of the duke of Genoa (born at Turin on the 20th of November 1851). On the 11th of November 1869 Margherita gave birth to Victor Emmanuel, prince of Naples, afterwards Victor Emmanuel III. of Italy. Ascending the throne on the death of his father (9th January 1878), Humbert adopted the style “Humbert I. of Italy” instead of Humbert IV., and consented that the remains of his father should be interred at Rome in the Pantheon, and not in the royal mausoleum of Superga (see Crispi). Accompanied by the premier, Cairoli, he began a tour of the provinces of his kingdom, but on entering Naples (November 17, 1878), amid the acclamations of an immense crowd, was attacked by a fanatic named Passanante. The king warded off the blow with his sabre, but Cairoli, in attempting to defend him, was severely wounded in the thigh. The would-be assassin was condemned to death, but the sentence was by the king commuted to one of penal servitude for life. The occurrence upset for several years the health of Queen Margherita. In 1881 King Humbert, again accompanied by Cairoli, resumed his interrupted tour, and visited Sicily and the southern Italian provinces. In 1882 he took a prominent part in the national mourning for Garibaldi, whose tomb at Caprera he repeatedly visited. When, in the autumn of 1882, Verona and Venetia were inundated, he hastened to the spot, directed salvage operations, and provided large sums of money for the destitute. Similarly, on the 28th of July 1883, he hurried to Ischia, where an earthquake had engulfed some 5000 persons. Countermanding the order of the minister of public works to cover the ruins with quicklime, the king prosecuted salvage operations for five days longer, and personally saved many victims at the risk of his own life. In 1884 he visited Busca and Naples, where cholera was raging, helping with money and advice the numerous sufferers, and raising the spirit of the population. Compared with the reigns of his grandfather, Charles Albert, and of his father, Victor Emmanuel, the reign of Humbert was tranquil. Scrupulously observant of constitutional principles, he followed, as far as practicable, parliamentary indications in his choice of premiers, only one of whom—Rudini—was drawn from the Conservative ranks. In foreign policy he approved of the conclusion of the Triple Alliance, and, in repeated visits to Vienna and Berlin, established and consolidated the pact. Towards Great Britain his attitude was invariably cordial, and he considered the Triple Alliance imperfect unless supplemented by an Anglo-Italian naval entente. Favourably disposed towards the policy of colonial expansion inaugurated in 1885 by the occupation of Massawa, he was suspected of aspiring to a vast empire in north-east Africa, a suspicion which tended somewhat to diminish his popularity after the disaster of Adowa on the 1st of March 1896. On the other hand, his popularity was enhanced by the firmness of his attitude towards the Vatican, as exemplified in his telegram declaring Rome “intangible” (September 20, 1886), and affirming the permanence of the Italian possession of the Eternal City. Above all King Humbert was a soldier, jealous of the honour and prestige of the army to such a degree that he promoted a duel between his nephew, the count of Turin, and Prince Henry of Orleans (August 15, 1897) on account of the aspersions cast by the latter upon Italian arms. The claims of King Humbert upon popular gratitude and affection were enhanced by his extraordinary munificence, which was not merely displayed on public occasions, but directed to the relief of innumerable private wants into which he had made personal inquiry. It has been calculated that at least £100,000 per annum was expended by the king in this way. The regard in which he was universally held was abundantly demonstrated on the occasion of the unsuccessful attempt upon his life made by the anarchist Acciarito near Rome on the 22nd of April 1897, and still more after his tragic assassination at Monza by the anarchist Bresci on the evening of the 29th of July 1900. Good-humoured, active, tender-hearted, somewhat fatalistic, but, above all, generous, he was spontaneously called “Humbert the Good.” He was buried in the Pantheon in Rome, by the side of Victor Emmanuel II., on the 9th of August 1900. (H. W. S.)
HUMBOLDT, FRIEDRICH HEINRICH ALEXANDER, Baron
von (1769–1859), German naturalist and traveller, was born at
Berlin, on the 14th of September 1769. His father, who was a
major in the Prussian army, belonged to a Pomeranian family
of consideration, and was rewarded for his services during the
Seven Years’ War with the post of royal chamberlain. He
married in 1766 Maria Elizabeth von Colomb, widow of Baron
von Hollwede, and had by her two sons, of whom the younger
is the subject of this article. The childhood of Alexander von
Humboldt was not a promising one as regards either health or
intellect. His characteristic tastes, however, soon displayed
themselves; and from his fancy for collecting and labelling
plants, shells and insects he received the playful title of “the
little apothecary.” The care of his education, on the unexpected
death of his father in 1779, devolved upon his mother, who
discharged the trust with constancy and judgment. Destined
for a political career, he studied finance during six months at the
university of Frankfort-on-the-Oder; and a year later, April 25,
1789, he matriculated at Göttingen, then eminent for the lectures
of C. G. Heyne and J. F. Blumenbach. His vast and varied
powers were by this time fully developed; and during the vacation
of 1789 he gave a fair earnest of his future performances in
a scientific excursion up the Rhine, and in the treatise thence
issuing, Mineralogische Beobachtungen über einige Basalte am
Rhein (Brunswick, 1790). His native passion for distant travel
was confirmed by the friendship formed by him at Göttingen with
George Forster, Heyne’s son-in-law, the distinguished companion
of Captain Cook’s second voyage. Henceforth his studies, which
his rare combination of parts enabled him to render at once
multifarious, rapid and profound, were directed with extraordinary
insight and perseverance to the purpose of preparing
himself for his distinctive calling as a scientific explorer. With
this view he studied commerce and foreign languages at Hamburg,
geology at Freiberg under A. G. Werner, anatomy at Jena under
J. C. Loder, astronomy and the use of scientific instruments
under F. X. von Zach and J. G. Köhler. His researches into
the vegetation of the mines of Freiberg led to the publication
in 1793 of his Florae Fribergensis Specimen; and the results of a
prolonged course of experiments on the phenomena of muscular
irritability, then recently discovered by L. Galvani, were contained
in his Versuche über die gereizte Muskel- und Nervenfaser
(Berlin, 1797), enriched in the French translation with notes by
Blumenbach.
In 1794 he was admitted to the intimacy of the famous Weimar coterie, and contributed (June 1795) to Schiller’s new periodical, Die Horen, a philosophical allegory entitled Die Lebenskraft, oder der rhodische Genius. In the summer of 1790 he paid a flying visit to England in company with Forster. In 1792 and 1797 he was in Vienna; in 1795 he made a geological and botanical tour through Switzerland and Italy. He had obtained in the meantime official employment, having been appointed assessor of mines at Berlin, February 29, 1792. Although the service of the state was consistently regarded by him but as an apprenticeship to the service of science, he fulfilled its duties with such conspicuous ability that he not only rapidly rose to the highest post in his department, but was besides entrusted with several important diplomatic missions. The death of his mother, on the 19th of November 1796, set him free to follow the bent of his genius, and, finally severing his official connexions, he waited for an opportunity of executing his long-cherished schemes of travel. On the postponement of Captain Baudin’s proposed voyage of circumnavigation, which he had been officially invited to accompany, he left Paris for Marseilles with Aimé Bonpland, the designated botanist of the frustrated expedition, hoping to join Bonaparte in Egypt. Means of transport, however, were not forthcoming, and the two travellers eventually found their way to Madrid, where the unexpected patronage of the minister d’Urquijo determined them to make Spanish America the scene of their explorations.
Armed with powerful recommendations, they sailed in the “Pizarro” from Corunna, on the 5th of June 1799, stopped six days at Teneriffe for the ascent of the Peak, and landed, on the
