Views a-foot by J. Bayard TaylorOr Europe seen with Knapsack and Staff (page 3)

made for evaporation are nearly two miles in length; a walk along the top gives a delightful view of the surrounding valleys. After reaching the _chaussee_ again, I was hailed by a wandering journeyman, or _handwerker_, as they are called, who wanted company. As I had concluded to accept all offers of this kind, we trudged along together very pleasantly, He was from Holstein, on the borders of Denmark and was just returning home, after an absence of six years, having escaped from Switzerland after the late battle of Luzerne, which he had witnessed. He had his knapsack and tools fastened on two wheels, which he drew after him quite conveniently. I could not help laughing at the adroit manner in which he begged his way along, through every village. He would ask me to go on and wait for him at the other end; after a few minutes he followed, with a handful of small copper money, which he said he had _fought for_,–the handworker’s term for _begged._

We passed over long ranges of hills, with an occasional view of the Vogelsgebirge, or Bird’s Mountains, far to the cast. I knew at length, by the pointed summits of the hills, that we were approaching Giessen and the valley of the Lahn. Finally, two sharp peaks appeared in the distance, each crowned with a picturesque fortress, while the spires of Giessen rose from the valley below. Parting from my companion, I passed through the city without stopping, for it was the time of the university vacation, and Dr. Liebeg, the world-renowned chemist, whom I desired to see, was absent.

Crossing a hill or two, I came down into the valley of the Lahn, which flows through meadows of the brightest green, with redroofed cottages nestled among gardens and orchards upon its banks. The women here wear a remarkable costume, consisting of a red boddice with white sleeves, and a dozen skirts, one above another, reaching only to the knees. I slept again at a little village among the hills, and started early for Marburg. The meadows were of the purest emerald, through which the stream wound its way, with even borders, covered to the water’s edge with grass so smooth and velvety, that a fairy might have danced along on it for miles without stumbling over an uneven tuft. This valley is one of the finest districts in Germany. I thought, as I saw the peaceful inhabitants at work in their fields, I had most probably, on the battle-field of Brandywine, walked over the bones of some of their ancestors, whom a despotic prince had torn from their happy homes, to die in a distant land, fighting against the cause of freedom.

I now entered directly into the heart of Hesse Cassel. The country resembled a collection of hills thrown together in confusion–sometimes a wide plain left between them, sometimes a clustre of wooded peaks, and here and there a single pointed summit rising above the rest. The vallies were green as ever, the hill-sides freshly ploughed and the forests beginning to be colored by the tender foliage of the larch and birch. I walked two or three hours at a “stretch,” and then, when I could find a dry, shady bank, I would rest for half an hour and finish some hastily sketched landscape, or lay at full length, with my head on my knapsack, and peruse the countenances of those passing by. The observation which every traveller excites, soon ceases to be embarrassing. It was at first extremely unpleasant; but I am now so hardened, that the strange, magnetic influence of the human eye, which we cannot avoid feeling, passes by me as harmlessly as if turned aside by invisible mail.

During the day several showers came by, but as none of them penetrated further than my blouse, I kept on, and reached about sunset a little village in the valley. I chose a small inn, which had an air of neatness about it, and on going in, the tidy landlady’s “be you welcome,” as she brought a pair of slippers for my swollen feet, made me feel quite at home. After being furnished with eggs, milk, butter and bread, for supper, which I ate while listening to an animated discussion between the village schoolmaster and some farmers, I was ushered into a clean, sanded bedroom, and soon forgot all fatigue. For this, with breakfast in the morning, the bill was six and a half groschen–about sixteen cents! Tin air was freshened by the rain and I journeyed over the hills at a rapid rate. Stopping for dinner at the large village of Wabern, a boy at the inn asked me if I was going to America? I said no, I came from there. He then asked me many silly questions, after which he ran out and told the people of the village. When I set out again, the children pointed at me and cried: “see there! he is from America!” and the men took off their hats and bowed!

The sky was stormy, which added to the gloom of the hills around, though some of the distant ranges lay in mingled light and shade–the softest alternation of purple and brown. There were many isolated, rocky hills, two of which interested me, through their attendant legends. One is said to have been the scene of a battle between the Romans and Germans, where, after a long conflict the rock opened and swallowed up the former. The other, which is crowned with a rocky wall, so like a ruined fortress, as at a distance to be universally mistaken for one, tradition says is the death-place of Charlemagne, who still walks around its summit every night, clad in complete armor. On ascending a hill late in the afternoon, I saw at a great distance the statue of Hercules, which stands on the Wilhelmshohe, near Cassel. Night set in with a dreary rain, and I stopped at an inn about five miles short of the city. While tea was preparing a company of students came in and asked for a separate room. Seeing I was alone, they invited me up with them. They seemed much interested in America, and leaving the table gradually, formed a ring around me, where I had enough to do to talk with them all at once. When the omnibus came along, the most of them went with it to Cassel; but five remained and persuaded me to set out with them on foot. They insisted on carrying my knapsack the whole way, through the rain and darkness, and when I had passed the city gate with them, unchallenged, conducted me to the comfortable hotel, “_Zur Krone_.”

It is a pleasant thing to wake up in the morning in a strange city. Every thing is new; you walk around it for the first time in the full enjoyment of the novelty, or the not less agreeable feeling of surprise, if it is different from your anticipations. Two of my friends of the previous night called for me in the morning, to show me around the city, and the first impression, made in such agreeable company, prepossessed me very favorably. I shall not, however, take up time in describing its many sights, particularly the Frederick’s Platz, where the statue of Frederick the Second, who sold ten thousand of his subjects to England, has been re-erected, after having lain for years in a stable where it was thrown by the French.

I was much interested in young Carl K—-, one of my new acquaintances. His generous and unceasing kindness first won my esteem, and I found on nearer acquaintance, the qualities of his mind equal those of his heart. I saw many beautiful poems of his which were of remarkable merit, considering his youth, and thought I could read in his dark, dreamy eye, the unconscious presentiment of a power he does not yet possess. He seemed as one I had known for years.

He, with a brother student, accompanied me in the afternoon, to Wilhelmshohe, the summer residence of the Prince, on the side of a range of mountains three miles west of the city. The road leads in a direct line to the summit of the mountain, which is thirteen hundred feet in height, surmounted by a great structure, called the Giant’s Castle, on the summit of which is a pyramid ninety-six feet high, supporting a statue of Hercules, copied after the Farnese, and thirty-one feet in height. By a gradual ascent through beautiful woods, we reached the princely residence, a magnificent mansion standing on a natural terrace of the mountain. Near it is a little theatre built by Jerome Buonaparte, in which he himself used to play. We looked into the green house in passing, where the floral splendor of every zone was combined. There were lofty halls, with glass roofs, where the orange grew to a great tree, and one could sit in myrtle bowers, with the brilliant bloom of the tropics around him. It was the only thing there I was guilty of coveting.

The greatest curiosity is the water-works, which are perhaps unequalled in the world. The Giant’s Castle on the summit contains an immense tank in which water is kept for the purpose; but unfortunately, at the time I was there, the pipes, which had been frozen through the winter, were not in condition to play. From the summit an inclined plane of masonry descends the mountain nine hundred feet, broken every one hundred and fifty feet by perpendicular descents. These are the Cascades, down which the water first rushes from the tank. After being again collected in a great basin at the bottom, it passes into an aqueduct, built like a Roman ruin, and goes over beautiful arches through the forest, where it falls in one sheet down a deep precipice. When it has descended several other beautiful falls, made in exact imitation of nature, it is finally collected and forms the great fountain, which rises twelve inches in diameter from the middle of a lake to the height of one hundred and ninety feet! We descended by lovely walks through the forest to the Lowenburg, built as the ruin of a knightly castle, and fitted out in every respect to correspond with descriptions of a fortress in the olden time, with moat, drawbridge, chapel and garden of pyramidal trees. Farther below, are a few small houses, inhabited by the descendants of the Hessians who fell in America, supported here at the Prince’s expense!

CHAPTER XVII.

ADVENTURES AMONG THE HARTZ.

On taking leave of Carl at the gate over the Gottingen road, I felt tempted to bestow a malediction upon traveling, from its merciless breaking of all links, as soon as formed. It was painful to think we should meet no more. The tears started into his eyes, and feeling a mist gathering over mine, I gave his hand a parting pressure, turned my back upon Cassel and started up the long mountain, at a desperate rate. On the summit I passed out of Hesse into Hanover, and began to descend the remaining six miles. The road went down by many windings, but I shortened the way considerably by a foot-path through a mossy old forest. The hills bordering the Weser are covered with wood, through which I saw the little red-roofed city of Munden, at the bottom. I stopped there for the night, and next morning walked around the place. It is one of the old German cities that have not yet felt the effect of the changing spirit of the age. It is still walled, though the towers are falling to ruin. The streets are narrow, crooked, and full of ugly old houses, and to stand in the little square before the public buildings, one would think himself born in the sixteenth century. Just below the city the Werra and Fulda unito and form the Weser. The triangular point has been made into a public walk, and the little steamboat was lying at anchor near, waiting to start for Bremen.

In the afternoon I got into the omnibus for Gottingen. The ride over the wild, dreary, monotonous hills was not at all interesting. There were two other passengers inside, one of whom, a grave, elderly man, took a great interest in America, but the conversation was principally on his side, for I had been taken with a fever in Munden. I lay crouched up in the corner of the vehicle, trying to keep off the chills which constantly came over me, and wishing only for Gottingen, that I might obtain medicine and a bed. We reached it at last, and I got out with my knapsack and walked wearily through half a dozen streets till I saw an inn. But on entering, I found it so dark and dirty and unfriendly, that I immediately went out again and hired the first pleasant looking boy I met, to take me to a good hotel. He conducted me to the first one in the city. I felt a trepidation of pocket, but my throbbing head plead more powerfully, so I ordered a comfortable room and a physician. The host, Herr Wilhelm, sent for Professor Trefurt, of the University, who told me I had over-exerted myself in walking. He made a second call the next day, when, as he was retiring, I inquired the amount of his fee. He begged to be excused and politely bowed himself out. I inquired the meaning of this of Herr Wilhelm, who said it was customary for travellers to leave what they chose for the physician, as there was no regular fee. He added, moreover, that twenty groschen, or about sixty cents, was sufficient for the two visits!

I stayed in Gottingen two dull, dreary, miserable days, without getting much better. I took but one short walk through the city, in which I saw the outsides of a few old churches and got a hard fall on the pavement. Thinking that the _cause_ of my illness might perhaps become its _cure_, I resolved to go on rather than remain in the melancholy–in spite of its black-eyed maidens, melancholy–Gottingen. On the afternoon of the second day, I took the post to Nordheim, about twelve miles distant. The Gottingen valley, down which we drove, is green and beautiful, and the trees seem to have come out all at once. we were not within sight of the Hartz, but the mountains along the Weser were visible on the left. The roads were extremely muddy from the late rains, so that I proceeded but slowly.

A blue range along the horizon told me of the Hartz, as I passed; although there were some fine side-glimpses through the hills, I did not see much of them till I reached Osterode, about twelve miles further. Here the country begins to assume a different aspect. The city lies in a narrow valley, and as the road goes down a steep hill towards it, one sees on each side many quarries of gypsum, and in front the gloomy pine mountains are piled one above another in real Alpine style. But alas! the city, though it looks exceedingly romantic from above, is one of the dirtiest I ever saw. I stopped at Herzberg, six miles farther, for the night. The scenery was very striking; and its effect was much heightened by a sky full of black clouds, which sent down a hail-storm as they passed over. The hills are covered with pine, fir and larch. The latter tree, in its first foliage, is most delicate and beautiful. Every bough is like a long ostrich plume, and when one of them stands among the dark pines, it seems so light and airy that the wind might carry it away. Just opposite Herzberg, the Hartz stands in its gloomy and mysterious grandeur, and I went to sleep with the pleasant thought that an hour’s walk on the morrow would shut me up in its deep recesses.

The next morning I entered them. The road led up a narrow mountain valley, down which a stream was rushing–on all sides were magnificent forests of pine. It was glorious to look down their long aisles, dim and silent, with a floor of thick green moss. There was just room enough for the road and the wild stream which wound its way zigzag between the hills, affording the most beautiful mountain-view along the whole route. As I ascended, the mountains became rougher and wilder, and in the shady hollows were still drifts of snow. Enjoying every thing very much, I walked on without taking notice of the road, and on reaching a wild, rocky chasm called the “Schlucht,” was obliged to turn aside and take a footpath over a high mountain to Andreasberg, a town built on a summit two thousand feet above the sea. It is inhabited almost entirely by the workmen in the mines.

