BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF FREDERICK WOlILER. 54 i 



the kitchen was safe in his sight, and it remains a wonder to the pres- 

 ent day that he did not set the house on fire or poison some of the 

 family by his operations in the kitchen ! The breaking of a flask of 

 chlorine at this period nearly suffocated him, and some severe burns 

 by phosphorus suggested greater caution. He was particularly in- 

 terested in experimenting with the voltaic battery, and succeeded in 

 constructing one with one hundred small pairs of plates, with which 

 he repeated Sir Humphry Davy's experiment of the isolation of potas- 

 sium. All his efforts were now concentrated upon an attempt to pre- 

 pare potassium in a chemical way, according to the method proposed 

 by Curadeau. An old graphite crucible, which Bunsen, the director 

 of the mint, gave to him, served as furnace, and, armed with a bellows 

 loaned by the same person, the experiment was tried in the laundry, 

 with his sister as assistant to blow the bellows. Great was his rejoic- 

 ing when he perceived the balls of metal in the gun-barrel attached 

 to the retort, and the sister was hardly less gratified at the result of 

 their combined efforts. But the young chemist carried on other studies, 

 to the detriment of his Latin and Greek. He constantly had instruc- 

 tion in drawing, to which his father, who himself drew well, attached 

 much importance. He learned to draw from Nature, and his sketch- 

 book always accompanied him on his excursions in the neighborhood 

 and on the Rhine ; he even tried painting in oil, and etching, for which 

 he received much encouragement from the painter Morgenstern. 



A rich present of antique Roman coins, w r hich a friend of his father 

 made him, increased his desire to collect similar ones to such a degree 

 that he succeeded in getting together all of the coins of the Roman em- 

 perors in their order of succession ; Roman urns, lamps, legion-stones, 

 which at that time were still found in the ancient Roman encamp- 

 ments of the neighborhood, were also collected, and aroused in him 

 much interest in Roman history. He likewise commenced to occupy 

 himself with German literature, and to make himself acquainted with 

 the poets of the last century, in which studies a young artist, his draw- 

 ing master, was his guide. He was too young to appreciate the great 

 political movements of the time, yet he always remembered with 

 interest having seen Napoleon I. during his triumphal entry into 

 Frankfort, and later the passage of the allied troops and Cossacks. 

 His father bestowed particular care upon his son's physical develop- 

 ment, and upon his strengthening of a naturally weak constitution by 

 regular exercise, riding, fencing, swimming, and boating. 



At Easter, 1820, when he had nearly completed his twentieth year, 

 Wohler graduated at the gymnasium and entered the university. 

 Partly in accordance with his own inclination, and partly because 

 favorable circumstances promised him success, it was decided that he 

 should study medicine. 



He spent his first year at the University of Marburg, where his 

 father had also studied, and where many of his father's friends could 



