356 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 



during this period will not seem to have an appreciable value ; 

 to those who judge others according to the standard of their 

 own ideal, the man who, while cherishing in his heart ' the 

 ideas of 1789,' could clothe himself in the uniform of a 

 chamberlain, cannot fail to be the subject either of ridicule 

 or of censure. No one, however, will presume to deny that 

 in Humboldt we have the example of one who, in advanced 

 years, throughout a sad and inglorious epoch in the national 

 history, manifested an enthusiasm almost youthful for the 

 honour of his country ; and was ever animated in the ful- 

 filment of duty by a spirit of kindness and sincerity, if not 

 by magnanimity and force of character ; a servant, no doubt, 

 and indeed a confidential and personal servant of the king, in a 

 country where the king, according to the conception of the wisest 

 and best of the land, should be nothing more than the first servant 

 of the State. If in the ranks of the Church no higher title can 

 be found than that of the servant of the servants of Grod, it 

 follows that the office of first servant of the first servant of the 

 State deserves to be regarded precisely on account of the 

 self-negation demanded as a place of honour by those who 

 proudly rejoice in their own freedom. But whatever may be 

 thought of the position occupied by Humboldt, it is sufficient 

 to say, that he fulfilled his duty. It was from a sense of patriotism 

 that in the autumn of 1858, a few months before his death, 

 when his habits ' had begun to assume the melancholy aim- 

 lessness of old age,' he was once more seen with the rabble of 

 the district, recording his vote at the poll : the circumstance 

 was mentioned in the papers, and was even made the subject 

 of some verses. The aid of poetry was not needed to do honour 

 to a deed which to him would appear so ordinary, and it may 

 be fearlessly maintained that so long as this indefatigable 

 traveller had strength to move, he would never through 

 indolence renounce the path of duty. 1 



Humboldt's labours in science during these last ten years 

 consisted almost exclusively in the continuation of c Cosmos.' 

 The third and fourth volumes, with the fragments of a fifth, 

 present a character widely different from the previous portion 



1 See ' Briefe an Varnhagen,' p. 398 ; < Briefe an Bunsen/ p. 201 ; the 

 poem of 1858 was found among Humboldt's papers. 



