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360 and after the suppression of that order lived for a few years as a tutor in families of the Bohemian nobility. During the later years of his life he, though he had been ordained as a priest, led the life of an independent scholar, living either at Prague or in the country residences of the Bohemian nobles, where he was always a welcome guest. Palacký quotes his own remark as to the uniformity of his life: "What interest," he said, "can the rather monotonous life of a private person have? One works, that is, one writes; has one's writing printed; then rests, and then begins another work of a similar character."

Dobrovský was entirely devoid of the enthusiasm for the national language that animated Jungmann, Kollar, Šafařik, Palacký, and the minor writers of the first half of the present century. He was, on the other hand, a philologist of the highest rank. Not only the Bohemians, but all Slav races, are indebted to him for his studies on Slav philology, a subject which at that period, when even in Russia the national language had to a great extent given way to Latin, French, and German, was absolutely uncultivated. Of his works we may mention the (German) "Detailed Grammar of the Bohemian Language" (Ausführliches Lehrgebände der Bohemischen Sprache). This work has become the model of all Bohemian grammars that were published subsequently, as well as of those of other Slav nationalities which have recently attained to the dignity of possessing written languages. The book was first published in 1809, and again in an enlarged form in 1818. Dobrovsky's "History of the Bohemian Language and its Older Literature" (Geschichte der Bohmischen Sprache und aeltern Literatur) first appeared in 1792, but subsequently so completely rewritten, that when it