86 ALEXANDEB VON HUMBOLDT. 



ambition, Alexander von Humboldt was possessed, through the 

 independence of his position, of sufficient means and leisure to 

 follow out his favourite pursuits, to gratify his love of travel, 

 to stimulate his mind with the contemplation of nature, and 

 prepare it by the habit of close observation for the most search- 

 ing investigations. 



During his stay with Forster at Mayence plans had been 

 laid for a journey to be taken in concert, the following spring, 

 to the Lower Ehine, Holland, Belgium, England, and France ; 

 for the old love of travel had been again aroused in Forster. 

 A visit to England promised to be of use in his father's affairs, 

 and he was anxious to gain some information on various 

 points connected with geography, natural history, and art. 

 How much of interest centred, too, in France, where the new 

 political regime had now been a year established ! 



Thus Humboldt, as if moved by an inspiration of his latent 

 genius, was led in the spring of 1790 to join with Greorge Forster 

 and Van Greuns, his young Grottingen friend, in this projected 

 tour. It was as if the exciting guidance of this circumnavigator 

 of our globe was to become the preparatory training for those 

 vast expeditions which for extent and diversity of discovery 

 were to surpass all that had hitherto been accomplished. 



His stay with Forster at Mayence was not long. On March 

 20, Forster wrote to Heyne that he was expecting Humboldt 

 to join him in the course of a day or two, and the first commu- 

 nication from the travellers was dated Boppart, March 24. 



Forster has given an account of the journey in his classical 

 work, c Sketches of the Lower Ehine,' but unfortunately the 

 reference to Humboldt is too occasional to afford evidence of 

 the impression the journey produced upon him, or the influence it 

 may have exerted upon his mind. That Humboldt kept, how- 

 ever, a copious record in his journal is evident from a portion 

 of the book still preserved bearing the inscription : ' Journey of 

 1790 England.' 



The journey down the Rhine was happily accomplished ; and 

 when a cloudy sky robbed the well-known scenery of any of its 

 accustomed charm, a book of travels placed them among the 

 wonders of Borneo, where the imagination was excited by the 

 glowing colours and gigantic growth of vegetation of that 



