Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis bool< is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028239758 
 
_njM ~ (i^.pL£. 
 
 The date shows when this volume was taken. 
 
 To renew this book cop3' the call No and give to 
 the librarian. 
 
 HOME USE RULEST 
 
 AM Books subject to Recall 
 
 Books not used for 
 instruction or research 
 are returnable within 
 4 weeks. 
 
 Volumes of periodi- 
 cals and of pamphlets 
 are held in the library 
 as much as possible. 
 «j-For special purposes 
 >'^ they are given out for 
 a limited time. 
 
 Borrowers should 
 not use their library 
 privilegesfor the bene- 
 fit of other persons. 
 
 Books not needed 
 during recess periods 
 should be returned to 
 the library, or arfange- 
 . ments made for their 
 return during borrow- 
 er's absence, if wanted. 
 
 Books needed by 
 more than one person 
 • are held on the reserve 
 list. 
 
 Books of .special 
 value and gift books, 
 when the giver wishes 
 it, are not allowed to 
 circulate. 
 
 Readers are asked 
 to report all cases of 
 books marked or nuiti- 
 lated. 
 
 Do not dslace books by marks and writing. 
 
 Cornell University Library 
 DD 901.M89W66 1864 
 
 Social life In Munlcli 
 
 3 1924 028 239 758 
 
^J5 
 
SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 EDWARD WILBERPORCK. 
 
 To the great trading nation, to the great manufacturing nation, no progress which 
 any portion of the human race can make in knowledge, in taste for the conveniences 
 of life, or in the wealth by which these conveniences aro produced, can be matter of 
 indifference. — Maoaulat — Speech on the Government qf India. 
 
 ^Monb €bition. 
 
 ^LONDON : 
 Wm. H. ALLEN & CO., 13, WATEELOO PLACE, S.W. 
 
 1864. 
 
'■'3-ei, 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 L5BRARY 
 
 Lewis and Son, Printers, Swan Buildings, Moorgate Street. 
 
TO THE 
 
 0rb §xsl^0|3 0f §dax^ 
 
 THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED; 
 
 WITH THE TBTTESI ADMIRATION FOK HIS INTELIECTUAL POWEES, 
 AND WITH AFFECTIONATE EEOAED, 
 
 BY HIS NEPHEW. 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 The first edition of " Social Life in Munich " has been 
 sold in so short a time^ and the demand for a second has 
 come on me so suddenly, that I must add a few words 
 in this place to supply a void in the body of the work. 
 I have unaccountably passed by Eiedel^s noble picture of 
 Judith in my description of the new Pinacothek. It is 
 too late to offer an excuse for this omission, but at least 
 I have the satisfaction of placing one of the most 
 remarkable works of the modern German school in a 
 more prominent position than it would otherwise have 
 occupied. 
 
 The kindness of my critics, and the popular favour 
 which has attended the publication of this volume, 
 render it incumbent on me to point out any faults which 
 I may have discovered, the more that their discovery has 
 been so mercifully left to the author. I trust this 
 Preface may serve to explain that I did not think the 
 time for correcting them would have come so speedily. 
 
 EDWARD WILBERFORCE. 
 
 Munich, December 28, 1863. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CELAP. PAGE 
 
 I. — Munich from the Outside 1 
 
 II. — Manners and Customs 16 
 
 III.— Eoyalty 32 
 
 IV.— "Two Kings of " 52 
 
 v.— Public Bmldinga 68 
 
 VI.— Picture Galleries 86 
 
 VII.— Kiinstlcr-FeBte 113 
 
 VIII. — Cornelius in Munich 128 
 
 IX.— Kaulbach 148 
 
 X.— Munich Artistic 169 
 
 XI.— Practical Munich 183 
 
 XII. — Bavarian Railways 198 
 
 XIII.— The Eoyal Library 214 
 
 XrV.— The Theatre in Munich 229 
 
 XV. — Concerts in Mimich 244 
 
 XVI.— Beer 257 
 
 XVII.— Houses 270 
 
 XVIII.— Village Life in Bavaria 287 
 
 XIX.— Laws of Trade 303 
 
 XX.— Laws of Mai-riage 323 
 
 XXL— Laws of PoKce . . • 338 
 
SOCIAL LIFE W MUNICH. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 MUNICH FROM . THE OUTSIDE. 
 
 In forming an idea of a town^ a great deal depends on 
 the first impression. And the first impression depends 
 almost entirely on circumstances over which you can 
 have no control ; on the weather^ on your own state of 
 health, on your companions, or on your reception. 
 Few cities present a more attractive front than Paris, 
 to one entering on a fine afternoon, and seeing the 
 Boulevards crowded with people ; but to drive in on a 
 November day, with a thick yellow fog hanging down 
 all the streets, would entirely destroy the best illusions. 
 A certain gloom cannot fail to oppress the man coming 
 on London from the East, and the universal verdict of 
 foreigners shows that this first impression has never 
 been overcome. Yet Alfieri was disgusted with his first 
 sight of Paris, and enraptured with his first sight of 
 England. I cannot, myself, hear the name of Paris 
 
 B 
 
2 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 mentioned without remembering the evening on which 
 1 entered, the whole range of the Boulevards glowing 
 golden in the setting sun, the trees and the gaily- 
 dressed passersj the colour and the glory. And it was 
 long before the beauties of Venice could make me 
 forget the winter night of my arrival, the Styx-like 
 canaletti through which we glided, like spies coming to 
 see the nakedness of the land; the silent, ghost-like 
 passers muffled in their cloaks, flitting noiselessly across 
 the bridges, and through the mysterious lanes, down 
 the mouths of which one peered with a half dread; 
 the blank hotel, with a rat walking down its steps, 
 as if lord of the manor ; the falling snow that hid St. 
 Mark's. 
 
 I think Munich is much favoured in the matter of 
 first impressions. The majority of travellers come to 
 it in summer, when it is certainly looking its best, and 
 the judgments generally passed on it are very much 
 influenced by its bright cheerful look from the outside. 
 My first impression of Munich was decidedly favour- 
 able, and to that I probably owe my residence. Be- 
 sides being bright and cheerful, Munich has an advan- 
 tage which cannot be over-estimated. All the well- 
 known towns that you visit are associated with some 
 idea. You have had a floating picture of them in your 
 mind since childhood, without well knowing the details, 
 and it is almost a necessary consequence of indefinite 
 pictures that the reality should prove a disappointment. 
 Mr. Dicey has expressed the inevitable disappointment 
 that every one must feel in visiting Rome, and probably 
 few but have formed a very difl'erent idea of Venice 
 
REAL versus IDEAL. 3 
 
 from tliat whicli is presented to them on their arrival. 
 The more you have read and thought of a place before 
 visiting it, the less chance of your vision being realised^ 
 and the advice given to travellers to make themselves 
 thoroughly acquainted with the history of a country 
 before going to it, is the surest guide to disappoint- 
 ment. A lady who was presented to a great man whom 
 she knew from his works^ said that she was much dis- 
 appointed ia Mr. , but was surprised to find 
 
 Mrs. so agreeable a woman. Was not this to say 
 
 that she had expected great things from Mr. , but 
 
 had not expected anything from his wife ? Sir Joshua 
 Eeynolds^ first feeling on seeing Raphaels pictures^ 
 Correggio^s exclamation^ " anch' io son pittore/' mean- 
 ing that he had formed an idea of the greatest painter 
 far beyond anything that the greatest painter could 
 achieve, are familiar examples of this law of the imagi- 
 nation. Who has not been disappointed with the figure 
 of our Lord in the Transfiguration ? asks Mr. Ruskin, 
 endeavouring to make that a reproach to Raphael 
 which only proves that he was bound by the laws of 
 our nature. For the meanest mind can conceive what 
 the greatest mind cannot execute, and it is impossible 
 for human work to come up to the standard that is set 
 by the human mind. 
 
 Now in this respect Munich is doubly fortunate. 
 Few people have an exalted idea of it before their first 
 visit, and they are agreeably surprised to light on so 
 pleasant a place. Everything around looks so clean 
 and fresh, all the houses are neat and gay from with- 
 out, and the many public buildings, with their diversity 
 
SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 The reader who carefally follows M. le Baron Thie- 
 bault's eloquencBj and compares it with my humble 
 arguments^ will find many poiats in this passage which 
 seem contradictory. But while I enter a slight protest 
 against the art of Munich being considered free from 
 convention and traditioUj which are the guiding stars 
 of its inspiration, from affectation and mesquin ideas, 
 which only recur too often, and cannot fail to recur in 
 works based on mere imitation of older models, I will 
 leave the other matters to be answered by the course of 
 this volume. As I shall have occasion to touch on 
 most of the buildings, and on the claims of Kiag Lud- 
 wig to occupy the same eminence as Leo the Tenth and 
 Lorenzo de^ Medici, I need not go out of my way to 
 reply to M. Thiebault. I am at present occupied with 
 the outward aspect of Munich alone, and desire to ex- 
 plain the secret of the fascination it exercises. 
 
 Few German cities have the same advantage ia point 
 of newness. Visitors to Munich generally come from 
 some places remarkable as monuments of antiquity, 
 from Nuremberg, Cologne, or the Belgian towns. And 
 I fancy that much as people are impressed with old 
 things, as a rule they generally prefer what is new. 
 The old is curious and iastructive, but there is a gap 
 between it and your habits which you do not care to 
 leap, and you like to live in the present. I asked a 
 travelling American what he thought of Venice, and 
 his answer was, " Well, I can^t say that I care very 
 much for them old towns." The feeling is perfectly 
 natural, and it is perhaps more often expressed in 
 Munich than elsewhere. Besides, the nineteenth cen- 
 
AN ENGIilSH JUDGMENT. 
 
 tuiy is rather self-sufficient, and is proud of what has 
 been produced during its own life. When we see 
 Nuremberg^ we say, " What splendid things these old 
 fellows did \" But in Munich it is, " one might really 
 live here \" The effect is pleasant throughout; in the 
 new part from the cheerfulness, in the old part from the 
 contrast. "Munich," says a recent traveller,* "sur- 
 prised me more pleasantly than almost any city I ever 
 remember to have entered. One had a sort of vague 
 notion that the late ting had a taste for the fine arts, 
 and spent a good deal of his own, and his subjects^ 
 money, ia indulging the taste aforesaid in his capital. 
 But one also knew that he had been tyrannized over by 
 Lola Montes, and had made a countess of her, and had 
 not succeeded in weathering 1848 ; so that, on the 
 whole, we had no great belief in any good work from 
 such a ruler. Munich gives one a higher notion of 
 him ; as long as the city stands, he will have left his 
 mark on it. On every side there are magnificent new 
 streets, and public buildings and statues ; the railway 
 terminus is the finest I have ever seen ; every church, 
 from the cathedral downwards, is in beautiful order, and 
 highly decorated; and it is not in the public buildings only 
 that one meets with evidences of care and taste. The 
 hotel in which we stayed, for instance, is built of brick, 
 covered with some sort of cement, which gives it the 
 appearance of terra cotta, and is for colour the most won- 
 derfully fascinating building material. The ceilings and 
 cornices of the rooms are aU carefully and tastefully 
 
 * Vacuus Viator, " Spectator," September 6tli, 1862. 
 
8 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 painted, and aU about the town one sees frescoes and 
 ornamentation of all kinds, wMcli show that the people 
 delight in seeing their city look bright and gay; and 
 every one admits that all this is due to the ex-king." 
 
 Even here there are a few slight errors, and the writer 
 has been tempted to wander off into a panegyric of 
 King Ludwig, which is not entirely deserved. That 
 the great improvements in Munich are due to King 
 Ludwig must be admitted, but it is a question if the 
 bright look of the town is owing to him. His own 
 street, the Ludwig's Strasse, is as nearly dismal as it can 
 be under the brilliant sun of Munich, and with a pro- 
 fusion of varied colour; in winter it is dreary in the 
 extreme. This is owing to the predominance of public 
 buildiugs over private houses, the disproportionate 
 breadth, the want of trees, the want of any place to 
 which the street leads. Thus the number of walkers in 
 the street is always small, and the windows not being 
 enlivened by lookers out are dismal and empty. Almost 
 aU the new quarters of other German towns are lively ; 
 Stuttgart, for instance, and Dresden, though they owe 
 nothing to panegyrised monarchs, and are consequently 
 unhonoured and unsung. One of the charms of the 
 new parts of Munich, especially of that quarter in 
 which the galleries are situated, is the green of trees, 
 and the little gardens in front of the houses. The fringe 
 of trees surrounding the Glyptothek, and spreading out 
 like a fan towards the entrance into the town, has a 
 very pleasing effect, enhancing the beauty of the build- 
 ing. All down the Brienner Strasse are lilacs and 
 laburnums, whose masses of flower in spring and chang- 
 
TREES AND SQUARES. ^ 
 
 ing leaves in autumn, are as beautiful as their tint and 
 refreshing shade in the summer. How much of this is 
 o\7ing to King Ludwig ? It is kno-vm that he has that 
 strange prejudice against trees which causes the gloom 
 of many Italian citieSj that he will not admit into the 
 Ludwig^s Strasse the only possible means of enlivening 
 it, that a great ugly open place runs between the inner 
 town and the new quarters, which cannot be laid out 
 with pleasant alleys and bosquets till his death; that 
 when his son began to plant trees in the square before 
 the palace, he came up to Munich, and had the work 
 discontinued. And yet these very trees and alleys 
 which are obnoxious to King Ludwig are the pleasantest 
 feature in Munich, and weigh more in its favour with 
 travellers than Kiug Ludwig's own achievements. 
 
 Now that the new quarters of the town are rapidly 
 being fiUed up, and large vacant spaces no longer exist 
 as they once did between churches and galleries, the 
 outward show is highly commendable. Houses ^vhich 
 are allowed to spread in an open and healthy way, are 
 apt to seem cheerful and airy, especially when they are 
 set off with trees and garden plots, which add so much 
 to the look of a town. Moreover, there is a more home- 
 like air about them, being smaller and more compact 
 than the many-storied houses of the inner city. Each 
 house is separated from its neighbour, and stands a little 
 apart from the rest, a little way back from the street. 
 A succession of such houses cannot but be attractive, 
 especially to wanderers from the dark streets of London. 
 Moreover the profusion of external ornament gives a 
 cheerful look to the new houses. There is something 
 
 b3 
 
10 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 strangely picttiresque in the aspect of Parisian houses, 
 and the newest ones in Munich are built in outward 
 imitation of Paris. Nor are the old houses behind- 
 hand in this particular. The scrolls and embossing 
 about the fronts of the houses in the Schrannen Platz, 
 might seem to have given the idea for the ornaments 
 above the windows and below the roofs in the Maxi- 
 milian's Strasse. Without the architectural interest of 
 Nuremberg, or the grave effect of Augsburg, the old 
 part of Munich is by no means destitute of the quaint 
 attraction of the national style of Germany. It is a 
 question if in modern times anything could be made 
 out of this style, had the building of Munich been left 
 to architects. But King Ludwig's introduction of all 
 the styles under the sun, and King Maximilian's imi- 
 tation of Napoleon the Third, have given Munich a 
 mongrel character, which places it out of the pale of 
 architectural discussion. Like those American connois- 
 seurs who prefer having their galleries fuU of Correggios 
 and Leonardos, instead of founding a native school of 
 painting, both the kings of Bavaria have put their own 
 memories before the interests of national art. 
 
 But though the character of the town is mongrel, no 
 one denies its outward charm. And one very great 
 addition to Munich is the English garden, which no 
 visitor can fail to appreciate, and which is certainly un- 
 rivalled in Europe. The flatness of the plain round 
 Munich, and the want of pleasant walks, only make 'this 
 promenade more necessary. The situation of the town 
 is admitted to be faulty, and it is said that King Ludwig 
 on his accession meditated removing the seat of govern- 
 
THE USE OF RIVERS. 11 
 
 ment to Ratisbon. All towns which have a claim to 
 pictirresqueness need the society of a river^ and make 
 much of its neighbourhood. Without the quays along 
 the Seine^ without the Lung, Arno, Paris and Florence 
 would lose much of their grace. The discussions that 
 have taken place in London about embanking the 
 Thames show that the English people are alive to the 
 necessity of making use of their river, and the Danube, 
 which flows through Ratisbon, would have been a favour- 
 able stream for that use and decoration. Being navi- 
 gable much higher up, and having daily steamers, the 
 Danube is a main artery, and it is important that a 
 main artery of a kingdom should be close to the capital. 
 The Isar, on the other hand, has none of these advan- 
 tages. It is merely a mountain stream, liable to fluc- 
 tuations, and certain to be very much swollen with each 
 spring melting of the mountain snows. It is not navi- 
 gable save for rafts, and has to be dammed and furnished 
 with a shoot for them. The town was never built along 
 it, and is now gradually approachiag it, though the 
 bank on which the town is built is low and marshy, 
 and the opposite bank is high, and save in some places 
 unsuited for buUding. Up the Isar the scenery much 
 improves, aud in this direction pleasant excursions are 
 to be made. But as a rule the country immediately 
 round Munich is dreary and unattractive, and few faci- 
 lities were given by nature for building a capital city in 
 this situation. 
 
 It is said, that King Ludwig asked some stranger 
 which street he preferred, the Ludwig's or the Maxi- 
 milian^'s Strasse. The stranger begged to be excused 
 
12 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 giving an answer ; but the King insisted. And whea 
 the stranger very naturally replied, that he preferred 
 the Maximilian's Strasse, the King called him a cad. 
 But, in spite of the royal epithet, I think most will 
 agree in the stranger's opinion. TheMaximilian's Strasse 
 is certainly the prettiest and liveliest street in Munich ; 
 though not architecturally conspicuous, nor decked with 
 such buildings as the Ludwig's Strasse. And though 
 the Ludwig's Strasse is composed of copies, at least the 
 copies have been selected from many places; whereas, 
 the Maximilian's Strasse is merely a version of the 
 Boulevards. As, iu earlier times, all German princes 
 were so much impressed by Louis XIV. that they copied 
 him in his buildings; so, in the present times, the 
 Napoleonic seems likely to be the prevailing style. The 
 palace of Nymphenburg, two and a-half miles out of 
 Munich, is] an evident imitation of Versailles, built on 
 the principle Thackeray has somewhere mentioned, 
 which impelled all German kings to have their Mon- 
 bijous or Mon-plaisirs after the pattern of the Grand 
 Monarque. In like manner they say that, when King 
 Maximilian returned from Paris, his first impulse was 
 to lay out the Maximilian's Strasse. In one thing at 
 least he improved on his father, — he made his street 
 lead somewhere. At the end of it he has built a bridge 
 across the river to the high bank which looks down on 
 Munich; he has laid out pleasant promenades there, 
 with sloping plots, and larch and fir ; and built a large 
 college to serve as ending to the street. How the pub- 
 lic appreciate this, is seen in their choosing the street 
 as their favourite walk, while the Ludwig's Strasse is 
 
PAGEANTRY. 13 
 
 almost deserted. For the Ludwig's Strasse leads no- 
 wherej and is at best a dismal walk, — only tolerable in 
 wet weather for its paving. 
 
 In dealing with the picturesque aspect of Munich, I 
 must not omit to notice the processions which take 
 place on feasts, such as Corpus Christi, and at inaugura- 
 tions of statues and buildings. The people of Munich 
 are celebrated for the success of their processions, for the 
 tasteful and artistic manner in which they are organised, 
 and for the pictorial nature of their execution. The 
 whole town seems to throw itself, heart and soul, into 
 the pageant ; and no better time can be found for seeiag 
 Munich most favourably, and with the greatest enjoy- 
 ment. I saw the Corpus Christi procession, at least the 
 latter part of it, from a window commanding the Odeon 
 Platz, where the whole train sweeps round : and the 
 effect was gorgeous. The large square was hemmed in 
 by soldiers on horseback, whose straight line gave a 
 regularity to the space enclosed, and a definiteness to 
 the limits of the stage. By every house door, young, 
 light green birch trees were planted ; and their leaves, 
 shivering in the wind, threw out tints of delicious colour. 
 Rich draperies, red and yellow, hung down from the 
 windows, and at each window were ladies in bight spring 
 clothing, looking at a distance like flowers arranged in 
 masses. To the right, the broad desolate Lud wig's 
 Strasse stretched away, forming a contrast, with its 
 silence, its emptiness, and its heavy buildings of solid 
 coloiir, to the animated scene before us. On the left, 
 the gaze was bounded by the light pillars of the Hall of 
 Marshals, which was filled with foot soldiers, — a mass 
 
14 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of ricli tlue. Through all this space passed the pro- 
 cessioiij in a imiltitude of hues. Friars leading in deep 
 brown; then a few rich crimson uniforms; the King, 
 under a canopy, surrounded by lighted tapers, and fol- 
 lowed by yellow robes ; — so that the eye wandered rest- 
 lessly over a wilderness of blending colours, like a pic- 
 ture of Titian set in motion. And each change produced 
 a new pictorial eflfect. As each colour passed, the whole 
 picture changed, as if you had turned a kaleidoscope, or 
 were watching a sunset. On the stage, with the even 
 glare of the footlights, such a procession would have 
 been robbed of half its charm. The open atmosphere, 
 the clouds that flitted lightly across the sun, — threw a 
 magic over the scene, that artificial means could not 
 have supplied. 
 
 Another picture that I witnessed in Munich was the 
 work of nature alone ; but I do not know where nature 
 produces such pictures, except in. Munich. The spring 
 had been unusually early, and all the trees and sprays 
 were covered with that delicious dew of young delicate 
 green, which Leigh Hunt has discussed so rapturously 
 in his letters. On a sudden came a heavy fall of snow, 
 which lay on all the trees, and was crusted and crystallised 
 on the fresh young leaves. "When the sun came out 
 and shone bright, the contrast between the tender green 
 below and the masses of pearly, sugary white, sparkling 
 upon them, was like the contrast I saw at a performance 
 of the Mariage de Figaro, when Marcelline was played 
 by a young woman. The actress put on white hair, to 
 suit the character, but was too vain to make her face 
 look old; and the white hair over the blooming face 
 
nature's pageantry. 15 
 
 was wortliy of snow on green leaves. Perhaps it is pro- 
 fanation of so lovely a picture, to compare it with the 
 caprice of a French actress ; and it is a pity that some 
 of the landscape painters of Munich did not snatch the 
 transitory effect. 
 
 Such is Munich from the outside; and I am the more 
 glad to dwell on the pictures it presents to me, as I 
 shall have few occasions to revert to it. The inside of 
 Munich is more my subject iu this volume ; and I am 
 sure the outside is the pleasanter of the two. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 
 
 In the celebrated story of the camel, the Frenchman 
 writes a brief and brilliant feuilleton, the Englishman 
 studies the habits of the animal for two years, and pro- 
 duces a mass of facts undigested and scarcely under- 
 stood, while the German retires to construct the camel 
 out of his moral consciousness. This chapter must be 
 the Englishman's chapter, though not without attempts 
 on the part of the author to digest his facts, and refer 
 them to principles. He is of opinion that national 
 definitions have mostly proved unsatisfactory, by reason 
 of rashness in forming conclusions, aud wideness of 
 generalisation. The following facts are put forward as 
 those which have come under his own observation, 
 . checked by the remarks of friends. He does not wish 
 to destroy the ideal figure of a German as painted in so 
 many sketch books, or to set down the whole nation, 
 north and south, as possessing those characteristics that 
 he has seen in Munich. His experience goes to prove 
 that the German nation is very far from resembling its 
 fancy portraits. When he reads that " society is very 
 pleasant, the Germans being frank and sociable," he 
 
OP THE GERMANS. 17 
 
 cannot iDut ask wHcli society, and what Germans ? He 
 has met with the utmost sociability and frankness at 
 one house, and with the utmost stiffness and reserve in 
 others. He knows pleasant people who have lived twenty 
 years in German towns, without maldng one friend 
 among the natives ; yet he has friends himself of whose 
 kindness he has often made proof. These are apparent 
 contradictions, and yet they are easily explained. The 
 first explanation lies on the surface; men differ from 
 one another. You may find a man stiff and rude, to 
 whatever nation he belongs. Englishmen are generally 
 considered cold in France, and an Englishman who un- 
 bends even in the slightest degree, may be complimented 
 by being called half a Frenchman. And yet it is 
 scarcely necessary to observe that there are Englishmen 
 of social habits, even cheery men who will speak to 
 their companions in the railway. The French are always 
 polite and talkative, you say ; but I have met some who 
 were neither. And so when the whole German nation 
 is set down as simple and modest, remarkable for bra- 
 very, good nature, good faith, and chastity, erring, 
 perhaps, in their too great neglect of externals, the 
 traveller can but shrug his shoulders, and produce thou- 
 sands of instances to the contrary. 
 
 There is another explanation, which applies to the 
 case as in Munich, and this is the separation of classes, 
 the division of society into layers, that are kept inde- 
 pendent of each other. A person moving in high society 
 may find it stiff and reserved, while another associating 
 with the literary and scientific classes may find them 
 frank and sociable. It is certain that the high society 
 
18 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 in Mimicli has a reputation for stifiness. I can myself 
 speak only favourably of the professional society. But 
 besides these two there are many other divisions of which 
 I am ignorant J and I do not profess myself competent 
 to judge the conduct of the creme de la crime. The few 
 occasions on which I have been permitted to take part 
 in its rejoicings, have impressed me very deeply. I 
 never found anythiag to reprehend in the young ladies' 
 dresses, in the light and sparkling conversation that 
 passed between the two sexes, in the courtesy of the 
 entertainers, in the refinement that checked all excess of 
 conviviality. To my humble notions everything seemed 
 perfect. But a noble of Rome, whose taste had been 
 educated in the ball-rooms of the gay cities which own 
 Rome as their capital, passed a very different verdict. 
 ''You think that gay and pleasant,'' he said, with ex- 
 treme contempt, twirling his moustache. " Why, you 
 never noticed what went on at the ball, or you have 
 forgotten it. Shall I teU you what I saw ? I went up 
 and asked a lady to dance ; she called for a sheet of 
 foolscap paper which contained her engagements for the 
 winter, and told me she could give me the third valse at 
 the next ball but one. She asked me if I went to the 
 pic-nic balls, and I found that was the name given to 
 the gayest balls of the town, because they were held at 
 an hotel." 
 
 " I don't see the derivation," I remarked. 
 
 " Evidently not. But it would be wrong to give the 
 same name to a ball that takes place in an hotel, and a 
 ball that takes place at court. So I accepted the dance 
 offered me without a remark, and made my bow." 
 
OF DANCES. 19 
 
 " And no further conversation ? " 
 
 "There you are again. Don^t you know it is not 
 the custom in Munich for ladies and gentlemen to talk 
 together ? Everybody woidd think you were engaged if 
 you talked together. When a dance is over every gen- 
 tleman drops his partner exactly where they happen to 
 stopj in the middle of the room, or iu one of the comers, 
 and she finds her way across by herself. You see all 
 the young ladies in one group between the dances, and 
 aU the young gentlemen in another group ; the ladies 
 by themselves, and the gentlemen by themselves, and 
 the elderly people by themselves." 
 
 "Besides, you have the quadrilles and lancers ex- 
 pressly for talking." 
 
