[69] Froebel desired to see in Rudolstadt, or elsewhere in Thuringia (his “native land"), an institution like that of Pestalozzi at Yverdon; and he sought to interest the Princess Regent of Rudolstadt by the full account of Yverdon already mentioned.

[70] This would scarcely seem probable to those who admire and love Pestalozzi.  But we must remember that religious teaching appeals so intimately to individual sympathies that it is quite possible that what was of vital service to many others was not of so much use to Froebel, who was, as he frankly admits, out of harmony on many points with his noble-hearted teacher.

[71] That the boys’ characters were immersed in an element of strengthening and developing games as the body is immersed in the water of a strengthening bath, seems to be Froebel’s idea.

[72] Sanskrit is here probably meant.

[73] Hebrew and Arabic.

[74] The comet of 1811, one of the most brilliant of the present century, was an equal surprise to the most skilled astronomers as to Froebel.  Observations of its path have led to a belief that it has a period of 300 years; so that it was possibly seen by our ancestors in 1511, and may be seen by our remote descendants in 2111.  The appearance of this comet was synchronous with an unusually fine vintage harvest, and “wine of the great Comet year” was long held in great esteem.

[75] Geognosie.

[76] The Plamann School, an institution of considerable merit.  Plamann was a pupil of Pestalozzi.  One of the present writers studied crystallography later on with a professor who had been a colleague of Froebel’s in this same school, and who himself was also a pupil of Pestalozzi.

[77] Froebel is here symbolically expressing the longing which pervaded all noble spirits at that time for a free and united Germany, for a great Fatherland.  The tender mother’s love was symbolised by the ties of home (Motherland), but the father’s strength and power (Fatherland) was only then to be found in German national life in the one or two large states like Prussia, etc.  It needed long years and the termination of this period of preparation by two great wars, those of 1866 and of 1870, to bind the whole people together, and make Germany no longer a “geographical expression” but a mighty nation.

[78] In the beginning of this great contest it was Prussia who declared war against the common enemy and oppressor, Napoleon.  The other German powers, for the most part, held aloof.

[79] The Baron von Luetzow formed his famous volunteer corps in March 1813.  His instructions were to harass the enemy by constant skirmishes, and to encourage the smaller German states to rise against the tyrant Napoleon.  The corps became celebrated for swift, dashing exploits in small bodies.  Froebel seems to have been with the main body, and to have seen little of the more active doings of his regiment.