The way from Andreasberg to the Brocken leads along the Rehberger Graben, which carry water about six miles for the oreworks. After going through a thick pine wood, I came out on the mountain-side, where rough crags overhung the way above, and through the tops of the trees I had glimpses into the gorge below. It was scenery of the wildest character. Directly opposite rose a mountain wall, dark and stern through the gloomy sky; far below the little stream of the Oder foamed over the rocks with a continual roar, and one or two white cloud-wreaths were curling up from the forests.

I followed the water-ditch around every projection of the mountain, still ascending higher amid the same wild scenery, till at length I reached the Oderteich, a great dam, in a kind of valley formed by some mountain peaks on the side of the Brocken. It has a breastwork of granite, very firm, and furnishes a continual supply of water for the works. It began to rain soon, and I took a foot-path which went winding up through the pine wood. The storm still increased, till everything was cloud and rain, so I was obliged to stop about five o’clock at Oderbruch, a toll-house and tavern on the side of the Brocken, on the boundary between Brunswick and Hanover–the second highest inhabited house in the Hartz. The Brocken was invisible through the storm and the weather forboded a difficult ascent. The night was cold, but by a warm fire I let the winds howl and the rain beat. When I awoke the next morning, we were in clouds. They were thick on every side, hiding what little view there was through the openings of the forest. After breakfast, however, they were somewhat thinner, and I concluded to start for the Brocken. It is not the usual way for travellers who ascend, being not only a bad road but difficult to find, as I soon discovered. The clouds gathered around again after I set out, and I was obliged to walk in a storm of mingled rain and snow. The snow lay several feet deep in the forests, and the path was, in many places, quite drifted over. The white cloud-masses were whirled past by the wind, continually enveloping me and shutting out every view. During the winter the path had become, in ninny places, the bed of a mountain torrent, so that I was obliged sometimes to wade kneedeep in snow, and sometimes to walk over the wet, spongy moss, crawling under the long, dripping branches of the stunted pines. After a long time of such dreary travelling, I came to two rocks called the Stag Horns, standing on a little peak. The storm, now all snow, blew more violently than ever, and the path became lost under the deep drifts.

Comforting myself with the assurance that if I could not find it, I could at least make my way back, I began searching, and after some time, came upon it again. Here the forest ceased; the way led on large stones over a marshy ascending plain, but what was above, or on either side, I could not see. It was solitude of the most awful kind. There was nothing but the storm, which had already wet me through, and the bleak gray waste of rocks. It grew sleeper and steeper; I could barely trace the path by the rocks which were worn, and the snow threatened soon to cover these. Added to this, although the walking and fresh mountain air had removed my illness, I was still weak from the effects of it, and the consequences of a much longer exposure to the storm were greatly to be feared. I was wondering if the wind increased at the same rate, how much longer it would be before I should be carried off, when suddenly something loomed up above me through the storm. A few steps more and I stood beside the Brocken House, on the very summit of the mountain! The mariner, who has been floating for days on a wreck at sea, could scarcely be more rejoiced at a friendly sail, than I was on entering the low building. Two large Alpine dogs in the passage, as I walked in, dripping with wet, gave notice to the inmates, and I was soon ushered into a warm room, where I changed my soaked garments for dry ones, and sat down by the fire with feelings of comfort not easily imagined. The old landlord was quite surprised, on hearing the path by which I came, that I found the way at all. The summit was wrapped in the thickest cloud, and he gave me no hope for several hours of any prospect at all, so I sat down and looked over the Stranger’s Album.

I saw but two names from the United States–B.F. Atkins, of Boston, and C.A. Hay, from York, Pa. There were a great many long-winded German poems–among them, one by Schelling, the philosopher. Some of them spoke of having seen the “Spectre of the Brocken.” I inquired of the landlord about the phenomenon; he says in winter it is frequently seen, in summer more seldom. The cause is very simple. It is always seen at sunrise, when the eastern side of the Brocken is free from clouds, and at the same time, the mist rises from the valley on the opposite side. The shadow of every thing on the Brocken is then thrown in grand proportions upon the mist, and is seen surrounded with a luminous halo. It is somewhat singular that such a spectacle can be seen upon the Brocken alone, but this is probably accounted for by the formation of the mountain, which collects the mist at just such a distance from the summit as to render the shadow visible.

Soon after dinner the storm subsided and the clouds separated a little. I could see down through the rifts on the plains of Brunswick, and sometimes, when they opened a little more, the mountains below us to the east and the adjoining plains, as far as Magdeburg. It was like looking on the earth from another planet, or from some point in the air which had no connection, with it; our station was completely surrounded by clouds, rolling in great masses around us, now and then giving glimpses through their openings of the blue plains, dotted with cities and villages, far below. At one time when they were tolerably well separated, I ascended the tower, fifty feet high, standing near the Brocken House. The view on three sides was quite clear, and I can easily imagine what a magnificent prospect it must be in fine weather. The Brocken is only about four thousand feet high, nearly the same as the loftiest peak of the Catskill, but being the highest mountain in Northern Germany, it commands a more extensive prospect. Imagine a circle described with a radius of a hundred miles, comprising thirty cities, two or three hundred villages and one whole mountain district! We could see Brunswick and Magdeburg, and beyond them the great plain which extends to the North Sea in one direction and to Berlin in the other, while directly below us lay the dark mountains of the Hartz, with little villages in their sequestered valleys. It was but a few moments I could look on this scene–in an instant the clouds swept together again and completely hid it. In accordance with a custom of the mountain, one of the girls made me a “Brocken nosegay,” of heather, lichens and moss. I gave her a few pfennings and stowed it away carefully in a corner of my knapsack.

I now began descending the east side, by a good road over fields of bare rock and through large forests of pine. Two or three bare brown peaks rose opposite with an air of the wildest sublimity, and in many places through the forest towered lofty crags. This is the way by which Goethe brings Faust up the Brocken, and the scenery is graphically described in that part of the poem. At the foot of the mountain is the little village of Schiercke, the highest in the Hartz. Here I took a narrow path through the woods, and after following a tediously long road over the hills, reached Elbingerode, where I spent the night, and left the next morning for Blankenburg. I happened to take the wrong road, however, and went through Rubeland, a little village in the valley of the Bode. There are many iron works here, and two celebrated caves, called “Baumann’s Hohle,” and “Biel’s Hohle.” I kept on through the gray, rocky hills to Huttenrode, where I inquired the way to the Rosstrappe, but was directed wrong, and after walking nearly two hours in a heavy rain, arrived at Ludwigshutte, on the Bode, in one of the wildest and loneliest corners of the Hartz. I dried my wet clothes at a little inn, ate a dinner of bread and milk, and learning that I was just as far from the Rosstrappe as ever, and that the way was impossible to find alone, I hunted up a guide.

We went over the mountains through a fine old forest, for about two hours, and came out on the brow of a hill near the end of the Hartz, with a beautiful view of the country below and around. Passing the little inn, the path led through thick bushes along the summit, over a narrow ledge of rocks that seemed to stretch out into the air, for on either side the foot of the precipice vanished in the depth below.

Arrived at last at the end, I looked around me. What a spectacle! I was standing on the end of a line of precipice which ran out from the mountain like a wall for several hundred feet–the hills around rising up perpendicularly from the gorge below, where the Bode pressed into a narrow channel foamed its way through. Sharp masses of gray rock rose up in many places from the main body like pillars, with trees clinging to the clefts, and although the defile was near seven hundred feet deep, the summits, in one place, were very near to one another. Near the point at which I stood, which was secured by a railing, was an impression in the rock like the hoof of a giant horse, from which the place takes its name. It is very distinct and perfect, and nearly two feet in length.

I went back to the little inn and sat down to rest and chat awhile with the talkative landlady. Notwithstanding her horrible Prussian dialect, I was much amused with the budget of wonders, which she keeps for the information of travelers. Among other things, she related to me the legend of the Rosstrappe, which I give in her own words: “A great many hundred years ago, when there were plenty of giants through the world, there was a certain beautiful princess, who was very much loved by one of them. Now, although the parents of this princess were afraid of the giant, and wanted her to marry him, she herself hated him, because she was in love with a brave knight. But, you see, the brave knight could do nothing against the great giant, and so a day was appointed for the wedding of the princess. When they were married, the giant had a great feast and he and all his servants got drunk. So the princess mounted his black horse and rode away over the mountains, till she reached this valley. She stood on that square rock which you see there opposite to us, and when she saw her knight on this side, where we are, she danced for joy, and the rock is called the _Tanzplatz_, to this very day. But when the giant found she had gone, he followed her as fast as he might; then a holy bishop, who saw the princess, blessed the feet of her horse, and she jumped on it across to this side, where his fore feet made two marks in the rock, though there is only one left now. You should not laugh at this, for if there were giants then, there must have been very big horses too, as one can see from the hoofmark, and the valley was narrower then than it is now. My dear man, who is very old now, (you see him through the bushes, there, digging,) says it was so when he was a child, and that the old people living then, told him there were once four just such hoof-tracks, on the _Tanzplatz_, where the horse stood before he jumped over. And we cannot doubt the words of the good old people, for there were many strange things then, we all know, which the dear Lord does not let happen now. But I must tell you, lieber Herr, that the giant tried to jump after her and fell away down into the valley, where they say he lives yet in the shape of a big black dog, guarding the crown of the princess, which fell off as she was going over. But this part of the story is perhaps not true, as nobody, that I ever heard of, has seen either the black dog or the crown!”

After listening to similar gossip for a while, I descended the mountain-side, a short distance to the Bulowshohe. This is a rocky shaft that shoots, upward from the mountain, having from its top a glorious view through the door which the Bode makes in passing out of the Hartz. I could see at a great distance the towers of Magdeburg, and further, the vast plain stretching away like a sea towards Berlin. From Thale, the village below, where the air was warmer than in the Hartz and the fruit-trees already in blossom, it was four hours’ walk to Halberstadt, by a most tiresome road over long ranges of hills, all ploughed and planted, and extending as far as the eye could reach, without a single fence or hedge. It is pleasant to look over scenes where nature is so free and unshackled; but the _people_, alas! wear the fetters. The setting sun, which lighted up the old Brocken and his snowy top, showed me also Halberstadt, the end of my Hartz journey; but its deceitful towers fled as I approached, and I was half dead with fatigue on arriving there.

The ghostly, dark and echoing castle of an inn (the Black Eagle) where I stopped, was enough to inspire a lonely traveller, like myself, with unpleasant fancies. It looked heavy and massive enough to have been a stout baron’s stronghold in some former century; the taciturn landlord and his wife, who, with a solemn servant girl, were the only tenants, had grown into perfect keeping with its gloomy character. When I groped my way under the heavy, arched portal into the guests’ room–a large, lofty, cheerless hall–all was dark, and I could barely perceive, by the little light which came through two deep-set windows, the inmates of the house, sitting on opposite sides of the room. After some delay, the hostess brought a light. I entreated her to bring me something _instantly_ for supper, and in half an hour she placed a mixture on the table, the like of which I never wish to taste again. She called it _beer-soup_! I found, on examination, it was _beer_, boiled with meat, and seasoned strongly with pepper and salt! My hunger disappeared, and pleading fatigue as an excuse for want of appetite, I left the table. When I was ready to retire, the landlady, who had been sitting silently in a dark corner, called the solemn servant girl, who took up a dim lamp, and bade me follow her to the “sleeping chamber.” Taking up my knapsack and staff, I stumbled down the steps into the arched gateway; before me was a long, damp, deserted court-yard, across which the girl took her way. I followed her with some astonishment, imagining where the sleeping chamber could be, when she stopped at a small, one-story building, standing alone in the yard. Opening the door with a rusty key, she led me into a bare room, a few feet square, opening into another, equally bare, with the exception of a rough bed. “Certainly,” said I, “I am not to sleep here!” “Yes,” she answered, “this is the sleeping chamber,” at the same time setting down the light and disappearing. I examined the place–it smelt mouldy, and the walls were cold and damp; there had been a window at the head of the bed, but it was walled up, and that at the foot was also closed to within a few inches of the top. The bed was course and dirty; and on turning down the ragged covers, I saw with horror, a dark brown stain near the pillow, like that of blood! For a moment I hesitated whether to steal out of the inn, and seek another lodging, late as it was; at last, overcoming my fears, I threw my clothes into a heap, and lay down, placing my heavy staff at the head of the bed. Persons passed up and down the courtyard several times, the light of their lamps streaming through the narrow aperture up against the ceiling, and I distinctly heard voices, which seemed to be near the door. Twice did I sit up in bed, breathless, with my hand on the cane, in the most intense anxiety; but fatigue finally overcame suspicion, and I sank into a deep sleep, from which I was gladly awakened by daylight. In reality, there may have been no cause for my fears–I may have wronged the lonely innkeepers by them; but certainly no place or circumstances ever seemed to me more appropriate to a deed of robbery or crime. I left immediately, and when a turn in the street hid the ill-omened front of the inn, I began to breathe with my usual freedom.

