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Title: One Year Abroad

Author: Blanche Willis Howard

Release date: March 25, 2011 [eBook #35680]

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Katherine Ward and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ONE YEAR ABROAD ***

ONE YEAR ABROAD

BY

THE AUTHOR OF “ONE SUMMER.”

“O rare, rare Earth!”

“Iron is essentially the same everywhere and always, but the sulphate of iron is never the same as the carbonate of iron. Truth is invariable, but the Smithate of truth must always differ from the Brownate of truth.”—Autocrat of the Breakfast Table.

BOSTON:

JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY,

Late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood, & Co.

1878.

Copyright, 1877.

By JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO.

University Press: Welch, Bigelow, & Co., Cambridge.

CONTENTS.

HAMBURG AT A FIRST GLANCE.

HEIDELBERG IN WINTER.

A FLYING SHEET FROM PARIS.

BADEN-BADEN.

RAMBLES ABOUT STUTTGART

THE SOLITUDE.

A DAY IN THE BLACK FOREST.

THE LENNINGER THAL.

FRANCISKA VON HOHENHEIM.

“NUREMBERG THE ANCIENT.”

SOME WÜRTEMBERG TOWNS.

IN A GARDEN.

LINDAU AND BREGENZ.

THE VORARLBERG.

IN THE TYROL.

INNSBRUCK.

OHENSCHWANGAU AND NEU SCHWANSTEIN.

LIFE IN SCHATTWALD.

UP THE AIRY MOUNTAIN.

THE ENGADINE.

RAGATZ.

A FLYING TRIP TO THE RHINE FALLS.

DOWN FROM THE HIGH ALPS.

BY THE LAKE OF LUCERNE.

UP AND ON AND DOWN THE RIGI.

A KAISER FEST.

THE CANNSTADT VOLKSFEST.

IN A VINEYARD.

AMONG FREILIGRATH'S BOOKS.

THREE FUNERALS.

SOME CHRISTMAS PICTURES.

HAMBURG AGAIN.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

ONE SUMMER.

“Little Classic” style. $1.25.

“A very charming story is ‘One Summer.’ Even the word ‘charming’ hardly expresses with sufficient emphasis the pleasure we have taken in reading it; it is simply delightful, unique in method and manner, and with a peculiarly piquant flavor of humorous observation.”—Appleton's Journal.

JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO.,

Publishers, Boston.

[pg!1]

HAMBURG AT A FIRST GLANCE.

There is a wild, fantastic poem, thronged with more phantoms, goblins, and horrors than are the legends of the Blockberg. It narrates in singularly vivid style the deeds of a frightful fiend, and is, believe me, a truly remarkable work. I beg you will not scorn it because it exists only in the brain which it entered one stormy night at sea. There it reigned, triumphant, through long sleepless hours; but for certain reasons—which are, by the way, perfectly satisfactory to my own mind—it will never be committed to paper. Its title is “The Screw,”—the screw of an ocean steamer.

Christmas is the best wishing-time in the year. One can wish and wish at Christmas, and what harm does it do? So I will wish my poem all written in stately, melodious measure, yet with thoughts that would make your cheek pale, and your very soul shudder; and then—since wishing is so easy—I will wish that I were an intimate friend of Gustave Doré, to whom I would take my masterpiece to be illustrated; and I would beg him to allow his genius for drawing awful things full sway, and I would implore him not to withhold one magic touch that might suggest another horror, so that extending from the central object—the terrible Screw—there should be demons reaching for their prey, howling and laughing in fiendish glee. Then I would say, “More, more, my good M. Doré!—more hideous faces, more leering phantoms, more writhing legs and arms, please!” For perhaps Doré never crossed the ocean in bad weather; perhaps he never occupied a state-room directly over the Screw; perhaps he never experienced the sensation of lying there in sleepless, helpless, hopeless agony, clinging frantically to the side of his berth, hearing the clank of chains, the creaking of timbers, the rattling of the shrouds, the waves sweeping the deck over his head,—most of all, the Evil Screw beneath, rampant and threatening. It may be Doré does not know how it feels when that Screw rises up in wrath, takes the steamer in his teeth and shakes it, then plunges deep, deep in the waves; while all the demons, great and small, stretching their uncanny arms towards the state-rooms, shriek, “We'll get them! We'll have them!” and the winds and waves in hoarse chorus respond, “They'll have them—have them—have them!” and again uprises the Screw and shakes himself and the trembling steamer. So through the night, and many nights, alas!

And yet, O Screw! thing of evil, thing of might, I humbly thank you that you ceased at last your terrible thumps, your jarrings and wicked whirls,—and silenced your chorus of attendant demons, with their turnings and twistings and mad laughter; I thank you that you did not get us! Truly, I believed you would. I thank you that you did not choose to keep us miserable souls wandering forevermore through the shoreless deep, or to sink us, as the phantom-ship sinks in “Der Fliegender Holländer,” amid sulphurous fumes and discordant sounds, down to that lurid abyss from which you came.

Do you all at home know this legend of the Flying Dutchman? At least, do you know it as Wagner gives it to the world, in words as lovely as its melodies? The music is worth hearing, and the story well worth a little thought. But perhaps you know it already? Because, if you do, of course I shall not tell it, and in that case we need not sail off in strange crafts for the wild Norway coast, but will only steam safely up the Elbe to Hamburg.

There are travellers from the Western World who, after months of sight-seeing, return home weary and disappointed because they have never once been able to “realize that they were in Europe.” Not realize! Not know! Not feel with every fibre that one has come from the New to the Old! Why, the very lights of Hamburg gleaming through the rain and darkness, as we cold and wet voyagers at last drew near our haven, even while they gave us friendly greeting, told us unmistakably that their welcome was shining out from a strange land, from homes unlike the homes we had left behind.

Dear people who never “realize” that it is “Europe,” who never feel what you expected to feel, may one less experienced in travel than yourselves venture to tell you that it is that fatal thing, the guide-book, that weighs you down? Not total abstinence in this respect, but moderation, would I preach. Too much guide-book makes you know far too well what to do, where to go, how long to stay. It leaves nothing to imagination, to enthusiasm, to the whim of the moment. Dear guide-book people, don't know so much, don't calculate so much, don't measure and weigh and test everything! Don't speak so much to what you see, and then what you see will speak more to you. Even here in old Hamburg, the haughty free city of commerce, the rich city boasting of her noble port filled with ships from every land,—proud of her wealth, her strength, her merchants, and her warehouses,—looking well after her ducats, caring much for her dinner, plainly telling you she is of a prosaic nature, leaving tales of love and chivalry to the more romantic South,—even here the air is full of subtle intangible influences, that will move you deeply if you will but receive them. A city a thousand years old must have something to say of far-off times and of the living present, if one has ears to hear.

Stand on the heights by the river and look down on all the noble ships at anchor there. The old windmill turns lazily before you. The flag on a building near by moves softly in the breeze. The tender, hazy, late-autumn day, kind to all things, beautifies even bare trees and withered grass. A large-eyed boy, his school-books under his arm, stares curiously at you, then longingly looks at the water and the great ships. The picture has its meaning, which you may breathe in, drink in if you will, but you will never find it if you are comparing your “Appleton” with your “Baedecker,” or estimating the number of square feet in the grass-plot where you stand, or looking hard at the ugly “Sailors' Asylum” because you may be so directed, and refusing to see my pretty boy with the wistful eyes because he's not mentioned in the guide-book.

Everywhere are little stories, pictures, glimpses of other people's lives, waiting for you. The flower-girl at the street-corner holds out a bunch of violets as you pass. Pale, thinly clad, she stands there shivering in the cold November wind. On you go. The shops are large and brilliant, the people seem for a time like those in any large city. You think you might as well be in New York, when suddenly you see, walking tranquilly along, a peasant-woman in the costume of her district,—short, bright gown, bodice square and high, with full white sleeves and a red kerchief round her shoulders, and on her head the most curious object, a thing that looks like a skullcap, with a flaring black bow, as large as your two hands, at the back, from which hangs her hair in two long braids. Sometimes there is also a hat which resembles a shallow, inverted flat basket. Why it stays in place instead of wabbling about as it might reasonably be expected to do, and whether there is any hidden connection between it and that extraordinary black bow, are mysteries to me, though I peered under the edge of the basket hat of one Vierländerin with great pertinacity.

The Hamburg maid-servants also wear a prescribed costume. A casement high above you swings open and discloses a little figure standing in the narrow window. A blond head, with a white bit of a cap on it, leans out. You catch a glimpse of a great white apron, and of a neat, sensible, dark cotton gown, made with a short puffed sleeve which leaves the arm bare and free for work. You wonder why the girl looks so long up and down the busy street, and what she hopes to see. To be sure, it may be only Bridget looking for Patrick, or, worse, Bridget thinking of nothing in particular; simply idling away her time, instead of sweeping the garret. But if her name is perhaps Hannchen, and she looks from a window, narrow and high, and the morning sunshine touches her yellow braids, and she stands so still, far above the hurrying feet on the pavement, how can one help finding her more interesting, as a bit of human nature to study and enjoy, than a beflounced and beribboned Bridget at home? And when, in her simple dress, well suited to her degree, she runs about the streets on her mistress's errands, carrying many a parcel in her strong round arms, she is a pleasant thing to see, and, because she does not ape the fine lady, loses nothing when by chance she walks by the side of one in silk attire.

Ah! if one has ever groaned in spirit to see the tawny daughters of the Penobscot Indians, those dusky maidens who might, in reason, be expected to bring into a prosaic town some wildwood grace, some suggestion of the “curling smoke of wigwams,” of “the dew and damp of meadows,” selling their baskets from door to door in gowns actually cut after a recent Godey fashion-plate, much looped as to overskirt, much ruffled and puffed and shirred,—then indeed must one rejoice in the dress of the Hamburg maids, and in these sturdy country-women trudging along in their picturesque but substantial costume, to sell their fruit and vegetables in the city markets.

In the olden time the good wives of Hamburg no doubt wore such gowns. One sees now in the street called Grosse Bleichen great buildings, banks and shops, and all the evidences of busy modern life; but one shuts the eyes and sees instead groups of women in blue and red, coming out from the city walls to lay on the green grass the linen they have spun, that it may whiten in the sunshine. They spun, and wove, and bleached. They lived and died. The growing city built new walls, and took within its limits those green banks once beyond its gates. The women knew not what was to be, when their spinning was all done. Nor did the maids, whose busy feet trod the path by the river-side, dream that the Jungfernstieg, or Maiden's Path, would be the name, hundreds of years after, of the most-frequented promenade of the gay world of a great city.

Those women with the spinning-wheels, silent now so long, the young maids with their waterjars, chatting together in the early morning by the river, still speak to us, if we but listen. Though the voices of the city are so loud, we can hear quite well what they tell us; but indeed, indeed, dear friends, it is not written in the guide-book.

————

Stories everywhere, did I not say? Why, I even found one imbedded in—candy!

Listen, children, while I tell you about marzipan. The grown people need not hear, if they do not wish.

Marzipan (or St. Mark's bread—marzi panis) is the name of a dainty which is made into bonbons of every shape and size and color imaginable; all, however, having the same flavor, tasting of sugar and vanilla and rose-water and almonds, and I know not what beside. There are tiny potatoes, dark and gray, with marvellous “eyes,” that would delight your souls; there are grapes, and nuts, and large, red apples, all made from the delectable marzipan. And most particularly there are little round loaves, an inch long, perhaps, which are the original celebrated marzipan, pure and simple, the other form being modern innovations. And why Mark's bread? Because, my dears, there was once a famine in Lübeck, and tradition saith that the loaf which each poor woman took from the baker to her starving bairns grew each day smaller and smaller, until finally it was such a poor wee thing it was no more than an inch long; and on St. Mark's Day was the famine commemorated, while the shape and size of the pitiful loaves are preserved in this sweetmeat, peculiar, I believe, to North Germany. Hamburg children—bless them!—will tell you the tale of famine, and swallow the tiny loaves as merrily as though there was never a hungry child in the world.

Hamburg children! Indeed, I have reason to bless them. Shall I not always be grateful to the fate that showed to eyes weary with gazing upon wet decks, dense fog, and the listless faces of fellow-voyagers, a bright and beautiful vision? Most travellers in Hamburg visit first the Zoölogical Gardens, and then immediately after—is it to observe the contrast or the similarity between the lower animals and noble man?—the Exchange or Börse, where they look down from a gallery upon hundreds, thousands of busy men, whose voices rise in one incessant, strange, indescribable noise—hum—roar—call it what you will. Neither of these spectacles, happily, was thrust at once before me. Did I not interpret as a happy omen that my first “sight” was twenty little German children dancing?

Can I ever forget those delicious shy looks at the queer stranger who has suddenly loomed up in the midst of their festivities? And the carefully prepared speech of the small daughter of the house who with blushes and falterings, much laughter, many promptings, and several false starts, finally chirps like a bird, trying to speak English, “I am va-ry happy to zee you,” and for the feat receives the felicitations of her friends, and retires in triumph to her bonbons.

Sweetest of all was the gracious yet timid way in which each child, in making her early adieus, gave her hand to the stranger also, as an imperative courtesy.

Each little maid draws up her dainty dancing-boots heel to heel, extends for an instant her small gloved hand, speaks no word except with the shy sweet eyes, gravely inclines her head, and is gone, giving place to the next, who goes through the same solemn form.

Dear little children at home, you are as dear and sweet as these small German girls—dearer and sweeter, shall I not say?—but would you, could you, prompted only by your own good manners, march up to a corner where sits a great, big, entirely grown-up person from over the sea, and stand before her, demure and quaint and stately, and make your stiff and pretty little bows? Would you now, you tiniest ones? Really?

Yet, do you know, if you would, of your own free will, without mamma visible in the background exhorting and encouraging, you would do a graceful thing, a courteous and a kindly thing, in thus including the dread stranger within your charmed circle, and in welcoming her from your child-heart and with your child-hands. You would be telling her, all so silently, that though her home is far away, she has her place among you; that kindness and warmth and free-hearted hospitality one finds the wide world over. And your pretty heads, bending seriously before her, and your demure, absurd, sweet, pursed-up baby-mouths might conjure up visions of curly gold locks, and soft dimpled faces far off in her home country, and she would—why, children, children, I cannot say what she would do! I cannot tell all that she would think and feel. But this I know well, she would love you and your dear little, frightened, welcoming hands, and she would say, with her whole heart, as I say now,—

“Merry, merry Christmas, and ‘God bless us every one!’”

[pg!12]

HEIDELBERG IN WINTER.

“If you come to Heidelberg you will never want to go away,” says Mr. Warner in his “Saunterings.” It was in summer that he said it. He had wandered everywhere over the lovely hills. He knew this quaintest of quaint towns by heart. He had studied the beautiful ruin in the sunshine and by moonlight, and had listened amid the fragrance and warmth of a midsummer night to the music of the band in the castle grounds, and to the nightingales. I, who have only seen Heidelberg in the depth of winter, with gray skies above and snow below, echo his words again and again.

“Don't go to Heidelberg in winter. Don't think of it. It's so stupid. There is nothing there now, positively nothing. O, don't!” declared the friends in council at Hamburg. When one's friends shriek in a vehement chorus, and “O, don't!” at one, it is usually wise to listen with scrupulous attention to everything which they say, and then to do precisely what seems good in one's own eyes. I listened, I came immediately to Heidelberg in winter, and now I “never want to go away.”

And why? Indeed, it is not easy to say where the fascination of the place lies. Everybody knows how Heidelberg looks. We all have it in our photograph albums,—long, narrow, irregular, outstretched between the hills and the Neckar. And all our lives we have seen the castle imprinted upon paper-knives and upon china cups that say Friendship's Offering, in gilt letters, on the other side. But in some way the queer houses,—some of solid stone, yellow and gray, some so high, with pointed roofs, some so small, with the oddest little casements and heavy iron-barred shutters, and the inevitable bird-cage and pot of flowers in the window, quite like the pictures,—in some way these old houses seem different from the photographs. And when one passes up through steep, narrow, paved alleys lined with them, and sees bareheaded fat babies rolling about on the rough pavement, and the mothers quite unconcerned standing in the doorways, and small boys running and sliding on their feet, as our boys do, laughing hilariously and jeering, as our boys also do,—why will they?—when the smallest falls heavily and goes limping and screaming to his home,—one is filled with amazement at the half-strange, half-familiar aspect of things, and wonders if it be really one's own self walking about among the picture houses. And as to the castle, I never want to see it again on a paper-weight or a card-receiver.

There's nothing here in winter, they say. I suppose there is not much that every one would care for. It is the quietest, sleepiest place in the world. It pretends to have twenty thousand inhabitants, but, privately, I don't believe it, for it is impossible to imagine where all the people keep themselves, one meets so few.

No, there's not much here, perhaps; but certainly whatever there is has an irresistible charm for one who is neither too elegant nor too wise to saunter about the streets, gazing at everything with delicious curiosity. Blessed are they who can enjoy small things.

A solemn-looking professor passes; then a Russian lady wrapped in fur from her head to her feet. Some dark-eyed laborers stand near by talking in their soft, sweet Italian. The shops on the Haupstrasse are brilliantly tempting with their Christmas display. Poor little girls with shawls over their heads press their cold noses against the broad window-panes, and eagerly “choose” what they would like. One stands with them listening in sympathy, and in the same harmless fashion chooses carved ivory and frosted silver of rare and exquisite design for a score of friends.

Dear little boy at home,—yes, it is you whom I mean!—what would you say to an imposing phalanx of toy soldiers, headed by the emperor, the crown prince, Bismarck, and Von Moltke all riding abreast in gorgeous uniforms? That is what I “choose” for you, my dear. And did you know, by the way, that here in Germany Santa Claus doesn't come down the chimneys and fill the children's stockings, and bring the Christmas-tree, but that it is the Christ-child who comes instead, riding upon a tiny donkey, and the children put wisps of hay at their doors, that the donkey may not get hungry while the Christ-child makes his visits.

Many women walk through the streets carrying great baskets on their heads. This custom seems to some travellers an evil. The women look too much, they say, like beasts of burden. But if a washerwoman has a great basket of clothes to carry home, and prefers to balance it upon her head instead of taking it in her hands, why may she not, provided she knows how? And it is by no means an easy thing to do, as you would be willing to admit if you had walked, or tried to walk, about your room with your unabridged dictionary borne aloft in a similar manner. These women wear little flat cushions, upon which the baskets rest. Those women I have seen looked well and strong and cheerful, and walked with a firm, free step, swinging their arms with great abandon. Three such women on a street-corner engaged in a morning chat were an interesting spectacle. One carried cabbages of various hues, heaped up artistically in the form of a pyramid. The huge circumference of their baskets kept them at a somewhat ceremonious distance from one another, but they exchanged the compliments of the season in the most kindly and intimate way, and their freedom of gesticulation and beautiful unconcern as to the mountains on their heads were really edifying.

I have not as yet been grieved and exasperated by the sight of a woman harnessed to a cart. One, apparently very heavily laden, I did see drawn by a man and two stalwart sons, while the wife and mother walked behind, pushing. As she was necessarily out of sight of her liege lord, the amount of work she might do depended entirely upon her own volition, and she could push or only pretend to push, as she pleased; or even, if the wicked idea should occur to her, going up a steep hill she might quietly pull instead of push, and so ascend with ease. The whole arrangement struck me as in every respect a truly admirable and most uncommon division of family labor.

We meet of course everywhere groups of students with their dainty little canes, their caps of blue or red or gold or white, and their altogether jaunty aspect. The white-capped young men are of noble birth. Some of them wear, in addition to their white caps, ornaments of white court-plaster upon their cheeks and noses, as memorials of recent strife with some plebeian foe. To republican eyes they are no better looking than their fellows, and it may be said that few of these scholastic young gentlemen, titled or otherwise, who in knots of three or five or more, accompanied by great dogs, often blockade the extremely narrow pavement, manifest their pleasing alacrity in gallantly scattering, and in giving place aux dames as might be desired.

It has been snowing persistently of late. More snow has fallen than Heidelberg has seen in many years, and the students have indulged in unlimited sleighing. The Heidelberg sleigh is an indescribable object. Its profile, if one may so speak, looks like a huge, red, decapitated swan. It has two seats, and is dragged by two ponderous horses with measured tread and slow, while the driver clings in a marvellous way to the back of the equipage, incessantly brandishing an enormously long whip. Sometimes a long line of these sleighs is seen, in each of which are four students starting out for a pleasure-trip. The young men fold their arms and lean back in an impressive manner. Their coquettish caps are even more expressive than usual. The curious thing is, that, apart from the evidence of our senses, they seem to be dashing along with the utmost rapidity. There is something in the intrepid bearing of the students, in the vociferations and loud whip-crackings of the driver, that suggests dangerous speed. On the contrary the elephantine steeds jog stolidly on, quite unmoved by the constant din; the students continue to wear their adventurous, peril-seeking air, and the undaunted man behind valiantly cracks his whip.

The contrast between the rate at which they go and the rate at which they seem to imagine that they are going is most comical. The heart is moved with pity for the benighted young men who do not know what sleighing is, and one would like to send home for a few superior American sleighs as rewards of merit for good boys at the university.

The thing with the least warmth and Christian kindness about it in Heidelberg is the stove. There may be stoves here that have some conscientious appreciation of the grave responsibilities devolving upon them in bitter cold weather, but such have not come within the range of my observation.

My idea of a Heidelberg stove is a brown, terra-cotta, lukewarm piece of furniture, upon which one leans,—literally with nonchalance,—while listening to attacks upon American customs and manners from representatives of the Swiss and German nations. The tall white porcelain stoves which somebody calls “family monuments,” are at least agreeable to the eye. But these are neither ornamental nor wholly ugly, neither tall nor short, white nor black, hot nor cold. They have neither virtues nor vices. We feel only scorn for the hopeless incapacity of a stove that cannot at any period of its career burn our fingers. It is, as a stove, a total failure, and it makes but an indifferently good elbow-rest.

However deficient in blind adoration for our fatherland we may have been at home, it only needs a few weeks' absence from it, during which time we hear it constantly ridiculed and traduced, to make us fairly bristle with patriotism.

It is marvellous how like boastful children sensible people will sometimes talk when a chance remark has transformed a playful, friendly comparison of the customs of different nations into a war of words. Often one is reminded of the story of the two small boys, each of whom was striving manfully to sustain the honor of his family.

“We've got a sewing-machine.”

“We've got a pianner.”

“My mother's got a plaid shawl.”

“My sister's got a new bonnet.”

“We've got lightning-rods on our house.”

“We've got a mortgage on ours!”

For instance:—

“You have in America no really old stories and traditions?” said a German lady to an American.

“We are too young for such things. But what does it matter? We enjoy yours,” was the civil response.

“But,” the German continued, in a tone of commiseration, “no fairy-stories like ours of the Black Forest, no legends like ours of the Blockberg! Isn't everything very new and prosaic?”

This superiority is not to be endured. The American feels that her country's honor is impeached.

“We have no such legends,” she begins slowly, when a blessed inspiration comes to her relief, and she goes on with dignity,—“we have no such legends, to be sure; but then, you know, we have—the Indians.”

“Ah, yes; that is true,” said the German, respectfully, knowing as much of the Indians as of the inhabitants of some remote planet, while the American, trusting the vague, mysterious term will induce a change of subject, yet not knowing what may come, rapidly revolves in her mind every item of Indian lore she has ever known, from Pocahontas to Young-Man-Afraid-of-his-Horses, determined, should she be called upon to tell a wild Indian tale, to do it in a manner that will not disgrace the stars and stripes.

But I grieve to say that America is not always victorious. Our table-talk, upon whatever subject it may begin, invariably ends in a controversy, more or less earnest, about the merits of the several nations represented.

A Swiss student with strong French sympathies charges valiantly at three Germans, and having routed their entire army, heaped all manner of abuse upon Kaiser Wilhelm, reduced the crown prince to beggary, and beheaded Bismarck, suddenly turns, elated with his victory, and hurls his missiles at the American eagle.

O, how we suffer for our country!

Some sarcasm from our student neighbor calls forth from us,—

“America is the hope of the ages.”

We think this sounds well. We remember we heard a Fourth-of-July orator say it. Then it is not too long for us to attempt, with our small command of the German tongue.

“A forlorn hope that has not long to live,” quickly retorts our adversary.

He continues, contemptuously,—

“America is too raw.”

“America is young. She's a child compared with your old nations, but a promising, glorious child. Her faults are only the faults of youth,” we respond with some difficulty as to our pronouns and adjectives.

“She's a very bad child. She needs a whipping,” chuckles our saucy neighbor.

America's banner trails in the dust, and Helvetia triumphs over all foes. In silence and chagrin America's feeble champion retires to the window, watches the birds picking up bread-crumbs on the balcony, and meditates a grand revenge when her German vocabulary shall be equal to her zeal. Helvetia's son being, in this instance, a very clever, merry boy, soon laughingly sues for reconciliation, on the ground that, “after all, sister republics must not quarrel,” and the two, in noble alliance, advance with renewed vigor, and speedily sweep from the face of the earth all tyrannous monarchical governments.

Is it not, by the way, thoroughly German, that down in its last corner the Heidelberg daily paper prints each day, “Remember the poor little birds”? And indeed they are remembered well; and there are few casements here that do not open every morning, that the birdies' bread may be thrown upon the snow.

And is there nothing else here in winter beside the innocent pastimes mentioned? There are wonderful views to be gained by those who have the courage to climb the winding silvery paths that lead up the Gaisberg and Heiligenberg. And then there is—majesty comes last!—the castle.

Ah! here lies the magic of the place. This is why people love Heidelberg. It is because that wonderful old ruin is everywhere present, whatever one does, wherever one goes, binding one's heart to itself. You cannot forget that it stands there on the hill, sad and stately and superb. Lower your curtains, turn your back to the window, read the last novel if you will, still you will see it. I defy you to lose your consciousness of it. It will always haunt you, until it draws you out of the house—out into the air—through the rambling streets—up the hill past the queer little houses—to the spot where it stands, and then it will not let you go. It holds you there in a strange enchantment. You wander through chapel and banquet-hall, through prison-vault and pages' chamber, from terrace to tower, where you go as near the edge as you dare,—nearer than you dare, in fact,—and look down upon the trees growing in the moat. Because you never, in all your life, saw anything like a “ruin,” and because there is but one Heidelberg Castle in the world, you take delight in simply wandering up and down long dark stairways, with no definite end in view. You may be hungry and cold, but you never know it. You are unconscious of time, and after hours of dream-life you only turn from gazing when somebody forcibly drags you away because the man is about to close the gates.

I cannot discourse with ease upon quadrangles and façades. I am doubtful about finials, and my ideas are in confusion as to which buttresses fly and which hang; but it is a blessed fact that one need not be very learned to care for lovely things, and while I live I shall never forget how the castle looked the first time I approached it.

Some people say it is loveliest seen at sunset from the “Philosopher's Walk,” on Heiligenberg across the Neckar, and some say it is like fairy-land when it is illuminated (which happens once or twice in a summer,—the last time, before the students go away in August, and leave the old town in peace and quiet), and when one softly glides in a little boat from far up the Neckar, down, down, in the moonlight, until suddenly the castle, blazing with lights, is before you.

But though I should see it a thousand times with summer bloom around, with the charm of fair skies and sunshine, soft green hills and flowing water, or in the moonlight, with happy voices everywhere, and strains of music sounding sweet and clear in the evening air, I can never be sorry that, first of all, it rose in its beauty, before my eyes, out of a sea of new-fallen snow.

O, the silence and the whiteness of that day!

We entered the grounds and passed through broad walks, among shadowy trees whose every twig was snow-covered, and by the snow-crowned Princess Elizabeth Arch. On we went in silence,—only once did any sound break the stillness, when a little laughing child, in a sleigh drawn by a large black dog, aided by a good-natured half-breathless servant, dashed by and disappeared among the trees. Soon we stood on the terrace overlooking the city and the Neckar.

On one side was the castle, the dark mass standing out boldly against the whiteness,—on the other, far below, the city, its steep, high roofs snow-white, its three church-spires rising towards cold, gray skies; beyond, the frozen Neckar, then Heiligenberg, its white vineyards contrasting with the dusky fir-forests, and, far away as one could see, the great plain of the Rhine, with the line of the Haardt Mountains barely perceptible in the distance and the dim light. All was so white and still! Only the brave ivy, glossy and green and fresh on the old walls and amid this frozen nature, spoke of life and hope. All else told of sadness, and of peace it may be, but of the peace that follows renunciation.

But to stand on the height—to look so far—to be in that white, holy stillness! It was wonderful. It was too beautiful for words.

[pg!24]

A FLYING SHEET FROM PARIS.

Is it in “The Parisians” that the soldier carries a bouquet on his musket, and it is said that Paris, though starving, must have flowers? These sweet spring days, when vast crowds of people are wandering about amusing themselves, and children are making daisy chains in the parks, and men pass along the streets with great branches of lilac blossoms or masses of rosebuds, which are sold at every corner, and skies are blue, and the lovely sunshine everywhere is falling upon happy-looking faces, you feel like blessing not only the spring-time, but beautiful Paris and the temperament of the French. “St. Denis caught a sunbeam flying, and he tied it with a bright knot of ribbons, and he flashed it on the earth as the people of France; only, alas, he made two mistakes,—he gave it no ballast, and he dyed the ribbons blood-red.” You think of the want of ballast and the blood-red tinge when you look at the ruined Tuileries, and see every now and then other traces of the Commune. In our dining-room is a great mirror with a hole in its centre and long seams running to its corners. Madame keeps it as a memento of those terrible times, and of her anxiety and terror when balls were coming in her doors and windows, and she would not on any account have it removed. But, after all, it is the flying sunbeams of the present that most impress you. They are more vivid, being actually before your eyes, than scenes of riot and madness, which you can only imagine. The life about you is altogether so fascinating, so cheering. You catch the spirit that seems to animate the people. Where all is so sunny and gay why should you grieve? Have you little troubles? Leave them behind and go out into the sweet sunshine, and they will grow so insignificant you will be ashamed to remember how you were brooding over them; and then, if they are really great, they will pass; everything passes. Only take to-day to your heart the loveliness that is waiting for you, for indeed there is something in it that makes you not only happy for the time, but brave and hopeful for the future. All of which is the little sermon that Paris preaches to us all day long. Perhaps we didn't come to Paris for sermons especially, but after all it is often the unexpected ones that are the best.

How shall I tell what we have seen and heard here? One day we visited the Pantheon, and, having seen what there was to see below, we went up to the dome, which affords a magnificent view of all Paris and the surrounding country. A party of school-girls ascended the long, narrow, winding flights at the same time, and they were entirely absorbed in counting the stairs. The one in advance clearly proclaimed the number; the others verified her account. The interest was intense. Occasionally we would come to a platform where at first it would seem that there was nothing more to conquer. Breathless, panting, flushed, the young girls would look searchingly around, then, with a shriek of delight, would plunge into a dark corner and open a door, from which another crazy-looking stairway led up to other heights. Their chaperon, who looked as if she might be the principal of a school, gave up in despair before we were half-way up, and, seating herself to await their return, cast amused, kindly glances after the retreating forms of the undaunted girls. I take pleasure in stating the important and interesting fact that the number of steps from the ground to the “Lanterne” above the dome of the Pantheon is five hundred and twenty, and you can't possibly go higher unless you should choose to ascend a rope which is used when on grand occasions they illuminate the dome and burn a brilliant light on the very tiptop. So said a little abbé who looked like a mere boy, and who courteously told us many interesting things as we stood there, a group of strangers scanning one another with mild curiosity,—two well-bred Belgian boys with the abbé, some ultra-fashionable dames, a party of Englishmen of course, and ourselves. The school-girls fortunately went down without seeing the rope. Had they observed it, and known that it was possible by any means whatever to go higher than they had gone, they would have been miserable, unless indeed their aspiring spirit had led them in some way to ascend it.

With the paintings and sculpture at the Louvre and the Luxembourg we have spent several happy days, only wishing the days might be months. Don't expect me to tell you what delighted us most, or how great pictures seemed which we had before seen only in engravings or photographs. They burst gloriously all at once upon our ignorant eyes, and we wanted to sit days and days before one picture that held us entranced, and yet our time was so limited we had to pass on and on regretfully. Of course some one was there to whisper in our ears, “O, this is nothing! You must go to Italy.” Certainly we must go to Italy, but the thought of the beauty awaiting there could not detract from that which was around us. Before some of the paintings we felt like standing afar off and worshipping. There were Madonnas with insipid faces which we did not appreciate. There were other pictures which we coldly admired; they were wonderful, but we did not want to own them,—did not love them. Among those which we longed to seize and carry away is the “Cupid and Psyche” of Gerard, in which Psyche receiving the first kiss of love is an exquisitely innocent, fair-haired little maiden, not so very unlike the friend to whom we would like to send it.

There are always curious people in the galleries. Sit down and rest a minute and something funny is sure to happen.

“See this chaw-ming thing of Murillo,” says a florid youth of nineteen or twenty, with very tight gloves, an elaborate necktie, and, alas! an unquestionably American air, as he marshals a timid-looking group,—his mother and sisters, perhaps. “Quite well done, now, isn't it?” And on he went. If he knew a Perugino from a Vandyck his countenance did him great injustice. Then another party comes along,—conscientious, ponderous, English,—and halts with precision. One of them reads, in a loud voice, from a book—“Titian—Portrait—462”—and they stare blankly at the picture before them, which happens to be not a Titian at all, but a “Meadow Scene, with Cows,” by Cuyp, or a great battle-piece of Salvator Rosa. When they discover their mistake and recover from their astonishment, they pass on in search of the missing Titian. We smiled at this, but, as the pictures are not hung according to the order given in catalogues, we knew very well that it was our good fortune, and not our merit or our wisdom, that kept us from similar mistakes. What might we not have done had we not been so beautifully guarded against all blundering by our escort, a French gentleman of rare culture,—both an amateur painter and sculptor,—and an intimate friend of some of the most distinguished French artists! With him for a companion we felt superior to all catalogues and treatises upon art. We have had the pleasure, too, of visiting his private museum and studio, where are strange relics collected in a life of unusual travel and adventure. He is a retired colonel of the French army, and when in service has lived in Egypt, Turkey, Persia, Greece, and now his little room, which we climbed six flights of stairs to reach, is crowded with mementos of his wanderings. I despair of conveying any idea of what he has hung upon his walls. It would almost be easier to tell what he has not. Persian pictures, stone emblems, fans, rosaries, swords, mosaics, pistols, queer chains and pipes, as well as some very valuable paintings,—a Vandyck, an Andrea del Sarto, a number of the modern French school, presented to him by the artists. Was it not a privilege to have such a guide when we visited the Paris lions? He took us to the Musée de Cluny, among other exceedingly interesting places, where we saw hosts of antiquities,—beautifully carved mantels, magnificent fireplaces, “big enough to roast a whole ox” (and they really use them, winters, too—the noble great logs were all ready to be lighted), rare old windows of stained glass, rich robes of high church dignitaries, porcelain, jewelled crowns of Gothic kings, old lace and tapestries, and carved wood that it did one's heart good to see. Girls with tied-back dresses, and hats fairly crushed by the weight of the masses of flowers with which French milliners persist in loading us this spring, did look so painfully modern in those mediæval rooms! We began to feel as if we were walking about in one of the Waverley novels, and fully expected to meet Ivanhoe clad in complete armor on the stone staircase that leads down from the chapel.

There were many things over which we found it impossible to be enthusiastic,—the jawbone of Molière, for example, in a glass case. It probably looks like less distinguished jawbones, but if his whole skeleton had been there I fear we should have been no more impressed. Chessmen of rock crystal and gold we coveted, and we liked the room in which are the great, ponderous, gilded state coaches of some century long ago, with their whips, harnesses, and comical postilion boots. There is a little sleigh or sledge there, said to have been Marie Antoinette's,—a small gold dragon, whose wing flies open to admit the one person whom the tiny equipage can seat. It looked as if it must have been pushed by some one behind. Fancy a gold dragon with fiery-red eyes and a wide-open red mouth coming towards you over the snow!

