino to tile exTderimenter's wish. From these very irrterestiruj stugies the author has been fed to summarize the structure of chs in suflgestino that they are composed of ~ o parts: a sponoiform stroma of clfforopfastin and an interstitia~ materi~j metaK/n. The

chlorophyl( pigment forms one body with chforopfastin. This concept results from a number of exFriments on swdfino, contraction and desadradation , pe~ormed accordino to the merotomic method of the author. Cfdoropfasts do not have their own Ffasmic membrane. The wor~ ends fry

an interestino overview of studies deafino with the question whether chloroplasts are ab(e to five indefinitely outside the fivino cytoplasm, and with tile ehyfosenesis of these bodies. The author has coffected an immense fitera-

Historical Paper Chromatographia Vol. 44, No. 9/10, May 1997 551

ture on his subject on a scale which is unusud, not ordy in the case of b~inrters, but &o in the case of specidists.

This wor~ is an interestim 3 contr~ution to the solution of gifficdt questions and we recommend it for acceptance by the Facu&y. It was earriaf out in the L~oratory of Gencrd Botany of t ~ University) ~dufeA by Pr~. Whury)andsuper- vised by the assistant Mr. Brfituct who testifies to the per- sistence shown by the eandiffate in ~is research ffuff~ long months of wor~.

Letter of Briquet (to Tfmry) ffatedJa~_v__a_ry 22, 1 8 9 6

Thurs@) 22 January 1896 Laboratory of Gencra~ Botany

Dear Sir and Teaches

I have a~ain s~immed throm3h the papers of K&bs in which, accordin 9 to Mr. Cho&t's persona[ opinion) of_s interestin~ resus obtained by Mr. Tswctt were supposed

to be found. I have not found an ythi~) as my memory flag indi-

eared, which couig be cfirect(y rdated to chforap~ts and their structure. The endosed fist of Kfebs' papers) which I am famffiar with, proves this. In oAdition, the farooe boo~ of Arth. Meyer (Untersuchwuden/tbier die cffforophyfff~rner, published in 1895) does not contain any reference to a paper by Kfebs on this suf~ect) thotudh the recent bibliography was utff/zed in &tail

/ f by chance Mr. Kfebs has published somethiruj more recently on the su6ject, nothin 9 could be easier than to add the quotation to those which Mr. Tswett included in his Thesis, without jeopardizim 3 at d the value of his worL

In research where two authors barely a~ree) a cfitica~ experimental control must be wdcomed. As I have said in our joint report) the interest of the wo~ of Mr. Tswett ties essentially in the application of the merotomic r t d meffw4 which may be amply proven by compad~ it with the recent article by Arth. Meyer.

In my personcff opinion the wor~) by its ~iffictffties, and by the way the author has f m ~ it) is superior to hosts of ~ctord theses) which boff down to research in the fief~ of comparative anatomy carried out by auffwrs with-

out sufficient systematic trainim 3.

I shou~f like to oAg that the omission of a quotation by Kfebs) even if it was proven by chance to be correct, coufA not be a r on for c ticisi basis of Tswett's Thesis. This is espec/affy c~.ar when one com- pares it with the previously accepted theses, which do not

contain a sin Ce citation of a pr sor in the of anatomy (for instance the othem~tse excdfent study of Mrs. B~icka on the Ifidace~).

I'd like to ash you to inform Mr. Chodat a6out this fetter as weft as ~out our joint report. I c&sofutdy stand by the fatter.

I had hoped to be excusedfrom attendincj your fecutre since I am rather occupied at the moment and the time spent in a probably sterffe discussion is too precious to me. I am ~ o unavailable today between 5 and 7 o'doc~.

With respectful regar& , dear Professor~ yours

J. Br~uct

Tswett's Letters from Simferopol These letters - - four letters and two post cards - - deal with Tswett's moving to Russia in the spring of 1896, his first six months there, finishing the manuscript of his Thesis, mailing it to Geneva; then waiting for its publication and to receive his diploma. We can also read about his first attempts to find some employment.

We have already mentioned in the Introduction that in 1895 the father of Michel - who since 1882 has been living in Switzerland with his family - decided to return to Russia. He was appointed the head of finances of Tauria Province (which included the Crimean peninsula and part of southern Ukraine), with the title of a privy councillor - equivalent to a general's position in the civil status - and in March 1895, they moved (except Michel, who was finishing his thesis) to the Crimea, settling in Simferopol, which at that time was the administrative center of Tauria. Semen Tswett rented the "Dacha Steven," a cottage outside the town. 18 A photo of the house is shown in Figure 8 of ref. [2] and Figure 17 of ref. [4]. This is the place to where Michel Tswett moved toward the middle of 1896.

We do not know exactly when M. Tswett left Geneva. Evidently, he finished the draft of his Thesis by the end of 1895: Briquet already refers to it in his January 22, 1896 letter (see above), thus, by then, it had to be ready. As mentioned above, Tswett's plan was to take this pre- liminary text with him on his trip, edit it for publication, and mail it back to Briquet as soon as possible. However, this was delayed and he mailed the final text to Briquet only on July 18 (July 30 according to the Gregorian calendar) from Russia. Figure 4 is a photograph of M. Tswett from 1895/96. Dh6r6 [1] shows the same photo originally given to Cla- per~de by Tswett, and mentions that on the back of that photo Tswett wrote "to my dear friend Edouard Cla- parade, as a souvenir for the four happy months spent at Champel," dated March 7, 1896) 9 This means that the earliest Tswett could leave Geneva was around the mid- die of March.


