Bunsen's Trip to Iceland As Recounted in Letters to His Mother' RALPH E. OESPER
University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio
KARL FREUDENBERG
University o f Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany
"Volcanoes haw a splendor that is grim, And earthquakes only terrify the dolts; But to him who's scientific Thee's nothing that's terri& I n thefalling of =sight of thunderbolts." -W. S. Gilbert, "The Mikado"
same time in Copenhagen and Marburg. He was particularly interested in the gases emitted by the active volcanoes and hot springs, and more than one hundred samples were taken back to his laboratory for analysis. An adequate number of samples of the rocks, lava, etc., were collected, and later analyzed. Out of
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HE exceptionally violent volcanic outbreak on Iceland in the summer of 1845 led the well-known traveler and scientist, (Wolfgang) Sartorius von Waltershausen, to propose to the Danish government that a scientific expedition be sent to the island to study the eruption, and also the geysers and hot springs that are due to the same,causes as the volcanoes. The authorities willingly supported the plan and placed all facilities a t the disposal of the party, which consisted of von Waltershausen, who acted as director; the French mineralogist, Alfred Descloizeaux (Des Cloizeaux) ; Robert Bunsen, who was then Professor of Chemistry a t Marburg; and his colleague the mineralogist, Bergmann. "Connected with the Icelandic expedition the following story is told: Bunsen had made all his arrangements for the expedition, had packed all the apparatus required t o carry on an experimental researchin thoseregions, hut he had been unable t o obtain from the Kurfiirst of Hesse-Cassel,of whose Civil Service he was a member, leave of absence from his professorship, although the application had been made repeatedly. I n this difficulty, he appealed far help t o a cousin who happened to he domestic physician t o this Prince, whose eccentricity was well known. The difficulty was solved as follows: the physician informed His Royal Highness that a cousin of his, who was professor of chemistry in the Marburg University, had conceived the wild idea of voyaging to Iceland, and that this was regrettab& inasmuch as the professor would inevitably lose his life in so dangerous an undertaking, comequently he hoped that His Royal Highness would not accede to the request. The result of the interview was that the documents so long waited for were in Bunsen's hands the next day."'
The expedition was in Iceland from the middle of May to the end of August, 184fj3; its members made a host of scientific observations and brought back numerous specimens. For example, Bunsen collected several hundred samples of the atmosphere a t sea, a t Rey. kjavik, and near the Arctic Circle, in order to compare the oxygen content with that of samples taken a t the Presented before the Division of the History of Chemistry a t the 100th meeting of the A. C. S., Detroit, Michigan, September 12, 1940. Roscoe, "Bunsen memorial lecture," Memorial Lectures delivered before the Chemical Society, 1893-1900, p. 535. a The Yellowstone geysers were first seen by a white man in 1807. The descriptions by later visiton were largely received with incredulity. The region was practically unknown until 1870, when a semiofficial expedition made the Yellowstone Wonderland widely known.
From ''Iiclorid, or ihr Journal ofp rrridcnie on that irlond dlrring 1814 a n d 1815, by E. Henderson. Edinburph, 1818
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this c.&e a of papers by B ~ they ~ were published from 1846 to 185L4 These Iceland studies are still counted as extremely important and fundamental contributions to petrology and chemicogeology, For instance, he Des Cloizeaux made a series of measurements of the temperature of the water a t various h e l s in the geyser tubes and these data formed the basis of the first satisfactory explanation of geyser - action, a theory that is still substantially acEditors, "Gesammelte AhSee O S T W ~AND D BODENSTEIN. handlungen van Robert Bunsen," Engelmann, Leipdg, 1904, Vol. 11, pp. 1-171 for reprints of the Iceland papers, which originally appeared chiefly in LIEBIG% Annalen and POGGENDO~'S Annalen;. see also DESCLOIZEAUX, Ann. chim. phyr., [3] 19, 444 (1847). For technical discussions see RATHKE, Z. anorg. allgem. ~h ?3,,401 ,, (1904); OsrwALo, Bunsen," Feuer Verlag, Lelpz~g,1905, p. 13; DEBUS,"AUgemeine Deutsche Biographie." Duncker und Humblot, kipzig, 1903, Vol. 47, p. 372. Translations of two of the most important papers are available: (1) *'on the intimate connection existing between the pseudovolcanic phenomena of Iceland," in "Cavendish Society, chemical reports and memoirs," edited by H h n n ~ s oLondon, ~, 1848. Reprinted in Science Nevs Letter, 18, 262 (1930); ,(2) "On the processes which have taken place during the formation of the volcanic rocks of Iceland," in "Scientific memoirs selected from the Transadions of foreign Academies of Science and from foreign journals," Taylor and Francis, London, 1851. See also: "On some of the eruptive phenomena of Iceland," a lecture by TYHDALL. June 3, 1853,Proc. Roy. Inst., 1,329 (1851-54). Bunsen's article on palagmite (Ann., 61, 265 (1847)). together with his work on cacodyl derivatives, won for him the Copley medal, Proc. Roy. Soc. London, 11. 14 (1860).
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cepted. Bunsen's observations gave him the foundations of other shrewd and important conclusions. Uufortunately, the majority of modem chemists have never read these papers.
and i t was one of his great regrets that her death (1853) came before he acquired his full reputation in the chemical world. "The only value such things (his decorations and honors) had for me was that they pleased my mother, and she is now dead." The letters to her describing his experiences on this Icelandic expedition clearly reveal this filial devotion, and show the essential simplicity of the great chemist's nature. They not only give interesting sidelights into this important scier~tific;~~dertakir~:,i u t exllihit also Bunscn's ahility in the fine art of letter writing. Some passages of merely transient family interest have been omitted in this translation, and Bunsen's Germanic spellingof place names has been changed to more widely accepted forms. The letters, along with other important Bunseniana that still await publication, are preserved in the Library of the University of Heidelberg. I Copenhagen, April 25, 1846 Dearly beloved Mother: I n spite of all my efforts to get a little free time for you, not until now have I found it possible finnallyt o get away from this whirl of entertaining, visits, and errands, t o tell you something more definite and in more detail abaut the journey that we have already made, and the one we are going to make. Our affairs here are in far better shape than we could have hoped them to be and all signs point t o the success of our enterprise. On Sundav. *. the 19th. Bermann and I . after a sliehtlv uncomfortable crossing, arrived in the harbor here, where our good friend Sartorius was waiting for us on the wharf. The King is most keenly interested in o w expedition and already has ordered that our arrival be announced t o him by Lieutenant Mathissen, who has been assigned t o us during our stay here and who is t o represent the government during the Iceland trip. As early as the 21st, I, along with Bergmam, had a rather lengthy audience with the King, who received us in a most friendly manner. Sartorius had already been received in the same way and soon after his arrival. The King' is a stately elderly gentleman with an extremely kindly, almost flattering air, and he immediately inquired if Lieutenant Mathissen had followed his orders and shown us the sights of Copenhagen. Since he is more than a dilettante in oryctognosy [mineralogy], and quickly turned the convemtiou to the special objectdof our trip, I was able to talk abaut several matters that seemed to interest him particularly. As we made our adieus he said that he hoped we would communicate to him the findings gathered by the expedition. This morning we were presented t o the Queen, who conversed with us for more than a quarter of an hour about the trip. Mathissen tells us that we are t o be invited to dine a t the royal table next Sunday. Before sailing we shall have to see their Majesties again to make our farewells. which would be all rieht - if those eternal audiences did nor nr,cesairarr all sorts of visits and return viairr to and from rhe 1.urd-AIar