 " Vraiment ? I believe it requires two people to talk, 
 and I never found the second. They pay so much at- 
 tention to the figure that their minds are engrossed, or 
 else they are like the Bermuda lady in. Captain Marryat, 
 who came to dance, and not to jabber. If you watch 
 the progress of the lancers, you will see that there is no 
 room for sliding in a word. Everybody takes it au 
 grand serieux. The music plays at the speed of a dead 
 march, and the gravity of countenance preserved by the 
 company is quite portentous. To see the officers doing 
 it you would think they were on parade. They stamp 
 through all the parts where they ought to glide, and 
 upon my word I believe they mark time when they 
 ought to be standing. Then the bows and the curtseys, 
 and the pauses between, and the solemnity of demeanour 
 are perfectly appaUing. I only once saw a bit of nature, 
 when a gentleman with a Calmuck face stepped through 
 
20 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 a lady^s dressj and recoiled some paces hopping, and 
 looking with horror at the offending foot which he held 
 poised in the air for a penance. As for their quadrilles — 
 would you heHeve it, they wound up the cotillon with a 
 quadriUe? I was so extenuated by the course of the 
 ball, and so nervous at the constant stamps, (you know 
 whenever a gentleman puts a lady down at the end of a 
 turn he gives a stamp with his foot,) that I lost all equa- 
 nimity. A quadrille I said. We always finish cotillons 
 with a quadrille, replied my partner, with a stress on 
 the always which placed the custom beyond appeal." 
 
 " Of course,''^ I replied to this tirade j " every nation 
 considers its customs more sacred than its laws." 
 
 " One of your country women found fault with the 
 custom of giving beer at ball suppers instead of cham- 
 pagne. And it does look strange to see the delicate 
 ladies of an exclusive aristocracy quaffing goblets of beer 
 after dancing. But I replied that good beer is better 
 than bad champagne ; and that beer is more refreshing 
 after dancing than anything, save champagne. Of course, 
 I prefer champagne, but only when it is first-rate ; and 
 how many people give you that ? Do they in England ? 
 No ; — there I think Munich is in the right." 
 
 I answered the noble Roman, that the supper was to 
 me the stumbling block of the evening. From the be- 
 ginning of the ball I had been offended by the predo- 
 minance of ofiicers ra uniform, seeing them arrive with 
 their swords buckled on, as if they were charged with 
 the preservation of order. One has a natural objection 
 to carpet knights ; and this objection is always liable to 
 be transferred to those who are ever seen in uniform, 
 
OF THE MILITARY. 31 
 
 but never on duty ; who seem to wear the gay colours 
 and the clashing metal for no other reason than to bear 
 off the palm from sober civilians. Munich is, perhaps^ 
 the most offensive place in the world, or one of the most 
 offensive, in this respect. I know of no other town in 
 which one notices so many uniforms. When one goes 
 from Munich to London, or even to Paris, one is agree- 
 ably struck by the prevalence of the civil garb over the 
 military. No officer in London would think of walking 
 the streets in uniform ; and in Paris, I am told the em- 
 ployment of uniform is formally restricted to those who 
 are on duty. In Munich, on 'the other hand, no mili- 
 tary man is allowed to appear in any other costume. 
 The same rule exists in the small towns of France ; but 
 I imagine the garrison is never as large, in proportion 
 to the population, as it is in Munich. Here, there is 
 one in seven in the army ; that is, every seventh person 
 you meet is likely, to be a soldier. And as the army is 
 almost the only profession open to young men of family, 
 the balls of the high society are monopolised by of&cers. 
 The incongruous spectacle is daily presented, of oflScers 
 driving themselves ; and in Munich it is carried to a 
 most ridiculous extent, by the want of carriages adapted 
 for that purpose. If anything can be worse than the 
 spectacle of officers in full uniform driving about the 
 street of a capital city, it is the sight of an officer driv- 
 ing from the box of a ramshackle country carriage, with 
 his servant occupying the body of the vehicle. After 
 this, one can tolerate almost anything, — even the cus- 
 tom so many officers in Munich have, of riding abreast 
 of their grooms, which makes you take the groom for a 
 
22 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 friend of his master. But one really gets so sick of the 
 everlasting soldiery in Munich^ that one cannot but 
 echo the sentiment which is fast growing with respect 
 to these standing armies, and which is best expressed 
 in Thackeray's line : — " Go to ! I hate him and his 
 trade.'' 
 
 One pities recruits, who have been drawn by conscrip- 
 tion instead of having taken the shilHng, when one sees 
 them drilled all day long, and beat and thumped if they 
 do not instantly appreciate the niceties of platoon exer- 
 cise. But when the recruit has become a full-blown 
 soldier, and repays the brutality of his early treatment 
 on the civilian, one almost regrets one's pity. Martial 
 music is a fine thing, and the strains of a good brass 
 band set the blood flowing faster ; but whenever one 
 gets close to a marching regiment, the band is sure to 
 stop, and the detestable drums strike up in its place. 
 The poet has stated his disgust at the drum's discordant 
 sound ; and one has only to hear six or eight drummers 
 beating as hard as they can on their diabolical parch- 
 ment, to appreciate the epithet. Why cannot men walk 
 without such a senseless row going on in front of them ? 
 The perpetual jar is enough to drive a nervous man to 
 despair; it shakes the houses to their foundations, and 
 seems to have got into the ground under your feet, and 
 to be rumbling hke premonitory symptoms of an earth- 
 quake. 
 
 To return, however, to the uniforms as they appear 
 at balls. " One would think," I said, " that some revolu- 
 tion, some invasion, was expected j or are these swords 
 only buckled on to defend the supper room ?" But when 
 
A PRACTICAL VIEW. - 23 
 
 you get to that quarter of the ball, you find it is xnucli 
 more a question of attack than of defence. "If the gentle- 
 men only waited on the ladies before beginning them- 
 selves ." But the noble of Rome interrupted me, 
 
 having listened with iU-disguised impatience to my long 
 discourse. " My dear sir, it is all very well to use ifs ; 
 but you should begin at the root of the matter. One 
 complains that the society is stiff and uagracious ; and 
 one finds fault with their customs. I could forgive them 
 this, and a great deal more, on one condition — if they 
 only had manners \" 
 
 With this my friend makes his bow, leaving me to 
 note down his strictures without being answerable for 
 them. I confess there are other things connected with 
 the society iu Munich that strike me unfavourably. I 
 think it awkward to see a footman helping his mistress 
 out of her carriage, with one hand on the carriage door 
 and the other employed in holding his hat by his side. 
 To say nothing of the servility of the action, nor of its 
 effect on the health in such a climate, it must be cen- 
 sured as eminently unpractical. If the lady's foot 
 catches in her dress, either the footman's hat, or his 
 mistress, must fall on the pavement. I think it unwise 
 to take up so much of the envelope with a man's titles, 
 that you have to crowd his name and address into a 
 small corner, and run the risk of your letter being mis- 
 sent, owing to the care you have taken that your 
 friend's dignity shall not be offended. I think it foolish 
 to lay so much stress on the formaHty of paying visits, 
 when a visit is only paid by sending two cards by a 
 servant, — as if you could promote social intercourse by 
 
24 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 possessing an extraordinary number of impressions of 
 every card plate. Either visiting means something or 
 nothing. It may be a great nuisance j but one con- 
 stantly submits to annoyances if they mean something. 
 But if it means nothing, why is it enforced as it is in 
 Munich? You never, by any chance, find people at 
 home, they are either just going out or just come in, or 
 at their toilettes or at table. You may have exchanged 
 cards with a man three months ago, and not know him 
 when you meet him in the street. As for knowing the 
 inside of his house, you might as weU expect to know 
 the inside of his mind. But you are represented by an 
 oblong piece of card board on his table, and your name 
 is inscribed on the tablet of his mind, that he may honour 
 you with a similar object at the fitting time. 
 
 The truth is, that so far from neglecting externals, 
 the Grermans carry the observance of externals to the 
 most extravagant lengths. What is the aggravation of 
 titles, but an observance of outward show? And the 
 idea of title is not confined to the nobility. As you go 
 lower down you find every one with some sort of handle 
 to his name. The authoress of " Quits^^ has made a 
 pleasant scene out of a legal Doctor, and the English 
 misapprehension of his employment; and in real life 
 such cases are of constant occurrence. A man who 
 cannot by any possibility get up a title, is botmd to call 
 himself a privatier, instead of leaving it to be implied 
 by the absence of a formula; and a newspaper writer 
 is called a privatgelehrter — ^literally, private man of 
 learning — in the address book. The custom of calling 
 all women of the lower classes Madame, to distinguish 
 
STARS AND CROSSES. 25 
 
 them from those who are entitled to the more honour- 
 able FraUj has an exactly opposite effect on strangers. 
 The universal term of French courtesy, the name that 
 stands by itself upon the steps of the ancient throne of 
 France, must always seem preferable to a familiar and 
 half- vulgar word, — a term of honour that few ladies, save 
 Germans, would wish to bear. Hand-in-hand with this 
 zeal for titles, goes the excessive use of decorations. 
 Till the beginning of 1863, it was the custom to give 
 away Orders every New Year's Day ; and on New Year's 
 Day, 1861, no less than one hundred and forty were 
 distributed. But the evil had got to such a height that 
 a check was necessary ; and the custom fell to the grovmd 
 on the 1st of January, 1863. It is said, that an order 
 w£is issued by the King, instructing the ministers of 
 state to be more chary of their recommendations, in 
 order to enhance the value of the Bavarian Orders. 
 But it is not by giving pieces of ribbon to two men of 
 letters, instead of to six, that ' the value of the Order is 
 enhanced, so long as the chief stars in. the decorative 
 firmament are bestowed on chamberlains and gentlemen- 
 in-waiting. We are pleased, when an Order is granted 
 to an eminent artist or man of mental acquirements; 
 perhaps the more, that such men are slighted by the 
 custom of England. We can fully appreciate the idea 
 of Nelson going into action at Trafalgar, with his 
 four stars on his frock coat, as we can understand his 
 answer to his oflB.cers : — " In honour I gained them, 
 and in. honour I will die with them." But when one 
 gentleman gets a grand cross for acting a part of upper 
 lackey, and another for telling the King the last bit 
 
26 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of gossip in Court French, the notion is too prepos- 
 terous. 
 
 I have never gone so far into the secrets of the grave, 
 as to ascertain if people are buried with their decora- 
 tions. It is the custom , ia Munich to bury people in 
 full dress; and what is stiU worse, to lay them out 
 behind a window, bedizened as if for a fete. Goethe 
 reproached some one for going to see a friend laid out 
 for burial ; adding, that he preferred to keep the memory 
 of his friend as he was, when alive, not the ghastly 
 memory of his features, stifiFened by death. The taste 
 of Munich is quite opposed to this saying. Crowds of 
 people go to the dead house and stand before the windows, 
 looking at young girls in ball dresses — old men with 
 bouquets of flowers on their bosoms. Burns, in his 
 Tarn O^Shanter, has hinted at the scene : — 
 
 " Coffins stood round like open presses, 
 That shaw'd the dead in their last dresses." 
 
 Much has been written against the Morgue ; but there 
 is at least an object in exposing unknown bodies, that 
 they may be claimed by their relations. In Munich 
 there is no reason, but pampered, disgusting curiosity — 
 an ignoble prurience, that every government should be 
 bound to suppress. The idea of exposing young girls in 
 ball dresses, with wreaths of flowers round their heads, 
 may, perhaps, suggest doubts to those over-literalists 
 who consider the resurrection of the body material — not 
 spiritual. If all were to rise again at the last day just 
 as they had been buried, it would hardly be appropriate 
 to rise in a ball dress. But this is the least objection 
 
THE SIGHT OP DEATH. 27 
 
 to be made to the Munich custom. It is marvellous, 
 that in a capital town, so widely renowned for its taste, 
 that Mr. Falkener's Daedalus is dedicated to the Bava- 
 rian people ; a town, in which the police have always 
 exercised the strictest supervision over public morals, 
 such a spectacle should be open to all the world, and 
 should be attended with such vulgar ostentation. 
 
 Not only in the matter of burials does death become 
 a mere form. It is seized on as an opportunity for the 
 most tedious and annoying ceremonial, which entirely 
 robs it of its meaning, while adding to its horrors. 
 When a person receives the last sacraments, it is the 
 custom for the nearest relations to be present, in fall 
 uniform. The day after a death, the survivor receives 
 the visits of all the town. I have heard of a widow 
 sitting down in a suit of black that had been hastily run 
 up during the night of her husband's death, and seeing 
 all her friends and acquaintances while the body was 
 yet unburied. One cannot conceive the union of feel- 
 ing with this formality ; nor is it possible that any one 
 who mourned her loss could admit the world to gaze 
 upon it. 
 
 Germans often express their surprise that Englishmen 
 should go to indifferent tea-parties in fall dress, while 
 they wear only morning dress to important dinners in 
 the middle of the day. On the other hand it seems 
 strange to English people to put on their evening clothes 
 at one o'clock, even though they have the ultra-English 
 habit of dressing every evening. One sees Germans 
 walking about in full black at one o'clock, sometimes 
 with a white wide-awake on the top, which has a sin- 
 
28 SOCIAl LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 gular effect in broad daylight. I confess myself inclined 
 to strike a balance between the two customs, believing 
 them both to be formal. But in Munich the recog- 
 nition of the right hand is made a point of even more 
 formality than the full dress for an early dinner. "When- 
 ever a lady goes into a house the mistress of the house 
 conducts her to the sofa, and places her on the right 
 hand side. In many places the sofa is meant for nothing 
 else, and I remember a person who let furnished lodg^ 
 ings objecting to the tenant lying on the sofa, because 
 that was not the proper use for it. In what other 
 coiintry but Germany could one have left-handed mar- 
 riages, as if the sanctity of the marriage tie lay in the 
 right hand of the bridegroom, and a mixed marriage 
 could only be contracted by the left ? • Perhaps the most 
 ridiculous use of this custom, the one which carries its 
 own punishment with it, is seen when a gentleman 
 drives a lady, or a servant drives a gentleman. I have 
 myself witnessed a gentleman driving a lady in a phae- 
 ton, the gentleman sitting on the left hand, and the lady 
 on the right. One need not be a good whip to see the 
 absurdity, and to predict the consequences. If the 
 driver had to give the slightest touch of the whip to his 
 horses, he would infallibly hit the lady in the face with 
 his elbow. 
 
 But it is not often that you see a gentleman driving 
 a lady in Munich. A kind of separate maintenance 
 seems the rule, especially in the evening. I know of 
 very few families in which the evening is passed in a 
 sociable way, in which the husband stays at home with 
 his wife. It is the old story of the French stage; 
 
CLUBS OP MUNICH. 29 
 
 Oil passerai-je mes soir6es? But instead of the gay and 
 brilliant cafe life of Paris, the husbands of Munich have 
 ■what they call their clubs at tayerns, or breweries. A 
 curious chapter might be written on the clubs of Munich. 
 The temptations they offer are certainly not the same 
 as those which entice so many married men in Lon- 
 don to their bachelor palaces in Pall Mall. They 
 are rather clubs in the earlier sense of the word, not 
 possessing a house of their own, but only a room in 
 some tavern, which is theirs for the time. And yet 
 their attractions seem even more powerful, as every 
 genuine Municher makes a point of spending the even- 
 ing at his club, and the wives of Munich people are 
 always abandoned. It is said that many gentlemen 
 object to making an exception even for their marriage 
 eveniag, and libellers declare that the ladies, when left 
 alone, immediately attire themselves in extreme neg- 
 lige, and knit stockings. Probably from this custom of 
 clubs has grown the rival custom of coffee parties at- 
 tended by ladies alone ; an opposition measure, which is 
 perfectly excused by the circumstances. Meanwhile the 
 men are collected ia a room, smoking and drinking 
 beer. The smoke is so thick, that clothes and hair 
 smell of it for days to come. 
 
 The names of the Munich clubs are not so far-fetched 
 as those recorded in the Book of Snobs, but they are 
 sometimes even more inappropriate. For instance, one 
 of them is the " Old Englishmen ;" but the club which 
 bears this name does not number one Englishman among 
 its members. I was invited to a military club by two 
 men, who were both civilians. But to English ideas 
 
30 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the Fisher Club would bear away the prize of absurdity^ 
 One naturally supposes that a club of this nature would 
 look after the interests of fishing ; would take a water, 
 preserve it strictly, and confine it to the members; would 
 secure, as far as possible, the preservation of fish in other 
 waters, and have the right of fishing in them. Nothing 
 of the sort is attempted. The Fisher Club has no cor- 
 porate existence out of the room in which it meets during 
 the winter. I read in a newspaper that it has turned its 
 attention to the breeding of fish, and that it has stocked 
 several of the rivers near Munich during the last two or 
 three years. But while poaching is general, and fisher- 
 men live on the produce of the lakes and rivers in Ba- 
 varia, it is of little use stocking the waters, especially 
 when they are not the property of the Fisher Club. 
 And the actual proceedings of the club are in no way 
 connected with fishing. The members meet once a 
 month in a room belonging to a tavern, they sit round 
 a table smoking and drinking beer, while a scientific 
 authority delivers a lecture on some scientific question. 
 All this is well enough ; the lectures are generally able 
 and instructive in the highest degree ; but an English- 
 man considers a fisher club ought to fish instead of 
 talk. 
 
 The domestic life of the Germans has been so often 
 and so fully described, that I have carefully avoided it 
 in this chapter. But one or two points may be men- 
 tioned in passing. Let me confirm the general idea 
 that the Germans dislike fresh air, by stating that in 
 many houses in Munich there is not one window opened 
 from autumn to spring. A French author has called 
 
JUSTICE TO BABIES. 31 
 
 attention to the singular mode of carrying home petti- 
 coats from the wash, sticking them upon poles like large 
 cotton umbrellaSj so that you see petticoats walking the 
 streets after the manner of Birnam Wood on its march 
 to Dunsinane. The very reverse of this freedom is 
 allotted to babies. Young English mothers are more 
 indignant at the injustice shown to these tender crea- 
 tures than they are at the public exhibition of their own 
 under garments. The unfortunate child is thrust into 
 a feather piUow, and swathed like an Egyptian mummy, 
 with tight bindings of tapes confining arms and legs, 
 and all the other members which a baby loves to dis- 
 port in freedom and familiarity. Even that unruly 
 member, the tongue, is chained, by the thrusting of a 
 lump of cloth with a piece of sugar inside it, or a com- 
 pound of sugar and the crumb of bread, into the infant 
 mouth. I leave it to the mothers of England, and to 
 learned writers on the treatment of children, to decide 
 if these practices are healthy, if the limbs arie not liable 
 to be stunted by the bandaging, and the stomach weak- 
 ened by constant sucking at the sugar bag. The appear- 
 ance is certainly not pleasing, nor does the aspect of the 
 babies of Munich bear witness to the good effects of their 
 training. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 ROYALTY. 
 
 This book would very inadequately express the senti- 
 ments of Munich, if an early chapter were not given to 
 kings. In no capital that I have seen, is loyalty so 
 general or so obtrusively shoTvn, as in the capital of 
 Bavaria. It seems to be a law, that the smaller a 
 monarch the more respect is paid to him ; and perhaps 
 it is fortunate ; for the ruler of a great country would 
 sink imder the weight of that homage which the ruler 
 of a small country finds grateful and refreshing. In a 
 small capital, the king is much nearer his subjects than 
 in a large one. He walks about the streets almost un- 
 attended; is constantly seen driving; and his move- 
 ments are known to the whole community. The gulf 
 that separates him from them is much smaller; and, 
 therefore, he seems to some extent one of themselves, — 
 a being of flesh and blood, though glorified. And people 
 always respect the highest among themselves more than 
 the highest in another scale of being. To the soldier, a 
 general is a much greater man than an admiral ; to the 
 lawyer, the lord chancellor, and to the clergyman, the 
 archbishop, are supreme; while the small noble con- 
 
SIGNS OF LOYALTY. 33 
 
 siders the highest rank in the nobility more truly ve- 
 nerable than any other conceivable dignity. In the 
 admiration thus felt, there is something definite and 
 easily explained : in all other respects there is an un- 
 certainty, -which naturally leads to heartless and lip- 
 loyalty. 
 
 It is only on this principle one can explaia the extra- 
 vagance of Munich loyalty. It is not directed towards 
 the achievements of either king alone; for, though 
 both the reigning kiag and the king who has abdicated 
 have done much for Munich, they have not done enough 
 to entitle them to such ultra professions of regard. Nor 
 is the regard confined to the heads of the royal family ; 
 every member of it, and of its branches, is greeted with 
 equal fervour. Every time one of these personages 
 goes out walking, the passengers stop, draw up in a 
 line, take off their hats and bow to the ground. This 
 is done to young princesses of a distant branch, when 
 they are walking with their governesses, and to the 
 young princes, when they are walking with their tutor. 
 On snowy days, when the Queen walks up and down 
 the arcades, with two footmen behind her, the strollers 
 there have to draw up in a line every time she passes. 
 And as these arcades are the great resort of Munich in 
 bad weather, and the turns taken by the Queen are 
 many, it may almost be calculated that every walk of 
 hers costs her subjects six or eight hats. It is not 
 sufficient to raise the hat, as is done in countries of 
 more advanced civilisation : each hat has to be pulled 
 off and held crown downwards, ia which position aU the 
 weight is thrown on the brim. Munich hats are bad 
 
 2 
 
34 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 by nature : and I doubt if even Lincoln and Bennet 
 would long resist such a pressure. Baron Thiebault^ 
 whose book on Municb I shall shortly have occasion to 
 notice^ complains of the necessity of doffing the hat com- 
 pletely, and says, that hats last longer in Paris than in 
 Munich. But the elder branch of royalty insists on the 
 full salute : aad the custom is too deeply rooted iu the 
 people to be speedily abolished. The salute is not con- 
 fined to royalty. Friends offer it to each other ; and if 
 you are walking with a man, you must salute every one 
 whom he salutes. There is an old story, of a notice 
 posted up in some German town, requesting people not 
 to take off their hats : but one can scarcely believe that 
 any movement has been made in. the right direction. 
 It is said that, during the Eevolution, King Ludwig 
 snatched off the hat of some man who did not salute 
 him, and flung it on the ground. Priace Charles, his 
 brother, abused a gentleman at Tegernsee for slightly 
 raising his hat, instead of making the customary salute. 
 One^s only consolation is, that these royal people are 
 more heavily taxed than their subjects. You bow once 
 to each of them you meet ; but they have to bow to 
 everybody who meets them. How many hats do they 
 use, I wonder ? Baron Thiebault saw King Ludwig 
 walking down the streets with his hat in his hand, to 
 avoid having to take it off every minute, and this with 
 the thermometer many degrees below zero. 
 
 But it is no real alleviation of an annoyance to reflect 
 that those who insist upon it are more annoyed than 
 yourself. Common-sense considerations should have 
 the first place in regulating the amount of respect to 
 
HATS. 
 
 35 
 
 be shown to individuals; and where is the common 
 sense of using twice as many hats as necessary^ in 
 a town where good hats are unattainable ? It gives 
 a man no more pleasure to have a hat swung right off in 
 his honour^ than to have it slightly raised, or to be bowed 
 to politely. What pleasure does a king feel, in waking 
 up his subjects at six in the morning, by banging of 
 cannon to announce his birthday? One turns round 
 in disgust, and wishes he had never been bom. I think 
 it is Victor Hugo, in the " Miserables," who makes a 
 calculation of the money spent yearly in foolish banging 
 away of powder in saluting, and of the good that might 
 be done with it. And in Munich, all carriages and 
 horsemen are stiU bound to stop when royalty comes 
 along the road, — a regulation of constant inconvenience 
 in a small capital. I am told, and I hope it is true, 
 that the reigning King of Bavaria is glad to have a 
 sensible lift of the hat from a stranger ; and he has only 
 to put himself against the needless servility of stopping 
 all carriages he meets, to earn the praise of the first 
 Alexander. " Enthusiastically beloved by his subjects," 
 says Sir Archibald Alison, "^ Alexander had, immediately 
 on his accession to the throne, abolished the custom of 
 alighting from the carriage whenever the royal equipages 
 were met, which had excited so much discontent under 
 his tyrannical predecessor; but the respect of his sub- 
 jects induced them to continue the practice, and to 
 avoid such a mark of oriental servitude, he was in the 
 habit of driving about, without guards, in a private 
 chariot." Oriental servitude is, perhaps, the most ap- 
 propriate term for such extravagant loyalty. So grateful 
 
36 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 should I feel to any one who would procure the aboli- 
 tion of the custom that I would — take my hat off to 
 him. Of all that has been written on the subject of 
 hatSj scarcely anything seems to have touched the ques- 
 tion of taking them oflf. Pielding^ whose chapter of 
 hatSj in Jonathan Wild the Great, has been pronounced 
 by Coleridge superior to anything written by Swift 
 in Lilliput, or The Tale of a Tub, confines himself 
 chiefly "to the wearing of them. His satire is, to some 
 extent, a forestalment of Sartor Resartus, viewing hats 
 as types of political differences, or as professional sym- 
 bols. Everything is found in Shakspeare, however; 
 and the pith of the question I have debated is given in 
 one line of Hamlet : — " The bonnet to his right use ;" 
 says Hamlet to Osrick ; — " 'tis for the head." Judging 
 by the importance assigned by some to the wearing of 
 hats, one would think the bonnet was not made for the 
 head — but the head for the bonnet ; and in Munich, 
 hats do not seem made to be put on — but to be taken 
 off. It is true, that both these objections might be 
 answered by a reference to the quality and occupation 
 of some most sedulous saluters ; as their heads seem 
 only made to put hats on, and their hands only made 
 to take hats off. 
 
 These, then, are the outward and visible signs of loy- 
 alty, desendng the first place in a chapter devoted to 
 subjective treatment of royalty rather than objective. 
 The institution of kings is not in itself a matter of such 
 interest to me that I should write of it as some have 
 done, nor has my stay in Munich inoculated me with 
 Munich loyalty, though it seems to be catching. With- 
 
A COURT GUIDE. '67 
 
 out adducing other examples to prove the contagious 
 efifects of the air of the place, the French book to which 
 I have just alluded will serve my purpose. I do not 
 imagine any French author would gossip about the tri- 
 vial details of imperial life as Baron Thi^bault has done 
 about the infinitely more trivial details of Bavarian royal . 
 life, or would set down word for word a formal conversa- 
 tion between himself and the Emperor as the Baron has 
 done for the king of Bavaria. But Baron Thiebault goes 
 so fully into all these matters that his volume is quite a 
 Court Guide, and my knowledge of Bavarian royalty is 
 due to it alone. The baron teUs us that the king dines 
 'at half-past three, goes to bed at half-past ten, and rises 
 all the year round at five ; that the queen drinks beer 
 every night, and does not like being addressed as Madame 
 by French people, because in Germany Madame is a 
 disparaging title. He expresses his regret that he began 
 the Carnival by not bowing to the Queen, and ended it 
 by sitting next to a prince without knowing him. He 
 enlarges on the literary character of the whole house of 
 Bavaria, and contrasts it favourably with the Catalogue 
 of Royal Authors. He copies out the genealogy of the 
 reigning house when he is kept at home by a fever, and 
 adds a list of the mediatised princes, and the whole 
 Bavarian nobUity. When presented to the Queen he 
 was troubled by the doubt whether or no she would 
 recognise the bold promenader who did not salute her. 
 Presented to Prince Charles he won that amiable prince's 
 heart by praising beer. " Ah," said the prince quickly, 
 " I, too, am a brewer \" I had evidently touched a ten- 
 der chord. I had been a courtier without knowing it ! 
 
