130 CHARACTER OF CHARLES. SELF-CHARACTERIZATION. 



by his innate friendly and benevolent disposition, a road 

 which usually leads him to the desired goal, since he 

 always well considers it and follows it with the greatest 

 energy to the end. 



I should call the next brother Charles the most 

 normally constituted of us all. He was always to be 

 depended upon, faithful and conscientious, a good pupil, 

 an affectionate, attached brother. His clear eye and 

 generally cultivated understanding made him an excellent 

 man of business and, with his large technical knowledge 

 and excellent tact, an admirable conductor of business 

 undertakings. Charles was the true connecting link bet- 

 ween us four brothers, who differed indeed radically 

 from one another, but were bound together for life-long 

 common work by all-subduing fraternal love. 



Not to leave myself out in this family characteri- 

 zation I will only remark that I possessed a fair share 

 of the good and bad qualities just described of my 

 three brothers, but that these qualities were much 

 repressed in outward manifestation through my parti- 

 cular line of life. To perform my duty and do good 

 work has always been my strenuous endeavour. To 

 find recognition has been indeed grateful to me. but 

 it has always been repulsive to me to push myself in 

 any way, or be made the subject of an ovation. 

 Perhaps my constant endeavour "to be. rather than 

 to seem'', and to have my merits first discovered by 

 others, was only a peculiar form of vanity. I shall 

 try as far as possible to avoid it in these pages. 



