228 ALEXANDEE VON HUMBOLDT. 



comprised a geological treatise for Moll's " Jahrbiicher," on the 

 hardening of rocks, which I am having printed off separately, an 

 introduction to Ingenhous's treatise on manures, besides various 

 papers on chemical experiments. The paper on subterranean 

 gases will be finished while I am at Paris ; I have been able to 

 make several additions to it during my sojourn here. I have 

 remained in this neighbourhood longer than I intended, for 

 the purpose of completing a series of eudiometric observa- 

 tions at Berchtesgaden, Aussee, and Salzburg. The chemical part 

 of these investigations is beginning to assume an entirely new 

 aspect. I have collected a great mass of new facts, and I am 

 now working uninterruptedly in arranging them ; for in visiting 

 the mines in this district my love for practical mining has been 

 quite reawakened.' 



The last letter from Salzburg is dated April 19, 1798, and is 

 addressed to Eichstadt, court counsellor at Jena, the editor of 

 the ' Jenaer allgemeine Literaturzeitung.' It runs as follows: 



6 On the eve of starting for Paris to join my brother, allow 

 me to recall myself once more to your remembrance. I have 

 spent nearly five months here in a most busy solitude, though 

 my plans have been so unsettled that sometimes twice in a 

 week I have been on the point of starting for Italy. Political 

 affairs, however, have now assumed such an aspect that it has 

 become impossible to cross the Alps. I am therefore thinking 

 of spending part of the summer in Paris ; and since this un- 

 fortunate war has rendered the seas too unsafe for me to 

 prosecute my intended voyage to the West Indies, I propose to 

 pass the winter in the East. No sooner are my preparations 

 for this eastern expedition completed, than rumours reach me on 

 all sides of a campaign in Egypt, which will have the effect 

 either of greatly facilitating or of entirely defeating my object. 

 I am willing, however, to believe that the events now transpir- 

 ing will ultimately be of service to science, but for myself, I 

 am so hampered in all my projects that I daily feel inclined to 

 wish I had lived either forty years earlier or forty years later. A 

 dull uniformity, so detrimental to moral improvement, will, I 

 fear, spread itself over the whole earth, and nations whose physical 

 and moral position call for very different forms of government 

 will all be compelled to submit to the one model- a Directory 