This whole building is full of interest from its age and historical associations. It was built in the fifteenth century, has been in the hands of comedians, of a sisterhood; Marat held his horrible meetings here; Mary of England lived here after the death of her husband, Louis XII., and you can still see the chamber of the “White Queen,” with its ivory cabinets, vases, and queer old musical instruments. Visitors are requested not to touch anything, but we couldn't resist the temptation of striking just one chord on a spinet. Such a cracked voice the poor thing had! It sounded so dead and ghostlike and dreary, we hurried away as fast as we could. Don't be alarmed, and think I am going to write up all the history of the place. I haven't the least idea of doing such a thing; only this I can tell you,—the Hôtel de Cluny affords an excellent opportunity to test your knowledge of history; and if you ever stand where we did, and send your thoughts wandering among past ages, may your dates be more satisfactory than were ours!

The ruins of an old Roman palace, of which only a portion of the baths remain, adjoin the museum. There is a great room, sixty feet long, all of stone, and very high, which was used for the cold baths. The other baths are all gone, but if you imagine hot and warm and tepid ones as large as the cold, it certainly gives you a profound admiration for the magnitude of the ancient bath system. If Julian the Apostate, who built the palace, they say, could see us as we go peering curiously about, asking what this and that mean, and the names of stone things that were probably as common in his day as sewing-machines are now, wouldn't he laugh? We looked over the shoulder of a painter who was making a delightful little picture of a part of the ruins, the stone pavement and staircase, then a beautiful arch through which we could look into the open air, and see the warm sunshine, the great lilac-bushes, and a tall old ivy-covered wall beyond. The contrast between the cold gray interior and the bright outer world was very effective.

Strange old place where Cæsars have lived, and through which early kings of France and fierce Normans have swept, plundering and ruining, and where, to-day, by the fragments of the massive ivy-covered walls and under the trees in the pleasant park, happy little children play, and nurses chatter, and life is strong, and fresh and warm, even while we are thinking of the dead past!

[pg!32]

BADEN-BADEN.

Baden is a little paradise. It seems like a garden with the freshness of May on every flower and leaf. The long lines of chestnut-trees are rich with bright, pink blossoms,—solid pink, not pink-and-white like ours at home. You walk beneath them through shady avenues, where the young grass is like velvet, and every imaginable shade of refreshing green lies before your eyes. There is the tender May-leaf green of the shrubs, another of the soft lawns, that of the different trees, of the more distant hill-slopes, and, beyond all, the deepest intensified green of the Black Forest rising nobly everywhere around. A hideous little bright-green cottage, prominent on one of the hills, irritates us considerably, not harmonizing with its deep background of pines, and we long at first to ruthlessly erase it from the picture; but finally remembering the ugly little thing is actually somebody's home, our better nature triumphs, and we feel we can allow it to remain, and can only hope the dwellers within think it prettier than we do.

There are already many visitors here, though it is as yet too early and cool for the great throng of strangers to be expected, and the vast numbers of people come no more who used to frequent the place before the gaming was abolished by the emperor a few years ago, through Bismarck's especial exertions, it is said; from which it is to be inferred that Baden's pure loveliness is less attractive to the world at large than the fascination of the gaming-tables. We hear everywhere around regrets for the lost charm, for the gayety, excitement, brilliancy; and it is impossible to avoid wishing, not certainly that play were not abolished, but at least that we could have come when it was at its height to see for ourselves the strange phases of humanity that were here exhibited, and just how naughty it all was. Now the waiters shake their heads mournfully, as if a glory and a grace were departed, and say, “No, it isn't what it used to be,—nothing like it!” and there seems to be a “banquet-hall-deserted” atmosphere pervading the rooms in the Conversation House. To be sure there is music there evenings, and a fashionable assembly walking about; and there is music, too, in the kiosk, and a goodly number of gay people chatting, eating, and drinking at the little tables in the open air; and people gather in the early mornings to drink the waters, as they always have done, but, after all, the tribute of a memory and a regret seems to be universally paid to the vanquished god of play, who is helping poor mortals cheat somewhere else.

The Empress of Germany is here, and, after long-continued effort, we have seen her. How madly we have striven to accomplish this feat; how we have questioned servants and shopkeepers; how we have haunted the Lichtenthal Allee, that long, lovely, shady walk where her Majesty is said to promenade regularly every day; how often we have had our garments, but not our ardor, dampened for her sake; how she would never come; and how finally, in desperation, we seated ourselves at a table under a tree near her hotel, devoured eagerly with our eyes all its windows, saw imperial dogs and imperial handmaidens in the garden, and couriers galloping away with despatches, saw the coachmen and footmen and retainers, but for a long time no empress,—all this shall never be revealed, because self-respect imposes strict silence in regard to such conduct.

We must have looked somewhat like a picture in an old Harper's Magazine where two hungry newsboys stand by the area railing as dinner is served, and when the different dishes are carried past the windows one regales himself with the savory scents, while the other says something to this effect: “I don't mind the meats, but just tell me when the pudding comes and I'll take a sniff.”

“Augusta, please, dear Augusta, come out!” entreated we; but she came not. When a carriage rolled round to the door, we were in ecstasies of expectation, convinced she was going out to drive, but instead came a gentleman, servants, and travelling-bags.

“Why, it's Weimar,—our Weimar!” said we with pride and ownership, because you see the Prince of Weimar lives in Stuttgart, and so do we. And as he drives off, out on the balcony among the plants comes her imperial Majesty and waves her handkerchief to her brother in farewell. She wore a black dress, a white head-dress or breakfast-cap, looked like her photographs, and must once have been beautiful. She is an intensely proud woman, it is said, and a rigid upholder of etiquette, and tales are told of slight differences between her and the crown princess on this account.

Baden is one of the enticing places of the earth,—is so lovely that whenever, however, wherever you may look, you always spy some fresh beauty, and the Black Forest legends are hanging all about it, investing it with an endless charm. You can see in the frescoed panels on the front of the new Trinkhalle a picture illustrating some old story of a place near by, and then for your next day's amusement can go to the identical spot where the ghost or demon or goblin used to be.

To Yburg, whose young knight met the beautiful, unearthly maiden by the old heathen temple in the full moonshine, as he was returning from the castle of his lady-love to his own, and who transferred his affections—as adroitly as our young knights do the same thing nowadays—from her to the misty figure, and met the latter, night after night, was watched by his faithful servant, and was found dead on the ground one bright morning.

Or to Lauf, where the ghost-wedding was, or almost was, but not quite, because the knight who was to be married to the very attractive ghost of a young woman grew so frightened when he saw all the glassy eyes of the ghostly witnesses staring at him that he couldn't say yes when the sepulchral voice of the ghost of a bishop asked him if he would have this woman to his wedded wife; and all the ghosts were deeply offended and made a great uproar, and the knight fell down as if dead, and he too was found lying on the ground in the morning; but him, I believe, they were able to revive.

And you can go to the Convent of Lichtenthal, from which the nuns, upon the approach of the enemy, in 1689 fled in terror, leaving their keys in the keeping of the Virgin Mary, who came down from her picture and stood in the doorway, so that the French soldiers shrank back aghast, and all was left unharmed.

We went there, and saw a number of Marys in blue and red gowns, but could not quite tell which was the one who came down from her frame to guard the convent.

In the chapel eight or ten children mumbled their prayers in unison, while we stood far behind, examining the old stained-glass windows, with the peculiar blue tint in them that cannot now be reproduced, and the queer old stone knights in effigy; and I don't imagine the Lord heard the children any the less because they were very absurd, and bobbed about in every direction, and constantly turned one laughing face quickly round to look at us, then back again, then another and another, while all the time the praying went mechanically on. There was a little girl, nine years old perhaps, who came to meet us by the old well here, and stood smiling at us with great, brown, expressive eyes. Her face was so brilliant and sweet we were charmed with her; but when we spoke she upturned that rare little face of hers and answered not a word. I took her hand in mine, but before she gave it she kissed it, and to each of the party, who afterwards took her hand, she gave the same graceful greeting. Not an airy kiss thrown at one, after the fashion of children in general, but a quiet little one deposited upon her hand before it was honored by the touch of the stranger. The pretty action, together with the exquisite face, calm and clear as a cherub, and ideally childlike, made a deep impression on us; and in some way, what we afterwards learned—that she was completely deaf and dumb—did not occur to us. We thought that she would not speak, not that she could not.

On a height overlooking the town stands a memorial chapel, built in antique style, of alternate strata of red and white sandstone, by which a very lively effect is produced. It has a gilded dome and a portico supported by four Ionic pillars. In the interior are frescos of the twelve apostles; and upon the high gold partition or screen, which separates the choir from the body of the chapel, are painted scenes from the New Testament. The floor is of marble in two colors.

We visited it fortunately during service, and saw for the first time the Greek ritual. The singing was fine, the boys' voices sweet and clear, but many of the forms unintelligible to a stranger. For instance, we could only imagine what was meant when one priest in scarlet and gold would go behind a golden door and lock it, and another one would stand before it intoning the strangest words in the strangest sing-song, until at last they would open the door and let him in. The service in the Greek churches is either in the Greek or old Sclavonic language. Here we inferred that we were listening to the old Sclavonic, as the chapel belongs to a Roumanian prince; but only this can we say positively,—that two words (Alleluia and Amen) were absolutely all that we understood.

The robes were rich; incense was burned; there were a few worshippers, all standing, the Greek Church allowing no seats; but in some places crutches are used to lean upon when the service is long, as on great festal days. There are no sermons except on special occasions, the ordinary ritual consisting of chants between the deacons and chorister boys, readings from certain portions of the Scripture, prayers, legends, the creed, etc. They all turn towards the east during prayer, and instrumental music is forbidden.

In this little chapel the morning service which we witnessed was brief, and, of its kind, simple. We noticed particularly among the worshippers one old gentleman who seemed to be very devout. He crossed himself frequently,—by the way, not as Roman Catholics do,—and at certain times knelt, and even actually prostrated himself, upon the marble pavement. He was a fine old man, and looked like a Russian. He was earnest and attentive, but he made us all exceedingly nervous, for his boots were stiff and his limbs far from supple, and when he went down we feared he never would be able to come up again without assistance; and we were incessantly and painfully on the alert, prepared to help him recover his equilibrium should he entirely lose it, which often seemed more than probable. This was a Roumanian prince, Stourdza,—who lives winters in Paris and summers in Baden,—and who erected the chapel in memory of his son, who died at seventeen in Paris from excessive study. A statue of the boy, bearing the name of the sculptor, Rinaldo Rinaldi, Roma, 1866,—life-size, on a high pedestal,—is on one side of the interior. He sits by a table covered with books,—Bossuet, Greek, and Latin,—while an angel standing beside him rests one hand on his shoulder, and with the other beckons him away from his work. His Virgil lies open to the lines,—

“Si qua fata aspera rumpas

Tu Marcellus eris.”

If the boy was in reality so beautiful as the marble and as the portrait of him which hangs at the left of the entrance, he must have looked as lofty and tender and pure as an archangel.

Opposite him are the statues of the father and mother, who are yet living, and between them a symbolical figure,—Faith, I presume. A curtain conceals this group, beneath which the parents will one day lie.

Paintings of them also hang by the entrance, with a portrait of the boy and one of the sister, “Chère consolation de ses parents,” as she is called. The faces are all fine, but that of the young student the noblest, and the statue of the lovely boy called away from his books seemed a happy way of telling his brief story. In the vaults below where he lies are always fresh flowers, and a light continually burning.

It is impossible to enumerate all the sights in and about Baden. If it is any satisfaction to you, you can look at the villas of the great as much as you please; but to know that Queen Victoria lived here, and Clara Schumann there, and yonder is the Turgenieff Villa, with extensive grounds, does not seem productive of any especial enjoyment. It is much more exhilarating to leave the haunts of men and walk off briskly through the woods to some golden milestone of the past,—the old Jäger Haus, for instance, whose windows look upon a wide, rich prospect, and where the holy Hubartus, the patron of the chase, is painted on the ceiling, with the stag bearing the crucifix upon his antlers; and within whose octagonal walls there must have been much revelry by night in the good old times.

To the old castle where the Markgrafen of Hohenbaden—the border lords—used to live we went one day, and anything funnier than that particular combination of the romantic and ridiculous never was known. Riding “in the boyhood of the year” through lovely woods, by mosses mixed with violet, hearing the song of birds, breathing the purest, balmiest air, who could help wondering if Launcelot and Guinevere themselves found lovelier forest deeps; and who could help feeling very sentimental indeed, and quoting all available poetry, and imagining long trains of stately knights riding over the same path, and so on ad infinitum! While indulging these romantic fancies we discovered that our donkey also was often lost in similar reveries, from which he was recalled by the donkey-boy, who by a sudden blow would cause him to madly plunge, then to stop short and exhibit all the peculiarly pleasing donkey tricks which we had read about, but never before experienced. And to ride a very small and wicked donkey and to read about it are two altogether different things, let me assure you.

Three donkeys galloping like mad up a mountain, three persons bouncing, jolting, shrieking with laughter, a jolly boy running behind with a long stick,—such was the experience that effectually dispelled our fine fancies.

The view at the castle is far extended and beautiful; you see something of the Rhine in the distance, the little Oosbach, and the peaceful valley between. Baden scenery, from whatever point you look at it, has the same friendly, serene aspect,—little villages dotted here and there on the soft hill-slopes, and in the background the bold, beautiful line of the pine-covered mountains. The castle must have been once a fine, grand place. Those clever old feudal fellows knew well where to build their nests, and like eagles chose bold, wild heights for their rocky eyries. “Heir liegen sie die stolzen Fürstentrümer,” quoted a German, wandering about the ruins.

Up to the Yburg Castle we went also; and the “up” should be italicized, for the mountain seemed as high and steep as the Hill of Science, and we felt that the summit of one was as unattainable as that of the other. But the woods were beautiful, and their whisperings and murmurings and words were not in a strange language, for the tall dark pines sang the selfsame song that they sing in the dear old New England woods, the wildflowers and birds were a constant delight, the air fresh and cool, and at last we reached the top, and found another castle and another view.

Here there was little castle and much view. Really a magnificent prospect, but so fierce and chilling a wind that we could with difficulty remain long enough on the old turrets to fix the landscape in our memory, and we were glad to seek shelter in the little house, where a man and his wife live all the year round; and frightfully cold and lonely must it be there in winter, when even in May our teeth were chattering gayly.

The visitors' book there was rather amusing.

One American girl writes, with her name and the date,—

“No moon to-night, which is of course

The driver's fault, not ours.”

“Mr. H. C.”—Black, we will call him—“walked up from Baden the 10th of August, 1875”; and half the people who go to Yburg walk. As we had walked and never dreamed of being elated by our prowess, Mr. Black's manner of chronicling his feat seemed comical.

You look down from the mountain into the Affenthaler Valley, where the wine of that name “grows.” It is a good, light wine, and healthful, but a young person—we decided she must be a countrywoman, because she expresses her opinion so freely—writes in regard to it,—

“Affenthaler. The drink sold under that honorable name at this restaurant is the beastliest and most poisonous of drinks, not absolutely undrinkable or immediately destructive of life. Traveller, take care. Avoid the abominable stuff. Beware!”

Immediately following, in German, with the gentleman's name and address, is,—

“I have drunk of the Affenthaler which this unknown English person condemns, and pronounce it a good and excellent wine.”

That Yburg by moonlight might be conducive to softness can easily be imagined. Here is a sweet couplet:—

“Let our eyes meet, and you will see

That I love you and you love me.”

But best of all in its simplicity and strength was “Agnes Mary Taylor, widow,” written clearly in ink, and some wag had underscored in pencil the last expressive word.

Does the lady go over the hill and dale signing her name always in this way? On the Yburg mountain-top it had the effect of a great and memorable saying, like “Veni, vidi, vici,” or “Après nous le déluge.” Agnes Mary Taylor, widow. Could anything be more terse, more deliciously suggestive?

[pg!44]

RAMBLES ABOUT STUTTGART

This letter is going to be about nothing in particular. I make this statement with an amiable desire to please, for so much advice in regard to subjects comes to me, and so many subjects previously chosen have failed to produce, among intimate friends, the pleasurable emotions which I had ingenuously designed, there remains to me now merely the modest hope that a rambling letter about things in general may be read with patience by at least one charitable soul. Bless our intimate friends! What would we do without them? But aren't they perplexing creatures, take them all in all! “Don't write any more about peasant-girls and common things,” says one. “Tell us about the grand people,—how they look, what they wear, and more about the king.” Anxious to comply with the request, I try to recollect how the Countess von Poppendoppenheimer's spring suit was made in order to send home a fine Jenkinsy letter about it, when another friend writes, “The simplest things are always best,—the flower-girl at the corner, the ways of the peasants, ordinary, every-day matters.” Have patience, friends. You shall both be heard. The Countess von Poppendoppenheimer's gown has meagre, uncomfortable sleeves, is boned down and tied back like yours and mine, after this present wretched fashion which some deluded writer says “recalls the grace and easy symmetry of ancient Greece”; but if he should try to climb a mountain in the overskirt of the period he would express himself differently.

As to the king, one sees him every day in the streets, where he courteously responds to the greetings of the people. He must be weary enough of incessantly taking off his hat. The younger brother of Queen Olga and of the Emperor of Russia, the Grand Duke Michael, came here the other day. Seeing a long line of empty carriages and the royal coachmen in the scarlet and gold liveries that betoken a particular occasion,—blue being the every-day color,—we followed the illustrious vehicles, curious to know what was going to happen, and saw a gentlemanly-looking blond man, in a travelling suit, welcomed at the station by different members of the court; while all those pleasing objects, the scarlet and gold men, took off their hats. For the sake of the friend who delights in glimpses of “high life,” I regret that I have not the honor to know what was said on this occasion, our party having been at a little distance, and behind a rope with the rest of the masses.

But really the common people are better studies. You can stop peasants in the street and ask them questions, and you can't kings, you know. Peasants just now can be seen to great advantage at the spring fair, which with its numberless booths and tables extends through several squares, and to a stranger is an interesting and curious sight. This portion of the city, where the marketplace, the Schiller Platz, and the Stiftskirche are, has an old, quaint effect, the Stiftskirche and the old palace being among the few important buildings older than the present century, while the rest of Stuttgart is fresh and modern. From the high tower of this old church one has the best possible view of Stuttgart, and can see how snugly the city lies in a sort of amphitheatre, while the picturesque hills covered with woods and vineyards surround it on every side. One sees the avenues of chestnut-trees, the Königsbau, a fine, striking building with an Ionic colonnade, the old palace and the new one, and the Anlagen stretching away green and lovely towards Cannstadt. On this tower a choral is played with wind instruments at morn and sunset, and sometimes a pious old man passing stops to listen and takes off his hat as he waits.

In the little octagonal house up there lives a prosperous family, a man, his wife, and ten children. The woman, a fresh, buxom, brown-eyed goodwife, told us she descended to the lower world hardly once in three or four weeks, but the children didn't mind the distance at all, and often ran up and down twelve or fifteen times a day. How terrific must be the shoe-bill of this family! Ten pairs of feet continuously running up and down nearly two hundred and sixty stone steps! She was kind enough to show us all her penates,—even her husband asleep,—and everything was homelike and cheery up there, boxes of green things growing in the sunshine, clothes hanging out to dry, canary-birds singing.

There is a small silver bell—perhaps a foot and a half in diameter at the mouth—at one side of the tower, and it is rung every night at nine o'clock and twelve, and has been since 1348. It has a history so long and so full of mediæval horrors, like many other old stories in which Würtemberg is rich, that it would be hardly fitting to relate it in toto, but the main incidents are interesting and can be briefly given.

On the Bopsa Hill where now we walk in the lovely woods, and from which the Bopsa Spring flows, bringing Stuttgart its most drinkable water, stood, once upon a time,—in the fourteenth century, to be exact,—a certain Schloss Weissenburg, about which many strange things are told. The Weissenburgs conducted themselves at times in a manner which would appear somewhat erratic to our modern ideas.

At the baptism of an infant daughter, Papa von Weissenburg was killed by the falling of some huge stag-antlers upon his head. We are glad to read about the baptism, for later there doesn't seem to have been a strong religious element in the family. Shortly afterwards Rudolph, the eldest son, was stabbed by a friend through jealousy because young Von Weissenburg had won the affections of the fair dame of whom both youths were enamored. Then followed strife between the surviving brother and the monks of St. Leonhard, who would not allow the murdered man to be buried in holy ground, the poor boy having had no time to gasp out his confession and partake of the sacrament, and they even refused to bury him at all. Hans von Weissenburg swore terrible oaths by his doublet and his beard, and cursed the monks till the air was blue, and came with his friends and followers and buried his brother twelve feet deep directly in front of St. Leonhard's Chapel (there is a St. Leonhard's Church here now on the site of the old chapel), and forbade the monks to move or insult the body. Later, when they wished to use the land for a churchyard, they were in a great dilemma. Rudolph's bones they dared not move and would not bless; at last, what did they do but consecrate the earth only five feet deep, so the blessing would not reach Rudolph, who lay seven feet deeper still,—and they also insulted the grave by building over it. Hans, on this account, slew a monk, and was in turn killed because he had murdered a holy man, and that was the end of him.

There remained in the castle on the hill Mamma von Weissenburg, or rather Von Somebodyelse, now, for she had wept her woman's tears and married again. When the infant daughter, Ulrike Margarethe, whose baptism has been mentioned, had grown to be a beautiful young woman, the mother suddenly disappeared and never was seen again. The daughter publicly mourned, ordered a beacon-light to be kept continually burning at the castle, gathered together all her silver chains and ornaments, and had them melted into a bell, which was hung on the castle tower, and which she herself always rang at nine in the evening and at midnight, for the sorrowing Ulrike said her beloved mother might be wandering in the dense woods, and hearing the bell might be guided by it to her home.

Ulrike was a pious person. She said her prayers regularly, went about doing good among poor sick people, never failed to ring the bell twice every night, and was always mourning for her mother. When at last she died, she gave orders that the bell should always be rung, as in her lifetime, from the castle; and in case the latter should be disturbed, or unsafe, the bell was to be transferred to the highest tower in Stuttgart. So Ulrike the Good bequeathed large sums of silver to pay for the fulfilment of her wishes, and died. Accordingly the little bell was brought, in time of public disturbance, to the small tower on the Stiftskirche in 1377, the higher one not then existing, and in 1531 was moved to its present position.

The next important item in the bell-story is that in 1598 the Princess Sybilla, daughter of Duke Friedrich I. of Suabia, was lost in the woods, and, hearing the bell ring at nine, followed the sound to the Stiftskirche, and in her gratitude she also endowed the bell largely, declaring it must ring at the appointed hours through all coming time.

So the little bell pealed out for many years,—just as it does this day,—until one night, two days after Easter, 1707, and three centuries and a half after the death of the exemplary Ulrike, it happened, in the course of human events, that the man whose office it was to ring the midnight bell was sleepy and five minutes late. Suddenly a woman's figure draped in black, with jet-black hair and face as white as paper, appeared before him, and asked him why he did not do his duty. He rang his bell, then conversed with the ghost, who was Ulrike von Weissenburg, and obtained from her valuable information. She must ever watch the bell, she said, and see that it was rung at the exact hours; and she it was who carried the light that confused travellers and led them to destruction near the ruins of Weissenburg Castle; and she was altogether a most unpleasant ghost, who could never rest while one stone of the castle remained upon another.

This was her condemnation for her evil deeds. She had murdered her mother, for certain ugly reasons which in the old chronicle are explicitly set forth, and she had stabbed her two young sons of whose existence the world had never known; and her career was altogether as wicked as wicked could be; but this Ulrike, like many another clever sinner, never lost her saintly aspect before the world.

They granted her rest at last by pulling down the remaining stones of the castle, and giving them to the wine-growers near by for foundations for the vineyards; so now no ghost appears to rebuke the bellringer when too much beer prolongs his sleep. Bones were found beneath the castle where Ulrike said she had hidden the bodies of her mother and children, thus clearly proving, of course, the truth of the tale. It is the most natural thing in the world to believe in ghosts when you read old Suabian stories. The Von Weissenburgs seem to have been, for the age in which they lived, a very quiet, orderly, high-toned family.

Now how do I know but that somebody will at once write, “I don't like stories about silver bells,” which will be very mortifying indeed, as it is evident I consider this a good story, or I should not take the trouble to relate it.

O, come over, friends, and write the letters yourselves, and then you will see how it is! Worst of all is it when we write of what strikes us as comic precisely as we mention a comic thing at home, or of mighty potentates, giving information obtained exclusively from German friends, and other German friends are then displeased. But is it worth while to resent the utterance of opinions that do not claim to be the infallible truth of ages, but only the hasty record of fleeting impressions? Peace, good people; let us have no savage criticism or shedding of blood, though we do chatter lightly of majestäte, saying merely what his subjects have told us.

We are all apt to be too sensitive about our own lands and their customs. Yet have we not learned to smile quietly when we are told that American gentlemen sit in drawing-rooms, in the presence of ladies, with their feet on the mantels; that American wives have their husbands “under the pantoffel” (would that more of them had); that America has no schools, no colleges, no manners; that American girls are, in general, examples of total depravity; that pickpockets and murderers go unmolested about our streets, seeking whom they may devour; that we have no law, no order, no morality, no art, no poetry, no past, no anything desirable? What can one do but smile? Smile, then, in turn, you loyal ones, when I have the bad taste to call ugly what you are willing to swear is beautiful as a dream. Thoughts are free, and so are pens; and both must run on as they will.

Let me, therefore, hurt no one's feelings if I say that Stuttgart in winter, with little sunshine, a dreary climate, and a peculiar, disagreeable, deep mud in the streets, does not at first impress a stranger as an especially attractive place. But now, with its long lines of noble chestnut-trees in full blossom; with the pretty Schloss Platz and the Anlagen, where fountains are playing and great blue masses of forget-me-nots and purple pansies and many choice flowers delight your eyes; with the shady walks in the park, where you meet a dreamer with his book, or a group of young men on horseback, or pretty children by the lake feeding the swans and ducks; with the lovely air of spring, full of music, full of fragrance; and, best of all, with the beauty of the surrounding country,—he would indeed be critical who would not find in Stuttgart a fascinating spot.

There is music everywhere, there are flowers everywhere. Your landlady hangs a wreath of laurel and ivy upon your door to welcome you home from a little journey, and brings you back, when she goes to market, great bunches of sweetness,—rosebuds and lilies of the valley. You climb the hills and come home laden with forget-me-nots,—big beauties, such as we never see at home,—violets, and anemones. It has been a cold spring here until now, but the flowers have been brave enough to appear as usual, and, wandering about among the distracting things with hands and baskets as full as they will hold, a picture of days long ago darts suddenly before me,—two school-girls, their Virgils under their arms, rubber boots on their feet, stumbling through bleak, wet Maine pasture-lands, bearing spring in their hearts, but searching for it in vain in the outer world around them. The other girl will rejoice to know that here I have found spring in its true presence.

And then there is May wine! Do you know what it is, and how to make it? You must walk several miles by a winding path along the bank of the Neckar. You must see the crucifixes by the wayside, and the three great blocks of stone,—two upright and one placed across them,—making a kind of high table, for the convenience of the peasant-women, who can stand here, remove from their heads their heavy baskets, rest, and replace them without assistance. You must peep into the tiniest of chapels, resplendent with banners of red and gold and a profusion of fresh flowers, all ready for the morning, which will be a high feast-day. You must pass through a village where women and children are grouped round the largest, oldest well you ever saw, with a great crossbeam and an immense bucket swinging high in the air. And at last you must sit in a garden on a height overlooking the Neckar. There must be a charming village opposite, with an old, old church, and pretty trees about you partly concealing the ruins of some old knight's abode. Don't you like ruins? But just enough modestly in the background aren't so very bad. You hear the sound of a mill behind you, and the falling of water, and, in the branches above your head, the joyful song of a Schwarz Kopf. And then somebody pours a flask of white wine into a great bowl, to which he adds bunches of Waldmeister,—a fragrant wildwood flower,—and drowns the flowers in the wine until all their sweetness and strength are absorbed by it, and afterwards adds sugar and soda-water and quartered oranges,—and the decoction is ladled out and offered to the friends assembled, while there is a golden sunset behind the hills across the Neckar. And you walk back in the twilight through the village that is so small and sleepy it is preparing already to put itself to bed. And the peasants you meet say, “Grüss Gott!” “Grüss Gott!” say you, which isn't in the least to be translated literally, and only means “Good day,” though the pretty, old-fashioned greeting always seems like a benediction. You hear the vesper-bells and the organ-tones pealing out from the chapel; you see some real gypsies with tawny babies over their shoulders (poor things! they will steal so that they are allowed to remain in a village but one day at a time, and then must move on). You feel very bookish, everything is so new, so old, so charming,—and that is “Mai Wein.”

How it would taste at dinner with roast-beef and other prosaic surroundings,—how it actually did taste, I haven't the faintest idea.

[pg!55]

THE SOLITUDE.

What the Germans call an Ausflug, or excursion, deserves to be translated literally, for it is often a veritable flight out of the region of work and care into a tranquil, restful atmosphere. The ease with which middle-aged, heavy-looking men here put on their wings, so to speak, and soar away from toil and traffic, at the close of a long, hard day, is always marvellous, however often we observe it. It seems a natural and an inevitable thing for them to start off with a chosen few, wander through lovely woods, climb a pretty hill, watch the changing lights at sunset over a broad valley, then return home, talking of poets and painters, of life problems, of whatever lies nearest the heart. Their ledgers and stupid accounts and schemes and the state of the markets do not fetter them as they do our business men. Such enjoyment is so simple, childlike, and rational, that the old question how men accustomed to wear the harness of commercial life will ever learn to bear the bliss of heaven, in its conventional acceptation, seems half solved. The Germans, at least, would be blessed in any heaven where fair skies and hills and forests and streams would lie before their gaze. However inadequate their other qualifications for Elysium may be, they excel us by far in this respect. Even the coarser, lower men who gather in gardens to drink unlimited beer are yet not quite unmindful of the beauty of the trees whose young foliage shades them, and look out, oftener than we would be apt to give them credit for, upon the vine-clad hills beyond the city. A friend, a prominent banker, who is almost invariably in his garden or some other restful spot in the free air at evening, now goes out to Cannstadt, two miles from here, mornings at seven, because “one must be out as much as possible in this exquisite weather.” If bankers and lawyers and our busiest of business men at home would only begin and end days after this fashion, their hearts and heads would be fresh and strong far longer for it, that is, if they could find rest and enjoyment so, and that is the question,—could they? And why is it, if they cannot? I leave the answer to wiser heads, who will probably reply as usual, that our whole mode of life is different, which is quite true; but why need it be, in this respect, so very different? Here is a valuable hint to some enormously wealthy person, childless and without relatives, of course, and about to make his will, who at this moment is considering the comparative merits of different benevolent schemes, and is wavering between endowing a college and founding a hospital. Do neither, dear sir. Take my advice, because I'm far away, and don't know you, and am perfectly disinterested, and, moreover, the advice is sound and good: Make gardens and parks everywhere, in as many towns as possible. Not great, stately parks that will directly be fashionable, but little parks that will be loved; and winding ways must lead to them through woodlands, and seats and tables must be placed in alluring spots, and all the paths must be so seductive they will win the most inflexible, absorbed, care-worn man of business to tread them. Do this, have your will printed in every newspaper in the land, and many will rise up and call you blessed. And if you are not so very rich, make just one small park, with pretty walks leading to it and out of it, and say publicly why you do it,—that people may have more open air and rest; and if they only have these, Nature will do what remains to be done, and win their hearts and teach them to love her better than now. Of course it is a well-worn theme, but no one can live in this German land without longing to borrow some of its capacity for taking its ease and infuse it into the veins of nervous, hurrying, restless America.

A pleasant Ausflug from Stuttgart is to the Solitude, a palace built more than a hundred years ago by Carl Eugen, a duke of Würtemberg, whose early life was more brilliant than exemplary. Many roads lead to it, if not all, as to Rome. In the fall we went through a little village,—throbbing with the excitement of the vintage-time, resplendent with yellow corn hanging from its small casements,—and by pretty wood-roads, where the golden-brown and russet leaves gleamed softly, and the hills in the distance looked hazy, and all was quietly lovely, though the golden glories and flaming scarlet of our woods were not there; and where now softly budding trees, spring air and spring sounds, anemones and crocuses, and forget-me-nots and Maiglöckchen, tempt one to long days of aimless, happy wandering. On one road, the new one by a waterfall, is the Burgher Allee, where once the burghers came out to welcome a prince or a duke returning from a wedding or a war, and stood man by man where now a line of pines, planted or set out in remembrance, commemorates the event. If exception is taken to the uncertain style of this narration, may I add that positiveness is not desirable in a story for the truth of which there are no vouchers? The idea of a prince welcomed home from the wars is to me more impressive; but choice in such matters is quite free.

You can go to the Solitude, if you please, through the Royal Game Park, a pretty, quiet spot, where a broad carriage-road winds along among noble oaks and beeches, and through the trees peep the great, soft eyes of animals who are neither tame nor wild, and who seem to know that they belong to royalty and may stare at passers-by with impunity. A superb stag stood near the drive, gave us a lordly glance, turned slowly, and walked with majestic composure away. We did not interest him, but it did not occur to him to hurry in the least on our account. We felt that we were inferior beings, and were mortified that we had no antlers, that we might hold up our heads before him. Two little lakes, the Bärensee and Pfaffensee,—the latter thick with great reeds and rushes, and haunted by a peculiar stillness,—invite you to lie on the soft turf, see visions, and dream dreams. A small hunting-pavilion stands on terraces by the Bärensee, with guardian bears in stone before it, and antlers and other trophies of the chase ornamenting it within and without. It was erected in 1782, at the time of a famous hunt in honor of the Grand Duke Paul of Russia, afterwards emperor, who married Sophie of Würtemberg, niece of Carl Eugen. From all hunting-districts of the land a noble army of stags was driven towards these woods, encircled night and day by peasants to prevent the animals from breaking through. The stags were driven up a steep ascent, then forced to plunge into the Bärensee, where they could be shot with ease by the assembled hunters in the pavilion. Seeing the pretty creatures now fearlessly wandering in the sweet stillness of the park, and picturing in contrast that scene of destruction and butchery, it seems a pity that the grand gentlemen of old had to take their pleasure like brutes and pagans.

The Solitude is not far from here. Built first for a hunting-lodge between 1763 and 1767, it was gradually improved, enlarged, and beautified, grew into a pleasure palace, had its time of brilliant life and of decay; and now, renovated by the king's command, is a place where people go for the walk and the view, and where in summer a few visitors live quietly in pure air, and drink milk, it being a Cur-Anstalt. The adjacent buildings were used as a hospital during the late war. The Solitude is not in itself an interesting structure; it is in rococo style, having a large oval hall with a high dome, adjoining pavilions, and it looks white and gold, and bare and cold, and disappointing to most people. There is nothing especial to see,—a little fresco, a little old china, some immensely rich tapestry, white satin embroidered with gold, adorning one of those pompous, impossible beds, in which it seems as if nobody could ever have slept. But there is enough to feel, as there must always be in places where the damp atmosphere is laden with secrets a century old, and the walls whisper strange things. There are narrow, triangular cabinets and boudoirs with nothing at all in them, which, however, make you feel that you will presently stumble upon something amazing. All of Bluebeard's wives hanging in a row would hardly surprise one here. The place is full, in spite of its emptiness. It seems scarcely fitting that the many mirrors should reflect a little band of tourists in travelling suits and with umbrellas, instead of stately dames and cavaliers affecting French manners and French morals, and gleaming in satin and jewels beneath the glass chandeliers. There is a walk, always cool even in the hottest summer days, where in a double alley of superb pines the company used to seek shade and rest, and the fair ladies paced slowly up and down in their long trains, and fluttered their fans and heard airy nothings whispered in their ears. Wooded slopes rise high around, and this walk, deep down in a narrow valley, being quite invisible from the ordinary paths, is called the Underground Way. The breath of the old days is here especially subtle and suggestive.

