BARON VON HUMBOLDT. 35 



St, Petersburg, held on the 28th November 1829, 

 wherein he gave a general view of the scientific 

 researches which had been recently carried on in 

 the Russian empire. The full details of the jour- 

 ney may be expected in a work announced, while 

 we write, as in the press, entitled Asie Centrale^ — 

 Recherches sur les chaines de montagnes et la cli^ 

 matologie comparee. Three volumes 8vo. with a 

 map. * 



For many years past Baron Humboldt has chiefly 

 resided in his native city of Berlin, the acknow- 

 ledged head of Prussian science and literature. Al- 

 though far advanced in life, his active mind continues 

 engaged in various investigations. In the words of 

 a distinguished periodical publication, — " The uni- 

 versality of his acquirements, which have left no 

 branch within the wide range of science indifferent 

 or unexplored, has connected him by friendship 

 with nearly all the most celebrated philosophers of 

 the age ; while the polished amenity of his man- 

 ners, and that intense desire of acquiring and of 

 spreading knowledge which so particularly charac- 

 terizes his mind, render him accessible to all strangers, 

 and ensure for them the assistance of his counsel in 

 their scientific pursuits, and the advantage of being 



* It was during this journey that another of the travellers, 

 M. Schmidt, a German, found the first diamonds that have 

 been discovered in the Uralian mountains, — an event which 

 Humboldt had foretold from the analogy of the formation of 

 tliat range to the mountains in Brazil, in which diamonds 

 occur. 