38 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Bold promenaderj and courtier without knowing it^, are 
 singular epithets to be applied to Baron Thiebault. His 
 royal pursuits must have been all-engrossing to enable 
 him to write a work on Munich in which the name of 
 Liebig is only mentioned once^ in a panegyric on the 
 King; in which the galleries are dismissed in a page/ 
 and literature only introduced in its princely shape ; in 
 which Munich's real claims to distiuction are ignored, 
 and the motley character of King Ludwig's buildings 
 proclaimed their chief merit. But he was occupied with 
 other things. Listen to his account of his presentation 
 to King Maximilian. " I print the conversation almost 
 word for word. The King. You have been unwell? 
 Myself. That alone forbade my soliciting the honour of 
 being presented to your Majesty on the 1st of January. 
 The King. I am glad to see that you are better. Our 
 climate is somewhat severe for strangers. Myself. Out 
 of doors one must be warmly clad, but when at home 
 the houses are so well heated that one has no idea of 
 the temperature without. The King. Are you related to 
 the author of the " Recollections of Twenty Years Stay 
 in Berlin?" Myself. Yes, sire, Dieudonn^ Thiebault 
 was my grandfather. The King. Well, sir, I have made 
 these " Recollections " the object of special study. I 
 know them by heart. Myself. I thank your Majesty 
 very humbly for having the goodness to say so flat- 
 tering a thing to me, and I am happy to see that my 
 name is not entirely strange to your Majesty. The King. 
 Do you speak German? Myself. No, sire, no more 
 than my grandfather. The King. He had a reason for 
 not learning it. Myself. Doubtless, sire, he had pro- 
 
ROYAL CONVERSATION. 39 
 
 raised the king of Prussia. The King, And lie kept his 
 word. Frederick thought that was the best way to pre- 
 serve his French from Germanism. Do you stay any time 
 in Munich ? Myself. My intention, sire, is to pass the 
 winter. The King. I hope that you will enjoy yourself, 
 and above all that your health will be good.'"" King Lud- 
 wig received the baron as graciously, telling him his 
 grandfather had replaced Voltaire at Berlin, but not 
 with the ideas of Voltaire. The conversation tiirned on 
 the Emperor of the French, and King Ludwig said he 
 had known Queen Hortense, that she was amiable and 
 witty, but added, " smiling, shutting his eyes, putting 
 his mouth close to my ear, and even pulling me by the 
 arm to draw me closer — not pretty." 
 
 Except as showing the character of the writer, and 
 affording texts for reflections on the strange fascination 
 of royalty, these descriptions are worthless. We learn 
 nothing of the character of the two kings from them, 
 nothing more than what we know already. To mere 
 observers in the street, who have never been presented 
 at court. King Max seems somewhat prosy, and King 
 Ludwig partially cracked. Any one admitted to see 
 them at home, and speak to them, might have carried 
 away some more definite idea of them, one would have 
 thought; might have discovered new traits, or explained 
 the old ones. But Baron Thiebault has attempted no- 
 thing of the kind. One casual glimpse indeed he gives 
 us, but only incidentally, and without seeming to attach 
 any importance to it, of a singular custom in the court 
 life of Munich. King Ludwig received him, he says, 
 in uniform, resting his hand on the hUt of his sword. 
 
40 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Was he just going to a review ? asks the reader. No, 
 he had just risen from table. Strange custom which 
 requires a pacific king to dine in a soldier's uniform, 
 wearing his sword. One step further, and you have the 
 dress in which the inhabitants of Branksome Hall were 
 in the habit of messiag : — 
 
 " They carved at the meal 
 Witli gloves of steel, 
 And they drank the red wine through the helmet barred." 
 
 But the costume which might be appropriate on the 
 Border is ridiculous in a time of profound peace, and in 
 the midst of civilisation. Why is it that so many rulers 
 in Germany make the military dress their constant 
 covering ? In a military man like the King of Prussia 
 it is somewhat natural, though the extent to which 
 he carries it is ridiculous. A king who has no fur- 
 ther view than one bounded by a square of soldiers, 
 and whose highest ideal is the profession of drill, may 
 very properly wear helmet, epaulets, and sword, for 
 dining, dancing and prayiag. But the kings of Bavaria 
 have a better ideal, and less limited views. The more 
 pity that they do not set themselves against the use of 
 this detestable dress, the badge of sad necessity in war, 
 but of idleness and worthless parade, if nothing worse, 
 in time of peace. "The first consul appeared on all 
 occasions in uniform, with boots and spurs," says 
 Alison, in describuig the steps by which Napoleon intro- 
 duced the reaction against republicanism, which was to 
 lead to his assumption of absolute power. With this 
 view the military dress was substituted for the Greek 
 
THE MEANING OF DEESS. 41 
 
 and Roman costumes, in tlie folds of which Jacobinism 
 was supposed to lurk. The motive is here intelligible ; 
 but if King Ludwig selected any dress on the same 
 principle, it ought to be a mediseval costume to match 
 with his buDdings. He ought to appear one day in the 
 garb of Pericles, when he walks towards the Glypto- 
 thek, another day in Florentine costume, another day 
 as Emperor or Pontiff. It must be this idea that has 
 caused the sculptor of his equestrian statue to mis up 
 all times in the monarches costume, and the mixture 
 might be consistent ia King Ludwig. But there is 
 another point to be considered in introducing Napoleon. 
 He had earned the best right to appear in military cos- 
 tume. He had won his spurs. Rivoli, Areola, the 
 Pyramids, were the exploits by which he was known, 
 and the man who had worn the soldier^s dress there 
 might justly parade it at Paris. 
 
 A strange mode of complimentiag soldiers of other 
 nations is adopted by monarchs in general. Each Ger- 
 man king is colonel of some regiment in every other 
 German state, — an unmeaning form, with the sole merit 
 that it ought to be embarrassing in case of war between 
 any two states. Such regiments ought to be called on 
 to choose between their king and their colonel; but 
 the want of true meaning is shown in the absence of 
 any such embarrassment. By similar usage, all royal 
 people are related, which ought consistently to make war 
 between them as sinful as family quarrels. But as this 
 relationship leads only to each being addressed as man 
 cousin, and entitled to foolish black throughout all the 
 courts of Europe iu the event of death ; so the various 
 
42 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 colonelcies only lead to changes of raiment. Whenever 
 a distinguished Austrian officer is received by the King 
 of Bavaria, you read in the papers, that, out of compli- 
 ment to his guest, the King wore his uniform as colonel 
 of such an Austrian regiment. The time of German 
 kings seems to be occupied in receiving people and 
 changing their dresses between the receptions. Every- 
 body of note has to be received; — foreign officers, 
 foreign ministers, new members of the diplomatic corps, 
 singers, actors and ballet-dancers, who are starring it at 
 the theatre. If the King has to change his dress for 
 each one of his visitors, the day would be almost too 
 short for many receptions. I cannot think the compli- 
 ment conveyed is worth the trouble incurred. What is 
 the exact value of the compliment ? If it were only 
 paid now and then, it might be a distinction ; but then 
 it is done so often. And in cases, such as the meeting 
 of the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria, the 
 double-barrelled compliment seems to miss fire. You 
 read, that the King of Prussia wore his Austrian uniform, 
 out of compliment to the Emperor of Austria ; and the 
 Emperor of Austria wore his Prussian uniform, out of 
 compliment to the King of Prussia. The Charivari, 
 indeed, quoted the proverb, that " if you would learn a 
 man's thoughts you must put on his skin," and added, 
 that not being able to change skins, the two sovereigns 
 had changed uniforms. But any one present, who did 
 not know the two monarchs, would not have appre- 
 ciated the mutual delicacy, and would merely have 
 taken the King of Prussia for the Emperor of Austria, 
 and the Emperor of Austria for the King of Prussia. 
 
NEWSPAPER PARAGRAPHS. 43 
 
 Scoffing minds are also led to ask, if these kings put on 
 foreign uniforms to receire foreign officers as becomes 
 their merit, why do they not put on tights and fleshings 
 to receive ballet-dancers ? 
 
 It is from the newspapers I learn the facts of all these 
 receptions, and, in gratitude for the information, I will 
 show the manner in which it is given. Thackeray says, 
 that he was moved with such curiosity to learn the com- 
 position of the Court Circular, that he bribed the 
 editor of some daily paper to let him see the man who 
 brought it. But what is the bare statement of facts- 
 which interest every loyal subject in the columns of the 
 London papers to the German expansion of such facts ? 
 The German papers seem to keep correspondents for 
 nothing else than to chronicle royal doings in. the most 
 fulsome style. Carlyle complained that no other topic 
 was discussed throughout the newspapers, save theatrical 
 proceedings, reminding us of Swift^s remark, that when 
 he was young, he thought all the world, as well as him- 
 self, was wholly taken up in discoursing upon the last new 
 play. " If you see ' intelligence from Munich,^ — ' intel- 
 ligence from Berlin,' — 'intelligence from Vienna,' — it 
 is only intelligence of green-room controversies and 
 negotiations." But this complaint can no longer be ut- 
 tered with truth. Theatrical news has been superseded 
 by court items, and the only possible way of laying 
 these before the English reader, is by following the 
 example Carlyle himself has set in one of his later 
 writings. One may venture to give literal translations 
 of German Court Circular phrases for which no equiva- 
 lent can be found in English, after reading this passage 
 
44 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 ia Frederick the Great: — "The King, who himself 
 sometimes deigns to take ihe regiments into highest 
 own eye-shine — hochst-eigenen augenschein, (that is to 
 review them) , say the reverential editors." It is, per- 
 haps, a just punishment on Carlyle for his attack on 
 theatrical news, that the only news which has succeeded 
 it, is such as must be translated by parodying him. 
 Instead of green-room controversies taking up all the 
 paper, whenever you see "news from Munich," it is 
 sure to be something about high Fraus and most serene 
 princes; how duke this has gone to Venice, and duke 
 that to Salzburg; how King Ludwig met the Grand 
 Duchess of Modena at the railway station, and pleas- 
 ingly surprised her. You look in the paper for an ac- 
 count of the Artists' Bill, and find the only statement 
 about it is, that the Queen was present, and the most 
 serene princes accompanied highest-their Frau mother. 
 You wish to read an account of the Corpus Christi 
 procession, one of the grandest spectacles Munich can 
 afford, and you find that the King was represented by 
 Prince Luitpold, and that the Queen and her sons looked 
 on from their apartments in the palace. " The proces- 
 sion took place in the usual manner," says the writer ; 
 '^though there were several small showers, the train 
 continued without interruption." The paragraph re- 
 minds me of that story of a reporter who was sent to 
 describe an eclipse, and who, after giving the time at 
 which it took place, and one or two similar details, 
 added, " the proceedings were entirely devoid of public 
 interest." 
 
 These writers are evidentlv of opinion that public in- 
 
EX-PRINCES. 45 
 
 terest is, or ought to he, concentrated on the proceed- 
 ings of royalty. All other subjects are secondary. It 
 is rather interesting to examine the views that are put 
 forth by them, if we would estimate the nature of the 
 opposition a large class of people is prepared to offer to 
 any social or political progress. To judge from the re- 
 spect they show to the Austro-Italian ex-grand dukes, 
 and to the king of the brigands of Naples, it would 
 seem that they hold the belief, " once a king, always a 
 king." Even in 1862, we read that the Queen Marie 
 of the Two Sicilies is going to pay a visit to her sister, 
 before returning to her consort, King Francis the Second, 
 at Rome; the writer forgetting that for the last year 
 there have not been two Sicilies, but one Italy. The 
 Grand Duke Ferdinand of Tuscany is a phrase that 
 constantly recurs in the German papers, although he 
 never even sat on the throne of Tuscany, his father 
 having abdicated in favour of his people, before he re- 
 sign,ed in favour of his son. No doubt it is a matter of 
 surprise to conservative writers like these Court Cir- 
 culars, that the Queen of Hanover should be able to 
 arrive in Munich at a quarter past four, be photographed 
 instantly, and depart at five; an amount of speed that 
 never was attained in the good old days. But the writer 
 retains his presence of mind even in the face of such an 
 astonishing event, and records hurriedly that her Majesty 
 came with her high family, and was received in the 
 station by the royal Hanoverian ambassador. But none 
 of the writers I have produced can vie with a Salzburg 
 correspondent, who was fortunate enough to witness the 
 arrival of the Empress of Austria ia that town, and her 
 
46 SOCIAL LIPE IN MUNICH. 
 
 meeting with her husband. He is entitled to literal 
 translation. "Even now departed from Salzbiirg the 
 all-highest ruler-pair. The emperor had already arrived 
 here at nine this mornings paid a visit to the empress 
 widow and drove with her to the (by the then in the 
 London Exhibition absent Archduke Ludwig Victor 
 evacuated) country seat Klessheim. From hence their 
 majesties repaired to the near the Railway lying ViUa 
 Schwarz^ and after a short view of it, to the Station 
 where the authorities and a selected share of the public 
 had found themselves^ which (the selected share) ex- 
 pected with excited interest the arrival of the much- 
 loved Empress Elizabeth. In the midday heat, 15 mi- 
 nutes before 12, rolled the Munich Court carriage train 
 slowly and noiselessly with the longed-for guests into 
 the station. Scarcely that the engine stood, the em- 
 peror mounted the Saloon carriage, to greet in the same 
 his high consort in the heartfullest manner. A few mo- 
 ments later the empress widow also betook herself into the 
 carriage of the reigning empress> embracing and kissing 
 her. The emperor immediately helped both the em- 
 presses out of the carriage. The empresses entered the 
 Perron, and then retired for a short time into the inner 
 chambers of the station. The young empress was 
 veiled, wore a black silk dress and a pretty round straw 
 hat of dark colour, which a brown wing-feather of a 
 golden pheasant decorated. In spite of the veil the full 
 healthy traits and the high colour of the high Frau 
 were to be remarked. With the same had also come 
 the serene mother, the Frau Duchess Max, as also the 
 Princes Charles Theodore and Max Emmanuel with 
 
A PLEA FOR PRIVACY. 47 
 
 the Princess Mathilda Countess of Trani and the Prin- 
 cess Sophie (collectively brothers and sisters of the em- 
 press) as also the Neapolitan Prince Louis Count of 
 Trani. At i past 12 the empress mounted^ visibly 
 touched by the family farewell and holding a white 
 handkerchief before her mouth, yet vigorously the car- 
 riage, in which also the emperor and Prince Charles 
 Theodore took places, after which the train set itself in 
 motion to Frankenmarkt where dinner was ordered for 
 the all-highest lordships.''^ 
 
 Absurd as this passage may seem, it is difBcult for a 
 reflecting man to read it without sadness. After all, 
 these "high lordships" are flesh and blood like the rest 
 of us, and it is charitable to suppose that they have our 
 feelings, at least as regards themselves and their nearest 
 kindred. The man who as absolute master of a kiiig- 
 dom plunges all his subjects into war sooner than resign 
 one part of them, and causes general misery rather than 
 relieve partial misery, may be loving and affectionate to 
 those who are companions of his life, may have the same 
 feelings himself that he disregards ia all the thousand 
 families under his sway. And yet these feelings are not 
 thought too sacred to be pawned by a Court Circular 
 scribe, and profaned by his mixture of toadyism and 
 familiarity. We may be glad that when we meet our 
 wives our greetings are not being noted down by a cor- 
 respondent, and do not afi'ord an opportunity for other 
 writers to sneer at us under pretence of rebuking the 
 toadyism of our chronicler. 
 
 It is a relief to turn from this subject to another. 
 
48 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 whicli is sheer humbug ; and yet a moment's considera- 
 tion tells us, that a worse blasphemy is here committed 
 than that outrage on our affections. When we read a 
 programme of the court ceremonies to be performed on 
 Holy Thursdays, we forget for the moment the sacred 
 meaning of what is thus travestied. We forget that, 
 when the King assists at a ceremony, in which he drops 
 a little water on the feet of twelve old men, who have 
 been washed for the occasion, he is repeating an act of 
 which we cannot read without being most deeply moved. 
 How is it possible to connect this most ceremonious 
 ceremonial with that so meaning and so touching act of 
 love ! It is only by excluding any connection that we 
 are able to view the thing calmly. But the piling up of 
 form upon form very soon makes us forget that any- 
 thing more than a coiirt ceremony can be intended. 
 And it is not likely, that any one who assists at it ever 
 casts his thoughts back to the upper room, which is sup- 
 posed to be represented by the Hercules Saal in the 
 palace. Here, then, is the programme of the cere- 
 monial: — 
 
 " After the procession held to-day, and after comple- 
 tion of vespers, His Majesty the King betake himself 
 out of all-highest-his oratory in the Eesidenz chapel, 
 preceded by the grand cortege, to the Hercules Chamber, 
 in which all-highest-the-same deign to perform the feet- 
 washing and feeding of the twelve old men. His Ma- 
 jesty THE King and the most seeene Princes, Royal 
 Highnesses, betake themselves to their seats, accom- 
 panied by all-highest and highest-their attendants. The 
 
THE king's pakt. 49 
 
 grand cortege takes tte seats assigned to it. The clergy^ 
 which enters after this, betakes itself, after reverence 
 made to the all-highest court, to the altar, by which 
 two pages stand with burning wax torches, performs 
 the usual church functions, and sings the gospel, which 
 is brought by the assistants, accompanied by two pages, 
 to his majesty the King and their royal highnesses to 
 be kissed. After this, his majesty the King give his 
 hat and sword to all-highest-his upper chamberlain 
 who gives both to the chamberlains on duty. At the 
 same time, the royal high steward receives from the 
 sub-deacon the can filled with water, and bears it to 
 His Majesty on a salver, as also the court marshal with 
 the foot-towel for drying, which he has received from 
 the plate-keeper. As soon as the director of the Royal 
 Chapel leaves the altar, and, attended by the two Le- 
 vites, goes to the old men, his majesty the King, es- 
 corted by the chief master of ceremonies, and accompa- 
 nied by the high steward, upper chamberlain, capitaine 
 des gardes, court marshal, and upper-plate-chamber- 
 lain on duty, walk to the eldest of the men near the 
 grand cortege, and the feet- washing begins in this way : 
 — The royal high steward hands the can to his majesty 
 the King, the sub-deacon holds the basin, which was 
 placed on the altar for this purpose, under the uncovered 
 foot. His Majesty sprinkle the uncovered foot of each 
 old man, and dry the same with the cloth presented 
 by the court marshal, on which the director of the Royal 
 Chapel kisses the foot of each one. On completion of 
 the feet-washing, the royal head- plate-chamberlain places 
 himself with the pitcher appointed for the sprinkling of 
 
50 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the hands of His Majesty, then a page with the basin, 
 and the page with the towel on a salver, by the last old 
 man ; after the sprinkling. His Majesty allow the towel 
 which is held ready for drying his hands by the head 
 chamberlain to be handed by the Prince Luitpold, high- 
 est-who is brought from his seat for this purpose by a 
 royal master of ceremonies at the right time, and is 
 accompanied by the chamberlain on duty. During this 
 proceeding, the whole clergy returns to the altar, and 
 there finishes the clerical functions. The royal high 
 steward receives at the door of the knight^s chamber, 
 from one of his staif, the gift of money in white and blue 
 purses, on a salver covered with blue tafFeta, to be pre- 
 sented to His Majesty. Before his majesty the King 
 hang the purses of money, which are carried round by 
 the high steward, on the neck of each of the twelve old 
 men, all-highest-the-same receive his sword from the 
 hands of the head chamberlain, but not till the last 
 purse is hung his hat. After this his majesty the King 
 betake himself again to all-highest-his place, on which 
 the clergy, after making a reverence, leaves the room." 
 So with the feeding of the old men, which I have not 
 patience to translate. Suffice it that, when they are 
 placed, the King gives up his hat to the head chamber- 
 lain, and is led by the chief master of ceremonies to the 
 table. One master of ceremonies leads Prince Luitpold 
 to one table : another master of ceremonies leads Priace 
 Adalbert and Duke Max to another table j and each 
 prince, after receiving his shareof the food from the cham- 
 berlains, hands it to the King. The King places meat, 
 bread, and wine before each of the old men, then receives 
 
RULES OF COtTRT GB^MMAR. 51 
 
 his hat from the head chamberlain, and returns to all- 
 highest-his apartment. 
 
 Throughout this programme, as in court writings 
 generally, the verb which is governed by the King's 
 name is in the plural ; and while the King is in large 
 capitals, the princes are in small. I think this is the 
 only comment I need make. 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 ■ TWO KINGS OF 
 
 Looking down the list of reigning sovereigns in the 
 Almanach de Gotha, we find no less than five whose 
 accession dates from 1848. One of these is King Maxi- 
 milian the Second of Bavaria^ who mounted the throne 
 on the abdication of his father^ King Ludwig. We may 
 speak of the kings of that year, and the year following, 
 as we would of the vintage of any given date, and we 
 ought to know them by their flavour. They came to 
 their thrones because their predecessors did not suit the 
 people, or were unequal to the exigencies of the time. 
 A decided constitutional smack is, therefore, expected 
 of them : — the young and fruity taste of kings accepted 
 by the people, instead of the dry, bodiless flavour of the 
 ,old theory. 
 
 I have a pamphlet of one hundred and two pages by 
 me, in which the constitutional merits of King Maxi- 
 milian are fully stated, and a list is given of the reforms 
 he has introduced. It is everywhere granted, that he 
 realises the present ideal of a king much better than 
 his father. If he is not so prominent, either in the 
 works he has executed or the words he has uttered, he 
 
KING MAX. 53 
 
 is much more popular with his subjects; and it is not 
 possible to look at him without recognising a good will 
 and graciousness of demeanour, more pleasing than 
 mental power and more befitting his station. He may 
 not have the force of character necessary to take a de- 
 cided HnCj yet he had the grace to yield to his people 
 and the power to obey the law. He may not have 
 uttered showy sentiments about a powerful Germany, 
 or gratified the most contracted minds in his kingdom, 
 by constant snarls against France. But his saying, " I 
 will have peace with my people,^' is quoted whenever a 
 warning has to be conveyed to a headstrong ruler, or 
 whenever the highest of aU compliments has to be paid 
 to a constitutional kiag. 
 
 It would not interest a large class in England to learn 
 the details of Kiag Max^s reforms. Enough, that he 
 has endeavoured in all ways to strengthen the principle 
 of constitutional government; that public works have 
 been developed; the law has been simplified and im- 
 proved. A small state like Bavaria, inclosed on aU 
 sides by other countries, and feeling none of those am- 
 bitious stirrings which have prompted other small states 
 to raise themselves to the rank of European powers, is 
 necessarily restricted to domestic measures. The great 
 thing we require of such a kingdom is, that it should 
 remain in obscurity. If we hear anything of it, either 
 the people are discontented, or the coimtry is beginning 
 to feel ambitious ; and while the first case procures the 
 sympathy of nations, the second invites the attention of 
 foreign ministers. It is hard to say which is most un- 
 pleasant for a government : — to have aU other nations 
 
54 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 looking forward to a disturbance in its territory, or to 
 feel the uneasy gaze of the gentlemen entrusted with 
 the balance of power, fixed ever on its movetaents. But 
 of the two, the first occurs the more often, and its 
 recurrence would make us believers in the truth of 
 Schiller's distich, " That the best state is to be known 
 as the best woman is, — by nobody speaking of them." 
 The few occasions on which Bavaria has been prominent 
 of late years, have certaialy not contributed to set her 
 ia a good light. Even now she shares with Austria the 
 unfortunate fame of not having recognised the kiagdom 
 of Italy; and from the first her conduct towards the 
 growing unity of that nation was characterised by the 
 pettiest hostility. Diplomatic relations do not exist to 
 this day between Turin and Munich; while an Envoy 
 Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the King 
 of Naples is stUl accredited to the court of Bavaria. It 
 is said, and I sincerely trust it may be true, that King 
 Max was opposed to the senseless clamour of 1859, and 
 that his people, who plunged the most deeply into the 
 folly of that time, actually longed for King Ludwig, who 
 boasts his narrowness of nationality as if it were a 
 virtue. Certain it is, that immediately after the peace 
 KiQg Max apologised to the Emperor of the French for 
 having allowed Austrian troops to pass through Munich. 
 But no apology could wipe out the remembrance of the 
 blind enthusiasm with which the Austrian troops were 
 received at the railway station, on their way to fight 
 against liberty : the cheers, the drinkiag toasts, — to a 
 speedy meeting of Austrians and Bavarians in Paris, — 
 reminding us of the Prussian trooper knocking off the 
 
HISTORICAL STUDY. 55 
 
 necks of clianipagne bottles^ in order to pledge that 
 toast with fitting honours. 
 
 The chief aim of King Max is said to be the eleva- 
 tion of Munich in science to an equal height with that 
 to which his father raised it in art. With this view 
 some of the greatest scientific names have been settled 
 in Munich during the present reign, and considerable 
 sums are granted for scientific objects. The name of 
 Liebig is a sufficient guarantee for the thorough pursuit 
 of chemical science, and though other departments are 
 not represented by men of equal reputation, the same 
 principle is followed in the selection. In history much 
 has been done, and much is still doing. By means of 
 a commission appointed to superintend historical re- 
 searches, important progress has been made, and as this 
 commission is presided over by the chief living historian 
 of Grermany, Ranke, and numbers the greatest histo- 
 rical names amongst its members, its results cannot fail 
 to be important. Under its auspices all archives in 
 Germany have been ransacked, and valuable materials 
 have seen the light. The early periods of German his- 
 tory are begianing to rival the latest days in the fulness 
 of detail, in the strong gleams that are shed upon them. 
 Inducement is given to the students of history to be- 
 come writers of history by large prizes beiag ofl'ered for 
 works on many subjects, instead of valuable discoveries 
 being left to the more capricious encouragement of the 
 pubUc. And collections of records, chronicles of the 
 free towns of the middle ages, or of the reigns of early 
 emperors, are published with the aid of the sums 
 
56 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 granted by the king. In more general literature the 
 royal encouragement is fast making Munich a centre of 
 activity. Several of the more distinguished poets of 
 this generation are settled in Munich, supported by the 
 king from his privy purse, or employed at his sugges- 
 tion in. the university. Nor has this patronage a bad 
 effect upon the tone of literature, as the encouragement 
 of Louis XIV. had on his poets, and as King Ludwig's 
 taste had on art. Each poet is left free to create as his 
 imagination prompts him, instead of receiving a com- 
 mand for a poem in this style. The only dissatisfaction 
 expressed at the king's patronage, is that of the native 
 Bavarians whenever a Protestant or a North German is 
 a recipient. 
 
 It is almost premature to speak of the public build- 
 ings in the Maximilian's Strasse, although some of 
 them are fast approaching completion. But though it 
 is easy to weigh the merits and defects of an architec- 
 tural design, it is difficult to predict the finished ap- 
 pearance of a building from its unfinished state. The 
 minor ornaments, which catch the eye when there is 
 nothing else to rival them, may sink into insignificance, 
 the light graceful tracery may be too flimsy, the statues 
 may not group. The design of the National Museum 
 is pleasing, but frequent looks at the unfinished building 
 lead to a less favourable judgment. Of one thing, in- 
 deed, the very brightest terms may be employed — the 
 new bridge over the Isar, at the end of the Maximilian's 
 Strasse. Whether it be from its novelty, or from its 
 usefdness, certain it is that the bridge is a more pleas- 
 
PASSING JUDGMENT. 57 
 
 ing object than most of King Ludwig's buildings, and 
 one feels a charmed surprise at such a work being exe- 
 cuted in Munich. 
 
