142 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 



convened in the autumn of 1842, where he was asked to 

 deliver the opening address, and even advised Murchison to 

 abandon the scheme. 1 Notwithstanding his failing interest in 

 the Association, he never failed to receive from the various 

 scientific meetings in Germany, however remote the place of 

 meeting, assurances of the honour and esteem in which he was 

 held. Since the telegraph has become the ready messenger 

 of all kinds of toasts and congratulations, he received a large 

 accession to the birthday greetings which were presented to 

 him every 14th of September, to all of which he replied in the 

 most gracious manner. In his letter of April 29, 1858, de- 

 clining the invitation to attend the meeting at Carlsruhe, the 

 last which was held during his life, he repeated the acknow- 

 ledgment that the Scientific Association of Grermany remained 

 as a faintly luminous image of the mythical union of his 

 country. 



One great enjoyment procured for Humboldt by the literary 

 fair of 1828 was ' the pleasure of furnishing hospitality to his 

 excellent friend Grauss.' He was ' charmed with his society in 

 familiar intercourse. His manner to strangers is certainly of 

 an icy coldness, and he is exceedingly unsympathetic for almost 

 everything that lies beyond the immediate range of his own 

 investigations. You, my dear friend, have a much nearer road to 

 both the mind and heart.' Thus wrote Humboldt to Schumacher 

 on October 18, while the impressions produced by the visit of 

 the greatest mathematical genius of the age were yet fresh 

 upon his mind. We shall often have occasion to refer to the 

 scientific relationships maintained between these distinguished 

 men, but we may avail ourselves of the present opportunity to 

 describe the personal connection they mutually sustained, and 

 the efforts made unceasingly by Humboldt to procure an ap- 

 pointment for Grauss at Berlin. On his return from America 

 in 1804, finding 6 the name of Grauss exciting universal atten- 

 tion in the scientific world of Paris, on account of his investi- 

 gations into the theory of numbers,' he urged upon the Academy 

 of Sciences at Berlin the propriety of summoning the great 

 mathematician to the capital. When invited by the king to 



1 De la Koquette. vol. ii. pp. 209, 326. 



