I have had the good fortune to find the King in excellent health, and in the usual kind disposition towards myself. Great recollections in long lives are a fine bond between man and man, the power of which is well tried when it has resisted the storms of time. It is more than half a century since my first intercourse with the young heir-apparent. What vicissitudes have occupied this long interval is matter of history. That they have never deprived me of the confidence of the two kings, father and son, is with me a source of pride—that is to say, of a sensation which the term peace of mind and heart would better characterize than the unsafe word that has escaped my pen. You, three years my senior, have just celebrated your eighty-seventh birth-day. That you and I have understood “the art of living,” we may confess. That we shall do well to cultivate it still longer, is not to be denied. With sincere friendship and esteem, METTERNICH. 186. HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN. BERLIN, _November 20th, 1856_. I want your literary aid, my noble friend. Our great landscape painter, Hildebrandt, who was in Brazil, Canada, Egypt, Palestine, Greece, and recently at the North Cape, has executed an admirable aquarelle picture of my “Interior Household,” in order to replace a smaller one sold in many hundreds of copies in America. “La renommée, fruit d’une longue patience de vivre, augmente avec l’imbécilité.” I am compelled to make an inscription to this picture of mine, with my own hand. This is no easy task. I pray that you will visit me on Saturday, at one o’clock, if it is possible to you. You shall guide me. Your most grateful A. V. HUMBOLDT. THURSDAY. 187. HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN. BERLIN, _November 21st, 1856_.