The Invention of Nature

At the end of October Humboldt and Bonpland rushed to Marseille ready to leave immediately. But nothing happened. For two months, day after day, they climbed the hill to the old church of Notre-Dame de la Garde to scan the harbour. Every time they saw the white glimmer of a sail on the horizon, their hopes rose. When news reached them that their promised frigate had been badly damaged in a storm, Humboldt decided to charter his own vessel but quickly discovered that regardless of all the money he had, the recent naval battles made it impossible to find a ship. Wherever he turned, ‘all hopes were shattered’, he wrote to an old friend in Berlin. He was exasperated – his pockets full of money and his mind brimming with the latest scientific knowledge, yet still not able to travel. War and politics, Humboldt said, stopped everything and ‘the world is closed’.

Finally, at the end of 1798, almost exactly two years after his mother’s death, Humboldt gave up on the French and travelled to Madrid to try his luck there. The Spanish were famous for their reluctance to let foreigners enter their territories, but with charm and a string of useful connections at the Spanish court, Humboldt managed to obtain the unlikely permission. In early May 1799 King Carlos IV of Spain provided a passport to the colonies in South America and the Philippines on the express condition that Humboldt financed the voyage himself. In return Humboldt promised to dispatch flora and fauna for the royal cabinet and garden. Never before had a foreigner been allowed such great freedom to explore their territories. Even the Spanish themselves were surprised by their king’s decision.

Humboldt had no intention of wasting any more time. Five days after they received their passports, Humboldt and Bonpland left Madrid for La Coruña, a port at the north-western tip of Spain, where the frigate Pizarro was waiting for them. In early June 1799 they were ready to sail despite warnings that British warships had been sighted nearby. Nothing – neither cannons, nor a fear of the enemy – could spoil the moment. ‘My head is dizzy with joy,’ Humboldt wrote.

He had bought a great collection of the latest instruments, ranging from telescopes and microscopes to a large pendulum clock and compasses – forty-two instruments in all, individually packed into protective velvet-lined boxes – along with vials for storing seeds and soil samples, reams of paper, scales and countless tools. ‘My mood was good,’ Humboldt noted in his diary, ‘just as it should be when beginning a great work.’

In the letters written on the eve of their departure, he explained his intentions. Like previous explorers, he would collect plants, seeds, rocks and animals. He would measure the height of mountains, determine longitude and latitude, and take temperatures of water and air. But the real purpose of the voyage, he said, was to discover how ‘all forces of nature are interlaced and interwoven’ – how organic and inorganic nature interacted. Man needs to strive for ‘the good and the great’, Humboldt wrote in his last letter from Spain, ‘the rest depends on destiny’.

Tenerife and Pico del Teide (Illustration Credit 3.3)

As they sailed towards the tropics, Humboldt grew increasingly excited. They caught and examined fish, jellyfish, seaweed and birds. He tested his instruments, took temperatures and measured the height of the sun. One night the water seemed to be on fire with phosphorescence. The whole sea, Humboldt noted in his diary, was like an ‘edible liquid full of organic particles’. After two weeks at sea, they briefly stopped at Tenerife, the largest of the Canary Islands. It was a rather unspectacular arrival at first as the whole island was shrouded in fog but when the thick mist lifted, Humboldt saw the sun illuminating the glistening white summit of the volcano Pico del Teide. He rushed to the bow of their ship, breathlessly catching a glimpse of the first mountain that he was going to climb outside Europe. With their ship scheduled to spend only a couple of days in Tenerife, there was not much time.

The next morning Humboldt, Bonpland and some local guides set off towards the volcano, without tents or coats, and armed only with some weak ‘fir torches’. It was hot in the valleys but the temperature dropped rapidly as they ascended the volcano. When they reached the peak at more than 12,000 feet, the wind was so strong they could hardly stand. Their faces were frozen but their feet were burning from the heat emanating from the hot ground. It was painful but Humboldt couldn’t care less. There was something in the air that created a ‘magical’ transparency, he said, an enticing promise of what was to come. He could hardly tear himself away but they had to get back to the ship.