The map of the place, as it was, tells of orangeries, pleasure pavilions, rose and laurel gardens, labyrinths, artificial lakes and islands, and many things of whose magnificence few traces remain. The common-looking buildings, formerly dwellings of the cavaliers in attendance, stand in a row; there are a few small houses with queer roofs; the Schloss itself stands on its height in the centre of an open space, fine old woods around, and an unusually extended view, from its cupola, of a broad, peaceful plain, a village or two, the Suabian Alb to the south; a straight, white-looking road intersects the meadows and woods, and leads to Ludwigsburg. This road was made by Carl Eugen, to avoid passing through Stuttgart, his choleric highness having had a grudge against the city at that time,—and indeed it has a spiteful air, with its utter disregard of hills and valleys, going straight as an arrow flies, never turning out for obstructions any more than the haughty duke would have turned aside for a subject. Fabulous stories are told of the speed with which his horse's hoofs used to clatter over this turnpike, and the incredibly short time in which, by frequently changing horses, he would arrive at his destination.

The romantic story of Francisca von Hohenheim and many interesting facts in Schiller's early life, during his attendance at the Carlsschule, a famous military academy, instituted by, and under the patronage of, Carl Eugen, are inevitably interwoven in any history of the Solitude; but both need more time than can be given at the close of so hasty a sketch. And indeed, from almost any point that might be taken here, threads wind off into a mass of stories and traditions far too wide-reaching to be more than hinted at when one is only making a little Ausflug and carelessly following one's will on a fair April day.

[pg!63]

A DAY IN THE BLACK FOREST.

“Zu Hirsau in den Trümmern

Da wiegt ein Ulmenbaum

Frischgrünend seine Krone

Hoch überm Giebelsaum.”

—Uhland.

One of the loveliest spots in all Würtemberg is Hirsau. It lies deep down in a valley on the Nagold, over which is a pretty stone bridge. High around rise the noble pines of the Black Forest, whose impenetrable gloom contrasts with the tender green of spring meadows basking in the sunshine, and makes, with the fringe of elms and birches and willows along the banks of the stream, a most magical effect of light and shade.

Blessings on the one of us who first said, “Let us see the old cloister at Hirsau!” An ideal spring day, a particularly well-chosen few, a trip by rail to Alt-Hengstett, then a long, lovely tramp over the moss carpet of the Black Forest, inhaling the sweet breath of the pines, finding each moment a more exquisite flower, catching bewitching glimpses between the trees of silver streams hurrying along far down below us,—this is what it was like; but the softness, the sweetness, the exhilaration of it all is not easy to indicate. The name itself, “Black Forest,” sounds immensely gloomy and mysterious. Goblins and witches and shrieks and moans and pitfalls and all uncanny weird things haunted the Black Forest of which we used to read years ago. And what does it mean to us now? Magnificent old woods, paths that beckon and smile, softly whispering, swaying tree-tops, turf like velvet, sunlight playing fitfully among the stately pines, seeking entrance where it may, and air that must bring eternal youth in its caresses. It means forgetfulness of trammels and all sordid, petty things, and being in tune with the harmonies of nature. It means freedom and peace; a “temple,” indeed, with the pines continually breathing their sweet incense and singing their sacred chants. There were in our party a professor or two, more than one poet,—indeed, it is said every other man in Suabia is a poet,—and a world-renowned art scholar and critic. They shook the dust of every-day life from their feet, and were happy as boys; one of them lay among the daisies, smiling like a child with the pure delight of living in such air and amid such peaceful beauty.

At the little Gasthaus in Hirsau, with the sign of the swan, we refreshed ourselves after our tramp. It is remarkable that poets, like clergymen, must also eat. After a few merry, graceful toasts and cooling draughts of the pleasant Landwein, we went to the cloister ruins. The work of excavation is still going on, much that we saw being but recently brought to the light. There were a few massive old walls at wide distances apart; the pavement of the aisles quite grass-grown between the low, broad, gray stones; fair fields of tall grass bright with daisies and buttercups, and starry white flowers,—a fascinating mass of variegated brightness, catching the sunshine and swaying in the breeze; a row of fine old Gothic windows; a tower in the Romanisch style of the twelfth century, which we, I believe, call Norman; a deep cellar where the monks of old stored their wines. Up a flight of stairs is a great bare room, where against the walls stand heavy wooden cases with carved borders, and in the ceiling is the same quaint carving slightly raised on a darker ground.

The whole effect of the ruins conveys the idea of immense size. The church was, indeed, the largest in Germany except the cathedral at Ulm. It is here an unusually lovely, peaceful scene. The cloister ruins would be, anywhere, picturesque and interesting in themselves; lying as they do above the village, framed by the beautiful Schwarzwald, they form a picture not easily forgotten. No far-extending view, nothing grand or imposing, only the exquisite, peaceful picture shut in by the dark-green hills; quaint homes nestling among rosy apple-blossoms; the great gray stone Brünnen, where for years and years maidens have come to fill their buckets and chat in the twilight after the day's work is done; the Nagold, silver in the sunlight; the cloister, with its old-time traditions,—all so very, very far from the madding crowd.

And the sweet legend of the origin of the cloister should be sung or spoken as one sees the picture: How there was, in the year 645, a rich, pious widow, a relative of the knight of Calb, named Helizena, who was childless, and who had but one wish, namely, to devote herself to the service of God. She constantly prayed that God would open to her a way acceptable in his sight. Once in a dream she saw in the clouds a church, and below in a lovely valley three beautiful fir-trees growing from one stem; and from the clouds issued a voice telling her that her prayer was heard, and that wherever she should find the plain with the three fir-trees she was to erect a church, the counterpart of that which she saw in the clouds. Awaking, the good Helizena, with holy joy and deep humility, took a maid and two pages and ascended a mountain from whose summit she could see all the surrounding country, and presently espied the quiet plain and the three firs of her dream. Hurrying to the spot, weeping for joy, she laid her silken raiment and jewels at the foot of the tree, to signify that from that moment she consecrated herself and all she possessed to the work. In three years the beautiful cloud-church stood in stone in the fair valley, and afterwards, in 838, a cloister was erected with the aid of Count Erlafried of Calb. Under Abbot Wilhelm, in 1080, it was at the height of its prosperity, and was the model of peace and goodly living among all the other Benedictine monasteries. The abbot gathered so many monks about him that the cloister at last grew too narrow, and he resolved to build a more spacious one. This was indeed a labor of love, and the work was done entirely by his own people, his monks and laity. Noble lords and ladies helped to bring wood and stone and prepared mortar in friendly intercourse with peasants, their wives and daughters,—such zeal and Christian love did the abbot instil into the hearts of his flock. It is the ruins of this cloister which we see to day.

An old German chronicle represents the place as little less than an earthly paradise:—

“There was here a band of two hundred and sixty, full of love for God and one another. No discussion could be found there, no discontented faces. Everything was in common. No one had the smallest thing for himself; indeed, no one called anything his own. Each went about his work in sweet content; of disobedience no one even knew. Not only was there no rebuke and angry word, but also no idle, frivolous, mirth-provoking talk. Among this great mass of men within the cloister walls could be heard only the voices of the singers and of them who knelt in prayer, and the sounds that came from the busy workrooms.”

These monks used to write much about music and poetry, and many learned, strong men were gathered there. The cloister was full of pictures, and the Kreuzgang had forty richly painted windows, with biblical scenes. A story is told of an old monk, Adelhard, who was twenty-three years blind, and received in his latter days the gift of second-sight. He foretold the day and hour of his death three years before it occurred, and also the destruction of the monastery.

As Körner's poem says:—

“In the cells and apartments sit fifty brothers writing many books, spiritual, secular, in many languages,—sermons, histories, songs, all painted in rich colors.

“In the last cell towards the north sits a white-haired old man, leans his brow upon his hand, and writes, ‘The enemy's hordes will break in, in seven years, and the cloister walls will be in flames.’”

Whether the old gray monk was ever there or not, at least we know that the French, in 1692, destroyed the beautiful cloister, and its paintings and carvings and works of art were all lost, except some of the stained glass, a few of its painted windows being at Monrepos, near Ludwigsburg.

The famous Hirsau elm, about which half the German poets have sung, is the most significant, touching, poetical thing imaginable. You feel its whole life-story in an instant, as if you had watched its growth through the long years; how the young thing found itself, it knew not why, springing up in the damp cloister earth, surrounded by four tall, cold, gray walls, above which indeed was a glimpse of heaven; how it shot up and up, ever higher and higher, with the craving of all living things for sunlight and free air, never putting forth leaf or twig until it had attained its hope and could rest. Within the high walls is only the strong, tall, bare trunk, and far above, free and triumphant, the noble crown of foliage.

Brave, beautiful elm, that dared to grow, imprisoned in cruel stone; that did not faint and die before it reached the longed-for warmth and light and sweetness!

[pg!69]

THE LENNINGER THAL.

Pilgrims were we recently, making a day's journey, not to gaze upon bones, rusty relics, and mouldy garments, but to see something fresh, fair, and altogether adorable,—the cherry-trees of the Lenninger Thal in full blossom. From Stuttgart we went by rail to Kirchheim unter Teck, a railway terminus, where we were shown the palace occupied by Franciska von Hohenheim after the death of Herzog Carl, and a Denkmal erected to Conrad Widerhold, that brave and very obstinate German hero who held the famous Hohentwiel fortress against the enemy, when even his own duke, Eberhard III., had ordered him to surrender it. Widerhold and his wife stand side by side, and you must look twice before you can tell which is the warrior. Kirchheim lies prettily in the Lauter Thal among the mountains. From there in an open carriage we drove on into the charming Lenninger Valley, one of the most beautiful in the Alb, with the whole landscape smiling benignly beneath a wonderful sky, and air deliciously pure and soft; past little brooks where the young, tender willows were beginning to leave out, through the little village of Dettingen, on and on over the broad chaussée, until we were fairly among the cherry-orchards. Bordering the road, running far back on the hill-slopes, shadowy, feathery, exquisite, the snowy blossoms lay before our eyes, with the range of the Suabian Alb beyond, and many a peak and ruin old in story. This was the fresh morning of a perfect spring day, where the peace and loveliness of the scene—the fields of pure whiteness reaching out on both sides of us, with now and then a dash of pink from the rosy apple-blossoms—made us feel that a special blessing had fallen upon us as devotees at the shrine of Ceres. At evening, returning by another route, with the varying lights and golden bars and heavy, piled-up purple cloud-masses in the western sky, it was lovely with yet another loveliness. The same mountains showed us other outlines and assumed new expressions, and bold, proud Teck rose from the foam of blossoms at its feet, like a stern rock towering above surging waters.

One of our experiences that day was becoming acquainted with Owen. Owen is not a man, as you may imagine, but only a very little village with crooked streets and queer old women, and that curious aspect to all its belongings which never grows less curious to some of us, though we ought to have become unmindful of it long ago. Owen is picturesque and dirty. “Ours at home aren't half so dirty or half so nice,” we endeavor to explain to our German friends.

At the inn where we drew up we were received by an admiring group of children,—three yellow heads rising above three great armfuls of wood, of the weight of which the little things seemed utterly unconscious in the excitement of seeing us. They stood, one above the other, on the dilapidated, crazy stone steps, while a bushy dog, whose hair looked as yellow and sun-faded as the children's, also made “great eyes” at us from the lowest stone. Out came mine host, and cleared away children and dog and woodpiles in a twinkling. This flattering reception occurred at the Krone. A large gilt crown adorned with what small boys at home call “chiney alleys” makes a fine appearance above these same tumble-down steps; and directly beside them is a great barn-door, so near that you might easily mistake one entrance for the other and wander in among the beasties; and benign Mistress Cow was serenely chewing her cud in her boudoir under the front stairs, we observed as we entered the house.

Let no one faint when I say we ate our dinner here. Indeed, we have eaten in much worse places, and the dinner was far better than we thought could be evolved from a house with so many idiosyncrasies, so very prominent barn-door qualities, such mooings and lowings in undreamed-of corners and at unexpected moments. However, we experienced an immense lightening of the spirits when trout were served, for it seemed as if we knew what this dish at least was made of. They were pretty silvery things with red spots, and had just been gleaming in the brook near by, beneath elms and birches and baby willows, and now they were butchered to make our holiday.

The little restored Gothic church at Owen is more than a thousand years old, and its walled Kirchhof recalls the times when the villagers with their wives and children sought refuge here from the descent of robber knights. The dukes of Teck are buried within the church, and their arms and those of other old families, with quaint inscriptions about noble and virtuous dames, are interesting to decipher. The prettiest thing in the church was a spray of ivy which had crept through a hole in the high small-paned window, completely ivy-covered without, and came seeking something within the still stone walls, reaching out with all its tendrils, and seemed like the little, adventurous bird that flutters in through a church window on a hot summer afternoon, and makes a sleepy congregation open its heavy eyes.

The altar-pictures are edifying works of art. Behind the little group in the “Descent from the Cross” rise a range of hills that look astonishingly like the Suabian Alb, with a genuine old German fortress perching on a prominent peak. Saint Lucia is also an agreeable object of contemplation, with a sword piercing her throat up to the hilt, the blade coming through finely on the other side, while her mildly folded hands, smirking of superior virtue and perfect complacency, make her as winning as a saint of her kind can be.

Beyond Owen is the Wielandstein, or a Wielandstein I should perhaps say, for Wielandsteins are as common in Germany as lovers' leaps in America; and the story is always how the cruel king murdered the wife and children of Wieland the smith and took him captive, granting him his life merely because of his skill in fashioning wonderful things from metals, but imprisoning him and maiming his feet that he might never escape. Wieland lived some time at court, and grew in favor with the king on account of his deft hands and clever designs. At length the king's young sons were missing and could not be found, though they were searched for many days, and the king was anxious and sorrowful. Then Wieland presented him with two beautiful golden cups, at the sight of which the king was so pleased that he gave a feast; and as he was drinking from the golden bowls and feasting with his nobles, Wieland flew away by means of two great golden wings he had for a long time been secretly fashioning, and, poising himself in mid-air, cried to the horrified king that he was drinking from the skulls of his sons, whom he, Wieland, had murdered out of revenge. The people shot many arrows after him, but he soared away unharmed, his golden wings gleaming in the sunlight until he disappeared behind the hills.

The ruin of the old Teck castle is in this neighborhood, and the Sybillen Loch, a grotto where a celebrated witch used to dwell, who differed from her species in general, inasmuch as she was a good witch. The old chronicles say she was an exemplary person, always delighting in good deeds. Her sons, however, were bad, quarrelled, stole from the world and one another, and even, upon one occasion, from her, and then ran away. Sybilla in her fiery chariot went in pursuit, and to this day a fair, bright stripe over orchard, field, and vineyard, always fresher and greener than the surrounding country, marks her course. How a fiery chariot could produce this beautifying effect is not to be questioned by an humble individual whose home is in a land where ruined castles and legend upon legend do not rise from every hill-top. Another story is that the fertile stripe was made by Sybilla's chariot-wheels, as she left forever the family to which she had always belonged. The last duke of Teck lay after a battle resting under a tree, and saw her passing with averted face, his arms lying at her feet, while she extended a stranger's in her hands, which signified ruin to his house; and the prophecy was fulfilled, for the duke outlived his twelve sons, and his arms and title were adopted by the counts of Würtemberg, who then became dukes of Würtemberg and Teck. All these interesting things are visible to the naked eye. The fresh green stripe is unmistakable; and the point in the air where Wieland hovered on his golden wings above the cliff can easily be discerned with a very little imagination.

A visit to a typical Suabian pastor, in another little village on this road, was a pleasant episode. A hale, handsome old gentleman of seventy, with a small black cap on his silvery locks and an inveterate habit of quoting Greek, looking at us with a simple, childlike air, as if we too were learned. His house has stone floors, low square rooms, severely simple in their appointments. The arms of a bishop of some remote century are on the inner wall by the front entrance, and a little farther on is an aperture, through which the cow of the olden time was wont to placidly gaze out upon hurrying retainers. The cow of that period seems to have had comfortable apartments in the middle of the house. The Suabian cow of the present time earns her hay by the sweat of her brow, toiling in the fields.

The good old pastor has a love amounting to adoration for his garden, every inch of which he has worked over and beautified, till it seems to be the expression of all the poetry and romance which the outward conditions of his frugal, rigid life repress. Full of nooks and arbors, comfortable low chairs and benches, where the blue forget-me-nots look as if they bloom indeed for happy lovers; trees whose great drooping branches close around retreats which can only be designed for tender tête-à-têtes; irregular little paths, wandering up and down and about, always ending in something delightful, always beckoning, inviting, smiling, amid flowers and foliage so fresh and luxuriant, you feel that every petal and leaf is known and loved by the white-haired old man. His favorite seat is at the end of a narrow, winding way at the foot of a magnificent elm. There he sits and looks, over the brook that sings to his sweet roses and pansies, upon broad meadow-lands and fields of grain extending to the Suabian hills, with their wealth of beauty and meaning and tradition. He sleeps and rests and thinks there after dinner, he tells us, and perhaps that is all; but I believe, when the old man is gone, a volume of manuscript poems will be discovered hidden away among his sermons and Greek tomes,—a volume of love poems, sonnets, dreamings of all that his life crowds out into his garden, and that only in his garden he has been able to express,—all the unspoken sweetness, all the unsung songs.

[pg!77]

FRANCISKA VON HOHENHEIM.

Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Paracelsus Bombastus is a personage whom we know, it must be confessed, more through the medium of Robert Browning than through our own historical researches; and we were therefore filled with wonder to learn that, in addition to the modest cognomen above, de Hohenheim also belonged to his name. This same Hohenheim we have recently visited. Paracelsus never lived there, to be sure, and was born far away in Switzerland. Browning puts him in Würzburg, in Alsatia, in Constantinople; and a solid German authority declares he lived in Esslingen, where his laboratory is still exhibited, and in proof mentions that in this neighborhood was, not many years ago, a Weingärtner whose name was Bombastes von Hohenheim, a descendant of Paracelsus. However, he lived nowhere, everywhere, and anywhere, I presume, as best suited such a conjurer, alchemist, philosopher, and adventurer, and went wandering about from land to land, remaining in one place so long as the people would have faith in his learning, his incantations and magic arts; but what concerns us now is simply that he was connected with the Hohenheim family, who, in the old days, occupied the estate which still bears its name.

To Hohenheim is a pleasant walk or drive, as you please, from Stuttgart. A castle, adjacent buildings, lawns, and fruit-trees are what there is to see at the first glance,—at the second, many practical things in the museum connected with the Agricultural College, which is what Hohenheim at present is; models, and collections of stones and birds and beasts, bones and skeletons, and other uncanny objects, pretty woods, grain, seeds, etc. Students from the ends of the earth come here, and from all ranks,—sons of rich peasants and also young men of family. An Hungarian count is here at present, and youths from Wallachia, Russia, Sweden, America, Australia, Spain, Italy, and Greece,—China too, for all I know to the contrary,—with of course many Germans, learning practical and theoretical farming. We sat under the pear-trees which were showering white blossoms around us, ate our supper to fortify us for our homeward walk, watched the sheep come home and the students walking in from the fields with their oxen-carts. They wore blue blouses and high boots, and cracked their long whips with a jaunty air, more like Plunket in “Martha” than veritable farmers. From the balcony opening from the largest salon we looked upon pretty woods, and the whole chain of the Suabian Alb, with Lichtenstein, Achalm, and other points of interest to be studied through a telescope.

This is, then, what Hohenheim now is,—a place where you go and look about a little, walk through large empty halls and long corridors affording glimpses of the simple quarters of the students, see a pleasant landscape, and, in short, enjoy an hour of unquestionably temperate pleasure. What it was as the seat of the Hohenheim family, which is mentioned as early as the year 1100, we do not know; but under Duke Carl Eugen of Würtemberg, in the last century, it was a sort of Versailles, if all accounts be true: magnificent parks and gardens, Roman ruins near Gothic towers and chapels, Egyptian pyramids and Swiss châlets, catacombs, artificial waterfalls, baths, hothouses, grottos with Corinthian pillars, a Flora temple with lovely arabesques on its silver walls, and the palace itself, rising proud and stately at the end of the park, furnished with every luxury, and filled with rare vases and pictures. Four colossal statues stand now in one of the halls, arrayed in garments which, in that freer time, they certainly could not boast. The raiment is of cloth, dipped, stiffened so that it resembles marble, unless you examine it too closely. No doubt it is more agreeable that those huge figures are somewhat clothed upon, but it does seem too absurd to think of ordering a new coat for “Apollo” when his old one gets shabby. Making minute investigations, we discovered he had already had several, wearing the last one outside of the others, as if to protect himself from the inclemency of the weather.

All the old magnificence was lavished by Herzog Carl upon Franciska von Hohenheim,—his “Franzel,” as he called her in the soft Suabisch,—whose most romantic story is, par excellence, the thing of interest here, and the Suabians must love it, they tell it so very often.

From many narratives I gather the life-story of a woman who, in spite of the stain upon her name, is deeply revered in Würtemberg for her strong, sweet influence upon its wild duke, for her wisdom and gentleness, and the good that through her came upon the realm.

She was a daughter of the Freiherr von Bernardin, a noble of ancient family and limited income. Franciska lived far removed from the gayety of courts, of which she and her sisters in their castle near Aalen rarely heard. When she was scarcely sixteen her father gave her hand to a Freiherr von Leutrum, a fussy, stuffy old man, who wrapped himself in furs even in summer, and was so conspicuously ugly the boys in the street would mock at him when he stood at his window. His great head, on a broad, humped back, scarcely reached the sill.

In addition, a small intellect, hot temper, and suspicious nature made him yet more of a monster; but Franciska was poor, and it appears it was considered then, as it would be now, a good match, as Von Leutrum was of an old family and rich. Whether the historians paint him blacker than he deserves in order to make Franciska white in contrast, is not easy to say. It certainly has that effect occasionally, however. Beauty, then, married the Beast. In 1770 Herzog Carl Eugen came to Pforzheim, where the nobles of the neighborhood, among them Baron von Leutrum, with his young wife, assembled to form his court.

Franciska was no famous beauty. She had, however, a tall, graceful figure, rich blond hair, and was very winning with her fresh, joyful ways, and a certain indescribable sweetness and gentleness of manner. The duke, from the first, singled her out by marked attention, which undoubtedly flattered her, coming from so famous, clever, and fascinating a man; and it is also probable that she made no especial effort to repulse the homage in which she could see no harm. He was then forty-two,—a man of stately beauty, one of the most renowned European princes of that time, with a strong and highly cultivated intellect, and of most winning manners where he cared to please. It also appears he could be a bear, a savage, and a tyrant when he willed.

It was, then, scarcely surprising that a girl married at sixteen to a fossil like Leutrum, who neglected and abused her, should be bewildered by the distinguished attention offered by her prince. Meanwhile Leutrum waxed more and more jealous, until one day in a rage, on account of remarks of the courtiers, he struck his wife in the face.

The duke, furious at this, insisted upon taking Franciska under his protection. But she, though agonized with fear and abhorrence of her husband, yet knowing too well her feeling for the duke, chose to leave the court at once and return with Leutrum to their castle.

Carl Eugen, never scrupulous as to means when he had anything to gain, caused a wheel of Leutrum's coach to be put into a state of precarious weakness, so that, going through some woods not far from Pforzheim, the carriage broke down, when the duke appeared, rode off with the trembling, miserable, happy Franciska, leaving Von Leutrum alone with his broken carriage and his rage.

The duke had been married for political reasons at eighteen to a princess of Bavaria, with whom he had lived but a year or two, their natures being strongly incompatible. He, however, a Roman Catholic, could not free himself from his first marriage until the death of his wife released him in 1784, when he married Franciska.

The remarkable thing in her history is, that the voice of no contemporary is raised against her. Noble ladies of unblemished name visited her as “Gräfin von Hohenheim,” and all testimony unites in praising her wisdom, sweetness, and grace, and her almost miraculous influence for good upon the duke.

“He found in her womanly grace and devoted love, the deepest appreciation of the beautiful and good, exquisite taste and tact, a strong, warm interest in his career and calling, wise counsel given in her soft, womanly words, and a heart for his people.

“In love and sorrow, in matters earnest and light, in his difficult affairs of state, in enjoyment of the beautiful in art and nature, she was ever by his side, filled with perfect appreciation of all that moved him.”

She taught him gradually his duty towards his folk, which the wild, haughty duke had sadly ignored, and she, herself, was always loved and revered by them.

She was graceful and sparkling in society, not wearing her sorrows upon her sleeve, but in her private life and letters are marks of lifelong grief.

“If I could tell you my whole story,” she writes to a friend in 1783, “if you could know the solemnity and repentance with which I look back upon it, you would withhold from me neither your pity nor your prayers.... Had I had in my sixteenth year, when, utterly inexperienced, I entered society with not the slightest knowledge of the world, left entirely to myself, surrounded by scenes whose meaning I could not grasp,—had I then had one true friend to warn me, to advise me; had his reason, his heart, his pureness of deed, inspired my respect and trust, indeed—indeed—I might have been a better woman.”

Later, after a delightful evening at the Princess of Dessau's, where Lavater also was, she wrote:—

“I was inexpressibly moved by your assurance that you thought of me in this circle. Could I have felt worthier of such society, the pleasure would undoubtedly have been more unalloyed. But, as it was—Still I must not complain.”

Such, briefly, is her story. She lived with the duke at the Solitude as well as here, and Hohenheim he made for her as beautiful as a fairy palace. He troubled neither her nor himself with scruples. His conscience was, indeed, not tender, and his life with her was unquestionably so innocent and idyllic in comparison with his mad past, that, to him at least, it no doubt seemed blameless. He loved her faithfully till his death, wrote to her when absent for a day or two as his good angel, with utter reverence as well as tenderest love. The proud respected her; the poorest and humblest came to her with their wants and sorrows.

She died in 1811 in her small, quiet court at Kirchheim unter Teck, where she had resided after the death of the duke; but her story and the remembrance of her eventful life will always haunt quiet Hohenheim, and invest it with a romance it cannot otherwise claim for itself.

[pg!85]

“NUREMBERG THE ANCIENT.”

The breeze of morning stole in and kissed our cheeks and whispered, “You have a day and a half to spend in dear, delicious old Nuremberg,—be up and doing!” Only a day and a half, and yet how infinitely better than no day at all there! We came, we saw, and were conquered, even by the huge knockers with bronze wreaths of Cupids and dragons' heads, the ornate, intricate locks, the massive doors, before we were within the portals of those proud patrician palaces with their stately inner courts and galleries, their frescos, painted windows and faded tapestries, time-stained grandeur, and all their relics of mediæval magnificence.

O, we stretched our day and a half well, and filled it full of treasures, and our hearts with lovely thoughts and pictures of the unique old town, its high quaint gables, stone balconies, beautiful fountains, double line of walls, and seventy sentinel towers; its castle and wide moat, where now great trees grow and prim little gardens; its arched bridges and streams, with shadows of the drooping foliage on the banks; its oriel windows; its narrow, shady ways and odd corners; its memories of Albrecht Dürer and Hans Sachs, of Kaiser and knight and Meistersinger,—its Nurembergishness!

The St. Lorenz Church was our first halting-place. The whole world knows that its portal and painted windows are beautiful, and that it retains all the rich old objects of the Roman ritual; that being the condition under which Nuremberg pranced over in a twinkling to Protestantism, and people were ordered by the municipal authorities to believe to-day what they had disbelieved yesterday; and most of the world, perhaps, has seen the tabernacle for the vessels of the sacrament, but they who have not can never know from words how it rests on the bowed forms of its sculptor, Adam Kraft, and his two pupils and assistants, and rises like frozen spray sixty-four feet in the choir, with the warm light from the painted windows coloring its exquisite traceries and carvings. It looks like a holy thought or a hymn of praise caught in stone, aspiring heavenwards.

We saw there heavy gold chalices from old, old times, and some Gobelin tapestry only recently discovered hidden away; one scene represented the weighing of the soul of St. Lawrence to see if it were too light for heaven. The saint's soul had a shape, in fact was an infant's body, and the Devil was crouching near by, and St. Lawrence, full-grown, stood waiting, anxious to know his fate.

Then came a few hours in the German Museum, where, as usual in such places, the weary lagged behind, the elegant looked blasé, the contrary-minded saw the wrong thing first, the energetic pushed valiantly on, striving to see all and remember all, from earliest forms of sculpture down through the ages,—all the gold and silver and carvings and costumes, the immense square green stoves, with the warm, cosy seat for the old grandmother in the corner; to glance at rare old lace without neglecting the ancient caps and combs and gewgaws; to look long at a few of the pictures,—the great one of Dürer's, “Otto at the Grave of Charlemagne,” is here, you know,—and so our straggling party wandered on through corridor and chamber and staircase, past knights in effigy, some of whom looked like such jolly old souls, with gallons of wine beneath their breastplates, past a memorial tablet to a baby prince who died dim ages ago, to whom a small death-angel is offering an apple; and then, after seeing the bear, who guards a glass case of precious things in gold and silver, lowered down to his domain every night, and after sprinkling beer on his nose to see if he were of German parentage, we gathered ourselves together and wondered if we quite liked museums. You see so much more than you can comprehend; you see so much more than you want to see; you feel so astoundingly ignorant; you have information thrust upon you so ruthlessly. One wilful maiden says, “I'll go and live on a desert island, provided no one will show me an object of interest.” Then in the shady cloisters we drank foaming beer with our German friends, and gathered strength for our next onslaught; and I beg no one to be captious about the length and out-of-breath character of this paragraph, for it is quite in keeping with our Nuremberg visit, with worlds to see in a little day and a half.

There was the old Rath Haus with the Dürer frescos and the Dürer house and pictures, which everybody mentions; and the rude, dark little den of a kitchen, which nobody to my knowledge has ever deigned to mention, where Mrs. Xantippe Dürer used to rattle her sauce-pans and scold her Mann. There was the Fraumkirche and St. Sebald, rich in painted windows and sculpture. In one room, so rich and dark with its oak wainscoting and Gobelin tapestry, we involuntarily searched behind the arras for Polonius, and then stared silently and felt quite flippant before the antique candelabra and Persian rugs and hopelessly indescribable ever-to-be-coveted furniture within those memory-laden walls. An antique, impressive writing-table was a model of rich, quaint beauty. Poems and romances would feel proud and pleased to simply write themselves under its ægis, and what a delicious aroma of the past would cling to them!

We visited the castle, of course, and streams of information about the Hohenzollerns were poured upon us. We were wicked enough to enjoy ourselves particularly among the instruments of torture,—exhibited by the jolliest, fattest, most debonair Mrs. Jarley in the world. She regaled us with awful tales, that sounded worse than the “Book of Martyrs,” and we were not disgusted, neither did we faint or scream. There was a lamentable want of feeling, and a marked inclination to laugh prevailed in our party. Indeed, we saw some sweet things there,—a hideous dragon's head, worn by women who beat their husbands; a kind of yoke in which two quarrelsome women were harnessed; a huge collar, with a bell attached, for gossips; and an openwork iron mask, with a great protruding, rattling tongue, for inveterate slanderers. We made liberal proposals to our jolly show-woman for a few of these articles, thinking we might be able to send them where they were needed, and strongly inclined to favor their readoption. An iron nose a foot long was worn by thieves, and the article stolen hung on the end of it.

It is grievous to think there will come a time when people who visit Nuremberg will see no walls and towers and moats. They are pulling down the walls at present, for they are as inconvenient as they are picturesque. Heavy teams and people on foot seeking egress and ingress at one time through the narrow passages in the massive structure, the city cramped, its growth retarded, dangerous accidents, as well as the most reasonable grounds in a commercial point of view, lead the wise to destroy something selfish tourists would fain preserve intact. But “if I were king of France, or, still better, pope of Rome,” or emperor of Germany, I'd let the commerce go elsewhere where there is room for it, and guard old Nuremberg jealously as a precious, beautiful memorial and heirloom from ancestors who have slept for centuries.

The Johannes Cemetery here is the only lovely one I have yet seen in Germany. It is not beautiful in itself, as our cemeteries are; but the solemnity, the dignity of death is here, and no gaudy colors and tinsel wreaths jar upon your mood and pain you. Only great flat, gray stones, tablets with the arms in bronze of the old Nuremberg patricians, tell us wanderers who lies beneath. It was like a solemn poem to be there deciphering the proud armorial bearings on the great blocks placed there centuries ago, and the sweet-brier blooming all around with such an unconscious air on its pale pink blossoms, like fair young faces. One of Columbus's crew lies there. So many old names and dates!

We plucked a few leaves from Dürer's grave:—

“Emigravit is the inscription on the tombstone where he lies,

Dead he is not, but departed, for the artist never dies;

Fairer seems the ancient city, and the sunshine seems more fair,

That he once has trod its pavement, that he once has breathed its air.”

[pg!91]

SOME WÜRTEMBERG TOWNS.

The gardener gave it to the milkmaid and the milkmaid gave it to the errand-boy, the errand-boy gave it to the cook, who gave it to the head-waiter, who sold it to the individual who presented it to me. “It” was a bunch of great, sweet, half-blown June roses, that hung glowing on their stalks in their native garden at dawn, and before noon had experienced this life of change and adventure. It all happened in Wasseralfingen, a little town, where nothing else so momentous occurred during our brief visit, because it was Sunday, but where usually the celebrated iron-works make an immense disturbance, and interest visitors of a practical turn of mind. Our German friends bewailed the absence of the noise of the machinery on our account; believing that every American is born with a passionate devotion to mechanics, which increases through life, to the exclusion of a love of the beautiful. Recently, after relating a romantic story about a place on the Rhine, a German gentleman concluded his tale of love and chivalry by telling us that the Princess Somebody had established a girls' school there,—“which will interest you as Americans more than the story,” he added, with perfect honesty and naïveté.

“And why?” we meekly ask.

“Because Americans are practical and like useful things,” he responds cheerfully, with as thorough a conviction as if he had said that two and two made four.

We made no useless effort to induce him to believe that the thought of sixty or eighty bread-and-butter misses does not enhance for us the charm of a tradition-haunted spot, nor did we struggle to impress our friends' minds in Wasseralfingen that its Sabbath stillness was more agreeable to us than the stir and rush of the works. There are some fixed ideas in the mind of the average German which a potent hand ought to seize and shake out. “Why don't you write letters to Germans about America, instead of to Americans about Germany?” suggests a clever German friend. “They seem to be more needed.” It might really be worth while if Teutonic tenacity of opinion were not too huge a thing for a feeble weapon to slay.

To return to our Wasseralfingen,—most curious name!—it was pretty enough to look upon, as indeed most places in Würtemberg are. It has its nicely-laid-out little park or Anlagen, with a statue in the middle of it; and this is what small manufacturing towns at home are not apt to waste much time upon, unfortunately for their children and their children's children. An inn nestled among the trees, with irregular wings and low, broad roofs, and a very broad landlord, who looked like a beer-mug, gave us comfortable shelter for a night, and supper and breakfast in its garden,—supper with lights and pipes and beer-bottles, and cheerful conversation all around.

A short trip by rail brought us to Heidenheim, past fields of waving grain and pretty hills, shadows of great trees falling on velvety meadows, oats rising and falling like billows in the morning breeze, and scarlet seas of poppies. Never anywhere have I seen such a glory of poppies! Miles of them on both sides of the road, gleaming and glowing as the sunlight kissed them.