M. Tswett combined his move to Russia with a "grand tour" through southern France and Italy, stopping in Marseille, Florence, Rome and Naples, also visiting the local universities and botanical laboratories. Most likely his ship from Italy (probably leaving the port of Naples) landed in Odessa which was then the major seaport for international travel and commerce in southern Russia: according to his letter of November 13, 1896, the pack- age with the reprints of his thesis also arrived there. In Odessa Tswett visited Ludvig Al'bertovich Rishavi, professor of botany and director of the Botanical Gar- den at Novorossisk University, 2~ a prominent botanist in southern Russia; evidently, Tswett had great hopes to find a position at this university 2~ and as his letter indicates, he even brought with him some letters of recommendations to help him in achieving this. Obviously, at that time he did not have any idea of the problem having a foreign diploma. Quite honestly, it is hard to under- stand that Tswett did not inquire ahead about the situa- tion in Russia particularly since obviously, the possibil- ity of joining Novorossisk University was on his mind even before he left Switzerland: otherwise he would not have letters of recommendations to Rishavi with him. The following letters illustrate M. Tswett's first months in Russia, his optimistic attitude hoping to find soon a position at the University of Odessa (Novorossisk Uni- versity), then waiting for his Thesis and finally, realizing that he has no opportunity in Odessa.

Dear Sir,

Simf~ropoC, 6. jay z~96. Dacha Steven

You may weft he surprised when you retum from your trip, that you don't f ind the manuscript of this wretched Thesis.

Tftinftiru 3 of a[s the trouf~[e and anxiety it fias caused me, I as~ myse~ not without arujuish , what it is 9oiru3 to be Cif~ for my future worL I 9et my confidence bac~ 6), 6famirr d my inefficiency on the overworft from which I have not recovered as yet.

In any case I reo~y was unafife to finish my edifi~ dur~n~ my trip. At the moment I have 40 pcades which I am fully satisfied w~th. I f I am not mistaf~en, I could send it to you w/thout &fay.

I am only afraid tfiat tile pu6fication deadiine mhjht have 6een missed. I hope, howeve5 tfiat a few wee~' ffehrf cou(d 6e excused.

As for the study on osmotic pressures, I eertain[y have not_qiven it up; aff the data are avaifa6fe, the plan fias 6een foffowed tftrom3G and the editi~ won't taf~ rowdY How- ever~ at this moment I shall defer this, so tfiat I can finish my Thesis first and mail it to you.

I imagine your trip to tile Afps was successful in off respects 14 and I already see tfiat many ofyour 6iofogicaf o6- servations are prMudn~, under your sftiffuf pen, one of those 6eaut/fuf 6h 3 volumes, which far, you so little ~fort to w ~ r ~ t ~ y seem ~ he born as if by m~ic.

My trt F to I~y was suV~, fi~r~y ~isturbed at ~ 6)/ my worries. Durim 3 t ~ journey I made the acquaintance of Mr. Hacdtd (?) in Marsei~; Mr. Carng in Florence; Mr. Pirrotta in Rome, and off tile ~lenffemen at ff3e zoofo~ica~ station in Napes. Mr. Carnd is in a redly 6oA shape. He has hoA severd stro~.s and his intellect is very much im- paired.

Mr. Pirrotta showed me around his Institute, which is superb. The 9arden 6efomdiru d to it fias some very 6eauti- fus tropica[ arborescent species. Amonfl others I admired an EPhedra altissima, a Grevillea robusta, some Casuarines, arras trees 5 -10 meters fthdh. Witf, aff these fivir~ species avaffafiG what 6eaut/fuf studies one cou/g do! The Insti- tute is very weft laid out. The rooms are very 6rkdftt and spacious: there is a chemicaf faboratoryj coffectionflaffer/es, a fi6rary that tof~ aff tile periodicals - notftin~ is missim d. NaphffwSene is used as a preservative in the herbarium. There is a rather nice coffection of instruments: micro- scopes of different ~ , a microspectroscope, an apparatus for monochromatic igumination, a Westmann mode[ chro- nostat ( absofu~y s&nt) etc.

In Odessa I was presented to Prof. Rishavi, z~ a man of heroic stature, sf~hffy reminiscent of Victor Emmanuel, With a fwatrious 6ear~ he eats fif~ four and drinlu accord- i~3cy. He was e~e.~y ~ . My c~rs of r~mme~- tion fiave made an exceffent impression. He fed me to expect that x would soon find eW~yme~.

I'ff write to you as soon as this is accomplished. The (oSoratory is not w/thout resources. There is some nice apparatus for 9asometry (peFfccted 6)/Timiryaz~v), a cfinostat by lffeffer and a nice au~nometer.

Mr. Rishavi was te~itu 3 me some trice an~do~.s a6out

Pfeffer (whom he profoundly +idi~s), that he hear+ from Sachs.