 Such constant reference is made throughout this 
 volume to the name of King Ludwig, that the author 
 finds it necessary to state his belief, and his impressions, 
 at the outset. Passing allusions are apt to be contra- 
 dictory. In one place the king is blamed with un- 
 wonted severity, in another he is praised the more 
 warmly to take off the sting of the censure. The most 
 indulgent reader turns back, and compares the passages 
 with a feeling of pity for the weakness of the writer, 
 and perhaps ends by laying down the book as unre- 
 liable. But while man is so contradictory iu his nature, 
 how can one's judgment be other than chequered? 
 Who does not feel a slight disappointment when a 
 writer goes out of his way to be consistent ? Macaulay 
 cannot give James the faintest praise without a sarcastic 
 qualification that neutralises its effects, nor can he 
 blame William without half excusing his fault. If such 
 reserve is needed for full-length portraits, how can a 
 miniature present the truth of every line ? 
 
 It is with great difficulty that any satisfactory verdict 
 can be pronounced on King Ludwig. There is an en- 
 tire dearth of reliable works upon him. Historians 
 seem afraid to enter iato details of his reign. At most 
 you find facts stated with the utmost brevity, and no 
 references by which they can be verified. Some writers 
 dwell upon the order of his buildings, without any 
 account of the source whence their expenses were taken. 
 Others wander off into vague terms of adulation, talk- 
 
 d2 
 
58 SOCIAL LIFI, IN MUNICH. 
 
 ing of a noble MsecenaSj a liberal prince, an art-loving 
 monarch. No doubt this is the easiest way of getting 
 over the difficulties of King Ludwig's position ; but if 
 the writers only knew the disgust inspired by such mis- 
 placed epithets, they would pause in their servile career. 
 Praise undeserved is satire in disguise, and even praise 
 which is best deserved may seem satire when the object 
 is plastered indiscriminately. But even those whose 
 honesty is far above the temptations of flattery, show a 
 remarkable reticence in treating of the ex-king. It 
 would seem that German writers are too much engrossed 
 in mediaeval history to feel the claim of the times that 
 are just gone by, or that they have adopted the safe 
 motto, " de vivis nil nisi bonum." 
 
 A biography of King Ludwig, says a writer in the 
 Saturday Review, would be a valuable preparation 
 for a visit to Munich. Doubtless it would, if the mate- 
 rials were accessible, and the biographer had the courage 
 to use them. But it would seriously damage all pre- 
 conceived opinions as to the character of the kiug, and 
 might detract from the charm of his buildings. Stran- 
 gers who see the miles of ornamental facade that he has 
 erected, who compare the present town with pictures of 
 the old town, and observe the impulse that has been 
 given to Munich by its enlargement and embellishment, 
 are apt to suppose that King Ludwig was an enlightened 
 and popular monarch, and that the nation, haviug de- 
 posed him in a fit of madness, has ever siace sighed ia 
 vain for his restoration. I confess that I held this view 
 when I first came to Munich, but since then I have 
 found it utterly erroneous. With the examples of his- 
 
LOLA MONTEZ. 59 
 
 tory before our eyesj we ought not to attacli so much 
 importance to outward shows. If we are no longer daz- 
 zled by the sham halo of Louis XIV., and have learned 
 that his reign was odious to his subjects, that his great 
 enterprises draiaed their money, and his vast cam- 
 paigns their blood ; if we have seen that the model of 
 royalty was narrow and bigoted, why do we expect his 
 humble imitators to be free from Jiis failings ? It has 
 been proved that the regenerators of capital cities were 
 often destitute of taste, and that the most glorious 
 reigns were times of national misery. Neither the ad- 
 miration of tourists, nor the hasty sentence of panegy- 
 rists, can afford the right means of judging a monarch ; 
 his public acts are more than his buildings, and history 
 must be influenced by the verdict of his people. 
 
 Why is it that all politicians, all political authorities, 
 are against King Ludwig? Why has his popularity 
 grovm up since his abdication ? It is well to represent 
 his fall as the natural consequence of 1848, and of his 
 infatuation for Lola Montez, but there must be deeper 
 roots for it than the general excitement of Germany, 
 and the disgust of his moral subjects at his subser- 
 vience to an actress. To me the fact of a change beiag 
 demanded by a people of such exemplary patience, speaks 
 volumes against his rule. It may be said that his abdi- 
 cation was the result of pique. But it must be remem- 
 bered that he put off the crown with the words, " a new 
 direction has been taken by the state, a direction quite 
 at variance with that laid down by the constitution." 
 The reactionary measures of his whole reign contrast un- 
 favourably with the reforms that have been introduced 
 
60 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 under Maximilian^ and though the son is considered 
 weak when compared with his father^ those who can 
 remember the last reign do not seem desirous of re- 
 verting to it. Nor can it be said with truth that King 
 Ludwig had a choice between Lola Montez and his 
 crown^ and that he resigned the latter sooner than the 
 former. I am afraid this romantic fidelity must be 
 classed among the fables of history. As a matter of 
 factj there was an interval of a month between Lola's 
 departure from Munich, and the king's abdication. It 
 is possible that the king's partiality for the danseuse 
 opened the eyes of his subjects, and brought them to 
 take a more common sense view of the relations of a 
 sovereign to his people. But they had much better 
 grounds of complaint than Lola's iafluence, and they 
 asked something more important than her removal. 
 They wanted ministerial responsibility, the great check 
 on kingly caprice, and they received it with the acces- 
 sion of King Maximilian. They wanted absolute con- 
 trol over the expenditure, not the nominal supervision 
 they had hitherto enjoyed. Other things they wanted 
 which were not demanded openly, and which are not 
 even yet stated in writing. But speak to any liberal- 
 minded man on the subject, and you will be astonished 
 at his denunciations of the despotism of King Ludwig. 
 Collect anecdotes from eye witnesses whose memory 
 serves them, and though enough materials may not be 
 provided for an impeachment at the bar of history, there 
 will be enough to leave an unfavourable impression. 
 In the ominous silence of contemporary authorities, 
 such things have almost more than their due weight, 
 
riNANCIAL QUESTIONS. 61 
 
 and must continue to bias our judgment till tlie facts of 
 the case are stated. 
 
 " The establishment of monasteries, the favouring of 
 ultramontane influences, the iatolerance displayed to- 
 wards non-catholics, the activity of the priestly party, 
 which was almost all-powerful, went hand-in-hand with 
 the suppression of free political movement, and the dis- 
 regard of constitutional forms." This is the verdict 
 that a reliable authority, distinguished for caution and 
 moderation, passes on King Ludwig's reign. It may 
 seem to some readers that very little censure is conveyed 
 in it ; but at least it must be admitted, that these doings 
 are not those of a liberal sovereign. 
 
 It is strange that so few financial difficulties were ex- 
 perienced by King Ludwig, considering the enormous 
 sums he spent upon building. He began his reign by 
 several important retrenchments, and seems to have 
 earned the gratitude of the Chambers by giving them 
 increased control over the expenditure. The lavishness 
 of Max Joseph was so prodigious, and so entirely with- 
 out result, that King Ludwig's one-sided parsimony and 
 ostentatious buUdiags would be welcomed as a change. 
 Court life in Munich had been much gayer duriag the 
 former reigns, and by suppressing public amusements a 
 large sum out of the civil list was left over for public 
 undertakings. Till 1825, there was an Italian opera ia 
 Munich, and Mozart composed his " Idomeneo " in 
 Mimich for the Italian theatre. The great show of 
 buildings and pictures left by King Ludwig must, there- 
 fore, be taken as a kind of equivalent for the gaiety 
 which formerly prevailed at court, and to part of which 
 
62 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the public were admitted. The rtders of Bavaria seem 
 always to have spent money in one way or another. 
 King Ludwig has left more signs of his disbursements 
 than any of his predecessors. 
 
 At the same time, neither perfect agreement between 
 the King and the Chambers, nor exactitude in financial 
 statements, existed during his reign. The budget of 
 Bavaria in 1846 differs little from that of 1863, and 
 where it differs is more limited, except in the civil list. 
 But we are told by a reliable authority that the official 
 budgets of Kiag Ludwig's reign are not to be trusted. 
 The specification was very imperfect; and between 1830 
 and 1840 great "savings'"^ were effected on useful works, 
 streets, bridges, &c., and applied to artistic buildings. 
 After the King's abdication an inquiry into his manage- 
 ment of the finances was made by the Chambers ; and it 
 was discovered that a great deal of public money had 
 been spent without ever appearing in the financial state- 
 ment. Twenty milliou florins, which had been econo- 
 mised in various ways, had totally disappeared. King 
 Ludwig was in consequence requested to pay back a 
 milKon and a-half of florins to the public purse ; and 
 he found it advisable to comply with the request. The 
 Bavarian politicians pride themselves justly on having 
 achieved so great a work ; but it must be remembered, 
 that King Ludwig had nothing left of royalty but the 
 title when he thought it expedient to yield. These facts 
 are known and authenticated. But the work from which 
 I take them, though it ventures to tell that Max Joseph 
 made a present to his wife and daughters of the chief 
 part of the indemnification-money received from France 
 
PRIVATE PUESE. 63 
 
 in 1815, does not hint at the financial crimes charged 
 on King Ludwig. 
 
 But if King Ludwig was thus lavish of the public 
 money when his buildiags were concerned, he was cer- 
 tainly not sparing of his own. And if he denied the 
 public those useful works on which public money should 
 have been spent, his own life of frugality and self-denial 
 may serve as an excuse. His own contributions to the 
 embellishment of Bavaria amount to almost a million 
 sterling. This sum does not include anything spent 
 since his abdication; it is, therefore, the result of twenty- 
 three years alone. Since 1848 he has received an al- 
 lowance of half a million of florins yearly, of which he 
 has devoted almost a sixth part to buiLdings. The ar- 
 chitectural aspect of most of his works is separately de- 
 scribed, but the great fault of his whole new town of 
 Munich must not be passed over. Partly sharing, partly 
 encouraging the chief want of the Bavarian nature. King 
 Ludwig was content to confine himself to ornament, and 
 leave practical matters untouched. Many of his streets 
 were buUt without an attempt at drainage ; and in the 
 year 1862 whole streets are impassable whUe drains are 
 being laid down in them. To him it is owing that the 
 side pavements in the most fashionable street are mo- 
 rasses, after the pattern of the walk in front of his own 
 palace. I shall have occasion to show the entire want 
 of practical ideas in Munich : and I cannot but trace 
 the prevalence of useless ornament to King Ludwig^s 
 example. He could not understand the beauty of fit- 
 ness, as his people cannot understand it even now. Har- 
 mony and agreement are the chief sources of much of 
 
64 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the picturesque effect of the finest buildings ; and great 
 as may be the arcbitectural merit of single works^ it is 
 nothing to the fitness of place which renders them per- 
 fect. Unpractical as are the Italians of the present age, 
 it is evident their ancestors were not without ideas of 
 use as well as of beauty ; and we do not sufiiciently ap- 
 preciate their practical intentions, while we wonder at 
 their exquisite art. But the tendency of the world since 
 then has been towards use, in too limited a degree, but 
 not without regard for the beauties that lie hid beneath 
 the practical surface. To copy the old Italians now, is 
 to throw ourselves back ; and even if we could catch 
 their spirit, their meaning would escape us. King 
 Ludwig's copies have not even caught the spirit. The 
 disadvantages of an early time have been carefully pre- 
 served, but we look in vain for the exclusive sense of 
 beauty that once attended those disadvantages. And 
 the result is, that we grow sceptical about that often- 
 quoted saying of Groethe^s, — "We must do our utmost 
 to encourage the Beautiful, because the useful encou- 
 rages itself.^^ This saying was King Ludwig^s guiding 
 principle ; and we see to what it has led him. By en- 
 couraging the Beautiful he has driven out one of the 
 chief elements of beauty; and the useful has not the 
 feeblest root in his domiuions. 
 
 The want of all use in King Ludwig's creations is 
 generally admitted even by his warmest admirers. But 
 when the king's statue was inaugurated, the burgo- 
 master of Munich thought it incumbent in him to add 
 a practical leaf to the usual artistic garland. He gave 
 the king credit for the canal between the Danube and 
 
EOYAL REFORMS. 65 
 
 the Main, for the railway communications of Bavaria, 
 and even for the existence of the Zollverein. Some 
 faithful admirers of royalty will always hold that every 
 good work, and every perfect work, is from the king ; 
 and this helief is very general in Munich. King 
 Ludwig has encouraged it by commemorating his two 
 immediate predecessors as founders of the English 
 garden. When Otho was turned out of Greece the 
 Munich papers asked indignantly how the material 
 welfare of Greece under Otho could have grown up 
 but for the king? when all the rest of Europe con- 
 sidered it the best proof of the vitality of the Greek 
 nation that it could thrive under the burden of a stupid 
 monarch. How often we see kings opposing reforms 
 with all their might, and only granting them when the 
 choice lies between a change of poUcy and a change of 
 dynasty. Who would credit George the Third with 
 the freedom of the American colonies ? Who would 
 assign to George the Fourth the merit of Cathohc 
 emancipation ? It is true that the first railway opened 
 in Germany was the line from Nuremberg to Purth, 
 and that the commercial union between Bavaria and 
 Wurtemberg gave the impulse to the Zollverein. But 
 does the merit of these undertakings rest solely with 
 King Ludwig? The point must be reserved for the 
 decision of history. 
 
 Baron Thiebault has vaunted the literary acquire- 
 ments of the royal family of Bavaria, and King Lud- 
 wig's poetry has found its way into Murray. More 
 than this, it has been translated into English, though, 
 to judge from the remarks of natives, it stood more in 
 
66 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 need of being translated into German. But King 
 Ludwig^s poetic reputation has suffered very much by 
 the excessive bitterness with which Heine has attacked 
 him ; and as Heine is read over all the world, King 
 Ludwig's neglect of him has been severely punished. 
 If it be true that the king banished the poet from 
 Munich, the biting sarcasms Heine has uttered against 
 Kiag Ludwig and his favourites would be explained. 
 It is so difficult for strangers to understand the ground 
 of partisan hostilities, it is so easy for the most vigorous 
 mind to be misled into exaggeration of violence by 
 political opinions, and it is impossible for natives to 
 take the impartial point of view that comes so natural 
 to a stranger. Some may think that my judgment of 
 King Ludwig has been too much influenced by the 
 censure of his foes, and I am almost conscious of 
 having inclined to the unfavourable side without giving 
 him sufficient credit for his really meritorious actions. 
 But my task has been far from easy. I have en- 
 deavoured to steer between the exaggerations of both 
 sides without surrendering my own opinions. If I 
 have not given the king credit for the many charitable 
 works that have been reported to me, I have passed 
 over imfavourable anecdotes with an excess of scru- 
 pulousness which will hardly be relished by the lovers 
 of gossip. Man^s natural tendency is to lay more stress 
 on anecdotes than on unsupported judgments; and 
 though the anecdote may be much exaggerated, it is 
 seldom quite unfounded. But who can pay any regard 
 to ex cathedra dogmas delivered by men who have 
 either an obvious motive in avoiding plain facts, or 
 
A NATIVE VIEW. 67 
 
 whose ignorance of facts is equalled by rashness of in- 
 ference. The predominance of such verdicts on King 
 Ludwig must have a worse effect on us than the anec- 
 dotes current in Munich^ or even the denunciations of 
 Heine. Did not Gibbon say that he never read an 
 ex parte statement without being inclined to take the 
 opposite side ? 
 
 To all attacks on King Ludwig the inhabitants of 
 Munich have a simple reply, like that of Sir Oliver 
 Surface to the objections against his nephew: — ^but he 
 has made Munich what it is. And no doubt this 
 answer is unanswerable. Yet we have only to look 
 back to the time of Pope to see that the faults of the 
 new town of Munich have not the excuse of novelty. 
 There is no lack of excellent translators in the literary 
 world of Munich, and if any one wishes to convey a 
 most appropriate lesson, he has only to translate the 
 fourth of the Moral Essays. The noble liaes that 
 Pope addresses to his country are with a few slight 
 changes applicable to the present subject, the more 
 that only one of his precepts seems to have been 
 adopted by the embellisher of Munich : — 
 
 " Bid harbours open, pubKc ways extend ; 
 Sid temfles worthier of the God ascend ; 
 Bid the broad arch the dangerous flood contain, 
 The mole projected break the roaring main ; 
 Back to his bounds their subject sea command. 
 And roll obedient riyers through the land : 
 These honours peace to happy Britain brings ; 
 These are imperial works, and worthy kings." 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 PUBLIC BUILDINGS. 
 
 It is curious to remark the indifference felt by residents 
 in cities for the sights and attractions around them. If 
 the British Museum were opened on Sundays how many 
 Londoners would frequent it ; how many go under the 
 present system ? Are the Florentines regular attendants 
 at the Pittij or the Romans at the Borghese ? One ac- 
 cuses the Munich people of bad taste, because they are 
 ignorant of the collections which have raised their town 
 to the rank of a show-place, but towns which have far 
 finer collections are as liable to the reproach. It may be 
 said that in the time of Leo the Tenth the population 
 of Rome cared more for the art that was being bom 
 under their eyes than their descendants care for it now, 
 and that Munich under King Ludwig ought not to be 
 compared with the Rome of to-day, but with the Rome 
 of artist activity. And there is little doubt that the 
 Italians from whose own bosom the glories of Florence 
 and Venice arose, must have felt a vivid interest in the 
 progress they witnessed, and that their sympathy must 
 have powerfully reacted on the artists. But Munich 
 has the proud j)re-eminence of being indifferent in the 
 
ART AND INDUSTRY. 69 
 
 presentj while other cities are merely indifferent to their 
 past. 
 
 As a resident I am not so well versed in the lions of 
 Munich as many sedulous strangers are, and the subjects 
 to wliich I devotemyselfchiefly in this volume are those 
 which come under the cognizance of residents. But my 
 book would be very incomplete without a full survey of 
 the public buildings and the chief paintings contained in 
 them. For without these important contributions to art 
 no one would care to read about Munich, and if it were 
 not for the artist reputation of the city there would be 
 no surprise at its shortcomings. The faults and failings 
 of domestic architecture would not be worth touching on 
 if the public architecture of the town had not a name 
 throughout Europe, nor would one attempt to gauge 
 King Ludwig's claims to distinction if a certain dis- 
 tinction were not allotted him already. Who would 
 complain of a market town in England as being behind 
 the age ? In writing of Mimich I always keep in view 
 the disparity between the fame enjoyed by the town as 
 a centre of art — a modern Athens, and the actual state 
 of its inhabitants, its trade, and its life. Strangers 
 who pass through Munich every summer miss the very 
 serious faults engendered by King Ludwig^s attempt at 
 forcing, and those not yet eradicated by the course of 
 time which has been so powerful with ourselves. It is 
 by their flying impressions that the mistaken judgments 
 we hear pronounced on Munich have been formed, and 
 from these mistaken judgments the recoil to over harsh 
 censure is natural and unavoidable. My attempt has 
 been to steer a middle course between the two. 
 
70 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 On no point would a difference of opinion be more 
 likely to arise than on the public buildings of Munich. 
 A casual traveller who is not a student of architecture 
 and does not much care for old buildings, would very 
 possibly be enthusiastic in his praise of King Ludwig^s 
 erections, while a severe architectural judge would con- 
 demn them without mercy. A lover of the modern might 
 find the palace in Munich less gloomy and forbidding 
 than the Pitti, the Hall of the Marshals certainly lighter 
 and more graceful than the Loggie of Orcagna; I once 
 met an American at Milan who was not much struck by 
 Raphael's Sposalizio, and who found that the Dusseldorf 
 school of painters gave more idea of religious feeliag, 
 and did not leave so much to the imagination as these 
 old masters. I was once studying Guido's celebrated 
 portrait of Beatrice Cenci in the Barberini palace, when 
 a party of English came in and after looking at it for a 
 moment remarked unanimously, " Well, I think I prefer 
 the copies.'' Much as one would be ashamed of uttering 
 such a sentiment, it is the natural expression of the 
 early stage of artistic feeliag. We have probably gone 
 through it ourselves at a time we do not care to remem- 
 ber, and have preached up Landseer as vastly superior to 
 Titian. Moreover those travellers who go from Germany 
 to Italy, labour under the same disadvantage as those 
 who know a painting from an engraving. It is hard to 
 look at a picture which you have seen well engraved 
 without a feeling of diappointment. The clearness and 
 cleanness of the fine lines do not prepare you for the 
 faded colours, and clouded expression. So when you 
 pass from the clean and airy copies of Munich, to the 
 
EXTREMES MEET. 71 
 
 stem and gloomy originals in Italy^ the first impression 
 is in favour of modern things whose beauties lie on the 
 surface, and you regret the trouble you must take in 
 studying the ancient and eliciting their merits. 
 
 Thus, I conceive, the reputation of Munich has grown. 
 This explanation of its fascinating powers can alone ex- 
 cuse the raptures that are uttered upon it. When we 
 come to consider its merits impartially, we find much 
 that is faulty ; and the raptures we have heard expressed 
 often hinder us from apportioning praise as it is deserved. 
 It seems almost ludicrous to have the figure of Bavaria 
 held up to admiration as the finest colossal statue in the 
 world, when one knows its defects ; and the exaggerated 
 praise does not allow any compromise in favour of its 
 real merits. When the three Greek buildings in dif- 
 ferent styles forming three sides of a square, are pre- 
 sented as an example to our nothing-but-Gothic archi- 
 tects, one is almost tempted to deny the beauty of the 
 only beautiful one of the three. When we hear that 
 the multitude of styles in Munich is owing to the catholic 
 taste of King Ludwig, not to the inventions of architects, 
 we cannot but remember that some of the chief buUdiags 
 were disfigured by the alterations the King dictated. 
 And when we are told that Munich is the cradle of art, 
 we forget all the excellence that at other times we are 
 so ready to allow, and reply that the saying is true so 
 far, as the art of Munich is essentially babyish. It is 
 wrong to form such extreme jiidgments ; but one ex- 
 tremity necessarily leads to another. 
 
 It is hard to know which building should be placed 
 first in an examination of Munich. Murray puts the 
 
72 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 clmrclies at the begirming ; but I am inclined to think 
 churches are not the first objects of a stranger's visit. 
 I would rather begin with the Glyptothek, partly be- 
 cause it was the first of King Ludwig's buildings, partly 
 because it has real merits, and is the best work of Klenze. 
 At present the Glyptothek is seen to great disadvan- 
 tage. The building opposite is in Corinthian style, and 
 stands so much higher that it attracts the eye. The 
 Propylaen, which stands between the two, is of a sort of 
 Doric, and though somewhat massive and imposing as 
 you come close under the portal, is he&vj and shapeless 
 as a whole. The Glyptothek, on the other hand, is a 
 really admirable work, one of the few modern buildings 
 in the Greek style that give any pleasure to the eye. 
 There are days in the summer when the white columns 
 glow with southern lustre, and when the climate does 
 not seem inappropriate to the building. Such a temple 
 in England would, long ere this, have become dingy 
 and dreary, like those gloomy works of pseudo- Greek 
 that are such powerful promoters of dyspepsia in Lon- 
 don. But the high position, the hot sun, and the clear 
 air of Munich, maintain the whiteness without which 
 Grecian architecture is a delusion ; and the Glyptothek, 
 which was built before King Ludwig's accession, remains 
 unimpaired long after his descent from the throne. One 
 warning, however, must be addressed to its admirers, — 
 not to go round the building. The back is perfectly 
 odious, haviag a window on each side of its portico; 
 and a window in a Greek temple is an abomination that 
 the architect might have been expected to avoid. In 
 all other respects the Glyptothek is praiseworthy, and 
 
ANCIENT SCULPTURE. 73 
 
 well adapted to its purpose. Of the collection, I need 
 not speak at any length ; and the frescoes I have set 
 apart for the chapter on their creator. The full descrip- 
 tion of the statues in Murray, and the detailed quota- 
 tions from Westmacott, would make my task superfluous, 
 even if I. were as versed in history as the one, and in 
 aesthetic criticism as the other. I will merely allude to 
 a paper on the Barberini Faun, read by a German Pro- 
 fessor, in which a different view is taken of the date of 
 the statue and the school to which it belongs. Professor 
 Westmacott attributes it, if not to Scopas or Praxiteles, 
 at least to a scarcely inferior scholar ; and ia this judg- 
 ment he coincides with many of the earlier critics. 
 Schom and Waagen both assign it to the same period 
 Waagen finding a close similarity between it and the 
 Theseus and Ilyssus. Others, however, had already 
 sought a later date for its production, some bringing 
 it down to Nero ; and Professor Von Liitzow attributes 
 it to the Roman- Alexandrine period. His grounds are 
 ably stated in a paper read before the meeting of 
 Philologers and Orientialists at Augsburg, ia September, 
 1862. He rests his assumption chiefly on the absence 
 of all similar objects in ancient Greek sculpture, and of 
 all literary description of similar statues. The only work 
 whose treatment at all coincides with that of the Bar- 
 berini Faun is a bronze discovered at Herculaneum, 
 and this bronze is generally attributed to Roman art. 
 Only two allusions to sleeping satyrs occur in ancient 
 literature : one in the Anthology, the other in Pliny. 
 Moreover, the naturalism of the Faun, the eminent ana- 
 tomical knowledge, the exquisite rendering of drunken 
 
74 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 sleepj would conspire to place the statue at a later time 
 than that at which idealism^ and the thirst for pure 
 beauty^ prevailed. Nor is this the only argument : a 
 very powerful one remains. The Faun is lying on a 
 skin, and Greek sculpture would almost certainly have 
 made this the skin of a panther. But the sculptor of 
 this statue has chosen a wolf's skiuj which at once gives 
 xis the connection with Rome, and with the Lupercus of 
 the Roman forests. 
 
 The English guide-book regrets, and English travel- 
 lers are inclined to follow the example, that the iEgina 
 sculptures, which form one of the chief glories of the 
 Glyptothek, were not secured for the British Museum. 
 During my stay in Munich, I cannot sympathise with 
 the regret ; and I am disposed to think that the statues 
 are more appreciated by the travelling English, and by 
 a greater number of visitors, than they would be in 
 London. It seems somewhat selfish to grudge Munich 
 her one treasure, without which the Glyptothek would 
 be poor indeed; while we have the friezes of the Par- 
 thenon and the unrivalled collection of casts at Syden- 
 ham. By the possession of these early works, the sculp- 
 ture gallery in Munich stands on the same footing as 
 the picture gallery. The statues of the culminating pe- 
 riod are few, and there are fewer still of extraordinary 
 merit. The ^gina marbles form an introduction to 
 these few, and the introduction is fuller and more valu- 
 able than the body of the work. It must always be 
 considered King Ludwig's highest claim, that he formed 
 the present collection ; and the Glyptothek, both build- 
 ing and contents, gives a better opinion of his taste than 
 
THE PALACE. 75 
 
 would be formed without it. And yet it is worthy of 
 remarkj that during the whole week of the popular fes- 
 tivity in October, when the population of Bavaria flocks 
 in to Munich, the Glyptothek is closed. Evidently, the 
 King has no very high opinion of the taste of the people 
 for whom his capital was decorated, or of the amount of 
 intellectual progress his improvements have wrought. 
 According to a return that I copied from one of the 
 newspapers, the expenses of the Glyptothek amounted 
 to £9,246 for building, and £16,463 for paintings and 
 sculpture. Murray states that the iEgina marbles were 
 bought for £6,000, — an agent from the English Govern- 
 ment being on his way with an ofler of £8,000. 
 
