Have with great diflidence ventured upon the following biographical sketch, based upon Professor Klenke's Denkmal. My sole apology is that my humble effort to popu larize the memory of Humboldt has received encouragement from many men renowned in science — some of them personal friends of that illustrious man. I indulge the hepe, however, that the interesting nature of the subject will go far to atone for my inadequate treatment of it. The reader will no doubt meet with many defects of style inseparable from efforts to think in one language and express those thoughts in another; and I therefore bespeak his indul gence for my attempt to write in a tongue I never learned from my mother's lips. To treat a great theme greatly, requires something of cognate greatness. To this I do not pretend.
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