me, he told us many things of former
times. Once he even spoke of his youth and the days which determined his
destiny. The following event seems to me especially worth recording.

When a young and wholly unknown student he had gone to Paris to bring
his discovery of fulminic acid to the notice of the Academy. On one of
the famous Tuesdays he had waited vainly for the introduction of his
work, and at the close of the session he rose sadly to leave the hall,
when an elderly academician in whose hand he thought he had seen his
treatise addressed a few words to him concerning his discovery in very
fluent French and invited him to dine the following Thursday. Then the
stranger suddenly disappeared, and Liebig, with the painful feeling of
being considered a very uncivil fellow, was obliged to let the Thursday
pass without accepting the invitation so important to him. But on
Saturday some one knocked at the door of his modest little room and
introduced himself as Alexander von Humboldt's valet. He had been told
to spare no trouble in the search, for the absence of his inexperienced
countryman from the dinner which would have enabled him to make the
acquaintance of the leaders of his science in Paris had not only been
noticed by Humboldt, but had filled him with anxiety. When Liebig went
that very day to his kind patron he was received at first with gay
jests, afterwards with the kindest sympathy.

The great naturalist had read his paper and perceived the writer's
future promise. He at once made him acquainted with Gay Lussac, the
famous Parisian chemist, and Liebig was thus placed on the road to the
lofty position which he was afterwards to occupy in all the departments
of science.

The Munich zoologist von Siebold we first knew intimately years after. I
shall have more to say of him later, and also of the historian Gervinus,
who, behind apparently repellant arrogance, concealed the noblest human
benevolence.

After the first treatment, which occupied six weeks, the physician
ordered an intermission of the baths. I was to leave Wildbad to
strengthen in the pure air of the Black Forest the health I had gained.
On the Enz we had been in the midst of society. The new residence was to
afford me an opportunity to lead a lonely, quiet life with my mother and
my books, which latter, however, were only to be used in moderation.

Shortly before our departure we had taken a longer drive with our new
friends Fran Puricelli and her d