CHAPTER XVIII.

NOTES IN LEIPSIC AND DRESDEN.

_Leipsic, May 8._–I have now been nearly two days in this wide-famed city, and the more I see of it the better I like it. It is a pleasant, friendly town, old enough to be interesting, and new enough to be comfortable. There in much active business life, through which it is fast increasing in size and beauty. Its publishing establishments are the largest in the world, and its annual fairs attended by people from all parts of Europe. This is much for a city to accomplish, situated alone in the middle of a great plain, with no natural charms of scenery or treasures of art to attract strangers. The energy and enterprise of its merchants have accomplished all this, and it now stands, in importance, among the first cities of Europe.

The bad weather obliged me to take the railroad at Halberstadt, to keep the appointment with my friend, in this city. I left at six for Magdeburg, and after two hours’ ride over a dull, tiresome plain, rode along under the mounds and fortifications by the side of the Elbe, and entered the old town. It was very cold, and the streets were muddy, so I contented myself with looking at the Broadway, (_der breite Weg_,) the Cathedral and one or two curious old churches, and in walking along the parapet leading to the fortress, which has a view of the winding Elbe. The Citadel was interesting from having been the prison in which Baron Trenck was confined, whose narrative I read years ago, when quite a child.

We were soon on the road to Leipsic. The way was over one great, uninterrupted plain–a more monotonous country, even, than Belgium. Two of the passengers in the car with me were much annoyed at being taken by the railway agents for Poles. Their movements were strictly watched by the gens d’arme at every station we passed, and they were not even allowed to sit together! At Kothen a branch track went off to Berlin. We passed by Halle without being able to see anything of it or its University, and arrived here in four hours after leaving Magdeburg.

On my first walk around the city, yesterday morning, I passed the _Augustus Platz_–a broad green lawn, on which front the University and several other public buildings. A chain of beautiful promenades encircles the city, on the site of its old fortifications. Following their course through walks shaded by large trees and bordered with flowering shrubs, I passed a small but chaste monument to Sebastian Bach, the composer, which was erected almost entirely at the private cost of Mendelssohn, and stands opposite the building in which Bach once directed the choirs. As I was standing beside it, a glorious choral, swelled by a hundred voices, came through the open windows, like a tribute to the genius of the great master.

Having found my friend we went together to the _Stern Warte_, or Observatory, which gives a fine view of the country around the city, and in particular the battle field. The Castellan who is stationed there, is well acquainted with the localities, and pointed out the position of the hostile armies. It was one of the most bloody and hard-fought battles which history records. The army of Napoleon stretched like a semicircle around the southern and eastern sides of the city, and the plain beyond was occupied by the allies, whose forces met together here. Schwarzenberg, with his Austrians, came from Dresden; Blucher, from Halle, with the Emperor Alexander. Their forces amounted to three hundred thousand, while those of Napoleon ranked at one hundred and ninety-two thousand men. It must have been a terrific scene. Four days raged the battle, and the meeting of half a million of men in deadly conflict was accompanied by the thunder of sixteen hundred cannon. The small rivers which flow through Leipsic were swollen with blood, and the vast plain was strewed with more than fifty thousand dead. It is difficult to conceive of such slaughter, while looking at the quiet and tranquil landscape below. It seemed more like a legend of past ages, when ignorance and passion led men to murder and destroy, than an event which the last half century witnessed. For the sake of humanity it is to be hoped that the world will never see such another.

There are some lovely walks around Leipsic. We went yesterday afternoon with a few friends to the Rosenthal, a beautiful meadow, bordered by forests of the German oak, very few of whose Druid trunks have been left standing. There are Swiss cottages embowered in the foliage, where every afternoon the social citizens assemble to drink their coffee enjoy a few hours’ escape from the noisy and dusty streets, One can walk for miles along these lovely paths by the side of the velvet meadows, or the banks of some shaded stream. We visited the little village of Golis, a short distance off, where, in the second story of a little white house, hangs the sign: “Schiller’s Room.” Some of the Leipsic literati have built a stone arch over the entrance, with the inscription above: “Here dwelt Schiller in 1795, and wrote his Hymn to Joy.” Every where through Germany the remembrances of Schiller are sacred. In every city where he lived, they show his dwelling. They know and reverence the mighty spirit who has been among them. The little room where he conceived that sublime poem is hallowed as if by the presence of unseen spirits.

I was anxious to see the spot where Poniatowsky fell. We returned over the plain to the city and passed in at the gate by which the Cossacks entered, pursuing the flying French. Crossing the lower part, we came to the little river Elster, in whose waves the gallant prince sank. The stone bridge by which we crossed was blown up by the French, to cut off pursuit. Napoleon had given orders that it should not be blown up till the Poles had all passed over, as the river, though narrow, is quite deep, and the banks are steep. Nevertheless, his officers did not wait, and the Poles, thus exposed to the fire of the enemy, were obliged to plunge into the stream to join the French army, which had begun the retreat towards Frankfort. Poniatowsky, severely wounded, made his way through a garden near and escaped on horseback into the water. He became entangled among the fugitives and sank. By walking a little distance along the road towards Frankfort, we could see the spot where his body was taken out of the river; it is now marked by a square stone, covered with the names of his countrymen who have visited it. We returned through the narrow arched way, by which Napoleon fled when the battle was lost.

Another interesting place in Leipsic is Auerback’s Cellar, which, it is said, contains an old manuscript history of Faust, from which Goethe derived the first idea of his poem. He used to frequent this cellar, and one of his scenes in “Faust” is laid in it. We looked down the arched passage; not wishing to purchase any wine, we could find no pretence for entering. The streets are full of book stores and one half the business of the inhabitants appears to consist in printing, paper-making and binding. The publishers have a handsome Exchange of their own, and during the Fairs, the amount of business transacted is enormous. The establishment of Brockhaus is contained in an immense building, adjoining which stands his dwelling, in the midst of magnificent gardens. That of Tauchnitz is not less celebrated. His edition of the classics, in particular, are the best that have ever been made; and he has lately commenced publishing a number of English works, in a cheap form. Otto Wigand, who has also a large establishment, has begun to issue translations of American works. He has already published Prescott and Bancroft, and I believe intends giving out shortly, translations from some of our poets and novelists. I became acquainted at the Museum, with a young German author who had been some time in America, and was well versed in our literature. He is now engaged in translating American works, one of which–Hoffman’s “Wild Scenes of the Forest and Prairie”–will soon appear. In no place in Germany have I found more knowledge of our country, her men and her institutions, than in Leipsic, and as yet I have seen few that would be preferable as a place of residence. Its attractions lie not in its scenery, but in the social and intellectual character of its inhabitants.

_May 11._–At last in this “Florence of the Elbe,” as the Saxons have christened it. Exclusive of its glorious galleries of art, which are scarcely surpassed by any in Europe, Dresden charms one by the natural beauty of its environs. It stands in a curve of the Elbe, in the midst of green meadows, gardens and fine old woods, with the hills of Saxony sweeping around like an amphitheatre, and the craggy peaks of the Highlands looking at it from afar. The domes and spires at a distance give it a rich Italian look, which is heightened by the white villas, embowered in trees, gleaming on the hills around. In the streets there is no bustle of business–nothing of the din and confusion of traffic which mark most cities; it seems like a place for study and quiet enjoyment.

The railroad brought us in three hours from Leipsic, over the eighty miles of plain that intervene. We came from the station through the _Neustadt_, passing the Japanese Palace and the equestrian statue of Augustus the Strong, The magnificent bridge over the Elbe was so much injured by the late inundation as to be impassable; we worn obliged to go some distance up the river bank and cross on a bridge of boats. Next morning my first search was for the picture gallery. We set off at random, and after passing the Church of Our Lady, with its lofty dome of solid stone, which withstood the heaviest bombs during the war with Frederick the Great, came to an open square, one side of which was occupied by an old, brown, red-roofed building, which I at once recognized, from pictures, as the object of our search.

I have just taken a last look at the gallery this morning, and left it with real regret; for, during the two visits, Raphael’s heavenly picture of the Madonna and child had so grown into my love and admiration, that it was painful to think I should never see it again. There are many more which clung so strongly to my imagination, gratifying in the highest degree the love for the Beautiful, that I left them with sadness, and the thought that I would now only have the memory. I can see the inspired eye and god-like brow of the Jesus-child, as if I were still standing before the picture, and the sweet, holy countenance of the Madonna still looks upon me. Yet, though this picture is a miracle of art, the first glance filled me with disappointment. It has somewhat faded, during the three hundred years that have rolled away since the hand of Raphael worked on the canvass, and the glass with which it is covered for better preservation, injures the effect. After I had gazed on it awhile, every thought of this vanished. The figure of the virgin seemed to soar in the air, and it was difficult to think the clouds were not in motion. An aerial lightness clothes her form, and it is perfectly natural for such a figure to stand among the clouds. Two divine cherubs look up from below, and in her arms sits the sacred child. Those two faces beam from the picture like those of angels. The wild, prophetic eye and lofty brow of the young Jesus chains one like a spell. There is something more than mortal in its expression–something in the infant face which indicates a power mightier than the proudest manhood. There is no glory around the head; but the spirit which shines from those features, marks his divinity. In the sweet face of the mother there speaks a sorrowful foreboding mixed with its tenderness, as if she knew the world into which the Saviour was born, and foresaw the path in which he was to tread. It is a picture which one can scarce look upon without tears.

There are in the same room six pictures by Correggio, which are said to be among his best works; one of them his celebrated Magdalen. There is also Correggio’s “Holy Night,” or the virgin with the shepherds in the manger, in which all the light comes from the body of the child. The surprise of the shepherds is most beautifully expressed. In one of the halls there is a picture by Van der Werff, in which the touching story of Hagar is told more feelingly than words could do it. The young Ishmael is represented full of grief at parting with Isaac, who, in childish unconsciousness of what has taken place, draws in sport the corner of his mother’s mantle around him, and smiles at the tears of his lost playmate. Nothing can come nearer real flesh and blood than the two portraits of Raphael Mengs, painted by himself when quite young. You almost think the artist has in sport crept behind the frame, and wishes to make you believe he is a picture. It would be impossible to speak of half the gems of art contained in this unrivalled collection. There are twelve large halls, containing in all nearly two thousand pictures.

The plain, south of Dresden, was the scene of the hard-fought battle between Napoleon and the allied armies, in 1813. On the heights above the little village of Racknitz, Moreau was shot on the second day of the battle. We took a foot-path through the meadows, shaded by cherry trees in bloom, and reached the spot after an hour’s walk. The monument is simple–a square block of granite, surmounted by a helmet and sword, with the inscription: “_The hero Moreau fell here by the side of Alexander, August 17th, 1813_.” I gathered, as a memorial, a few leaves of the oak which shades it.

By applying an hour before the appointed time, we obtained admission to the Royal Library. It contains three hundred thousand volumes–among them the most complete collection of historical works in existence. Each hall is devoted to a history of a separate country, and one large room is filled with that of Saxony alone. There is a large number of rare and curious manuscripts, among which are old Greek works of the seventh and eighth centuries; a Koran which once belonged to the Sultan Bajazet; the handwriting of Luther and Melancthon; a manuscript volume with pen and ink sketches, by Albert Durer, and the earliest works after the invention of printing. Among these latter was a book published by Faust and Schaeffer, at Mayence, in 1457. There were also Mexican manuscripts, written on the Aloe leaf, and many illuminated monkish volumes of the middle ages.