And then Heidenheim, a pretty town given to manufactures, to factories and mills, with the ruins of its castle Hellenstein on the height, and its memories reaching far back to Roman times. Here lived knights who were princes of profligacy, and gloried in their extravagance; who shod their steeds with silver and gold, and flung jewels away like water. One of them longed to have his whole estate transformed into a strawberry, that he could swallow it all in one instant. Of course this family came to a bad end. It spent all its money, and its castles got out of repair; the last of its armor was sold for old iron, and the last of the race died a pauper.

The ruins retain traces of Roman architecture in the earliest walls, with various additions in later times, and are not especially interesting upon close acquaintance. The old well sunk deep in the foundation of natural rock, where you pay ten cents and see a woman drop a stone three hundred and eighty-five feet, and wait breathlessly until you hear the dull plash deep down in the darkness, is their most exciting feature. The woman offered to give us some water, but it requires a whole hour to get it up, and we felt suspicious of what might be lying in those uncanny depths.

On the shady side of the castle, with broad reaches of fertile field and belts of wood lying before our contented gaze, we listened to Volkslieder, so old and sweet they carried our hearts back into dim ages, and we strongly felt the tie that binds us to the race where such strains have their birth. Suddenly, as our singers ceased, a group of village children sitting on a block of stone at a short distance took up the refrain,—an irregular row of flaxen heads against the light, their forms prominent against the deep, peaceful background, singing away with such zest we could only be silent and listen. Song after song, in praise of their loved land, they sang; all sweet, whether the smallest ones could always keep in tune or not. They told how Eberhard im Bart could lay his head on the knee of his poorest peasant and sleep in peace till morning broke, and many another sweet, old story; and, keeping time with their heads and making daisy-chains with their hands, they shouted,—

“Beautiful Suabia is our Heimath Land!”

Truly you can forgive the Germans for a multitude of sins when you hear how and what their common people sing.

[pg!95]

IN A GARDEN.

A Garden by the water's edge,—a garden where clematis and woodbine and grape-vines run all over their trellises and up the graceful young locust-trees and down over the stone-wall to meet the water plashing pleasantly below, and reach out everywhere that vine-audacity can suggest in an utter abandonment of luxuriance!—a garden where superb blood-red roses are weighed down by a sense of their own sweetness, and pure white ones look tall and stately and cool and abstracted by their side. At the right a point of land extends into the lake, so thickly covered with trees that from here it looks like a little forest, and the houses are almost concealed in the fresh green; and the trees look taller than anything except a funny old building that was once a cloister, and is now the royal castle, and has two queer, tall towers that rise far above the tree-tops at the extremity of the point. At the left, faint and shadowy in the distance, rise the Alps, and the mountains of Tyrol. There are bath-houses along the shore. Small boys who think they “would be mermen bold” are prancing about gayly in the water. On a rocky beach, peasant-women in bright-colored dresses are standing by tubs, dipping garments in the lake and wringing them dry. Some of them are kneeling. The sun is warm, and beats down on their uncovered heads, and the work is hard, and I don't suppose they have any idea they are making a picture of themselves, on the rocky shore with the background of trees. But everybody is a picture this morning. There is a young man standing in a row-boat, which an old fisherman lazily propels here and there before my eyes. The youth is really statuesque, balancing himself easily in the dancing boat, strong, supple, graceful, his arm extending the long fishing-rod. A rosebud of a girl in a white morning-suit and jaunty sailor-hat leans over the railing of a pavilion built out into the lake from the garden, and also patiently holds a fishing-rod, looking like a “London Society” illustration, as she gazes intently with drooping eyelashes into the water.

There are people reading, sketching, studying their Baedeckers, drinking their coffee or beer, in comfortable nooks through the pretty garden. All is quiet and restful, with only the rippling of the water and the shouts of the merry mermen to break the stillness. Now doesn't it seem as if one ought to write an exceptionally pleasant letter from so pleasant a spot? But, alas! there is not much to say about it when once you have tried to tell how it looks,—that it is a calm, peaceful, pretty place, where you could stay a whole summer and lose all feverish desires to explore and climb and see sights. To sit here in the garden, leaning on the wall among the vines, is happiness enough. In the morning early, the lake smiles at you and talks to you, and you see far away great masses of rose-color and pearl-gray, with snowy summits gleaming in the sunshine, and your eyes are blessed with their first view of the Alps. The outline of the opposite shore is misty and many-colored, and has also its noble heights. At sunset, too, is the garden a dreamy, blissful spot, as the little boats float about in the golden lights, and the water and the mountains assume all possible lovely hues, then sink away in a deep violet, and the stars come out and German love-songs go up to meet them.

Yes, it is a satisfying spot. If there's a serpent here, he keeps himself wonderfully well concealed. We haven't caught a glimpse of him, and we are wise enough not to search for him. It's an admirable place to be lazy, but it isn't very good for letters. Things hinder so, you know. You listen to the water, and your pencil forgets to go. You get lost in contemplation of the flapping of the ducks' feet, and make profound studies of their mechanism, and enviously wish you had something of the sort at your command, so that you could sail about in the cool, clear water as unconcerned as they, and with no more effort. Funniest of ducks that they are!—so pampered by the attention and bread-crumbs of summer guests that their complacency exceeds even ordinary duck self-satisfaction, and they act as if they thought they were all swans.

It occurs to me somebody may feel a faint curiosity to know where it all is. On the Lake of Constance, or the Bodensee, which, if you want useful information, is forty-two miles long, eight miles wide, is fed principally by the Rhine, and whose banks belong to five different States,—Bavaria, Würtemberg, Baden, Switzerland, and Austria; a sheet of water whose shores are green and thickly wooded, where gay little steamers run, constantly displaying the flags of their several countries, between the principal places on the lake, and wherever you go you have beautiful mountain scenery. You see the Alps, the mountains of Bavaria, the Baden hills, the Tyrol, and you don't always know which is which; but they pile themselves up grandly among the clouds, one range behind the other, in a way that to the unaccustomed vision does not exactly admit of labelling, and you don't care what their names are. You are content to feel their beauty, to wonder and be silent.

This particular place on the lake is Friedrichshafen. It is really a new place and a commercial place,—and these adjectives are certainly not attractive,—but then the newness is not conspicuous, and the commerce, so far as we summer birds of passage are concerned, almost invisible.

The king and queen of Würtemberg come here every summer, and are here at present. The Emperor of Germany and the Grand Duke of Baden are on the Island of Mainau.

It may be a busy place, but it does not seem so. Content and rest pervade the atmosphere. Serenity is written on every face. It may be many people would weary of its roses and the ripple of the water; of its gardens, that look as if they were growing directly out of the lake; of the blue, hazy, changing mountains far away; of its perfect quiet: but there are others who would love it well, and who would not tire of it in many a long summer day.

[pg!100]

LINDAU AND BREGENZ.

Auf wiederschen, and not Lebewohl, we said to pleasant Friedrichshafen, as the little steamer left those kindly green shores and we sailed away, not for a year and a day, like the owl and the pussy cat in the beautiful pea-green boat, but for an hour or so only. There were many curious people to watch on board, but the most monopolizing sight was two Catholic priests devouring a chicken, or rather devouring chickens. They had, on the seat between them, a basket large enough for a flock of Hühnchen—boiled, dissected, and only too tempting to the priestly appetite—to repose in. And they had the lake as a receptacle for the bones. What more could they desire? If we could have suggested anything it would have been—napkins, because it was requiring too much work of their fingers to use them as knives and forks, and then to wipe their mouths on them. The zeal with which the holy men tore the tender meat from the bones and showered the remnants in the water, and particularly the endurance they exhibited, made us hope they evinced as much fervor and devotion in caring for their human flocks.

To Lindau then we came, having, as we approached, charming mountain scenery. The town is on an island, connected with the mainland by an embankment and railway bridge. It is a little place, but very striking as you look at it from the water, having a lofty monument (a statue in bronze of Maximilian II.), a picturesque old Roman tower, and, at the entrance of the harbor, a fine lighthouse, and a great marble lion on a high pedestal, guarding the little haven and his Bavarian land. We remained part of a day here, having before our eyes a beautiful picture,—the mountains of Switzerland directly across the lake, narrow at this point, with the lighthouse and the proud, ever-watchful Bavarian lion rising, bold and sentinel-like, in the foreground. You look between these two over the placid water to the heights beyond.

From Lindau we sailed to Bregenz, where the lake and mountains have quite another expression. It would be difficult to say which is the most attractive place on the Bodensee. You feel “How happy could I be with either, were t'other dear charmer away,” and it is of course a question of individual taste. One person prefers the mountains near, another watches them lovingly from a distance. One likes to live on low land by the water's edge, and look up to the mountain-tops; another perches himself high, and finds his happiness in looking down upon the lake and off to other heights. But the shores are lovely everywhere, much frequented yet quiet, crowded with villas, private cottages, hotels, yet secluded and restful if one chooses.

Bregenz is a quiet place, a real country-place, with mountain views and mountain excursions without end. The common people have intelligent, happy faces, pleasant, cheerful ways, quickness of repartee, and civility. The women give you a smiling “Grüss Gott.” The commonest man takes off his hat as you pass, and if you go by a group of rollicking school-boys every hat comes off courteously.

Gebhardsberg is the first place to which people usually go from Bregenz. We went, as in duty bound. It is a mountain—a castle—a pilgrimage church—a view; and to say that one commands a view of the entire lake, the valley of the Bregenzer Ach and the Rhine, the Alps, the snow mountains of Appenzel and Glarus, with mountains covered with pine forests in the foreground, conveys a very faint idea of the beauty before our eyes. In the visitors' book in the tower were some German rhymes, which, roughly translated, go somewhat in this way:—

“Charming prospect, best of wine,

Be joyful, then, O heart of mine;

Farewell, thou lovely Gebhard's hill,

Thou Bodensee, so fair, so still.”

And more still about wine, for this is not the land of the Woman's Crusade, it appears:—

“It makes you glad to drink good wine,

And praying makes life more divine.

If you would be both good and gay,

Pray well and drink well every day.”

Some one remarks,—

“What below was far from clear,

Is no less dark when we stand here.”

And a very enthusiastic person writes,—

“Here flies from us sorrow, here vanishes pain,

Here bloom in our hearts joy and freshness again.

Who can assure us, and how can we know,

That heaven is fairer than this scene below?”

In pages of such doggerel one finds comical enough things; but exported, they may lose their native flavor, so I will not give too many of them.

By making rather a long excursion from here you can visit the birthplace of Angelica Kauffman. We didn't go, but we felt very proud to think we could if we wished, having lately read “Miss Angel.”

There is a place in this neighborhood the name of which I refuse to divulge, because, if I should tell it and disclose its attractions, the next steamer from America would certainly bring over too many people to occupy it, and so ruin it. I shall keep it for myself. But I will describe it, and awaken as much longing and unrest and dissatisfaction with American prices as I can. It isn't exactly a village, but it is near a village. It has shady lanes that wind about between hedges; houses that are placed as if with the express purpose of talking with one another,—only three or four houses, with superb old trees hanging over them. There is the nicest, brightest of Fraus,—who owns this bit of land, the houses and the hedges and trees close by the water's edge, a boat, a bath-house, and a great dog,—a happy, prosperous widow, with a daughter to help in household matters, and to go briskly to market to the neighboring town. So happy is she, one thinks involuntarily her Mann was perhaps aggressive, and that to be free from his presence may be to her a blessing from Heaven. She lives in a house where the ceiling is so low one must stoop going through the doors. The windows and doors are all open. The tables and chairs are scoured snowy white. She brings you milk in tall glasses,—it is cream, pure and simple. And then she takes you into the house close by, with great airy chambers, and broad low casements, under which the water ripples softly, and she tells you, without apparently knowing herself, one of the wonders of the age,—that she will rent her four rooms in this detached house for forty guldens a month, and serve four persons from her own dwelling with fruit, meat, cream, the best the land affords; and forty guldens are about twenty dollars, gold. (This must not mislead the unwary. There are places enough here where you can spend quite as much as you do at home.) We did not quite faint, but we were very deeply moved. We did not even tell the good woman that her terms were not exorbitant, crafty, worldly creatures that we were. Here was one spot unspoiled by the madding crowd. We were not the ones to bring pomps, and vanities, and high prices to it. So we choked down our amazement, and hypocritically remarked it was all very pleasant, and we thought perhaps we might return. Return! Of course we shall return! When all things else fail, and ducats are painfully few, then will we flee to this friendly abode, and live in a big room on the lovely lake, so near, indeed, that we can almost fish from our windows; have a boat to row, a bath-house at our service; quarts, gallons of cream; and the Swiss mountains before our eyes morning, noon, and night; and all for five dollars a month. I am telling the truth, but I do not expect to be believed. I am tempted to write its name,—its pretty, friendly, suggestive little name,—but I will not. It ends in LE, it sounds like a caress, so much will I say; perhaps so much is indiscreet. Don't waste your time looking for it. You will never find it. We only happened to drift there. It really is not worth your while to search for it. It is quite secluded, quite out of the way, a sleepy-hollow that I am sure you would find dull.

There are many green, sweet nooks, many pretty villages, many cleanly little cottages, many smiling, broad-browed, clear-eyed women, on the shores of the Lake of Constance; but our woman, our cottage, our cream, our mountains, our treasure, you will never, never find.

[pg!106]

THE VORARLBERG.

I feel a deep and ever-increasing sympathy with explorers of strange lands whose narratives a harsh world pronounces exaggerations. What if they do say that the unknown animal which darts across their path has five heads and seventeen legs? There is a glamour over everything in an utterly new place,—the very atmosphere is deceptive. After a while, things assume their natural proportions, but at first it seems as if one really did see with one's own eyes all these redundant members. Even here in the beaten track of travel, writing as honestly as possible from my own point of view, I feel like begging my friends to put no faith in anything I say. The mountains in themselves are intoxicating enough to turn one's head; but then of course much depends upon the kind of head one possesses. Recently, at sunset by a lake, we were looking over the water at a mountain view,—soft, wooded slopes near us, huge rocky masses beyond, height upon height rising in hazy blue, the snowy summits just touched by the Alpine glow,—when some strangers approached. Berlin has the honor of being their dwelling-place, we ascertained afterwards.

“Lieber Mann,” said the lady, “just look at all that snow!”

“Snow!” replied the lieber Mann, “snow in summer! But that is impossible!”

“I think it must be snow,” said the wife, doubtfully. Then, “But only see the beautiful mountains.”

“Hm, hm,” remarks the lieber Mann, regarding them superciliously through his eye-glass; “I can't say that they are particularly well-formed!” Here, at least, is a head that is secure; no jocund day on the misty mountain-tops, no broad, magnificent ranges at high noon, and no twilight with “mountains in shadow, forests asleep,” have power to move that astute Kopf a fraction of an inch. “They have better mountains in Berlin,” remarked a German friend in an undertone.

Bludenz is a little town in the Vorarlberg, which means, you know,—or you don't know,—the country lying before the Adler or Arlberg, and the Arlberg is the watershed between the Rhine and Danube, and the boundary between the Vorarlberg and the Tyrol. This sounds guide-bookish,—and very naturally, as I have copied it word for word from Baedecker,—but one must say something of praiseworthy solidity once in a while. Bludenz is a railway terminus, which fact may not interest the world at large, but it did us hugely. We rejoiced in the thought of the great post-wagon, the cracking of whips and blowing of horns, and long, delightful, breezy rides over the hills and far away. Our after-experience of this lively whip-cracking and horn-blowing has led us to the conclusion that it is decidedly at its best in the opera, where the Postilion of Lonjoumeau sings his pretty song and cracks his whip for a gay refrain; and that it is all very well, when you yourself are going off early in the morning amid the prodigious noise and the excitement of stowing away passengers and packages, while a crowd of village loafers stand gazing and gaping at you,—in short, when you are “in it,” you know; but when it is only other people who are going, only they for whom all the noise is made and you are roused from your gentle slumbers at half past four perhaps, you do not regard the postilion and his accomplishments with unqualified admiration.

You wish you had gone to the “Eagle,” or the “Ox,” or the “Lamb,” or the “Swan,” or the “Lion,” or to any other beast or bird, rather than to the “Post,” where the “Post” omnibus and its relations make your mornings miserable. These are always the names of the inns in these little towns. There is usually a “Crown” too, and often an “Iron Cross.” But people with nerves mustn't go to the “Post.” Our party left its nerves in the city before starting off on a rough tour, yet even we have suffered at various inns which bear the names of “Post,” but which should properly be called “Pandemonium.”

Our first postilion wore the regulation long-boots, a postilion hat, and silver pansies in his ears. He cracked his whip nobly,—as well as we have heard Sontheim in the theatre at Stuttgart, and that is no faint praise. He was the jolliest of men, on the best of terms with all the dwellers among the mountains. He stopped at every inn and house where a glass of wine was to be had, and I think I may say invariably drank it. All the goodwives joked with him and smiled at him; all the men had a friendly word for him, and all the peasant-girls who had lovers in distant villages were continually stopping our great ark to send packages, letters, or messages to the absent swain. He seemed to be for the whole region a friend, patron, and adviser, a tutelary deity in fact, and grand receptacle for confidences. He had a shrewd, kind face, large clear eyes, and had driven among these mountains twenty-six years. It really did not seem a bad way of spending one's days, always going over the mountain-passes, knowing everybody and loved by everybody in the country round. I admired him extremely, and felt very much elated at the honor of sitting up on the box with so important a personage.

He told us a story of an Englishman who was inquiring how much it would cost to be driven to a certain point.

The driver replied so many gulden.

“Impossible,” said the Englishman; “Baedecker says half as many.”

“I'll tell you what,” answered the postilion; “let Baedecker take you, then.”

Having laughed at the poor stranger, it is only fair that we now laugh at the natives.

“I spiks English,” an innkeeper said to me. “Ein joli hearse,” he remarked further, to my great bewilderment, until it gradually dawned upon me that this was English for “a pretty horse.” There is a house in this region whose proprietor wished to receive English lodgers, and signified his desire to the world by hanging out this sign: “English boards here.”

After all, there are no more ludicrous verbal blunders in the world than we English-speaking people continually make during our first year's struggles with this mighty German tongue; and nowhere do a foreigner's queer idioms and laughable choice of words meet with more kindness, charity, courtesy, and helpfulness than in Germany. It is astonishing how kind the Germans in general are in this respect. It is all very well to say politeness demands such kindness; but where things sound so irresistibly droll, I think sometimes we might shriek with laughter where the Germans kindly correct, and do not even smile.

But we are neglecting Bludenz, for which little town we mean to say a friendly word. It is usually considered only a stepping-stone to something higher and better, but we liked it. The mountains rise on both sides of the village and its one long road, where we walked at sunset, crossing the bridge which spans the foaming, tumbling, rushing Ill. Beyond the ravine of the Brandnerthal, the Scesaplana, the highest mountain of the Raeticon range, rises from fields of snow. We strolled along, breathing the sweet, pure air, meeting groups of peasant-girls, all of whom carried their shoes in their hands. It was a fête day, and they had been to vespers, putting their shoes on at the church door and removing them when they came out. This most practical and admirable method of saving shoe-leather, I venture to recommend to the fathers of large families. It must be superior to “copper-toes.” When we came back to take our supper in a garden, somebody was playing Strauss waltzes, with a touch so loving, spirited, and magnetic, it seemed as if the mountains themselves must whirl off presently in response. In this land a garden where people drink beer and wine, eat, smoke, rest, think, enjoy, all in the open air, is sometimes made up of most delightful surroundings; but on the other hand it sometimes means two emaciated, dyspeptic trees, a gravel floor, and half a dozen wooden tables with wretchedly uncomfortable chairs. But if it is an enclosure in the open air with one table large enough to hold a beer-mug, it is still a garden.

Our Bludenz garden was pleasant enough, however, and we sat there till the mountains sank deeper and deeper into the gloom; and the Mädchen who waited upon us told us about her native village, where her brother was schoolmaster; our landlady came, too, and talked with us, quietly, and somewhat with the manner of a hostess entertaining guests. It was all very pretty and simple and kindly, and seemed the most natural thing in the world, as it happened. The people here had intelligent faces, clear eyes like children, and pleasant, courteous ways. The trouble about all these little places is, we don't like to leave them. It seems as if the new place could not be so pretty, the new people so kindly and simple and honest, and we go about weakly, leaving fragments of our hearts everywhere.

Then the mountain tramps we had, climbing high for a view, and then glorying in it! A little maid was once our guide, who chattered to us prettily all the way, and told us the chief events of her life,—how her father and mother were dead, and her uncle beat her, and made her work too hard; how there was a great, great, great bird who sat up on the barren cliffs so high that never a Jäger could climb near enough to shoot him; how he had eyes as big as a cow's, and when he sat on the right cliff the weather was always fair, but when he sat on the left there was storm among the mountains. This must be true, for we saw the cliffs. Then she solemnly assured us, if we would go early to the chapel in a neighboring village the following morning, we could get absolution for all our sins, because, as it appeared, the priest there was going far away, as missionary to America, and in farewell was washing the souls of his flock with extra thoroughness. We told the child it was very fortunate the good priest was going to America. From what we had heard of that ungodly land, we thought it must be in sad need of missionary work.

The scenery from Bludenz to Landeck is a series of picturesque, varied views. The road ascends with many windings to the pass of the Arlberg, when you are at last in the Tyrol; and the green, richly wooded mountains, the jagged, rocky ones, the lofty peaks where the snow gleams, together with the pure, invigorating air, and the swing of our mountain chariot with its five horses,—which, if not very rapid, were at least strong and fresh,—made altogether a thoroughly enjoyable experience.

On the Arlberg we gathered our first Alpine roses. They are not so very pretty, except as they grow often in masses so luxuriant as to give a rosy effect to a broad slope. That is, they are pretty, but their graceful cups droop so quickly when you take them from their native air and native heights, that they are disappointing.

At St. Christoph, which is almost at the top of the Arlberg, we stopped long enough to refresh ourselves with a glass of Tiroler wine, and were taken into a little chapel behind the inn to see a wooden statue of St. Christopher, who seems to be held in peculiar veneration in this region, being painted or carved in many churches and even on the walls of houses. This was a great creature of eight or nine feet, standing in the corner of the chapel, with glaring, beady eyes, glossy black painted hair, and a huge staff, to represent the pine-tree of the sweet old legend, in his hand; while on his shoulder was perched the child Jesus, with a face like a small doll. He was as funny and grotesque a saint as the world can boast, yet our hearts went strongly out to him when we learned what a very little peasant-boy it was who had made him with his pocket-knife out of a block of wood, and particularly when we observed his saintship's legs, never too symmetrical, but now hacked and chipped into utter deformity, and were told the reason. Every child in this neighborhood who must leave his mountain home takes a bit of St. Christopher with him as a talisman against homesickness. Poor little souls! Imagine them coming to say, “Lebewohl zu dem heiligen Christoph,” and tearfully hacking away in the region of his patellas and tibias and fibulas, because long ago they have removed the exterior of his stalwart members, and he will soon be dangerously undermined. His shoulders are sufficiently developed to bear considerable cutting down without perceptibly diminishing them; but I presume the little ones attack the region which they can most conveniently reach.

Lovely air and lovely hills! No wonder the children fear Heimweh will come to their hearts when they can no longer see the little village houses all huddled together round the church with the tall spire, while the green hills rise on every side, and the morning mists roll from them, and the evening glow warms and glorifies their cold, white summits, and the impetuous mountain torrent goes foaming by.

We felt premonitory symptoms of homesickness ourselves for those fair and noble heights, and we wanted very much to beg for a bit of St. Christopher's knee-pan. But they would not have given us an atom of the dear old, hideous, overgrown giant-saint, worthless heretics that we are.

[pg!115]

IN THE TYROL.

They said Landeck would not please us, but it did. They said it was not pretty, but it was. They said we would not stay there, but that is all they knew about it or us. In itself, so far as its houses are concerned, it is not attractive, it is true; but it lies in a very picturesque way on both banks of the Inn, which rushes and roars constantly at this point, and the hills around are bold and beautiful. It has its ancient castle, on the heights directly above the town; but the castle now is a failure, whatever proud tales its walls might tell us could they speak,—a failure even as a “ruin,” I mean. It is not very high, but the path is steep; and when you get to the top you wish you had remained below, for there is nothing to reward you. The view is no finer than you can have from almost any point here; and the castle is simply nothing to see, being only a few gray walls without form or comeliness, in the shade of which, the day we visited it, sat a few poor old women, who now occupy it, with snails and bats and wind and storm, rent free.

To Zams, the next village, you walk along the river road past fields of grain, where cornflowers and poppies are gayly growing, and the water hurrying from the mountains sings its loud, bold song, and everywhere around are the varied hues and heights of the Tyrolean Alps. At Zams there is a beautiful waterfall, which you must seek if you would see, for it hides itself from the world. Over a bridge, along the river road, then through lanes where there were more of the pretty cornflowers and gay poppies, past a group of cottages, a mill, a noisy brook, a mass of rugged cliffs, we strolled, the voice of the falling water calling us ever nearer and nearer, until suddenly at the last it was before us. The rocks conceal it on every side up to the last moment when you are directly at the foot of it,—one of the fine dramatic effects in which Mother Nature likes sometimes to indulge.

It falls with great force a hundred and fifty feet, perhaps,—this is a wild feminine guess, yet somewhere near the truth, I hope,—in a narrow, immensely swift stream, which, as it issues from the rock, runs a little diagonally. It has forced a passage through the rock, and when we saw it was sweeping through this aperture; but in stormy weather it hurls itself over the summit of the ledge, increasing its height many feet, and is magnificent in its fury. An experienced mountain-climber told us that there are a succession of these falls, of which this is the seventh and last, and the only one that can be seen without painful and dangerous climbing, they are so singularly concealed. The stream springs from the glaciers far away, and leaps from rock to rock in wild, unseen beauty. It seemed to speak to us of the lonely, frozen heights and solitude of its birthplace.

From Landeck to Innsbruck the scenery, taken all in all, though pleasing, is less bold and more monotonous than are many other parts of the Tyrol. There are many historical points of interest here, and reminders of the bravery of the mountaineers in different wars. You see where they stood high on their native hills hurling down trunks of trees and huge masses of rock on the invading Bavarians; and what this work of destruction failed to do, the sure aim of the Tyrolese riflemen effectually accomplished.

In one village they exhibit the room where Frederic Augustus, king of Saxony, died suddenly from the kick of a horse. Having no inordinate interest in his deceased majesty, we were quite content to gaze placidly at the outside of the house from the post-wagon, as we informed the man who tried to induce us to march in, pay our fees, and so increase the revenues of the inn. He was deeply disgusted, and evidently considered us persons of inferior taste.

You are shown, off at the right of the road on a wooded height, the ruins of Schloss Petersburg, the birthplace of Margaret, daughter of the count of the Tyrol through whom Tyrol came into the possession of the emperors of Austria.

We have seen so many little villages more or less alike, all having saints painted on their houses in brilliant hues, and mottoes over their doorways,—some religious, some quite secular and merry, and all, too, having names of one syllable, composed chiefly of consonants, such as Imst, Silz, Zams, Mils, Telfs, Zirl,—we cannot hope to remember them with that clearness which characterizes the well-regulated mind on its travels. (No one in our party has a well-regulated mind.) But we have a way among ourselves of designating places, which is quite satisfactory and intelligible to us. For instance, we say, “That was where we drank the cream”; “That was where the innkeeper was a barrel, with head and feet protruding”; “That was where that interesting body, the fire department, were feasting at long tables and singing Tyrolean songs”; “The village where we met the procession, old men and maidens, young men and children, singing, chanting, telling their beads, bearing candles, and, most of all, staring at the strangers.”—And what were the strangers doing? Staring at the people, to be sure. We always stare. We are here for that purpose.—“The village where the girl put a flower in her sweetheart's hat.” And how pretty it was! The post-wagon had hardly stopped before a good-looking youth dashed down from its top, and at the same instant a rosy waiter-girl dashed out from the inn, bearing a tall mug of foaming beer. She had eyes but for him. He had eyes but for her—and the beer. Entranced they met! They stood a little apart from us by a garden, and beamed and smiled at each other and whispered their secrets, and didn't care a straw whether we stupid “other people” saw them or not. They had but a few moments of bliss, for the boy had to go on with the post; but while he was drinking the very last of that reviving fluid, she took his hat from his head, and, stooping to the flowers beside her, chose a great flaming carnation pink, which she fastened in his hat-band. He looked pleased, which of course made her look pleased; but what a wise little village-Hebe it was to give him the beer first! What would he have cared for the flower when his throat was dusty and thirsty! It is such a pity some women always persist in offering their flowers and graces too soon,—forgetting the nature of the creature they adore.

In an inn at one village was a table which we coveted strongly. It was, they said, a hundred and fifty years old, octagonal, four or five feet in diameter, made of inlaid woods in the natural colors, now darkened with age. Broad, solid, firm, it looked as if it might last a hundred and fifty years longer and then retain its vigor of constitution. It had a wise, knowing air, as of having seen a great deal of the world; and the landlord told us tales of drinking and fighting and scenes of rough soldier-life, which were enough to make it tremble for its existence. Bavarian soldiers once, when they were occupying the village, used it rather roughly, and left as many sword-cuts and dents in it as they could make in its brave, firm wood. Its centre was a slate or blackboard, on which beer accounts are conveniently reckoned.

Just beyond Zirl, the Martinswand rises sixteen hundred feet perpendicularly above the road. It has its story, to which everybody who comes here must listen.

The Emperor Maximilian, in 1493, was chasing a chamois above the Martinswand, and, having lost his way, made a misstep, fell down to the edge of a precipice, and hung there, unable to recover his footing. The priest of Zirl came with some of his people, and, it being impossible to reach him, stood at the bottom of the cliff, elevated the host, granting him absolution; and then, in horror, awaited the end. But “an angel in the garb of a chamois-hunter” appeared at this crisis, and bore the exhausted monarch to a place of safety. The perilous spot, nine hundred feet above the river, is now marked by a cross, and the paten used by the priest is a blessed relic in a church.

The story seems to be quite generally believed in this neighborhood. We sceptical strangers do not find it so enormous a morsel to swallow as is sometimes presented to us. I presume if any of us were dangling between heaven and earth, with the immediate prospect of falling nine hundred feet, we would be very apt to call whatever should rescue us an “angel.”

[pg!121]

INNSBRUCK.

Innsbruck impressed us, at first, as being far too citified for us to delight in. Entering its streets about sunset, the time when we have of late been accustomed to see the cows come home in great herds from the mountain pastures, we, our bags and shawl-straps, were deposited upon the sidewalk; for when the post stops, you stop without ceremony, and are never taken to the particular hotel where you wish to go. We stared blankly at the broad streets and ruefully at one another. Our eyes, instead of seeing lowing herds, fell upon gallant young officers in brilliant uniforms. We became painfully aware of certain defects in our personal appearance, of which we had been beautifully unconscious in the rural mountain districts. We observed for the first time that there were chasms in our gloves, indented peaks in our hats, alluvial deposits on our gowns; while our boots suggested dangerous ravines, bridged across by one button, instead of boasting that goodly, decorous row without which no civilized woman can be truly respectable. We revenged ourselves by calling Innsbruck “tame,” and declaring that we would at once flee to our mountain. But it is surprising how quickly we have become accustomed to the luxuries of life in an excellent hotel, how bravely we bear the infliction of well-cooked dinners, with what fortitude we recline in luxurious chairs, and allow well-trained servants to wait upon us. Already we have remained longer than we intended, there is so much here that interests us; but soon we start off again to commune with Nature and get sunburned.

Then, the truth is, Innsbruck, which looked so enormous, so grand, to our eyes, used as they were to Tyrolean villages,—we know now how the typical country cousin feels when he comes “to town” for the first time,—is only a little place most charmingly situated on the Inn, in a great broad valley, with mountains ten thousand feet high on one side, and on the other heights that look almost as bold. It has, including its large garrison, eighteen or twenty thousand inhabitants, and with its pleasant atmosphere, extended views, charming mountain excursions, peasants in a variety of costumes, soldiers in a variety of uniforms, excellent music, and many things of historical interest to see, is a very enjoyable place.

The Museum is thoroughly interesting; a visit to Schloss Amras, where Archduke Ferdinand II. and his wife Philippina Welser used to live, is an inevitable but agreeable excursion; you are shown buildings erected by celebrated personages,—among them a “golden roof” over a balcony of a palace which Count Frederic of the Tyrol built to prove that he did not deserve the nickname, “with the empty pockets.” But the chief thing to see, the glory of Innsbruck, is the Maximilian monument in the Franciscan church. Maximilian, in bronze, kneels on a marble pedestal in the centre of the nave, and eight-and-twenty great bronze figures of kings and queens and heroes surround him. Some are stately and grand; some—dare I say?—are comical. The feet of these mailed heroes are so broad and big and their ankles so attenuated, you are reminded of the marine armor worn by divers; and the waists of the women, in the heavy folds of ancient times, are so enormously dumpy and their heads so curious, you smile in their august faces, though the whole effect of all these dark, still figures in the dim church is imposing in the extreme.

They are all celebrated people, whose histories we know; or, if we do not, we ought to. There is Clovis of France, who looks very important indeed, and Philip of Spain. There is Johanna, Philip's queen; Cunigunde, sister of Maximilian; Eleanora of Portugal, his mother; and there are many more “dear, dead women,” with stately, beautiful names, and they themselves, no doubt, were stately and beautiful too, but they are not handed down to posterity in a very flattering guise. There is Godfrey de Bouillon, “king of Jerusalem,” with a crown of thorns on his head. But the two that are really lovely to see are Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, and Arthur of England. Susceptible, romantic girls of eighteen should not be allowed to gaze too long at these ideal young men. It will make them discontented with the realities of life, and they will spend their days dreaming of knightly figures in bronze.

Theodoric is considered the finest as a work of art. So says all established authority; but to me Arthur is hardly less interesting. Perhaps, in some absurd way, it gratified us of Anglo-Saxon blood to see, in the midst of these Rudolphs and Sigismunds, these counts of Hapsburg and dukes of Burgundy, a hero who seemed to belong to us; but, whatever was the cause, the blameless king won our loving admiration.

Theodoric is the more graceful. He stands in an easy, leaning attitude. He is lost in thought. He is in full armor, but he may be dreaming of something far removed from war. Arthur is firm and proud and strong, looking every inch a king and a true knight. Both are knightly. Both are kingly. Their figures are slight and strong, and they stand like young heroes amid these mighty old potentates, some of whom look as if gout might have been a greater source of trouble to them than their enemies.

If your affections are divided, as were ours, between the two, the best thing to do, perhaps, is to repair immediately to the store where the wood-carving and Tyrol souvenirs make you feel quite miserable,—you want so much more than you can possibly have,—and carefully select a Theodoric and an Arthur from the many representations of them, in wood of different colors and in various sizes, that you will there see. If you march off with them, you will feel sublime enough not to be beguiled into yielding to the temptation of the paper-knives and boxes and innumerable fascinating knick-knacks made by the Tyrolean wood-carvers. But do have them well packed, for it is very sad to see Arthur without his visor and Theodoric with several fractured fingers.

On the sarcophagus, below the kneeling Maximilian, are marble reliefs representing the chief events in the emperor's life. Thorwaldsen pronounced the first nineteen the most perfect work of its kind in the world. These are by Colin, and the others,—there are twenty-four in all,—by Bernhard and Albert Abel, are less remarkable in their perspective, and far less clear. Colin's are very interesting to study carefully. In battle scenes, in grand wedding feasts, with hundreds of spectators, in triumphant entries into conquered cities, every face, every weapon, every feature, and all the most minute details are executed with wonderful clearness.

Three or four of the oldest women in the world were saying their prayers in the church as we wandered about, or sat quietly looking at these men and woman of the past, while queer snatches of history, poetry, and romance came and went confusedly in our minds.