 It has ever been considered right that strangers in Mu- 
 nich should see the Palace, and I do not suppose the re- 
 marks I am about to make will dissuade any one from fol- 
 lowing the tradition. For some time past those parts of 
 the Palace that seem most attractive have not been shown, 
 the rich chapel, the treasury, and the apartments of the 
 King and Queen. The rooms on the groujid floor with 
 great frescoes from the Nibelungenlied, the large hall in 
 the other part of the building with frescoes from the life 
 of Charlemagne, Barbarossa and Rudolph of Hapsburg, 
 the throne room with its colossal statues, and the ball 
 room are shown, and unfortunately I can speak of them 
 aU from experience. It is interesting to read in a guide- 
 book of the palace fitted up, not after the usual manner 
 of palaces, but in an admirable style of decoration, espe- 
 cially when you have once been dragged round an un- 
 meaning series of rooms with heavy beds and railings 
 before them, and have been lectured on the wash hand- 
 
76 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 stand of the Grand Monarque, or the chair on which 
 Louis XV. used tb change his shirt. But when you go 
 the rounds of large rooms still less intended for life than 
 the show rooms of Versailles^ and yawn before fresco 
 after frescOj each one of which has to he iaterpreted in 
 all its details by the enthusiastic guide, you come to 
 admit that all palaces are vanity, and you are humiliated 
 at having succumbed at an ignoble curiosity. I have 
 known people who found that their punishment was 
 greater than they could bear, and who had to make an 
 ignominious retreat in the midst of the guldens harangue. 
 Wearisome indeed are these great hard pictures of early 
 times, of dark ages on which the painters shed no light. 
 I found the floor of the ball room more attractive and 
 more artistically composed than the transcendental 
 frescoes of the adjoining halls, just as a small court in 
 the middle of the Palace with bronzes and a garden is 
 more worthy of admiration than all the Konigsbau or 
 Festsaalbau of orthodox wonder. 
 
 You may observe from the outside with some surprise 
 how the new parts of the Palace dovetail into the old. 
 Beginning in front you have the stone chipped and ham- 
 mered into the appearance of massive unhewn blocks, 
 and as you go round the side you come to the bare old 
 waLs, in every way a striking contrast. You must take 
 each part for what it is worth, for there is no possible 
 harmony, no attempt at a whole. The building resem- 
 bles nothing so much as an old statue, pieced and re- 
 stored. One of the statues in the Glyptothek was found 
 in a stone-mason's yard, provided with head and hands 
 by its temporary owner. It would be unjust to call the 
 
RESTORATION. Ti 
 
 architect of the new Palace a stone-mason and still more 
 unjust to compare the old Palace to the son of Niobe. 
 But if the King had desired Thorwaldsen in restoring the 
 -^giaa sculptures to put a head of the time of Praxiteles 
 and arms of the Roman period on one of the ancient 
 figures^ an effect similar to that of the Palace might 
 have been produced. The sculptor would not have 
 obeyed such a command^ and in restoring the iEgina 
 marbles he has followed the style of the time which pro- 
 duced them. Why could not the architect do the same ? 
 If a new palace must be built could it not be built anew ? 
 At present the building has the appearance of a palim- 
 psest. It is certainly not one of those works that do ' 
 honour to an architect. If such as this were the only 
 buildings of Klenze he would hardly deserve the name. 
 But the Glyptothek and Pinacothek may be placed 
 against those in which he seems to have followed too 
 faithfully the instructions of his patron. 
 
 I have thought it my duty to study several of the 
 pictures which are representative of Munich art, that I 
 might not have to dismiss the subject too summarily , 
 and might not judge rashly without full power of deter- 
 mining. But I confess I had not patience to do this 
 with the pictures in the Palace. Had their painter oc- 
 cupied the same position as ComehuSj I should have 
 forced myself to have examined his works as I forced 
 myself to examine the works of Cornelius. 
 
 The entire expenses of buUding the palace, including 
 the court chapel amounted to £350,000. The court 
 chapel is perhaps the most perfect part of the whole, and 
 in richness of decoration, solemnity, and appropriateness 
 
78 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of ornament, resembles the churches built by wealthy- 
 religious orders rather than those built by Kings who 
 have so many calls on their purses, and who are engaged 
 in so many works as King Ludwig. 
 
 Before passing to the Ludwig's Strasse, which was 
 chiefly built by Gartner, I will mention briefly the 
 other works of Klenze. The Pinacothek must have 
 a place by itself; not for its external grandeur, but for 
 questions of its contents. And when the Pinacothek 
 and Glyptothek have been disposed of, the others are 
 neither important nor blameless. The ministry of war, 
 and the palace of Duke Max, in the Ludwig's Strasse, 
 the Odeon, and the palace (once called the Leuchten- 
 berg,) which balances it, the arcade of the Post Office 
 over against the Residenz, the arcades of the Hofgar- 
 ten, the royal theatre, are the most prominent, and none 
 of these call for decided praise. It is admitted by Ger- 
 man critics, that in spite of the great decorative powers 
 shown by Klenze, and his wide knowledge of architec- 
 tural history, his works are wanting in true genius, 
 having been almost invariably built on the model of 
 some Greek or Italian construction. At the same time 
 he is reproached for not observing the rules that should 
 guide an architect in the arrangement of interiors, espe- 
 cially with regard to the position of staircases. But in no 
 building has he exposed himself to more blame than in his 
 last, the Propylaen. This gate was erected by King Lud- 
 wig after he had ceased to be king, in honour of the 
 foundation of the Grseco-Bavarian dynasty,* and it seems 
 that its failure is meant to typify the abdication of the 
 * It was not finished till after the fall of the same. 
 
CONFUSION WORSE CONFOUNDED. 79 
 
 monarcli, and its mixture of styles the inappropriate- 
 ness of King Otho's rule. It has a portico east and 
 west, with Doric columns, and the two porticoes are 
 joined by Corinthian columns. On each side of the 
 portico is a cumbrous and immeaning wiag, pierced with 
 windows and doors, and on the line of roof that runs 
 from wing to wing, over the porticoes, are sham lion^s 
 heads, like the Edinburgh samples of Mr. Ruskin. 
 The general effect of the building is heavy and clumsy, 
 and the sculpture placed on it is far too small to bear 
 any proportion to the whole. As you near the portico, 
 indeed, there is a certain grandeur in it, but seen from a 
 distance the grandeur vanishes in the disproportionate 
 dimensions. In a practical point of view the gate is 
 even more faiilty than in an artistic. There are two 
 side passages for carriages, the centre is reserved for 
 royal carriages, and there are steps along the centre for 
 foot passengers. The pedestrians have thus to cross the 
 carriage way twice in order to get through, have to ex- 
 pose themselves twice to the risk of being run over, 
 and have, strictly speaking, no footpath at all. When I 
 add that the gate was opened before it was finished, to 
 let the statue of King Ludwig pass through, and was 
 then shut again from the public, after being solemnly 
 inaugurated and handed over to them for their use, I 
 have sufSciently spoken of the new building. The 
 Burgomaster of Munich, receiving it from the master 
 of ceremonies of Kiag Ludwig, promised that it should 
 always be kept by the town iu the same state in which 
 the town received it ; fortunately the promise was made 
 without considering the state in which the town received 
 
80 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 it, and the gate was not condemned to remain incom- 
 plete to the end of time. Allowing, however, for all these 
 drawbacks to the reputation of Klenze, one must admit 
 that he has deserved well of Munich by two, at least, 
 of his buildings, and one is glad that his desert is to be 
 recognised so as to commemorate his name. In a part 
 of the town where several new streets are being laid 
 out, the magistrate determined that two streets should 
 bear the names of celebrated artists, and should meet 
 in a rond-point, which should be decked with their 
 statues. One of these streets was to be called the 
 Cornelius Strasse, the other the Klenze Strasse. The 
 idea is good, and the execution of it will probably tend 
 more to perpetuate the name of Klenze, than some of 
 the buildings I have just characterised. 
 
 " There rolls the deep where grew the tree. 
 O earth, what changes hast thou seen ! 
 There where the long street roars, hath been 
 The stillness of the central sea." 
 
 And the poefs words may with slight changes be 
 applied to the Ludwig's Strasse. Not that the dull 
 unfrequented street may be said to roar, for your steps 
 sometimes echo unpleasantly with a soimd of loneliness 
 as you walk along it. Nor can the site be supposed to 
 have been washed by the central sea, at least within 
 living recollection. The stillness of the central land is 
 however sufficient to keep up the antithesis. There is a 
 series of curious pictures in the new Pinacothek which 
 seems to be passed over too quicldy by visitors, but 
 which would furnish inquirers with a singular idea of 
 Munich before the time of King Ludwig. These pic- 
 
THE OLD TOWN. 81 
 
 tures occupy the tenth and eleventh cabinets, and are 
 views taken from various points and reproducing various 
 parts of the town. One gives the old corn market, and 
 a number of vignettes of the old towers and places 
 around. Another shows a formal old garden that used 
 to stand somewhere in the position of the present Hof- 
 garten, and that bore the old title of the reigning house. 
 Another shows the old riding school, another the old 
 Palace Square, with the low old-fashioned part of the 
 building which is now replaced by the Pitti, and the 
 hideous yellow and blue side of the old Post Office. 
 Where now the HaU of the Marshals is was once an inn, 
 with a sign of the Virgin and Child high up on the front. 
 The old Schwabing gate was just outside the Theatiner 
 Kirche ; a high bank of grass topped with railings rose 
 on one side of the road, and waggons are seen in the 
 picture peacefully driving along the present Odeon's 
 Platz. Where now the Maximilian's Strasse runs out 
 of the place in front of the palace, was formerly a dis- 
 cordant mixture of little houses, a narrow irregular alley 
 ran in one direction, and the ground was uneven, bulg- 
 ing in one part, and falling in another. Gates and old 
 towers guarded the inner town from the palace and the 
 post office, as if the citizens were afraid of royal encroach- 
 ments, and suspected the treasonableness of letters. At 
 the back of the palace, where now is the Court Chapel, 
 and at the side where now the PaUadian wing is devoted 
 to festivals, was a deep moat turned into various gardens, 
 and laid out irregularly with beds and trees, walls running 
 round and bridges a,cross to the palace. Little cottages 
 and fragments of old buildings rise up capriciously, many 
 
 B 2 
 
82 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 covered mtli ivj, from the middle of which their round 
 windows can scarcely peep^ slantiag roofs run up and 
 are fastened on to the palace, and the desolate effect is 
 wrought out with gables, towers, walls, wooden staircases 
 outside the buUdings, and the lawless growth of vegeta- 
 tion wherever it can strike root. The quaint departed 
 fashions wander about these pictures, ricketty cabriolets, 
 that have long been consigned to the unknown limbo of 
 their kind, drive down the uneven streets, or stand for 
 hire. 
 
 One must examine these pictures to see what Munich 
 was before King Ludwig and where his new additions 
 have been built in. The study is highly curious, and 
 one sees that the metamorphosis must at first have pro- 
 mised to be a difficult undertaking. Anything more 
 strangely ugly than many of these old buildings can 
 hardly be conceived, and the taste of the people may 
 be judged from a sight of what they were contented to 
 keep. There was nothing here to build upon, and yet 
 an entire demolition could hardly be contemplated. 
 When, therefore, we object to the present Palace, we 
 must be careful not to look at the pictures of the old ; 
 and when we rail at the dreariness of the Ludwig's 
 Strasse, we deserve to be reminded of what it has 
 replaced. The great want of the street is the more 
 remarkable, that in almost all other towns it has been 
 remedied, the want of shops. For in no other town 
 would an important street be filled with public build- 
 ings exclusively, a class of building the least able to 
 impart life and cheerfulness to the space in front of it. 
 There are certainly some fine works ia the Ludwig's 
 
THE CHURCH OF ST. LUDWIG. 83 
 
 Strasse, which give one a higher opinion of Gartner 
 than of Klenze. The Eoyal Library has, I think, more 
 solid merits than either the Glyptothek or the Pina- 
 cothek; in grandeur it is certaialy not second to the 
 latter, and it transcends both in originality. The Lud- 
 ■wig's Church, I am given to understand, was altered 
 from the architect's design by the patron of the street, 
 and the Hall of Marshals also made higher than was 
 intended. This may explain the want of fair propor- 
 tion ia the one, and the weedy appearance, the neces- 
 sity of iron supports in the other. Perhaps the want 
 of proportion explains the unpleasing effect of the 
 Ludwig Kirche, so far as an eifect can be explained. 
 Certaiu it is that one derives no sense of satisfaction 
 from looking at the church, and it is difi&cult to under- 
 stand the reason of one's disappointment. I have re- 
 served the frescoes, which are the only particulars 
 worth mention, for my chapter on their artist, and I 
 need not linger in the unattractive building. One only 
 point, however, should be touched on here with regard 
 to Cornelius's "Last Judgment," to correct a mistake 
 in Murray's Handbook. "The features of the ugly 
 creature who crawls beneath Satan's feet resemble those 
 of Goethe." There are two figures under Satan's feet, 
 Judas Iscariot, who betrayed his lord; and Segestes, 
 who in revenge for the seduction of his daughter by 
 Armiaius, warned Varus of his designs, and was there- 
 fore considered to have betrayed his country. Just in. 
 front of Satan a figure is kneeling, which is remarkably 
 like Goethe, though I believe it represents one of the 
 seven capital sins. It would be curious to know if the 
 
84 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 painter really intended to pourtray tlie greatest man 
 that the literature of his nation can boast under the 
 mask of a capital sin, and, if so, what motives impelled 
 him ? But it is no longer necessary for English 
 travellers to endeavour to make out the features of 
 Goethe in one of the bearded couple crawling under 
 Satan^s feet. 
 
 The church of St. Boniface and the church in the 
 Au are two sights that no visitor should miss, and are 
 two of the worthiest contributions of King Ludwig. 
 The painted windows in the second are quite unique, 
 presentiag clear and enjoyable pictures instead of the 
 imitations of medisevalism that go imder the name of 
 stained glass. I do not care to enter into a discussion 
 about the aesthetic mission of windows, whether they 
 should be pictures or no ; I am content to admire the 
 beauty of these without answering for my opinion in a 
 court of art. The paintings in the Basilica of St. Boni- 
 face are so generally admired that there may be little 
 merit in recording a vote with the majority. But one 
 can hardly refrain from entering into the reverence 
 and religious feeling that characterise them, and that 
 place them so fally in harmony with the grandeur and 
 solemnity of the church. So many feelings enter into 
 the mind that criticism is disarmed, and the verdict 
 against modern religious art is robbed of its severity. 
 This Boniface church must be taken as an ample set- 
 off against the illiberal side of King Ludwig's religion. 
 Some bigotry in behalf of his faith may be allowed to 
 one who has shown the bright side of his zeal in such a 
 splendid monument, such a testimony to the sincerity 
 
OTHER CHURCHES. 85 
 
 of his faith. Nor is the painter who executed the 
 works to be less commended than the sovereign who 
 commanded them. The departure of the saint from 
 Netley Ahbey would alone entitle him to the praise of 
 feelings so charingly bestowed on his contemporaries ; 
 and many English visitors carry away that picture in 
 their miads as the one liak between Munich and their 
 native country. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 PICTURE GALLERIES. 
 
 As a general rulej the picture galleries of Europe are fit 
 for anything, save pictures. It must be allowed that 
 they were mostly built for other purposes. The first 
 owners, when they contemplated the admission of pic- 
 tures into rooms which were to serve for residence, never 
 intended to form such large collections as were made by 
 their descendants. And the collections once made, the 
 claims of art-students became so pressing, that the haUs 
 originally intended for private use had to pass to the 
 public. By degrees, the encroachments of lovers of pic- 
 tures become greater, and the inhabitants are thrust out 
 of their best rooms during a large portion of each day ; 
 or the prince is driven to build himself another palace, 
 and leave his old one to become a gallery. One cannot 
 of course compel a prince to build a new house for the 
 pictures and to occupy the old one himself; nor can one 
 expect the heir of a fine house to build a gallery ex- 
 pressly suited for artistic study. But it must be said, 
 that both palaces and houses are generally ill-suited for 
 the exhibition of a crowd of pictures. 
 There are certain architectural requirements in a pic- 
 
THE TEST OP USE. 87 
 
 ture gallery wMcli are almost certain to be neglected in 
 a palace. A human occupant wants light distributed 
 equally about his room. But a picture is greedy, and 
 wants all the light to be thrown upon itself. Agaiu ; 
 one man likes lofty rooms, especially if he lives in a 
 warm climate : another likes his rooms low and compact, 
 if he has a taste for snugness. But high rooms would 
 be useless for small pictures, and a large picture might 
 not find place to stand in a low room. Your treasures 
 may be invisible, if you are chary of glass ; if you are 
 lavish of it, the streams of light may cross and obscure 
 the picture, by over-briUiance. AU these objections 
 may be found in full force in most of the public galleries ; 
 but in Munich, where a building was erected especially 
 for the pictures, we may suppose that they will not 
 apply. Murray's guide-book says with all possible con- 
 fidence, " In addition to the praise of having constructed 
 a beautiful edifice, Klenze deserves that of having formed 
 the most convenient and appropriate receptacle for paint- 
 ings in Europe.^' Beautiful edifice is not too strong a 
 term to employ in describiug the old Pinacothek. It is 
 certainly a noble building. The entrance at the side 
 prevents many from duly appreciating it ; and it is not 
 till you get the view of the front that you can judge it 
 as its merits deserve. From this point the effect is 
 truly grand and harmonious ; the massive look of the 
 whole budding is a worthy product of the style selected, 
 seconded by the tone of the material. Built in the style 
 of a Eoman palace, the Pinacothek does not remiad you 
 of any particular model, as its architectural merits ex- 
 ceed those of any possible model. But this praise can 
 
88 SOCIAL Lirll IN MUNICH. 
 
 only be bestowed on the outside. The architect had no 
 excuse for repeating the faults that detract from the 
 utility of picture galleries generally, for his building was 
 avowedly intended to be a receptacle for pictures. In 
 his desire for show, he has entirely neglected the archi- 
 tectural requirements of a gallery, while acknowledging 
 their existence. The skylight system of lighting would 
 deserve praise, if the ceilings were not so high that the 
 light is wasted upon them. And the large haUs, which 
 look grand enough when compared with one's own 
 height, and which answer to the promise of the exte- 
 rior, are quite inappropriate for their purpose. Some 
 pictures must be hung so high that they can scarcely 
 be seen, even with an opera glass j and the lower ones 
 are too far from the light to be shown advantageously. 
 It is true, that some of the pictures in the collection are 
 so large, that they require a room of some size to con- 
 tain them ; but I doubt if there is a picture in the world 
 that needs the height of the Pinacothek. To whose 
 charge are these faults to be laid, if not to the architect's ? 
 Yet, if the hanging committee had not seconded Klenze 
 so ably, these faults would not have been so evident. 
 The light might have been bad, as it is in so many gal- 
 leries, and yet we should not have looked up at the 
 height of the rooms to explain it. But the committee, 
 or the director, or whoever he be on whom the hanging 
 devolves, has called our attention to the architect's 
 blunder. In the large rooms the pictures are hung at 
 an inordinate height ; and even in the cabinets, the 
 bottom of the frame, not the picture itself, is on the 
 line of the eye. The result is, that many of the works 
 
PUBLIC WANTS. 89 
 
 of art in the gallery pass entirely mmoticed. It were 
 well if all the inferior works were hung out of sights so 
 as to give all the lower space to the better ones ; but 
 this is not the principle selected. The second, third, 
 and fifth rooms, are taken up chiefly with inferior works, 
 many of them honoured with excellent places; while 
 the early Germans, which form the strength of the gal- 
 lery, are crowded into the first room, one above another. 
 That it may not be thought I am making the charge 
 rashly, or from any spirit of contradiction, unfairness, 
 or spleen, I wiU add, that many of the facts communi- 
 cated in this chapter have already been stated by art- 
 critics of position and reputation in Munich. Having 
 no pretensions to that power of assigning pictures to 
 their true painters, that belongs to some modern judges 
 in a peculiar degree, I have thought it better to consult 
 the chief authorities and repeat their conclusions, than 
 to attempt any independent decision. At the same 
 time, I have examined the charges made against the 
 gallery myself, and have resorted frequently to my pri- 
 vate judgment before endorsing the sentences of others. 
 The badness of the hanging and the unfitness of the 
 large rooms oannot fail to strike the most casual ob- 
 server. But many of the faults which are most obnoxi- 
 ous to resident visitors are unknown to the majority of 
 passing travellers. On cloudy days, says an artist living 
 in Munich, it is almost impossible to see anything in the 
 middle rooms ; but cloudy days are unknown in summer. 
 The want of seats in the large rooms* renders the gallery 
 doubly fatiguing to those who are seeing all the sights 
 * A few have been added since this was written. 
 
90 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of the town in a couple of days, and contrasts unfavour- 
 ably with the National Gallery or the centre rooms of the 
 LouTre. But in winter the seats would have a perfect 
 sinecure, for any one who sat down five minutes would 
 be frozen. There seems to be no attempt to heat the Pin- 
 acothek, and the result is that it is rendered useless 
 during winter. I have been there when the thermometer 
 marked two or three degrees only above zero, and found 
 aU study impossible. In a cold climate, large rooms 
 with stone floors are only accessible in summer, as the 
 architect might reasonably have foreseen. But there is 
 every facility for heating them, if the directors would 
 only go to the expense of buying wood. 
 
 These evils most affect the public, and perhaps they 
 are the only evils by which the public thinks itself 
 affected. Their result is, that the public stays away. 
 If the public studied the pictures attentively, other 
 faults would have their influence, but in the absence 
 of the public the other faults act only on students and 
 beginners. To thetti they are perhaps more serious 
 than the want of seats, and light and warmth, for they 
 may have a paralyzing influence on the whole life of an 
 artist. These faults are many and serious, they strike 
 at the root of all art, and there is not the smallest 
 excuse for their existence. They may be summed up 
 in one sentence, restoration of pictures, falsity of names, 
 carelessness and neglect of preservation, illiberality as 
 regards copying. Each one of these clauses deserves 
 consideration in detail, and immediate remedies. If 
 nothing else is done in Munich, surely the claims of 
 art ought to be regarded in a city which calls itself the 
 
PICTURE-CLEANING. 91 
 
 capital of art. The mania of restoring pictures that 
 has devastated so many galleries of Europe has not 
 spared the Pinacothek. An art-critic gives a pitiable 
 sketch in a German newspaper of the process of re- 
 storing as adopted in Munich. How often, he says, 
 is the restorer a man of very small ability, who owes 
 his appointment to backstairs influence, and who has a 
 powerful stimulant to restore all possible pictures as he 
 is paid by the piece. It is a mistake to suppose that 
 all painters are connoisseurs ; many modern painters 
 never study the old masters for fear of spoiling their 
 originality, and without a course of study no man can 
 be master of such a subject. Many of these men 
 undertake restoring as a means of eking out small 
 incomes ; a painter does restoring work just as an em- 
 ploye in a public ofiSce writes for newspapers, or makes 
 up accounts, or performs any similar drudgery. The 
 consequence of it in Munich is, that the works of 
 Rubens are half spoiled, and twenty-eight years have 
 transformed the Gallery from a perfect collection to 
 an imperfect one. " Let any one examine the Fall of 
 the Damned by Rubens," writes the critic, "a work 
 of his best period, a work referred to in all his biogra. 
 phies, and in all writings on art. The magic colouring, 
 for which it was once so celebrated, has given place to 
 an incoherent mixture of dark and light patches. Let 
 any one look at Rubens's portrait of his second wife, 
 and compare the flesh of the hand which holds the glove 
 (and which has not been restored) with the flesh of the 
 other hand and the bosom." 
 
 If we turn to another branch, to the carelessness in 
 
93 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 preserving those pictures which have not been spoilt by 
 this pretended restoration, we find very little improve- 
 ment. Dust and mould settle on the canvas without 
 being removed, the pictures are constantly taken down 
 either to be restored, or to be copied, or to be re- 
 numbered; and nothing is so apt to harm a picture 
 as this constant removal. The floors of the Pinacothek 
 are made of some sort of stucco which gives out a great 
 deal of dust, and besides being obnoxious to the pictures, 
 is one reason why no copying can go on in the rooms. 
 One of the writers from whom I quote states the 
 astounding fact, that a picture of Rubens was taken 
 to a photographer's studio, a quarter of a mile distant 
 from the Gallery, carried hither horizontally on the 
 shoulders of six soldiers, and then left to stand in the 
 sun. Partly owing to the unsuitable material of the 
 floors, partly to natural iUiberahty, copying in Munich 
 labours under great disadvantages. No copying of any 
 kind is allowed in the rooms, you may not even make a 
 sketch of a picture in your pocket-book. One room is 
 devoted to copying, and in this room the light is bad, 
 there is only place for ten persons, and at least five 
 seats are always taken up by painters on porcelain. 
 The man who wants to copy a picture has to pay for 
 its being taken down and brought to his room, besides 
 being called on for many incidental expenses, which are 
 more than many art students in Munich can afford. 
 While he is copying, of course the picture is useless for 
 the public, and as most students choose the more cele- 
 brated pictures, the public is constantly deprived of 
 what it most desires to see. In most other galleries 
 
TO SELL A CATALOGUE. 93 
 
 copying goes on at the same time as public inspection; 
 in Paris and Florence the same limits apply to both. In 
 some caseSj perhaps, copying is obnoxious to visitors, or 
 visitors are obnoxious to copyists. But it is better to 
 obviate disagreements by allovcing certain days to each, 
 as is done in the National Gallery, than to make war on 
 both, as they do in the Pinacothek. 
 
 In objecting to the constant taking down of pictures 
 as hurtful to them, it has been added that they were 
 taken down for bad purposes. Either they are taken 
 down to be restored, which they would be better with- 
 out, or to be copied, which might be done better if they 
 stayed in their places, or for another reason. This other 
 reason leads me to the great blemish of the Munich Gal- 
 lery, the Catalogue. In order to make people buy cata- 
 logues the old ones are rendered useless by re-numbering. 
 A sale is thus created for a publication which is notori- 
 ously bad, and the proceeds of the sale are not em- 
 ployed in administering any remedy. No change has 
 been made in the catalogue during the last twenty-five 
 years, though that space of time is remarkable for the 
 number of new discoveries in art it has witnessed. 
 Here lies the chief crime of the Pinacothek, a crime 
 of which the catalogue gives only the outward and 
 visible sign. In the less frequented galleries of Italy, 
 in out of the way churches, and half inhabited palaces, 
 one has little reason to complain if anonymous copyists 
 go by the name of Raphael, and quattrocento pictures 
 are assigned to Salvator Rosa. But in Germany, and 
 stUl more in Munich, one would think there was no 
 danger of such ignorance. Is it not from German 
 
94 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 critics that all our present knowledge of art has come ; 
 are not the names of Rumohr, Kugler, Waagen, sufficient 
 guarantees for the accuracy of their nation ? And yet, 
 on good authority, there are no less than fifty-four pic- 
 tures in the Pinacothek of Munich that are placed under 
 false names in the catalogue. 
 