5imferopd is a Citt& provincied city with a whogy bu- reaucratic ~trnosphere. H~/~/Cy we five in the countryside and are isolated from the world. Aft around us there are sev- eral smog biffs, roc~ in places, with a r ed s te~e charac- ter: ~y a series of Progressivdy ft~her undulations you reach the foot of the mountains in the south-east direction - of t~e the ~ 3 ~ t is the chatyra. 3 (about z5so m e -

ters), which is located 15 ~m from here. I am pfanni~ to have frequent excursions in these mountains.

Historical Paper Chromatographia Vol.44,No.9/10, May 1997 553

With my manuscript I sting send you some of tile Pcants which seemeA to me to be new. If erie p(ams o f f , is country are of arty interest toyou I'ffsendexampfes toyou.

Here in tile plain tile climate is very dry, with tile sun bumitu 3 riot in summer and violent winds ... og (ex~iru 3 you to expect to find many ~zrotfiermic a&tnations. In tile mountains, on tile other fiand,/t often rains and tile plateau formiN tile top of every mountai~ is dways 9reen. Tile s~es are woo~.

I sfiou[d be 9ratefiff ifyou cou~ ~ me ~now about tile arrtvd of my Tfiesis and flow [otu 3 tile pfintitu 3 w/~ tofee.

Wou~ you be so ~ind as to pass on my 9reaings to ~rg. T~ury and ~ t a me~bers of your f ~ y .

Let me coru3ratufate you upon your fort&omiru 3 mar- tinge and wish you and your w ~ tile most peeect fiapp i- hesS.

Yours sineerdy,

M. Tswett

some bo~ in ~ for~ of bio~g~ obser~a~o, and inter- esan 9 exs/ccam.

Wit~ my Tfiesis I am sendin 9 you some sampks whid~ I flare found in tile surroundings. Ifyou find tfiem interestiru 3, I wou~ be 9fad to 9atfier tile endem/c plants as nke specimens for you to flare tfiem &iaf alwopriatdy.

Within a wee~ or two I propose to start wrt t i~ tile paper on osmotic pressures. In generd I shaft do my best to contribute fr~uenffy to tile Buffetin. 23 As soon as you flare received my Tfiesis you would greagy o6[ige me 6y inform- iru 3 mej since I am rattier anxious about it. I f it were lost!! Anyway you sfiou~ receive it at tile same time as t~is fetter. It was sent rexjistered.

With (rind regar& to you andyour wifi, sincere~

M. Tswett

Mr. Risfiavi to wfiom I ficd sfioum our Bulletin, said fie wou~ 6e very 9 ~ to receive issues of this publication. It wouf, d 6e very ~ind if you cou~ sent me No. 2. wfien you flare time. 24

Letter of Ju~y 18, 1896

Simferopd, 18 Ju~y 1896.

Dear Sir,

I flare tile pleasure to sendyou, ~y tile same post, tile f ind manuscript of my never-endin 9 Thesis. It is high time! You m~ht o6serve tfiat I flare cowfetdy resfiapeg it and I hope that in tile present form its vogue won't be too disproporaonate to tile effor~ it fins cost me.

I have remade tile figures so tile)/can be con&nsd onto one Plate and flare profited from tile improvements which you were ~ind enotujh to carry out in my first dr@.

I am endosiru 3 some remarks regardin 9 tile pdntin 9. You wiff do wfiatyou consider to be correct.

Now there is tile important question of fire proofs. It is out of tile question to send tfiem fiere - but on tile other fiand I cannot affow tfiatyou sfioufd beforce~ to see tfiem yoursdfl under tile present circumstances this would be a doubly tedious drudgery. I sfiaff tfiergCore as~you to entrust tile matter to a proof-reader wfiosefee I sfiog cover.

Now that I have rid mysdf of this wor~, which has been absorbin 9 tile best of my streru3th, I'm goin 9 to to~ a bit of a rest and prepare mysdf for tile prob~ms of stru e- 9ci~3 for ~istence. with ~ a@ of Mr. e.is~,,i i,~soon b~in to do somethim 3 about this and I fiopr tfiat I sfia~ find soma~iru 3 in tile autumn. In tile meantime I sfiaff see tile steppe and tile mountain again and try to return with

Pos t card o f Se[r 29j 1 8 9 6 "~s

S imferopof, 29. September 1896. 25 Dacfia Steven

Dear S irj

I am very worried that I have not had any message about my Tfiesis. I woufg be 9ratefur to 6e informed as to w~at ~ ~ e n e X to it.

Have tfie Archives 23 agrcexf to 6ear part of tile e~cpenses 4 trig P~ate? 26 Nothitu d is new fiere for tile moment. I am waititu 3 impatienffy for my worf~.

With ~,ind regarcfs, sincerdy yours

M. Tswett

Erratum. At tile end of tile fast cfiatner I twice wrote grouppement instead of groupement.

For tile paper on osmo~ pressures I am waitin 9 to re- mmto O ~ s a as I fear tfiat new pub&ations onthis subject cot~f flare appeareg since May.

