Page:Hans Christian Ørsted - The Soul in Nature - Horner - 1852.djvu/14

Rh external demeanour won all hearts. Amidst the number of distinguished men with whom he had intercourse in Germany, we may especially mention Schelling, the two brothers Schlegel, Fichte, Schleiermacher, Tieck, Z. Werner, Fr. Baader, Erman, Kielmeier, Rumford, and the mineralogists Hausmann and Weiss. But he became most intimately acquainted with the celebrated physicist Ritter, who was then at the height of his fame. At a later period, Oersted had an opportunity of doing him a great service. In the winter of 1802–1803, he spent some time in Paris, where he diligently studied and mastered the French language and literature; and it was just at that period that Ritter, having discovered his "Pile" (Ladungsaüle), sent a treatise of it to Oersted, written in his peculiarly obscure style, with the request that he would translate it into French, that it might compete for the annual prize of the French Institute. The latter agreed to the proposal, and performed the task so well, that Ritter afterwards asserted "that he understood the translation better than his own writing," so thoroughly had Oersted's pliable mind previously familiarized itself with the thoughts and method of the German physicist. The merits of the discovery were not, indeed, at that time appreciated by the Institute, but they were more fully recognized at a later period.

Oersted returned from Paris (1803) by the route of Brussels, Leyden, Haarlem, and Amsterdam. At home he continued to be considered more in the light of a natural philosopher, and less as a physicist, and on that account he was unable to obtain the chair of physics, though it was then vacant; however, for the period of three years he received an income of 300 bankthalers from the public purse, and an equal sum for experimental purposes. The University had at that time lost by fire all the instruments belonging to the laboratory, and those used for the purposes of natural philosophy; but