36 G-uyot on Carl Bitter. 



the history of European nations before Herodotus, around the 

 Caucasus and on the shores of the Black Sea" — a subject 

 which had grown under his pen when writing the second vol- 

 ume of his General Geography on Western Asia. The first 

 edition of the Erdkunde being exhausted, the following year, 

 1821, was devoted to the preparation of a second, much en- 

 larged edition, the first volume of which, containing Africa only, 

 appeared in January, 1822, thus beginning the new series of 

 volumes which compose the work we now possess. That first 

 fruit of his literary activity in Berlin, as he calls it himself, 

 was followed by a long interval of full ten years, during which 

 he issued only two papers read before the Academy of Sciences, 

 a very graphic and interesting description of India in the 

 Berlin Almanac for 1824, and several smaller contributions. 



But that period was none the less one of intense activity 

 for him and of paramount usefulness for the rising generation. 

 The claims upon his talents as an academic teacher, became 

 more and more numerous. In addition to his previous duties 

 he took charge, from 1822, of the chair of history at the military 

 school, left vacant by the death of his friend Woltmann. In 

 1825, he was intrusted with the direction of the studies of 

 the corps of cadets. He was honored with a call to instruct 

 in history Prince Albert of Prussia, a duty which he performed 

 during several years. The Crown-Prince of Prussia, now Fred- 

 erick William IV., whose taste for historical studies and bril- 

 liant attainments in that department of knowledge are well 

 known, held Bitter in particular esteem, and the modest 

 scholar was not unfrequently invited, during the winter 

 months, to deliver discourses on subjects connected with 

 Geography and history, before a select and private circle as- 

 sembled in the royal palace. These marks of' high favor and 

 of trust, and the growing popularity of Ritter's lectures at the 

 University, cheered him on in the work of diffusing, by oral 

 teaching and by personal influence, the new views and methods 

 in geographical science which he believed to be more conso- 

 nant with nature itself, and helped, no doubt, the reform 

 movement which originated with him and now began to spread 

 itself. His lectures in the halls of the University were soon 

 regarded as such as all students interested in true humanitary 

 culture should hear. While a large number of officers of 

 the Prussian army were trained by him every year, or studied 

 under his immediate direction and influence, hundreds of stu- 

 dents left the University, carrying with them into all parts 

 of Germany and into all stations of life, the remembrances 



