24 MEMOIR OF 



countered innumerable difficulties and dangers. To 

 the credit of Humboldt let it be told that this en- 

 terprise, which would have done honour to a nation, 

 was executed at his own expense. Its results have 

 been of the highest importance to science in many 

 departments, especially those of natural history, 

 botany, geology, geography, and astronomy, and 

 were from time to time communicated in various 

 publications, most of which appeared in the names 

 of both the associated philosophers. The Personal 

 Narrative of their travels is familiar to the English 

 reader by means of the translation by Mrs. H. M. 

 Williams, which was for the most part revised by 

 Humboldt himself, and has much of the air of an 

 original work. When the first portion of the trans- 

 lation appeared, the Edinburgh Review (vol. xxiv. 

 p. 134) pronounced the following just eulogium on 

 Humboldt : " We congratulate the present age on 

 having produced a traveller, armed at all points, 

 and completely accomplished for the purpose of 

 physical, moral, and political information. In M. 

 de Humboldt we have an astronomer, a physiolo- 

 gist, a botanist, one versed in statistics and political 

 economics; a metaphysician, an antiquary, and a 

 learned philologist, possessing at the same time 

 the enlarged views, the spirit, and the tone of true 

 philosophy. This assemblage of acquirements, so 

 seldom found in the same individual, is in him 

 accompanied with the most indefatigable industry ; 

 with the zeal, the enterprise, and the vigour which 

 are necessary to give these their true effect." And 



