PERSECUTED WITH LETTERS. 41 1 



steps as you pass him. He has earned the right to 

 dream, for his dreams are worlds ! 



The only drawback to Humboldt's happiness in his 

 last years, was the flood of letters which poured in upon 

 him. He had always corresponded largely with scientific 

 men in all parts of the world. He was glad to learn of 

 their experiments and discoveries, and to communicate 

 his own in return. But to be deluged as he was with 

 letters in his latter days was intolerable. 



"I work," Humboldt wrote to his friend, Julius 

 Froebel, in January, 1858, "I work mostly in the night, 

 because I am unmercifully tormented with a constantly 

 increasing correspondence, for the most part of not the 

 slightest interest. I live joyless in my eighty-ninth year, 

 because of the much for which I have striven from my 

 early youth, so little has been accomplished. 



" Your illegible, 

 " Al. Humboldt." 



It was only of those who pestered him, however, auto- 

 graph hunters, and the like, that Humboldt complained, 

 not of scholars and savcms, and least of all of his friends. 

 His pen was as ready in their service as his purse had 

 been in former years, and would have been still, had 

 there been anything in it. Witness this letter to George 

 Ticknor, the historian of Spanish Literature. 



" My Dear and Excellent Friend : — Bonds of 

 friendship, which have their origin so far 'back as my 

 family, and the affection felt for you by my brother, 

 William Yon Humboldt, when you lived in German}^ 

 as a young man, seem to impose on me the very plea- 



