Page:Memoirs of Henry Villard, volume 2.djvu/362

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
340
HENRY VILLARD
[1890

he had lost in 1883. As soon as he was able to do so, he resumed his practice of using his spare means for the benefit of others, and made good the promise of a donation to the Law School of Harvard University, which his misfortunes had prevented him from completing. He contributed largely to the building fund of the Bed Cross Hospital and Nurses Training School at Munich, Bavaria. He also added to his previous gifts to the hospital at Speyer and to the Industrial Museum of his native province, and made a large subscription towards the Protestant Memorial Church at Speyer in honor of the famous Protest of 1529 at the sitting of the Imperial Diet in that city. Mr. Villard had a documentary history of Speyer compiled and printed at his own expense, and paid for the publication of an historical work on the Palatinate by the historian Professor Friedrich Menzel, of Bonn, a native of the province. At the request of the historian Von Sybel, he paid the salaries of two of his assistants pursuing special studies in Germany and Italy. On this side of the water, he provided the means for three years for an archaeological exploration of the antiquities of Peru by A. F. Bandelier, and presented the collections resulting from it to the American Museum of Natural History in New York. He furthermore again became a regular contributor to numerous public charities and other enterprises for the public good.

While his business interests were thriving, Mr. Villard did not overlook the danger which menaced the whole country from the introduction into Congress of the Sherman silver-purchasing act. He saw at once that, if it became a law, the substitution of the silver for the gold standard would be but a question of time, and that very short. Hence, he tried to arouse the most influential bankers to realize the threatening prospect, and to urge them to an active agitation against it in the press and at Washington, but with only limited success. He found hardly any one willing to go with him to the capital to work against the passage of the measure. Indeed, Mr. Villard had, years