408 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 



added a request that ' the peace of the household might not be 

 disturbed.' Of this state of dependency we scarcely feel dis- 

 posed to complain, since it arose almost unavoidably from his 

 easy good nature, and the helplessness of age by which he was 

 far removed from the influence of friends ; but that, by the 

 noble weakness of a grateful heart, he should have been led so 

 far as, of his own free will, to make a deed of gift to his servant 

 of all his possessions, and occupy the position of a penniless 

 labourer in his own household, is a fact almost unexampled in 

 history, which cannot fail to awaken the keenest sympathy. 



With these people had Humboldt for thirty years shared his 

 domestic life, yet in the highest sense of the word might he 

 not be truly called lonely 'i From the house where he had en- 

 tertained Grauss ' he had been driven,' as be facetiously re- 

 marked, 1 by King Frederick William IV., in 1841, upon the 

 erection of the new Museum. For about a year he lived 

 'behind the Werder Church,' but, finding the situation too 

 noisy, he removed, in 1842, to the first floor of the small house 

 in Oranienburg-strasse, No. 67, where he died. This situation 

 4 in the healthy neighbourhood of the Siberian quarter of the 

 city ' suited him well. Through the considerate kindness of 

 the Mendelssohn family, with whom Humboldt was ever on 

 terms of friendly intimacy, being a weekly guest at their table, 

 the house was purchased by them in 1844, not only to .prevent 

 him again suffering from the rent being raised, but also to 

 secure him from another remove, of the ' horrors ' of which he 

 had experienced more than his due share during the frequent 

 migrations of the court. Of the interior of his abode little 

 need be added to the description of Taylor. While strangers 

 approached by the front steps, intimates found their way across 

 the courtyard through Seifert's apartments. Through the small 

 museum of natural curiosities and the library, the visitor was 

 ushered either into the simple drawing-room facing the street, 

 or into the study, still plainer in appearance, at the back of 

 the house. In addition to the map of the world, by Berghaus, 

 and the likeness of Columbus, represented in Hildebrandt's 

 sketch, there hung, of late years, two portraits by Madame 

 Graggiotti, one of herself and the other of Eduard Hildebrandt. 



1 ' Briefwechsel mit Berghaus/ vol. iii. p. 335. 



