COLLEGE LIFE. 115 



In a spirit of grateful remembrance Humboldt alludes to this 

 period of his life in a letter he addressed to his friend Fischer, 

 on Februarys, 1847, when congratulating him on attaining the 

 jubilee of his degree of Doctor : l ' Allow me to offer you my 

 heartiest and most fervent congratulations, for I was privileged, 

 together with our departed friend Freiesleben, to be among 

 the first to recognise the greatness of your talents and the 

 amiability of your character. Can you still recall to mind 

 the garden behind the church at Freiberg, the sojourn at Dres- 

 den with Eeinhard von Haften, the residence at Paris, where 

 Caroline von Humboldt was your pupil, and where you received 

 so many gratifying marks of esteem, both from my brother 

 and from Cuvier ? These are reminiscences from the world of 

 shadows which are to me most precious and affecting ! ' 



In his address at the festival in commemoration of the 

 centenary of Werner's birth, on September 25, 1850, Hum- 

 boldt expresses his deep sense of the obligations he was under 

 to the institution at Freiberg and the powerful influence which 

 his sojourn there exercised upon the whole course of his life. 

 He therein states that he was indebted to the comprehensive 

 grasp and methodising power of "Werner's genius for an im- 

 portant part of his mental culture and for the direction which 

 had been given to his efforts ; that it was his constant endea- 

 vour to honour the name of Werner and to elevate his works, in 

 modern times so often misunderstood, to their right position ; 

 that he had devoted his energies for several years exclusively 

 to the practical art of mining ; that he felt proud of having 

 held the office of Superintendent of the Franconian Mines in the 

 Fichtelgebirge ; that the happiest recollections of his youth were 

 associated with all those advantages, for which he felt indebted 

 to that excellent institution, the School of Mines at Freiberg, 

 which had, especially during the brilliant period of Werner's 

 administration, exercised so powerful an influence not only upon 

 the rest of Europe, but even upon Spanish and Portuguese 

 America ; and finally, how much he owed to the encouraging 

 kindness of the various officials in the mines in Saxony, and to 



1 ' Stance extraord. de la Soci6t6 imper. des Naturalistes de Moscou du 22 

 fevr. 1847, a 1'occasion du jubile semi-seculaire de S. Exc. M. Fischer de 

 Waldheim,' p. 7. 



i 2 



