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volume of " Kosmos" (both parts bound in one), 

 which it has cost me great efforts to complete. I was 

 sure of a kind reception at your hands, and your letter 

 of the 24th October, which had been lying at my house 

 in Berlin, confirms my resolution. Ottilia von Goethe* 

 has brought me cheering news about your health : 

 you will, as usual, question the decision. I am quite 

 astonished that the Minister-President, f ordinarily as 

 cold as ice, has been greatly delighted with Ottilia, and 

 quite inclined to meet her wishes concerning Wolf- 

 gang's appointment to one of the situations at the 

 Prussian embassy, in Eome. But I question whether 

 it was imperative on his part, after having published 

 a very clever little book on " Nature and Legislation/' 

 to issue a collection of poems, in which there is but 

 here and there a flash of imaginative power ! 



With attachment, in gloomy, worn-out times, by 



A. V. HUMBOLDT. 



On 24th November, 1851, Varnhagen wrote in his Diary : " In- 

 sinuations attempted against Humboldt. The small and mediocre, 

 who know well that, compared with a great man, they are nothing, 

 combine in envy and malice against him, and think thus to become 

 somebodies. One meets the other with a smile, confides to him the 

 dislike he feels, the foibles and shortcomings he has discovered ; the 

 other takes it very kindly, answers in a similar strain, they shake 

 hands delighted, and henceforth are staunch allies against the hero. 

 Those professing to be among his truest friends will lend themselves 

 to such intrigues. Taken individually, they matter very little; 

 but in the aggregate they act by their weight ; they make the day 

 feel heavy ; they clog and spoil the Good, undermine the spirits and 

 the temper. From such rabble Goethe suffered, and Humboldt 

 is suffering. I know all this from my own experience, having seen 



* Goethe's daughter-in-law ; Wolfgang, her son. TR. 

 t Baron von Manteuffel, since 19th December, 1850. TK. 



