Extracts from Diaries - Monday, 13th December.—When the rain and fog had cleared, we enjoyed the spring temperature, walking with my father on the terrace. My brothers write that the apple blossoms are coming out on the Rhine. My father geographised with the General. Later, he called me to him, and showed me the various volumes of ' Egypt ' (some Tabellen for the second volume he gave me to copy), and told me he had now been twenty years engaged in the work,—it was in September 1832, in Rome, that one Saturday evening the thought struck him, and he at once wrote down the sketch of it ; the next morning early, he had so long a conversation about it with Abeken, that they were late at church, and just as they entered the chapel on the Capitol, the congregation were singing, ' Leave the vanities of Egypt—quit the stubbles and the bricks' ('Auf, lass Egyptens eitles Wesen').