We were fortunate in seeing the _Grune Gewolbe_, or Green Gallery, a collection of jewels and costly articles, unsurpassed in Europe. The entrance is only granted to six persons at a time, who pay a fee of two thalers. The customary way is to employ a _Lohnbedienter_, who goes around from one hotel to another, till he has collected the number, when he brings them together and conducts them to the person in the palace, who has charge of the treasures. As our visit happened to be during the Pentecost holidays, when every body in Dresden goes to the mountains, there was some difficulty in effecting this, but after two mornings spent in hunting up curious travelers, the servant finally conducted us in triumph to the palace. The first hall into which we were ushered, contained works in bronze. They were all small, and chosen with regard to their artistical value. Some by John of Bologna were exceedingly fine, as was also a group in iron, _cut_ out of a single block; perhaps the only successful attempt in this branch. The next room contained statues, and vases covered with reliefs, in ivory. The most remarkable work was the fall of Lucifer and his angels, containing ninety-two figures in all, carved out of a single piece of ivory sixteen inches high! It was the work of an Italian monk, and cost him many years of hard labor. There were two tables of mosaic-work, that would not be out of place in the fabled halls of the eastern genii, so much did they exceed my former ideas of human skill. The tops were of jasper, and each had a border of fruit and flowers, in which every color was represented by some precious stone, all with the utmost delicacy and truth to nature! It is impossible to conceive the splendid effect it produced. Besides some fine pictures on gold by Raphael Mengs, there was a Madonna, the largest specimen of enamel painting in existence.

However costly the contents of these halls, they were only an introduction to those which followed. Each one exceeded the other in splendor and costliness. The walls were covered to the ceiling with rows of goblets, vases, &c., of polished jasper, agate and lapiz lazuli. Splendid mosaic tables stood around, with caskets of the most exquisite silver and gold work upon them, and vessels of solid silver, some of them weighing six hundred pounds were placed at the foot of the columns. We were shown two goblets, each prized at six thousand thalers, made of gold and precious stones; also the great pearl called the Spanish Dwarf, nearly as large as a pullet’s egg; globes and vases cut entirely out of the mountain crystal; magnificent Nuremberg watches and clocks, and a great number of figures, made ingeniously of rough pearls and diamonds. The officer showed us a hen’s egg of silver. There was apparently nothing remarkable about it, but by unscrewing, it came apart, and disclosed the yelk of gold. This again opened and a golden chicken was seen; by touching a spring, a little diamond crown came from the inside, and the crown being again taken apart, out dropped a valuable diamond ring! The seventh hall contains the coronation robes of Augustus II., of Poland, and many costly specimens of carving in wood, A cherry stone is shown in a glass case, which has one hundred and twenty-five faces, all perfectly finished, carved upon it! The next room we entered sent back a glare of splendor that perfectly dazzled us. It was all gold, diamond, ruby and sapphire! Every case sent out such a glow and glitter that it seemed like a cage of imprisoned lightnings. Wherever the eye turned it was met by a blaze of broken rainbows. They were there by hundreds, and every gem was a fortune. Whole cases of swords, with hilts and scabbards of solid gold, studded with gems; the great two-handed coronation sword of the German emperors; daggers covered with brilliants and rubies; diamond buttons, chains and orders, necklaces and bracelets of pearl and emerald, and the order of the Golden Fleece made in gems of every kind. We were also shown the largest known onyx, nearly seven inches long and four inches broad! One of the most remarkable works is the throne and court of Aurungzebe, the Indian king, by Dinglinger, a celebrated goldsmith of the last century. It contains one hundred and thirty-two figures, all of enamelled gold, and each one most perfectly and elaborately finished. It was purchased by Prince Augustus for fifty-eight thousand thalers,[**] which was not a high sum, considering that the making of it occupied Dinglinger and thirteen workmen for seven years!

It is almost impossible to estimate the value of the treasures these halls contain. That of the gold and jewels alone must bo many millions of dollars, and the amount of labor expended on these toys of royalty is incredible. As monuments of patient and untiring toil, they are interesting: but it is sad to think how much labor and skill and energy have been wasted, in producing things which are useless to the world, and only of secondary importance as works of art. Perhaps, however, if men could be diverted by such play-things from more dangerous games, it would be all the better.

[Footnote **: A Prussian or Saxon thaler is about 70 cts.]

CHAPTER XIX.

RAMBLES IN THE SAXON SWITZERLAND.

After four days’ sojourn in Dresden we shouldered our knapsacks, not to be laid down again till we reached Prague. We were elated with the prospect of getting among the hills again, and we heeded not the frequent showers which had dampened the enjoyment of the Pentecost holidays, to the good citizens of Dresden, and might spoil our own. So we trudged gaily along the road to Pillnitz and waved an adieu to the domes behind us as the forest shut them out from view. After two hours’ walk the road led down to the Elbe, where we crossed in a ferry-boat to Pillnitz, the seat of a handsome palace and gardens, belonging to the King of Saxony. He happened to be there at the time, on an afternoon excursion from Dresden; as we had seen him before, in the latter place, we passed directly on, only pausing to admire the flower-beds in the palace court. The King is a tall, benevolent looking man, and is apparently much liked by his people. As far as I have yet seen, Saxony is a prosperous and happy country. The people are noted all over Germany for their honest, social character, which is written on their cheerful, open countenances. On our entrance into the Saxon Switzerland, at Pillnitz, we were delighted with the neatness and home-like appearance of every thing. Every body greeted us; if we asked for information, they gave it cheerfully. The villages were all pleasant and clean and the meadows fresh and blooming. I felt half tempted to say, in the words of an old ballad, which I believe Longfellow has translated:

“The fairest kingdom on this earth, It is the Saxon land!”

Going along the left bank of the Elbe, we passed over meadows purple with the tri-colored violet, which we have at home in gardens, and every little bank was bright with cowslips. At length the path led down into a cleft or ravine filled with trees, whose tops were on a level with the country around. This is a peculiar feature of Saxon scenery. The country contains many of these clefts, some of which are several hundred feet deep, having walls of perpendicular rock, in whose crevices the mountain pine roots itself and grows to a tolerable height without any apparent soil to keep it alive. We descended by a foot-path into this ravine, called the Liebethaler Grund. It is wider than many of the others, having room enough for a considerable stream and several mills. The sides are of sandstone rock, quite perpendicular. As we proceeded, it grew narrower and deeper, while the trees covering its sides and edges nearly shut out the sky. An hour’s walk brought us to the end, where we ascended gradually to the upper level again.

After passing the night at the little village of Uttewalde, a short distance further, we set out early in the morning for the Bastei, a lofty precipice on the Elbe. The way led us directly through the Uttewalder Grund, the most remarkable of all these chasms. We went down by steps into its depths, which in the early morning were very cold. Water dripped from the rocks, which but a few feet apart, rose far above us, and a little rill made its way along the bottom, into which the sun has never shone. Heavy masses of rock, which had tumbled down from the sides lay in the way, and tall pine trees sprung from every cleft. In one place the defile is only four feet wide, and a large mass of rock, fallen from above, has lodged near the bottom, making an arch across, under which the traveller has to creep. After going under two or three arches of this kind, the defile widened and an arrow cut upon a rock directed us to a side path, which branched off from this into a mountain. Here the stone masses immediately assumed another form. They projected out like shelves sometimes as much as twenty feet from the straight side, and hung over the way, looking as if they might break off every moment. I felt glad when we had passed under them. Then as we ascended higher, we saw pillars of rock separated entirely from the side and rising a hundred feet in height, with trees growing on their summits. They stood there gray and limeworn, like the ruins of a Titan temple.

The path finally led us out into the forest and through the clustering pine trees, to the summit of the Bastei. An inn has been erected in the woods and an iron balustrade placed around the rock. Protected by this, we advanced to the end of the precipice and looked down to the swift Elbe, more than seven hundred feet below! Opposite through the blue mists of morning, rose Konigstein, crowned with an impregnable fortress, and the crags of Lilienstein, with a fine forest around their base, frowned from the left bank. On both sides were horrible precipices of gray rock, with rugged trees hanging from the crevices. A hill rising up from one side of the Bastei, terminates suddenly a short distance from it, in on abrupt precipice. In the intervening space stand three or four of those rock-columns, several hundred feet high, with their tops nearly on a level with the Bastei. A wooden bridge has been made across from one to the other, over which the traveller passes, looking on the trees and rocks far below him, to the mountain, where a steep zigzag path takes him to the Elbe below.

We crossed the Elbe for the fourth time at the foot of the Bastei, and walked along its right bank towards Konigstein. The injury caused by the inundation was everywhere apparent. The receding flood had left a deposit of sand, in many places several feet deep on the rich meadows, so that the labor of years will be requisite to remove it and restore the land to an arable condition. Even the farm-houses on the hillside, some distance from the river, had been reached, and the long grass hung in the highest branches of the fruit trees. The people wore at work trying to repair their injuries, but it will fall heavily upon the poorer classes.

The mountain of Konigstein is twelve hundred feet high. A precipice, varying from one to three hundred feet in height, runs entirely around the summit, which is flat, and a mile and a half in circumference. This has been turned into a fortress, whose natural advantages make it entirely impregnable. During the Thirty Years’ War and the late war with Napoleon, it was the only place in Saxony unoccupied by the enemy. Hence is it used as a depository for the archives and royal treasures, in times of danger. By giving up our passports at the door, we received permission to enter; the officer called a guide to take us around the battlements. There is quite a little village on the summit, with gardens, fields, and a wood of considerable size. The only entrance is by a road cut through the rock, which is strongly guarded. A well seven hundred feet deep supplies the fortress with water, and there are storehouses sufficient to hold supplies for many years. The view from the ramparts is glorious–it takes in the whole of the Saxon Highlands, as far as the lofty Schneeberg in Bohemia. On the other side the eye follows the windings of the Elbe, as far as the spires of Dresden. Lilienstein, a mountain of exactly similar formation, but somewhat higher, stands directly opposite. On walking around, the guide pointed out a little square tower standing on the brink of a precipice, with a ledge, about two feet wide, running around it, just below the windows. He said during the reign of Augustus the Strong, a baron attached to his court, rose in his sleep after a night of revelry, and stepping out the window, stretched himself at full length along the ledge. A guard fortunately observed his situation and informed Augustus of it, who had him bound and secured with cords, and then awakened by music. It was a good lesson, and one which no doubt sobered him for the future.

Passing through the little city of Konigstein, we walked on to Schandau, the capital of the Saxon Switzerland, situated on the left bank. It had sustained great damage from the flood, the whole place having been literally under water. Here we turned up a narrow valley which led to the Kuhstall, some eight miles distant. The sides, as usual, were of steep gray rock, but wide enough apart to give room to some lovely meadows, with here and there a rustic cottage. The mountain maidens, in their bright red dresses, with a fanciful scarf bound around the head, made a romantic addition to the scene. There were some quiet secluded nooks, where the light of day stole in dimly through the thick foliage above and the wild stream rushed less boisterously over the rocks. We sat down to rest in one of these cool retreats, and made the glen ring with a cheer for America. The echoes repeated the name as if they had heard it for the first time, and I gave them a strict injunction to give it back to the next countryman who should pass by.

As we advanced further into the hills the way became darker and wilder. We heard the sound of falling water in a little dell on one side, and going nearer, saw a picturesque fall of about fifteen feet. Great masses of black rock were piled together, over which the mountain-stream fell in a snowy sheet. The pines above and around grew so thick and close, that not a sunbeam could enter, and a kind of mysterious twilight pervaded the spot. In Greece it would have been chosen for an oracle. I have seen, somewhere, a picture of the Spirit of Poetry, sitting beside just such a cataract, and truly the nymph could choose no more appropriate dwelling. But alas for sentiment! while we were admiring its picturesque beauty, we did not notice a man who came from a hut near by and went up behind the rocks. All at once there was a roar of water, and a real torrent came pouring down. I looked up, and lo! there he stood, with a gate in his hand which had held the water imprisoned, looking down at us to observe the effect, I motioned him to shut it up again, and he ran down to us, lest he should lose his fee for the “sight!”

Our road now left the valley and ascended through a forest to the Kuhstall, which we came upon at once. It is a remarkable natural arch, through a rocky wall or rampart, one hundred and fifty feet thick. Going through, we came at the other end to the edge of a very deep precipice, while the rock towered precipitously far above. Below lay a deep circular valley, two miles in diameter, and surrounded on every side by ranges of crags, such as we saw on the Bastei. It was entirely covered with a pine forest, and there only appeared to be two or three narrow defiles which gave it a communication with the world. The top of the Kuhstall can be reached by a path which runs up through a split in the rock, directly to the summit. It is just wide enough for one person to squeeze himself through; pieces of wood have been fastened in as steps, and the rocks in many places close completely above. The place derives its name from having been used by the mountaineers as a hiding-place for their cattle in time of war.

