Writinga of the late Professor Blumenbach, 5 



Although the confidence of the public in the faculty of teach- 

 ing of the venerable old Professor rested on a firm foundation, 

 yet he never ceased his endeavours to justify that confidence 

 by refreshing his former knowledge, nay, anxiously adding new 

 information. In his note-book of a later period, the following 

 memorandum occurs : " Although I have lectured for so many 

 years, yet up to the present time I have never gone into my 

 class-room without new and special preparation for each of 

 my prelections ; for I know by experience how many teachers 

 have injured themselves, by considering repeated prepara- 

 tion unnecessary for lectures which they have already delivered 

 twenty times and more." 



Blumenbach did not trust merely to his fortunate natural 

 gifts, but strenuously and unremittingly endeavoured to give 

 these their highest possible development. It can only be thus 

 explained how his oral and written communications' never 

 evinced marks of old age, but always continued to be interest- 

 ing, nay in some respects models, and never failed to merit the 

 attention of his hearers and readers. With respect to the 

 clearness and ease of his public speaking, the following remark 

 deserves to be recorded : he says, " Amongst the rules on 

 which my father laid particular stress in regard to our educa- 

 tion was this, that in speaking we should invariably continue 

 with the construction once commenced, that we should seek 

 out the proper terms of expression belonging to it, and never 

 recommence in order to find a different mode of expressing our 

 ideas. This advice assisted me greatly in extempore speak- 

 ing." 



While Blumenbach became a most distinguished teacher by 

 a combination of natural talent, study, and experience, he also 

 possessed, by means of natural gifts and practice, the power, 

 in ordinary conversation, of bringing forward, in replies and 

 observations, the most important parts of a subject, some- 

 times by the most pithy remarks, sometimes by the most 

 startling illustrations. He was constantly able to communi- 

 cate an original turn to a topic, and to place it in a new and 

 interesting point of view. He sometimes termed reason " the 

 power of perfecting oneself, or the talent of accommodating 

 oneself to circumstances," and his conversation, as w«U as hia 



