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Letters of Alexander von Humboldt to Varnhagen von Ense. / From 1827 to 1858. With extracts from Varnhagen's diaries, and letters of Varnhagen and others to Humboldt cover

Letters of Alexander von Humboldt to Varnhagen von Ense. / From 1827 to 1858. With extracts from Varnhagen's diaries, and letters of Varnhagen and others to Humboldt

Chapter 228: 218. HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN.
By Alexander von Humboldt
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Essays, Letters & SpeechesGerman LiteratureHistory - Modern (1750+)

About This Book

A curated correspondence collects letters from Alexander von Humboldt to his friend and confidant Varnhagen von Ense, supplemented by diary excerpts and letters from other contemporaries. The missives blend personal friendship with professional exchange, discussing scientific observations, lectures, manuscripts, travels, and reactions to peers and events. Editorial apparatus preserves original phrasing and provides contextual notes and extracts that illuminate relationships and chronology. The selection highlights the writer’s methods of observation, precise descriptive habits, and modes of intellectual collaboration. Together the documents form a compact portrait of an engaged scholar whose private reflections and public endeavors intersect across a wide range of topics.

218.
HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN.

Berlin, January 11th, 1858.

Revered Friend,—I, too, am a sufferer from the returning cutaneous affection, an unwelcome consequence of old age. You have, at least, unconditional freedom, and can attend to your comfort; to me there is no freedom granted; I am molested by all; most unmercifully and inexorably by the mail. The kind memento of Mrs. Sarah Martin is very honorable to me. I owe it, like many other things, to you. Suffer me to make you the interpreter of my gratitude and of my faithful reverence for the talented lady, and for her brother, so dear to me, Mr. John Taylor. The news from Livingstone interests me chiefly on account of his views of the susceptibility of the negro race to civilization, at a time when France on the one hand, and North America on the other, are most shamelessly subserving the capture of slaves in Africa, under the flimsy pretext of introducing free laborers. The political news from India, by Captain Meadows Taylor, was unimportant. Perhaps it is agreeable to you to add to your archives some original letters of Count Walewski, Prince Napoleon, who goes to Egypt, son of King Jerome, Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, and a copy of a very finely-written letter of the Pasha of Egypt, the original of which I was obliged to present to Dr. Brugsch.

Dr. Michael Sachs could not be prevented from celebrating me in Hebrew.[98] Many kind greetings to the noble General von Pfuel, whom I shall visit as soon as possible.

Yours faithfully, always equally illegible,

A. v. Humboldt.