HERMANN VON HELMHOLTZ 



him from all parts of the world. The celebration of 

 his seventieth birthday became a national event, and a 

 tribute was then paid to his eminence as a man of 

 science and as an inspiring teacher, only equalled a few 

 years ago by the ceremonies at the jubilee of his friend 

 Lord Kelvin. The Emperor William II. sent him an 

 autograph letter in ackowledgment of his great services 

 to science, and conferred special honours upon him. 

 The Kings of Sweden and Italy, the Grand Duke of 

 Baden, and the President of the French Republic, 

 sent him the insignia of various orders. Representa- 

 tives of academies, universities, and learned societies, 

 sent representatives and addresses. A Helmholtz gold 

 medal was struck in his honour, to be awarded from 

 time to time for distinguished services to science, and 

 was, at a banquet, handed to Helmholtz himself as its 

 first recipient, after a brilliant speech by his life-long 

 friend Du Bois Reymond. At the same time a marble 

 bust by Hildebrand was unveiled. 1 



At this banquet von Helmholtz delivered a speech, 

 in which he uplifted the veil of his inner life and 

 revealed some of the secret influences that contributed 

 to his marvellous creativeness. His own words, in 

 free translation, are better than any other. Referring 

 to the medal, he said, 



* It is the greatest honour men of science could pay 



1 On the 6th of June 1899, a marble statue of von Helmholtz was 

 unveiled by the Emperor William II., in front of the University of 

 Berlin. It has been fittingly placed near those of the brothers von 

 Humboldt. See Daheim, 24th June 1899, No. 39, p. i. 

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