EMANUEL VON, a celebrated educationist, was born in 1771 at Berne, in Switzerland. His father was of patrician family, and a prominent public man in his native canton, and his mother was a grand-daughter of the celebrated Dutch admiral Van Tromp. In both of his parents he was peculiarly fortunate, and to the tender and pious care of his mother he used to attribute the suc- cess of his efforts for the public good in after life. From her and from Pfell, the blind poet of Colmar, he received a better education than falls to the lot of most boys, while the intimacy of his father with Pestalozzi gave to his mind that bent which it afterwards followed. As soon as he was able he began to make it the object of his life to investigate thoroughly the social and moral condition of his countrymen, and, in so far as he could, to improve it. For this purpose he spent much of his time in travelling through Switzerland, usually on foot, with a knapsack on his back, visiting the hamlets and farm-houses, mingling in the labours and occupations, and partaking of the rude fare and lodging of the peasants and mechanics, and often extending his journeys into the adjoining countries. In 1790 he went to Tubingen, where he distinguished himself by his rapid progress in legal studies. After the downfall of Robespierre, he went to Paris and remained there long enough to be assured of the storm impending over his native country. This he did his best to avert, but his warnings were disregarded, and Switzerland was lost before any efficient means could be taken for her safety. Fellenberg, who had hastily raised a levy en masse, was proscribed, a price was set upon his head, and he was compelled to fly into Germany. He was shortly afterwards recalled however by his countrymen, and sent on a mission to Paris to remonstrate against the rapacity and cruelty of the agents of the French republic. But in this and other diplomatic offices which he held for a short time, he was witness to so much corruption and intrigue that his mind revolted from the idea of a political life, and he returned home with a view to devoting himself wholly to the education of the young. With this resolution he purchased the estate of Hofwil, near Berne, intending to make agriculture the basis of a new system which he had projected—for elevating the lower and rightly training the higher orders of the state, and welding them together in a closer union than had hitherto been deemed attainable. His scheme at first excited only the ridicule of his friends, but in the course of a few years it began to attract the notice of foreign countries, and pupils from every country in Europe flocked to Hofwil, at once for the sake of studying agriculture, now raised to the dignity of a science, and of imbibing those wholesome moral precepts of which the agricultural system was made the exponent. For 45 years Fellenberg, assisted by his wife, and latterly by his sons, conducted this institution and raised it to the highest point of prosperity and usefulness; and when at length he died, Nov. 21, 1844, he left behind him the reputation of one of his country's greatest benefactors.