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On the first page of this biography is recorded the birth of Jean Martin Charcot to a 28-year-old carriage builder and his 16-year-old wife. On the second page he is described as a taciturn, cold, reserved, and studious youth. By the fourth page le Maître has reached his internship and prepared a thesis on gout. Thereafter, although this account is divided into two sections, one relating the life and the other the work of Charcot, the impression is readily developed that Charcot's life drew meaning almost entirely from his work. There prevails throughout a justified reverence for le fondateur de la neurologie. His exacting and comprehensive devotion to his subject, his application to both pathology and clinical experimentation, and his excellence as a teacher and physician are extolled; his limitations are explained as those imposed by the inadequacies of the available techniques and data. This appraisal does not represent the