PREFACE. 



THE circumstances which led the writer to the 

 preparation of the following Biography of Count 

 Rumford may properly be mentioned here. 



In one of a series of letters with which I was favored 

 by my much-esteemed friend, the Hon. Robert C. 

 Winthrop, also my associate on the Council of the 

 Academy, during his last European tour, was a pas- 

 sage which I here copy. The letter was dated Munich, 

 August 19, 1867. 



" You have not forgotten how much there is here 

 to remind an American of his own country. No one 

 could drive in the beautiful English Garden (as it is 

 called) without remembering with pride that it was 

 originally laid out by Benjamin Thompson, Count 

 Rumford, who would almost seem to have been driven 

 from his native land (by unjust suspicions and preju- 

 dices, as I have always feared) in order to give him 

 a wider sphere for doing good to mankind. We 

 have never done honor enough to his memory in 

 America. Is there any portrait of him at Harvard, 

 where he endowed so valuable a Professorship ? I 

 do not remember any. [Mr. Winthrop for the mo- 



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