THE LAST TEN YEAKS. 387 



honours, he was frequently compelled to adopt the language of 

 insincerity. His studious avoidance of any connection with 

 Napoleon III. has already been remarked ; when, however, the 

 Emperor, with delicate attention, conferred upon him in 1857 

 the grand cordon of the Legion of Honour, Humboldt, who had 

 never declined any of the inferior steps of this order, found 

 himself obliged to express his thanks through Count Walewski 

 in a manner that sounds no less complimentary to NapoleoK 

 than a similar communication addressed once to the Emperor 

 Nicholas, to whom it had been as little the expression of sincere 

 feeling. 



More consonant with his sympathies were the honours so 

 enthusiastically bestowed by the citizens of the United States 

 of America. The Minister for War, John B. Floyd, wrote to 

 Humboldt from Washington on July 14, 1858 : 'Never can we 

 forget the services you have rendered not only to us but to all 

 the world. The name of Humboldt is not only a household 

 word throughout our immense country, from the shores of the 

 Atlantic to the waters of the Pacific, but we have honoured 

 ourselves by its use in many parts of our territory, so that 

 posterity will find it everywhere linked with the names of 

 Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin.' Accompanying this 

 letter was an album composed of nine maps, showing the 

 various localities to which his name had been affixed, among 

 which were rivers, lakes, bays, streams, mountains, villages, 

 towns, and counties. In order to secure a gratification ' for 

 the ladies,' American travellers were in the habit of ordering a 

 bust of Humboldt from Eauch, who could not fail to be struck 

 with astonishment at the courage with which these transatlantic 

 travellers ventured into Germany, and without knowing any but 

 their own language, would make themselves perfectly at home.' 

 A portrait of Humboldt in oils was solicited by the Natural 

 History Society of New York, with the warm assurance : ' There 

 is no name out of the calendar of our own country's heroes 

 and men of worthy note more respected than that of Alexander 

 von Humboldt. The most of your works are with us, and so 

 familiar, that they are looked upon as almost belonging to and 

 a part of us ; and long after you have passed away and life's 

 frail tenement shall have crumbled with its mother earth, we 



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