KARL

HILLEBRAND (1829–1884)  , German author, was born at Giessen on the 17th of September 1829, his father Joseph Hillebrand (1788–1871) being a literary historian and writer on philosophic subjects . Karl Hillebrand became involved, as a student in Heidelberg, in the Baden revolutionary move-ment, and was imprisoned in Rastatt . He succeeded in escaping and lived for a time in Strassburg, Paris—where for several months he was Heine's secretary—and Bordeaux . He continued his studies, and after obtaining the doctor's degree at the Sorbonne, he was appointed teacher of German in the Et-ale mililaire at St Cyr, and shortly afterwards, professor of foreign literatures at Douai . On the outbreak of the Franco-German War he resigned his professorship and acted for a time as correspondent to The Times in Italy . He then settled in Florence, where he died on the 19th of October 1884 . Hillebrand wrote with facility and elegance in French, English and Italian, besides his own language . His essays, collected under the title Zeiten, Volker and Menschen (Berlin, 1874–1885), show clear discernment, a finely balanced cosmopolitan judgment and grace of style . He undertook to write the Geschichte Frankreichs von der Thronbesteigung Ludwig Philipps bis zum Fall Napoleons Ill., but only two volumes were completed (to 1848) (2nd ed., 1881–1882) . In French he published Des conditions de la bonne comedie (1863), La Prusse contemporaine (1867), Etudes italiennes (1868), and a translation of O . Muller's Griechi schie Literaturgeschichte (3rd ed., 1883) . In English he published his Royal Institution Lectures on German Thought during the Last Two Hundred Years (188o) .

He also edited a collection of essays dealing with Italy, under the title Italia (4 vols.,

Leipzig, 1874–1877) . See H . Homberger, Karl Hillebrand (Berlin, 1884) .