May 23, 1859.] OBITUARY.— HUMBOLDT. 227 



lei, to which the attention of this Society has been called on a 

 former occasion. 



Returning to France from the United States in 1804, Paris was 

 his chief home from that year to 1827. Arranging there his splendid 

 collections, and surrounded and honoured by all the leading mem- 

 bers of the Academy of Sciences, he published successively that 

 series of volumes which, showing his mastery over all the kingdoms 

 of nature, have rendered his name famous for all ages. Although 

 in these efforts he was assisted by Arago, Gay Lussac, Cuvier, 

 Klaproth, Valenciennes, and Latreille, his grand generalizations 

 have drawn from his contemporaries the admission, that since Aris- 

 totle, Humboldt is almost the only example of such achievements. 



In 1829, on the invitation of the Emperor Nicholas, who defrayed 

 the expenses of the journey, Humboldt, being then in his sixtieth 

 year, undertook his memorable expedition into Siberia, accompanied 

 by the eminent mineralogist Gustav Rose and the profound micro- 

 scopist Ehrenberg. This journey, hurried as it was — for he tra- 

 velled 11,500 miles — was not only fertile in those results which are 

 recorded in his * Asie Centrale,' and in the excellent mineralogical 

 work of his companion Eos6, but was also productive of many 

 important data relating to terrestrial magnetism. 



We know, indeed, that his Siberian travels gave rise to that 

 influence, which was constantly exerted by him in succeeding years 

 in urging the various European Governments to establish magnetic 

 observations in distant lands, and particularly over wide regions in 

 Russia, America, and England. When the British Association inau- 

 gurated the formation of the Physical Observatory at Kew, which 

 has put forth such good fruits, we well know the strength we 

 obtained when we appealed to him; for then it was that he 

 vigorously maintained the necessity of rendering physical observa- 

 tories independent of astronomical observatories. We also know 

 how such physical observatories, both here and abroad, have enabled 

 our associate Sabine to investigate the laws of the magnetical 

 phenomena. 



It is unnecessary that I should here mention all the publications 

 of Humboldt which have been prized by our generation. It is 

 enough to say that the same marvellous man, who made such 

 gigantic journeys in distant lands, and published splendid works 

 in illustration of them, has also produced, both in the French and 

 German languages, a variety of works on astronomy, on geology 

 (' Classification des Roches '), on the geographical distribution of 