You see here, too, a little “Silver Chapel,” so called from a silver statue of the Virgin over the altar. The tomb of the Archduke Ferdinand II., by Colin, is here, and that of Philippina Welser; and near the entrance, in the main church, is a fine statue, in Tyrolese marble, of Andreas Hofer, and memorial tablets in honor of all the Tyrolese who have died for their country since 1796.

We have been refreshing our memories in regard to Andreas Hofer, and are extremely interested in his career; but, having just suffered a grievous disappointment with which he is connected, we are going to try to banish every thought of him from our minds. A play representing his whole life was to have been enacted to-day in a neighboring village; but to-day it rains, and as the village histrionic talent was going to display itself in the open air, “Andreas Hofer” is postponed till to-morrow, when, unfortunately, we shall be riding over hill and dale in a post-wagon. We have tried to prevail upon the post-wagon powers to allow us to wait a day, but they are obdurate. We can wait if we care to pay our passage twice, not otherwise. This cross may be well for a party that usually sails along on the full tide of prosperity, having always the rooms it wants, front seats in post-wagons, the good-will of drivers and guides, and that hasn't lost or broken anything since it started.

It is possible that we are too successful and need this discipline. But only think what we lose!—a village drama in the open air, given by village amateurs in the patois of the district. According to the announcement, the tailor—the Herr Schneider—was to be director-in-chief; and the audience would audibly express its praise and blame, while the actors would have the liberty of retiring. This, added to heroics in dialect, certainly promised an entertaining scene. The costumes, too, were to be like those worn in Andreas Hofer's time, and the tailor's daughter was to be leading lady. Was, do I say? Is—is yet to be, but not for us, alas!

[pg!127]

OHENSCHWANGAU AND NEU SCHWANSTEIN.

It pains me to think that the king of Bavaria, or any other fine-looking young gentleman, would deliberately scowl at an inoffensive party of ladies who were, one and all, only too pleased to have the opportunity of gazing smilingly at him. But the truth is, he did. The way it happened is this. We and the king of Bavaria are at present travelling in the North Tyrol. But he cannot have wanted so much as we to go to the South Tyrol, which is bolder and grander, or he would have gone there, not being bound by petty considerations of convenience and expense like ordinary tourists. At a little inn, “Auf der Ferne,” between Innsbruck and Reutte, in a place called Fernstein, by a lake named Fernsee (and also “The Three Lakes,” because the land juts out on one side in two long points, making three pretty coves where the tranquil water meets the soft green shores), the post-wagon halted, that our postilion might drink his glass of native wine. There were numerous servants in blue-and-silver livery at the door, and we were told King Louis was driving in the neighborhood, and that we would certainly meet him. While we were waiting, the people regaled us with tales of the young king's eccentricities. Some of his extravagant fancies remind one of the Arabian Nights, or old fairy-tales, more than of anything in these latter days. He usually travels by night, for instance, and sleeps, the little that he ever sleeps, mornings. He drives fast through the darkness, servants with torches galloping in advance, stopping here and there only long enough for a change of horses, his own horses and servants being in readiness for him at the different inns along the route. Often his carriage dashes up to this inn, “Auf der Ferne,” at twelve o'clock at night, and then this deliciously eccentric being is rowed across the little Fernsee to a tiny island, where he partakes, by the romantic gleam of torches, of a feast prepared by French cooks. Rowed back to the shore, he starts again with fresh horses and goes swiftly on, through the night, to some other inn, where the noise of his arrival awakens all the sleepers.

We heard him later ourselves at two in the morning at an inn on the road where we were staying, and in fact were told by the landlord that he was expected; were shown the sacred apartment set apart for his majesty, who now and then sits an hour in it at some unearthly time of night, and we were advised to peep through our curtains at him, his suite, and his horses, torches, etc.; but such was the sleepiness created by a ride of sixteen hours in mountain air, that, though we were dimly conscious something of interest was happening, I do not think we would have been able to stir, to see even Solomon in all his glory. This was the true reason, but the one that we pretended actuated us is quite different. We remark with dignity that no young woman of proper spirit will condescend to peep through a curtain at a man who has scowled at her, king or no king.

But I must tell you how, when, and where the royal scowl took place. We had left the little inn by the lake, and were riding along in an expectant mood, when there came a great clatter of hoofs, and two blue-and-silver men dashed by followed by an open carriage, where King Louis sat alone. A kind fate ordained that the road should be narrow at this point, with a steep bank on one side, over which it would not be pleasant to be precipitated; so the royal coachman, as well as our driver, moderated the speed of his horses, and we therefore had an admirable opportunity to see this “idealisch” young man—as the Germans call him—distinctly. The ceremonies performed were few. Our postilion took off his hat; so did the king. Then it seemed good in his sight to deliberately throw back his head, look full in our amiable, smiling, interested countenances, and indulge in a haughty and an unmistakable scowl. He must have slept even less than usual that morning. We were not accustomed to have young men scowl at us, and really felt quite hurt. If he had looked grand and unseeing, had gazed off abstractedly upon the mountain-tops, we would have been delighted with him. As it is, we cannot honestly say that we consider his manner to strangers ingratiating. Still, as the melancholy fact is that he hates women, his scowl probably meant no especial aversion to our humble selves, but was merely the expression of the immense scorn and disgust he feels towards the sex at large.

In revenge, I hasten to say that, though he certainly has a distinguished air, and a fine head, and the great eyes that look so dreamy and poetical in the photographs of him at eighteen or twenty, he is not nearly so handsome as those early pictures. Perhaps he can look dreamy still; but of this he granted us no opportunity to judge, and he has grown stout, and has lost the delicate refinement of his youth.

This road to Reutte is one of the finest of the mountain-passes between the Tyrol and Bavaria. The deep, wooded ravines, lovely, dark-green lakes, and noble heights make the landscape very beautiful and inspiring. Near Lennos, you see on the east great bald limestone precipices, the snowy Zugspitze, 9,761 feet high, the Schneefernerkopf, 9,462 feet, and other peaks of 8,000 feet and more; while you spy picturesque ruins, old hunting-seats, and fortresses here and there high on the proud cliffs.

Reutte has large, broad, pretty houses. It is said laughingly that there is not a house in the place which a king or some other exalted being has not selected to die in, or in some way to make memorable.

From this place we have pursued still farther our studies of royalty, having met with so much encouragement at the outset. We have visited the Schloss Hohenschwangau, where the king of Bavaria and his mother, the queen, spend some time every summer; and also Schloss Schwanstein, which is yet building, but where the young king often stays, unfinished as it is.

The way to Hohenschwangau leads through a charming park. The castle was once a Roman fort, they say, then a baronial estate, then almost destroyed by the Tyrolese, then bought by King Max of Bavaria, who had it remodelled and ornamented with fine frescos by Munich artists.

In the vestibule is an inscription in gold letters on blue, which says something like this:—

“Welcome, wanderer,—welcome, fair and gracious women!

Leave all care behind!

Yield your souls to the sweet influences of poetry.”

Isn't that a pretty greeting? It's all very well, however, to have such things written on your walls, and then to go about the world scowling at people; but it doesn't look consistent. From the vestibule you pass into a long hall, where are two rows of columns, old suits of armor standing like men on guard on both sides, shields, spears, halberds, and cross-bows on the walls, and a little chapel at the end.

The frescos throughout the castle are very interesting. From the billiard-room, with a pretty balcony, you go into the Schwanrittersaal, where the pictures on the walls represent the legend of the Knight of the Swan, and remind you of the opera of “Lohengrin.” The painted glass of the doors opening from this room upon a balcony is of the seventeenth century.

There is an Oriental room, with reminiscences of King Max's Eastern travels. Here you see Smyrna, Troja, the Dardanelles, Constantinople, in fresco; rich presents from the Sultan, a table-cover embroidered by the wives of the Sultan, jewelled fans, etc.

There is an Autharis room, with frescos by Schwind, telling the story of the wooing of the Princess Theudelinda by the Lombard king, Autharis. Do you feel perfectly familiar with the history of Autharis and Theudelinda? Because, if you do not, I don't really know of any one just at this moment who feels competent to give you the slightest information upon the subject.

There is a room of the knights, the frescos illustrating mediæval chivalry,—a Charlemagne room. There are, in fact, more rooms than you care to read about or I care to describe, and many rich objects to see. In the queen's apartments was a casket of gold studded with turquoises and rubies; elegant toilet-tables rosy with silk linings, soft with falling lace; and there is one dear little balcony-room, cosy and full of familiar pictures,—Raphael's cherubs, a little painting of Edelweiss and Alpine roses; and actually two real spinning-wheels: one is the queen's, and the other belonged to a young court lady whose recent death was a deep grief to the queen, it is said.

But the most striking, and in the end fascinating, thing in the castle is the number of swans you see. It would be difficult to convey any idea of the swan-atmosphere of this place. Swans support baskets for flowers and vases. There are swans in china, in marble, in alabaster, in gold and silver, on the tables, on the mantels and brackets, painted, embroidered on cushions and footstools,—everywhere you find them. A half-dozen of different sizes stand together on a small table, some of them large, some as tiny as the toy swan a child sails in his glass preserve-dish for a pond. There is a swan-fountain in the garden; a great swan on the stove in a reception-room.

King Louis can bathe every day in a gold bath-tub if he wishes. Our eyes have seen it, though the guide said he had never shown it before. I have no means of knowing whether the man told the truth. There is another and yet more enticing bath-room hewn out of the solid rock. We entered it from the garden. From without, its walls look like dark thick glass, through which one sees absolutely nothing. From within, the effect is enchanting. You see the highest tower of the castle on one side rising directly above you, the lovely garden with its choice flowers and superb trees, the grand mountains beyond,—and all bathed in a deep rosy light from the hue of the glass. It is an enchanted grotto, and very Arabian Nights-ish. A marble nymph stands on each side of the bath, which is cut in the centre of the stone floor, and one of them turns on a pivot, disclosing a concealed niche, into which you step and slowly swing round until you are in a subterranean passage, from which a mysterious stairway leads to the dressing-room above.

We went everywhere, even into the king's little study, up in the tower, where we were explicitly told not to go. It was a simply furnished room, with an ordinary writing-table, upon which papers and writing-materials were strewn about, and important-looking envelopes directed to the king. And it commanded a lovely view of mountains, broad plains, and four lakes, the Alpsee, Schwansee, Hopfensee, and Bannwaldsee.

Our little tour of inspection was just in time, for at twelve that night, the castle servants told us, the king would come dashing up to his own door, after which there can be of course no admittance to visitors.

Hohenschwangau is most beautifully situated, but the Neu Schwanstein is still more striking. It is founded upon a rock. You climb to reach it, and you can climb far higher on the mountains that tower behind it. It stands directly by a deep ravine, and the view from it is magnificent. The young king here by his own hearthstone has wild and abrupt mountain scenery,—a rocky gorge, crossed by a delicate wire bridge, an impetuous waterfall; and looking far, far off from the battlements he sees villages, many lakes, dense woods, winding streams, Hohenschwangau looking proudly towards its royal neighbor, and the glorious mountains circling and guarding the valley. Living here, one would feel like a god on high Olympus looking down upon humanity toiling on the plains below.

The king likes this place, and it is said wishes to remain here when the queen, his mother, comes to Hohenschwangau. But this is an unwarrantable intrusion upon their little family differences, which they should enjoy unmolested, like you and me. Schwanstein in its exterior form and character resembles a mediæval castle, and the appointments in the servants' wing, the only part of the interior as yet finished, are strictly in keeping. There are solid oaken benches and tables, carved cases and chests, oaken bedsteads as simply made as possible, and windows with tiny oval or diamond panes.

The room occupied temporarily by the king is very small and simple,—has a plain oak bedstead and dressing-table. Across the bed were thrown blankets, on which were blue swans and blue lions, and in the dining-room adjoining the carpet was blue, with golden Bavarian lions, and the all-pervading swans. This was a pretty room, the frescos illustrating the story of a life in mediæval times,—the life of a warrior from the moment when he starts forth from his father's door, a fair-haired boy, to seek his fortunes in the great world. Mountain scenery, village life, his first service to a knight, battle, gallant deeds, receiving knighthood, betrayal, imprisonment, escape, victory,—all the eventful story until he sits with men old like himself, and over their wine they tell of the doughty deeds of the past; and then, older still, and frail and feeble and alone, he leans upon his staff as he rests under a tree where careless children play around him.

A charming road, through the woods belonging to the Schwanstein park, leads to the castle, past the lovely Alpsee, which looks deep and calm, and lies lovingly nestled among the beautiful woods that surround it and that rise high above it, as if striving to conceal its loveliness from profane eyes.

We saw forty of the royal horses—pretty creatures they were too—each with the name painted over the stall. We were reading them aloud, they were so odd and fanciful, when, as one of us said Fenella, the little horse that claimed that name turned her pretty head and tried to come to us. However gently we would call her, she always heard and looked at us. Encouraged by this gracious condescension on the part of a royal animal, we ventured to make friends with her; and if ever a horse smiled with good-will and delight it was Fenella when we gave her sugar.

His majesty's carriages were also shown to us, and received our approval. They are plain and elegant, but do not differ from high-toned equipages in general. A narrow little phaeton, low, and large enough to hold but one person, we were told was a favorite of the king. In it, with a man at each side of the horse's head leading him, and bearing a torch, the king amuses himself by ascending dangerous mountain-roads at night. They say it is astonishing where he will go in this manner. Fancy meeting that scowling but interesting young man, his torches and his funny little vehicle, on a lonely peak at midnight!

[pg!137]

LIFE IN SCHATTWALD.

We have been in the Tyrol many days, in villages among the mountains, living in simplicity, content, and charity to all mankind. We have believed that our condition was as thoroughly rural as anything that could possibly be attained by people who only want to be rural temporarily as an experiment. But our present experience so far transcends all that we have known in the past, that the other villages seem like bustling, important towns, unpleasantly copying city ways, compared with this funny little quiet Schattwald.

We came here from Reutte in an open carriage, passed through a wonderfully beautiful ravine, saw the lovely dark-green lakes that delight the soul in this part of the world, little hamlets scattered about picturesquely among pine-clad hills, bold peaks towering to the clouds in the distance, and drove slowly through soft, broad meadows, where the whole population was out making hay. We saw many Tyrolean Maud Müllers in bright gowns that looked pretty in the sunshine. A German friend told us a certain small object was “an American hay-cart, and very practical, like all American inventions.” He was so positive in his convictions, and, at the same time, so gracious towards the inventive genius of America, that we saw it would be useless and unwise to pretend to know anything about the hay-cart of our native heath. But if an American hay-cart should see its Tyrolean prototype, it would shatter itself into atoms with laughter.

So in the serene, perfect midsummer weather, through this charming country, we came to Schattwald, the highest village in the Thanheimer Thal.

I feel now that it is my duty to give a friendly caution to people whose nerves are easily shocked, and to advise them to drop this letter at this very point, for it is shortly going to treat of exceedingly realistic and inelegant things.

We drove to the village inn. There were hens and children on the broken stone doorstep, and men drinking beer in a little pavilion close by. A broad and jocund landlady told us there was absolutely no place for us. We are, therefore, ensconced in a veritable peasant's cottage over the way, going across to the inn when we are hungry, which is tolerably often in this mountain air.

Our rooms are broad and very low, with wide casements having tiny panes. A stout wooden bench against the wall serves as sofa and chairs. A bare wooden table in front of it is graced by a great dish filled with Alpine roses, Edelweiss, and Wildemänner, which is an appropriate name for the little flower with its brown unkempt head and shaggy elf-locks blowing in the wind. A six-inch looking-glass is hung exactly where the wall joins the ceiling, and exactly where we cannot possibly see ourselves in it without standing on something, when we invariably bump our heads. This pointedly tells us that vanity is a plant that does not flourish in these lofty altitudes. There are crucifixes on the walls, and extraordinary religious pictures; and in the corner of the front door there is a saint somebody made of wood, life-size, with a reddish gown, and tinsel stars on a wire encircling her head. I think she must be Mary, though it did not occur to me at first, she is such a corpulent young woman, with a thick, short waist, and solid feet, which, nevertheless, by their position, express the idea that she is floating. An old woman often sits by her, knitting, as we go in and out.

“Is it clean?” I know some one is asking. That depends upon what you call clean; and when travelling one must modify one's opinion about cleanliness and order. For a dressing-room it would be shockingly unclean; for peasant life up in the Alps it is—if the expression is permissible—clean enough.

The floors are clean, and the bedding and towels. The water is pure and fresh, the dishes and food perfectly clean. And these, after all, are the essentials. But things are very much mixed, to say the least; and the animal kingdom lives in close proximity to its superiors. In fact, up here it seems to have no superiors.

You sit in the open air eating a roast chicken, with a bit of salad; and the brother and sister chickens, that will some day be sacrificed to the appetite of another traveller, are running about unconscious of their doom at your feet. A little colt walks up to you and insists upon putting his nose in your plate,—insists, too, upon being petted,—and hasn't the least delicacy or comprehension when you tell him you are busy and wish he would go away. He stays calmly, and presently a goat or two and a big dog join the group. Such imperturbable good-nature and complacency, such naïveté, I have never before known animals to possess. They have been treated since their birth with so much consideration, they never imagine that their society may not always be desired. In fact, the animals and the people have innocent, friendly ways; and as it never occurs to them you can be displeased with anything they may do, the result is you never are. And as to the question of cleanliness, perhaps the simplest way to settle it is to say that there is indeed dirt enough here, but it is all, as the children say, “clean dirt,” and at all events, with glorious air and lovely mountain views, brightness and goodness and kindness meeting you on every side from the peasants, one must be very sickly either in body or mind, or in both, to be too critical about trifles.

One whole morning we spent in a Sennhütte,—a cowherd's hut,—high above the village. (Did I not warn you that ungenteel things were coming?) And it was one of the most interesting and amusing half-days we have ever known. There were fifty cows there, as carefully tended as if they were Arabian horses, and noble specimens of their kind of beauty. The prettiest ones were cream-colored, with great soft eyes. They expected to be talked to and petted like all the other animals in Schattwald. There were different rooms, the mountain breezes blowing straight through them all, where five or six workmen were making butter and enormous cheeses. If we do not know how to make superior cheese and butter, it is not the fault of our hosts in the Sennhütte, for they left nothing unexplained.

Dare I, or dare I not, tell what should now come in a faithful chronicle of that morning? I dare. Towards twelve, the chief workman—a man who had been devoting himself to our entertainment, even sending his little son far out on the hills for Alpine flowers for us—prepared the simple soup which serves as dinner for these hard-working men, who eat no meat during the entire summer, and work nearly eighteen hours a day. We were interested in that soup, as in everything that was made, done, or said in that novel place. It was only cream, and salt, and butter, and flour, but it was made by a dark-eyed man with his sleeves rolled up and a white cap on his head, and it simmered in a kettle large enough to be a witch's caldron.

When quite cooked it was poured into a great wooden dish that was almost flat, and each workman drew near with his spoon in his hand. We were thinking what a pleasant scene this was going to be, and were about to regard it from afar like something on the stage, when to our utter amazement our friend the soup-maker, as simply, as naturally, with as much courtesy and kindness as ever a gentleman at his own table offered delicate viands to an honored guest, gave me a spoon and assigned me my place at the table.

Dear Mrs. Grundy, what would you have done? I know very well. You would have drawn yourself up in a superior way, and you would have looked as proper as the mother of the Gracchi, and you would have remarked,—

“Really, my dear Mr. Cowherd-cheese-maker, I have been educated according to the separate-plate theory.”

But then Mrs. Grundy would never have placed herself quite in our position, for she would not have been demeaning herself by peering into churns and kettles, tasting fresh butter, drinking cream from wooden ladles, and asking questions about cows, and indeed it is improbable that she would have allowed herself to even enter such a place; we will therefore leave Mrs. Grundy completely out of the question,—which is always a huge satisfaction,—and tell how we conducted ourselves under these unforeseen circumstances.

With outward calmness, with certain possible misgivings and inward shrinkings, we smilingly took the seat assigned in the circle of friendly young workmen, and dipped our spoon in the wooden soup-dish with all the other spoons. That we ate, really ate, much, I cannot say. Not only was suppressed amusement a hindrance to appetite, but the five young men with their rolled-up sleeves, their patois, their five spoons dipping together in unison and brotherly love, though interesting as a picture, with the cows lazily lying in the background, and the Tyrolean Alps seen through the open doors and windows, presented nevertheless certain obstacles to a thorough enjoyment of the rustic meal. To taste, according to our code, was obligatory; to eat was impossible. We tried to spur on that languid spoon to do its duty; we philosophized about human equality, but all in vain; and we ate not in a proper, true spirit, but like a hypocrite, or an actress, so strong are these silly prejudices that govern us.

But the men were quite satisfied, since their soup was pronounced excellent; and, having once accepted their hospitality, we had no difficulty in excusing ourselves when a second soup—cheese being its principal ingredient—was offered us. Our one regret in the whole experience was, that we could not summon the primest woman of our acquaintance to suddenly stand in the doorway and gaze in, aghast, upon this convivial scene. That, had it been possible, would have been a joy forever in our remembrance.

This Schattwald certainly has great fascinations to offer the wanderer who seeks shelter here. Rough scrambles for Alpine flowers are followed by a long afternoon of novel enjoyment, listening to a chorus of hunters singing Tyrolean songs,—real hunters, and we never saw their like before except on the stage! The one who played the zither was adorned with trophies of the chase,—a chamois beard on his dark-green hat, and, on his coat, buttons made from stag-antlers. He was rather a noble-looking man, with a straightforward, kindly expression in his eyes, and he sang the mountain songs with great spirit. They all sang with enjoyment, and there seemed to be an immense “swing” to the music. The songs expressed joy and pride in the freedom of the mountain life, and alluded in poetical language to their mountain maids. In several of them the singers gave the “Jodel,” which we also heard repeatedly echoing among the mountains, and responded to from height to height.

On the prettiest cottage in the place is this inscription in verse. I give the literal translation:—

“I once came into a strange land;

On the wall was written,

‘Be pious, and also reserved:

Let everything alone that is not thine.’”

The hunters sang with special delight one song which frequently asserted that “Auf der Alm there is no sin.” This impressed us as a delightful idea, though somewhat at variance with the theological doctrines in vogue in a less rarefied atmosphere. We did not presume to doubt anything they told us, however. We are rapidly becoming as credulous, as simple, as bucolic, as they. But, reclining one evening at sunset on a soft slope above the village, with the breath of the pines around us, and listening, in a lotus-eating mood, to the “drowsy tinklings” of the bells of the herds on the opposite heights, this problem occurred to us: How long will it be, at our present rapid rate of assimilation with things pastoral, and with the slight line of demarcation that exists in Schattwald between man and bird and beast, before we also contentedly eat grass, and go about with bells on our necks?

[pg!145]

UP THE AIRY MOUNTAIN.

“Will you walk into my parlor?” said every innkeeper from Chur to St. Moritz, and our minds were half absorbed in contemplation of the scenery and half in resisting the allurements of these Swiss spiders, all of whom declared with many grimaces and shrugs that we could not accomplish the distance between the two places in one day.

“Does not the regular post go through in one day?” we inquire. “Then why not we by extra post?”

“You are too late, madame.”

“We are not so heavy as the diligence. We can go faster.”

“Impossible, madame.”

“Why impossible?”

“Not precisely impossible; but it would be better, ah, yes, madame, far better, to remain here,”—with the sweetest of smiles,—“and go on to St. Moritz to-morrow.”

They knew this was nonsense. We knew it was nonsense. They knew that we knew that it was nonsense. We had borne all that it was fitting we should bear.

“But why?” we sternly demand.

“You will be more comfortable, madame.”

“We do not wish to be comfortable.”

“You will arrive at midnight.”

“We like to arrive at midnight.”

What then could the spiders do with flies who retorted in this unheard-of-way, who resisted advice, would telegraph for horses, cheer the postilions with absurdly frequent Trink Geld, and push steadily on to St. Moritz high in the upper Engadine?

The truly remarkable feature of the expedition was, that when we left Chur in the morning it was only with a lazy consciousness that up among the mountains somewhere was a St. Moritz, which we at some indefinite time would reach.

Innkeeper No. 1 made us think we would like to go through in one day.

Innkeeper No. 2 strengthened the wish.

No. 3, by his efforts at discouragement, gave us, in place of the wish, a determination to go on.

No. 4 created in us a frantic resolve to reach St. Moritz that night, or perish in the attempt.

No banner with a strange device did we bear, yet as the shades of night were falling fast, and we stopped to change horses at a little inn in an Alpine village, and queer-looking men with lanterns walked about the wild place speaking in an unknown tongue (it was Romanisch, but then we did not know), and the road was steep before us, we gloried in resembling the immortal “youth” of the poem. We always have admired him from the time we learned him by heart, and repeated him in our first infant sing-song; but never before did we have the remotest idea why his brow was sad, why his eye flashed like a falchion from its sheath, why he persisted in his eccentric career. Now it is clear as light before us. He was goaded on, as we were, by the Swiss innkeepers.

“O, stay!” said they.

“Excelsior!” cried we. And on we went, feeling that a mighty fate was impelling us, alluding grandly to “Sheridan's Ride,” “How they brought the Good News,” and all similar subjects that we could remember where people pushed on with high resolve, and being in the end grateful to the petty souls who had roused our obstinacy, ignorant that even the Alps are no obstacle to woman's will; for the latter part of the journey was by perfect moonlight, and therefore do we bless the innkeepers. Our obstinacy, do I say? Let the sneering world use that unpleasant term. We will say heroism, for who shall always tell where the line between the two is to be drawn?

Never shall we forget that wonderful white night, the gleams and glooms on the mountains, the silver radiance of the lakes, the vast glaciers outstretched before us, the mighty peaks towering to the skies, the impressive stillness broken only by the bells on our horses' necks, the sound of their hoofs on the hard road, the rumbling of our carriage, and the cracking of the whip. We, with our miserable jarring noises, were the only discordant element, and we well knew we ought to be suppressed. It seemed profane to intrude upon such grandeur, such majestic stillness.

In the full sunlight since, all is quite different; yet we close our eyes, and that glorious white, still night comes vividly before us, and always there will be to us a glamour about the Engadine on account of it.

The village of St. Moritz lies picturesquely on the hillside above a pretty lake of the same name. The St. Moritz baths are a mile farther on, where numerous hotels and pensions stand on a grassy plateau between high mountains, whose sharp contour is wonderfully defined in this clear atmosphere against the peculiar deep-blue of the sky.

In a very interesting article about the Upper Engadine in the Fortnightly Review for March, the writer speaks with undisguised contempt of “the Germanized Kurhaus,” “the damp Kurhaus,” “the huge and hideous Kurhaus,” even telling people to beware of it. Now, if it were not a shockingly audacious thing to dare to have any opinion at all in the presence of the Fortnightly Review, I would venture most humbly to state that I am at present staying at that object of British scorn, the Kurhaus, and like it.

It is ugly. It is immensely long and awkward. If your room is in one end and you have a friend in the other, you feel, walking through the interminable corridors, that the introduction of horse-cars and carriages would promote economy of time and strength. The Kurhaus certainly has its unamiable qualities. It is tyrannical. It puts out its lights at ten o'clock “sharp,” leaving you in Egyptian darkness and not saying so much as “by your leave.” [I have observed that men, whom I have believed to be faultlessly amiable, under these circumstances lose their composure and utter improper ejaculations, as they find themselves, in the midst of an interesting game of whist, unable to see the color of a card.] But after all, unless you are in the village proper, where we—again differing from the awful Fortnightly—would not prefer to be, it seems to be the best abiding-place, because everything centres in it. The people from the other hotels must all come here to drink the mineral waters and take the baths, to dance twice a week if they wish, to hear the music three times a day, to attend various entertainments given by marvellous prestidigitateurs from Paris and singers from Vienna; and though these things are very ignoble to talk about when one is among the grand mountains, yet there come nights and days when it rains in torrents, and when the most enthusiastic mountain-climber must condescend to be amused or bored under a sheltering roof. Then, the Kurhaus, being the largest hotel, the place where things of interest most do congregate, seems to us the most desirable abode. The Victoria, which the English frequent, has fresher paint and newer carpets and finer rooms. But we are true to the Kurhaus, notwithstanding. We are grateful to it for a few charming weeks, and in some way we don't like to see Albion's proud foot crushing it.

It is “Germanized.” That is enough, to be sure, in the opinion of many English and Americans, to condemn it; they often like a hotel exclusively for themselves, and dislike the foreign element even in a foreign land. But to many of us it is infinitely more amusing to live in exactly such a place, where we meet Italians and Spaniards, French, Germans, Swiss, Dutch, Russians, people from South America and islands in the far seas,—in fact, from every land and nation,—than to establish a little English or American corner somewhere, wrap ourselves in our national prejudices, and neither for love nor money abandon one or the other.

To the Paracelsus Spring at the Kurhaus come all the people every morning to drink the mineral water, and walk up and down while the band plays in the pavilion, but very few have an invalid air. Some drink because the water is prescribed by their physicians; some, because it is the fashion; some, because it is not unpleasant, and drinking gives them an opportunity to inspect the other drinkers. The mighty names written over the glasses fill us with amazement. You may be plain Miss Smith from Jonesville, U. S. A., and beside your humble name is written that of the Countess Alfieri di Sostegno, and the name of a marquis, and even that of a princess; but when they all come to the spring and glance at you over their glasses, just as you glance at them over yours, and you see them face to face, you don't much care if you are only Miss Smith. It is astonishing what an ordinary appearance people often have whose great-great-grandfathers were doges of Venice.

It seems positive stupidity here not to speak at least five languages fluently. To hear small children talking with ease in a variety of tongues is something that, after the first astonishment, can be borne; but it never ceases to be exasperating and humiliating when common servants pass without the least difficulty from one language to another and another. Yet we Americans should perhaps have patience with ourselves in this respect, and remember that the ability to speak half a dozen languages well, which at first seems like pure genius, is often more a matter of opportunity or necessity than actual talent, though it certainly is a great convenience, and gives its possessor a superior air. “It's nonsense to learn languages, or to try to speak anything but good, honest English,” says a young gentleman here,—an American recently graduated from one of the colleges. “You can make your way round with it, and everything that's worth two straws is translated.” So he brandishes his mother-tongue proudly in people's faces, and is always immensely disgusted and incensed at their stupidity when he is not understood.

An Englishwoman the other day bought a picture of Alpine flowers, and tried to make a man understand that she also wished a stick upon which the cardboard could be rolled and safely carried in her trunk. He knew no English; she, no German. First she spoke very loud, with emphatic distinctness, as if he were deaf. Whereupon he made a remark in German, which, though an excellent remark, in itself a highly reasonable statement, had not the least relation to her request. She then spoke slowly, gently, in an endearing manner, as if coaxing a child, or endeavoring to influence a person whose understanding was feeble and who must not be frightened. He responded in German,—again sensible, but widely inappropriate. So they went on, each continuing his own line of thought, as much at cross-purposes as if they were insane, until a bystander, taking pity on them, came to the rescue. The lady was, however, not indignant that her “good, honest English” was not understood; she was simply despairing. It is singular that it never occurs to some minds that other languages, and even the people who speak them, may also be good and honest.

Here in the Engadine the dialect is Romanisch, but the people also speak German, French, Italian, and often tolerable English. The houses are solidly built, with very thick walls, curious iron knockers, deep-sunken windows, with massive iron gratings over them. The object of the gratings is doubtful. Some say they are to guard against robbers; some say they are an invention of jealous husbands; some, that they are so constructed in order to allow a maiden and her lover to converse without danger of an elopement. Arched, wide doors on the ground-floor, directly in the front of the house, are large enough to admit carts and horses into the basements, which serve as carriage-houses and stables.

Is it really summer? Is it possible that in our beloved America people are suffering from heat, that Philadelphia is suffocating? Here ladies wear furs and velvet mornings and nights, and men wrap themselves in ulsters and shawls. The air is the most bracing,—the coolest, dryest, purest imaginable. It is considered admirable for nervous disorders, and this one can readily believe. But though it is the fashion to order consumptives here, many eminent physicians say more invalids with lung complaints are sent to the Engadine than should properly come. It certainly seems as if this immensely bracing air would speedily kill if it did not cure. “Nine months winter and three months cold” is the popular saying here about the climate. Delicate persons are often so enervated at first by the peculiar atmosphere that they cannot eat or sleep or rest in any way.—Indeed, with certain constitutions this air never agrees.—This condition, however, usually passes off in a few days; they feel able to move mountains, and accomplish wonders in the way of climbing; while people who are well in ordinary climates come here and forget that they are mortal. There is something in the air that gives one giant strength and endurance,—something inexpressibly delightful, buoyant, and inspiring,—something that clears away all cobwebs from the brain.

[pg!154]

THE ENGADINE.

They say that Auerbach has thought and written much in the beautiful Engadine,—that many of his mountain descriptions are from this grand country. Somewhere here a seat is shown where he sits and plans and dreams. Whether it is due to “ozone,” or whatever it may be, the heart and lungs do unusual work here, and the brain too. It would seem that here, if anywhere, would come inspiration. And yet, when we remember that Schiller wrote his “Wilhelm Tell” without ever seeing Switzerland, it teaches us that wide, free genius can soar in a narrow room, and only petty, mediocre talent is really dependent upon its surroundings.

They who view the Alps with a critic's eye say that the contours in the Engadine are too sharply defined, the rocks too bold and rugged, the snow too glaring white, the air too clear, the whole effect too hard and unmanageable,—all lacking the slight haze that is necessary to a perfect mountain view. This makes me feel very ignorant and small, for I have not yet learned to speak with condescending approval of one landscape, and with dignified, discriminating censure of another. And yet I don't believe these lofty critics could have made a grander, nobler Engadine if they had had the fashioning of it; and if Nature is lovely in her soft, smiling scenes, in her hazes and mists and tender lights, so is she also magnificent in her strength and rugged grandeur, sublime in her stillness, her frozen heights, as in the Engadine. Most unutterably impressive is she here.

And who shall say that here she does not also show us loveliness? The Maloja Pass, for instance, that leads, in its remarkable steep, zigzag down, down through fragrant woods, where vines and moss droop over the rocks, till it reaches a milder temperature, and the warm breath of Italy seems to touch your cheek. You stand high on the cliff and look down into the valley, following every curious winding of the road till it meets the plain, and goes off towards Chiavenna far away. When we saw the Maloja, a group of men who looked like bandits were gathered round a fire and a kettle where polenta was cooking. The people here live on polenta. It isn't at all bad. We know, because we've tasted it. We taste everything. There is a pretty lake and a pretty waterfall here, concealed, and well worth finding; but the particular “sight,” the especial thing you must do, is to stand on the cliff opposite the inn, and watch the diligence as it descends a thousand feet in twenty minutes.

Behind the Kurhaus is a hill with shady seats among the trees, where you can sit by one of those impatient, impetuous little mountain brooks that come rushing down from the glaciers, and that act so young and excited about everything; and while it talks to you and tells you its wild stories and eager hopes, you say to it, “Wait till you've seen a little more of the world, my dear, and you'll take things more quietly.” And the water tumbles and foams over the rocks, and sings strange things in your ears, and you look off upon three peaks with their heads close together like Michael Angelo's “Three Fates.” You learn to love them very much, and to watch their different expressions. One is greener, softer, milder than the others. One is sharp, cruel, inflexible rock. On one, great snow-masses forever lie in stillness, solemnity, and peace.

A little winding path by the water's edge leads to Crestalta. Here surely it is not grand, but lovely, every inch of the way. The Inn, which seems like an old friend now, so often has it met us in the Tyrol days, we visit here at its birthplace, and hear its baby name, the Sela, for it is not the Inn till it leaves the Lake of St. Moritz. A coquettish, wayward, merry stream it is in its youth,—bubbling and laughing in little falls,—stopping to rest in clear enchanted lakes, whose depths reflect the skies and clouds and soft green banks and Alpine cedars, then rushing on, frolicking and singing boldly as it goes.

