afterwards utilized in 1851 by Humboldt in the third volume of his Kosmos. The periodicity of sun-spots is now fully recognized (see SUN); and to Schwabe is thus due the credit of one of the most important discoveries in astronomy. See H. H. Turner, Astronomical Discovery (1904).
SCHWALBACH, or LANGENSCHWALBACH, a favourite German
health resort, in the Prussian province of Hesse-Nassau,
pleasantly situated in a deep valley, near the junction of the
Schwalbach with the Aar, 12 m. N.W. from Wiesbaden, on
the railway Dotzheim-Dietz. Permanent population (1905)
2836. Besides a large kursaal, the town has four churches,
two Evangelical, a Roman Catholic and an English, a synagogue
and several schools. There are eight springs, which are
largely impregnated in varying proportions with iron and
carbonic acid, and are used both for drinking and bathing.
They are especially efficacious in feminine disorders, and the
greater number of visitors (about 6000 annually) are ladies.
The public grounds are prettily laid out and there are numerous
fashionable hotels.
See Frickhoffer, Die Eisenquellen zu Schwalbach (2nd ed., Schwalbach, 1888), and A. Genth, Geschichte des Kurortes Schwalbach (3rd ed., Wiesbaden, 1884).
SCHWANN, THEODOR (1810-1882), German physiologist,
was born at Neuss in Rhenish Prussia on the 7th of December
1810. His father was a man of great mechanical talent; at
first a goldsmith, he afterwards founded an important printing
establishment. Schwann inherited his father's tastes, and
the leisure of his boyhood was largely spent in constructing
little machines of all kinds. He studied at the Jesuits' college
in Cologne and afterwards at Bonn, where he met Iohannes
Muller, in whose physiological experiments he soon came to
assist. He next went to Wtirzburg to continue his medical
studies, and thence to Berlin to graduate in 1834. Here he
again met Muller, who had been meanwhile translated to Berlin
and who finally persuaded him to enter on a scientific career
and appointed him assistant at the anatomical museum.
Schwann in 1838 was called to the chair of anatomy at the Roman
Catholic university of Louvain, where he remained nine years.
In 1847 he went as professor to Liége, where he remained till
his death on the 11th of January 1882. He was of a peculiarly
gentle and amiable character, and remained a devout Catholic
throughout his life. It was during the four years spent under
the influence of Müller at Berlin that all Schwann's really valuable
work was done. Muller was at this time preparing his great
book on physiology, and Schwann assisted him in the experimental
work required. His attention being thus directed to
the nervous and muscular tissues, besides making such histological
discoveries as that of the envelope of the nerve-fibres
which now bears his name, he initiated those researches in
muscular contractility since so elaborately worked out by Du
Bois Reymond and others. He was thus the first of Müller's
pupils who broke with the traditional vitalism and worked
towards a physico-chemical explanation of life. Mtiller also
directed his attention to the process of digestion, which Schwann
showed to depend essentially on the presence of a ferment
called by him pepsin. Schwann also examined the question
of spontaneous generation, which he greatly aided to disprove,
and in the course of his experiments discovered the organic
nature of yeast. In fact the whole germ theory of Pasteur, as
well as its antiseptic applications by Lister, is traceable to his
influence. Once when he was dining with Schleiden in 1837,
the conversation turned on the nuclei of vegetable cells.
Schwann remembered having seen similar structures in the
cells of the notochord (as had been shown by Muller)
and instantly realized the importance of connecting the two
phenomena. The resemblance was confirmed without delay
by both observers, and the results soon appeared in his famous
Microscopic Investigations on the Accordanoe in the Structure
and- Growth of Plants and Animals (Berlin, 1839; trans. Sydenham
Society, 1847). The cell theory was thus definitely constituted.
In the course of his verifications of the cell theory,
in which he traversed the whole field of histology, he proved
the cellular origin and development of the most highly differentiated
tissues, nails, feathers, enamels, &c. His generalization
became the foundation of modern histology, and in the
hands of Rudolf Virchow (whose cellular pathology was an
inevitable deduction from Schwann) afforded the means of
placing modern pathology on a truly scientific basis.
An excellent account of Schwann's life and work is that by Léon
Frédéricq (Liege, 1884). M
SCHWANTHALER, LUDWIG MICHAEL (1802-1848), German
sculptor, was born in Munich on the 26th of August 1802. His
family had been sculptors in Tirol for three centuries; young
Ludwig received his earliest lessons from his father, and the
father had been instructed by the grandfather. The last to
bear the name was Xaver, who worked in his cousin Ludwig's
studio and survived till 1854. For successive generations the
family lived by the carving of busts and sepulchral monuments,
and from the condition of mechanics rose to that of artists.
From the Munich gymnasium Schwanthaler passed as a student
to the Munich academy; at first he purposed to be a painter,
but afterwards reverted to the plastic arts of his ancestors.
His talents received timely encouragement by a commission
for an elaborate silver service for the king's table. Cornelius
also befriended him; the great painter was occupied on designs
for the decoration in fresco of the newly erected Glyptothek,
and at his suggestion Schwanthaler was employed on the sculpture
within the halls. Thus arose between painting, sculpture,
and architecture that union and mutual support which characterized
the revival of the arts in Bavaria. Schwanthaler in
1826 went to Italy as a pensioner of the king, and on a second
visit in 1832 Thorwaldsen gave him kindly help. His skill was
so developed that on his return he was able to meet the extraordinary
demand for sculpture consequent on King Ludwig's
passion for building new palaces, churches, galleries and museums,
and he became the fellow-worker of the architects Klenze,
Gartner and Ohlmiiller, and of the painters Cornelius, Schnorr
and Hess. Owing to the magnitude and multitude of the plastic
products they turned out, over-pressure and haste in design
and workmanship brought down the quality of the art. The
works of Schwanthaler in Munich are so many and miscellaneous
that they can only be briefly indicated. The new palace is
peopled with his statues: the throne-room has twelve imposing
gilt bronze figures IO ft. high; the 'same palace is also enriched
with a frieze and with sundry other decorations modelled and
painted from his drawings. The sculptor, like his contemporary
painters, received help from trained pupils. The same prolific
artist also furnished the old Pinakothek with twenty-five marbles,
commemorative of as many great painters; likewise he supplied
a composition for the pediment of the exhibition building facing
the Glyptothek, and executed sundry figures for the public
library and the hall of the marshals. Sacred art lay outside
his ordinary routine, yet in the churches of St Ludwig and St
Mariahilf he gave proof of the widest versatility. The Ruhmeshalle
afforded further gauge of unexampled power of production;
here alone is work which, if adequately studied, might have
occupied a lifetime; ninety-two metopes, and, conspicuously,
the colossal but feeble figure of Bavaria, 60 ft. high, rank among
the boldest experiments. A short life of forty-six years did not
permit serious undertakings beyond the Bavarian capital, yet
time was found for the groups within the north pediment of the
Walhalla, Ratisbon, and also for numerous portrait statues,
including those of Mozart, Tean Paul Richter, Goethe and
Shakespeare. Schwanthaler died at Munich in 1848, and left
by will to the Munich academy all his models and studies, which
now form the Schwanthaler Museum.
SCHWARTZE, TERESA (1852-), Dutch portrait painter, was born at Amsterdam, the daughter of Johan Georg Schwartze (1814-1874), from whom she received her first training, before studying for a year under Gabriel Max and Franz von Lenbach in Munich. In 1879 she went to Paris to continue her studies under jean Jacques Henner. Her portraits are remarkable for excellent character drawing, breadth and vigour of handling and rich quality of pigment. She is one of the few women painters
