402 Notices of Books. [July, 



During the latter part of 1790 he travelled through England and 

 France, and appears to have made most careful memoranda of 

 everything that struck him in those countries. In the following 

 year he entered the School of Mines, at Freiberg, which had 

 been established in 1766, and was now enjoying considerable 

 reputation on account of Werner's notoriety. He resided here 

 only eight months, and was then appointed " Assessor cum voto 

 in the Administrative Department of Mines and Smelting 

 Works," which appointment was offered him " on account of the 

 valuable knowledge, both theoretical and practical, possessed by 

 him in mathematics, physics, natural history, chemistry, tech- 

 nology, the arts of mining and smelting, and the general routine 

 of business." 



Space will not permit us to do more than allude to the ex- 

 tremely interesting chapter (p. 161, vol. i.), on the state of 

 society in Weimar and Jena, and the circle of cultivated men 

 into whose midst Humboldt was introduced. Here we find 

 anecdotes of Goethe and Schiller, and numerous extracts of 

 letters from Humboldt and others. 



In 1799 Humboldt began his greater travels, and to 'lay the 

 foundation for his great " Cosmos." He visited Teneriffe, and then 

 went to South America. The celebrated expedition to the Ori- 

 noco was commenced in 1800 ; he afterwards visited, in suc- 

 cession, Cuba, Quito, Mexico, and the United States, returning 

 to Europe in August, 1804, after an absence of five years, during 

 which he had travelled 40,000 miles in South America alone. 

 The travels in Asiatic Russia were undertaken about twenty 

 years later, at the request of the Russian Government. 



Humboldt resided in Paris from 1808 to 1826. He originally 

 went there on a diplomatic mission with Prince William of 

 Prussia. He arrived at a time when the First Empire was at 

 the height of its glory, and he entered at once into that brilliant 

 circle of men of genius which had congregated in the capital of 

 France. Here he published the results of his expedition to 

 America in twenty folio and ten quarto volumes, the price of an 

 unbound copy being £400. The work was not altogether a 

 success ; in the first place, the extravagant price prevented it 

 from being generally purchased by scientific men ; and in the 

 second place, the numerous plates, which had caused the book 

 to be so expensive, were not artistically good, and were quite 

 unworthy of the good artists which then existed. While in 

 Paris, Humboldt numbered among his friends at least two gene- 

 rations of scientific men ; among them De Luc, Ingenhouz, 

 Delambre, Laplace, Pictet, Arago, Biot, Gay-Lussac, Thenard, 

 Fourcroy, Vauquelin, Milne-Edwards, Jussieu, Hauy, Brongniart, 

 Guizot, and Elie de Beaumont : a few of these men still remain 

 active members of the Institute, while the very name of Four- 

 croy carries us back to the science of the last century. During 

 his eighteen years of residence in Paris Humboldt was very 