 If the catalogue were not meagre in the extreme, it 
 would afford some means of ascertaining the truth of its 
 system of nomenclature. But to avoid the trouble of 
 inquiring into dates, and pedigrees and authorities, to 
 avoid the disagreeable necessity of telling the truth and 
 diminishing by nine-tenths the market value, the direc- 
 tors of the Gallery have contented themselves with the 
 shortest possible description of every picture, and have 
 declined to put forth a catalogue raisonne. It is true, 
 they answered one complainant by giving their per- 
 mission to any one' else who chose to undertake the 
 issue of one; but that is scarcely the same as con- 
 tributing to it themselves. They seem to look upon 
 the catalogue simply as a source of revenue, not at all 
 as a part of their duty. They never for a moment sup- 
 pose that there is any sort of obligation attached to the 
 possession of pictures. It is enough for them if the 
 yearly proceeds derived from the sale of the present 
 imperfect catalogue are large, and if they are not, the 
 plain expedient of re-numbering the pictures supplies 
 the deficiency. Meanwhile the wants of the GaUery 
 remain unheeded, and the usefulness of a public insti- 
 tution is seriously diminished. The study of art is liable 
 to be perverted, the fountain of early taste to be poisoned 
 at its spring. It is quite impossible for a student to de- 
 
EDUCATION IN ART. 95 
 
 rive full benefit from the collection, to judge in future 
 with any accuracy, or make comparisons and draw in- 
 ferences with any certainty, when his point of departure 
 is false. A young man who has a copy executed two 
 hundred years after Raphael passed oif on him as an 
 original is not in a fit state to judge the genuine works 
 of the master, and the confusion of mind into which a 
 beginner must be thrown by the inequalities of the 
 Italian pictures in Munich is almost fatal to learning. 
 It hardly reflects much credit on the artistic taste 
 of King Ludwig, and on the reality of his patronage, 
 to learn that he bought the St. Cecilia in the Munich 
 Gallery for more than £2,000 for his private gallery, 
 believing it to be a genuine Raphael, and when the 
 general verdict declared it a late copy, got disgusted 
 with it, and presented it to the Pinacothek. 
 
 It is, however, in the works of another school that 
 the unreliable nature of the catalogue is most con- 
 spicuous. And here it is even more hurtful than in the 
 Italian rooms, because the early German and Flemish 
 pictures form the strength of the Munich Gallery, and 
 are nowhere else to be found in such numbers. Some 
 might think it worth their while to pass many days in 
 Munich to study these pictures alone, and might, if 
 they were fresh to that branch of art, get more harm 
 than good of their labour. Take for instance the works 
 of Van Eyck. The catalogue gives us six pictures 
 under his name. Dr. Waagen, in his "Handbook to 
 the Schools of the Netherlands," denies the authenticity 
 of every one of the six, agreeing in this with Messrs. 
 Crowe and Cavalcaselle, whose work on the Early 
 
96 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Flemish Painters is the chief authority on the subject. 
 The Triptych of the Adoration of the Kings (Cabinets, 
 35, 36^ 37) is by both assigned to Roger van der Weyden, 
 as also St. Luke painting the Virgin (Cabinets, 43). 
 The Offerings of the Magi (Rooms, 45) Waagen at- 
 tributes to a certain Court painter to Henry the 
 Vlllth.j while Crowe and CavalcaseUe assign it to 
 the early half of the I6th century, without determining 
 the name of the painter. It is by an imitator of Van 
 Eyck and Memling, they say, and is an attempt to 
 graft the colour of Van Eyck on the composition of 
 Memling. Memling, or Hemling, as he used to be 
 named, and is named stiU in the Catalogue of the 
 Pinacothek, is as badly treated as Van Eyck. Of nine 
 pictures that bear his name only one is considered 
 genuine by the authors of the Early Flemish Painters, 
 and four by Waagen. M. Vitet, de I'Academie Fran- 
 gaise, goes even further, and renounces them all. The 
 indiscriminate condemnation is not borne out by the 
 best judges, and is hardly safe. Messrs. Crowe and 
 CavalcaseUe call the large picture of the Seven Joys of 
 Mary (Cabinets, 63), a genuine work, well executed 
 and preserved, but ill-arranged and over-crowded. " If 
 the whole is not a perfect picture, each little subject is 
 quite a gem of finish." This verdict contrasts strangely 
 with M. Vitet's wholesale denunciation, and one is 
 tempted to quote from Horace: — 
 
 " Quid quieque vitet nimquam homini satis ** 
 
 Cautum est in horas." 
 
 Waagen also admits the Seven Joys to be genuine, and 
 
THE NEW PINACOTHEK. 97 
 
 adds the Triptych of St. Christopher as an early work, 
 though bearing traces of Van der Weyden. I confess 
 that I am partial to this picture, and am more inclined 
 to agree with Dr. Waagen than with Messrs. Crowe and 
 Cavalcaselle. In their judgment, it bears the impress 
 of the school of Stuerbout, to whom they assign several 
 other pictures, called Hemling in the catalogue, — The 
 Israelites picking Manna, Melchisedec and Abraham, 
 and The Kiss of Judas. I observe that Waagen agrees 
 with them in these points, which may add some value 
 to his divergence in respect of the St. Christopher. 
 But even if this Triptych be admitted, five pictures are 
 left, which all judges agree in re-naming. Six to Van 
 Eyckand five to Memling,make eleven pictures under two 
 names; if the proportion were at all observed throughout 
 the gallery, there would be an end of all study. It is 
 beyond my present purpose to go more deeply into the 
 subject. What I have already quoted will suffice to put 
 visitors on their guard; and rectifications are more in 
 place in a new edition of Murray's Hand Book than in 
 these pages. 
 
 The new Pinacothek is rather unfairly treated by 
 English travellers. "All very well, no doubt," says 
 one, superciliously ; " but I prefer the Royal Academy." 
 Others sneer at the allegorical frescoes outside, "as 
 oddly recalling the scenic temptations hung on the out- 
 side of booths at fairs." Others, still more unfairly, 
 insist on seeing the whole ; and if you are their travel- 
 ling companion, and are dragged round the rooms with- 
 out mercy, you sympathise strongly with the supercilious 
 and the sneerers. But neither of them are quite just 
 
 p 
 
98 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 to the modern picture gallery of Municli. The outside, 
 it is true, is detestable ; and the frescoes are sign paint- 
 ings. But their failure is not attributable to any inca- 
 pacity on the part of the artist, to any attempt at glo- 
 rifying the revival of German art. Most people see 
 in them the most objectionable of styles, the ideal alle- 
 gorical, applied to the most objectionable of ends, 
 puffery. But in reality they are a series of squibs, by 
 a very clever and bitter satirist ; and the evaporation of 
 their spirit is attributable in great measure to the size 
 at which they are painted. If any one looks over the 
 sketches as they are hung up in one of the inside rooms, 
 instead of looking at the colossal frescoes outside, he 
 will have more chance of appreciating the artist. It 
 would indeed be ridiculous, if these pictures were meant 
 for a serious tribute to the modern art of Munich. To 
 represent Cornelius and Overbeck fighting against pe- 
 dants in order to release the Graces, would be consum- 
 mate folly if it were meant seriously, seeing that these 
 two painters are notorious for their exceeding pedantry, 
 and have never once sacrificed to the Graces. But we 
 know that Kaulbach's sketches were taken to be carica- 
 tures by those who would otherwise have been flattered by 
 them. The painter of the huge frescoes in the palace, 
 Schnorr von Carolsfeld, published a protest against 
 those of the new Pinacothek, and declared them untrue 
 representations, as well as a disgrace to the nation. A 
 stronger testimony in their favour could hardly have 
 been uttered ; and it is only to be wished that they had 
 been executed as effectively as they were conceived. 
 But certain considerations seem to have paralysed the 
 
kaulbach's satire. 99 
 
 hand of the satirist. It must not be forgotten that he 
 was a pupil of Cornelius, and had painted under his 
 direction the same empty, mythological works, that he 
 might otherwise have ridiculed. Besides, the suscep- 
 tible feelings of the royal patron might have resented 
 any open reflection upon the justness of the taste, and 
 the liberal superintendance that developed the public 
 works of Munich. Thus, Kaulbach has so judiciously 
 veiled his satire, that it is generally interpreted as 
 panegyric. 
 
 A good deal of out-of-the-way knowledge, the sort of 
 information learned only by gossip with the oldest inha- 
 bitant, is required to fathom the secret satirical mean- 
 ings of these frescoes ; and I have not proper access to 
 it. Perhaps the present suggestion may tempt some 
 duly qualified person to reveal the mysteries. As a 
 slight indication of Kaulbach's spirit, let me point to 
 the portly figure staggering in with a cushion on his 
 arms covered with orders and decorations, at the right- 
 hand corner of one of the pictures. This gentlema;n is 
 the king's cook ; and the point consists in his carrying 
 the cushion of orders as he would carry a tray of dishes. 
 One needs no very deep study of Klenze's buildings to 
 appreciate his portrait, where he sits making architec- 
 tural designs and referring to a book close at hand for 
 some warrant or model. It always struck me that the 
 representations of King Ludwig, received enthusiastically 
 by artists and connoisseurs, were to some extent parodies 
 of the last pictures in Eeineke Puchs, — those in which 
 the fox comes proudly through a triumphal arch, and is 
 invested with an order by the lion. The allusion is cer- 
 
100 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 tainly very faint ; but something in the attitude of King 
 Ludwig is a clear suggestion of it. 
 
 Although the collection of pictures in the new Pina- 
 cothek is very imperfect, and very capriciously selected, 
 it has one great value to students of modem art. It is 
 the only place in Munich where you can get any idea 
 of the state of painting in Germany, and of the really 
 meritorious painters who have not an European reputa- 
 tion. The chief painters in each country are pretty 
 well known by engravings, and by hearsay, which is even 
 more effectual. But the painters of a second rank, men 
 of great talent perhaps, highly valued already by native 
 judges, and destined at som.e future time to achieve 
 general distinction, are still unknown beyond the frontier. 
 An opportunity, like that afforded by the International 
 Exhibition, comes rarely ; and accident or caprice may 
 prevent a good use being made of it, when it comes. I 
 do not know what reason can be assigned for the paucity 
 of exhibitors from Munich in the fine art galleries ; I 
 find only the names of eleven painters from Bavaria in 
 the catalogue, and two of the eleven were merely copy- 
 ists. None of the greatest Munich names were there • 
 scarcely any even of the second rank of painters, — of 
 those represented in the new Pinacothek. It may not 
 be surprising that the men engaged on great public 
 works were absent, but these may be counted on the 
 fingers, and the mass of smaller painters remains. In 
 England, the yearly exhibitions draw out all the best 
 pictures, and a zealous attendant at these is kept fully 
 au courant. But, let any one familiar with foreign 
 writings on English art ask himself, how many names 
 
HOW IT STRIKES POREIGNEKS. 101 
 
 of English painters are well known on the continent ? 
 I read in a French criticism some time ago, that for 
 certain reasons the English had no great landscape 
 painter ; and the critic took pains to explain why Land- 
 seer was not a great landscape painter, although the 
 " reine d'Angleterre qui est riche et qui raffole des ouv- 
 rages de Sir Landseer lui couvre de guinees le moindre 
 tableau." Apparently, the writer had never heard of a 
 cer.tain J. M. W. Turner. A German critic, estimating 
 the comparative merits of the painters of different na- 
 tions at the International Exhibition, says, " that modern 
 English art is very mediocre. With the exception of 
 Landseer, and perhaps of Frith, there are no prominent 
 men of genius, — no movement of importance." It would 
 be only too easy to retaliate on both French and Ger- 
 mans, if one was so prejudiced in favour of one's own 
 nation as to resent every species of criticism. But our 
 judgments on foreign art have been habitually too hasty 
 and too general ; nor has even the show of admirable 
 French pictures in the International taught all our critics 
 to be just. A mere retaliation on the surface faults of 
 the art of either nation, would neither wash out their 
 unjust judgment nor aid to bring about future agree- 
 ment. Of course, everybody is more or less prejudiced 
 in favour of the products of his country. They are cal- 
 culated for him ; hit his taste as far as taste can be pre- 
 dicted ; and are, consequently, sure of some appreciation. 
 With foreign things, on the other hand, the taste has 
 to be created. And as the foreign thought has started 
 from a widely different base, and tends to a different 
 goal, any criticism of its details from the point of view 
 
102 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of another nation, without allowing the primary diver- 
 gence, must necessarily be unfair. So long as an Eng- 
 lishman compares a German landscape with Creswick, 
 or a French genre picture with Mulready, and rejects 
 them because they do not adopt his national standard, 
 he is judging as crudely as the French and German 
 critics I have quoted. Let the painter's means be un- 
 satisfactory, and his end worthless, — he is fair game; 
 but to dismiss him and his brethren in a line, because 
 they do not happen to be English, is really a ludicrous 
 perversion. 
 
 For this reason the collection in the new Pinacothek 
 is valuable to the traveller, as it affords him an oppor- 
 tunity for making up his mind. It will be well to leave 
 out all thought of the Royal Academy, not only on 
 national grounds, but also because the pi'oducts of a 
 single year have a different effect from the gradual 
 growth of many. You would not compare any number 
 of the Quarterly Review with any number of the 
 Times, although there may be three brilliant leading 
 articles, and several foreign letters of great merit in 
 one, and only inferior essays in the other. Goethe's 
 saying is of wider application than even to what is 
 really brilliant, and what is really solid and genuine. 
 
 " Was glanzt, ist fiir den Angenblick geboren ; 
 Das Aechte bleibt der Nachwelt unverloren."* 
 
 It is, perhaps, a misfortune for Munich artists, that 
 
 * What glitters is born for tlie moment. What is genuine remains 
 uulost to posterity. — Hayward's Translation of "Faust." ' 
 
BUYING IN THE CHEAPEST MARKET, 103 
 
 there is no yearly exhibition of pictures during the 
 summer, when so many strangers pass through. The 
 reputation of Munich as an art-producing town is so 
 great, that lovers of art naturally look for some such 
 public show, and are liable to be disappointed at finding 
 none. The Art Union, where so many pictures are 
 exhibited, is inaccessible to strangers without some in- 
 troduction, and the pictures exhibited there are not the 
 best class of works. To go round to studios requires 
 considerable time and effectual guidance, nor does one 
 feel free to express opinions in the presence of the 
 painter. Thus it is that the new Pinacothek is the 
 only resource left to strangers, and the purchase of a 
 picture for the new Pinacothek is so valuable to artists, 
 that they are willing to sell their pictures at any price 
 King Ludwig may offer. I am told he gets pictures 
 cheaper than any dealer, and that artists would gladly 
 make him a present of their works, to have them hung 
 on the walls of his gallery. One painter who could 
 find no custom for his pictures, was fortunate enough to 
 sell two of them to the king, and was instantly over- 
 done with commissions. "With such temptations to buy 
 worthless pictures cheap, and encourage poor artists at 
 the expense of the many who want to have galleries 
 without an idea of taste, it is strange that King Lud- 
 wig has contrived to collect so many works of decided 
 merit. The' description of the gallery in Murray's 
 Hand-Book is so cursory, that I shall take the liberty 
 of accompanying the visitor. 
 
 The first of the large rooms contains Kaulbach's fine 
 portrait of King Ludwig, wearing the dress of the 
 
104 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Bavarian Order of St. Hubert. In the second room is 
 the unfinished picture of the Deluge by Carl Schorn, 
 Piloty's " Seni discovering the dead body of Wallen- 
 stein," a> good picture of Verona bathed in sunshine by 
 Kirchner, and two paintings of the interior of West- 
 minster Abbey, which are rather cold and painty. There 
 is great vigour, many touches of feeling in Schorn's 
 Deluge, although its incompleteness is most likely to 
 act unfavourably on the spectator. The expression of 
 some of the faces is decidedly good ; — the furious des- 
 pair with which one man is praying to his graven image, 
 the king or chieftain at the top throwing his arms up 
 to heaven, and the slow rising of the water storming 
 the peak on which the last survivors have taken refuge. 
 Piloty's picture of Wallenstein is firmly and solidly 
 painted, though not free from a certain heaviness which 
 has appeared more strongly in his subsequent work, 
 Nero among the ruins of Rome. The attitude of the 
 chief figure, it is true, is borrowed from Delaroche's 
 Due de Guise, and there is a calmness in Sen?s look on 
 the dead body which answers the conventional view of 
 an astrologer, but is not equal to the dramatic truth of 
 Schiller. Stuff is very well painted in Piloty's Wal- 
 lenstein, the whole is arranged like a tableau vivant, 
 and the forced repose of the dead, the overawed quiet of 
 the living, the neatly studied disorder, enable the 
 painter to dwell on contrasts and details with the mi- 
 nuteness of an inventory. The table cloth, on the 
 end of which Wallenstein has fallen, dragging it haK 
 off the table, the carpet turned over on itself in the 
 death-scufiie, the long dress of Wallenstein himself, 
 
piloty's wallenstein. 105 
 
 and the deep rich purple of Seni, are admirably done, 
 and these things seize the eye at the first glance, and 
 dwell on the memory amidst the barbarous painting of 
 the other great pictures in the building. There is an 
 attempt at more than stuiF-painting, too, as if Piloty 
 was to some extent penetrated by the tragic depth of 
 his subject, but was hampered by his love of material. 
 Wallenstein's face is noble, and his repose is that of 
 violent death. Spite of the conventional view of Seni> 
 there is a sorrow, a yearning against fate in his expres- 
 sion, and consciousness of age and powerlessness. But 
 how weak this painting seems to achieve the height of 
 the argument ! In the fifth act of Wallenstein, Schiller 
 rises to greater dramatic power than he has ever shown, 
 and a comparison of his version with this of Piloty's, 
 should warn every painter against attempting the sum- 
 mit of tragedy, with such clogs of silk and satin upon 
 him. 
 
 The third large room contains Kaulbach's Destruc- 
 tion of Jerusalem, two portraits of paiaters in the cos- 
 tumes they wore at an artists' ball, by the same, and a 
 landscape by Heinlein. The latter is one of the best- 
 known landscape painters in Munich. I have seen 
 works of his that pleased me more than this. The 
 fourth room contains a picture of Schraudolph's, which 
 has only lately been added to the gallery, two land- 
 scapes of Albert Zimmermann's, an old one, represent- 
 ing centaurs fighting with leopards, which does not 
 much attract me, and a new one of a waterfall pouring 
 through a rocky mountain country, which pleases me 
 highly J two or three other landscapes, one of them by 
 
 F 2 
 
106 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Schleichj and a strange blue canvas of Otho's Entry 
 into Nauplia^ 1833, by Peter Heas. The landscapes 
 are the only remarkable feature of this room ; Schrau- 
 dolph's religious picture is conventional in the extreme, 
 and Peter Hess is not only hard in his colouring, and 
 unpleasing in his drawing, but his attempt at repro- 
 ducing the blue water and sky and mountains of Greece, 
 succeeds only in transferring pigments from his palette 
 to the picture, without any preparation. The fifth large 
 room is also occupied with religious pictures ; an Ascen- 
 sion by Schraudolph, an Altar-piece of Henry Hess, 
 and a Holy Family by Overbeck. There is little to re- 
 mark in any of the three. Enough has been said on 
 the religious painting of modem Germany to enable 
 me to be silent. I must remark, however, that this 
 Holy Family of Overbeck's is tolerably known by 
 means of engravings. The Virgin stands behind look- 
 ing on our Saviour and John the Baptist, accompanied 
 by a cross and a lamb. I had at one time thought that 
 it might be possible to assign each of the figures to 
 their original, but on examining the picture more care- 
 fully I had to abandon the thought. Raphael, Francia, 
 and Perugino, are all more or less mixed up in the 
 ground. The background is Raphael's every line, but 
 Raphael under the tuition of Perugino. The Virgin's 
 dress is a literal copy of Raphael's drapery, the attitude 
 of one child is adapted from the Belle Jardiniere, and 
 the figure of the Virgin more or less resembles the 
 Cardellino at Florence. But it is useless to particularise 
 sources, when one look is sufficient to detect the general 
 origin. 
 
WANT OF CLEARNESS. 107 
 
 Rottmann's encaustic landscapes have the next room 
 to themselves, a room so arranged that while all the 
 centre is dark the walls are fully lighted from above^ 
 and at a distance the pictures have all the effect of 
 illusion. But they do not bear close examination, and 
 the spectator must be warned to remain in the darkness 
 himself if he would feast his eyes on their light. From 
 the last but one of the large rooms, that in which the 
 two large altar pieces front each other, we go into the 
 smaller rooms on the southern side of the building. 
 The numbers begin from the other end, but the most 
 natural way of seeing the rooms is by reversing the 
 numbers. We thus begin with the fifth room. A 
 sheep-stall, by the celebrated Dutch painter Verboek- 
 hoven, and a knight entertained by Dominican monks, 
 by Eugene Hess, are the best pictures in it; one or 
 two others are worthy of remark, but not of decided 
 praise. Schadow's Holy Family is likely to attract 
 attention as thoroughly German-religious ; the view of 
 the reigning King of Bavaria's fancy castle of Hohen- 
 schwangau is curious, and the picture of the fortune- 
 teller is remarkable, as showing the inability of so 
 many Munich artists to tell a plain story. From the 
 attitude of the old woman, and the way the young man 
 sinks back in his chair, with one hand on his pocket, as 
 if he was cleaned out, one would think the two were 
 playing a gaiae, and that the old woman had beggared 
 her neighbour ; it is only by noticing the earnest faces 
 of the other characters that one sees the meaning. 
 How differently a French artist would have told the 
 story ! There would have been no possibility of a mistake. 
 
108 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Eugene Hess's picture of the two monks entertaining a 
 stout red-faced knight is an admirable work, just what 
 a genre painting should be. All the accessories are 
 solidly and carefully painted, the jugs, the bottles, all 
 the little minutiae that one cannot detail in verbal de- 
 scription, but which tell so decidedly on the general 
 effect of a picture. Foreign painters are so sparingly 
 represented in this gallery that one is thankful for all 
 one can get, and the sheep-stall of Verboekhoven is so 
 perfectly original in the different range of subjects 
 chosen by German painters, that one is inclined either 
 to rate it too high or too low. 
 
 In the next room we have a picture of Leys, a vil- 
 lage-street in Holland, one of Adam's battle-pieces, 
 a temple of Psestum, by Coignet : a Veronese cemetery, 
 by Kirchner ; and a fine work of Gallait's, a Monk feed- 
 ing the Poor in a Cloister. These works of Leys and 
 Gallait are very different from those more ambitious 
 pictures of theirs that made so much sensation in the 
 International Exhibition. Leys's Village-street is quiet 
 and retiring, many people would be likely to pass over 
 it without giving it a second look, if they did not happen 
 to remember the name ; but the longer you stand before 
 it the more certain your appreciation. Gallait's fine 
 figure of the young monk holding the large stone jar to 
 the mouth of one of the poor can hardly be overlooked, 
 however ; but the picture is colder and paler than his 
 later works, resembling in some points his Tasso and 
 Montaigne. Kirchner seems devoted to Verona, and 
 the Italian towns at the foot of the Alps. There is a 
 glow of colour and light on all his pictures, which 
 
BATTLE-PIECES. 109 
 
 harmonises with the depth and richness of the architec- 
 ture he loves to paint. Passing over the room of 
 Kaulbach's sketches for the frescoes without, the visitor 
 having already been exhorted to study them carefully, 
 we find two more of Adam's large battle-pieces in the 
 next, Novara and Custozza, which, with the Storming of 
 the Portifications of Diippel in the Schleswig-Holstein 
 war (fourth room) may serve as a text for a short view 
 of the painter. I am not in general very partial to 
 battle-pieces, nor do I think that a painting of any 
 celebrated battle is of any value, unless it betray some 
 decided genius in the artist. For the object of painting 
 a battle is not to show how the field was won, but to 
 extract some interest from it. The dry historical de- 
 scription of any celebrated fight, if utterly unreadable 
 to the student of history, may yet be valuable to the 
 military critic, may serve to convey hints to future 
 generals, and may season future addresses to armies 
 drawn up before the enemy. But a picture cannot 
 pretend to such a mission. No military critic would 
 judge a battle from a picture of it, and no general 
 would draw up his troops in a certain order because he 
 had seen troops so drawn up on the canvas. The 
 painter must give you the spirit of the battle, not the 
 details ; he must compress into the space of a moment 
 what may have taken hours to execute ; must seize the 
 dramatic pith of the story, and present it at the cul- 
 minating moment of the day. Most painters have ap- 
 preciated this to some extent; Adam seems never to 
 have had an idea of it. One does not get the faintest 
 notion of any unity in these battle-pieces. In the im- 
 
110 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 mediate foreground one has the details which one would 
 most gladly avoid, put the most prominently forward ; 
 soldiers march by next, and a shell explodes in the 
 middle of them ; beyond are officers on horseback, very 
 probably taken from the life. This is the outskirts of 
 the battle; what effect has this on the whole? Far 
 better the conventional cloud of smoke, and one or two 
 bullets coming out of it, than these sickening details in 
 their worst reality. If the object of the painter had 
 been to disgust us with war, he could not have chosen 
 his ground better ; but that could hardly have been the 
 wish of the man who set himself as a glorious task to 
 celebrate German victories, and chose as such the 
 execrable fields in which the liberty of Italy was over- 
 thrown. One would think that in Adam's view the 
 soldier who is binding up his wound in the foreground 
 was the hero of the day, as in Victor Hugo^s view it 
 was Cambronne who won the battle of Waterloo. The 
 laws of painting, however, are very distinct from the 
 laws of description. The prophet can say with magni- 
 ficent vagueness that every battle of the warrior is with 
 confused noise and garments rolled in blood j but the 
 painter must banish those thoughts from his canvas if 
 he would not give us a ghastly reality. How very dif- 
 ferent the spirited and admirable battle-pieces of the 
 French; one feels that achievements are being done, 
 and one is not forced to dwell on what is revolting to 
 humanity. That Adam's pictures are cold and un- 
 pleasing in colour is not surprising; one who could 
 sympathise with the ugly heroes of the Austrian garb 
 had no claim to glow or to feeling. 
 
SMALLER PICTURES. Ill 
 
 A fine picture of gipsies, brought up for stealing, by 
 Claude Jacquand ; a Venetian Court, by Kirchner ; and 
 one of the interminable winter landscapes of Richard 
 Zimmermann, are pleasant changes from the battle 
 pictures that hang in this second room. The one of 
 the gipsies is especially powerful, both in character and 
 painting. The first room, to which we come last, has a 
 fine landscape of Andreas Achenbach, who is generally 
 ranked as the first of German landscape painters. The 
 scene represented is the Pontine Marshes ; — an autumn 
 morning, and the glow of colour is almost dazzling. I 
 scarcely know how to describe the efl"ect produced, — so 
 much warmth and so much brilliance combine, that it 
 would seem a sunset at mid-day. Geyer's Medical 
 Consultation, which hangs next, is also a good picture, 
 though the faces are not entirely original ; but his com- 
 panion work. The End of a Masked Ball, is to the French 
 models, by which it is inspired, what Hacklander is to 
 Balzac. 
 