Next morning we descended by another crevice in the rock to the lonely valley, which we crossed, and climbed the Little Winterberg on the opposite side. There is a wide and rugged view from a little tower on a precipitous rock near the summit, erected to commemorate the escape of Prince Augustus of Saxony, who, being pursued by a mad stag, rescued himself on the very brink, by a lucky blow. Among the many wild valleys that lay between the hills, we saw scarcely one without the peculiar rocky formation which gives to Saxon scenery its most interesting character. They resemble the remains of some mighty work of art, rather than one of the thousand varied forms in which Nature delights to clothe herself.

The Great Winterberg, which is reached by another hour’s walk along an elevated ridge, is the highest of the mountains, celebrated for the grand view from its summit. We found the handsome Swiss hotel recently built there, full of tourists who had come to enjoy the scone, but the morning clouds hid every thing. We ascended the tower, and looking between them as they rolled by, caught glimpses of the broad landscape below. The Giant’s Mountains in Silesia were hidden by the mist, but sometimes when the wind freshened, we could see beyond the Elbe into Bohemian Switzerland, where the long Schneeberg rose conspicuous above the smaller mountains. Leaving the other travellers to wait at their leisure for clearer weather, we set off for the Prebisehthor, in company with two or three students from the Polytechnic School in Dresden. An hour’s walk over high hills, whose forest clothing had been swept off by fire a few years before, brought us to it.

The Prebisehthor is a natural arch, ninety feet high, in a wall of rock which projects at right angles from the precipitous side of the mountain. A narrow path leads over the top of the arch to the end of the rock, where, protected by a railing, the traveller seems to hang in the air. The valley is far below him–mountains rise up on either side–and only the narrow bridge connects him with the earth. We descended by a wooden staircase to the bottom of the arch, near which a rustic inn is built against the rock, and thence into the valley below, which we followed through rude lonely scenery, to Hirnischkretschen (!) on the Elbe.

Crossing the river again for the sixth and last time, we followed the right bank to Neidergrund, the first Austrian village. Here our passports were vised for Prague, and we were allowed to proceed without any examination of baggage. I noticed a manifest change in our fellow travelers the moment we crossed the border. They appeared anxious and careful; if we happened to speak of the state of the country, they always looked around to see if anybody was near, and if we even passed a workman on the road, quickly changed to some other subject. They spoke much of the jealous strictness of the government, and from what I heard from Austrians themselves, there may have been ground for their cautiousness.

We walked seven or eight miles along the bank of the Elbe, to Tetschen, there left our companions and took the road to Teplitz. The scenery was very picturesque; it must be delightful to float down the swift current in a boat, as we saw several merry companies do. The river is just small enough and the banks near enough together, to render such a mode of travelling delightful, and the strength of the current would carry one to Dresden in a day.

I was pleasantly disappointed on entering Bohemia. Instead of a dull, uninteresting country, as I expected, it is a land full of the most lovely scenery. There is every thing which can gratify the eye–high blue mountains, valleys of the sweetest pastoral look and romantic old ruins. The very name of Bohemia is associated with wild and wonderful legends, of the rude barbaric ages. Even the chivalric tales of the feudal times of Germany grow tame beside these earlier and darker histories. The fallen fortresses of the Rhine, or the robber-castles of the Odenwald had not for me so exciting an interest as the shapeless ruins cumbering these lonely mountains. The civilized Saxon race was left behind; I saw around me the features and heard the language of one of those rude Sclavonic tribes, whose original home was on the vast steppes of Central Asia. I have rarely enjoyed traveling more than our first two days’ journey towards Prague. The range of the Erzgebirge ran along on our right; the snow still lay in patches upon it, but the valleys between, with their little clusters of white cottages, were green and beautiful. About six miles before reaching Teplitz, we passed Kulm, the great battle-field, which in a measure decided the fate of Napoleon. He sent Vandamme with 40,000 men to attack the allies before they could unite their forces, and thus effect their complete destruction. Only the almost despairing bravery of the Russian guards under Ostermann, who held him in check till the allied troops united, prevented Napoleon’s design. At the junction of the roads, where the fighting was hottest, the Austrians have erected a monument to one of their generals. Not far from it is that of Prussia, simple and tasteful. A woody hill near, with the little village of Kulm at its foot, was the station occupied by Vandamme at the commencement of the battle. There is now a beautiful chapel on its summit, which can be seen far and wide. A little distance further, the Emperor of Russia has erected a third monument to the memory of the Russians who fell. Four lions rest on the base of the pedestal, and on the top of the shaft, forty-five feet high, Victory is represented as engraving the date, “Aug. 30, 1813,” on a shield. The dark, pine-covered mountains on the right, overlook the whole field and the valley of Teplitz; Napoleon rode along their crests several days after the battle, to witness the scene of his defeat.

Teplitz lies in a lovely valley, several miles wide, bounded by the Bohemian mountains on one side, and the Erzgebirge on the other. One straggling peak near is crowned with a picturesque ruin, at whose foot the spacious bath-buildings lie half hidden in foliage. As we went down the principal street, I noticed nearly every house was a hotel; we learned afterwards that in summer the usual average of visitors is five thousand. The waters resemble those of the celebrated Carlsbad; they are warm and particularly efficacious in rheumatism and diseases of like character. After leaving Teplitz, the road turned to the east, towards a lofty mountain, which we had seen the morning before. The peasants as they passed by, saluted us with “Christ greet you!”

We stopped for the night at the foot of the peak called the Milleschauer, and must have ascended nearly 2,000 feet, for we had a wide view the next morning, although the mists and clouds hid the half of it. The weather being so unfavorable, we concluded not to ascend, and taking leave of the Jena student who came there for that purpose, descended through green fields and orchards snowy with blossoms, to Lobositz, on the Elbe. Here we reached the plains again, where every thing wore the luxuriance of summer; it was a pleasant change from the dark and rough scenery we left. The road passed through Theresienstadt, the fortress of Northern Bohemia. The little city is surrounded by a double wall and moat, which can be filled with water, rendering it almost impossible to be taken. In the morning we were ferried over the Moldau, and after journeying nearly all day across barren, elevated plains, saw late in the afternoon the sixty-seven spires of Prague below us! The dark clouds which hung over the hills, gave us little time to look upon the singular scene; and we were soon comfortably settled in the half-barbaric, half-Asiatic city, with a pleasant prospect of seeing its wonders on the morrow.

CHAPTER XX.

SCENES IN PRAGUE.

_Prague._–I feel as if out of the world, in this strange, fantastic, yet beautiful old city. We have been rambling all morning through its winding streets, stopping sometimes at a church to see the dusty tombs and shrines, or to hear the fine music which accompanies the morning mass. I have seen no city yet that so forcibly reminds one of the past, and makes him forget everything but the associations connected with the scenes around him. The language adds to the illusion. Three-fourths of the people in the streets speak Bohemian and many of the signs are written in the same tongue, which is not at all like German. The palace of the Bohemian kings still looks down on the city from the western heights, and their tombs stand in the Cathedral of the holy Johannes. When one has climbed up the stone steps lending to the fortress, there is a glorious prospect before him. Prague, with its spires and towers, lies in the valley below, through which curves the Moldau with its green islands, disappearing among the hills which enclose the city on every side. The fantastic Byzantine architecture of many of the churches and towers, gives the city a peculiar oriental appearance; it seems to have been transported from the hills of Syria. Its streets are full of palaces, fallen and dwelt in now by the poorer classes. Its famous University, which once boasted forty thousand students, has long since ceased to exist. In a word, it is, like Venice, a fallen city; though as in Venice, the improving spirit of the age is beginning to give it a little life, and to send a quicker stream through its narrow and winding arteries. The railroad, which, joining that to Brunn, shall bring it in connection with Vienna, will be finished this year; in anticipation of the increased business which will arise from this, speculators are building enormous hotels in the suburbs and tearing down the old buildings to give place to more splendid edifices. These operations, and the chain bridge which spans the Moldau towards the southern end of the city, are the only things which look modern–every thing else is old, strange and solemn.

Having found out first a few of the locations, we hunted our way with difficulty through its labyrinths, seeking out every place of note or interest. Reaching the bridge at last, we concluded to cross over and ascend to the Hradschin–the palace of the Bohemian kings. The bridge was commenced in 1357, and was one hundred and fifty years in building. That was the way the old Germans did their work, and they made a structure which will last a thousand years longer. Every pier is surmounted with groups of saints and martyrs, all so worn and time-beaten, that there is little left of their beauty, if they ever had any. The most important of them, at least to Bohemians, is that of the holy “Johannes of Nepomuck,” now considered as the patron-saint of the land. He was a priest many centuries ago, whom one of the kings threw from the bridge into the Moldau, because he refused to reveal to him what the queen confessed. The legend says the body swam for some time on the river, with five stars around its head. The 16th of May, the day before we arrived, was that set apart for his particular honor; the statue on the bridge was covered with an arch of green boughs and flowers, and the shrine lighted with burning tapers. A railing was erected around it, near which numbers of the believers were kneeling, and a priest stood in the inside. The bridge was covered with passers-by, who all took their hats off till they had passed. Had it been a place of public worship, the act would have been natural and appropriate, but to uncover before a statue seemed to us too much like idolatry, and we ventured over without doing it. A few years ago it might have been dangerous, but now we only met with scowling looks. There are many such shrines and statues through the city, and I noticed that the people always took off their hats and crossed themselves in passing. On the hill above the western end of the city, stands a chapel on the spot where the Bavarians put an end to Protestantism in Bohemia _by the sword_, and the deluded peasantry of the land make pilgrimages to this spot, as if it were rendered holy by an act over which Religion weeps!

Ascending the broad flight of steps to the Hradschin, I paused a moment to look at the scene below. A slight blue haze hung over the clustering towers, and the city looked dim through it, like a city seen in a dream. It was well that it should so appear, for not less dim and misty are the memories that haunt its walls. There was no need of a magician’s wand to bid that light cloud shadow forth the forms of other times. They came uncalled for, even by fancy. Far, far back in the past, I saw the warrior-princess who founded the kingly city–the renowned Libussa, whose prowess and talent inspired the women of Bohemia to rise at her death and storm the land that their sex might rule where it obeyed before. On the mountain opposite once stood the palace of the bloody Wlaska, who reigned with her Amazon band for seven years over half Bohemia. Those streets below had echoed with the fiery words of Huss, and the castle of his follower–the blind Ziska, who met and defeated the armies of the German Empire–moulders on the mountain above. Many a year of war and tempest has passed over the scene. The hills around have borne the armies of Wallenstein and Frederic the Great; the war-cry of Bavaria, Sweden and Poland has echoed in the valley, and the red glare of the midnight cannon or the flames of burning palaces have often gleamed along the “blood-dyed waters” of the Moldau!

But this was a day-dream. The throng of people coming up the steps waked me out of it. We turned and followed them through several spacious courts, till we arrived at the Cathedral, which is magnificent in the extreme. The dark Gothic pillars, whose arches unite high above, are surrounded with gilded monuments and shrines, and the side chapels are rich in elaborate decorations. A priest was speaking from a pulpit in the centre, in the Bohemian language, which not being the most intelligible, I went to the other end to see the shrine of the holy Johannes of Nepomuck. It stands at the end of one of the side aisles and is composed of a mass of gorgeous silver ornaments. At a little distance, on each side, hang four massive lamps of silver, constantly burning. The pyramid of statues, of the same precious metal, has at each corner a richly carved urn, three feet high, with a crimson lamp burning at the top. Above, four silver angels, the size of life, are suspended in the air, holding up the corners of a splendid drapery of crimson and gold. If these figures were melted down and distributed among the poor and miserable people who inhabit Bohemia, they would then be angels indeed, bringing happiness and blessing to many a ruined home- altar. In the same chapel is the splendid burial-place of the Bohemian kings, of gilded marble and alabaster. Numberless tombs, covered with elaborate ornamental work, fill the edifice. It gives one a singular feeling to stand at one end and look down the lofty hall, dim with incense smoke and dark with the weight of many centuries.

On the way down again, we stepped into the St. Nicholas Church, which was built by the Jesuits. The interior has a rich effect, being all of brown and gold. The massive pillars are made to resemble reddish-brown marble, with gilded capitals, and the statues at the base are profusely ornamented in the same style. The music chained me there a long time. There was a grand organ, assisted by a full orchestra and large choir of singers. It was placed above, and at every sound of the priest’s bell, the flourish of trumpets and deep roll of the drums filled the dome with a burst of quivering sound, while the giant pipes of the organ breathed out their full harmony and the very air shook under the peal. It was like a triumphal strain; the soul became filled with thoughts of power and glory–every sense was changed into one dim, indistinct emotion of rapture, which held the spirit as if spell-bound. I could almost forgive the Jesuits the superstition and bigotry they have planted in the minds of men, for the indescribable enjoyment that music gave. When it ceased, we went out to the world again, and the recollection of it seems now like a dream–but a dream whose influence will last longer than many a more palpable reality.

