The Shadow of Great Britain

Chapter 1258: Chapter 155: Problem Student (2)

All the civil servants in Britain know that the longer a person works in a specific department, the greater his power and influence.

Even if he is just the most ordinary clerk, serving in the department for 58 years is enough to make his position in that department extremely special.

Even small clerks can rely on their seniority to make a name for themselves, let alone Blumenbach, who was once a ‘prodigy of youth, and now a prodigy of old age’.

Furthermore, due to the special nature of the teaching profession, having taught at the University of Gottingen for so many years, Blumenbach naturally brought up many influential students.

Among them, his most famous student recently came to Gottingen to attend the All-Europe Electromagnetic Conference.

That is none other than the President of the Berlin Academy of Sciences—Mr. Alexander von Humboldt.

Even when the Duke of Sussex came to visit University of Gottingen, he could summon other professors, but he explicitly stated beforehand that he must visit Blumenbach personally.

Because back when the Duke of Sussex and his prince brothers were studying in Gottingen, Blumenbach was already a highly esteemed old professor.

After so many years, other professors usually achieve less as they age, but Blumenbach’s achievements only increased with experience. The “Principles of Physiology” and “Manual of Comparative Anatomy” he compiled have always been fundamental textbooks in the Deutsch University Medical College, and many medical colleges in Britain and France have also listed them as compulsory subjects.

His anthropological work “Ten Skull Theory” laid the foundation for cranial measurement and creatively proposed the idea of ‘five major human races, but only one species’.

From Blumenbach’s work, the concepts of Caucasian (white race), Mongolian (yellow race), Malay (brown race), Ethiopian (black race), and American (red race) emerged.

Moreover, this brilliant old man sharply refuted some racist scholars who misused his theory and pointed out concisely: the morphological differences among races are mainly caused by climate and lifestyle. In addition, as a supporter of monogenesis, Blumenbach insisted that humanity originated from a single point and directly exposed the hidden agenda of polygenesis proponents: the ultimate aim of polygenesis is to promote racial inequality.

With these groundbreaking academic achievements and his students flourishing across the European continent, Blumenbach firmly established his status as a prominent figure in medicine and biology.

For such a venerable gentleman, everyone from national special representatives like Sir Arthur Hastings to stubborn problem students like Bismarck could only treat him with utmost respect when they saw him.

Fortunately, Blumenbach cared little for politics; his interests mostly lay in academic pursuits. Besides teaching students, he spent his time writing at home, and occasionally indulged in the hospital, hoping to randomly encounter some minor surgical procedures.

The facial gunshot wound he encountered this time was very much to Blumenbach’s liking.

While the old man was enjoying himself in the operating room, the school leaders were anxiously waiting outside.

They were not only worried about the student’s surgery not going well but also concerned that the old man would tire himself out.

The two University Stewards, Schaefer and Doser, even got angry right outside the operating room.

“Why didn’t you hold back Mr. Blumenbach a bit? Don’t you remember that he’s already 81 this year?”

“Doctoral students are the school’s precious assets, and Mr. Blumenbach even more so! I can’t believe that with so many professors and lecturers in the Medical College, it had to be Mr. Blumenbach himself to perform this surgery!”

The doctors could only awkwardly apologize, “We thought the same, but as you know, Mr. Blumenbach himself insisted, so… we dared not stop him.”

“Moreover, the situation was urgent at the time; if we had argued with him, we might have missed the best treatment window.”

Schaefer, upon hearing the doctors’ explanations, was so angry that he blew his beard and glared, “You’re just making excuses!”

Arthur, seeing that the two groups were about to argue, interrupted by saying, “Alright, it’s too late to regret now. Besides, I just went in to check, and thankfully, the surgery is progressing quite smoothly. Mr. Blumenbach, despite his age, has ample surgical experience, so there shouldn’t be any problems.”

With that said, Arthur turned his attention to the two stewards, still remembering their alleged report about him to the Confederal Parliament.

“Have you figured out the issue? Who is the student lying inside? What was the reason for their suicide?”

This time, before the two stewards could speak, Bismarck eagerly reported, “Sir, the person lying inside is a doctoral student from the Medical College, Mr. Matthias Schleiden. After the incident, the Student Union promptly sent someone to find Mr. Schleiden’s roommate. According to them, Mr. Schleiden is a new doctoral student who just enrolled this year, and they just got to know him. However, they recalled hearing Mr. Schleiden say he studied law at Jena University during his undergraduate.”

“A law student choosing to pursue a doctorate in medicine?” Arthur raised an eyebrow in surprise, “That’s quite a leap in fields.”

“Indeed,” Agares, perched on the doorframe, chimed in, “It’s like studying history in undergrad and ending up with a doctorate in electromagnetism.”

Arthur glanced at the sarcastic Red Devil and then asked, “Have you acquired his student file?”

Upon hearing this, Doser retrieved a file folder tucked under his arm and handed it over, “The file is here. Based on his records, we cannot entirely dismiss the possibility that his suicide might have been politically motivated.”

As a typical European Continental country, even though Hanover is among the most liberal regions in Germany, the records expected to be in a student file are still complete. Moreover, since Schleiden’s undergraduate studies were at Jena University, his undergraduate experience was meticulously recorded in accordance with the “Carlsbad Decrees.”

Arthur, with just a glance, discerned quite a bit from the file.

Mr. Schleiden was born in the Free City of Hamburg and comes from a family of doctors in Hamburg. At 19, he entered Jena University to study law. During his time at Jena, he was neither outstanding nor poor in performance. However, given the absence of disciplinary actions and no transfer records, he seemed to be quite a well-behaved student, at least not a troublemaker like Bismarck and Heine.

According to Schleiden’s own account in the file, he graduated from Jena University in 1827. He then followed his father’s wishes to open his own law office in Hamburg.

Logically, a lawyer with a private practice is unlikely to pursue a doctorate degree, especially across disciplines into medicine.

Because, in terms of social status, although both lawyer and doctor are good professions, lawyers clearly have a more respectable work environment and social standing than doctors.

On this matter, Schleiden also provided an explanation in the file.

He claimed he did not have a knack for business and was weary of the word-battles in court. Growing up in a family of doctors, he thought of taking a different path by studying medicine to see if it could rekindle his zest for life.

Just as Arthur put down the file, Doser immediately spoke up, “Sir, I think once the surgery is over and the patient is initially recovered, we should promptly conduct a political investigation on him. I seriously suspect this incident may not be a suicide. As everyone knows, why bother committing suicide in a public square? He seemed to want to draw attention, perhaps his original intention was not to commit suicide. It could be that some students, after failing to cause trouble in Gottingen, use the excuse of suicide to cover their political activities, just like the series of incidents that recently occurred in Italy.”