It was one of the many fortunate circumstances in the position of the two Humboldts that they passed their youth in the quiet old castle of Tegel, separated from Berlin by a pine-wood, and surrounded by walks and gardens. They too, like Tycho Brahe, enjoyed that happy combination of tranquillity with the neighborhood of a capital city which is so peculiarly favorable to culture. In later life, when Alexander Humboldt had collected those immense masses of material which were the result of his travels in South America, he warmly appreciated the unequalled advantages of Paris. He knew how to extract from the solitudes of primæval nature what he wanted for the enrichment of his mind; but he knew also how to avail himself of all the assistance and opportunities which are only to be had in great capitals. He was not attracted to town-life, like Dr. Johnson and Mr. Buckle, to the exclusion of wild nature; but neither, on the other hand, had he that horror of towns which was a morbid defect in Cowper, and which condemns those who suffer from it to rusticity. Even Galileo, who thought the country especially favorable to speculative intellects, and the walls of cities an imprisonment for them, declared that the best years of his life were those he had spent in Padua. LETTER II. TO A FRIEND WHO MAINTAINED THAT SURROUNDINGS WERE A MATTER OF INDIFFERENCE TO A THOROUGHLY OCCUPIED MIND. Archimedes at the siege of Syracuse--Geoffroy St. Hilaire in the besieged city of Alexandria--Goethe at the bombardment of Verdun--Lullo, the Oriental missionary--Giordano Bruno--Unacknowledged effect of surroundings--Effect of Frankfort on Goethe--Great capitals--Goethe--His garden-house--What he said about Béranger and Paris--Fortunate surroundings of Titian.