Postcard; o f October 9~ 189627

Simf~ropof, 9. Octofier 189627 Dacfia Steven

Don't 6e off~ndexf, dear Sir, if I 6otfier you again about my Thesis in as~itu d you to speed up its publication as much as possible. It is of primary importance to flare this


dissertation without further &fay. Without tile Thesis and w/thout the gip(oma my hands are tied. 281 assume that tile first part of the dissertation wig appear shorgy. 2~ I hope that accorgiru 3 to the information you lave me the second half wig fie dgivered immediatdy and that in addition to the copies intended for the Faculty, I can simu&aneous(y ofrazin some copies, which I need urgently in my inquiries to tier a job.

I s hou~ Of-so askyou to send me a bifffor the expenses.

Than~iru 3 you in anticipation, with my kindest re- gards,

yours sincerdy

M. T.

Letter of october 15, 1896

Simferopofj 15. October 1896

Dear Si5

I was very ~reeoS(y surprisedtoday to receive the co D its of my Thesis - receipt of which was &&yed a bit & to my short stay at the University of O&ssa. 3~

How can I express my thanf~s sufficiently for off the care you have liven to tile process ofprepariru 3 it for p~fication! Ifindthat the Plate has beenveryweffflone andthe a/most pegCect type-setti~ m a ~ me sorry for the precious moments you flea to spend for the corrections.

I also tha~ you for comvi(i W the tab& of contents and for modifyi W some pofemieaf phrases whirl I over- looked chtrt~ the final editi~ process andwhose sharpness I W O I ~ have ttow re.gdreD.ed. 31

Amo~ the rare misprints which I have found there are some which seem to me raffter serious and whose cor- rection either in writi W or ~y t)Tography (gthere is stig time) would be very desiroSfe:

p. 146 (24) note 1 fine 6: they have printed 93 % instead Of 9 %

p. 194 (72) fine 2 from 6dow andp. 195 (73) fine 13 from the top and note 2 fine 1: tile)/have printed "absorption" instead of adsorptian.

p.161 (39) fine 8 from the top: "surtout" instead of $ouvent.

The misprint "absorption" is especiagy unfortunate and if there is no means of correctina 3 it in tile te~, it WOUhf be necessary to indicate it in tile Errata, tither in tile Bul- &tin or in tile Archives.

There are some other (ess ser/ous misprints: (Note: we omit the listing of these here, in the translation)

I am most dg/zjhted to have these copies of my Thesis. I shag send them to Petersfurg to Borodin 32 (you know him, I hope, he's a (earned man and extremdy a~ree~fe), and to Ovsyanni ov, Emeritus Professor of P nt Physiof-

myf t r's University co ue.3,

It floes not seem that I wiff find a positive outcome in O&ssa. I plan to wait impatiently for my Diploma and I'ff send the usud smdf bonus to Mr. Demont w/thout d&y. Woufd you be so kind as to &t him know the aff&ess endosed here.

The inactivity I see myself condemned to weflfis heaviCy on me; I hope to be a6fe to inform you ne~ time a6out a decisive step forward. May I reiterate my most sin- czregratitu&for aff you flare &ne for me; I wish to find an opportunity to be us~uf to you in return. I hope, Sis that you wig inform me from time to time oSout your wor~, your projects, your fife, everythiru 3 what woufg be Of.qreat interest to me.

My warmest rexjar&, yours tngy

M. Tswett

sw dmoh?' has asked for some copies of the work; one cogg 9ive him two.

Let ter o f November 13j 1 8 9 6

Simferopof, 13. November 1896.

Dear Sirj

I shaft not flo to Odessa at all Mr. Borodin from St. Petersfiur 9, whose advice I had asked when I was sendim d him my Thesis, has assured me tfiat I wig now receive the permission and support to wofft at the Physicd Laboratory Of the Aza&my Of sdenees. This is a positive result at fast, and I tftin~ that in my present circumstances I shall take advanteuje Of the proFosd and ma& my way more quirgy than I would otherwise. Thus I sfudd &ave within one or two weeks.

The reprints Of my Tfw~sis have been ~pt at the Cus- toms in O&ssa for 3 weeks.Just imo~jine - I have not fieen oS[e to of~in them yet! Ineigentagy, S i s case is fly no means exceptional This is the way our administration wor~5 .

Neither have I received Issue No. 3 Of the Buffetin, whose disV~h you to~ me oSout.

The artide on osmotic pressures which you reminded me r in your fast fetter is 6y no means forgouen. The reason is only that I have fieen a6sofutefy kdnorant of aW- thin 9 9oin9 on in the sciemific worfg for the past 6

Historical Paper Chromatographia Vol. 44, No. 9/10, May 1997 555

months, so I am anxious tfiat the literature on the su6ject misht have 9town durtw this time.

I therefore prefer to pos~one the editi~ of this arti~e to a t ime when I w i g 6e in a position to undertafeg trip nec-

essary 6i6fiogroThicaf search. No doubt you must have come to the conclusion that I am not a rdiabfe co(fiff3orator, since my manuscrttns are never ready in time.

I hope that up to now these procrastinations areparffy excusable ~y the circumstances. Nevertfidess, I sfiag in future do my 6r to be more punctual, in the German sty&.

Recently I have read in the Travaux de fa Soa impd- riafe des natur, de St. Pftersb., XXVII, fiwe i (1896) a short and very interestiru 3 paper wftich may have escaped your attention (there is a German summary in the same issue of the same collection): J. Kfirtse, 3s Zur Biofogie der Bfiite.