 The inferior works are generally placed in the small 
 cabinets, which may be more hastily viewed. No Eng- 
 lishman is likely to leave the building without seeing 
 Wilkie's Reading of the Will, which is in the second 
 cabinet. In the fourth cabinet hangs Stieler's portrait 
 of Goethe, which is engraved in Mr. Lewes's " Life," as 
 frontispiece to the second volume. In the fifth cabinet 
 Hassenclever's picture of the examination scene in the 
 Jobsiad, very clever and spirited ; the helpless ignorance 
 of the candidate, his enormous blunders, and the amuse- 
 ment of the doctors baiting him. The tenth and eleventh 
 cabinets contain the curious views of old Munich, which 
 
112 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 I have already noticed j the thirteenth, some views of 
 Heidelberg, hy Kirchner ; and the fourteenth, a picture 
 from the Thirty Years' War, by Eugene Hess, — the 
 Swedish general, Wrangel, surprised while hunting 
 near Dachau, by the Bavarian general, Johann von 
 Werth. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 KTJNSTER-PESTE. 
 
 There are, I believe, about a thousand artists in Munich, 
 and the most agreeable feature of this society is its love 
 of amusement and pageant. The costume balls, that 
 have at different times been organised by the Munich 
 painters, are constant subjects of remembrance; and 
 the yearly excursion to the country in May adds a relish 
 to the spring. It has not been my fortune to see any 
 of the grander feasts with which the memories of great 
 men, or the anniversaries of notable events in the art- 
 world, are recorded, saving that one that I shall describe 
 in the next chapter. But I purpose here to devote a few 
 pages to two of the ordinary festivals that I witnessed, — 
 the fancy ball and the May-feast of 1863. 
 
 The continental habit of confining all dancing to the 
 Carnival, and crowding ball upon ball, revel upon revel, 
 into the last days before Lent, if it does not lead to 
 unrestrained gaiety and frantic pleasure, as it does in 
 Paris, is apt to be a kill-joy. It certainly acts as such 
 in Munich. People who would willingly amuse them- 
 selves moderately during a season of suflEicient length, 
 find themselves compelled by law to crowd all their 
 
114 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 amusement into six or eight weeks, without a pause to 
 recover their breath in, to concoct small talk, and inter- 
 pret the clever remarks that they put aside as needing 
 reflection. Thus they come to the Carnival as a duty, 
 and go through it with the serious face and resolution 
 that duty requires. The young ladies go to balls to 
 dance, and dance because it is their duty. At the end 
 of the Carnival come the masked-balls, and people go in 
 masks because it is their duty. The sagacious remark, 
 however, that you may take a horse to the water, but 
 can't make him drink, applies to this enforced amuse- 
 ment; and though people go to the masked-balls be- 
 cause they think it their duty, they cannot amuse them- 
 selves for that reason. The court masked-balls stand 
 in need of no such enlivenment, for the court is too 
 much accustomed to parade itself to need the excuse of 
 amusement. But I cannot conceive why private per- 
 sons should go to the theatre in order to sit in the 
 boxes and see the royal family walking about in cos- 
 tume on the floor, though the attraction of the sight was 
 once fully explained to me by a spectator. "It is ex- 
 ceedingly pleasant," he said. " The pit and stage are 
 boarded over so as to form a level surface, and are spread 
 with a carpet. There are several little tables laid about 
 at which the King and the royal family sit down if they 
 feel inclined, or else they walk to and fro. You sit in 
 the boxes and watch them; it is very amusing." I must 
 be allowed to differ. If the royal persons were in any 
 costume, if anything that we are accustomed to associate 
 with masked balls took place, there might be some fan 
 in looking on. But that one figure in a black domino 
 
EXTRAOUDINAllY DELUSIONS. 115 
 
 is the Kingj and another the old King, and that these 
 black figures sit down at little tables or walk about on 
 the floorj can in no possible degree cause a rational being 
 to be amused or excited. 
 
 I do not wish to imply that the stupidity of these 
 masked balls is owing to their being held in Munich. 
 So far from this, I have generally found masked balls, 
 even in places where they are indigenous beyond measure 
 tedious. It must be borne in mind that to enter into 
 the fun of intriguing you must be well known to some 
 of the company, and a disguise which merely prevents 
 you from seeing a strange face is quite useless and need 
 not be effectual. The interest of a masked ball consists 
 in friends playing tricks on each other, in persons who 
 are familiar with all your ways evincing their familiarity 
 without being detected. It is rare for a stranger in a 
 place to have such friends^ and yet strangers are the 
 very people who look for amusement in going to masked 
 balls. Besides which, in many places once celebrated for 
 gaiety, the spirit has departed. It is all very well for the 
 defenders of the Austrian rule in Venice to draw pictures 
 of the real content of the people, and to argue that the 
 stagnation is merely an invention or is got up by the 
 enemies of the government. If this were so, the masked 
 balls would probably be attended by some others than 
 strangers, and those who make their sex their profession. 
 As it is you need only go to the far famed Ridotto to find 
 an Italian version of Cremorne, and I think of the two 
 most Englishmen would prefer the latter. 
 
 The fancy balls that the Munich artists arrange about 
 every three years are very different from the ordinary 
 
116 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 masked balls that I have mentioned. Some of them 
 which have been more than ordinarily successful, have 
 lingered long in the memory of the town, and have 
 served to disparage subsequent attempts which were less 
 praiseworthy. A subject is always chosen, and the cos- 
 tume of the period rigorously observed. Thus it hap- 
 pens that the dresses are not left to the choice of the 
 wearers, as in fancy balls generally, and odds and ends 
 cannot be pieced into a nondescript attire. Sketches 
 are made by the artists who organise the ball of the 
 dresses that are to appear, and if you wish to take a 
 costume you must adopt one of the sketches and follow 
 it rigorously. The disorderly mass of vestments that 
 appears at fancy balls where aU is left to individual ca- 
 price is thus avoided; none of those soldiers talking with 
 Pierrots, old court dresses, sailors, Turks, Swiss peasant 
 girls and Diana of the Ephesians. A very celebrated 
 ball some years ago represented Rubens ; this time the 
 subject taken was an historical panorama of fairy tales. 
 Half the artistic world was engaged for months preparing 
 sketches, or dresses, or decorations for the ball, and from 
 an artistic point of view the success of the pageant was 
 complete. The hall of the Odeon was beautifully deco- 
 rated, the dresses were aU in keeping with each other 
 and were highly to be praised, each train was well organ- 
 ised and swept past with splendour that seemed too real 
 to be mimic. But it was this very splendour that de- 
 tracted from the perfect success in all other respects. 
 The character of the fairy tales was not duly preserved. 
 Some jealous feeUng had kept the elder artists from 
 joining, and the voun^er artists, not to be left in the 
 
MORAL OF FAIRY TALES. 117 
 
 lurch, had to call in the bourgeois world to assist them. 
 The humour of the feast and the character of the society 
 suffered by the mixture. Of course those members of 
 the bourgeoisie who took characters preferred the showy 
 dresses to the characteristic dresses. Every one wanted 
 to be a prince or princess, and though the sketches were 
 followed, the harmony of the whole picture was des- 
 troyed. A very slight reflection suflBces to show that 
 the courts and rich dresses which may be made to figure 
 prominently in fairy tales are only put in as concessions 
 to human weakness, and are not the essential part of 
 the story. The fairy element is the real thing in each 
 story ; you may vary the accessories, or even remove 
 them altogether without any serious harm. In Cinde- 
 rella, for instance, the pumpkin which was turned into a 
 coach, the rats that were turned into the coach- horses — 
 I quote from memory — are far more interesting than the 
 toilets of the two sisters and the prince's train. But in 
 a procession the two sisters take a much higher place 
 than they are allowed by the fairy annalist, and the ba- 
 lance of right and wrong is disturbed. Perhaps this view 
 of the subject is taken in order to show that the merits 
 of the good characters were greater, and the temptations 
 to which they were exposed more dangerous than we 
 should gather from the stories. We always thought 
 that there was no particular merit in resisting the proud 
 sisters and choosing the humble one, because we knew 
 that the proud sisters were wicked and that the humble 
 sister was good. But when we see them pass before us 
 we forget their pride and wickedness, and might very 
 probably, if we were in the place of the prince, succumb 
 
118 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 to the temptation and take the wrong one. If this was 
 the object of the procession, we ought to thank it for the 
 new light it throws on the faiiy characters. 
 
 No such excuse, however, can be found for the pre- 
 dominance of court dresses. The charm of the fairy 
 tales would be extinguished, as well as their moral, if 
 they merely led up to a life at court. No one would 
 be either virtuous or clever, if he was to be rewarded 
 by being placed in a situation where neither of those 
 qualities would avail him. As I have said before, the 
 introduction of courts and riches is a concession to hu- 
 man weakness. Some reward is needed for virtue, and 
 some object for the exertion of cleverness ; so the fairy 
 annalist throws in what seems most splendid, merely to 
 imply what he cannot exactly convey. The fairy world 
 in which the characters move is before all things fan- 
 tastic, and is so far above the real world, that an actual 
 court is a descent from it. But as court is above us 
 who read, so there must be something above the fairy 
 world, and this something is conveyed to us by a symbol 
 which we are supposed to be capable of appreciating. 
 
 Enough of these metaphysical considerations, which 
 are rather out of place as an introduction to a fancy 
 ball. I merely wish to imply that the dresses were 
 deficient in character, and over-abounding in splendour; 
 that there was more sameness than fan. Having en- 
 tered this protest, let me turn to description. 
 
 The large hall of the Odeon was turned into a fairy 
 world. The pillars were hidden behind a mass of tro- 
 pical vegetation, flowers and creepers hanging in fes- 
 toons across the spaces between, gay birds, butterflies. 
 
THE FAiaY WORLD. 119 
 
 and lizards swarming through the foliage. The whole 
 eifect was highly fantastic, and prepared the imagina- 
 tion for the fairy panorama that was to come by initia- 
 tion into fairy life. One hardly recognised the room in 
 which one had heard so many concerts, or the columns 
 behind which single gentlemen are supposed to crowd 
 themselves, so as to leave the body of the hall to the 
 ladies. Everything was softened away, and the lovely 
 screen of rich tropical growth shut out the real world. 
 Up the pillars swarmed snails of great size, with shells 
 of gorgeous blue and gold, happily idealised so as to 
 present no trace of affinity with the coarser snails of 
 daily life; green tree-frogs keeping pace with gaudy 
 lizards, and humming birds balanced their graceful 
 forms on the festoons of luxuriant creepers, while at 
 the top a giant peacock was perched, its feathers made 
 of reeds, and their tips wrought up to natural beauty 
 by the aid of moss. The stage at the end of the haU 
 was screened by a large red curtain, in the middle of 
 which a lesser drop curtain hid a lesser stage. In front 
 of this the spectators congregated, all standing and 
 waiting with exemplary patience, till the arrival of the 
 Queen should give the signal to begin. 
 
 But with the arrival of the Queen all patience evapo-. 
 rated. Hitherto each one had stood his ground without 
 much difficulty, and the occasional pushing of those 
 ambitious of better places, had not caused much dis- 
 composure. But the presence of the Queen was made 
 generally known by an oscillation in the crowd, like the 
 setting in of a rapid tide. The cheering and shouting 
 caused a violent swell like a gale, but the movement to 
 
120 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 and fro went on after the cheering had subsided with 
 more regularity and more trying result. Looking to 
 discover the cause of the motion, I at last ascertained 
 that it was owing to the shorter people rising spasmodi- 
 cally on tip-toes to catch a view of the royal party. A 
 lady close to me gave me the most practical insight into 
 the workings of this manosuvre. She was very short 
 and very active, and her hoop was exceedingly sharp. 
 Every moment she made a sudden start on to her toes, 
 and each start brought her hoop in such violent contact 
 with my legs, that I had to recoil a step. In such a 
 crowd a recoil only throws you against a barrier of im- 
 passable forms, but your impulse communicates a certain 
 motion to them that is felt through several rows in that 
 direction. You have only to multiply the short lady 
 who sets you going by the number of similar short 
 ladies in the room, to find the force of the oscillation. 
 And to ascertain this may, perhaps, enable you to 
 compute the force of the loyal curiosity, which is the 
 primary cause of the movement, and to which I have 
 so often to refer in the course of my narrative. 
 
 When the Queen is seated, the small drop curtain 
 rises, and a little operetta is performed. This was an 
 amusing little piece composed for the occasion, dealing 
 with two young people of the fairy world, named Han- 
 sel and Grethel. What with the enchanted prince of 
 sugar candy, who had been turned into a bear, the old 
 ogre who loved children (roasted), the witch his house- 
 keeper, who heated the oven, and was tipped into it 
 herself by the children, what with the house roofed with 
 cakes to entice wandering children into the ogre's 
 
FAIRY GROUPS. 121 
 
 clutches, atid the appearance of the dreaded police in 
 all their Munich majesty, the play succeeded very well, 
 and every one who could hear it was amused. But now 
 came the business of the evening. The large red cur- 
 tain was drawn aside, showing a castle on the Rhine. 
 Pinnacles and battlements rose ffom the precipitous 
 rock hanging over the river, like some of those Italian 
 hiU-towns that seem to cling by main force to the scanty 
 soil. Prom the gate of the castle came the procession 
 down a sloping way across the stage, and drew up in a 
 line facing the audience. Each branch of the faiiy tale 
 was represented by a special train, which marched round 
 the hall in front of the Queen, and too much on a level 
 with the mass of the crowd to be sufficiently inspected. 
 First came the Prince of Sugar Candy, and his wedding 
 train, representing nursery tales. Then the fairy tale 
 bordering on legend, the fairy tale in its relation to home 
 and family life, represented by Cinderella ; forest tales. 
 Snowdrop and the seven dwarfs. Little Eed Eiding 
 Hood, Riibezahl and the Gnomes ; the fairy shapes of 
 the watery world, the Queen of the Nixies, and fairy 
 tales of humour. Puss in Boots, and the Goose with 
 the Golden Feathers. One was glad to recognise many 
 of one's old playmates, many of the friends of early 
 childhood. The Seven Ravens walked about staring at 
 the company, and sometimes pecking. Puss in Boots 
 seemed lively and intelligent, the reapers and mowers 
 who accompanied him did not shake off the tame 
 characteristics of the agricultural mind. The frogs who 
 supported the car of the princess in the story of the 
 Enchanted Frog, the strange watery shapes attending 
 
122 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the Queen of the Nixies, the solemn little dwarfs with 
 their long white heards escorting Snowdrop, the wolf 
 following Little Red Riding Hood, were all well got up, 
 though, perhaps, a httle too post. 
 
 With the procession the formal ceremony is over, 
 and the company divides itself into dancers and sup- 
 pers. The Queen retires, and, after her retirement, it 
 is hut fair to mention that the programme laid before 
 her was illuminated with the artistic feeling of a missal 
 painter of old time. The flies and bees crawling in 
 and out of the letters, the animals at the head of the 
 page, were painted with admirable truth, and in some 
 cases the illusion was perfect. The pains bestowed on 
 a work that could scarcely look for meet recompense, 
 the talent and skill exerted by the painter, were far 
 beyond the occasion, and deserved special appreciation. 
 Let us hope the programme is preserved in the palace, 
 among those many paintings that distinguish it from 
 all other palaces in Europe. 
 
 Meanwhile the supper-room is not deficient in some 
 traits of character that come out very strongly at balls. 
 Every place has been taken the moment the doors are 
 open, and many seem determined to sit there, not to 
 sup, but to rest. Ladies occupy tables with a glass of 
 lemonade before them, others go to dance, leaving a 
 pater familias to take charge of their seats, and hungry 
 guests find no room from one end to the other. So 
 crying at last does the evil become that the hotel- 
 keeper, who has charge of the food, goes round and 
 expostulates. One person, when requested to leave, 
 replies indignantly, " I have been here all the even- 
 
A COUNTRY EXCURSION. 123 
 
 ing," as if that were not the best reason for going then. 
 Dancing goes on all the time in the large hall, a space 
 round being with difficulty cleared, in which the couples 
 follow each other like bubbles floating down a stream. 
 The fairy characters have generally taken sufScient ex- 
 ercise during the performance of their parts, but some 
 of them are dancing still. A lucky mortal has been 
 favoured with the hand of the princess who but lately 
 made the Enchanted Frog the happiest of princes. We 
 leave them waltzing. 
 
 Very difierent is the atmosphere of the May Feast, 
 which needs a fine day, and some charming spot in the 
 country. One has got rather sceptical of late about 
 the beauties of May ; but when that month comes out 
 in all its glory, nothing can be more delightful. This 
 year everything was forward, and May was glorious. 
 
 An artistical ticket, showing a train of children in 
 procession bearing lilies of the valley, and attended by a 
 May-bug as instrumentalist, admitted to the feast. The 
 train took its thousand passengers away from Munich, 
 turned off from the wide dreary plain that extends un- 
 interruptedly to Augsburg, and ascended the course of 
 the Wurm towards Starnberg — past the forests of fir 
 and oak that inclose the strange chapel of the Virgin 
 at Planegg, the Sunday excursion of so many Munichers, 
 till we get out at a station on an eminence looking 
 down on the lovely Miihlthal, with the stream gushing 
 from the mill, and beyond at the succession of ridges 
 that leads the eye to the blue line of mountains. A 
 run down the grassy slope takes us into the valley, and 
 we roam through paths in the beechwood till we come 
 
124 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 to tte group, of buildings, the small old cliapel with a 
 red top-kuot, and the wooded hill of Petersbrunn. 
 Here is the site chosen for the festival, and by the time 
 we arrive the woods are already alive with revellers. 
 Light spring dresses 'are ghnting' pleasantly through the 
 mass of fresh young sunny green, intersected by the 
 clear straight stems of the beeches ; and here and there 
 are flags wreathed among the branches, which scarcely 
 add to the picturesque effect, save when their colour 
 contrasts with that surrounding. Tables are spread 
 about, and one has a moveable kitchen, from which the 
 smoke curls up in faint clouds, and the demands for 
 food and beer are voluble from an early hour of the 
 morning. For the artists, not like us degenerate 
 mortals who take the train all the way, have walked 
 in procession from the third station, and even at the 
 early German dinner-hour much of the food is ex- 
 hausted. In one place a plateau has been made of 
 boards for dancing; in another is a tent that, later in 
 the day, is to dispense Mai-wein. Meanwhile we stroll 
 about the beechwood along the paths leading in all 
 directions, admiring the pretty faces and bewildering 
 dresses that seem to have turned out for this time only, 
 glad to see artists of European celebrity casting ofl' the 
 cares of historical painting to enjoy themselves like 
 children, and stopping every now and then to get a 
 peep at some picturesque bit of scenery or effect that 
 would make a picture of itself. Here we catch a glimpse 
 of the bulbous red tower of the little chapel below, 
 thrusting itself between two boughs of the lovely green 
 leaves. Here we find the branches receding so as to 
 
COUNTRY APPETITES. 125 
 
 form the mouth of a cavern, and the setting for a 
 picture of the Lake of Starnberg, a couple of miles 
 away. Anything so picturesque as the general effect 
 it would be hard to conceive possible, so great is the 
 talent employed by the artists of Germany in organizing 
 such spectacles, so kindly does Nature lend herself to 
 complete the panorama. 
 
 We now look about for a table and some dinner, 
 both of which are easier looked for than found. All 
 those in the wood are crowded, and the balcony of the 
 inn is equally so. At last we get places, and proceed 
 to the bar across the kitchen door to find food. The 
 crowd already congregated in the narrow way is little 
 disposed to yield; plates and dishes are passed over 
 their heads, and the solitary waiter of the establishment 
 stands afar off and shouts to the cooks. It is a marvel 
 how fathers of families get out with piles of soup-plates, 
 like waiters in Vienna, and manage to convey the con- 
 tents safely to their ravenous brood. But when you 
 have got at last a limb of roast goose, which is quite an 
 anatomical study, and is charged accordingly, you must 
 get a plate from another quarter, and your glass of beer 
 from a vault over the road. Carts, conveying casks 
 and barrels are still coming up, and huge baskets full 
 of brown bread are speedily emptied. But dinner is 
 now over, and we scramble up again into the wood with 
 rather more difficulty than before. The tent which we 
 noticed in the morning is open, and the artists who 
 concocted the Mai-wein are serving it out in large 
 glasses. A pile of Waldmeister {Asperula odorata, 
 sweet-scented woodroof) lies on the board to be mixed 
 
126 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH, 
 
 ad libitum, and the delicious potion only needs tie 
 artistic barrel-glasses and the floating flowers to equal 
 its insidious brother of the Rhine. Certain it is that 
 to many the Mai-wein forms the vital part of the Mai- 
 Fest, the libation in honour of the new god May, with- 
 out which the deity could not be propitiated. At any 
 rate, the devotion of his subjects shows itself most 
 copiously, and with as much gratification to themselves 
 as to the object of their worship. 
 
 After this refreshment the dancing begins. Young 
 ladies who are stripped for the occasion of hats and 
 mantles enter the lists, and the small space is soon full 
 of moving couples. Some dance well, especially the 
 ladies ; some dance badly, and some cannot dance at 
 all. One gentleman seems to have got up a species of 
 Irish jig, which he dances with much violence, to the 
 confusion of the other dancers, sometimes amounting to 
 a dead lock. The dances are interspersed with choruses, 
 sung with wonted German accuracy and precision. Then 
 comes the event of the day. A gentleman who is famed 
 for such performances gets on a tub and delivers his 
 Capuchin sermon. "Written in rhyme, and abounding 
 with jokes, it may be supposed this sermon was listened 
 to with less solemnity, though often with more atten- 
 tion, than is vouchsafed to serious preachers. One in- 
 terruption of a ludicrous character, however, might have 
 occurred elsewhere, and taxed the preacher's gravity as 
 much as the interruptions of Lord Dudley and Ward 
 the gravity of the Rev. Sydney Smith. Before giving 
 his text the preacher made an emphatic pause : "We 
 read in the Bible — " " Cuckoo, cuckoo," from an irre- 
 
THE FEAST WAS OVER. 
 
 127 
 
 r 
 
 ^'■"fl in. a neighbouring tree. "With, this the re- 
 
 " '■^° feast was completed. Dances, 
 
 "■ the afternoon till 
 
 vnd so back to the 
 
 ds, the stems stand- 
 
 ,nd the leaves laid to 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 CORNELIUS IN MUNICH. 
 
 The father of modern German art — as it is the fashion 
 to call Peter von Cornelius — happened to pass through 
 Munich on his way from Rome to Berlin, and his many 
 hundred sons, grand-sons, step-sons, and adopted sons, 
 joined to give him a greeting. The place chosen for the 
 feast was the West end Halle, one of the largest heer 
 and dancing saloons in Munich, Above four hundred 
 artists were present, and many other notabilities. The 
 large hall was beautifully decorated with the unfailing 
 taste of a city of artists, the taste which shows itself 
 most conspicuously in decorations and processions. 
 Garlands and flags hung from the ceiling and the pillars 
 that supported the balconies, chandeliers with tasteful 
 wreaths, paintings, and a fine bust of the hero of the 
 feast. At the end of the hall was a small stage erected 
 for the dramatic pairt of the feast ; immediately beneath 
 was the table for Cornelius and his supporters; the 
 rest of the haU, and a large ante-room, were crowded 
 with tables, and the tables were crowded with all the 
 intellectual population of Munich. At about half-past 
 seven Cornelius appeared escorted by a deputation, " a 
 
THE CORNELIUS FEAST. 129 
 
 ittle Druid wight/' to quote the description of the 
 poet in the Castle of Indolence, "of withered aspect, 
 but his eye was keen." That he looked feeble may be 
 accounted for by the age of seventy-four that he had 
 attained, and the nervousness he seemed to show by the 
 presence of such a crowd of admirers. When he was 
 seated the curtain of the stage rose, and three artists 
 presented a dramatic prologue, in which Munich, Dus- 
 seldorf, and Rome disputed the right of crowning the 
 artist, till they came to mutual agreement, and crowned 
 his bust together. The supper was interrupted by va- 
 rious speeches which were not much listened to, save a 
 few words from Cornelius in praise of King Ludwig, 
 his generous patron, words breathlessly watched for, 
 yet only audible to a few. Next came a troop of young 
 maidens with flowers, headed by a poetess, who recited 
 a poem of her own composition ; after which the 
 maidens formed in a circle round Cornehus, and his 
 wife came down from the gallery to keep him out of 
 mischief. She is the painter's third wife, report says ; 
 is an Italian, and twenty-two. Now came singing, 
 Mendelssohn's " Sons of Art," and the " Cornelius- 
 Lied," a parody of Prince Eugene, written for a Munich 
 festival in 1835, and glorifying modern German Art 
 under the leadership of Cornelius, and the patronage of 
 King Ludwig, with its triumph against the perukes. 
 With this the formal part of the feast came to an end; 
 Cornelius and the elders left, and the fun grew fast and 
 furious. Artists got up on chairs and made speeches, 
 one preached a sermon in verse, another a sermon in 
 prose, for which some lines made by the hero of the 
 
 g2 
 
130 SOCIAL LITE IN MUNICH. 
 
 evening served as a sort of text. A dramatic perform- 
 ance was organised, which lasted three quarters of an 
 hour. Songs and toasts, mirth and frolic, went on till 
 deep into the night, and it is not known when the last 
 guest quitted the room. The success of the feast was 
 complete, and could not but strike me very favourably. 
 The hearty appreciation of an artist to whom Munich 
 has only a divided claim, the entire burial of animosir 
 ties, and the catholic sympathy of all the different 
 schools, impressed me with a pleasant sense of brother- 
 hood in art, and the sight of the man who had founded 
 all these schools, who had been master of Kaulbach, 
 and is now looked up to as originator and instigator of 
 the whole life of German painting, carries me back in 
 thought to the great men of Italy, and the bands of 
 pupils who owed half their eminence to their master. 
 We see all these men, some of them already at the 
 height of celebrity, some rapidly attaining an enviable 
 position, some feeling truer stirrings of genius than 
 can be given by success, uniting to applaud with one 
 voice a man with whom they have so little in common, 
 whose style is so entirely different from the styles of all 
 the rising schools, and whose authority is daily being 
 sapped by the influence of France and Belgium. His 
 return to Germany at this time is like the last public 
 appearance of Louis XIV., yet the artists are more 
 grateful to their former sovereign, than the people of 
 France to that departed greatness. 
 
 It may be well to let this feast serve as a peg to hang 
 some reflections on, with regard to the state of that art 
 which is derived from Cornelius, and with regard to the 
 
CAUSE OF THE ENTHUSIASM. 131 
 
 master's own works in Munich. Art may be but a 
 small portion of daily life, as has been said of litera- 
 ture; but it is certainly the most prominent part of 
 Munich activity. It is the artistic reputation of Mu- 
 nich that brings so many strangers to visit the town, 
 much as they may be disappointed by all collections, 
 save the old picture gallery. The artistic reputation of 
 Munich is supported by the residence and energy of 
 nearly a thousand painters, although the patronage of 
 the inhabitants is miserably small, and the taste of the 
 population very little developed. Art cannot but have 
 its effect in leading strangers to take up their residence 
 in Munich, as it affords them at least a refuge from 
 utter stagnation, and a sense of something going on. 
 And as the works of the lesser artists are constantly 
 exhibited in the Art Union, which has a fresh supply of 
 pictures every week, as the studios are generally open 
 with sufficient freedom, and the greater works are almost 
 invariably shown to the pubhc on their completion, there 
 is a decided link between the artists and the population. 
 If people confine their study of art to a weekly visit to 
 the Kunst Verein, the fault lies with their own indiffer- 
 ence, not with their opportunities. 
 