These are small things to do. They are for the first day, before one is accustomed to the air here. They are for invalids who must not work for their enjoyment. But for the strong, for the blessed ones with clear heads and tireless feet, what is there not to see that is grand and inspiring!

O, these mountains, these magical, giant mountains! How their silence, their vastness, their terrible beauty, speak to our restless hearts! I can well believe that mountain races are, as it is said, deeply superstitious, for there are times when the effect of the mighty, stern heights is simply crushing. Old heathenish fancies, without comfort, without hope, come to us in spite of ourselves. What are we, our poor little life-stories, our hopes, and our heart-breakings, our wild storms, and short, sweet, sunny days, before these cold, eternal hills? Above their purple sublimity are cruel pagan gods, who do not hear though we cry to them in agony. Our feet bleed. Our hearts are faint. The chasms swallow us. Rocks crush us. Nature is a cruel, mighty tyrant, and our enemy.

But not only thus do the mountains speak. So many voices have they! So many songs and poems and mysteries and tragedies and glories do they tell you! So many strong, sweet chords do they strike in your soul! Did they crush you yesterday? Ah, how they lift you up to-day, and heal the wounds they themselves have made, and comfort you with a sweet and noble comfort! They tell you how little you are, but they give you a great patience with your own littleness. They bid you look up, as they do, to the heavens above; to stand firm, as they stand firm; to take to yourself the beauty and the grace of passing sunshine, of bird and flower and tree, and song of brook; to take it and rejoice and be glad in it, though the gray, sad cliffs are not concealed, and the sorrowful wind moans in the pines. They whisper unutterable things to you of this mystery we call life,—things which you never, never felt before. They fill you with infinite patience and tenderness, and send you forth to meet your fate with the heart of a hero. Ah, what a pity it is that we must ever leave the mountains; and what a pity it is that, if we should remain, the mountains might leave us,—might speak less to us, sustain and elevate us less! And yet it does not seem as if a heart that had a spark of reverence in it could ever grow too familiar with such majesty.

From St. Moritz it is not easy to say what excursion or mountain tramp is the most enjoyable, but, if I were positively obliged to give my opinion, I think it would be in favor of the Bernina Pass and Palü Glacier. You go first to Pontresiná,—a place, by the way, especially liked and frequented by the English. With the mountains crowding round it, and its glimpse of the Roseg Glacier, it is certainly very beautiful. Samaden, Pontresiná, and St. Moritz have rival claims and rival champions. St. Moritz is, however, to us indisputably superior. Not that we love Pontresiná less, but that we love St. Moritz more.

On this road the superb Morteratsch Glacier greets you, imbedded between Piz Chalchang and Mont Pers, and you see the whole Bernina group. The Morteratsch Glacier has beautiful blue ice-caves, real ones, not artificial as in Interlaken.

From Pontresiná you go higher and higher to the Bernina hospice, two thousand feet above St. Moritz. Here, side by side, are two small lakes, the Lago Nero and the Lago Bianco. The “white” lake, coming from the glaciers, is the lightest possible grayish-green, and the dark one is spring water, and looks purplish-blue beside it. It is strange to think how far apart the waters of the sister lakes flow,—the Lago Nero into the Inn, so to the Danube and Black Sea, while the Lago Bianco, through the Adda, finds its way to the Adriatic.

To the hospice you can ride, but after that you must walk over rough rocks and snow, and past pools where feathery white flowers stand up straight on tall, slight, stiff stalks, like proud, shy girls, and at last you are at the Alp Grüm, where wonderful things lie before your eyes. The magnificent Palü Glacier is separated from you only by a narrow valley. You stand before it as the sun pours down on its vast whiteness, and on the mountain range in which it lies. Far below in the ravine the road goes winding away to Italy, past the villages of Poschiavo and Le Prese: above, the eternal snows; below, the soft, blooming valley, lovely as a smile of Spring, and in the distance even a hint of sunny Italy, for you gaze afar off upon its mountains wistfully, and feel like Moses looking into the Promised Land.

Everywhere are the brave little Alpine flowers. They are very dear, and one learns to feel a peculiar tenderness towards them, as well as to be astonished at their variety and abundance. There are many tiny ones whose names I do not know, but their little star-faces smile at you from amazingly rough, high places.

About the Edelweiss much fiction has been written. It is true that it often grows in rather inaccessible spots, but it is not at all necessary to peril one's life in order to pluck it; and we must regretfully abandon the pretty, old legend that the bold mountaineer, when he brings the flower to his sweetheart, gives her also the proof of his valor and devotion, and his willingness to risk all for her dear sake. It is interesting and exciting to find these flowers,—they do grow at a noble height,—and here in the Engadine, at this season, and in this vicinity, they are rare. But, sweethearts, of all ages, sexes, and conditions, who will shortly receive from me Edelweiss in letters, do not be disappointed to hear that, though my hands were full to overflowing, I plucked them in gay security, with my feet on firm ground; and there was only one single place where it wasn't pleasant to look down, or, to be more impressive, where a yawning abyss threatened to ingulf me.

The Edelweiss is certainly very good to find and send home in a letter, it is so suggestive of dangerous cliffs, horrible ravines, and immense daring, as well as telling very sweetly its little story of blooming in lonely beauty on the high Alps; but that any especial valor is required to obtain it, is, if the truth be told, a mere fable.

And the last grain of romance vanishes when we hear that shrewd guides bring the flowers down from their own heights, and set them in the path of enthusiastic but not high-climbing ladies, who in their delight are wildly lavish of fees. The Devil can quote Scripture for his purpose, and the pure, precious little flower can be used as a trap by mercenary man.

[pg!161]

RAGATZ.

Over the Albula Pass we came from St. Moritz to Chur, and when we went, it was by the Julia. How grand we feel going over these great mountain-passes, where Roman and German emperors, with all their vast armies, their high hopes and ambitions, have trod, it is quite impossible to express. The emperors are dead and gone, and we, an insignificant but merry little party, ride demurely over the selfsame route. Blessed thought that the mountains are meant for us as much as they were for the emperors; that the beauty and grandeur and loveliness of nature, everywhere, is our own to enjoy; that it has been waiting through the ages, even for us, to this day! It is our own. No king or conqueror has a larger claim.

This was one of the tranquil, joyous days that have so much in them,—a day of clear thoughts, unwearying feet, unspeakable appreciation of nature, and good-will towards humanity. There was a long, bright flood of sunshine, with beautiful flakes of clouds floating before a fresh mountain wind. The great mountains looked solemnly at us, and the happy laugh of a little child-friend echoed through the sombre ravines.

We passed queer old villages; small dun cattle with antelope eyes and fragrant breath; wise-looking goats; pastures that stretched out their vivid green carpets on the mountain-side; and, above all, the great snow-slopes.

We got some supper in a very grave little village. The woman who waited upon us looked as if she had never smiled. This made us want somebody to be funny. The other travellers were matter-of-fact Englishmen, some heavy Jews, and particularly eagle-looking Americans. The little woman gave us good coffee, sweet black-bread and sweeter butter, and eggs so rich and fresh we felt that they would instantly transform our famishing selves into Samsons. These eggs had chocolate-colored shells. The Englishmen, the Eagles, and the Jews ate solemnly, as if they had eaten brown eggs from their cradles. But we, with that curiosity which, whatever it may be to others, is in our opinion our most invaluable travelling companion,—of more profit and importance than all the guide-books and maps, often more really helpful than friends who have made what they call “the tour of Europe” three times,—inquired:—

“Why, do Swiss hens lay brown eggs?”

To this innocent inquiry the little woman with sombre mien replied that she had boiled the eggs in our coffee. “Water was scarce, and she always did it.”

Not discouraged, we remarked we would like to buy the hen that could lay such rich, delicate eggs, and take her away in our travelling-bag. The fire and the coffee-pot we might be able to establish elsewhere, but that hen was a rara avis. This small pleasantry caused a little cold ghost of a smile to flit over her lips, but it was gone in an instant, and she was counting francs in her coffee-colored palm.

A night in Chur, then the next morning a short ride by rail, and we are in Ragatz. Do you know what Ragatz is? It is, in the first place, to us at least, a surprise; its name is so harsh and ugly, and the place is so soft, pretty, and alluring. And coming from that wonderful, electrifying St. Moritz air directly here, is like dropping from the North Pole to the heart of the tropics. It is said the change should not be made too suddenly, that one should stay a day or two on the route, which seems reasonable. Happily our strength is not impaired by the new atmosphere, but we feel very much amazed. We cannot at once recover ourselves. There, it was, as somebody says, “always early morning.” Here, it is “always afternoon.” There, we had broad outlooks, stern, rough lines, and vast snow-fields. Here, we are in a lovely garden, luxuriant with flowers. Grapes hang, rich and heavy, on the trellises. Shade-trees droop over enticing walks and rustic seats. Oleanders and pomegranate-trees, with their flame-colored tropical blossoms, stand in long rows by the lawns. Children paddle about in tiny boats on little lakes. Rustic bridges cross the stream here and there. A young English girl, with golden hair so long and luxuriant that it rather unpleasantly suggests Magdalen as it falls in great waves to the ground, sits sketching, and wears a thin blue jaconet gown,—wonderful sight is that blue jaconet! Only yesterday we left the region of sealskin sacques, breakfast-shawls, and shivers.

The hotel is most charmingly situated. Did I ever recommend a hotel in my life? It is a rash thing to do, but I feel impelled to advise people to come here to the Quellenhof. We live, not in the hotel proper, but in one of the “dependencies,” the Hermitage, a kind of châlet. It is delightful to live in a Hermitage, let me tell you. Fuchsias and asters and scarlet geraniums make a glory about our door. Our windows and balconies look on the lake just below. Great trees bend over us, and green mountain slopes come down to meet us on the other side. Our Hermitage is a quiet, restful nest. The people occupying the different rooms go softly in and out. We never meet them. Marie, with her white cap and white apron, opens the door for us as we stand under the fuchsia-covered porch. We hear no hurrying steps, no waiters and bells, or any hotel noises. Every moment we like our Hermitage better, and we really think we own it. It is all very sweet and soft and lotus-eating here, with balmy odors, and drowsy hum of bees, and mellow, golden lights on the mountains. We feel as if a magician had touched us with his wand, and whirled us off into another planet. No one can say that we as a party have not a goodly share of the wisdom that takes things as they come,—but Ragatz after St. Moritz!

That which drew us here is what draws everybody to Ragatz,—that is, everybody who is not sent by a physician to drink the water and take the baths,—the celebrated Pfaffer's Gorge. It is well worth a long journey and much fatigue and trouble. From Ragatz you walk through the little village, then along a narrow road between immense limestone cliffs, where the Tamina, that most audacious of mountain streams, hurls itself angrily by you. The cliffs are in some places eight hundred feet high, and the Gorge is often extremely narrow. You pass beneath the vast overhanging rocks, the two sides leaning so far towards each other that they almost meet in a natural bridge. It is cold, damp, and in gloom where you are. You look up and see the trees and sunlight far, far above you,—the rocks, at times, shut out the sky,—and the Tamina acts like a mad thing that has broken loose, as it sweeps through the sombre Gorge.

After the walk,—I had no ideas of time or distance in regard to it; everything else was so impressive these trifles were banished from my mind,—we reached the hot springs, did what other people did, and were greatly astonished.

A man had insisted upon putting shawls upon all the ladies of the party. Another man now insists upon removing them. There is a cavern before you which looks very black and Mephistophelian. Everybody slowly walks in,—you too. It is dark where your feet tread. There are one or two men with uncertain, wavering lights that seem designed to deceive the very elect. You begin to dread snares and pitfalls. The atmosphere grows hotter, more oppressive, and more suggestive every instant. You are certain that you smell brimstone, and expect to see cloven hoofs. You go but two or three steps, and remain but a few seconds, the temperature of the cavern is so high, but you feel as if you were in the bowels of the earth. A man with a light passes you a glass, and you fancy you are going to drink molten lead or lava, or something appropriate to the scene, and are rather disappointed to find it tastes uncommonly like hot water, pure and simple.

Then you turn and go into the light of day, and everybody has a boiled look, every face is covered with moisture; and the outer air sends such a chill to your very soul, you bless the man whom a few moments before you had scorned when he hung the ugly brown shawl on your shoulders. You seize it with thankfulness, and back again you go between the massive rocky walls with the Tamina shouting boisterously in your ears.

There is a bath-house near the Gorge for people who wish to take the waters near their source. The sunlight touches it in the height of summer only between ten and four. People go there and stay, why, I cannot imagine, unless they have lost, or wish to lose, their senses. The guide-books speak respectfully of its accommodations, but it is the dreariest house I ever saw, with a monastic, or rather, prison look, that is appalling; and the girl who brings you bread-and-butter and wine looks at you with a reproving gloom in her eyes, as if all days must be “dark and dreary.” We felt quite frivolous and out of place, lost our appetite, grew somewhat frightened, and ran away as soon as possible.

The baths at the Quellenhof are pleasant, and the water, though conveyed through a conduit two miles and a half long, loses very little of its heat. It is perfectly clear, free from taste or smell, and resembles, they say, the waters of Wildbad and Gastein. An eminent German physician told us something the other day in regard to the efficacy of these crowded baths here, there, and elsewhere in this part of the world,—something that was both funny and unpleasant to believe. Although it is not my theory but his plainly expressed opinion, I shall only venture to whisper it for fear of offending somebody. He says it is not by the peculiar efficacy of any particular kind of water that the bathers in general are benefited, but by the simple virtue of pure water freely used; that many people at home do not bathe habitually; and when a daily bath for five or six weeks, in a place where they live simply and breathe pure air, has invigorated them, they gratefully ascribe their improvement to sulphur or iron or carbonic acid or some other agent, which is really quite innocent of special interposition in their case.

Beside the baths and the Gorge and its ways of pleasantness in general, Ragatz has many pretty walks along the hills between houses and gardens, and up steep, zigzag forest-paths to the ruins of Freudenberg and Wartenstein. A broad, sunny landscape lies before you,—the valley of the Rhine, Falknis in the background, green pastures and still waters. Blessed are the eyes that see what we see.

[pg!168]

A FLYING TRIP TO THE RHINE FALLS.

There was the rock upon which the Lorelei used to sit and comb her golden hair, and sing her wondrous melodies, and lure men to destruction? Near St. Graz, there have been and are, I suppose, Loreleis enough in the world besides the famous maiden of the poem. We found an admirable place for one, yesterday, on the top of the great rock that stands quivering in the Falls of the Rhine. We had sent our heavy luggage on to Zurich, with that wisdom which often characterizes us, and, free as air except for hand-bags, went to see the Rhine Falls.

And first we saw Schaffhausen, which has a pretty, picturesque, mediæval air, as it lies among the hills and vineyards on the banks of the Rhine. It has its old cathedral, with the celebrated bell cast in 1486, which bears the inscription that suggested to Schiller—as everybody knows—his “Song of the Bell,”—“Vivas voco, mortuos plango, fulgura frango”; but besides this there is not much to see except the tranquil landscape, and that, fortunately, one does not lose by going farther.

Most people are, I presume, disappointed in the Falls of the Rhine. At least, I know that many of my own countrymen pronounce them not worth seeing “after Niagara.” But—dare I make this mortifying confession?—what if it is not, “after Niagara”? What if Niagara is still to you in the indefinite distance? It ought not to be, of course. (We all know very well “nobody should go to Europe who has not seen Niagara.”) But what if it is? Under such circumstances may not one find beauty here?

And even with the remembrance of Niagara clear in your mind, I do not know why the Rhine Falls, so utterly different in character, may not still be lovely.

Their height is estimated, including the rapids and whirlpools and all, at about one hundred feet, which must be very generous measurement, and they are three hundred and eighty feet broad. It may have been in part owing to the exquisite atmosphere of the day we visited them, it may be we expected too little on account of the tales our friends had told us, but certainly we found them very lovely, and Nature seems to have given their surroundings a peculiar grace. The shores are so extremely pretty,—the high, bold cliff on one side, the soft green slopes on the other; the row of tall, stiff poplars, that look as prim as the typical New England housekeeper, and give the landscape that curiously neat appearance, as if everything were swept and dusted. Then the rocks, clothed with vines and moss and shrubs and little trees, rise with so fine an effect in the midst of the white foaming waters.

We saw the falls from every point,—from above on the cliff; [what a pity there isn't a fine old, tumble-down, “ivy-mantled tower” there, instead of the painted, restaurant-looking Schloss Laufen!] from the little pavilion and platform at the side, where the foam dashes all over you, and you are deafened by the roar; from the top of the central rock in the falls; and from the Neuhausen side.

To go from shore to shore, just below the falls, is really quite an adventure. Your funny flat-boat careens about in the most eccentric and inconsequent manner; the spray envelops you; it all looks very dangerous, and is not in the least. Still more eventful is a voyage to the central rock, after which our boatman fastens his skiff—which is a broad-bottomed scow, to be exact, but skiff sounds more poetical—securely. You alight on the wet stones, ascend the rough steps cut in the rock, and feel that you are doing a novel and interesting thing. On the top, amid the shrubs and vines, where the Lorelei ought to be, is only an upright iron rod. From here we thought the falls were seen to the best advantage, and it was a delightful experience to be so near and yet so far,—to stand so securely amid the foaming, seething mass, to be actually in the deafening roar. Mother Nature was in a complacent mood when she placed those rocks in the midst of the mighty waters. But no,—she placed the rocks there long ago, and merely brought Father Rhine towards them in later days. So say the wise.

There were myriads of rainbows in the spray. On one side was brilliant sunshine flashing on soft fields and vine-covered hills; on the other, as a most effective background, against which the whiteness of the foam shone out, low black thunderclouds. It was a singular picture, with its strongly contrasting hues. We could not help being glad that we had never seen Niagara, we found so much here to delight in.

But, friends, a word of advice that comes from depths of sad experience. See Niagara before you come here. At least, read up Niagara. Be perfectly able to answer all questions as to Niagara's height, breadth, and volume, and the character of the emotions created in an appreciative soul by seeing Niagara. If you cannot, you will suffer. Somebody will ask you a Niagara question suddenly at a dinner-party, and you will either reply with shame that you do not know, or with the courage of despair you will make an utterly wild guess, and say something that cannot possibly be true. There are a great many people in Germany—extremely intelligent, and to whom it is a delight to listen—who are wonders of information and appreciation when they talk about German literature and German art; are also on easy terms with the ancient Greeks, and possibly with Sanscrit; but when they approach America it is as if that beloved land were an undiscovered country,—an “unsuspected isle in far-off seas.” The one thing they positively know is that it has a Niagara. Therefore arm yourselves with formidable statistics, and pass unscathed and victorious through the inevitable volley of questions. Personally, I feel that I owe Niagara a never-dying grudge; for, since the harrowing examinations of school committees in my youthful days, never have I been subjected to catechisms so pertinacious and embarrassing as this pride of our land has caused me. I have succeeded at last in fixing the main figures in my memory, but am always more or less nervous when the examination threatens to embrace the adjacent country. If it advances like heavy battalions, I can calmly meet it. But when it comes like light cavalry, is brilliant and inclined to skirmish, I tremble.

It is also well—may I add, for the benefit of young women contemplating a sojourn in Europe?—to know the population of your native town, its area, its distance from the coast, the length of the river upon which it is situated,—above all, its latitude and longitude. This last is of incalculable importance. It is safe to assume that the elderly German who doesn't instantly embark upon Niagara will eagerly plunge into latitude and longitude. Perhaps you think you know all these things; others equally confident have been rudely torn from their false security. Of course it is what we all learned in the primary schools, and we are expected to know it still; but it is astonishing what clouds of uncertainty envelop the understanding when you are suddenly asked in a foreign tongue, before eight or ten strangers, for the very simplest facts. Men are so stupid about such things, you know! They never ask where the May-flowers grow, where the prettiest walks are, where you like to drive at sunset, from what point the light and shade on the hills over the river is loveliest,—in fact, anything of real importance; but always they demand these dreary statistics. Was there never a great man who hated arithmetic?

At the Falls of the Rhine people, I regret to say, make money too palpably. You buy a ticket of a young woman in a pavilion, and she says it will take you over the foaming billows and back again. A man rows you across,—or, rather, propels the boat in a remarkable manner to the opposite shore,—when another man demands some more francs for allowing you to stand on his platform, get very wet and very enthusiastic. You ascend to Schloss Laufen, and pay a franc for looking at the Falls from that point of view. Eager to see them from every possible place, you come down and tell your ferryman to take you to the great rock, that looks so tempting, so hazardous, so altogether enticing, with the foam dashing against it. The boat, as it makes this passage, is the most agitated object imaginable. You survey the Falls from the rock, and at last are content. You gather a few leaves and some of the common flowers that grow upon it, and you almost, from force of habit, give it also a franc. Then the boat, with convulsive lurches and dippings and bobbings, plunges through the rough waters, and finally you reach your original point of embarkation. The ferryman, an innocent-looking blond,—your innocent-looking blonds are invariably the worst kind of people to deal with,—smilingly demands a fabulous number of francs, not alone because he has taken you to the rock, which you knew was an extra, but for the whole trip, for which you have already paid. You are afraid of losing your train. Your friends are high on the bank, wildly beckoning, and waving frantic handkerchiefs from afar. There is no time for expostulation, and already fresh victims are filling the boat. You mutter,—

“Take, O boatman, thrice thy fee,”

which would be a greater comfort if he understood English as well as he does extortion, and then you climb the steep bank and hurry after the retreating figures. You depart impressed with the magnitude of the Falls of the Rhine, and quite conscious of a not insignificant fall of francs in your purse.

[pg!175]

DOWN FROM THE HIGH ALPS.

It is not wise to visit what are called the High Alps first and then make the tour of the Swiss cities. This order should be reversed. From loveliness we should ascend to grandeur, and not come down from Engadine heights, and space and air, to cities, pretty lakes, purplish hills, and white peaks in the background. If we were to see Switzerland again for the first time—isn't this a tolerably good Irishism?—and knew as much about it as we do now,—which doesn't by any means imply that we couldn't easily know more,—we would certainly not do as we have done, especially if, as at present, we were expected to chronicle our emotions. The fact is, when you come down from the heights there is a palpable ebb in your impressions. How can it be otherwise? You glide in well-oiled grooves over the regular routes of travel. You see what you have seen in pictures and read of in books all your life. It is perfectly familiar, and how can you have the audacity to be very diffuse about it? Experiences in well-conducted hotels are not so suggestive as in the rougher mountain life. It is all very comfortable, very lovely. Strange—is it not?—that there come moments when one tires of the comfort and is impatient with the loveliness, and longs for something different,—for grand heights, even if the rocks towering to the skies are fierce and cruel looking; for the depth of the gloomy ravines; for the loneliness and cold of the gray, barren peaks; for the sense of space, immensity, even when harshness goes with it!

We have, then, left the High Alps. We are now in the region of fine hotels, brilliantly lighted rooms, flirtations on the piazza, and long trains. We go where all the world goes, see what all the world sees, fare sumptuously every day, and, whether we are arrayed in purple and fine linen or not, at least we see other people so clothed upon.

Zurich, the busy, flourishing, learned Swiss town on its pretty lake, we have just left, with its two rivers running up through the heart of it; with its bridges and its pleasure-boats; the villages and orchards and vineyards on the fertile banks of the lake as far as the eye can reach; the lovely views of the Alps,—the perpendicular Reisettstock; the Drusberg, “like a winding staircase”; the Kammlisstock; great horns in the Rorstock chain; the pyramidal Bristenstock, which is on the St. Gothard route; and many, many others, if the day be clear. Beautiful views of land and lake you can get from different points here. It certainly could have been nothing less than lack of amiability or lack of taste that made us dissatisfied. Had we seen it first, we might have been beside ourselves with delight. “Yes, it is very beautiful,” we say, quite calmly, and it is; but—

Zurich was in short, to us, agreeable, but not fascinating. We liked it, but left it without a regret. Our emotions were not largely called into play by anything. Perhaps our liveliest sensation was occasioned by the discovery that at that excellent hotel, the Baur au Lac, we were formally requested to fee no one, a reasonable amount for service being charged daily in the bill. This was a relief indeed. Often one would gladly pay double the sum he gives in fees merely to escape the hungry eyes and ever-ready palms. Another sensation was seeing Count Arnim. He is quite gray, and looks delicate.

The people in the hotels are often a source of amusement to us. We consider them fair game, when they are very comical, because—who knows?—perhaps we also are amusing to them. Some faces, however, look too bored and miserable to be amused by anything. It is very inelegant never to be bored,—to like so many different people, ways, thoughts, things. We often feel mortified that we are so much amused, but the fault is ineradicable.

There is an Englishwoman of rank, whom we have met recently in our wanderings,—exactly where I dare not tell. She comes every day to table d'hôte with a new bonnet, and each bonnet is more marvellously self-assertive than its predecessor. She bears a well-known name. She is my Lady E——ton; but if she were only Mrs. Stubbs from Vermont, I should say she had more bonnets, more impudence, and more vulgar curiosity than any woman I had ever seen. She seized the small boy of our party in her clutches at dinner, where an unlucky chance placed him by her side, and questioned him minutely and mercilessly during the six courses. Who was his father? Who was his mother? Had he a sister? Had he a brother? What did his father do? Where did he live, and how? Where did we come from? Where were we going? How long were we going to stay? And what were all our names? Was the young lady engaged to be married to the young man? How old was the child's mamma? How old were we all? And so on ad infinitum. The boy, though old enough to feel indignant, was not old enough to know how to escape, and so helplessly, with painful accuracy, answered her questions; but on the very delicate point of age we were providentially protected by a childish, honest “I don't know.” Some of us who are more worldly-wise and wicked than the little victim heartily regretted fate had not given us instead of him to our lady of the bonnets. It would have been so delicious to make her ribbons flutter with amazement at the astonishing tales told by us in reply! Certainly, under such circumstances, it is legitimate to call in a little imagination to one's aid.

Our cousins, the English, whom we meet on the Continent, are very much like the little girl of the nursery-rhyme,—when they are good they are “awfully good,” and when they are bad they are “horrid.” (No one is more truly kind, refined, and charming than an agreeable Englishman or Englishwoman; no one more utterly absurd than a disagreeable one.) Possibly this impresses us the more strongly on account of the cousinship. Aren't our own unpleasant relatives invariably a thousand times more odious to us than other people's?

I saw a pantomime the other day which, though brief, was full of meaning. A German lady and gentleman, quiet-looking, well-bred people, were walking through a long hotel corridor. The gentleman stepped forward in order to open the door of the salon for the lady. From another door emerges an Englishman with an unattractive face and dull, pompous manner. He is also en route for the salon, and, not noticing the lady, steps between the two. The German throws open the door and waits. The burly Englishman, solemn but gratified, accepting the supposed courtesy as a perfectly fitting tribute from that inferior being, a foreigner, to himself and the great English nation, pauses and makes in acknowledgment a profound bow, which, being utterly superfluous and unexpected, strikes the lady coming along rapidly to pass through the doorway, and, naturally imagining the second gentleman, too, was waiting for her, literally and with force strikes her and nearly annihilates her. The Englishman turns in utter wonder and gazes at the lady. The three gaze at one another. Everybody says, “I beg your pardon.” The Englishman, as the facts dawn upon his comprehension, has the grace to turn very red, but has not the grace to laugh, which would be the only sensible thing to do,—too sensible, apparently, for a man who goes about thinking strange gentlemen will delight in smoothing his path and opening doors for him. Of course, he ought to have known instinctively, there was a lady in the case, as there always is. The two Germans were too polite to laugh unless he would. But he did not even smile, which proclaimed his stupidity more clearly than all which had gone before; and presently three very constrained faces—one red and sullen, two with dancing eyes and lips half bitten through—appeared in the salon, which, this time, the lady entered first. It isn't so very funny to tell, but the scene was so funny to witness, it really seemed a privilege to be the solitary spectator.

From Zurich on to Lucerne, with pretty pictures all the way from the car windows. We anticipated feeling romantic here, but so far all we know is that Lucerne looks very drab. It rains in torrents, a hopeless, heavy flood. The lake does not smile at us, or dimple or ripple, as we have read it is in the habit of doing. The mountains we ought to be seeing don't appear. The streets are shockingly muddy. We cannot go to see the Lion; and as to the Rigi, upon which our hopes are set, there is small chance that it will at present emerge from its clouds, and allow us to behold from the Kulm the wonderful sunrise and sunset which many go out for to see, but most, alas! in vain.

Great Pilatus tells us to hope for nothing. He is the barometer of the region. He is very big and rugged and inspiring, and stands haughtily apart from the other heights:—

“Overhead,

Shaking his cloudy tresses loose in air,

Rises Pilatus with his windy pines.”

A popular rhyme runs to the effect that when Pilatus wears his cap only, the day will be fair; when he puts on his collar, you may yet venture; but if he wears his sword, you'd better stay at home. To-day he wears cap, collar, sword,—in fact, is clothed with clouds, except for a moment now and then, to his very feet. There are many old legends about Pilatus and its caverns. One of the oldest is, that Pontius Pilate, banished from Galilee, fled here, and in anguish and remorse threw himself into the lake; hence the name of which the more matter-of-fact explanation is Mons Pileatus, or “capped mountain.” If there were sunshine, we would believe the latter simple and reasonable definition. Now, in this dreary rain, we take a gloomy satisfaction in the dark tale of remorse,—the darker, more desperate and tragic it is made, the better we like it.

Pilatus and the skies and wind and barometer, and fate itself, apparently, are against us. But the Rigi is still there. Behind the cloud is the sun still shining,—patience is genius, and—we wait.

[pg!182]

BY THE LAKE OF LUCERNE.

Who was so wicked as to call Lucerne “drab”? If it were I, I don't remember it, and I never will acknowledge it, though the printed word stare me in the face. After the rain it shone out in radiant colors,—the pretty city with its quaint bridges, and the Venice-look of some of the stone houses that rise directly from the lake; the water plashing softly against their foundations, the little boats moored by their sides. People who have seen Venice are at liberty to smile in a superior way if they wish. We, who have not, will cherish our little fancies until reality verifies them or proves them false.

And the lake,—

“The Lake of the Four Forest Cantons, apparelled

In light, and lingering like a village maiden

Hid in the bosom of her native mountains,

Then pouring all her life into another's,

Changing her name and being,”—

how lovely it is! Roaming there at sunset was an ever-memorable delight:—the happy-looking people under the chestnut-trees on the shore, the little boats dancing lightly about everywhere, the pleasant dip of the oars, the chiming of evening bells; on one side, the city, with its old watchtowers and slender spires; over the water, the piled-up purple mountains, with the warm opaline sunset lights playing about them; behind, the long range of pure-white peaks, catching the last rays of the sun, glistening and gleaming gloriously, while the lower world sinks into gloom, and even they at last grow dim and vague, and still we float on in drowsy indolence.

The narrow covered bridges, the one where the faded old paintings represent scenes from Swiss history, and the Mühlenbrücke with the “Dance of Death” picture described in the “Golden Legend,” were both interesting. Prince Henry and Elsie seemed to go by with all the stream of life,—the soldiers, and peasant-girls, and monks, and workingmen in blouses, and children with baskets on their backs; and queer old women we met as we stood by the little shrine in the middle of the bridge, peered in and saw the candles and flowers and crucifixes, or looked out through the small windows upon the swift waters beneath. So faint and obscure are many of the paintings, yet we found the ones we sought, and saw the

“Young man singing to a nun

Who kneels at her devotions, but in kneeling

Turns round to look at him; and Death, meanwhile,

Is putting out the candles on the altar.”

The old church with the celebrated organ, which may be heard every afternoon, has some carved wood and stained glass that people go to see. Its churchyard, so little, so old, so pitifully crowded, is a sad place, like all the cemeteries I have yet seen here. With their colored ornaments and tinsel, their graves crowding one against another, and the multitude of sad, black, attenuated little crosses that have such a skeleton air, they are positively heartbreaking: they seem infinitely more mournful and oppressive than ours at home, with their broad alleys, stately trees, and the peace and beauty of their surroundings. There are two new-made graves in the pavement here. You can't help feeling sorry they are so very crowded. They are covered with exquisite fresh flowers, which the passer-by sprinkles from a font that stands near, thus giving a blessing to the dead. We have had ample opportunity to observe all the old monuments and epitaphs without voluntarily making a study of the churchyard, for the way to and from our châlet led through it. To one very ancient stone we felt positively grateful because its inscription was funny:—

“Here lies in Christ Jesus

Josepha Dub

Jungfrau

Aged 91.”

We were glad to have Miss Dub's somewhat prolonged life of single-blessedness to smile over, so heavy otherwise was the atmosphere of that little churchyard.

The celebrated Lion of Lucerne we found even more beautiful than we had anticipated. It was larger and grander, and the photographs fail to convey a true idea of it, and of the exact effect of the mass of rock above it. It all comes before you suddenly,—the high perpendicular sandstone rock, the grotto in which the dying Lion lies, pierced through by a broken lance, his paw sheltering the Bourbon lily; the trees and creeping plants on the very top of the cliff, at its base the deep dark pool surrounded by trees and shrubs. The Lion is cut out of the natural rock, a simple and impressive memorial in honor of the officers and soldiers of the Swiss Guard who fell in defence of the Tuileries in 1792. They exhibit Thorwaldsen's model in the little shop there, which is one of the beguiling carved wood-ivory-amethyst places where, I suppose, strong-souled people are never tempted, but we, invariably. There are lovely heads of Thorwaldsen here, by the way, the most satisfactory I have seen.

We live in a pension, a châlet on the banks of the lake. It has, like most things, its advantages and disadvantages. From our balcony we look out over shrubs and little trees upon the lovely lake and the mountains. The establishment boasts numerous retainers, mostly maids of all work; but our attention is drawn exclusively to a small, pale girl, whom we call the “Marchioness,” and a small, pale boy, whom we call “Buttons.” Why need such mites work so hard? Buttons is only fourteen, and he drags heavy trunks about and moves furniture and does the work of two men, besides running on all the errands, and blacking all the boots, and waiting at the table.

If you ask him if things are not too heavy he smiles brightly and says, “No, indeed!” with the air of a Hercules, so brave a heart has the little man. So he goes about lifting and pulling and staggering under heavy loads, and breathing hard, and he has a hollow cough that it makes the heart ache to hear from such a child; and it does not require much wisdom to know what is going to happen to him before long,—poor little Buttons!

[pg!187]

UP AND ON AND DOWN THE RIGI.

Truth is mighty. We have been up the Rigi Railway, and in spite of the beauty before our eyes, instead of experiencing grand and elevated emotions, instead of remembering the words of some noble poet, instead of doing anything we ought to have done, we could only, prompted by a perverse spirit, say over and over to ourselves,—

“General Gage was very brave,

Very brave, particular;

He galloped up a precipice,

And down a perpendicular.”

Our Rigi experience, taken all in all, was an agreeable and a very amusing outing. We had waited long till skies were fair enough for us to venture, but at last Pilatus looked benign, and we had the loveliest of sails across that lovely lake, Lucerne; happy sunlight falling on blue water and exquisite shores, shadows of floating clouds reflected in the depths; and all the noble army of mountains thronging before us, and beside us, and behind us; bold barren hills rising sharply against rich and varied foliage; superb white heights afar off. At Vitznau we waited a short time for our train, and employed ourselves happily in watching a great group of fruit-sellers, who stood with huge baskets of fine grapes, and poor peaches, and figs, before the bench where we were sitting. After the fashion of idle travellers, we audibly made our comments upon the pretty scene:—

“If I had not already bought this fruit, I should buy it of that little boy; I always like to buy my fruit of little boys.”

“And if I had not already bought mine, I should buy it of the man with the long tassel on his cap: I dote on buying fruit of good-looking young men with tassels on their caps.”

