Morning journal and courier., 1886-01-20
Leopold VOn Ranke.

To-day I had the pleasure of long con- versation with Leopold von Ranke, whose ninetieth birthday was celebrated about week ago with so much honor and circum- stance.
 I could not help comparing the figure of the nonagenarian historian with fine paint ing overhead representing him in the bloom of manhood, trim, shorn and shaven-a very marked contrast, indeed, to the singular per sonality who seemed to have actually stepped into one's presence out of the middle ages Clad in 8 loose dressing gown, with careless slippers 'Fthrust upon contrary feet" his venerable beard falling on his breast, his eyes bleared with infaming particles of book-dust, and the forehead of his tete car rec knotted and gnarled with the lifelong habit of mental oncentration-Leopold von Ranlze looks like perfect specimen of those medieval philosophers who spent their days and nights in front of huge, outspread foli- os, with no companion but pensive cat, and no furniture or ornament to their cells save skulls and cross-bones, sand-glasses, elixir phials and chemical retorts
 But though outwardly resembling such a Dr. Faust Dr. von Ranke has nothing what ever in him of morose taciturnity or surly snappishness. On the contrary, his nature is still almost as sunny and simple as that of a child. 1t is impossible to conceive literary greatness combined with more unaffected ways, genuineness and affability; and in these respects he forms happy contrast to so many of his class in Germany, with whom the unwary foreigner cannot come into personal contact twice without having bitter cause to rue his disregard of the maxim, "Cave hominem unius ibri." The historian of the Popes has nothing whatever in con- mon with the astronomical professor, who will transfx you with an icy stare if you ask him what he thinks of so-and-sos new vol ume of poems, or with the great metaphysi- clan, who dreamily hands you the salt if you beg him to pass the sherry. There is tain class of professors in the Fatherland who only enter drawing-rooms to sit silently and be stared at like Greek busts, or to pass their hands wildly through their long hair and mutter strange sounds and uncanny in- cantations.
 But Leopold von Ranke never did, and never does, affect any of these disagreeable eccentricities of genius. On the contrary, everyone who converses with him must be tempted to ask himself whether it be possi- ble that such an extremely simple little man can be so great a writer Of his qualities as writer one can only judge by going through the fifty odd volumes which embody his his tcrieal researches, but few minutes con versation with the author of this library will suffice to convince his visitors that he is as skillful st entertaining with his tongue as with his pen. Ard even now, with ninety summers, or rather winters, on his brow his talk is as firm, fluent and continuous as ever it seems to have been. His enunciation is clear and forcible; he requires not to stop and search for the right word; you never see him interrupt his story to pass his hand across his brow in the effort to regain some forgotten fact or f1eeting idea, but all goes on swimmingly, and he will occasionally en- phasiZe sentence by motion of the hand fash of his bright, penetrating eye, which is still the index to his mind and the redeeming ornament of his time-worn face He spoke to me sadly and with thankful reference to the will of God of other mem bers of the human race who had attained, or nearly so, to his own marvellous age-of Sir Moses Montefore, of Thomas Carlyle (who was born in the same year and month Ranke), and of Sophocles, who might have even lived to be centenarian but for the fla bled eagle and it's tortoise.
 ''Bnt that will never be my fate" said the historian, for do not live so much in the open air as did Sophocles" ''But your Ex- eellency"-for, being ''Wirklicher Geheim CT Rath," he is entitled to this appellation- "But your Excellency," I observed, ''still takes regular outdoor exercise" "Oh. ves," was the reply, "I still do my two hours
 
 is good; but I don't like driving; it is too much of bore. And this interval of exer- else enables me to get through an average of eight hours hard work every day. My first spell is from ten to two, and I return to my desk at nine till about one in the morning. Midnight is my most congenial hour, and this is the time, find, when I can produce most"
 ''And your Excellency can still write with easel" ''No, my writing days are done, but have two secretaries, whom I keep busily engaged in reading. looking up authorities, making excerpts and writing from my dicta- tion. I have written little nothing with my own hand since the appearance of my English History and strange to say, some of the works thus dictated have been bet ter received than others. Dictation some times enables one to be less fastidious and more natural. Of course I have to be very careful with my mode of life. I have nev- CT been a smoker, but I can always enjoy a glass of good wine, and thank God my nights are still free from sleeplessness, I should never get at all. You may think this house of mine''-a second floor fiat in the Luisen Strasse, with the high level metropolitan railway trains screaming past-''you may think this house of mine rather 8 humble, illsuited and unfashiena- more than the last forty years, and cannot thing about it is that the sun can never get into my working room; and then I have all around me here about thirty thou sand volumes, which I never could get properly removed and rearranged."