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[Translation.] 



I hardly know, my dear sir, how to thank you sufficiently for the two interesting 

 letters which you had the kindness to address to me on the 5th and 7th of September. 

 The printed letter from Para" is replete with naturalness and charms. To one who is 

 partial to you, and admires your noble and disinterested work, it is a pleasure to see 

 you described in the midst of your adventurous life; but I value still higher your 

 two sketches on the distribution of races. At my request Mr. Gallatin had com- 

 menced a geographical work of this kind relating to North America, based, however, 

 on very scanty data. I have been so much pleased with these important communi- 

 cations that I shall come to-morrow, Sunday, for a few hours, to the city (Berlin), 

 when I will see you at two o'clock (2 o'cl.) at your lodging in the Crown Prince Ho- 

 tel.* Will you kindly be at home for me at that hour, if possible ? I hope I may see 

 at your place some of your portraits and drawings which have arrived from Brussels. 

 I knew well that Mr. von Olfers would be agreeable and useful to you, owing to the 

 interest he takes in indigenous races. Your observation on the analogy in the cus- 

 toms aud ornaments of the Nayas and Botocudos is very striking, and also that re- 

 lating to the limits of the fine and strong race.t The aquiline nose of the Mexican 

 divinities seen in the oldest manuscripts and in the bas-reliefs of Oaxacat seems to 

 be absent in South America ; nor is the aquiline nose characteristic of the tall and 

 fine Carib race. 



I foresee with the greatest regret that the king will not find leisure to see some- 

 thing of your fine collections. You have arrived at a time when this sovereign's at- 

 tention is engaged by the military exercises in places remote from his residence. He 

 spends the Sundays with the royal family ; to-morrow evening he will depart from 

 Sanssouci to attend, the maneuvers to be held on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, 

 beginning with those at Halberstadt; his journey to the Rhine is fixed for the 17th 

 of September. $ Thus no day remains free previous to the preparations for a long 

 sojourn at Stolzenfels on the Rhine. 



A thousand kind regards. 



[2 o'cl.] I shall then see you to-morrow, Saturday, at two o'clock at vour hotel. 



A. v. HUMBOLDT, 

 At Potsdam, this 8th September, 1855. 



* At the close of the letter the appointment is made for Saturday. 



t Probably an allusion to the Payaguas on the Paraguay Piver. (See Catlin's "Last Ramblea 

 amongst the Indians," New York, 1867, p. 211.) 



t The writer, it appears, substituted, by mistake, "Oaxaca" for "Palenque." 

 § There is a repetition in the original sentence which renders it obscure. 