Duriru 3 a botanical excursion to Terrafera (near Dor- pat) 36 the author observedj in tile bushy dumps of Fradaria vesca in 6fossom, some Viola canina flore a[6o which were to be found exdusivdy there - wh i l e the same species outside these part icular dumps were only seen vvtth violet

flowers. Further on, at the e@e of a forest, the author re-

ported the same (ocafisation of Viola canina f l . a[6o in a

9roue of plants with white flowers (Mechringia, Oxalis, Anemone nemorosa). Also found in the same 9ro~ were 6 specimens of H~atica trifoba with white flowers (fate flowertru3) and w / t h perigonixg sections smager t h a n i n

o.ng ers. The mtthor considers tfiesefindirtcjs to be exp~ica6fr as

a phenomenon of mimicry, when tile flowers adopt the

white cofour of the ncighfiouring flowers - at this season of the year, this is the dominatin 5 co(ou5 as it is pr~Cerred 6y insects.

Don't you t h in~ tha t this question, which is ~ inter-

est to 6iofogy as a whole from a 9enerd point of view, wott~ 6e worth reinvesti~atinS, either ~y simple o6serva- tion, or ~y experimentation which would be conclusive? There won't ~y any6ody other tfian you aft& to study the question to the extent rexluired.

I shafff~you fmow a3out my departure andI foo~forward to of~inimj news from you and Mr. Thury in St. Pe- ters6ur 9.

K i n d retjarffs, yours

M. Tswet t

I irrt~ine that the big refat/ru d to my Thesis is with the reprints beiru d detained at the Customs in Odessa. If

not, I wig as~ theprtnter to sendit without delay to the fo- cod address, namely: Simfiropof - Country House Steven.

I have received my diploma. Recently I wrote to Mr. Thury. Has my fetter reached him?

Notes 1 Concerning the spelling of his family name, see later. With

regard to his first name, we use both Mikhail (the Russian way) and Michel (the French form). Usually, he did not indicate his middle name (his patronym): in his letters and in his publications in western journals, he simply wrote his name as M. Tswett.

z Dmitrii losifovich Ivanovskii (1864-1920), a Russian micro- biologist, who is generally considered as the discoverer of vi- ruses as a conclusion of his study, in 1890, of the mosaic di- sease of tobacco in the Crimea. In St. Petersburg, he became one of the best friends of M. Tswett. Toward the end of 1901 he was appointed as professor of botany at the University of Warsaw and he invited Tswett to join him there.

3 This Prize carried with it a cash premium of 1000 Rubels. It is interesting to compare this amount with salaries. The yearly pension of the widow of Semen Tswett (whose position, of a privy councillor, was equivalent to a general's rank) was 3500 Rubels which permitted her to educate two of her daughters at the Sorbonne, in Paris. In 1889, an ordinary (full) professor at a Russian university was paid 3000 Rubels per year.

4 Publications about Tswett's life usually speak about his "re- turning to Russia." However, one can only return to so- mewhere where he had already been. On the other hand M. Tswett has never been before in Russia: as mentioned he was born in Italy and has lived in Switzerland. This is the reason we use here the expression "move."

5 Clapar~de's full name was Edouard Jean Alfred Clapar~de, and Tswett consistently called him in his letters as Edouard. It is interesting, however, that in the preface of his Thesis, he gives his name as A. Clapardde. For details on the life and activities of Clapar6de, see Hais [19].

6 Jean-Marc Antoine Thury (1822-1905) had been associated with the Universit6 de Gen~ve as a professor since 1851. In 1872 he organized the Laboratoire de Botanique G~n&ale, which he directed until his retirement in 1900.Tswett carried out his thesis work in this laboratory. In 1896 Thury established the Bulletin (see note 2s) - edited by Briquet - as the major organ of this laboratory.

7 According to Dh6r6 [1] the collection in Geneva Botanical Library consisted of 15 letters and 8 postcards, all addressed to Briquet. The copies received by us contained indeed 15 letters, but only five postcards. Hais [19] referred to the possible existence of an additional postcard written in 1915, but this was an incorrect information, based on my error (LSE).

8 Charles Dh&d (1876-1955) was from 1900 to 1938 professor of physiology and biological chemistry at the University of Fribourg, in Switzerland. He was an early follower of Tswett, carrying out chromatographic investigations already in 1912. After his retirement in 1938, Dh4r6 moved to Geneva and became associated with the Institute of Zoology of the Uni- versity. Among others he also studied the life and activities of Tswett and published in 1943 his first definitive biography [11.

9 Robert Chodat (1865-1934) became in 1889 extraordinary and in 1891 ordinary professor of botany, medicine and pharmacy at Geneva University, and director of the Botani- cal Institute. In 1908-1910 he has served as the rector of the University.

lo This prize was established in 1829 by Lady Davy in memory of her husband who died in Geneva.

11 This report has not been published at that time; later, in St. Petersburg,Tswett expanded this work and finally published it in 1899 [24].