Who could dream that this utterly inane conversation would be understood? But the face of the youth with the tassel—he looked Italian, although he was speaking German—suddenly gleamed and sparkled mischievously, and showed a row of white teeth, as he pointed at his head and touched his tassel and said, “Cap! cap!” with huge satisfaction and pride. Not another English word could he say, but the similarity between this and the German Kappe, and his quick intuition, told him that we were alluding, and not unpleasantly, to him.

Traveller, beware! Don't buy fresh figs at Vitznau. We each pursued one to the bitter end; then politely presented what remained in our paper to a small fruit-seller, to devour if she liked, or to sell over again to the next guileless person who has never eaten fresh figs, and wants to be Oriental. This civility on our part was received with laughter by the whole group of men, women, and children, who all seemed to perfectly appreciate the point of the joke. It at least was consoling. Being cheated in buying fruit is an evil that can be borne, but it is an utterly crushing sensation when people won't smile at your jokes.

The carriage which was to take us up the precipice we surveyed with curiosity and pleasure,—one broad car with open sides, affording perfect command of the views, the seats running quite across it and turned towards the locomotive, which, going up, runs behind. Between the ordinary rails are two rails with teeth, upon which a cog-wheel in the locomotive works. The train runs very slowly, only about three miles an hour, which is both safe and favorable to enjoyment of the scenery, and in case of accident the car can be instantly detached from the locomotive and stopped. No one need think that I am giving these few facts as information, the very last thing one wants to find in a letter from Europe. I would not presume,—and of course almost everybody knows how the Rigi Railway works; only, it happens, I did not know, and I mention these things merely to refresh my own memory.

So far as views are concerned, it is of course preferable to make the ascent on foot. But where one is bewildered by the affluence of beauty in Switzerland, one feels willing to sacrifice something of it to the new experience of this curious ride. Some people, it is true, like to say they walked up the Rigi. But why shall we indulge in so small a vanity, when we can easily indulge in a greater one,—several thousand feet greater, in fact? When any one boasts, “I walked up the Rigi,” we shall return quietly, “We ascended Piz Languard in the Engadine.” For all the world knows the Rigi is only 5,905 feet high, and Piz Languard is 10,715 feet. We felt that we could afford to ride up the Rigi, then.

It was all extremely spirited and enjoyable, and we could never forget how strongly we resembled General Gage. The views were beautiful and ever varying. The atmosphere was slightly hazy, so that the dark Bürgenstock beyond the lake, which lay in loveliness before us, became more and more shadowy as we ascended; and the Stanserhorn and Pilatus, and all the Alps of the Uri, Engelberg, and Bernese Oberland, though distinct, had yet the thinnest possible veil before their faces; and the precipice above us was amazing to see, and the perpendicular reached down, down into deep ravines, where the narrow waterfalls looked like silver threads among the trees and bushes and gray, jagged rocks.

Reaching the hotels that stand on the tip-top of the Kulm, we went to the one that had stoves, which is the Schreiber, for “bitter chill it was.” We had barely time to see the whole magnificent prospect, before the clouds closed in upon us, enveloping us in such a thoroughgoing way that we could only allude to the sunset with shrieks of laughter. And up to the time of the arrival of the latest train came pilgrims from every quarter, also bent on seeing the sunset from the Rigi Kulm. Group after group came up through the mist from the little station to the hotel, everybody very merry over his own blighted hopes. Towards evening it rained heavily, and there was nothing to do but amuse one's self within doors. This is not difficult at the Schreiber, an unusually large and well arranged hotel. To find such spacious, brilliant salons up here is a surprise; and when you look about in them and see persons from many different grades of society, many nations, and hear almost every language of Europe, and realize that you are all here together on a mountain-top and fairly in the clouds, it is quite entertaining enough without the books and papers which are at your service. There were even two Egyptian princes there. The small boy of our party, whom every one notices and pets, and who, though speaking absolutely nothing but English, has a miraculous way of being understood and of conversing intimately with Russians, Poles, Greeks, etc., was on friendly terms with the Egyptians at once, and, after five minutes' acquaintance, had made his usual demand for postage-stamps. By the grace of childhood much is possible.

Truly this Rigi Kulm is a curious place. It is said the spectacle of sunrise rarely deigns to appear before the expectant mortals who throng there to see it. Half an hour before sunrise, in fair weather, an Alpine horn rouses the sleepers, and people rush out, often in fantastic garb, with blankets round them and a generally wild-Indian aspect. There is actually a notice on every bed-room door in the Rigi Kulm House, requesting guests to be good enough not to take the coverings from the beds when they go to see the sunrise.

A strange, wild place was the Kulm as the night advanced. The wind howled, and shrieked, and moaned, and witches on broomsticks flew round and round the house and tapped noisily on our window-panes. If you don't believe it, stay there one night in a storm, and then you will believe anything. But though storm and night and cloud encircled us, we saw vividly, as we sank into our dreams, the whole superb landscape,—forests, lakes, hills, towns, villages, plains, the waves of mist in the valleys, the ever-changing light and shade, the little fleecy clouds wreathing the glistening snowy peaks, the sunshine and the glorious sky. The wide, calm picture was before us still.

It was a night of witchy noises, of starts and fears that we should oversleep and so lose the sunrise, which, in spite of the storm, the predictions of the weather-wise, and the promptings of common-sense, it was impossible for our party not to confidently expect, so strong an element in it was the sanguine temperament. From midnight on, one figure or another might have been seen standing by the window, two excited, staring eyes peering wildly through the shutters, anxious to discern the first glimmerings of dawn; and from every restless nap we would awake with a start, thinking we surely heard that “horn.” If the other people were as absurd as we, they were quite absurd enough. That Rigi sunrise, whether it comes or is only anticipated, is enough to shake a constitution of iron.

But no horn sounded, and the lazy sun only struggled through the clouds as late as eight o'clock, when the view once more opened before us, grand and beautiful in the sudden gleam of morning sunshine. The Bernese Alps magnificently white,—the Jungfrau, Finster-Aarhorn, many well-known peaks in raiment of many colors; the lakes of Lucerne and Zug directly below, and seven or eight more lakes visible,—in all, a beautiful prospect, and remarkable from the fact that the gaze sweeps over an expanse of three hundred miles.

Very soon the clouds rolled in again. Not a vestige of view remained, and a persistent drizzle sent several car-loads of disappointed but amused beings down the mountain. We all began to be sceptical about that Rigi Kulm sunrise which we had heard described in glowing words. We were inclined to doubt whether any one, even the oldest inhabitant, had ever seen it.

Some writer says it is dismal on the Kulm in wet weather. I think if there were only one poor, drenched, frozen mortal up there aspiring to gaze upon the glory that is denied him, it would be dismal in the extreme; but when so many, scores, hundreds, go, and so few attain their object,—for the summit of the Rigi is often surrounded with clouds, even in fairest weather,—it is not in the least dismal; on the contrary, highly enlivening, and the trip well worth taking, though it end in clouds.

In the language of a young Russian gentleman who is learning English, “I have made a little tripe, and enjoyed my little tripe delicious.”

[pg!194]

A KAISER FEST.

We have been having in Stuttgart what an intensely loyal newspaper-pen calls “Kaiser days.” That is, days in which the city has been glorified by the imperial presence. We have been having, too, “Kaiser weather,” for they say the hale old man whenever he comes brings with him sunshine and clear skies. Before his arrival all was flutter and expectation. Festoons and wreaths and inscriptions, waving banners, bright ribbons and flowers, were everywhere displayed, giving the whole place a happy, welcoming air. The decorations were extremely effective and graceful. Königstrasse, the chief business street, looked like a bower. Lovely great arches were thrown across it, and every building was gay with garlands, flowers, and flags. The variety of the designs was as noticeable as their beauty. Sometimes the colors of the Empire and those of Würtemberg—the black, white, and red, and black and red—floated together. Sometimes to these was added the Stuttgart city colors, black and yellow. Many buildings displayed, with these three, the Prussian black and white, while other great blocks had large flags of Prussia and Würtemberg and the Empire as a centre ornament, and myriads of little ones, representing all the German States, fluttering from every window. One saw often the yellow and red of Baden, the green and white of Saxony, the white and red of Hesse-Darmstadt, and the pretty, light-blue and white of Bavaria, that always looks so innocent and girlish, amid so much warlike red and bold yellow, as if it were meant for dainty neckties and ribbons, and not for the colors of a nation. Many good souls mourn that even now, after its consolidation, the German Fatherland is so very much divided into little sections. Let them take comfort where it may be found. Were not the rainbow hues of banners and ribbons a goodly sight in the pleasant September sunshine? Ribbons, too, have their uses, and these, of many colors, were a thousand times more effective than any one flag duplicated again and again, even the stars and stripes. Pretty and joyous were they, floating on the breeze: they told tales of the different lands they represented, and it was no light task at first to understand their languages, there were so very many of them, such multitudes of brave little banners of brilliant hues, and all to welcome the Kaiser.

“Hail to our Kaiser!” said one inscription,—“Welcome to Suabia!” Poems, too, in golden letters fitly framed, were here and there waiting to meet him and do him honor. But the prettiest greeting was the simplest: “To the German Kaiser a Schwäbisch Grüss Gott,” which was over an evergreen arch in the Königstrasse, and looked so very sturdy and honest in the midst of all the pomp and the grand inscriptions that called him Barbablanca, Imperator, and Triumphator. The house of General von Schwarzkoppen, commander of the Würtemberg troops, and the house of the Minister of War also, displayed, with the national colors, stacks of arms of every description, from those of ancient times down to the present day, at regular intervals between the windows, under long green festoons. At the American Consul's the flags of Germany hung with the stars and stripes. Ears of corn and cornflowers, which are the Kaiser's Lieblingsblumen, were woven into the wreaths on one house. Everywhere were evidences of busy fingers and happy ideas. At 4 P. M. of the 22d, while a salute was thundering from the Schutzenhaus, the imperial extra train entered the city. Even the locomotive looked conscious of sustaining unwonted honors, proudly wearing a garland of oak-leaves round the smokestack, and a circle of little fluttering flags.

At the moment the train came into the station the band accompanying the guard of honor gave a brilliant greeting, to which was added the “Hoch” of welcome. His imperial majesty the Kaiser descended from the car and embraced his majesty the king, who was waiting on the platform to receive him. While the crown prince, the grand dukes of Baden and Mecklenbürg-Schwerin, Prince Karl of Prussia, Prince August of Würtemberg, and other distinguished persons were coming out of the train, the Kaiser stepped in front of the soldiers and greeted the generals, ministers, and all the gentlemen of the court who were there, cordially.

Then the Oberbürgermeister, with committees in black coats and white rosettes behind him, in behalf of the city, made his little speech, which I will not quote because we all know what mayors have to say on such occasions, and this was quite the proper thing, as mayors' addresses always are. Indeed, if I only venture to give the first half-dozen words, I fear that people who are not used to the German form of expression will be alarmed, and will say gently, “Not any more at present, thank you.”

“Allerdurchlauchtigster grossnädigster Kaiser and Konig allerguädigster Herr!” This is the glorious way it began. Isn't it fine? Can any one look at that “allerdurchlauchtigster” without involuntarily making an obeisance? Aren't these words entirely appropriate to head a huge procession of aldermen, and other pompous municipal boards, and do credit to a great city? And wouldn't you or I be a little intimidated if any one should say them to us?

The Kaiser is, however, accustomed to having such epithets hurled at him. He was therefore not dismayed, and replied somewhat as follows:—

“This is the first time since the glorious war of the German nation that I have visited your city. I accept with pleasure the friendly reception which you have prepared for me, and heartily unite with you in the good wishes for our German Fatherland which you in your greeting have expressed. Until now we have only sowed, but the seed will spring up. In this I rely upon your king, who has ever loyally stood by my side. [Here he turned and extended his hand to the king. This as a dramatic ‘point’ was very good indeed.] Assure the city that I rejoice to be within its walls.”

After which were more and more “Hochs,” and then the illustrissimi seated themselves in the carriages which were waiting to convey them slowly through the crowded streets. Along the whole route where the procession passed were fire-companies with glittering helmets, different clubs and vereins, school-children,—the girls in white, with wreaths of flowers to cast before the emperor,—and soldiers, all stationed in two long lines. Through the alley so formed the carriages passed, and, behind, the dense crowd reached to the houses.

The people seemed very eager to see the Kaiser, but their curiosity was more strongly manifested than their enthusiasm, this first day of his visit, at least so it appeared to us. The loyal Tagblatt, however, says that the cries of the multitude rose to the skies in a deafening clamor, or something equally strong. But our eyes and ears told us that while the people continuously cheered, they were very temperate in their demonstrations. There was more warmth and volume in the voices when they greeted the crown prince. But Moltke alone kindled the real fire of enthusiasm. They cheered him in a perfect abandonment of delight. Hundreds of his old soldiers gave the great field-marshal far more homage than they accorded the Kaiser. As soon as he came in sight there was instantly something in the voices that one had missed before.

In the procession, first, were some of the city authorities, police and city guard, mounted, preceding the carriage in which the Kaiser and king rode. This was drawn by six white horses, with outriders in scarlet-and-gold livery. The two sovereigns chatted together, and the Kaiser looked in a friendly way upon the people, often acknowledging their greetings by a military salute.

Next came the crown prince,—“the stately, thoroughly German hero, with his dark-blond full beard,” says the German reporter,—and with him were the grand duke of Baden and Adjutant Baldinger. Many carriages followed, full of celebrities. Prince Karl of Prussia was there, Prince August von Würtemberg, Prince of Hohenzollern, Princes Wilhelm and Hermann of Saxe-Weimar. In the sixth carriage sat the great, silent Moltke, with his calm face, received with storms of cheering, and he would put up his hand with a deprecating gesture, as if to appease the tumult his presence created. There were, besides, magnates and dignitaries of all descriptions in the long train. Generals and majors and hofraths, counts and dukes, men with well-known names, men recognized as brave and brilliant soldiers; but it is scarcely expedient to tell who they all are. My pen has so accustomed itself to-day to writing the names of sovereigns, and to linger lovingly over the beautiful six-syllable words that cluster round a throne, it has imbibed from these august sources a lofty exclusiveness. It says it really can't be expected to waste many strokes on mere dukes. “Everybody of course cannot be born in the purple,” it admits,—this it writes slowly with long, liberal sweeps,—“no doubt counts and dukes are often very estimable people, but really, you know, my dear, one must draw the line somewhere”; and it does not deny that it feels “a certain antipathy towards discussing persons lower than princes,”—which impressive word it makes very black and strong,—“except in the mass.” And then it waves its aristocratic gold point in a way that completely settles the matter. I am very sorry if anybody would like to know the names, but it is such a tyrant I never know what it will do next; and I really don't dare say anything more about those poor dukes, except to mention briefly that there were seventeen carriages full of manly grace and chivalry, uniforms and decorations, scarlet, and blue, and crimson, and gold, and white, blond mustaches, plumes, swords, and titles.

When the line of carriages had passed over the appointed route, and all the people had gazed and gazed to their heart's content, the procession approached the Residenz where Queen Olga received her imperial relative and guest. He gave her his arm, and they vanished from the eyes of the ignobile vulgus. This was an impressive and elevating moment; but it is not curious to remember that after all, if the truth be told, allerdurchlauchtigster though he be, he is only her—Uncle William.

In the evening was a brilliant and large torch-light procession, and all the world was out in merry mood. The illuminated fountains, the statues and flowers in the pretty Schloss Platz, shone out in the gleam of Bengal lights, which also revealed the sea of heads in the square in front of the palace. A stalwart young workman stood near us with his little fair-haired daughter perched on his shoulder. They did not know how statuesque they looked in the rosy light, but we did. Much music, many Hochs, and the edifying spectacle of all their majesties and royal highnesses in a distinguished row on the balcony, for the delectation of the masses, completed the joys of the evening.

If any one imagines for an instant that all this very valuable information was obtained without much effort, and heroic endurance of many evils, he is entirely mistaken. At such times, if you wish to see anything, you must either be in and of the multitude, or you must look from a window, which affords you only one point of view and curbs your freedom, and doesn't allow you to run from place to place in time to see everything there is to be seen. At these dramas enacted by high-born artists for the purpose of touching the hearts and awakening the zeal of the lowly, there are no private boxes and reserved seats. We scorned the trammelling window, and chose to mingle with our fellow-men, with our fellow-butcher-and-baker boys, as well as with little knots of intrepid, amused women, like ourselves. Upon the whole, we enjoyed it. We made studies of human nature, and of policeman nature, which is often not by any means human, but, as Sam Weller says, “on the contrary quite the reverse.”

Policemen everywhere are glorious, awe-inspiring creatures. German policemen are particularly magnificent. They wear such gay coats, and are often such imposing, big blond men, it is impossible to look at them without admiration. The way they thrust and push when they want to keep a crowd within certain bounds is as ruthless as if they were huge automata, with great far-reaching limbs that strike out and hew down when the machinery is wound up. Practically they are successful; the only trouble is, it is the innocent ones in front, pushed by the pressure of the crowd behind, who are thrust back savagely, with a stern “Zurück!” by the mighty men, and who are treated like dumb, driven cattle. A friend who is always dauntless and always humorous, feeling the weight of a heavy hand on her shoulder, and hearing a tempestuous ejaculation in her ear, calmly looked the autocrat in the face, and with gentle gravity said, “Don't be so cross!” at which the great being actually smiled.

After that we thought perhaps these petty officials dressed in a little brief authority only put on their crossness with their uniforms. Perhaps at home with their wives and blue-eyed babies they may be quite docile. They may even, here and there,—delicious idea!—be henpecked!

This was the sentiment expressed by a loyal German at the close of the day: “Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for I have seen my Kaiser.”

[pg!203]

THE CANNSTADT VOLKSFEST.

It rained, in the first place, which was very inconsiderate of it; rained on the race-course, on the school-girls in white muslin with wreaths of flowers on their heads, on the peasants in their distinctive dresses, making their full, white sleeves limp and shapeless, spotting the scarlet-and-blue bodices of the maidens from the Steinlach Thal and Black Forest; rained on the monkey-shows and negro minstrels, the Punch and Judys, the beer-shops, booths, and benches, on the country people in their best clothes, the city people in their worst, upon all that goes to make up the Cannstadt Volksfest,—in short, upon the just and the unjust.

It was a beautiful experience to sit there in a waterproof, holding an umbrella and seeing thousands of other people in waterproofs holding umbrellas, on the raised circular seats that extended round the whole great race-course, while, occupying the entire space, within the track was a mass of men standing, also with umbrellas; but on account of our elevated position we could see very little of the men, while the umbrella effect was gigantic. It was like innumerable giant black mushrooms growing in a bog.

And all the time the band opposite the empty royal pavilion played away with great energy, while without this enclosure for the races, among the surrounding booths and “shows,” country people were plunging ankle-deep in the mud, and the violins that call the world to see the Fat Woman, the accordion which the trained-dog man plays, the turbulent orchestras of the small circuses, and the siren tones of the girl who sings for the snake-charmer, united to make an ineffable Pandemonium.

This Volksfest was founded fifty years ago by Wilhelm, father of the present king of Würtemberg, who did much to promote the agricultural interests of his people, taking great personal interest in everything appertaining to farming, stock, etc., giving prizes with his own hand for the best vegetables and fruits, the largest, finest cattle,—for excellence, in fact, in any department. Since then, it is an established national event, that happens every year as regularly as September comes; always attracting many foreigners, to whom it is amusing and interesting, in the rare opportunities it affords of seeing many distinctive features of Suabian peasant-life. It should be visited with thick boots and no nerves, for the ground is as if the cattle upon a thousand hills had come down in a great rage and trampled it into pits and quagmires, and the noise is—utterly indescribable. To say that the Volksfest combines the peculiar attractions of the Fourth of July, St. Patrick's Day, a State Fair, and Barnum, gives, perhaps, as correct a notion of the powwow that reigns supreme, as any elaborate description that might be made.

Yes, it is like entertainments of a similar grade with us,—like, yet unlike. The elephant goes round, the band begins to play, the men in front of the different tents roar and gesticulate and try to out-Herod one another, the jolly little children go swinging round hilariously on the great whirligigs, the man with the blacked face is the same cheerful, merry, witty personage who charms the crowd at home. Indeed, they are all quite the same, only they talk German, they are jollier and fatter, they take their pleasure with more abandon, and there is one vast expansive grin over the whole throng. Instead of the tall, thin girl in book-muslin, who comes in from the country to see the circus, clinging tight to her raw-boned lover's hand, both looking painfully conscious and not so happy as they ought, we have here, too, the country sweethearts, but of another type. The peasant-girl and her Schatz, broad, blissful, rosy, the most delicious personifications of unconsciousness imaginable, go wandering about among the clanging and clashing from the tents, the beer-drinking, the shouts and rollicking laughter, and find it all a very elysium. Their happiness is as solid as they themselves; and if there are other eyes and ears in the world than those with which they drink in huge draughts of pleasure as palpably as they take their beer from tall foaming tankards, they, at least, are oblivious of them.

But we left it raining heavily, cruelly blighting our hopes. A Volksfest with rain is a heartless mockery of fate, and a rainy Volksfest, when there is a Kaiser to see, unspeakably aggravating. But the obnoxious clouds being in German atmosphere naturally knew what etiquette demanded of them, and respectively withdrew just as the pealing of the Cannstadt bells announced his majesty's approach; and as he and his suite rode into the grounds, the sun, who had made up his mind to have a day of retirement and was in consequence a little sulky about appearing, had the courtier-like grace to try to assume a tolerably genial expression, since he had burst unwillingly into the imperial presence.

The pavilion for the people of the court was filled with ladies in brilliant toilets, with their attendant cavaliers, as the glittering train rode towards it; the city guard in front, according to an old custom, then the Kaiser and king side by side, and, after them, all the princes and grand dukes, etc., whom we have had the honor of mentioning more than once of late, and of seeing them often enough to look at them critically and search for our individual favorites as they gallantly gallop by. The enthusiasm of the multitude was immense, and the shouting proved that peasants' lungs are powerful organs.

After the horsemen came a line of open carriages, in the first of which was the empress and her majesty Queen Olga; the latter looking, as usual, pale, stately, gracious, and truly a queen. Princess Vera, the Grand Duchess of Baden, and other ladies followed, and they all went into the pavilion, while the Kaiser and king rode about among the people, looking at models, machinery, animals,—and being scrutinized themselves from the top of their helmets to their spurs, it is needless to say.

Upon joining the ladies the crown prince took off his helmet, kissed the queen's hand, then his mother's, which amiable gallantry we viewed with deep appreciation and interest. The next thing to see was the prize animals, which were led over the course past the pavilion, wearing wreaths of flowers. Some vicious-looking bulls, their horns and feet tied with strong ropes, and led by six men, regarded the scarlet of the officers' uniforms very doubtfully, as if they had half a mind to make a rush at it, ropes or no ropes. There were pretty, white cows, who wore their floral honors with a mild, bovine grace: and sheep with ribbons floating from their tails, and a coquettish rose or two over their brows, were attractive objects; but pig perversity and ugliness so adorned was too absurd.

The event of the day was the “gentlemen's races,” as they are called, being under the direction of a club, of which the Prince of Weimar is president, and Prince Wilhelm a member. They were interesting, and the whole picture gay and pleasing,—the flying horses, with their jockeys in scarlet, yellow, and blue silk blouses; the pavilion full of bright colors, the hundreds of banners waving in the breeze; beyond the grounds, pretty groves, and the little Gothic church at Berg, well up on the hill: but, as the Shah of Persia said when they wanted to have some races in his honor at Berlin, “Really, it isn't necessary. I already know that one horse runs faster than another.”

There were two structures there which deserve special notice. When I tell you that they were composed of ears of corn, apples, onions, etc., you will never imagine how artistic was the result, and I quite despair of conveying an idea of their beauty. One was the music-stand, having on the first floor an exhibition of prize fruits; above, the military bands from the Uhlan and dragoon regiments; yet higher, a platform with tall sheaves of wheat in the corners, and in the centre, upon a large base, a column sixty feet high, perhaps, bearing on its summit a statue of Concordia. But the walls of this little temple, and the lofty column too, were all of vegetables, arranged with consummate skill on a firm background of wood covered with evergreen. Imagine, if you can, a kind of mosaic, with arabesques in bright colors; sometimes a solid white background of onions, with intricate scrolls and waving lines of deep-red apples, seemingly exactly of a size, ingeniously designed and perfectly executed. It was quite wonderful to observe how firm and compact and precise this vegetable architecture was; and surprising enough to discover old friends of the kitchen-garden looking at us proudly from this thing of beauty. Golden traceries of corn, elaborate figures in cranberries, æsthetic turnips and idealized beets,—all the products of Würtemberg soil, in fact,—utilized in a masterly way, and all as firm and sharp in outline as if carved out of stone. A broad triumphal arch fashioned in the same way was quite as much of a marvel, and most effective as one of the gates of entrance.

After the races the Kaiser rode away in an open carriage with the king, and that was the last we saw of this attractive old gentleman, with his genial, kindly, honest face, and simple, soldierly ways,—in his freshness and strength certainly a wonderful old man, whatever newspapers and political writers may say of him. They say his private life is simple in the extreme; that his library is only a collection of military works; that he carefully keeps everything that is ever given him, even sugar rabbits that the children in the family give him at Easter. It is said that once, in Alsace, in the midst of the excitement over him and the celebration, he noticed a little boy all alone in the streets crying bitterly, and called to him. “What's the matter, little man?” said the Kaiser.

“Matter enough,” replies the exasperated child. “This confounded emperor is the matter. They're making such a fuss about him, my ma's gone and forgotten my birthday.” The next day the boy received a portrait of the Kaiser, richly framed, with the inscription,—

“From the Emperor of Germany to the little boy who lost his birthday.”

After the line of carriages drove off, the cavalcade formed again, led this time by the crown prince and the Grand Duke of Baden; and they galloped over the course and out of the west gate in a very spirited way, to the great delight of the people, who shouted and cheered most frantically. Is anybody weary of hearing about these distinguished riders? We are a little tired of them ourselves, it must be confessed, goodly sights though they be. But now they are quite gone, and the last remembrance we have of them is the fall of their horses' hoofs, the glittering of metal, and the waving of plumes as they swept through the pretty arched gateway, stately and effective to the last.

The rollicking spirit of the Volksfest at evening, stimulated by unlimited beer, was a wonderful thing to observe. We stayed to see it by lantern-light, in order to be intimately acquainted with its merriest phases, and the noise of it rings in our ears yet, though now the Fest is quite over, the Volks are gone to their homes, the hurly-burly's done.

[pg!211]

IN A VINEYARD.

Our milkwoman is a person of importance in her village. This we did not know till recently, though we were quite aware of our good fortune in getting excellent milk and rich cream daily; and we had had occasion to admire her rosy cheeks and broad, solid row of white teeth,—in fact, had already laid a foundation of respect for her, upon which a recent event has induced us to build largely. A very comely, honest woman we always thought her; but when she came smilingly one morning, and invited us, one and all, out to her vineyards, to eat as many grapes as we could, to help gather them if we wished, to see her Mann and all her family, and to investigate the subject of wine-making, we were unanimously convinced her equal was not to be found in any village in Würtemberg, and the invitation was accepted with enthusiastic acclamations.

We were much edified to learn that the condition of things demanded a certain etiquette. We were to visit people of inferior station, we were told, and, in return for their hospitality, must take unto them gifts. The idea struck us, of course, as highly commendable, and we declared ourselves ready to do the correct thing. But we were quite aghast to learn that a large sausage should be offered to our hostess,—in fact, that this object would be expected by her; that it actually was lurking behind the pretty invitation to come to see her under her own vine and fig-tree. A sudden silence fell upon our little party at the breakfast-table. It really did seem as if something else might more fitly express our grateful appreciation and kind wishes.

One little lady spoke:—

“A horrid sausage! Why can't we take something nice,—cold tongue, and chocolate-cakes with cream in them, for instance?”

“O, yes, do,” says our German friend, with a sardonic expression. “By all means give our Suabian peasants chocolate-cakes; but then what will they have to eat?” she demands, grimly.

“Why, chocolate-cakes, to be sure,” says Miss Innocence. With a withering air of half-concealed contempt, the very clever German girl endeavors to present to the mind of the little lady from New York—who lives chiefly on sweets—the reasons why chocolate-cake and the Suabian peasant are, so to speak, incompatible. Among other things, she remarked that he could devour a dozen cakes and be quite unaware that he had eaten anything; that his hard-working day must be sustained by something solid; that the sausage was a support, a solace, a true and tried friend; and, last and strongest argument, he liked sausage better than anything else in the world.

We felt disturbed. There was a great disappointing discrepancy somewhere. Going out to the vineyards, even in anticipation, had a ring of poetry in it, while sausage—is sausage the world over. Nevertheless, to the sausage we succumbed, and a hideous one, as long as your arm and as big, was a carefully guarded member of our party to the vineyard the next day. Fireworks, too, we carried,—why, you will see later; and so, dona ferentes, we went out to Untertürkheim by rail, a ride of fifteen minutes from Stuttgart.

The smile, teeth, and cheeks of our hostess were visible from afar as we drew near the station. She beamed on us warmly, and led us in triumph through the village, which was everywhere a busy, pretty scene; long yellow strings of ears of corn hanging out to dry on nearly every house, and the narrow streets full of the unwonted bustle incident to the vintage-time.

Great vats of grape-juice; wine-presses in active operation, some of which were sensible, improved, modern-looking things, some primitive as can be imagined; the well-to-do people using the modern improvements, while their humbler neighbors employed small boys, who danced a perpetual jig in broad, low tubs placed above the large vats that received the juice. We ascended the little ladders at the side of the vats, to satisfy ourselves as to the kind of feet with which the grapes were being pressed, “the bare white feet of laughing girls” being, of course, the picture before our mind's eye. What we actually saw was, in some cases, a special kind of wooden shoe, and in others ordinary, well-worn leather boots! These solemn small boys in tubs, their heads and shoulders bobbing up and down before our eyes as they energetically stamped and jumped and crushed the yielding mass, filled us with such utter amazement at the time that we forgot to laugh, but they are now an irresistibly comical remembrance. Their intense gravity was remarkable. It would seem as if the ordinary small boy, who can legitimately jump upon anything until all the life is crushed out of it, ought to be happy. Perhaps these were, with a happiness too deep for smiles. And perhaps—which is more likely—it was hard work, and they realized it meant business for their papas, and they must spring and jump with zeal, and there was no play in the matter. One child of ten or so had such a dignified, important air, as he stood at the side of his tub, into which his father was pouring grapes! He looked like an artist conscious of power waiting for his time, knowing that immense results would depend upon his antics. Let me mention with pride that our milkwoman's Mann owns the largest press in the place, and her stalwart, pinky brother works it. So pink a mortal never was seen. He exhibited the mechanism of the press with tolerable clearness, though seriously incommoded by blushes. We thought he would vanish in a flame before our eyes. But, observing he grew pinker each time we addressed him, we wickedly prolonged the interview as long as possible.

Then up the hill we went, through narrow, steep paths, with vineyards on every side of us, in which men, women, and children were working busily. We met constantly long files of young men and maidens, carrying great baskets of grapes down to the village, all of whom gave us a cheery Grüss Gott.

We found the whole family in the vineyard working away busily, filling the huge, long, narrow baskets, which the men carry on their backs by a strap over the shoulders. They welcomed us cordially, and bade us eat as many grapes as we could, which we all with one accord, with great earnestness and simplicity, did. If you have never eaten grapes in a vineyard, perhaps you don't know how fastidious and dainty you become, how you take one grape here, one there, select the finest from a cluster, then toss the remainder into the basket. Deliciously cool and fresh, with a wonderful bloom on them, were they, and, together with the crisp autumn air, the busy bare-headed peasants working in all the vineyards as far as we could see, Untertürkheim lying under the hill, and the little bridge across the narrow Neckar, they filled us with an innocent sort of intoxication. The brilliant Malagas with a touch of flame on them in the sunlight, white ones beyond, and rich black-purple clusters, lured us on. If the amount consumed by the foreign invaders during the first half-hour could be computed, it would seem a fabulous quantity to mention. We would indeed prefer to let it remain in uncertainty, one of those interesting unsolved historical problems about which great minds differ. But it was not in the least matter-of-fact eating; on the contrary, a most refined and elevated feasting upon fruits fit for the gods.

And then we worked, with an energy that won for us the goodman's wondering admiration, until every grape was gathered. Never before had the vines been cleared so fast, said our grateful host. From above and below and everywhere around came the sound of pistols and fireworks, each demonstration indicating that some one had gathered all his grapes. Now was the fitting moment for the presentation of the sausage, which was gracefully transferred from the nook where it was blushing unseen to the hands of our host, and was graciously, even tenderly, received. After which we devoted ourselves to pyrotechnic pursuits, and, this being a novel experience, we all burned our fingers, and nearly destroyed our friend the pinky man by directing, unwittingly, a fiery serpent quite in his face.

Then down, down over the hill through the thread-like paths between the vineyards, through the village in the twilight, where every one is still busy and the small boys still dancing away for dear life, suggesting—like Ichabod Crane, was it not?—“that blessed patron of the dance, St. Vitus,” and past the great fountain, with the statue of the Turk grimly rising above half a dozen girls, slowly filling their buckets (you will never know what wise remarks on the “situation” that Turk occasioned), we sauntered along to the station, and presently the train whisked us away from the village and the gloaming and the pretty autumn scene, so real, so merry, so innocent, so healthy, and picturesque. Night and the city lights succeeded the twilight in the village. Our hearts bore pleasant memories and our hands baskets of grapes, given us at the last moment by that excellent and most sagacious person, our milkwoman.

We hope we were not straying from the true fold, but certainly our views on the temperance, or rather the total-abstinence, question were quite lax as we returned to Stuttgart that evening. The water in Germany is often so unpleasant and impure one learns to regard it as an undesirable, not to say noxious and immoral beverage, while the light native wines in contrast seem as innocent as water ought to be. And what is the strictest teetotaler to do when positively ordered by the best physicians not to drink the water here, under penalty of serious consequences in the shape of a variety of disorders? American school-girls, who persist in taking water because the home habit is too strong to be at once broken off, have an amusing way of examining their pretty throats from time to time to see if they are beginning to enlarge, for the goitre is hinted at (whether with reason or not I do not know) as one of the possible evil effects of continued water-drinking in South Germany. It would seem that even the Crusaders would here yield to the stern facts, and at least color the water with the juice of the grapes that grow in their beauty on the hillsides everywhere around. And certainly we may be pardoned for taking an extraordinary interest in this year's vintage; for have we not toiled with our own hands in the vineyards on the Neckar's banks, did we not see with our own eyes those boots, and is it not now the fitting time for the spirit of '76 to make our hearts glad?

[pg!218]

AMONG FREILIGRATH'S BOOKS.

A poet's study, when he has lain in his grave but one short year, and the character and peculiarities which his presence gave to his surroundings are yet undisturbed, is a sacred spot. In light mood, ready to be agreeably entertained, we went out to pleasant Cannstadt to see Freiligrath's books, and even in crossing the threshold of his library the careless words died on our lips, so strong a personality has the room, so heavy was the atmosphere with associations and memories of a man who had lived and loved and toiled and suffered.

