My far from dormant ambition has been abundantly gratified by the grateful praise bestowed by the great master of our language (to avoid the expression rhetorician), upon my manner of speaking of the King, and my relations with him. In praising that with which the party praised is but scantily supplied, we point him to the honorable road, and justify ourselves before the people. A man of the woods, who is supposed to have been tamed at court, is in need of such justification. Madame Quitzow, whom I could not sooner obtain from the King, I now repose in your hands, as your own. Our former minister, General Thiele, was firmly persuaded that the Guizots of the neighborhood of Montpellier were disguised remnants, softened in pronunciation, Frenchified and Protestantized, of the emigrated Quitzows[[78]] from Langkloder. And your poor excellent Dora, who pities all your friends for the sufferings she knows so well how to alleviate! Give her my kindest regards.
Your faithful
A. Humboldt.
At Night.
The Grand Duke, whom you escaped, sends much love. He has curious theories, probably imbibed somewhere or other (Bœotia was near to ancient Attica), and misunderstood. There are two classes of sculptors, the one inferior, to which Rauch inclines, and which works inward from without, while the better (represented by Rietschel) works outward from within. But what an exposure. Philarète Chasles in the “Journal des Debats!” I wrote to Paris: “Vulgaire dans les idées comme dans les formes des langage, indigne d’un litterateur du Collége de France.”
173.
HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN.
Berlin, Thursday, Feb. 7th, 1856.
As it would be impossible that you, dear friend, should not have seen the new book by Montalembert (the friend and companion of the Abbé Lammenais on his journey to Rome), I hope to give you a little pleasure by offering you the King’s copy for a few days (five or six). The only thing racy in it is the conclusion, levelled at the present state of affairs in France, p. 284 to 298. I wish it were possible to have the whole of it translated and published in Germany.
Most gratefully yours,
A. v. Humboldt.