In the autumn of 1831, at the conclusion of this fruitful summer term, Lepsius begged his father for permission to follow his best friend, Kreiss, to his home at Strasburg, in Alsace, and to pass the holidays there in the house of Kreiss’s parents. Just at this time the court president had incurred great expenses, yet he was willing to comply with his son’s wish, if the latter could assure him that he expected to derive substantial scientific advantages from the proposed journey. “As I am well acquainted,” runs the answer, “with your present circumstances of which you write, and how all your expenses accumulate just at this time, it would be foolish and very wrong of me to expect from you any considerable sum for a pure pleasure trip. You yourself make your permission dependent upon your firm conviction that I shall derive from this trip great, and not trifling, gains for my scientific as well as for my general education, and indeed on a moderate sum. Of the former I cannot say so much, since the literary advantages will be confined to the diligent, and let us hope, more intelligent and judicious consideration of the treasures of art on the way, and whatever chance may possibly throw into my hands at the library in Strasburg. But I cannot overlook the indirect benefit, dependent upon forming the acquaintance of so many learned men, which must conduce to advancement in my general culture. For I may well say that this lies no less near to my heart, and has always done so, than purely philological progress; indeed, I have always regarded them as quite inseparable, one completing and sustaining the other. But if I can say of none of my former excursions that they were mere pleasure trips, from which I derived no substantial benefit, still less would it be true of this next one, to which I should address myself with better preparation and more knowledge than to any previous journey. Besides, I could neither make up for it in the future, during my final years of study, when my time will be still more limited, nor could I ever again expect to meet so good an opportunity.” Lepsius remained faithful to this desire for general culture throughout his later years, and it preserved the indefatigable investigator, who was often obliged to devote the best part of his time and energy to apparently trivial scientific problems, from becoming, even in the remotest degree, what is called a closet scholar.