How much rooms have to say for themselves, indeed! How they catch tricks and ways from their occupants! How faultily faultless and repellent are some, how strangely some charm us and appeal to us! This room of Freiligrath's speaks in touching little ways of the man who lived there and loved it, as plainly as a young girl's room tells a sweet, innocent story while the breeze moves its snowy curtains, beneath which in his golden cage a canary trills, and the sunshine steals in on the low chair, the bit of unfinished work, the handful of violets in a glass, the book opened at a favorite poem. The girl is gone, but the room is as warm from her presence as the glove that has just been drawn from her hand. Freiligrath sleeps in the Cannstadt Friedhof, where for a thousand years the sturdy little church, with its red roof and square tower, has watched by the silent ones; but his chair is drawn up by the great study-table, the familiar things he loved are as he left them, and his presence is missed even by them who knew him not. It is, perhaps, this air of having been touched by a loving hand, that impresses one especially in the arrangements here,—a corner room, looking north and east, having two windows, through which air and sunshine freely come, and from which the poet used to gaze upon a landscape lovely as a dream; far extended, tranquil, idyllic, in the distance, the Suabian Alps, rising against the horizon beyond long, soft slopes of fertile lands crowned by vineyards, and broad, sunny meadows intersected by lines of the martial poplar; a glimpse of the lovely, wooded heights of the park of the “Wilhelma,” that “stately pleasure dome,” which King Wilhelm of Würtemberg decreed, and the Neckar close by, rushing over its dam, and sweeping beneath the picturesque stone bridge with its fine arches, and flowing on past the old mill and quaint gables of Cannstadt to meet the distant Rhine. How Freiligrath must have loved the sound of the water that sang to him ever, night and day, not loud but continuously, soothing him as a cradle-song soothes a weary child, in these latter years at quiet Cannstadt after his life-struggles, and fever, and pain! They say he loved it well, and that he would often rise from his work and stand long by the window, looking out on the singing water and the peaceful landscape, watching it as we watch a loved face that has for us a new, tender grace with every moment.

The room does not look like the abode of a solitary man. The easy-chairs seem accustomed to be drawn near one another for a cosy chat between friends, and the expression of all things is genial, gemüthlich. Not a bookworm, not simply a great intellect lost in his own pursuits, forgetting the world outside, but a strong, warm heart throbbing for humanity, must have been the genius of a room like this.

Under his table lies a deerskin rug, a trophy of his son Wolfgang's prowess in the chase. On the walls are pictures of different sizes, irregularly hung in irregular places, and each one seems to say, “I was selected from all others of my kind because Freiligrath loved me.” They are mostly heads of his favorite authors and poets, small pictures as a rule,—the one of Schiller sitting by the open vine-clad window,—Goethe, Heine, Uhland, and many more of the chief poets of Germany; Byron, several of Longfellow and the Howitts (dear friends of Freiligrath), Burns, Burns's sons and the Burns Cottage, Goldsmith, Carlyle, Jean Paul; a small colored picture of Walter Scott bending his gentle face over his writing in front of a great stained-glass window in the armory at Abbotsford; a cast of the Shakespeare mask; a few scenes from Soest, a picturesque old town, where Freiligrath was, when a boy, apprenticed to a merchant; a lock of Schiller's hair,—quite red,—with an autograph letter; a lock of Goethe's hair, which is dusky brown, with letters, and an unpublished verse written for a lottery at a fair in Weimar:—

“Manches herrliche der Welt

Ist in Krieg and Streit zerronnen;

Wer beschützet and erhält

Hat das schönste Loos gewonnen.”

—Goethe.

Weimar, d. 3 Sept. 1826.

Madame Freiligrath was Ida Melos, daughter of Professor Melos of Weimar, and when a child was an especial pet of Goethe. She and her sister tell many pleasant anecdotes of their life there, and of their playfellows, Goethe's grandchildren, with whom they have always been on terms of close intimacy; and of Goethe as a beautiful old man, smiling and throwing bonbons from his window to the group of children at play in the garden below. Mrs. Freiligrath told us she was a tall, mature girl, with a wise, grave look far beyond her years, and they always made her enact Mignon in the tableaux vivants. She was so young she did not know what it was all about, but she “remembers she liked wearing the wings.” Two gentlewomen, speaking with a tender sadness of their long, eventful lives, telling us of associations with some of the leading spirits of the age, charming in their stories of the past, appreciative of all that is best in the latest literature, they harmonize well with the quiet old house where they graciously dispense their hospitality.

Gently and gravely they showed us the treasures of the library, which probably during the spring will come under the auctioneer's hammer, and be scattered through the world. Seeing it in its completeness,—seven or eight thousand volumes amassed through the skill and patience of a true book-lover, who allowed himself in his frugal life the one luxury of a rich binding now and then, and who had a perfect genius for discovering rare old books hidden away in dusty odd corners in London bookshops, being, in this respect, as his friend Wallesrode says, in a recent article in “Ueber Land and Meer,” a real “Sunday child,”—one must regret it cannot be preserved intact, and given as a Freiligrath memorial to some college.

There are first editions here, which on account of their rareness could command from connoisseurs their weight in gold: Schiller's “Robbers,” Frankfort and Leipsic, 1781, first edition; the second edition, 1782, and many other early editions of Schiller's works, small, rough, curious-looking, precious books: also, first edition Goethe's “Gotz von Berlichingen,” 1773; “Werther,” Leipsic, 1774. The German and English classics stand in noble, stately rows, with much of value in Italian, French, and Spanish. The English collection is especially rich, however. There is a “Hudibras,” first edition, 1662; “Rasselas,” first edition; a “Don Quixote” with Thackeray's autograph on the fly-leaf, written in Trinity College; and there are “Elzevirs” of 1640-47. The ballads, legends, Eastern fairy-tales, and imaginative lore are very attractive. There is a fine selection of works on German, French, English, Scotch, and Irish dialects, in all of which Freiligrath was extremely proficient. How many “Miltons” there are I do not dare say, and the number is not important, since this does not pretend to be an inventory; but there was a whole shelf of them, from the first edition on.

On the library-table lay superb volumes, bound in richest calf,—Beaumont and Fletcher, London, 1679, in folio; Ben Jonson, 1631, folio; Spenser, 1611; Shakespeare, the rare folio of 1685, and many other valuable Shakespeares. If only some one who knows how to love them will buy these books! It seems like sacrilege to imagine them in the hands of the unworthy or careless.

One could spend days, years, in that quiet room, with its subtle influences and suggestions, surrounded by old friends on the shelves, and by books that look as if they would deign to open their hearts to us and become our friends also. And there must one ponder long upon the varied life of the poet and patriot,—how Fate was always putting fetters on his Pegasus, binding him as an apprentice as a boy in Soest, later making him a clerk in a banking-house in Amsterdam, and forcing him again to write at a clerk's desk in London; and how, nevertheless, he sang himself, as some one says of him, into the hearts of the German people. They say he was so loved, and his face so well known through his photographs, that often, upon going through a town where he personally was unknown, the school-children in the streets would recognize him, and instantly begin to sing poems of his that were set to music and sung everywhere throughout Germany, particularly the well-known

O, lieb, so lang du lieben kannst!

“O, love, while love is left to thee!”

It is said, too, that once on a steamer, during the Franco-Prussian war, a woman came up to him and suddenly put her arms round his neck and kissed him. “That's for Wolfgang in the field,” said she, having a son herself at the front.

And after his struggles for freedom, the persecution he endured because of his political principles and his immense influence upon the people, after his flight into England and long exile, he came back finally, honored and revered, to his native land, and spent his last years in this peaceful abode. He breathed his last, like Goethe, sitting in his chair. The Neckar still sang on, outside the vine-clad window. Within, the poet's voice was hushed forever.

[pg!225]

THREE FUNERALS.

Three funeral processions which have lately moved through Stuttgart streets have awakened, on account of peculiar associations connected with each, more attention and interest, more feeling I might perhaps say, than we selfish beings usually accord to these mournful black trains that mean other people's sorrows.

Of these three, the first was the train that bore the Herzog Eugen of Würtemberg to his last resting-place. Young, popular, after Prinz Wilhelm presumptive heir to the throne; the husband of the Princess Vera,—who is the niece and adopted daughter of the queen, and according to report a very lovable person,—he had apparently enough to make life sweet at the moment he was called from it. Recently he went to Düsseldorf to take command of a regiment there. The Princess Vera remained at the Residenz in Stuttgart, but was intending to join him immediately. A slight cold neglected,—a rich banquet followed by night-air,—and suddenly all was over. He died after an illness of a day or two, while the princess, summoned by a telegram, was on the train half-way between Stuttgart and Düsseldorf.

The air is full of fables, and the common people “make great eyes” when they speak of the poor duke, and dark hints of foul play, poison, enemies, cabals, perfidy, delight all good souls with a taste for the sensational. They, however, who have the slightest ground for knowing anything about the matter, and, indeed, all rational people, declare it was simply a cold, inflammation, congestion, such as makes havoc among frail mortal flesh, and never draws any distinction in favor of blood royal.

After the ceremonies at Düsseldorf came the solemn reception of the remains here. Early in the evening the streets were thronged with an immense but quiet, patiently waiting crowd, and, along the line where the procession was to pass, burning tar cast a fitful light over the mass of people: and the flickering flames, fanned by the night breeze, now would illumine the Residenz and Schloss Platz and the fine outline of the “Old Palace,” in the chapel of which the duke was to lie; now, subsiding, would leave the scene in half gloom. The slow, sad voice of the dirge announced the approach of the procession, the whole effect of which was intensely solemn and impressive. Outriders with flickering torches, the escort of cavalry, Uhlans of the Würtemberg regiment in which he had served, floating streamers of black and white, the hearse drawn by coal-black horses, slowly passing, with the loud ringing of all the bells, made one hold one's breath as the black figures went by in the lurid light. The inevitable hour had, indeed, awaited him, and snatched him from his worldly honors and family affection, and “der edle Ritter,” in spite of all the “boast of heraldry and pomp of power” that so lately had surrounded him, lay silent and cold, while the flames burned strong and warm and the loud bells clanged, and he rode slowly on to the chapel in the old castle, beneath which he now rests with others of his race.

This is not the first sad, stately night-procession that has occurred here. Wilhelm, father of the present king, was a strong, original nature, averse to form, and gave strict orders concerning his own burial. They were to bury him on a hill, some miles from the city, between midnight and dawn, and simply fire one gun over him, he had said. His son, however, while observing his wishes as to time and place of burial, took care that the state and dignity of the procession should befit royalty dethroned by death. At midnight the train left the palace, and, with its long line of nobles, cavaliers, and soldiers, swept slowly out of the city amid the constant ringing of bells and booming of cannon, and wound through the soft summer night along the Neckar's banks, over the bridge at Cannstadt, while great fires blazed on every hill-top, and the old king, in the majesty of death, was borne on, past the fair vineyards and soft fertile slopes of the land he had loved so well, to the Rothenberg, on the summit of which they laid him to rest and fired one gun just as the morning star dropped below the horizon.

“And had he not high honor?

The hillside for his pall,

To lie in state while angels wait

With stars for tapers tall,

And the dark rock-pines, like tossing plumes,

Over his bier to wave—.”

Certainly, nothing less than the “Burial of Moses” can have been so grand as this last dark ride of the strong old king! We behold the train in its magnificent gloom winding along the Neckar and up the vine-clad hillside, so often as we see its route, after nightfall. Dusky, stately forms ride by, and the wail of the dirge sounds on the evening breeze. Why may we not all be laid at rest at night? Sunlight is cruel to eyes blinded by tears, and glaring day hurts grieved hearts. The Night is so solemn and tender, why may she not help us bury our dead?

The next procession that we saw with earnest eyes, after the Duke Eugen's, was that of a student of the Polytechnic School, who died from the effects of a sword-wound. There was no anger, no provocation, nothing which according to the student code might perhaps soften the memory of the deed. It was simply a trial of skill with the Degen, a slender, murderous-looking sword. Both were expert fencers. The presence of friends incited them to do their best. Their pride was roused; neither would yield, and in the excitement one received a cut in the head, from the effects of which he died in a few days. He was a promising scholar and a favorite with the students, and the affair seems very shocking in the cruel uselessness of such a death, though the more bitter fate of course is his who unwittingly did the deed and must live with the memory of it in his heart.

These student funerals occur now and then. We have had three or four this winter. Our countrymen, not sympathizing with student ways and student traditions, are sometimes apt to call such spectacles “comedies,” but to us the comic element has never been apparent. First come the musicians, playing a dirge,—on this last occasion a funeral march from Beethoven. Near the hearse walk the students of the corps of which the deceased had been a member. They wear their most elegant uniform,—black velvet blouses or jackets, buff knee-breeches, high boots, the cap and sash of the color which distinguishes the corps, long buff gauntlets, and swords,—altogether quite striking. On the draped coffin are the dead student's cap, sash, and sword. The other corps walk behind, the professors also, and friends.

The last funeral of the three was hardly grand enough to be called a procession. It was only a few carriages winding slowly out to the new Friedhof. A touching little story preceded it, perhaps not uncommon, yet, to those who watched its close, invested with a peculiar pathos. A young American girl came here last fall, with high hopes and unbounded energy and courage. She was in the art-school, and it may be her eager spirit forgot that bodies too must be cared for, and it may be that her naturally frail constitution had been weakened by overwork before she came; but at all events a cold, which she ignored in her zeal and devotion to her studies, led to an illness from which she never recovered. She was entirely alone and unknown, and at first no one except the people in her pension knew of her sickness. Patient, uncomplaining, and reserved, she bore whatever came, and was finally taken, as she grew worse, to a hospital, where she could command better and more exclusive care. As the facts became known in the American colony, she was ministered to most tenderly, and flowers and delicacies of every description were sent daily to her little room at the Olga Heil Anstalt. Indeed, the good sister who nursed her there found it difficult to guard her from the visits and kindly proffered administrations of newly made friends, who came full of tender sympathy for the lonely girl. Of her loneliness she never made complaint. When asked by our consul why she had not at once sent for him when she was first ill, she replied, smilingly, “Because I knew you had quite enough to do without taking care of me.” In fact, she sent for no one, and only through accident did the English clergyman and the consul hear of her case. And, lying in her bare room in a foreign hospital, hearing only the foreign tongue of which she was not yet mistress, and at best, when her countrywomen came to cheer her, seeing only new faces, instead of her own home-people, her brave, bright smile was always ready to greet the visitor, even when she was too languid to utter a word. Her one confessed regret was that her illness took her from her art-studies; and her eyes would beam with delight when a fellow-student in the art-school would speak of it, of the professors, and the work there. Her whole enthusiastic soul was absorbed in this theme, so that her suffering seemed, to her, of no account in comparison with her high aims and ideal. Utterly single-hearted, she lay there, brave and uncomplaining to the last, and seemed the only one unconscious of the pathos of her position. Her thoughts were so given to the beautiful pictures she longed to make, and to the beautiful pictures others had made, she had none at all left for the poor girl dying alone in a strange land, who was filling so many eyes with tears and so many hearts with pain. She faded away very gently, and, for a long time before her death, suffered more from extreme languor than from acute distress. After it was all over, there was a little, solemn service in the hospital chapel, attended by the many who had interested themselves for her, and some of the professors and pupils of the Kunst Schule, who added their exquisite wreaths to the lovely flowers about her. And then she was taken to the new Friedhof and laid beneath the pavement of the Arcade, while a little band of wanderers stood by—united, many of them, only through their sympathy with her who was gone—and listened to the solemn words of the English service, and looked thoughtfully out through the arches upon a tender gray sky, a wide expanse of land—now almost an unbroken surface, but one day to be filled with graves—and off upon the hills rising softly beyond; and the last violets and tuberoses were strewn upon her resting-place, and the little band separated, each going his way, but in many hearts was a tender memory for the young girl whose brief story was just ended,—a sad thought for her who never seemed sad for herself.

[pg!232]

SOME CHRISTMAS PICTURES.

A few days before Christmas the three kings from the Orient came stealing up our stairs in the gloaming. They wore cheap white cotton raiment over their ordinary work-a-day clothes, and gilt-paper crowns on their heads. They were small, thin kings. Melchior's crown was awry, Kaspar felt very timid, and was continually stumbling over his train; but Balthazar was brave as a lion, and nudged his royal brothers,—one of whom was a girl, by the way,—putting courage into them with his elbows; and the dear little souls sang their songs and got their pennies, and their white robes vanished in the twilight as their majesties trudged on towards the next house. There they would again stand in an uncertain, tremulous row, and sing more or sing less, according to the reception they met with, and put more or less pennies—generally less, poor dears!—into their pockets. Poor, dear, shabby little wise men,—including the one who was a girl,—you were potentates whom it was a pleasure to see, and we trust you earned such an affluence of Christmas pennies that you were in a state of ineffable bliss when, at last, freed from the restraint of crowns and royal robes, you stood in your poor home before your Christmas-tree. It may have been a barren thing, but to your happy child-eyes no doubt it shone as the morning star and blossomed as the rose.

Other apparitions foretelling the approach of Christmas visited us. One was an old woman with cakes. Her prominent characteristic is staying where she is put, or rather where she puts herself, which is usually where she is not wanted. Buy a cake of this amiable old person, whose breath (with all the respect due to age let it be said) smells unquestionably of schnapps, and she will bless you with astounding volubility. Her tongue whirls like a mill-wheel as she tearfully assures us, “God will reward us,”—and how she stays! Men may come and men may go, but the old woman is still there, blessing away indefatigably. She must possess, to a remarkable degree, those clinging qualities men praise in woman. Indeed, her tendrils twine all over the house; and when, through deep plots against a dear friend, we manage to lead her out of our own apartment, it is not long before, through our dear friend's counter-plots, the old woman stands again in our doorway with her great basket on her head, smiling and weeping and bobbing and blessing as she offers her wares. Queer old woman, rare old plant!—though you cannot be said to beautify, yet, twining and clinging and staying forever like the ivy-green, you were not so attractive as the little shadowy kings, but you, too, heralded Christmas; and may you have had a comfortable time somewhere with sausage and whatever is nearest your heart in these your latter days! That she is not a poetical figure in the Christmas picture is neither her fault nor mine. She may, ages ago, have had a thrilling story, now completely drowned in schnapps, but that she exists, and sells cakes according to the manner described, is all we ever shall know of her.

Then the cakes themselves—“genuine Nurembergers,” she called them—were strange things to behold. Solid and brown, of manifold shapes and sizes, wrapped in silver-paper, they looked impenetrable and mysterious. The friends in council each seized a huge round one with an air as of sailing off on a voyage of discovery, or of storming a fortress, and nibbled away at it. As a massive whole it was strange and foreign, but familiar things were gradually evolved. There was now and then a trace of honey, a bit of an almond, a slice of citron, a flavor of vanilla, a soupçon of orange.

Gazing out from behind her cake, one young woman remarks, sententiously,—

“It's gingerbread with things in it.”

Another stops in her investigations with,—

“It is as hard as a brownstone front.”

“It's delightful not to know in the least what's coming next,” says another. “I've just reached a stratum of jelly and am going deeper. Farewell.”

“Echt Nürnberger, echt Nürnberger!” croaked the old dame, still nodding, still blessing; and so, meditatively eating her cakes, we gazed at her and wondered if any one could possibly be as old as she looked, and if she too were a product of “Nuremberg the ancient,” to which “quaint old town of toil and traffic” we wandered off through the medium of Longfellow's poem, as every conscientious American in Europe is in duty bound to do. It is always a comfort to go where he has led the way. We are sure of experiencing the proper emotions. They are gently and quietly instilled into us, and we never know they do not come of themselves, until we happen to realize that some verse of his, familiar to our childhood, has been haunting us all the time. What a pity he never has written a poetical guide-book!

These unusual objects penetrating our quiet study hours told us Christmas was coming, and the aspect of the Stuttgart streets also proclaimed the glad tidings. They were a charming, merry sight. The Christmas fair extended its huge length of booths and tables through the narrow, quaint streets by the old Stiftskirche, reaching even up to the Königstrasse, where great piles of furniture rose by the pavements, threatening destruction to the passer-by. Thronging about the tables, where everything in the world was for sale and all the world was buying, could be seen many a dainty little lady in a costume fresh from Paris; many a ruddy peasant-girl with braids and bodice, short gown and bright stockings; many types of feature, and much confusion of tongues; and you are crowded and jostled: but you like it all, for every face wears the happy Christmas look that says so much.

These fairs are curious places, and have a benumbing effect upon the brain. People come home with the most unheard-of purchases, which they never seriously intended to buy. Perhaps a similar impulse to that which makes one grasp a common inkstand in a burning house, and run and deposit it far away in a place of safety, leads ladies to come from the “Messe” with a wooden comb and a string of yellow-glass beads. In both cases the intellect is temporarily absent, it would seem. Buy you must, of course. What you buy, whether it be a white wooden chair, or a child's toy, or a broom, or a lace barbe, or a blue-glass breastpin, seems to be pure chance. The country people, who come into the city especially to buy, know what they want, and no doubt make judicious purchases. But we, who go to gaze, to wonder, and to be amused, never know why we buy anything, and, when we come home and recover our senses, look at one another in amazement over our motley collections.

At this last fair a kind fate led us to a photograph table, where old French beauties smiled at us, and all of Henry the VIII.'s hapless wives gazed at us from their ruffs, and the old Greek philosophers looked as if they could tell us a thing or two if they only would. The discovery of this haven in the sea of incongruous things around us was a fortunate accident. The photograph-man was henceforth our magnet. To him our little family, individually and collectively, drifted, and day by day the stock of Louise de la Vallieres, and Maintenons, and Heloises, and Anne Boleyns, and Pompadours, and Sapphos, and Socrates, and Diogenes, etc.,—(perfect likenesses of all of them, I am sure!)—increased in our pension, where we compared purchases between the courses at dinner, and made Archimedes and the duchess of Lamballe stand amicably side by side against the soup-tureen. Halcyon, but, alas! fleeting days, when we could buy these desirable works of art for ten pfennig, which, I mention with satisfaction, is two and one half cents!

But, of all the Christmas sights, the Christmas-trees and the dolls were the most striking. The trees marched about like Birnam Wood coming to Dunsinane. There were solid family men going off with solid, respectable trees, and servants in livery condescending to stalk away with trees of the most lofty and aristocratic stature; and many a poor woman dragging along a sickly, stunted child with one hand and a sickly, stunted tree with the other.

As to the doll-world into which I have recently been permitted to penetrate, all language, even aided by a generous use of exclamation-points, fails to express its wondrous charm. A doll kindergarten, with desks and models and blackboards, had a competent, amiable, and elderly doll-instructress with spectacles. The younger members were occupied with toys and diversions that would not fatigue their infant minds, while the older ones pored over their books. They had white pinafores, flaxen hair, plump cheeks. I think they were all alive.

Then there were dolls who looked as if they lay on the sofa all day and read French novels, and dolls that looked as if they were up with the birds, hard-working, merry, and wise,—elegant, aristocratic countess dolls, with trunks of fine raiment; and jolly little peasant dolls, with long yellow braids hanging down their backs, and stout shoes, and a general look of having trudged in from the Black Forest to see the great city-world at Christmas. Such variety of expression, so many phases of doll-nature,—for nature they have in Germany! And in front of two especially alluring windows, where bright lights streamed upon fanciful decorations, toys, and a wonderful world of dolls, was always a great group of children. Once, in the early evening, they fairly blockaded the pavement and reached far into the street, wide-eyed, open-mouthed, not talking much, merely devouring those enchanted windows with their eager eyes; some wishing, some not daring to wish, but worshipping only, like pale, rapt devotees. And we others, who labor under the disadvantage of being “grown up,” looked at the pretty doll-world within the windows and the lovely child-world without, and wished that old Christmas might bring to each of us the doll we want, and never, never let us know that it is stuffed with sawdust.

[pg!239]

HAMBURG AGAIN.

It seems almost like having been in two places at once to be able to tell from observation a Christmas Tale of Two Cities. First there was Stuttgart, where the sun was pouring down warm and summerish on the hills around the city, and where we were borne away on the glad tide that went sweeping along towards Christmas under the fairest skies that ever smiled on saint or sinner in mid-winter, until it grew so near the time we almost heard the Christmas bells. And then there was Hamburg, to which place—having consigned ourselves to the tender mercies of a sleeping coupé—we went rushing off through the night, and found the dear, glad Christmas just going to happen there, too, and the great Northern city seemed very noisy and bold and out-in-the-world after Stuttgart, nestled so snugly among its hills.

Hamburg has, however, its quiet spots, if you seek them under the great elms in the suburbs, or among the quaint streets in the oldest portions of the city. One of the very stillest places is a paved court by St. George's Church, where the little, old houses of one story all look towards three great crosses in an octagonal enclosure, on which Christ and the two thieves hang, and Mary and John stand weeping below. It has always been still there when we have passed through, though close to the busy streets. It is a place with a history, I am sure. Indeed, what place is not? But it is reticent and knows how to keep its secrets. Perhaps Dickens might have made something out of the grave, small houses that have been staring at the crosses so many long years.

A very good place for moralizing, too, is down by the Elbe, where the great ships from all quarters of the earth lie, and you hear Dutch and Danish sailors talking, and don't understand a word. There commerce seems a mighty thing, and the world grows appallingly great, and you feel of as much importance in it as the small cat who sits meditatively licking her paws down on the tug-boat just below you.

But this was to be more or less about Christmas. Christmas in general is something about which there is nothing to say, because it sings its own songs without words in all our hearts; but a story of one particular Christmas may not be amiss here, since it tells of a pretty and graceful welcome which Germans knew how to give to a wanderer,—a welcome in which tones of tenderness were underlying the merriment, and delicate consideration shaped the whole plan.

In a room radiant, not with one Christmas-tree, but with five,—a whole one for each person being the generous allowance,—stood a lordly fir, glistening with long icicles of glass, resplendent with ornaments of scarlet and gold and white. The stars and stripes floated proudly from its top; unmistakable cherries of that delectable substance, Marzipan, hung in profusion from its branches; and at its base stood the Father of his Country. George, on this occasion, was a doll of inexpressibly fascinating mien, arrayed in a violet velvet coat, white satin waistcoat and knee-breeches, lace ruffles, silver buckles, white wig, and three-cornered hat, and wearing that dignified, imperturbable Washingtonian expression of countenance which one would not have believed could be produced on a foreign shore. He held no hatchet in his hand, but graciously extended a document heavily sealed and tied with red, white, and blue ribbons.

This document was written in elegant and impressive English. A very big and fierce-looking American eagle hovered over the page, which was also adorned by the arms of the German Empire and of Hamburg. The purport of the document was that George Washington, first President of the United States, did herewith present his compliments to a certain wandering daughter of America, wishing her, on the part of her country, family, and friends,

“A merry Christmas and happy New Year,”

and “all foreign authorities, corporations, and private individuals were enjoined to promote, by all legal means of hospitality and good-will, the loyal execution of the above-mentioned wishes.” It displayed the names of several highly honorable witnesses, and concluded:—

“Given under my hand and seal at my permanent White House residence, Elysium, 24th December, 1876.

—— “George Washington.”

And the seal bore the initials of the mighty man.

The tree yielded gifts many and charming, but the sweetest gift was the kindly thought that prompted the pretty device. Though one had to smile where all were smiling, yet was it not, all in all, quite enough to make one a little “teary roun' the lashes,” especially when one is very much “grown up,” and so has not the remotest claim upon the happy things that, “by the grace of God,” belong to the children? Such scenes make one feel the world is surely not so black as it is painted.

There was during the festivities, later, a bit of mistletoe over the door, which, in an indirect, roundabout way, through our ancestral England, was also meant as a tribute to America, and which caused much merriment during the holidays in a family unusually blessed with cousins in assorted sizes. When certain flaxen-haired maidens felt that their age and dignity did not permit them to indulge in such sports, and so resisted all allurements to stand an instant under the mistletoe-bough, what did the bold young student cousins? Each seized a twig of green and stood it up suggestively in a cousin's fair braided locks, when she was at last “under the mistletoe,” and

“I wad na hae thought a lassie

Wad sae o' a kiss complain!”

None but the brave deserve the fair, and then—lest any one should be shocked—they were positively all cousins, and when they were more than five times removed I can solemnly affirm I think it was the hand only that was gallantly lifted to the lips of Cousin Hugo, or Cousin Rudolph, or Cousin Siegfried; and, if I am mistaken after all, Christmas comes but once a year, and youth but once in a lifetime.

At the theatre, Christmas pieces were given especially for the children. The Stadt Theatre one evening was crowded with pretty little heads, the private boxes full to overflowing; and across the body of the house a great, solid row of orphan girls in a uniform of black, with short sleeves and a large white kerchief pinned soberly across the shoulders. They wear no hats in winter, nor do common housemaids here. A friend in Stuttgart remarked innocently to a servant who was walking with her to the theatre one bitter cold night, “Why, Luise, you'll freeze; you ought to wear a hat or hood.” “No, indeed!” said the girl, quite repudiating the idea, “I am no fraülein.” They do not seem to suffer any evil consequences, never having known anything different, and perhaps the little orphans, too, are not so cold as they look. It may be they are made to go bareheaded, to teach them their station and humility, but it seems a miracle that it does not teach them influenza. The little things were in the seventh heaven of delight, and the play a bit of pure, delicious nonsense,—a fairy-tale with an old, familiar theme,—the three golden apples and the three princesses who pluck them, and in consequence are plunged into the depths of the earth, where a fire-breathing dragon is their keeper; the despair of their royal father, who is a portly old gentleman with a very big crown, and his proclamation that whoever, high or low, shall rescue them may wed them; then the procession that sets out in search of the missing maidens, with the tailor, the gardener, and the hunter in advance, and the adventures of the three, until the hunter, who is the beautiful, good young man who always succeeds,—in fairy-tales,—finally rescues the princesses, and marries the youngest and loveliest, while the tailor and gardener, who have conducted themselves in a treacherous and unseemly manner, are punished according to the swift retribution that always overtakes offenders—in fairy-tales.

The action was extremely rapid, the scenery very effective; there were perfect armies of children on the stage, some of whom danced a kind of Chinese mandarin ballet, and some of whom represented apes, and also danced in the suite of the Prince of Monkeyland, one of the rejected suitors of the princesses. In actual life the Prince of Monkeyland is, unfortunately, not always rejected. There was a pretty scene when the sunlight streamed through the Gothic windows of an old castle, and red-capped dwarfs hopped about the stone floor, and played all sorts of pranks by the old well. And then there was the man in the moon, with his lantern; and all the women in the moon, who were blue, filmy, misty creatures, bowing and swaying in a way that made the children through the house scream with laughter; and these moony maidens were so very ethereal they could only speak in a whisper, and almost fainted when the hunter, who happened to be up that way, addressed them.

“Speak softly, softly, noble stranger,” they implored, in a whispering chorus, shrinking from him in affright, with their hands on their ears. “Thy voice is like a thunder-clap.”

It was certainly one of the prettiest spectacular dramas imaginable, with its innocent, droll plot; and to see a good old-fashioned fairy-tale put on the stage so well, and to see it with hundreds of blissful, ecstatic children, was thoroughly enjoyable.

Through the holidays social life here seems to resolve itself chiefly into great family gatherings, and the custom of watching the old year out is very general. One party of between thirty and forty persons, being only brothers and sisters with their children, was a charming affair. The dignified played whist, and the frivolous sang and were merry in other rooms. Tea and light cakes were served frequently during the evening, from the arrival of the guests until the supper at eleven, when the long table was brilliant with choice glass and silver and flowers; and fresh young faces and sweet, benign elderly ones were gathered around. A family party can be a dismal, dreary assembling of incongruous elements that make one soul-sick and weary of the world, or it can be a tender, cheery, blessed thing. There are, indeed, many varieties of family parties. Most of the large ones are perhaps no better than they ought to be; but this gathering of a clan happened to possess the intangible something that cheers and charms.

There were jests and toasts and laughter and blushes, and there was a wonderful punch, brewed by the eldest son of the house in an enormous crimson glass punch-bowl,—which, like the “Luck of Edenhall,” “made a purple light shine over all,”—and dipped out with a gold ladle; and its remarkably intoxicating ingredients, particularly the number of bottles of champagne poured in at the last, I shall never divulge.

The host rose just before midnight, and alluded briefly to certain losses, and causes for sadness experienced by the family during the year; yet they were still, he said very simply, united, loving, and hopeful; he then gave the toast to the New Year, and they all drank it heartily, standing, as the clock was striking twelve, after which was a general movement through the room, warm greetings, hand-pressures and kisses, and suspicious moisture about many eyes, though lips were smiling bravely.

Then came a walk home through the great city, whose streets were crowded full at two o'clock in the morning. “Prosit Neujahr! Prosit Neujahr!” sounded everywhere, far and near. A band of workmen, arm in arm, tramp along in great jollity, pushing their way and greeting the whole world. “Prosit Neujahr!” they cry to the young aristocrat; “Prosit Neujahr!” is the hearty response. For an hour all men are brothers, and everybody turns away from the sad old year, and gives an eager welcome to the new young thing, whom we trust, though we know him not. Above the surging multitude, and the hoarse, loud voices and impetuous hearts, and wild welcoming of the unknown, the starlit night seems strangely still, and the quiet moon shines down on the great frozen Alster basin, around which reaches the twinkling line of city lights. Beyond are the city spires. “Round our restlessness His rest,” says some one softly; and so

Prosit Neujahr!

Cambridge: Electrotyped and Printed by Welch, Bigelow, & Co.

NOTICES OF “ONE SUMMER.”

“No more charming story than this has appeared since Howells's ‘Chance Acquaintance.’ ‘One Summer’ is a delightful, and withal sensible, love-story, which one will be loath to stop reading until the conclusion is reached. The characters are exceedingly attractive, without anything of the superhuman or sensational about them, but full of life, vigor, and common-sense; and a tinge of genuine romance spreads over every chapter.”—New Haven Journal and Courier.

“A delightfully fresh and spirited little romance. The style is graceful and spirited to an eminently pleasing degree; and the plot is charmingly simple and interesting. The hero and heroine are drawn with rare skill and naturalness. Their acquaintance begins by an untoward accident, which sets them at loggerheads; and the means by which their misunderstanding is cleared up, and they gradually begin to esteem each other, form the substance of the story, which has a heartiness of tone, and an apparent freedom from effort in its telling, that make it peculiarly attractive.”—Boston Gazette.

“One of the most charming stories of the season.”—Chicago Inter-Ocean.

“A bright, happy story, delightfully natural and easy. It is just suited for a pleasant afternoon in a hammock, or lying in a breezy shade.”—Boston Traveller.

“It is one of those fresh and breezy love-stories one meets with but twice or thrice in a lifetime. Altogether for charm of style, simpleness of diction, and pleasantness of plot, the book is quite inimitable.”—Rocky Mountain News.

“A story of great merit, both as a novel and a work of art. In reading it, one meets on nearly every page some delicate touch of Nature, or dainty bit of humor, or pleasant piece of description.”—The Independent (New York).

“One of the best of summer novels. If we are not mistaken, it will be borrowed and lent around, and laughed over, and possibly cried over, and hugely enjoyed, by all who get a chance to read it.”—The Liberal Christian.

“This little book is one of the most delightful we ever read. It has made us laugh until we cried; and, if it has not made us cry out of pure sadness, it is because our heart is very hard.”—Christian Register (Boston).

“The story is charmingly told. The fragrant breath of a rural atmosphere pervades its scenes; much of the character-painting is admirably well done; there is a freshness and vivacity about the style that is singularly attractive; and the whole action of the play comprised within the limits of ‘One Summer' has a flavor of originality that commands the unflagging attention of the reader.”—Boston Transcript.

“It is a dainty little love-story, full of bright, witty things, which are related in a charmingly fascinating manner.”—Christian at Work.

“Fresh, airy, sparkling, abounding in delicious bits of description. Its dialogues brimming with a fun which seems to drop from the lips of the speakers without the slightest premeditation, its interest sustained throughout: it is just the book to read under the trees these lazy June days, or to take in the pocket or satchel when starting upon a journey.”—Newark Courier.

“It is a clean-cut, healthy story, with no theology and no superfluous characters. The hero is a manly fellow, and the heroine a sweet and womanly girl, with no nonsense about her.”—Boston Globe.

“It is a woman's book,—bright, fresh, and attractive, and more than ordinarily interesting. There is a decided dash of fun running through the story, and plenty of good, healthy romance, which never degenerates into sentimentality. There is an engaging simplicity about the style, and a refreshing lack of the modern sensational.”—Portland Transcript.

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