FROM ACCESSION OF FREDERICK WILLIAM IV. TO 1848. 321 



the letter quoted above : ' As this is the last book I intend to 

 write, I have introduced many things into the notes which I 

 thought were of value, and which would otherwise perhaps 

 have been lost. I do not attempt to defend myself from the 

 accusation that I have shown some amount of partiality in the 

 authorities I have adduced. I am not averse to the subjective 

 being prominent ; after my death my papers will show among 

 whom I have lived, and by whom I have been influenced. Of 

 this I have no reason to be ashamed.' 



The compilation of the second volume doubtless presented 

 fewer difficulties than the ' Survey of Nature,' inasmuch as 

 historical material naturally arranges itself according to the 

 order of date ; events are generally grouped in periods, and 

 the degree of importance to be attached to any event is natu- 

 rally to be estimated by the results to which it gave rise, so 

 that to make a judicious selection of facts is far easier than to 

 estimate the relative value of natural phenomena. On this 

 portion of the work, however, Humboldt bestowed no small 

 labour ; throughout the ' History of the Eise and Progress of 

 Science ' a careful distinction has been made between the 

 ' events of greatest importance,' reserved for the text, and facts 

 of lesser moment given in the notes. In the opening chapters 

 of the second volume, moreover, where the subject, ' Incite- 

 ments to the Study of Nature,' is of an aesthetic character, a 

 greater finish of style was requisite. No wonder therefore that, 

 in a letter to Bockh, Humboldt asserts that in the chapter 

 upon the poetic description of nature he ' has devoted every 

 possible care upon the composition ; ' while to Varnhagen 1 he 

 confesses that it is a chapter of which ' he is very proud.' In 

 referring to the chapters upon the Picturesque, and the Culti- 

 vation of Exotic Plants, he remarks, with greater modesty : 6 1 

 have endeavoured by artistic treatment to master the profusion 

 of material, but there is a wide step between striving and suc- 

 ceeding.' ' I think,' he writes upon another occasion, ' that the 

 second part ought to prove interesting from the wealth of 

 material, the attempt at accuracy, and the adaptability to every 

 grade of mental culture.' This expectation, as is well known y 



1 ' Briefe an Varnhagen/ No. 54. 

 YOL. II. T 



