LITTLE JOURNEYS hall, and speaks or reads to fifty or sixty students, but the printed word goes to millions, so his thoughts here expressed in Jena, are shots heard 'round the world. American pedagogic institutions are mendicant-they depend upon private charity and are endowed by pious pirates and beneficent buccaneers. The individuals made these institutions possible very naturally have a controlling voice in their management. The colleges in America that are not supported by direct mendicancy, depend upon the dole of the legislator, & woe betide the pedagogic principal who offends the orthodox vote. His supplies are cut short, and the purse strings pucker until he moderates his voice to a monotone and dilutes his views to a dull neutral tint. CI do not know a University in the United States that would not place Ernst Hæckel on half rations, and make him fight for his life, or else he would be discharged and be reduced to the sad necessity of tilting windmills in popular lecture courses for the edification of agrarians. The German government seeks to make men free. It even gives them the privilege of being absurd; for pioneers sometimes take the wrong track. We do not scout Columbus because his domestic voyages were failures; not even because he sought one thing and found another, and died without knowing the difference. Hæckel's wants are all supplied; what he needs in the way of apparatus or material, is his for the asking; he travels at will the round world over; visions of old age and yawning almshouses are not for him. He owns LITTLE himself he does what he wishes-he says what he JOURNEYS thinks, and neither priest nor politician dare cry, hist! So we get the paradox: the only perfect freedom is to be found in a monarchy. "A Republic," said Schopenhauer, "is a land that is ruled by the many,-that is to say by the incompetent." But, of course, Schopenhauer knew nothing of the American primary, devised by altruistic Hibernians for the purpose of defeating the will of the incompetent many. ア RNST HECKEL was born in 1834, and The greatest error one can make in life, is not to be well born; failing in this, a man struggles through life under an awful handicap. Hæckel formed the habit of steady, systematic work, in youth, and untiring effort has been the rule of his life. Man was made to be well, and he was made to work. It is only work-which is the constant effort to retain equilibrium-that makes life endurable. So we find Hæckel now, at three-score-and-ten, a model of manly vigor. with all the eager, curious, receptive qualities of youth-a happy man, but one who knows that happiness lies on the way to heaven, and not in arriving there and sitting down to enjoy it. LITTLE JOURNEYS Ernst Hæckel gathers his manna fresh every day. I believe Hæckel enjoys his pipe and mug after the day's work is done; but for stimulants in a general sense, he has no use. In his book on Ceylon, he attributes his escape from the jungle fever, from which most of his party suffered, to the fact that he never used strong drink, and ate sparingly. He is jealous of the sunshine-a great walker-works daily with hoe and spade in his garden; and breathes deeply, pounding on his chest when going from his house to the college in a way that causes much amusement among the fledglings. Tall, spare rather than stout, bronzed, active, wearing shoes with thick soles, plain gray clothes, often accompanied by a half dozen young men, he is a common figure on the roads that wind out of Jena, and lose themselves amid the mountains The distinguishing feature of the man is his animation. He is full of good cheer, and acts as if he were expecting to discover something wonderful very soon. To find the balance between play and work, has been the aim of his life; and surely, he has pretty nearly discovered it. Once when a caller asked him what he considered the greatest achievement of his life, he took out of his pocket a little leather case containing a bronze medal, and proudly passed it around. This medal was presented to him in 1859, in token of a running high jump -the world's record at the time, or not, as the case may be. Hæckel is essentially an out-of-door man, as opposed to the philosopher who works in a stuffy room, and grows round-shouldered over his microscope. "I may entrust laboratory analyses to others, but there is one thing I will never let another do for me, and that is take my daily walk a-field," he once said. In lecturing he sits at a table and simply talks in a very informal way; often purposely arousing a discussion, or awakening a sleepy student with a question. Yet on occasion he can speak to a multitude, and, like Huxley, rise to the occasion. Oratory, however, he considers rather dangerous, as the speaker is usually influenced by the opinions of the audience, and is apt to grow more emphatic than exact—to generate more heat than light. The comparison of Hæckel with Huxley, is not out of place. He has been called the Huxley of Germany. just as Huxley was called the Hæckel of England. In temperament, they were much alike; although Hæckel perhaps does not use quite so much aqua fortis in his ink. Yet I can well imagine that if he were at a convention where the Bishop of Oxford would level at him a few theological spit-balls, he would answer, unerringly, with a sling and a few smooth pebbles from the brook. And possibly, knowing himself, this is why he keeps out of society, and avoids all public gatherings where pseudo-science is exploited. There is a superstition that really great men are quite oblivious of their greatness, and that the pride of achievement is not among their assets. Nothing could LITTLE LITTLE be wider of the mark. When Ernst Hæckel was JOURNEYS asked "Who is your favorite author?" he promptly answered, "Ernst Hæckel." His study is a big square room on the top floor of one The last book issued by Professor Hæckel was that Unlike Herbert Spencer, whose later writings were |