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1799年夏天，一位名叫亚历山大·冯·洪堡 [1] 的29岁德国人，从西班牙的拉科鲁尼亚海港起航，踏上南美洲探险的旅程。
In the summer of 1799, a twenty-nine-year-old German by the name of Alexander von Humboldt set sail from the Spanish port of La Coruña, bound for a voyage of exploration of the South American continent.
“我早年的时候，就有一股欲望，想要远行到欧洲人很少涉足的地方，”他回忆道。“研究地图和阅读旅游指南充满神秘感并引人入胜，有时实在难以抗拒。”这位年轻的德国人的确很适合追求自己的理想，因为除了惊人的体力外，他在生物学、地质学、化学、物理学和历史方面都是行家。在格丁根大学求学时，他结识了曾经陪伴库克船长第二次出航的博物学家福斯特 [2] ，并且掌握了分辨植物和动物种类的技巧。毕业后，洪堡一直寻找机会到偏远而不为人知的地方旅游。到埃及和麦加旅游的计划在最后一分钟告吹，不过1799年的春天，他有幸遇到西班牙国王卡洛斯四世，并说服了国王资助他到南美洲进行探险。
From my earliest days I had felt the urge to travel to distant lands seldom visited by Europeans,' he would later recall. 'The study of maps and the perusal of travel books aroused in me a secret fascination that was at times almost irresistible.' The young German was ideally suited to follow up on his fascination. Along with great physical stamina, he had expertise in biology, geology, chemistry, physics and history. As a student at the University of Göttingen, he had befriended Georg Forster, the naturalist who had accompanied Captain Cook on his second voyage, and he had mastered the art of classifying plant and animal species. Since finishing his studies, Humboldt had been looking for opportunities to travel to somewhere remote and unknown. Plans to go to Egypt and Mecca had fallen through at the last moment, but in the spring of 1799, he had had the good fortune to meet King Carlos IV of Spain and had persuaded him to underwrite his exploration of South America.
以后，洪堡离开欧洲长达5年的时间。他回来后，在巴黎定居，并在接下来的20年内出版了一部30册的旅游集《新大陆赤道地区之旅》。这部规模宏大的著作确实反映出他的非凡成就。爱默生 [3] 曾写道：“洪堡是众多世界奇迹之一，就像亚里士多德 [4] 、尤利乌斯·恺撒 [5] 和克赖顿 [6] 一样，仿佛在不同时代里展现了人类智慧的潜能，包括其力量和各种才能，他可说是一个‘全能’的人。”
Humboldt was to be away from Europe for five years. On his return, he settled in Paris and over the next twenty years published a thirty-volume account of his travels entitled Fourney to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent . The length of the work was an accurate measure of Humboldt's achievements. Surveying these, Ralph Waldo Emerson was to write: 'Humboldt was one of those wonders of the world, like Aristotle, like Julius Caesar, like the Admirable Crichton, who appear from time to time as if to show us the possibilities of the human mind, the force and range of the faculties-a universal man.'
当洪堡从拉科鲁尼亚启航时，南美洲对于欧洲人来说相当陌生。韦斯普奇 [7] 和布甘维尔 [8] 曾经绕着南美洲的海岸环行，拉·孔达铭 [9] 和布给 [10] 也曾经勘察过亚马孙和秘鲁的山河，但是当时还是没有精确的南美洲地图，也没有关于那里的地质、植物和原住民的任何资料。洪堡将欧洲对于南美洲的认识提高到另一个层次。他沿着南美洲北部的海岸线和南美洲内陆，行进了15000公里，一路上采集了1600个植物样本，并发现了600个新品种。他根据计算精确的天文钟和六分仪所测量出的数据，重新绘制了南美洲的地图。他研究了地球的磁场，并且是首个发现离开地球两极越远，磁场就越弱的人。他也是第一个描述橡胶树和金鸡纳树的人。他画出连接奥里诺科河和内格罗河的流域。他测量出气压和海拔高度对植物种植的影响程度。他研究了亚马孙河盆地土人的宗族仪式，也发表了关于地理和文化特征之间关系的理论。他比较了太平洋和大西洋海水盐分的含量，还提出了海潮的观念，并意识到海水的温度受海潮的影响，远大于纬度的影响。
Much about South America was still unknown to Europe when Humboldt set sail from La Coruña: Vespucci and Bougainville had travelled around the shores of the continent, La Condamine and Bouguer had surveyed the streams and mountains of the Amazon and of Peru-but there were still no accurate maps and little information on geology, botany and the life of indigenous people. Humboldt transformed the state of knowledge. He travelled 15,000 kilometres around the northern coastlines and interior and, on the way, collected 1,600 plants and identified 600 new species. He redrew the map of South America based on readings from accurate chronometers and sextants. He researched the earth's magnetism, and was the first man to discover that magnetic intensity declines the further one is from the poles. He gave the first account of the rubber and cinchona trees. He mapped the streams connecting the Orinoco and the Rio Negro river systems. He measured the effects of air pressure and altitude on vegetation. He studied the kinship rituals of the people of the Amazon basin and inferred connections between geography and cultural characteristics. He compared the salinity of the water in the Pacific and Atlantic and conceived of the idea of sea currents, recognizing that the temperature of the sea owes more to drifts than to latitude.
爱德华·恩德：《洪堡和庞普兰德在委内瑞拉》，约1850年
早期为洪堡立传的作者施瓦岑贝格，将其著作的副题命名为：“一生所能缔造的成就”，并把洪堡特别好奇的事物归纳为5个方面：其一，对地球及其居住者的知识；其二，对主宰宇宙、人类、动物、植物和矿物的更高自然法则之发现；其三，对新生物的发现；其四，对已发掘但未完整认识的陆地及其各种物产的发现；最后，对新认识的人种及其风俗、语言、文化历史遗迹的了解。
Humboldt's early biographer, F. A. Schwarzenberg, subtitled his life of Humboldt What May be Accomplished in a Lifetime, and summarized the areas of his extraordinary curiosity: '1. The knowledge of the earth and its inhabitants. 2. The discovery of the higher laws of nature, which govern the universe, men, animals, plants and minerals. 3. The discovery of new forms of life. 4. The discovery of territories hitherto but imperfectly known, and their various productions. 5. The acquaintance with new species of the human race-their manners, language and historical traces of their culture.'
这种成就也许很少或者不可能是一个人一生所能完成的。
What may be accomplished in a lifetime-and seldom or never is.
