170 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
lazy creatures, are attached by rope tugs which are tied I 
to the whiffletrees, and the driver with a trumpet, and a t 
whip which he cracks perpetually, is uniformed in the j 
most inconvenient apparel for discharging his duties— t 
i. e. he wears a ponderous cloak, with an immense cape, t 
His trumpet rings merrily out at certain unascertained t 
intervals. This famous establishment is under the con- ( 
trol of government, and over these beautiful roads, that s 
would witness either in England or America, a speed of 1 
ten miles an hour, it lumbers along at the rate of five or 1 
six. s 
Giessen impresses the approaching traveler pleasant- < 
ly. It is situated upon the Lahn, one of the tributaries ’ 
to the Rhine, and scarcely equal to the Mohawk at Uti- < 
ca. The country around, reminds one of the valley i 
westward from Little Falls. Upon basaltic peaks on i 
either side are the ruins of castles or towers, seven or : 
eight hundred years old. Between these and the Lahn, i 
the cultivation is apparently excellent. Orchards of fruit : 
trees, and of oak, birch and evergreen, beautify the land¬ 
scape about, and beside the city of Giessen, not less than 
ten villages are seen across the valley and among the hills. 
The road enters the new town, in which the hospital, med- 
ical college, Liebig’s laboratory and residence, and a series 
of beautiful edifices are situated. Two low stone struc- : 
tures mark the entrance to the city proper, entirely around 
which, a distance of I suppose a mile and a half, is a de¬ 
lightful promenade, occupying the site of the old ram¬ 
parts. This promenade is skirted throughout with trees, 
and changing its direction every few rods, conducts one 
through a variety of scenes looking from Giessen across 
the valley of the Lahn, and out upon the basaltic cones, 
that in summer must be grateful indeed to students who 
have all day long been engaged with their books. 
The old town has nothing to commend it to generous 
consideration. Boston is said to have crooked streets, 
and I have known a little surprise expressed at the ser¬ 
pentine character of some of the avenues of Albany; but 
they are straight lines compared with the narrow, irre- ! 
gular corkscrew passages of Giessen; and then the build- i 
ings upon a street are not parallel to any thing. With j 
scarcely an .exception, they are constructed of wood, fill- j 
ed in with brick, sometimes burnt, and sometimes un- j 
burnt, and plastered over within and without. The ho- j 
tels have carriage ways through them, which permit the 
vehicles of travelers to be taken into a court-yard, where 
they may remain in safety. All the modern houses are 
entered from the back side; there being, with few excep- ! 
lions, no marring the uniformity of the front, with soun- | 
graceful an appendage as a door.* The pavements are 
excruciating,the citizens seeming scarcely to have known j 
the luxury of a side-walk. Even the pulverized basalt, j 
which is strown over the roads and streets, and ground to 
dust by the ponderous freight wagons, is swept away in 
a little time by the street scavengers, and preserved for 
purposes of manure. 
To the vehicles of Germany, I intend to devote an en¬ 
tire letter; but 1 have already too long postponed an ac¬ 
count of the mighty man whose genius has given such 
impulse to chemical and agricultural science—the teach¬ 
er who has congregated in his laboratory, gentlemen 
from every kingdom of Europe, from Great Britain, the 
United States and Mexico—the man of whom something 
is known by every individual who speaks or reads the 
English language—who has been to organic chemistry, 
what Newton was to mathematics and astronomy— Jus¬ 
tus Liebig. My first interview with him was in his 
private laboratory. The reception seemed to me rather 
that of a military officer than of a scientific man.f He was 
manifestly engrossed with some matters of thought, and 
while he conducted me through the different apartments of 
* An association which in the New World, would be sought for at 
u distance from eating and sleeping apartments perhaps, and indeed 
uniformly disconnected from the residence, and carefully concealed 
in shrubbery, here salutes one as he passes into what we would con¬ 
sider the entry hall. 