556 Chromatographia Vol. 44,No. 9/10, May 1997 Historical Paper

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

2(]

21

22

Emil Yung (I854-1918) became in 1883 associate and in 1895 professor of zoology at Geneva University. Tswett specifically thanks M. Thury in whose laboratory his research was conducted, and then lists those to whom he wants to specially express his gratitude for their advise, en- couragement, or lending books and instruments. These were John Briquet, his thesis advisor, Casimir de Condolle (1836-1918) whose library he used, Charles Soret (1854-1904: professor of mineralogy and experimental phy- sics), Philippe-August Guye (1862-1922: professor of chemistry) and Dr A. Clapardde 5 (his friend and colleague at the university). It is peculiar that Chodat, who was his professor of botany and in whose laboratory Tswett started his scientific career, is not mentioned at all, while two of his undergra- duate teachers (Soret and Guye) are. It is interesting to note that in the book about botanists in Geneva which Briquet compiled [21], Chodat is not included, although he was for a long time professor of botany at Geneva University. Briquet's biography [21] emphasizes the yearly extended botanical trips in which he participated with a few selected colleagues, mostly in the Swiss Alps, but also in other parts of Europe, which greatly contributed to their understanding of the flora of the region. The first of these trips was organized in 1895. Benedikt Pierre George Hochreutiner (1873-1959) was also a doctoral candidate in Thury's laboratory together with Tswett. Later he became professor of botany at Geneva Uni- versity. He supplied to Dh6r6, for his article [1], most of the information about Tswett. It is worthwhile to speak here briefly about Tswett's command of languages. French was his principal language: in fact even later, in Warsaw, he preferred to use it with his wife as the language of conversation. From his father, during his extended stays in Switzerland, Michel learned Russian although according to Sakodynskii, in the first years after his move to Russia, his Russian was far from perfect. His Certifi- cat de Maturit~ (high school diploma) shows that he learned German and English in high school [6, 7]. His step-mother was of German origin and he further improved his German with her. The fact that in 1898 (see Part II) Briquet proposed him a position in Germany also indicates that M. Tswett obviously had a good command of German. In his letter of Fe- bruary 22, 1897 (see Part II), M. Tswett mentions that he is working on his English and thus, he most likely could at least read in that language. There are also some indications that he at least understood Italian. Khristian Khristianovich Steven (1781-1863) was one of the famous early Russian botanists. In 1812 Steven founded a Botanical Garden in the village Nikita, near Yalta, where the climate is subtropical and, for a long period, he has served as its director. Later in his life Steven built a modest house, with a large garden, outside Simferopol and this was rented by Se- men Tswett from Steven's son. Champel was the name of the old house with a large garden in Geneva, in which Edouard Clapar~de was born and has lived in most of his life. Tswett often visited this house and most likely, he was actually living there for the last months of his stay in Geneva, after his father and the rest of the family left for Russia. Ludvig Al'bertovich Rishavi (1851-1915) was professor of botany and director of the Botanical Garden at Novorossisk University. At that time Rishavi was the most prominent botanist in southern Russia and evidently, Tswett had great hopes to find a position at this university. One must be careful not to mix up Novorossisk University located in Odessa, with the city o f Novorossisk, on the nort- hern shore of the Black Sea, over 300 km east of Odessa! The name of the University can be traced to the plans of Catheri- ne the Great to build a "new Russia" ("Novorossisk") in the south, in the territories just conquered from Turkey. We shall read about this many times. However, apparently, Tswett never finished this study and never wrote a paper about it.

23 This is the Bulletin de Laboratoire de Botanique G~n~rale de l'Universitd de Gen~ve, the periodical of the General Botani- cal Laboratory of Geneva University. It was founded by Thury in 1896, and edited by Briquet. On the other hand, the Archives des Sciences Physiques et Naturelles de Gendve was a general scientific periodical of Geneva University which already existed for a number of years. The two were published parallel and evidently, from 1896 on, most work from Thury's Laboratory was published in these two journals.

24 No. 1 of the Bulletin was published (at least nominally) in April 1896 and in it, Tswett had a short paper on the use of permanganates in the microtechniques [25]. Evidently, he took a copy of this issue with him to Russia. No. 2 of the Bulletin was published after Tswett's departure, most likely in the Summer, and he again had a short paper in it [26]. No. 3 is the issue in which his Thesis was published.

2.5 Tswett indicates the date as September 29, while the canceller of Simferopol post office has the date of September 16; the letter arrived in Geneva on October 4. This makes the September 29 date in the Julian calendar impossible: that would correspond to October 12 in the Gregorian calendar, what is obviously absurd. Assuming that September 16 OS (the cancellation of Simferopol post office) is correct, that would correspond to September 28 in the Gregorian calendar: this means that Tswett made a one-day error in calcula- ting the proper date.

26 Tswett's Thesis as published in both journals had a very ela- borate color plate: its printing was probably quite expensive in 1896.

27 October 9 0 S would correspond to October 21 in the Grego- rian calendar: since the card arrived at Geneva post office on October 15, this is obviously an absurd date. On the other hand, the canceller of Simferopol post office is dated Sep- tember 27 OS, what corresponds to October 9, the date indicated by Tswett in his card.

28 Tswett finally started to realize the problems he was facing in obtaining an academic employment, although evidently, he was not yet aware of the problem having a foreign degree which is not recognized in Russia.

