[Footnote 67]: A report that Froebel drew up for the Princess Regent of Rudolstadt in 1809, giving a voluminous account of the theory and practice pursued at Yverdon (Wichard's "Froebel," vol. i., p. 154).
[Footnote 68]: The castle of Yverdon, an old feudal stronghold, which Pestalozzi had received from the municipality of that town in 1804, to enable him to establish a school and work out his educational system there.
[Footnote 69]: Froebel desired to see in Rudolstadt, or elsewhere in Thuringia (his "native land"), an institution like that of Pestalozzi at Yverdon; and he sought to interest the Princess Regent of Rudolstadt by the full account of Yverdon already mentioned.
[Footnote 70]: This would scarcely seem probable to those who admire and love Pestalozzi. But we must remember that religious teaching appeals so intimately to individual sympathies that it is quite possible that what was of vital service to many others was not of so much use to Froebel, who was, as he frankly admits, out of harmony on many points with his noble-hearted teacher.
[Footnote 71]: That the boys' characters were immersed in an element of strengthening and developing games as the body is immersed in the water of a strengthening bath, seems to be Froebel's idea.
[Footnote 72]: Sanskrit is here probably meant.
[Footnote 73]: Hebrew and Arabic.
[Footnote 74]: The comet of 1811, one of the most brilliant of the present century, was an equal surprise to the most skilled astronomers as to Froebel. Observations of its path have led to a belief that it has a period of 300 years; so that it was possibly seen by our ancestors in 1511, and may be seen by our remote descendants in 2111. The appearance of this comet was synchronous with an unusually fine vintage harvest, and "wine of the great Comet year" was long held in great esteem.
[Footnote 75]: Geognosie.
[Footnote 76]: The Plamann School, an institution of considerable merit. Plamann was a pupil of Pestalozzi. One of the present writers studied crystallography later on with a professor who had been a colleague of Froebel's in this same school, and who himself was also a pupil of Pestalozzi.