imself; the
town of Antwerp invited him to become head of their school. He might
easily have accepted. He was not altogether happy at Groningen. His
countrymen had done him honour, but they had no real appreciation for
learning, and some of them were boorish and cross-grained. It was the
old story of Pegasus in harness; the practical men of business and the
scholar impatient of restraint. His parents, too, were now both
dead--in 1480, within a few months of each other--and such homes as he
had had, with his father amongst the nuns at Siloe and with his mother
in the house of her husband the tranter, were therefore closed to him.
And yet neither invitation attracted him. Friesland was his native
land; and for all his wanderings the love of it was in his blood.
Adwert, too, was near, and Wessel. He refused, and stayed on in his
irksome service.

[1] In view of Geldenhauer's testimony to Agricola's high
character in this respect, we need not question, as does
Goswin of Halen, the nature of this intimacy.

But in 1482 came an offer he could not resist. An old friend of Pavia
days, John of Dalberg, for whom he had written the oration customary
on his installation as Rector in 1474, had just been appointed Bishop
of Worms. He invited Agricola for a visit, and urged him to come and
join him; living partly as a friend in the Bishop's household, partly
lecturing at the neighbouring University of Heidelberg. The opening
was just such as Agricola wished, and he eagerly accepted; but
circumstances at Groningen prevented him from redeeming his promise
until the spring of 1484. For little more than a year he rejoiced in
the new position, which gave full scope for his abilities. Then he set
out to Rome with Dalberg, their business being to deliver the usual
oration of congratulation to Innocent VIII on his election. On the way
back he fell ill of a fever at Trent, and the Bishop had to leave him
behind. He recovered enough to struggle back to Heidelberg, but only
to die in Dalberg's arms on 27 Oct. 1485, at the age of 41.

Few men of letters have made more impression on their contemporaries;
and yet his published writings are scanty. The generation that
followed sought for his manuscripts as though they were of the
classics; but thirty years elapsed before the _De inuentione
dialectica_ was printed, and more than fifty before there was a
collected edition. Besides his letters the only thing which has
permane