29 As we have seen in Briquet's review, Tswett's Thesis consisted of two parts: discussion of plasmic membranes and the protoplasma, and discussion of the chloroplasts; and he apparently assumed that they will be published separately. Ac- tually, the two parts were published together in the Bulletin under the title Etudes de physiologie cellulaire: contribution d la connaissance des mouvements du protoplasme, des membranes plasmiques et des chloroplastes ("Studies on the physiology of cells: contribution to our knowledge on the move- ment of the protoplasm, on plastic membranes and chloroplasts"). However, the Archives split the Thesis into three parts: Part I was entitled Etudes de physiologie cellulaire, 1: Des membranes plasmiques et des mouvements du protoptas- me; the title of Part II was Les chloroplastes; and of Part III, Etude des chloroplastes par la mdthode m~rotomique. In the Bulletin publication, this Part III is actually a subchapter of the discussion of the chloroplasts.

3o We are not sure which publication did Tswett receive at this time, but most likely, it was neither the Bulletin, nor the Ar- chives, but some other printing. We have not seen the respec- tive issue(s) of the Archives, but only the Bulletin: the interesting is that it has an Errata, listing all the corrections included in Tswett's letter. In other words, the final printing of No. 3 of the Bulletin occurred only after Briquet received this letter of Tswett. The publication date of No. 3 is given on its title page as October 15,1896, but obviously, this is a nominal date: the actual publication date had to be later. Tswett's letter is dated October 15 but we are not sure whether this is given in the Julian or the Gregorian calendar, but anyway, Bri- quet cannot have received Tswett's letter before the end of October - early November. Note also, that while Tswett received the printed text of the Thesis, he did not receive at this time the actual issue (No. 3) of the Bulletin, which means that it was not yet ready. He acknowledges receipt of that only in his December 30, 1896, letter (see Part If. of this series).

Historical Paper Chromatographia Vol.44,No.9/10, May 1997 557

It is most likely that at this time Tswett received a separately printed text, serving as his final Ph.D. Thesis to be submitted to the Faculty. In the Bulletin Tswett's paper has a double pagination: a continuous numbering of the pages of this issue (pp. 125-206), and page numbers 1-85 in parentheses. At the same time, the next article in the same issue of the Bulletin by Briquet [27] has only the regular page numbers (pp. 207-226). Thus, the numbers in parentheses in Tswett's paper probably represent the pagination of a separate printing of the Thesis and this is what Tswett received at this time.

31 This is an interesting remark. We know that later during his scientific activities, Tswett was heavily engaged in polemics, sharply attacking everybody who disagreed with him, or had a different opinion - and some of these attacks included ex- pressions which today, no scientific publication would per- mit to use. Evidently Tswett had a tendency for such sharp polemics already at the beginning of his scientific career, but here, he was still restrained by his supervisor.

32 Ivan Porfir'evieh Borodin (1847-1930) was professor of botany in St. Petersburg, a member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, and very active in the field of chlorophylls and plant anatomy. He is often mixed up with his namesake, Alexander P Borodin (1833-1887), the famous Russian com- poser, who in his main job, was professor of chemistry at the Medico-Surgical Academy (University) in St. Petersburg, and an internationally recognized organic chemist.

33 Filip Ovsyannikov studied at the University of Dorpat/Yu- re'ev 36 in the middle of the 19th century (Semen N. Tswett, Mikhail's father studied there in 1848-1851 and, according to M. Tswett, they were classmates). He became one of the important Russian physiologists, co-author of the first Rus- sian book on histology. We do not know which university he was affiliated with (it was not Dorpat/Yure'ev).

34 We do not know who Stapelmohr was. 35 Johannes Christopher Klinge was a graduate of the Universi-

ty of Dorpat/Yure'ev, 36 a prominent student of Edmund Russow, professor of botany at Dorpat between 1874 and 1895.

36 Dorpat is the Swedish/German name of the city of Tartu in present-day Estonia, seat of one of the oldest universities in this region. It was founded in 1632 by the Swedish king Gu- stavus II Adolphus: at that time the Baltic shores belonged to Sweden. After the annexation of this area into Russia, the school was reorganized in 1802 as a Russian Imperial university, however, the teaching language remained German (let us not forget that the Baltic area was originally settled by the German knights). The town's Russian name in this period was Derpt which was then changed in 1893 to Yure'ev, in con- junction with the Russification of the university, also chan- ging the teaching language to Russian. We shall give more information about this school in Part III. of our series, in con- junction with the last letters of Tswett.

37 Evidently Briquet spent decades to compile this book; however, it was published posthumously, only nine years after his death, in January 1940, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Societ~ Botanique Suisse. The biography of Briquet (written by V. Crumi~re-Briquet and E Cavillier) was added later to the book.

References [1] Ch. Dh~r~, "Michael Tswett - le Cr6ateur de l'Analyse

Chromatographique par Adsorption: sa Vie, ses Travaux sur les Pigments Chlorophylliens." Candollea (Gen~ve) 10, 23-73 (1943).

[2] T. Robinson, "Michael Tswett." Chymia 6,146--161 (1960). [3] K. L Sakodynskii, "M. Tswett - His Life." J. Chromatogr. 49,

2-17 (1970). [4] K. L Sakodynskii, "The Life and Scientific Work of Michael

Tswett." J. Chromatogr. 73, 303-360 (1972). [5] K. 1. Sakodynskii, K. Chmutov, "M. S. Tswett and Chromato-

graphy." Chromatographia 5, 303-360 (1972).

