168 HOLIDAYS IN NAME ONLY. 



from his chair, his museum, and his home, he could 

 not refrain from study and intellectual work. Most 

 men in his situation would have fallen into a dolcefar 

 niente life and repose ; but with Goodsir to be idle 

 was to be miserable ; to stay the progress of the 

 machine, were it only to oil and adjust the gearing, 

 implied, to his impetuous march, arrestment of force, 

 if not retrogression ; and a stand-still was no better 

 than moth and rust. He was at Wildbad, and as the 

 language of the country was of high import to the 

 literature of his science, he took to its study, engaged 

 a teacher, and plodded away in his usual fashion so as 

 to fathom all its bearings. The " Black Forest," 

 whilst it lost in local and historical interest gained 

 immeasurably more in his eyes as affording philological 

 instruction ; in other words his retirement to Wildbad 

 was far from being an hiatus in his life, as he added 

 greatly to his knowledge of the German language and 

 literature. 



He acted similarly at Nice, which he reached before 

 Christmas 1853; there he studied Italian, to make 

 himself familiar with the language that clothed the 

 poesy of Dante, and conveyed to the world of modern 

 science the researches of Matteucci and Secchi. Nice 

 was most enjoyable to Goodsir. At his feet was the 

 Mediterranean upon whose shores the fates of empires 

 had been decided, and the chief events of the world 

 were clustered — events probably of as great import in 

 man's history as those attending the victories of Alex- 

 ander, the be witchery of Cleopatra, and the martyred 



