INTRODUCTION. IX 



In the castle at Tegel, where he was born, and in the 

 park of which he now sleeps beside his brother, hangs a 

 portrait of him, painted at the age of thirty-live. He is 

 there represented as man of rather less than the medium 

 stature, but firmly and symmetrically built, with a full, 

 keen, ardent face, firm lips, clear blue eyes, and thick locks 

 of chestnut hair, clustering about his square, massive brow. 

 He wears a green coat, knee-breeches, and a heavy cloak 

 lined with red. He is represented as leaning against a 

 rock on a slope of the Andes, the snowy dome of Chimbo- 

 razo filling up the background of the picture. In com- 

 paring this picture with his living presence, I found that 

 the shoulders had stooped, leaving the head bent forward, 

 as if weighed down by the burden of its universal know- 

 ledge ; the hair had grown snow-white, and somewhat 

 thinner ; the mouth had lost its clear, sharp outline, and 

 the eager, energetic expression of the face was gone : but 

 the blue eyes were as serene and youthful as ever, and the 

 skin as fair, smooth, and ruddy, almost, as that of a young 

 man. ^ 



The first impresRm produced by Humboldt's face was 

 that of its thorough humanity. The blood which fed his 

 restless brain never weakened the pulsations of his human 

 heart. Beneath that devotion to science which he illus- 

 trated by the labours of seventy-five years, burned steadily 

 and unwaveringly the flame of sympathy for his kind. Pro- 

 bably no man who ever lived has given aid and encourage- 

 ment to so great a number of aspiring and deserving men. 

 I know instances of persons in humble life having sought 



