80 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 



he ever was completely indifferent to the good will of any 

 one. But he could have wished to have been able to enjoy it 

 longer while resident at Paris, and to have paid only occasional 

 short visits to his native country. 



After all that may be said there can be no doubt that the 

 thought of permanently quitting Paris and making Berlin his 

 future home must have been, to him, extremely distasteful. A 

 frank disclosure of his feelings on this occasion is furnished us 

 in the laconic statements of his fragmentary autobiography. 

 Maintaining an eloquent silence upon aught else, he makes sole 

 mention, in reference to his return to Berlin, of c the renewed 

 pleasure, after so long an interval, of residing with his brother 

 and uniting with him in scientific pursuits.' This was in fact 

 almost the only attraction that a residence in Berlin had to offer 

 him ; in every other respect he knew that he should suffer 

 loss. 



The relative importance of Paris and Berlin in the present 

 day affords very insufficient data for estimating their compara- 

 tive importance at the time of Humboldt's arrival in his native 

 city. In those days, visitors from Berlin described Paris as 

 'enormous,' 'a swarming labyrinth,' and in 1824 Karl Bitter 

 expressed himself as rejoiced to c turn his back upon it ' and 

 find himself once more in ' good old Berlin.' And so, he 

 adds, thinks every German, Humboldt alone excepted, to 

 whom Paris has become a second home. 1 No European city 

 has risen so rapidly to the highest rank as Berlin ; for this 

 position has been acquired mainly during the last forty years. 

 As a consequence of its rapid growth, there is even now much 

 of a petty character traceable in its social relationships ; cer- 

 tainly previous to 1830 it could scarcely be considered a great 

 city in the modern acceptation of the term. Breslau as it 

 now is surpasses the Berlin of those days ; for though not 

 perhaps excelling it in population, it is superior in the 

 beauty and regularity of its buildings. Berlin was at that 

 period undoubtedly a mean town, and houses such as those 

 inhabited by the families of Mendelssohn and Beer stood 

 almost in solitary grandeur. The introduction of a sheet of 



1 < Karl Hitter ; ein Lebensbild. Von G. Kramer ' (2 Parts, Halle, 1864- 

 1870), vol. ii. p. 183. 