Not far from this place is the palace of Wallenstein, in the same condition as when he inhabited it, and still in the possession of his descendants. It is a plain, large building, having beautiful gardens attached to it, which are open to the public. We went through the courtyard, threaded a passage with a roof of rough stalactitic rock, and entered the garden where a revolving fountain was casting up its glittering arches. Among the flowers at the other end of the garden there is a remarkable fountain. It is but a single jet of water which rises from the middle of a broad basin of woven wire, but by some means it sustains a hollow gilded ball, sometimes for many minutes at a time. When the ball drops, the sloping sides of the basin convey it directly to the fountain again, and it is carried up to dance a while longer on the top of the jet. I watched it once, thus supported on the water, for full fifteen minutes.

There is another part of Prague which is not less interesting, though much less poetical–the Jews’ City. In our rambles we got into it before we were aware, but hurried immediately out of it again, perfectly satisfied with one visit. We came first into a dark, narrow street, whose sides were lined with booths of old clothes and second-hand articles. A sharp featured old woman thrust a coat before my face, exclaiming, “Herr, buy a fine coat!” Instantly a man assailed me on the other side, “Here are vests! pantaloons! shirts!” I broke loose from them and ran on, but it only became worse. One seized me by the arm, crying, “_Lieber_ Herr, buy some stockings!” and another grasped my coat: “Hats, Herr! hats! _buy something, or sell me something!_” I rushed desperately on, shouting “no! no!” with all my might, and finally got safe through. My friend having escaped their clutches also, we hunted the way to the old Jewish cemetery. This stands in the middle of the city, and has not been used for a hundred years. We could find no entrance, but by climbing upon the ruins of an old house near, I could look over the wall. A cold shudder crept over me, to think that warm, joyous Life, as I then felt it, should grow chill and pass back to clay in such a foul charnel-house. Large mounds of earth, covered with black, decaying grave-stones, which were almost hidden under the weeds and rank grass, filled the inclosure. A few dark, crooked alder-trees grew among the crumbling tombs, and gave the scene an air of gloom and desolation, almost fearful. The dust of many a generation lies under these mouldering stones; they now scarcely occupy a thought in the minds of the living; and yet the present race toils and seeks for wealth alone, that it may pass away and leave nothing behind–not even a memory for that which will follow it!

CHAPTER XXI.

JOURNEY THROUGH EASTERN BOHEMIA AND MORAVIA TO THE DANUBE.

Our road the first two days after leaving Prague led across broad, elevated plains, across which a cold wind came direct from the summits of the Riesengebirge, far to our left. Were it not for the pleasant view we had of the rich valley of the Upper Elbe, which afforded a delightful relief to the monotony of the hills around us, the journey would have been exceedingly tiresome. The snow still glistened on the distant mountains; but when the sun shone out, the broad valley below, clad in the luxuriance of summer, and extending for at least fifty miles with its woods, meadows and white villages, looked like a real Paradise. The long ridges over which we travelled extend for nearly a hundred and fifty miles–from the Elbe almost to the Danube. The soil is not fertile, the inhabitants are exceedingly poor, and from our own experience, the climate must be unhealthy. In winter the country is exposed to the full sweep of the northern winds, and in summer the sun shines down on it with unbroken force. There are few streams running through it, and the highest part, which divides the waters of the Baltic from those of the Black Sea is filled for a long distance with marshes and standing pools, whose exhalations must inevitably subject the inhabitants to disease. This was perceptible in their sallow, sickly countenances; many of the women are afflicted with the _goitre_, or swelling of the throat; I noticed that towards evening they always carefully muffled up their faces. According to their own statements, the people suffer much from the cold in winter, as the few forests the country affords are in possession of the noblemen to whom the land belongs, and they are not willing to let them be cut down. The dominions of these petty despots are marked along the road with as much precision as the boundaries of an empire; we saw sometimes their stalely castles at a distance, forming quite a contrast to the poor scattering villages of the peasants.

At Kollin, the road, which had been running eastward in the direction of Olmutz, turned to the south, and we took leave of the Elbe, after tracing back his course from Magdeburg nearly to his home in the mountains of Silesia. The country was barren and monotonous, but a bright sunshine made it look somewhat cheerful. We passed, every few paces, some shrine or statue by the roadside. This had struck me, immediately on crossing the border, in the Saxon Switzerland–it seemed as if the boundary of Saxony was that of Protestantism. But here in the heart of Bohemia, the extent to which this image worship is carried, exceeds anything I had imagined. There is something pleasing as well as poetical in the idea of a shrine by the wayside, where the weary traveller can rest, and raise his heart in thankfulness to the Power that protects him; it was no doubt a pious spirit that placed them there; but the people appear to pay the reverence to the picture which they should give to its spiritual image, and the pictures themselves are so shocking and ghastly, they seem better calculated to excite horror than reverence. It was really repulsive to look on images of the Saviour covered with blood, and generally with swords sticking in different parts of the body. The Almighty is represented as an old man, wearing a Bishop’s mitre, and the image of the Virgin is always drest in a gay silk robe, with beads and other ornaments. From the miserable painting, the faces often had an expression that would have been exceedingly ludicrous, if the shock given to our feelings of reverence were not predominant. The poor, degraded peasants always uncovered or crossed themselves when passing by these shrines, but it appeared to be rather the effect of habit than any good impulse, for the Bohemians are noted all over Germany for their dishonesty; we learned by experience they deserve it. It is not to be wondered at either; for a people so poor and miserable and oppressed will soon learn to take advantage of all who appear better off than themselves. They had one custom which was touching and beautiful. At the sound of the church bell, as it rung the morning, noon and evening chimes, every one uncovered, and repeated to himself a prayer. Often, as we rested at noon on a bank by the roadside, that voice spoke out from the house of worship and every one heeded its tone. Would that to this innate spirit of reverence were added the light of Knowledge, which a tyrannical government denies them!

The third night of our journey we stopped at the little village of Stecken, and the next morning, after three hours’ walk over the ridgy heights, reached the old Moravian city of Iglau, built on a hill. It happened to be _Corpus Christi_ day, and the peasants of the neighborhood were hastening there in their gayest dresses. The young women wore a crimson scarf around the head, with long fringed and embroidered ends hanging over the shoulders, or falling in one smooth fold from the back of the head. They were attired in black velvet vests, with full white sleeves and skirts of some gay color, which were short enough to show to advantage their red stockings and polished shoe-buckles. Many of them were not deficient in personal beauty–there was a gipsy-like wildness in their eyes, that combined with their rich hair and graceful costume, reminded me of the Italian maidens. The towns too, with their open squares and arched passages, have quite a southern look; but the damp, gloomy weather was enough to dispel any illusion of this kind.

In the neighborhood of Iglau, and, in fact, through the whole of Bohemia, we saw some of the strangest teams that could well be imagined. I thought the Frankfort milkwomen with their donkeys and hearse-like carts, were comical objects enough, but they bear no comparison with these Bohemian turn-outs. Dogs–for economy’s sake, perhaps–generally supply the place of oxen or horses, and it is no uncommon thing to see three large mastiffs abreast, harnessed to a country-cart. A donkey and a cow together, are sometimes met with, and one man, going to the festival at Iglau, had his wife and children in a little wagon, drawn by a dog and a donkey. These two, however, did not work well together; the dog would bite his lazy companion, and the man’s time was constantly employed in whipping him off the donkey, and in whipping the donkey away from the side of the road. Once I saw a wagon drawn by a dog, with a woman pushing behind, while a man, doubtless her lord and master, sat comfortably within, smoking his pipe with the greatest complacency! The very climax of all was a woman and a dog harnessed _together_, taking a load of country produce to market! I hope, for the honor of the country, it was not emblematic of woman’s condition there. But as we saw hundreds of them breaking stone along the road, and occupied at other laborious and not less menial labor, there is too much reason to fear that it is so.

As we approached Iglau, we heard cannon firing; the crowd increased, and following the road, we came to an open square, where a large number were already assembled; shrines were erected around it, hung with pictures and pine boughs, and a long procession of children was passing down the side as we entered. We went towards the middle, where Neptune and his Tritons poured the water from their urns into two fountains, and stopped to observe the scene. The procession came on, headed by a large body of priests, in white robes, with banners and crosses. They stopped before the principal shrine, in front of the Rathhaus, and began a solemn religious ceremony. The whole crowd of not less than ten thousand persons, stood silent and uncovered, and the deep voice of the officiating priest was heard over the whole square. At times the multitude sang responses, and I could mark the sound, swelling and rolling up like a mighty wave, till it broke and slowly sank down again to the deepest stillness. The effect was marred by the rough voice of the officers commanding the soldiery, and the volleys of musquetry which were occasionally discharged. It degraded the solemnity of the pageant to the level of a military parade.

In the afternoon we were overtaken by a travelling _handwerker_, on his way to Vienna, who joined company with us. We walked several miles together, talking on various matters, without his having the least suspicion we were not Germans. He had been at Trieste, and at length began speaking of the great beauty of the American vessels there. “Yes,” said I, “_our_ vessels are admired all over the world.” He stared at me without comprehending;–“_your_ vessels?” “Our country’s,” I replied; “we are Americans!” I can see still his look of incredulous astonishment and hear the amazed tone with which he cried: “_You_ Americans–it is impossible!” We convinced him nevertheless, to his great joy, for all through Germany there is a curiosity to see our countrymen and a kindly feeling towards them. “I shall write down in my book,” said he, “so that I shall never forget it, that I once travelled with two Americans!” We stopped together for the night at the only inn in a large, beggarly village, where we obtained a frugal supper with difficulty, for a regiment of Polish lancers was quartered there for the night, and the pretty _Kellnerin_ was so busy in waiting on the officers that she had no eye for wandering journeymen, as she took us to be. She even told us the beds were all occupied and we must sleep on the floor. Just then the landlord came by. “Is it possible, Herr Landlord,” asked our new companion, “that there is no bed here for us? Have the goodness to look again, for we are not in the habit of sleeping on the floor, like dogs!” This speech had its effect, for the _Kellnerin_ was commanded to find us beds. She came back unwillingly after a time and reported that _two_, only, were vacant. As a German bed is only a yard wide, we pushed these two together, but they were still too small for three persons, and I had a severe cold in the morning, from sleeping crouched up against the damp wall.

The next day we passed the dividing ridge which separates the waters of the Elbe from the Danube, and in the evening arrived at Znaim, the capital of Moravia. It is built on a steep hill looking down on the valley of the Thaya, whose waters mingle with the Danube near Pressburg. The old castle on the height near, was formerly the residence of the Moravian monarchs, and traces of the ancient walls and battlements of the city are still to be seen. The handwerker took us to the inn frequented by his craft–the leather-curriers–and we conversed together till bed-time. While telling me of the oppressive laws of Austria, the degrading vassalage of the peasants and the horrors of the conscription system, he paused as in deep thought, and looking at me with a suppressed sigh, said: “Is it not true, America is free?” I told him of our country and her institutions, adding that though we were not yet as free as we hoped and wished to be, we enjoyed far more liberty than any country in the world. “Ah!” said he, “it is hard to leave one’s fatherland oppressed as it is, but I wish I could go to America!”

We left next morning at eight o’clock, after having done full justice to the beds of the “Golden Stag,” and taken leave of Florian Francke, the honest and hearty old landlord. Znaim appears to great advantage from the Vienna road; the wind which blew with fury against our backs, would not permit us to look long at it, but pushed us on towards the Austrian border. In the course of three hours we were obliged to stop at a little village; it blew a perfect hurricane and the rain began to soak through our garments. Here we stayed three hours among the wagoners who stopped on account of the weather. One miserable, drunken wretch, whom one would not wish to look at more than once, distinguished himself by insulting those around him, and devouring like a beast, large quantities of food. When the reckoning was given him, he declared he had already paid, and the waiter denying it, he said, “Stop, I will show you something!” pulled out his passport and pointed to the name–“Baron von Reitzenstein.” It availed nothing; he had fallen so low that his title inspired no respect, and when we left the inn they were still endeavoring to get their money and threatening him with a summary proceeding if the demand was not complied with.