t Frequent personal interviews have shown me that the bearing 
observed on the morning of my first visit, belongs to the laboratory 
and the station of instructor alone. Every where in private life, ei¬ 
ther around his own board, or in assemblies with friends, or in 
skating on the Lahn, he is among the first in giving the impulse to 
pleasure 
his great laboratory, I could but feel that working and 
thinking were the characteristic employments here. A 
gentleman to whom I was introduced, spake in an under 
tone, as if conversation were contraband. Liebig turns 
to me and says, “ You may converse in English two or 
three days, but not more.” All this without a smile; de¬ 
cidedly a German mode, thought I, of impressing upon a 
stranger the necessity of study. I went to seek my 
lodgings rather depressed. A few days rolled away, and 
I was one of an audience of about a hundred students as¬ 
sembled in the lecture room awaiting the entrance of the 
distinguished man. The course of organic chemistry 
was about to commence. Gentlemen in great variety of 
costume, with note books, pens and ink or pencils were 
seated, conversing upon various topics, while before us, 
the assistant was just completing his arrangement of sub¬ 
stances and apparatus to be employed in the lecture of 
the day. The hour of the lecture was on the point of 
striking—the murmur of conversation had subsided to a 
whisper—presently, the whole audience by one impulse 
rose, and I saw entering and bowing to the salutation, Dr. 
Liebig. He had just returned from England, where the 
attentions of the most learned, most wealthy, and most 
eminent had been lavished upon him, as they have been 
shared by no man in science in modern times. The pub¬ 
lished account of the great dinner at Glasgow, had reach¬ 
ed Giessen. At Darmstadt, appropriate honors had sig¬ 
nalized his return; and now, with the memory of all 
these things fresh in his mind and theirs, it was most in¬ 
teresting to look upon the scene which the lecture room 
presented. 
The apartment in an instant was breathless, and the 
lecture commenced. What it was about, I was able to 
see from the formula on the black-board, and from a 
word now and then which I understood, but I was too 
much absorbed with the manner, to give much attention 
to what he said. He is perhaps two or three inches less 
than six feet, and stands quite erect, though a little round- 
ling of the shoulders from much writing, labor and study, 
jmight be seen if made the especial object of search. His 
|figure is slender rather than stout, which makes him ap- 
jpear taller than he really is. All his movements, and 
Iparticularly those connected with demonstration, experi¬ 
ment, or illustration, are graceful to a degree I have not 
|seen equaled in any lecturer. To see him hold in the 
same hand three glass test-tubes and an equal number of 
stoppers, while with the other he pours from vessels 
'containing re-agents, at first a little excited my surprise. 
;The portrait that to some extent is circulated in A Baer i- 
ca, represents him much younger than he appears. 
I Another, a lithograph, has recently been published, which 
j is better; but no picture can be made of him. There is 
an expression of thought in all his attitudes and move¬ 
ments, which I could have scarcely believed upon the 
mere relation, and which the crayon cannot commit to 
paper; whether with the chalk and sponge, or with the 
index finger along the chin and nose, presenting that 
most singular of all German attitudes, or in gesticulation, 
or with apparatus, it is all the same. He is all mind— 
and it beams as distinctly through its corporeal tenement, 
as his chemical compounds are seen through the vessels 
that contain them. His detail of chemical decomposi¬ 
tions and recompositions is clear and expressed without 
any circumlocution in terms, comprehended by every 
one. Occasionally these details bring him to review 
some investigations and theories of his own, and then a 
new animation is superadded to his ordinary bearing, and 
the illustrations are dramatic. His large eyes expand, 
and his features seem to glow. The gesticulations are 
sometimes so happy and so numerous, that I have fancied 
one might understand some of his themes even if he were 
unable to hear. 
His notes consist of a few formula, written out upon 
two or three little strips of paper; and yet his lectures 
are as systematic as if elaborated with the greatest care. 
I have heard the remark made that Liebig is not an ex. 
pounder of chemistry or an operator in chemistry, but is 
chemistry itself. I am inclined to think the remark en¬ 
cases a German idea, for it has quite eluded my humble 
American apparatus for sounding. Still, it is not diffi¬ 
cult to see some of the probable data upon which this 
