PREFACE.

not because the author preferred them to their originals, but because he doubted his ability to better them. It is one thing to find fault with a translator for his shortcomings, but quite another thing to avoid them in one's own translation. The translators to whom the author of this Biography is indebted are: Thomasina Ross, for the "Voyage;" Mrs. Sabine for the "Ansichten der Natur;" Helen Maria Williams, for the "Vues des Cordillères ;" and John Black for the "Essai politique." The last two works are out of print, though copies are occasionally to be found at the old book stalls; the "Ansichten der Natur," and the "Voyage," or as it is christened in the translation, the "Personal Narrative," are in print, though scarcely within the reach of the general reader, never having been reprinted in this country. The English edition of the "Personal Narrative" costs three times as much as the present volume.

The chapter on Central Asia, in Book III., which is the substance of Rose's "Reise nach dem Ural," is rewritten and enlarged from Mr. Taylor's "Cyclopædia of Modern Travel." These, as far as the author remembers, are the principal sources to which he is indebted. He should men tion, perhaps, the various French and English Encyclopadias from which he has filled up his sketches of some of Humboldt's contemporaries, but Encyclopædias have no authors, as everybody knows; besides, they are made for the very purpose to which he has put them. The same

may be said of the journals of the day.

The reader now understands the extent of the author's

obligations in this Biography. Of the Biography itself it does not become the author to speak, further than to say that he has taken great pains to make it accurate. If it shall be considered as readable as it is accurate, he will have accomplished his purpose, which was to write a popu lar life of Humboldt.

INTRODUCTION.

A BIOGRAPHY of Alexander Von Humboldt, which shall contain a full and conscientious account of his life and labors, written in a style sufficiently clear and untechnical to meet the popular tastes, has long been a necessity in our literature. Those biographies which are already in existence do not possess this character: they are rather chronicles of his achievements in the various departments of natural science, than stories of a life almost unexampled for its wealth of experience, its labors, and successes. The "Lives of the Brothers Humboldt," by Klencke, which has been translated into English, is very fragmentary in this respect; it passes over unnoticed, many episodes in the life of Alexander Von Humboldt, which are of great interest to the general reader. In fact, it has only been in the closing years of his life, that the excellences of his character, as a man, apart from his distinction as a savant, have received full and general acknowledgment.

No task could have been pleasanter to me than that of attempting to bring home to the familiar acquaintance of

the great reading public of the United States, the history of the great man, with whose friendship I was honored; and, as the literary labors I had already on hand prevented me from undertaking such a work, it is all the more grati fying to me to know that it has been faithfully and conscientiously done by one every way capable of the performance. Having examined the biography which follows, I can testify to its exactness and completeness, and therefore— though the subject of the book is its own sufficient recommendation--cordially accede to the request of the author, that I should add a few words of introduction, embodying my own impressions of Humboldt's character.

When I first saw him, he was in his eighty-eighth year, but, except in the bowed head and slow step,showed scarcely any signs of bodily decay. A portrait, painted nearly forty years before, at which time his hair was already gray, showed that time had occasioned but little change in his appearance, while its only effect upon his mind was, perhaps, a lack of that power of concentration which enabled him to master so many various departments of natural science. He was still every inch a king, with no faculty appreciably dulled, no sympathy blunted, no hope for the increase of human knowledge or generous aspiration for the good of his kind less earnest than in his prime of life. A year later, I found him broken, indeed, in bodily health, yet still capable of sixteen hours of continuous mental labor, and his last letter to me, written but a short time before his death, betrayed no sign of failing faculties, though the hand which traced it was evidently weak and trembling.

In the castle at Tegel, where he was born, and in the park of which he now sleeps beside his brother, hangs a portrait of him, painted at the age of thirty-five. He is there represented as man of rather less than the medium stature, but firmly and symmetrically ouilt, with a full, keen, ardent face, firm lips, clear blue eyes, and thick locks of chestnut hair, clustering about his square, massive brow. He wears a green coat, knee-breeches, and a heavy cloak lined with red. He is represented as leaning against a rock on a slope of the Andes, the snowy dome of Chimborazo filling up the background of the picture. In comparing this picture with his living presence, I found that the shoulders had stooped, leaving the head bent forward, as if weighed down by the burden of its universal knowledge; the hair had grown snow-white, and somewhat thinner; the mouth had lost its clear, sharp outline, and the eager, energetic expression of the face was gone but the blue eyes were as serene and youthful as ever, and the skin as fair, smooth, and ruddy, almost, as that of a young

man.

The first impression produced by Humboldt's face was that of its thorough humanity. The blood which fed his restless brain never weakened the pulsations of his human heart. Beneath that devotion to science which he illustrated by the labours of seventy-five years, burned steadily and unwaveringly the flame of sympathy for his kind. Probably no man who ever lived has given aid and encouragement to so great a number of aspiring and deserving men. I know instances of persons in humble life having sought