[6] K. 1. Sakodynskii, "New Data on M. S. Tswett's Life and Work." J. Chromatogr. 220, 1-28 (1981).

[7] K. 1. Sakodynskii, Michael Tswett - Life and Work. Carlo Erba Strumentazione, Milan, undated (1981); 62 pp.

[8] E. M. Senchenkova, Mikhail Semenovich Tswett. Nauka Publisher, Moscow, 1973; 307 pp.

[9] L.S. Ettre, "Evolution of Liquid Chromatography: a Histori- cal Overview." In Cs. Horv(tth (editor), High Performance Liquid Chromatography - Advances and Perspectives, Vol. 1, Academic Press, New York, NY, 1980; pp. 1-74 (Tswett: pp. 22-30).

[10] L.S. Ettre, K. I. Sakodynskii, "M. S. Tswett and the Discovery of Chromatography. I: Early Work (1899-1903)." Chromato- graphia 35, 223-231 (1993).

[11] L.S. Ettre, K. 1. Sakodynskii, "M. S. Tswett and the Discovery of Chromatography. II: Completion of the Development of Chromatography (1903-1910)." Chromatographia 35, 329-338 (1993).

�9 [12] L.S. Ettrg "M. S. Tswett and the 1918 Nobel Prize in Chemi- stry." Chromatographia 42, 343-351 (1996).

[13] V.G. Berezkin, "Mikhail Semenovich Tswet t - a Biographi- cal Sketch." In V. G. Berezkin (compiler), Chromatographic Adsorption Analysis - Selected Works of M. S. Tswett. Ellis Horwood, Chichester, 1990; pp. 95-102.

[14] M. Tswett, "Etudes de Physiology Cellulaire." Bull. Lab. bot. g6n. Univ. Gen~ve 1 (3), 125-206 (1896); Arch. Sci. phys. natur. Gen~ve 4 (2), 228-260, 339-348, 467--486 (1896).

[15] M.S. Tswett, "Fiziko-Khimicheskoe Stroenie Khlorofil'nogo Zerna. Eksperimental'noe i Kriticheskoe Issledovanie" (The Physico-chemical Structure of the Chlorophyll Par- ticle. Experimental and Critical Study). Trudy Obshchestva Estestvoispytatelei pri Imperatorski Kazanskom Universi- tet 35 (3), 1-268 (1901).

[16] M. Tswett, "Physikalisch-chemische Studien tiber alas Chlo- rophyll. Die Adsorption." Ber. dtsch, botan. Ges. 24, 316-323 (1906).

[17] M. Tswett, "Adsorptionsanalyse und die chromatographi- sche Methode. Anwendung auf die Chemic des Chloro- phylls." Ber. dtsch, botan. Ges. 24, 384--393 (1906).

[18] M.S. Tswett, Khromofilly v Rastitel'nom i Zhivotnom Mire (Chlorophylls in the Plant and Animal World). Karbasnikov Publishers, Warsaw, 1910; 380 pp. (For a partial English translation, see ref. 13, pp. 35-79).

[19] 1. M. Hais, "Tswett's Letters to Clapar~de." J. Chromatogr. 440, 509-531 (1988).

[20] 1. M. Hais, "Tswett's Letters to Clapar~de on Tropism and Taxes." J. Chromatogr. 452, 5-16 (1988).

[21] John Briquet, Biographies des Botanistes ~ Gen6ve, de 1500 1931. Published as Vol. 50a of the Bulletin de la Societ6 Bo-

tanique Suisse, Geneva, 1940; 494 pp. Briquet's biography is on pp. 71-93. 37

[22] G. Hesse, H. Weil, Michael Tswett's erste chromatographi- sche Schrift. M. Woelm, Eschwege, 1954; 36 pp. An English edition of the same text ("Michael Tswett's First Paper on Chromatography") was published in 1957.

[23] L M. Hais, "Tswett and the Nobel Prizes." J. Chromatogr. 86, 283-288 (1973).

[24] M. Tswett, "Uber die Verkn0pfung des ~iusseren und des in- neren Leptoms der Solanaceen durch markst~indige Lep- tombt~ndel." Ber. dtsch, botan. Ges. 17, 231-235 (1899).

[25] M. Tswett, "Sur l'Emploi des Permanganates dans la Micro- technique." Bull. Lab. bot. g6n. Univ. Gen~ve 1 (1), 13-15 (1896); Arch. Sci. phys. natur. Gen~ve 4 (1), 481--483 (1896).

[26] M. Tswett, "Description d'un Idiom~tre pour l'Etude de Transpiration V6g6tale." Bull. Lab. bot. g6n. Univ. Gen~ve 1 (2), 210-211 (1896);

[27] Z Briquet, "Le Laboratoire de Botanique G6n6rale ~ l'Ex- position Nationale Suisse de Gen~ve 1896." Bull. Lab. bot. g6n. Univ. Gen~ve I (3), 207-226 (1896).

Received: Feb 26,1997 Accepted: Mar 3,1997


M. S. Tswett's Correspondence With John Briquet I. Review of Tswett's Ph.D. Thesis by Briquet, And...

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