Next morning the sky was clear and a glorious day opened before us. The country became more beautiful as we approached the Danube; the hills were covered with vineyards, just in the tender green of their first leaves, and the rich valleys lay in Sabbath stillness in the warm sunshine. Sometimes from an eminence we could see far and wide over the garden-like slopes, where little white villages shone among the blossoming fruit-trees. A chain of blue hills rose in front, which I knew almost instinctively stood by the Danube; when we climbed to the last height and began to descend to the valley, where the river was still hidden by luxuriant groves, I saw far to the southwest, a range of faint, silvery summits, rising through the dim ether like an airy vision. There was no mistaking those snowy mountains. My heart bounded with a sudden thrill of rapturous excitement at this first view of _the Alps!_ They were at a great distance, and their outline was almost blended with the blue drapery of air which clothed them. I gazed till my vision became dim and I could no longer trace their airy lines. They called up images blended with the grandest events in the world’s history. I thought of the glorious spirits who have looked upon them and trodden their rugged sides–of the storms in which they veil their countenances, and the avalanches they hurl thundering to the valleys–of the voices of great deeds, which have echoed from their crags over the wide earth–and of the ages which have broken, like the waves of a mighty sea, upon their everlasting summits!

As we descended, the hills and forests shut out this sublime vision, and I looked to the wood-clothed mountains opposite and tried to catch a glimpse of the current that rolled at their feet. We here entered upon a rich plain, about ten miles in diameter, which lay between a backward sweep of the hills and a curve of the Danube. It was covered with the richest grain; every thing wore the luxuriance of summer, and we seemed to have changed seasons since leaving the dreary hills of Bohemia. Continuing over the plain, we had on our left the fields of Wagram and Essling, the scene of two of Napoleon’s blood-bought victories. The outposts of the Carpathians skirted the horizon–that great mountain range which stretches through Hungary to the borders of Russia.

At length the road came to the river’s side, and we crossed on wooden bridges over two or three arms of the Danube, all of which together were little wider than the Schuylkill at Philadelphia. When we crossed the last bridge, we came to a kind of island covered with groves of the silver ash. Crowds of people filled the cool walks; booths of refreshment stood by the roadside, and music was everywhere heard. The road finally terminated in a circle, where beautiful alleys radiated into the groves; from the opposite side a broad street lined with stately buildings extended into the heart of the city, and through this avenue, filled with crowds of carriages and people on their way to those delightful walks, we entered Vienna!

CHAPTER XXII.

VIENNA.

_May 31._–I have at last seen the thousand wonders of this great capital–this German Paris–this connecting link between the civilization of Europe and the barbaric magnificence of the East. It looks familiar to be in a city again, whose streets are thronged with people, and resound with the din and bustle of business. It reminds me of the never-ending crowds of London, or the life and tumult of our scarcely less active New York. Although the end may be sordid for which so many are laboring, yet the very sight of so much activity is gratifying. It is peculiarly so to an American. After residing in a foreign land for some time, the peculiarities of our nation are more easily noticed; I find in my countrymen abroad a vein of restless energy–a love for exciting action–which to many of our good German friends is perfectly incomprehensible. It might have been this which gave at once a favorable impression of Vienna.

The morning of our arrival we sallied out from our lodgings in the Leopoldstadt, to explore the world before us. Entering the broad Praterstrasse, we passed down to the little arm of the Danube, which separates this part of the new city from the old. A row of magnificent coffee-houses occupy the bank, and numbers of persons were taking their breakfasts in the shady porticoes. The Ferdinand’s Bridge, which crosses the stream, was filled with people; in the motley crowd we saw the dark-eyed Greek, and Turks in their turbans and flowing robes. Little brown Hungarian boys were going around, selling bunches of lilies, and Italians with baskets of oranges stood by the side-walk. The throng became greater as we penetrated into the old city. The streets were filled with carts and carriages, and as there are no side-pavements, it required constant attention to keep out of their way. Splendid shops, fitted up with great taste, occupied the whole of the lower stories, and goods of all kinds hung beneath the canvass awnings in front of them. Almost every store or shop was dedicated to some particular person or place, which was represented on a large panel by the door. The number of these paintings added much to the splendor of the scene; I was gratified to find, among the images of kings and dukes, one dedicated “_to the American_,” with an Indian chief in full costume.

The _Altstadt_, or old city, which contains about sixty thousand inhabitants, is completely separated from the suburbs, whose population, taking the whole extent within the outer barrier, numbers nearly half a million. It is situated on a small arm of the Danube, and encompassed by a series of public promenades, gardens and walks, varying from a quarter to half a mile in length, called the Glacis. This formerly belonged to the fortifications of the city, but as the suburbs grew up so rapidly on all sides, it was changed appropriately to a public walk. The city is still surrounded with a massive wall and a deep wide moat; but since it was taken by Napoleon in 1809, the moat has been changed into a garden, with a beautiful carriage road along the bottom, around the whole city. It is a beautiful sight, to stand on the summit of the wall and look over the broad Glacis, with its shady roads branching in every direction, and filled with inexhaustible streams of people. The Vorstaedte, or new cities, stretch in a circle around, beyond this; all the finest buildings front on the Glacis, among which the splendid Vienna Theatre and the church of San Carlo Borromeo are conspicuous. The mountains of the Vienna Forest bound the view, with here and there a stately castle on their woody summits. I was reminded of London as seen from Regent’s Park, and truly this part of Vienna can well compare with it. On penetrating into the suburbs, the resemblance is at an end. Many of the public thoroughfares are still unpaved, and in dry weather one is almost choked by the clouds of fine dust. A furious wind blows from the mountains, sweeping the streets almost constantly and filling the eyes and ears with it, making the city an unhealthy residence for strangers.

There is no lack of places for pleasure or amusement. Beside the numberless walks of the Glacis, there are the Imperial Gardens, with their cool shades and flowers and fountains; the Augarten, laid out and opened to the public by the Emperor Joseph: and the Prater, the largest and most beautiful of all. It lies on an island formed by the arms of the Danube, and is between two and three miles square. From the circle at the end of the Praterstrasse, broad carriage-ways extend through its forests of oak and silver ash, and over its verdant lawns to the principal stream, which bounds it on the north. These roads are lined with stately horse chesnuts, whose branches unite and form a dense canopy, completely shutting out the sun. Every afternoon the beauty and nobility of Vienna whirl through the cool groves in their gay equipages, while the sidewalks are thronged with pedestrians, and the numberless tables and seats with which every house of refreshment is surrounded, are filled with merry guests. Here, on Sundays and holidays, the people repair in thousands. The woods are full of tame deer, which run perfectly free over the whole Prater. I saw several in one of the lawns, lying down in the grass, with a number of children playing around or sitting beside them. It is delightful to walk there in the cool of the evening, when the paths are crowded, and everybody is enjoying the release from the dusty city. It is this free, social life which renders Vienna so attractive to foreigners and draws yearly thousands of visitors from all parts of Europe.

St. Stephen’s Cathedral, in the centre of the old city, is one of the finest specimens of Gothic architecture in Germany. Its unrivalled tower, which rises to the height of four hundred and twenty-eight feet, is visible from every part of Vienna. It is entirely of stone, most elaborately ornamented, and is supposed to be the strongest in Europe. If the tower was finished, it might rival any church in Europe in richness and brilliancy of appearance. The inside is solemn and grand; but the effect is injured by the number of small chapels and shrines. In one of these rests, the remains of Prince Eugene of Savoy, “_der edle Ritter_,” known in a ballad to every man, woman and child in Germany.

The Belvidere Gallery fills thirty-five halls, and contains three thousand pictures! It is absolutely bewildering to walk through such vast collections; you can do no more than glance at each painting, and hurry by face after face, and figure after figure, on which you would willingly gaze for hours and inhale the atmosphere of beauty that surrounds them. Then after you leave, the brain is filled with their forms–radiant spirit-faces look upon you, and you see constantly, in fancy, the calm brow of a Madonna, the sweet young face of a child, or the blending of divine with mortal beauty in an angel’s countenance. I endeavor, if possible, always to make several visits–to study those pictures which cling _first_ to the memory, and pass over those which make little or no impression. It is better to have a few images fresh and enduring, than a confused and indistinct memory of many.

From the number of Madonnas in every European gallery, it would almost seem that the old artists painted nothing else. The subject is one which requires the highest genius to do it justice, and it is therefore unpleasant to see so many still, inexpressive faces of the virgin and child, particularly by the Dutch artists, who clothe their figures sometimes in the stiff costume of their own time. Raphael and Murillo appear to me to be almost the only painters who have expressed what, perhaps, was above the power of other masters–the combined love and reverence of the mother, and the divine expression in the face of the child, prophetic of his mission and godlike power.

There were many glorious old paintings in the second story, which is entirely taken up with pictures; two or three of the halls were devoted to selected works from modern artists. Two of these I would give every thing I have to possess. One of them is a winter scene, representing the portico of an old Gothic church. At the base of one of the pillars a woman is seated in the snow, half-benumbed, clasping an infant to her breast, while immediately in front stands a boy of perhaps seven or eight years, his little hands folded in prayer, while the chill wind tosses the long curls from his forehead. There is something so pure and holy in the expression of his childish countenance, so much feeling in the lip and sorrowful eye, that it moves one almost to tears to look upon it. I turned back half a dozen times from the other pictures to view it again, and blessed the artist in my heart for the lesson he gave. The other is by a young Italian painter, whose name I have forgotten, but who, if he never painted anything else, is worthy a high place among the artists of his country. It represents some scene from the history of Venice. On an open piazza, a noble prisoner, wasted and pale from long confinement, has just had an interview with his children. He reaches his arm toward them as if for the last time, while a savage keeper drags him away. A lovely little girl kneels at the feet of the Doge, but there is no compassion in his stern features, and it is easy to see that her father is doomed.

The Lower Belvidere, separated from the Upper by a large garden, laid out in the style of that at Versailles, contains the celebrated _Ambraser Sammlung_, a collection of armor. In the first hall I noticed the complete armor of the Emperor Maximilian, for man and horse–the armor of Charles V., and Prince Moritz of Saxony, while the walls were filled with figures of German nobles and knights, in the suits they wore in life. There is also the armor of the great “Baver of Trient,” trabant of the Archduke Ferdinand. He was nearly nine feet in stature, and his spear, though not equal to Satan’s, in Paradise Lost, would still make a tree of tolerable dimensions.

In the second hall we saw weapons taken from the Turkish army who besieged Vienna, with the horse-tail standards of the Grand Vizier, Kara Mustapha. The most interesting article was the battle-axe of the unfortunate Montezuma, which was probably given to the Emperor Charles V., by Cortez. It is a plain instrument of dark colored stone, about three feet long.

We also visited the _Burgerliche Zeughaus_, a collection of arms and weapons, belonging to the citizens of Vienna. It contains sixteen thousand weapons and suits of armor, including those plundered from the Turks, when John Sobieski conquered them and relieved Vienna from the siege. Besides a great number of sabres, lances and horsetails, there is the blood-red banner of the Grand Vizier, as well as his skull and shroud, which is covered with sentences from the Koran. On his return to Belgrade, after the defeat at Vienna, the Sultan sent him a bow-string, and he was accordingly strangled. The Austrians having taken Belgrade some time after, they opened his grave and carried off his skull and shroud, as well as the bow-string, as relics. Another large and richly embroidered banner, which hung in a broad sheet from the ceiling, was far more interesting to me. It had once waved from the vessels of the Knights of Malta, and had, perhaps, on the prow of the Grand Master’s ship, led that romantic band to battle against the Infidel.

A large number of peasants and common soldiers were admitted to view the armory at the same time. The grave _custode_ who showed us the curiosities, explaining every thing in phrases known by heart for years and making the same starts of admiration whenever he came to any thing peculiarly remarkable, singled us out as the two persons most worthy of attention. Accordingly his remarks were directed entirely to us, and his humble countrymen might as well have been invisible, for the notice he took of them. On passing out, we gave him a coin worth about fifteen cents, which happened to be so much more than the others gave him, that, bowing graciously, he invited us to write our names in the album for strangers. While we were doing this, a poor handwerker lingered behind, apparently for the same object, whom he scornfully dismissed, shaking the fifteen cent piece in his hand, and saying: “The album is not for such as you–it is for noble gentlemen!”

On our way through the city, we often noticed a house on the southern side of St. Stephen’s Platz, dedicated to “the Iron Stick.” In a niche by the window, stood what appeared to be the limb of a tree, completely filled with nails, which were driven in so thick that no part of the original wood is visible. We learned afterwards the legend concerning it. The Vienna Forest is said to have extended, several hundred years ago, to this place. A locksmith’s apprentice was enabled, by the devil’s help, to make the iron bars and padlock which confine the limb in its place; every locksmith’s apprentice who came to Vienna after that, drove a nail into it, till finally there was room for no more. It is a singular legend, and whoever may have placed the limb there originally, there it has remained for two or three hundred years at least.

