旅行的藝術(shù):Ⅳ 好奇心-2

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1799年夏天，一位名叫亞歷山大·馮·洪堡 [1] 的29歲德國人，從西班牙的拉科魯尼亞海港起航，踏上南美洲探險的旅程。

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.

“我早年的時候，就有一股欲望，想要遠行到歐洲人很少涉足的地方，”他回憶道。“研究地圖和閱讀旅游指南充滿神秘感并引人入勝，有時實在難以抗拒。”這位年輕的德國人的確很適合追求自己的理想，因為除了驚人的體力外，他在生物學(xué)、地質(zhì)學(xué)、化學(xué)、物理學(xué)和歷史方面都是行家。在格丁根大學(xué)求學(xué)時，他結(jié)識了曾經(jīng)陪伴庫克船長第二次出航的博物學(xué)家福斯特 [2] ，并且掌握了分辨植物和動物種類的技巧。畢業(yè)后，洪堡一直尋找機會到偏遠而不為人知的地方旅游。到埃及和麥加旅游的計劃在最后一分鐘告吹，不過1799年的春天，他有幸遇到西班牙國王卡洛斯四世，并說服了國王資助他到南美洲進行探險。

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，洪堡離開歐洲長達5年的時間。他回來后，在巴黎定居，并在接下來的20年內(nèi)出版了一部30冊的旅游集《新大陸赤道地區(qū)之旅》。這部規(guī)模宏大的著作確實反映出他的非凡成就。愛默生 [3] 曾寫道：“洪堡是眾多世界奇跡之一，就像亞里士多德 [4] 、尤利烏斯·愷撒 [5] 和克賴頓 [6] 一樣，仿佛在不同時代里展現(xiàn)了人類智慧的潛能，包括其力量和各種才能，他可說是一個‘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.'

當洪堡從拉科魯尼亞啟航時，南美洲對于歐洲人來說相當陌生。韋斯普奇 [7] 和布甘維爾 [8] 曾經(jīng)繞著南美洲的海岸環(huán)行，拉·孔達銘 [9] 和布給 [10] 也曾經(jīng)勘察過亞馬孫和秘魯?shù)纳胶?，但是當時還是沒有精確的南美洲地圖，也沒有關(guān)于那里的地質(zhì)、植物和原住民的任何資料。洪堡將歐洲對于南美洲的認識提高到另一個層次。他沿著南美洲北部的海岸線和南美洲內(nèi)陸，行進了15000公里，一路上采集了1600個植物樣本，并發(fā)現(xiàn)了600個新品種。他根據(jù)計算精確的天文鐘和六分儀所測量出的數(shù)據(jù)，重新繪制了南美洲的地圖。他研究了地球的磁場，并且是首個發(fā)現(xiàn)離開地球兩極越遠，磁場就越弱的人。他也是第一個描述橡膠樹和金雞納樹的人。他畫出連接奧里諾科河和內(nèi)格羅河的流域。他測量出氣壓和海拔高度對植物種植的影響程度。他研究了亞馬孫河盆地土人的宗族儀式，也發(fā)表了關(guān)于地理和文化特征之間關(guān)系的理論。他比較了太平洋和大西洋海水鹽分的含量，還提出了海潮的觀念，并意識到海水的溫度受海潮的影響，遠大于緯度的影響。

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.

愛德華·恩德：《洪堡和龐普蘭德在委內(nèi)瑞拉》，約1850年

早期為洪堡立傳的作者施瓦岑貝格，將其著作的副題命名為：“一生所能締造的成就”，并把洪堡特別好奇的事物歸納為5個方面：其一，對地球及其居住者的知識；其二，對主宰宇宙、人類、動物、植物和礦物的更高自然法則之發(fā)現(xiàn)；其三，對新生物的發(fā)現(xiàn)；其四，對已發(fā)掘但未完整認識的陸地及其各種物產(chǎn)的發(fā)現(xiàn)；最后，對新認識的人種及其風(fēng)俗、語言、文化歷史遺跡的了解。

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.'

這種成就也許很少或者不可能是一個人一生所能完成的。

What may be accomplished in a lifetime-and seldom or never is.