XXVlll FROM NORTH POLE TO EQUATOR. 



When he took his doctor's degree he published an account of his 

 travels {Reiseskizzen aus Nordostafrica. Jena, 1855, 3 vols.). 



After a zoological holiday in Spain with his like-minded brother 

 Reinhold — a physician in Madrid — he settled for a time in Leipzig, 

 writing for the famous " Gartenlaube ", co-operating with Koss- 

 massler in bringing out Die Tiere des Waldes, expressing his very 

 self in his Bird-Life (1861), and teaching in the schools. It was 

 during this period that he visited Lapland, of whose bird-bergs the 

 first lecture gives such a vivid description. In 1861 he married 

 Matthilde Reiz, who proved herself the best possible helpmeet. 



In 1862, Brehm went as scientific guide on an excursion to 

 Abyssinia undertaken by the Duke of Coburg-Gotha, and subse- 

 quently published a characteristic account of his observations 

 Ergebnisse einer Reise naeh Habesch: Results of a Journey to 

 Abyssinia (Hamburg, 1863). On his return he began his world- 

 famous Tierleben (Animal Life), which has been a treasure-house to 

 so many naturalists. With the collaboration of Professors Taschen- 

 berg and Oscar Schmidt, he completed the first edition of this great 

 work, in six volumes, in 1869. 



Meanwhile he had gone to Hamburg as Director of the Zoologi- 

 cal Gardens there, but the organizing work seems to have suited 

 him ill, and he soon resigned. With a freer hand, he then under- 

 took the establishment of the famous Berlin Aquarium, in which he 

 partly realized his dream of a microcosmic living museum of nature. 

 But, apart from his actual work, the business-relations were ever 

 irksome, and in 1874 he was forced by ill-health and social friction 

 to abandon his position. 



After recovery from serious illness he took up his r61e as popular 

 lecturer and writer, and as such he had many years of happy 

 success. A book on Cage Birds (1872-1876), and a second edition 

 of the Tierleben date from this period, which was also interrupted 

 by his Siberian journeys (1876) and by numerous ornithological 

 expeditions, for instance to Hungary and Spain, along with the 

 Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria. But hard work, family sorrows, 

 and finally, perhaps, the strain of a long lecturing tour in America 

 aged Brehm before his time, and he died in 1884. 