We spent two or three hours delightfully one evening in listening to Strauss’s band. We went about sunset to the Odeon, a new building in the Leopoldstadt. It has a refreshment hall nearly five hundred feet long, with a handsome fresco ceiling and glass doors opening into a garden walk of the same length. Both the hall and garden were filled with tables, where the people seated themselves as they came, and conversed sociably over their coffee and wine. The orchestra was placed in a little ornamental temple in the garden, in front of which I stationed myself, for I was anxious to see the world’s waltz-king, whose magic tones can set the heels of half Christendom in motion. After the band had finished tuning their instruments, a middle-sized, handsome man stepped forward with long strides, with a violin in one hand and bow in the other, and began waving the latter up and down, like a magician summoning his spirits. As if he had waved the sound out of his bow, the tones leaped forth from the instruments, and guided by his eye and hand, fell into a merry measure. The accuracy with which every instrument performed its part, was truly marvellous. He could not have struck the measure or the harmony more certainly from the keys of his own piano, than from that large band. The sounds struggled forth, so perfect and distinct, that one almost expected to see them embodied, whirling in wild dance around him. Sometimes the air was so exquisitely light and bounding, the feet could scarcely keep on the earth; then it sank into a mournful lament, with a sobbing tremulousness, and died away in a long-breathed sigh. Strauss seemed to feel the music in every limb. He would wave his fiddle-bow awhile, then commence playing with desperate energy, moving his whole body to the measure, till the sweat rolled from his brow. A book was lying on the stand before him, but he made no use of it. He often glanced around with a kind of half-triumphant smile at the restless crowd, whose feet could scarcely be restrained from bounding to the magic measure. It was the horn of Oberon realized. The composition of the music displayed great talent, but its charm consisted more in the exquisite combination of the different instruments, and the perfect, the wonderful exactness with which each performed its part–a piece of art of the most elaborate and refined character.

The company, which consisted of several hundred, appeared to be full of enjoyment. They sat under the trees in the calm, cool twilight, with the stars twinkling above, and talked and laughed sociably together between the pauses of the music, or strolled up and down the lighted alleys. We walked up and down with them, and thought how much we should enjoy such a scene at home, where the faces around us would be those of friends, and the language our mother tongue!

We went a long way through the suburbs one bright afternoon, to a little cemetery about a mile from the city, to find the grave of Beethoven. On ringing at the gate a girl admitted us into the grounds, in which are many monuments of noble families who have vaults there. I passed up the narrow walk, reading the inscriptions, till I came to the tomb of Franz Clement, a young composer, who died two or three years ago. On turning again, my eye fell instantly on the word “BEETHOVEN,” in golden letters, on a tombstone of gray marble. A simple gilded lyre decorated the pedestal, above which was a serpent encircling a butterfly–the emblem of resurrection to eternal life. Here then, mouldered the remains of that restless spirit, who seemed to have strayed to earth from another clime, from such a height did he draw his glorious conceptions. The perfection he sought for here in vain, he has now attained in a world where the soul is freed from the bars which bind it in this. There were no flowers planted around the tomb by those who revered his genius; only one wreath, withered and dead, lay among the grass, as if left long ago by some solitary pilgrim, and a few wild buttercups hung with their bright blossoms over the slab. It might have been wrong, but I could not resist the temptation to steal one or two, while the old grave-digger was busy preparing a new tenement. I thought that other buds would open in a few days, but those I took would be treasured many a year as sacred relics. A few paces off is the grave of Schubert, the composer, whose beautiful songs are heard all over Germany.

It would employ one a week to visit all the rich collections of art in Vienna. They are all open to the public on certain days of the week, and we have been kept constantly in motion, running from one part of the city to another, in order to arrive at some gallery at the appointed time. Tickets, which have to be procured often in quite different parts of the city, are necessary for admittance to many; on applying after much trouble and search, we frequently found we came at the wrong hour, and must leave without effecting our object. We employed no guide, but preferred finding every thing ourselves. We made a list every morning, of the collections open during the day, and employed the rest of the time in visiting the churches and public gardens, or rambling through the suburbs.

We visited the Imperial Library a day or two ago. The hall is 245 feet long, with a magnificent dome in the centre, under which stands the statue of Charles V., of Carrara marble, surrounded by twelve other monarchs of the house of Hapsburg. The walls are of variegated marble, richly ornamented with gold, and the ceiling and dome are covered with brilliant fresco paintings. The library numbers 300,000 volumes, and 16,000 manuscripts, which are kept in walnut cases, gilded and adorned with medallions. The rich and harmonious effect of the whole cannot easily be imagined. It is exceedingly appropriate that a hall of such splendor, should be used to hold a library. The pomp of a palace may seem hollow and vain, for it is but the dwelling of a man; but no building can be too magnificent for the hundreds of great and immortal spirits to dwell in, who have visited earth during thirty centuries.

Among other curiosities preserved in the collection, we were shown a brass plate, containing one of the records of the Roman Senate, made 180 years before Christ, Greek manuscripts of the fifth and sixth centuries, and a volume of Psalms, printed on parchment, in the year 1457, by Faust and Schaeffer, the inventors of printing. There were also Mexican manuscripts, presented by Cortez; the prayer-book of Hildegard, wife of Charlemagne, in letters of gold; the signature of San Carlo Borromeo, and a Greek testament of the thirteenth century, which had been used by Erasmus in making his translation and contains notes in his own hand. The most interesting article was the “Jerusalem Delivered” of Tasso, in the poet’s own hand, with his erasions and corrections.

We also visited the Cabinet of Natural History, which is open twice a week “to all _respectably dressed_ persons,” as the notice at the door says. But Heaven forbid that I should attempt to describe what we saw there. The Mineral Cabinet had a greater interest to me, inasmuch as it called up the recollections of many a school-boy ramble over the hills and into all kinds of quarries, far and near. It is said to be the most perfect collection in existence. I was pleased to find many old acquaintances there, from the mines of Pennsylvania; Massachusetts and New York were also very well represented. I had no idea before, that the mineral wealth of Austria was so great. Besides the iron and lead mines among the hills of Styria and the quicksilver of Idria, there is no small amount of gold and silver found, and the Carpathian mountains are rich in jasper, opal and lapiz lazuli. The largest opal ever found, was in this collection. It weighs thirty-four ounces and looks like a condensed rainbow.

In passing the palace, we saw several persons entering the basement story under the Library, and had the curiosity to follow them. By so doing, we saw the splendid equipages of the house of Austria. There must have been near a hundred carriages and sleds, of every shape and style, from the heavy, square vehicle of the last century to the most light and elegant conveyance of the present day. One clumsy, but magnificent machine, of crimson and gold, was pointed out as being a hundred and fifty years old. The misery we witnessed in starving Bohemia, formed a striking contrast to all this splendor.

Beside the Imperial Picture Gallery, there are several belonging to princes and noblemen in Vienna, which are scarcely less valuable. The most important of these is that of Prince Liechtenstein, which we visited yesterday. We applied to the porter’s lodge for admittance to the gallery, but he refused to open it for two persons; as we did not wish a long walk for nothing, we concluded to wait for other visitors. Presently a gentleman and lady came and inquired if the gallery was open. We told him it would probably be opened now, although the porter required a larger number, and he went to ask. After a short time he returned, saying: “He will come immediately; I thought best to put the number a little higher, and so I told him there were _six_ of us!” Having little artistic knowledge of paintings, I judge of them according to the effect they produce upon me–in proportion as they gratify the innate love for the beautiful and the true. I have been therefore disappointed in some painters whose names are widely known, and surprised again to find works of great beauty by others of smaller fame. Judging by such a standard, I should say that “Cupid sleeping in the lap of Venus,” by Correggio, is the glory of this collection. The beautiful limbs of the boy-god droop in the repose of slumber, as his head rests on his mother’s knee, and there is a smile lingering around his half-parted lips, as if he was dreaming new triumphs. The face is not that of the wicked, mischief-loving child, but rather a sweet cherub, bringing a blessing to all he visits. The figure of the goddess is exquisite. Her countenance, unearthly in its loveliness, expresses the tenderness of a young mother, as she sits with one finger pressed on her rosy lip, watching his slumber. It is a picture which “stings the brain with beauty.”

The chapel of St. Augustine contains one of the best works of Canova–the monument of the Grand Duchess, Maria Christina, of Sachsen-Teschen. It is a pyramid of gray marble, twenty-eight feet high, with an opening in the side, representing the entrance to a sepulchre. A female figure personating Virtue bears in an urn to the grave, the ashes of the departed, attended by two children with torches. The figure of Compassion follows, leading an aged beggar to the tomb of his benefactor, and a little child with its hands folded. On the lower step rests a mourning Genius beside a sleeping lion, and a bas-relief on the pyramid above represents an angel carrying Christina’s image, surrounded with the emblem of eternity, to Heaven. A spirit of deep sorrow, which is touchingly portrayed in the countenance of the old man, pervades the whole group. While we looked at it, the organ breathed out a slow, mournful strain, which harmonized so fully with the expression of the figures, that we seemed to be listening to the requiem of the one they mourned. The combined effect of music and sculpture, thus united in their deep pathos, was such, that I could have sat down and wept. It was not from sadness at the death of a benevolent though unknown individual,–but the feeling of grief, of perfect, unmingled sorrow, so powerfully represented, came to the heart like an echo of its own emotion, and carried it away with irresistible influence. Travellers have described the same feeling while listening to the Miserere in the Sistine Chapel, at Rome. Canova could not have chiseled the monument without tears.

One of the most interesting objects in Vienna, is the Imperial Armory. We were admitted through tickets previously procured from the Armory Direction; as there was already one large company within, we were told to wait in the court till our turn came. Around the wall on the inside, is suspended the enormous chain which the Turks stretched across the Danube at Buda, in the year 1529, to obstruct the navigation. It has eight thousand links and is nearly a mile in length. The court is filled with cannon of all shapes and sizes, many of which were conquered from other nations. I saw a great many which were cast during the French Revolution, with the words “_Liberte! Egalite!_” upon them, and a number of others bearing the simple letter “N.”

Finally the first company came down and the forty or fifty persons who had collected during the interval, were admitted. The Armory runs around a hollow square, and must be at least a quarter of a mile in length. We were all taken into a circular hall, made entirely of weapons, to represent the four quarters of the globe. Here the crusty old guide who admitted us, rapped with his stick on the shield of an old knight who stood near, to keep silence, and then addressed us: “When I speak every one must be silent. No one can write or draw anything. No one shall touch anything, or go to look at anything else, before I have done speaking. Otherwise, they shall be taken immediately into the street again!” Thus in every hall he rapped and scolded, driving the women to one side with his stick and the men to the other, till we were nearly through, when the thought of the coming fee made him a little more polite. He had a regular set of descriptions by heart, which he went through with a great flourish, pointing particularly to the common military caps of the late Emperors of Prussia and Austria, as “treasures beyond all price to the nation!” Whereupon, the crowd of common people gazed reverently on the shabby beavers, and I verily believe, would have devoutly kissed them, had the glass covering been removed. I happened to be next to a tall, dignified young man, who looked on all this with a displeasure almost amounting to contempt. Seeing I was a foreigner, he spoke, in a low tone, bitterly of the Austrian government. “You are not then an Austrian?” I asked. “No, thank God!” was the reply: “but I have seen enough of Austrian tyranny. I am a Pole!”

The first wing contains banners used in the French Revolution, and liberty trees with the red cap; the armor of Rudolph of Hapsburg, Maximilian I., the Emperor Charles V., and the hat, sword and order of Marshal Schwarzenberg. Some of the halls represent a fortification, with walls, ditches and embankments, made of muskets and swords. A long room in the second wing contains an encampment, in which twelve or fifteen large tents are formed in like manner. Along the sides are grouped old Austrian banners, standards taken from the French, and horsetails and flags captured from the Turks. “They make a great boast,” said the Pole, “of a half dozen French colors, but let them go to the Hospital des Invalides, in Paris, and they will find _hundreds_ of the best banners of Austria!” They also exhibited the armor of a dwarf king of Bohemia and Hungary, who died, a gray-headed old man, in his twentieth year; the sword of Marlborough; the coat of Gustavus Adolphus, pierced in the