forth, to rest beside her
husband and children, her father William, and her uncle Alexander von
Humboldt. The gnarled and twisted stem of a venerable ivy clasps with
two arms one of the most majestic of the tall trees before the house,
one branch bearing large leaves of a tender green, the other small and
beautifully outlined leaves of dark maroon exquisitely veined. Beds
bordered with box are bright with pansies. We wander onward, along the
great shaded avenue, with level green fields on either side. An
opening suddenly sets a study in color before our eyes. The unbroken
stretch of sward southward is in most vivid spring green; there is a
gleam of blue water beyond the tender purple of a distant forest,
overhung by the fleecy cumuli of a perfect but constantly changing
sky. It is simple and beautiful beyond description. We approach some
wooded hills, well cared for, but lifting themselves upward in the
beauty of Nature, not art. Buttercups and star-grass and chickweed
arrest us occasionally by the roadside, until a wooded pathway brings
us to a plot surrounded by an iron fence. Within, an old woman is
trimming the ivy overspreading a grave, and there are eight or ten
other mounds, all ivy or flower covered, and with low headstones. At
the west end of the enclosure is a semicircular stone platform, with a
stone seat skirting the circumference. From the centre rises a lofty
shaft of polished granite, bearing on its summit a statue of Hope, by
Thorwaldsen. On the pedestal are the names of William von Humboldt and
his noble wife, and near it the newly closed grave of this daughter,
who at the age of eighty-five, after a distinguished life, sleeps here
beneath the funeral wreaths which hide the mound, and bear, on long
black or white ribbons, the names of societies and eminent families
who have sent these tributes of remembrance and affection. White
hyacinths and lilies-of-the-valley perfume the air, and palm-branches
lie on the new-made grave, above the flowers. I treasure an ivy leaf
or two, given by the workwoman, and pick up a cone which has just
fallen from a fir-tree upon the grave of Alexander, as I read the
inscription on his headstone: "Thou too wilt at last come to the
grave; how art thou preparing?" This simple epitaph, with name and
age, is all, except his earthly work, that speaks for him who was
once, after Napoleon Bonaparte, the most famous man in Europe, and
who, in learning and in devotion to Nature, was as