 But this branch of the subject must be touched upon 
 later. At present I am engaged with the works of Cor- 
 nelius. If a stranger had been present at this feast, he 
 would doubtless have inquired for the works that had 
 caused the enthusiasm he had witnessed, the speeches 
 and songs he had heard. And he would certainly go 
 to see these works with some pre-conceived idea of 
 the greatness of their painter. It would matter little 
 
133 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 to him to be told that the man whom Munich had 
 feasted and toasted was represented by pictures very- 
 much inferior to those in Berlin and Rome ; he would 
 naturally seek on the spot the cause of its excitement. 
 And I fear he would be much disappointed. I confess 
 that I am very much in that position. Till I was pre- 
 sent at the Cornelius feast I never wearied myself with 
 studying his works, and now that I wish to ascertain 
 the secret of his fame, his works in Munich are the 
 only ones accessible to me. I am willing to admit that 
 those in Berlin are vastly superior, so long as I do not 
 see them. With Cornelius, unfortunately, seeing is dis- 
 believing. His chief paintings in Munich are the fres- 
 coes in the Lud wig's Kirche, of which the Last Judg- 
 ment is entirely his work; the frescoes in the Glypto- 
 thek, partly his work, and parly the work of the scholars; 
 and the Loggie of the Pinacothek, which were painted 
 from his designs. 
 
 In judging the works of Cornelius one must neces- 
 sarily revert to first principles, and ask what is the 
 object of painting. Is it not to express your own 
 thoughts and feelings so as to act on other men ? The 
 secret of the success of the greatest painters lies in this, 
 we seem to read their heart or their mind in all their 
 pictures. The depth of feehng in the early painters 
 more than excuses their technical imperfections ; we 
 find that there is something below the surface, and we 
 study their works the more carefully that they are not 
 able to dispense with our labour. But when we come 
 down to more recent times among painters who had 
 nothing to say, but an admirable power of saying it. 
 
THE GERMAN KEYIVAL. 133 
 
 who adopted the thoughts of their progenitors, and put 
 them clearly on the canvas, we turn away without a 
 word. Who that has mastered an original cares for a 
 loose translation ? And yet the later artists, neglecting 
 the first requisite, were more awake to the second. 
 They saw that to act on others you must of necessity 
 please, and they only forgot that in making pleasure 
 the sole object, the mission of painting was abandoned. 
 The early painters gave their own feelings without suf- 
 ficiently acting on others ; the latter tried to act on 
 others without expressing any feelings at all. Tech- 
 nical perfection is only too apt to supplant what it is 
 meant to convey. The revival of Cornelius was appa- 
 rently based on this principle, and his aim was to emu- 
 late the elder painters, by forsaking the path their suc- 
 cessors had travelled. Unfortunately he has forgotten 
 both the requirements of painting ; he neither expresses 
 his own feelings, nor does he give pleasure. 
 
 To limit the action of painting to its power of giving 
 pleasure is not to confine the art in too narrow a com- 
 pass. You are left free to choose through the whole 
 range of pleasures of which the human mind is capable. 
 You may begin with the mere sensuous pleasure of un- 
 cultivated minds, and rise gradually to the highest plea- 
 sure of the soul that can be felt by the most refined. 
 How many difierent chords are struck by Correggio, 
 from pure maternal love and childish frolic to perfect 
 beauty of form and to the " strongest of human in- 
 stincts" in its most varied phases ! "What soul is not 
 awed by the grandeur of Titian, or impressed by the 
 vigour of Michael Angelo? And yet how different is 
 
134 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the path of these painters from the quiet, retired walk 
 of Francia and Perugino. These are like the meditative 
 figures of monks you see pacing their cloister with an 
 occasional ramble into the garden that forms the court, 
 while the others plunge into the heart of human action, 
 and feel the wildest pulses of excitement. And the 
 result of this divergence is, that each one is genuine 
 throughout, each one feels what he paints. So long as 
 the painter feels himself he can make others feel, be it 
 in a limited degree, and in a future age. So long as he 
 expresses his feelings his work is not wasted, and how- 
 ever abstruse his feelings may be, the true expression of 
 them can hardly fad to find favour. But when once an 
 artist steps outside the circle that bounds him, and 
 attempts to reason by means of his art without observ- 
 ing its rules, to make music a mathematical science, and 
 painting the black board accompaniment of a class-room, 
 he ceases to please, he loses all command over the feel- 
 ings, and his aim is no longer artistic. It is idle for a 
 painter to plead that the great masters did thus, and 
 that he must follow their example. The great masters 
 were great because they spoke their feelings so that the 
 world would listen to them, and you must follow their 
 example in this if you would hQpe to rival them. " If 
 one has the spirit of a composer," said Mozart, "one 
 writes because one cannot help it." 
 
 Perhaps it would have been better for Cornelius if 
 the great masters had never existed. He might have 
 then employed his real powers, which are considerable, 
 in something better than imitation. As it is, with such 
 splendid examples before him, he has fallen into an 
 
VARIATIONS IN PAINTING. 135 
 
 error to whicii artists of all kinds are liable. Nothing is 
 more common than for a man to be impressed by the 
 thoughts of others, to take them into his mind, and 
 brood over them till they seem to become his own. 
 How frequently it occurs in daily life that men repeat 
 to you your expressions of a few days back, and teU you 
 your own stories. We talk very much about plagiarism 
 without thinking that this is so. often the explanation of 
 it. A young man with a love for poetry is moved by 
 the thoughts of a poet; the thoughts take root in his 
 mind, and gradually find an utterance. He thinks this 
 utterance is due to himself alone, he is not conscious of 
 having borrowed. We see it again in modern music, 
 when fine subjects are taken and treated, as the great 
 composers ought to have treated them. And this is the 
 explanation of the German art of the revival. A love of 
 fine subjects and a genuine admiration of the old pain- 
 ters was mistaken for independent inspiration. With 
 this feeling the modern Germans produced a series of 
 variations on all the old masters in turn. If a Last 
 Judgment was to be painted, the question was, how had 
 Michael Angelo painted it ; if a Holy Family, a clever 
 compound of Raphael's early manner and Francia was 
 passed off as original. The moderns never asked if they 
 were fitted to paint such subjects as the Italians had 
 painted them, if that style was suited to their taste and 
 the taste of their country, or if they had to tell anything 
 new or striking in that way which the Italians had left 
 untold. The times have very much changed since the 
 days of Raphael ; inquiry has told us much that was not 
 known to the ripest scholars of that world ; nothing is 
 
136 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the same, even in the most backward institutions and 
 the most sluggish minds. Yet we have these men en- 
 deavouring to paint as if the times could be rolled back 
 agaiuj and the same motives for action, the same views 
 of surrounding things preserved unimpaired through the 
 dust of three centuries. 
 
 Now that the school of Kaulbach has succeeded to 
 the school of Cornelius, and is being pushed out in its 
 turn by the modern school formed on the dominant 
 styles of the day, the French and Belgian, the merits of 
 Cornelius are not seriously discussed, but are passed 
 over with silent allowance. At the time of his great 
 activity, however, his head might well have been turned 
 by the praises bestowed on him, if the right balance had 
 not been restored by the attacks of those who took an 
 opposite view. I find, for instance, in the letters of 
 1833 Dr. Forster has just pubhshed, the subjoined 
 judgment, important indeed as coming from an art 
 critic of such reputation, the author of the History of 
 German Art, and of so many further contributions to 
 artistic knowledge. "Giulio Romano," says Dr. For- 
 ster, " has served in many respects as a model for Cor- 
 nelius, and the mythological paintings in the Glyp- 
 tothek resembles those in the Palazzo del T, even down 
 to the smallest details; but Cornelius is throughout 
 nobler and simpler than Giulio, though the graces of 
 Raphael have not entirely deserted his chief scholar." 
 The judgment of Byron was rather different. In a 
 letter from Rome (where the painters had established 
 themselves for greater facilities of copying) he writes, 
 " There is a set of Germans here who let their hair grow 
 
BYRON AND HEINE. 137 
 
 to imitate Raphael. If they were to cut it off, make it 
 into brushes, and paint like him, it would be more 
 german to the matter." Some time later Heine wrote 
 of the dispersion of Cornelius' scholars in Munich, as if 
 he had read Byron's allusion to the hair. 
 
 " With Cornelius, too, was borne off 
 His disciples' joined array. 
 All its long hair it had shorn off 
 And in that its virtue lay. 
 
 " For he laid, the master knowing, 
 Magic spells upon the hair, 
 Truly, by the motion's showing. 
 Something that had life was there." 
 
 Has the strength of the school departed with its hair, 
 or has Samson regained enough to bring down the 
 temple about the ears of the Philistines ? The works 
 he has left in Munich date chiefly from his middle time, 
 as the frescoes in the G-lyptothek were finished in 1830, 
 and those in the Ludwig's Kirche within the next ten 
 years. There is no lack of strength in these produc- 
 tions ; in truth, the power displayed might aptly lead to 
 a comparison with Samson, but out of the strong comes 
 forth no sweetness. It is merely as a duty that the 
 student of art goes to look on Cornelius; no charm 
 attends the study, no pleasure is derived from it. Who 
 can feel that enthusiasm before these cold academical 
 labours that trained minds feel before the works of old 
 masters, as Thackeray has so admirably shown us in 
 Clive Newcome? The great merit claimed for Corne- 
 lius by an orthodox critic is, that he has translated the 
 
138 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Greek figures into old G-erman in his frescoes for the 
 Glyptothek, and with the originals before you in the 
 sculptures you are doubly inclined to resent the trans- 
 lation. It might be said, with equal truth, that in the 
 Last Judgment the painter has translated Michael 
 Angelo into Cornelius. I confess that I am always pre- 
 disposed against painters who have no sense of colour, 
 and my objection to Cornelius may partly be exagge- 
 rated by the atrocity of his colouring. But, surely, if a 
 man has a power of drawing and an jentire absence of 
 the instinct of colour, he should confine himself to car- 
 toons, which are willingly enough accepted in Germany, 
 and should find colourists to do the painting for him. 
 Michael Angelo was not too proud to employ the ser- 
 vices of Sebastian del Piombo for what was beyond 
 himself, and Michael Angelo's translator would have 
 done well to follow the example. For not only does 
 the colour of the works of Cornelius give no pleasure, it 
 gives pain. It is not a negative quality, but a positive. 
 It is not like the light coating of indifferent colour laid 
 on by painters who, wanting any decided sense, are wise 
 enough to avoid making their want conspicuous; it 
 challenges condemnation by its obtrusiveness, and sets 
 one's teeth on edge by its badness. The brickdust and 
 tiles that do duty for the different shades of red, the 
 execrable hue given to flesh, the predominance of 
 painful blue, would make a Venetian frantic. If any- 
 thing were needed to distinguish our pre-Raphaelites 
 from those of Germany, this colouring would suffice. 
 
 Some would urge as an excuse for the execrable colour 
 of the frescoes in the Glyptothek, that the example of 
 
MODERN MYTHOI.OGY. 139 
 
 Giulio Romano is not favourable. I grant the proposi- 
 tion; but I do not see that it proves anything for 
 Cornelius. There was no necessity for him to copy 
 Giulio Romano even down to his defects. If he could 
 not work without a model, there is surely no want of 
 classical painting to serve him as model. Besides, we 
 must remember that he is much noblei" and simpler 
 than Giulio Romana, and whatever can be said againt 
 the chief scholar of Raphael, it cannot be said that he 
 ever produced such colour as that on the walls of the 
 Glyptothek. There is some classical feeling in the 
 classical paintings of Giulio Romano, but there is not 
 a jot of it in these frescoes. Neither Greek form nor 
 Greek spirit are preserved, though there is an open 
 imitation of Greek sculpture. Ganymede feeding the 
 Eagle is an exact reproduction of one of Thorwaldsen's 
 works, and single figures might be proved identical 
 with familiar statues. The introduction of copies from 
 sculptiire and anatomical design is often a great blemish 
 in Cornelius, the figures are put in without regard to 
 fitness of time and place, and the harmony of the whole 
 is sacrificed to a display of drawing. Of the two rooms 
 in the Glyptothek, the one which is devoted to heathen 
 mythology is far better than the other which contains 
 the tale of Troy. The marriage of Neptune and Am- 
 phitrite indeed is poor ; the female faces are ugly, and 
 their German cast of features with copious flaxen hair 
 destroys any truth to Greek nature that the grotesque 
 dolphin might have preserved. In the picture of Olym- 
 pus, Hebe is pretty, and there is a strange introduction 
 of character in the right-hand corner, the face of the 
 
140 - SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 old man peeping over Silenns. But of the three the 
 descent of Orpheus is the best, and the right hand side 
 of that pictui'e can safely be commended. Some of the 
 Danaides are actually pretty girls, especially the second 
 face from the front, and the female figure leaning 
 against the balustrade of Pluto's throne. Cerberus 
 dropping to sleep, one mouth still barking faintly, and 
 the Furies sinking on their iron beds with the snakes 
 uncurling, show considerable attempt at preserving the 
 local character, though it can scarcely be necessary to 
 make them so ugly. Pluto himself is a mistake, the 
 sort of figure that would be cut by a tenth-rate Ger- 
 man actor undertaking the part. The ceiling of the 
 god's room is well painted with lunettes, the Sun God 
 in his chariot drawn by four spirited Greek horses, the 
 beautiful moon drawn by kids. One of the steeds 
 stands straight out from the wall, like that noble white 
 horse of Parmigiano, in the church at Parma ; and the 
 life and energy that old sculptors give the horse are 
 perfectly preserved. Painful as it always is to look at 
 ceilings, I recommend the study of this ; the animals, 
 horses, kids, owls, are quite a relief after the figures in 
 the hall of Troy. 
 
 The hall of the Trojan war, says a German authority, 
 is the most marvellous and magnificent in its composi- 
 tion. I consider it the most hideous that ever was 
 painted. It is almost a penance to dweD. on the fres- 
 coes, and save some salient faults, impossible to re- 
 member them. Mr. Gladstone is indignant at the 
 treatment of the Trojan story in Troilus and Cressida, 
 and carries his wrath so far as to doubt that Shakspeare 
 
THE TALE OF TROY. 141 
 
 was author of the play. What would he say to Corne- 
 lius's version? It is hard to say which is the most 
 offensive, the want of dignity in the men, or the want 
 of beauty in the women. Who would recognise Helen 
 (the German guide-book takes care to remind us that 
 she is the beautiful Helen) in the ugly crying woman 
 clinging to the pillar on the right hand side of the 
 picture of the destruction of Troy? Who would re- 
 cognise Achilles in the long-hmbed, long-nosed, weedy- 
 looking spoony in the opposite picture? In that one, 
 indeed, there is this merit, that Briseis is pretty and 
 Minerva has black hair. But Briseis is put in the 
 corner of the picture where she might be passed over, 
 and the ugly parts are thrust into the middle where 
 they must be seen. The same partiality for corners is 
 seen in the frescoes in the hall of the gods, but in the 
 other two frescoes in the Trojan hall there is not even 
 this redeeming point. The colour of the fight for Pa- 
 troclus is so bad that the design has to endeavour to 
 keep pace with it, and the obtrusive anatomy in the 
 destruction of Troy is only equalled by the utter want 
 of fidelity. After waging a war of ten years to recover 
 the most beautiful of women, it is hardly in keeping 
 with the character of Menelaus to make him neglect 
 Helen in order to gain possession of Polixena. 
 
 Even in assigning these paintings a modicum of praise, 
 I believe it is open to dispute how far it is deserved. 
 A severe critic might allege that the utter badness of 
 the greater part makes us too favourable to some minor 
 excellences, which stand out in the more striking relief 
 as they are so much superior to what surrounds them. 
 
142 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 But this is too great a refinement for me, and I 
 own my inability to conduct such an investigation. 
 When a picture is before us, we naturally judge it by a 
 pre-conceived standard, and pronounce it good or bad 
 accordingly. But when there are great inequalities in 
 a picture we can only judge them by the rest of the 
 picture ; and though they may be so much better than 
 the rest as to merit praise in comparison, they may be 
 much below our standard, and, if judged separately, 
 might have been condemned. We remember the story 
 in Bacon of the man who ran badly one day in green, 
 and ran worse the next day in yellow, that it might be 
 said some one had run worse than the green. I doubt, 
 however, if such an attempt would answer in painting. 
 Certainly one judges the works of Cornelius in Munich 
 by what predominates in them, and there is less danger 
 of our rating his merits too highly than of our involving 
 the whole work in too sweeping a condemnation. The 
 paintings on the Loggie of the Pinacothek show pretty 
 nearly what he ought to have done, show the real bent 
 of his mind, and the subjects in which he was interested. 
 The enthusiasm that he felt for art was more directed 
 to the artists who had excelled in it than to the art 
 itself, and instead of showing that enthusiasm by copy- 
 ing the works of these painters he should have painted 
 their lives. It was not their subjects he felt, but their 
 treatment of the subjects, and he necessarily fell into 
 servile imitation when he endeavoured to reproduce 
 what had pleased him in them. He took the same 
 mistaken path that is taken by modern writers of 
 religious poetry, who believe that by rendering the 
 
SCENES FROM THE LIVES OF PAINTERS. 143 
 
 Psalms or parts of Scripture from noble prose into poor 
 rhyme they are emulating David or Isaiah. He forgot, 
 as they forget, that originahty is the first requsite if you 
 would have greatness, and this is the answer to the 
 questions so often repeated ; why have we no high reh- 
 gious art ? why have we no good rehgious poetry ? 
 The pictures in the Loggie of the Pinacothek, which 
 present scenes from the lives of painters, are far more 
 valuable than the religious and mythological frescoes, 
 on which the fame of CorneUus is supposed to rest, 
 because we see that he felt his own subjects, and not 
 the treatment of them that others had adopted. 
 
 I must own that I have scarcely the patience to de- 
 scribe or to criticise CorneUas^s Last Judgment in the 
 Ludwig's Kirche. It is not enough to dismiss it with 
 the remark, that it is an attempt at a literal reproduc- 
 tion of Michael Angelo's Last Judgment in the Sis- 
 tine j an attempt which fails, in so much as Cornelius 
 is inferior to Michael Angelo, and which ought to fail, 
 as the duties of religious art are so entirely changed 
 since Michael Angelo's time. The Last Judgment is 
 not a subject to which any painter that ever lived can 
 do justice, because it is a subject that no human being 
 can conceive. The mind has wisely ceased its endea- 
 vour '|to realise eternity, and the eye is as Httle able to 
 command such a field as the world brought to be 
 judged. If any pictorial representation were attempted 
 of such a subject, it must necessarily be imperfect in 
 the extreme, and the painter would have to choose be- 
 tween omitting nine tenths of the figures, or crowding 
 them into such a mass, that neither faces nor characters 
 
144 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 could be discerned. Martin's Last Judgment is a mob ; 
 Cornelius's is a little private performance, with perhaps 
 fifty figures in all, and King Ludwig looking on as an 
 impartial spectator. But the unfitness of the subject 
 for pictorial treatment is not the only objection, the 
 choice of a model is equally to be censured, As a dis- 
 play of power, Michael Angelo's picture is very remark- 
 able; but neither Protestants nor Catholics are satis- 
 fied with its rendering of the Last Judgment. Kugler, 
 while praising the lower half of the picture, observes 
 that the upper part is faulty, that the glory of heaven^ 
 the joy, and peace, and blessedness of the heavenly 
 choirs are sought in vain ; "everywhere we meet with 
 the expression of human passion, of human efforts. 
 We see no choir of solemn tranquil forms, no harmo- 
 nious unity of clear grand lines, produced by ideal 
 draperies ; instead of these we find a confused crowd of 
 the most varied movements, naked bodies in violent 
 attitudes, unaccompanied by any of the characteristics 
 made sacred by a holy tradition. Christ, the principal 
 figure of the whole, wants every attribute but that of 
 the judge; no expression of divine majesty reminds us 
 that it is the Saviour who exercises this ofiice. The 
 upper half of the composition is in many parts heavy, 
 notwithstanding the masterly boldness of the drawing ; 
 confused, in spite of the separation of the principal 
 and accessory groups; capricious, notwithstanding a 
 grand arrangement of the whole." A Catholic passed 
 a more severe censure than this of the great German 
 critic, saying, that if the glory were taken from the 
 head of Christ, and the upper part somewhat altered, 
 
Cornelius's last judgment. 145 
 
 the picture might serve for an admirable representation 
 of the war between Jupiter and the Titans. 
 
 So far as I can remember, Michael Angelo is the last 
 who has treated the subject, and if this be correct the 
 inference to be drawn is not unimportant. The later 
 painter admit their inability to deal with it, and what 
 the successors of Michael Angelo left untouched might 
 well be avoided by a modern. The Italian versions of 
 the Last Judgment that remain are those of an earlier 
 date J the frescoes of Orcagna in the Campo Santa at 
 Pisa, and a celebrated picture of Fra Angelico in the 
 Academy of Florence. But though these differ very 
 widely from Michael Angelo's fresco, in one point they 
 are analogous to it. The painters in selecting this sub- 
 ject have only done so in order to express their own 
 feelings. As Michael Angelo laid a stress on the lower 
 part of his fresco, where energy and action were more 
 in place than in the upper half, so in Fra Angelico's 
 Last Judgment, the rapture of heaven and the blest is 
 the prevailing sentiment. And the Italian painters 
 generally made use of the religious scenes that were 
 assigned to them, as opportunities for displaying the 
 bent of their minds, and for conveying indirectly with 
 all possible freedom what they were not allowed directly 
 to express. For instance, who does not see that the 
 Venetian painters graft Venice upon Jerusalem ? Paul 
 Veronese paints the Crucifixion merely to show Vene- 
 tian senators and grandees presiding at it, and to accu- 
 mulate his favourite dresses and colours, his pomp and 
 magnificence on a subject in which an ascetic artist sees 
 nothing but the intensest suffering. At that time no- 
 
 H 
 
146 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 thing further was demanded. But with our increased 
 desire for truth we insist on each scene being repro- 
 duced as it may be supposed to have taken place, and 
 we revolt against anything conventional. Perhaps we 
 carry this too far, even as regards feeling : we certainly 
 carry it too far as regards dress and accessories. Yet 
 it has one good effect on painters, that it makes them 
 study their subject with some independence of thought, 
 and does not leave them free to draw on an early master 
 for every line, for details as well as for inspiration. On 
 this rock Cornelius has split, and we ought to be grate- 
 ful to our principle, that it preserves us from such 
 paintings as his Last Judgment. 
 
 The whole work is inspired by Michael Angelo, and 
 the sentiment of it is a confused recollection of Itahan 
 sentiment. Not being able to copy Michael Angelo^s 
 Christ, Cornelius has given us a figure which is even 
 more conventional than a literal copy would have been. 
 The failure of his master taught him timidity. After 
 what has been said and written against the Christ of 
 the Sistine no one would venture to adopt it; but 
 after such wholesale copying of the rest of Michael 
 Angelo's picture, Cornelius had scarcely the right to 
 stop short. We look up expecting to see Michael 
 Angelo's Christ as a natural consequence of the lower 
 part, and we are disappointed. The recollections of the 
 . Sistine are so numerous, that we ask the painter to 
 trust entirely to his memory. And yet it is only neces- 
 sary to compare the two to see that we do Cornelius 
 injustice. The lower half of his Last Judgment is 
 xeally no copy of the lower half of Michael Angelo's. 
 
NO COPY AFTEK ALL. 147 
 
 Where is the animation and life, the admirable figure 
 of Charon aud the oar raised to strike? Cornelius is 
 far more composed and decorous. Strictly speaking, it 
 is not so much a plagiarism from Michael Angelo's one 
 picture that this fresco shows, as a general feeliug for 
 Michael Angelo. The anatomical display in the lower 
 half strikes us not as love for anatomy, but love for 
 Michael Angelo^s anatomy. The introduction of King 
 Ludwig, crowned with laurel and looking forbidding, is 
 a departure from the text of the original, and a remi- 
 niscence of various painters. But the picture is in aU 
 other points true to the narrow streak of inspiration. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 KAULBACH. 
 
 Betoke proceeding to a general survey of the present 
 state of art in Munich, we must pause before a great 
 name. As pupil of Cornelius, Wilhelm von Kaulbach 
 deserves to be mentioned immediately after his master, 
 and in dealing with Munich, he must have a chapter to 
 himself. 
 
 And first a word of caution, which no doubt will be 
 needed. The reader must not for a moment suppose 
 that Kaulbach is judged as a painter, that is as an artist 
 possessing a sense of colour. This highest excellence 
 must, unfortunately, be put out of the question, and 
 the painter considered merely in the quality of draughts- 
 man. I believe he acknowledges himself that he is 
 more of a sculptor than painter, and that the words 
 placed by the Danish poet in the mouth of Michael 
 Angelo would not be inappropriate in his mouth. 
 
 " I am no painter, no, not I — I know it. 
 I am a sculptor. What of scvJpture'B art 
 In painting can be used, why, that is mine ! 
 In drawing and design I stand alone, 
 But as for dipping in the paint pot, zounds." * 
 
 * Oehlenschlager's Correggio, translated by Martin. 
 
PATRONAGE AND TEACHING. 149 
 
 It is unfortunate that an artist so evidently pre-disposed 
 to drawing should not be allowed to follow the bent of 
 his genius. There are enough painters in the world 
 without pressing others into their ranks^ and a good 
 drawing is in its way as perfect and as pleasing as a 
 painting. A man with Kaulbach's astonishing power 
 should rather have been employed in producing works 
 in which his power could be freely displayed^ than in 
 making vain attempts which were not smiled on by 
 nature, and were eclipsed by the works of inferior men- 
 Injudicious patronage, or rather blindness of patronage, 
 diverted the artist from his true career, and defective 
 teaching contributed to lead him astray. It is a ques- 
 tion if King Lud wig's patronage did Kaulbach more 
 harm than the teaching of Cornelius, and yet it is a 
 question what he might have been without his patron 
 and his teacher. No doubt many artists are spoiled by 
 unintelligent support, and many by imperfect tuition. 
 But how many more are extinguished by the want of 
 support, or the want of tuition? If the greatest men 
 owe it to the force of their genius that they have had 
 the strength to overcome impediments, it is necessary 
 that the weaker should sink under them. The English 
 artist who has to fight up to a position without aid from 
 above looks longingly to the more extended patronage 
 of the Continent, and to the monarchs who make it 
 their business to nourish art from the roots. But the 
 caprices, the ignorance, and the wilfulness of such pa- 
 trons are left out of sight in the vision of their liberality. 
 No one thinks that Genelli, with the truest power of 
 decorative painting, and the most thorough taste for 
 
150 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 mythology, was never once employed by King Ludwig, 
 while Cornelius was retained to daub the walls of the 
 Glyptothek. No one thinks that painters such as Moriz 
 von Schwind have seen their works go away from Munich, 
 while crowds of inferior pictures have been set up in the 
 new Pinacothek. No one thinks of Kaulbach, a satirist 
 and a designer scarcely inferior to the French, set to 
 paint Apollo and the Muses on the ceiling of a concert- 
 room, and the rivers of Bavaria in the arcades of the 
 Hofgarten. 
 
 One must beg,r in mind, whenever one feels dissatis- 
 fied with Kaulbach, the disadvantages he has had to 
 contend against. The temptations to which a man is 
 exposed by education and patronage are often more 
 fatal to genius than the trials of difficulty and neglect. 
 A man often gains more knowledge of himself, and 
 more reliance in his powers, when he is left to himself, 
 than when he is fondled and pampered by unskilful 
 judges. Some one says, 
 
 " Too krge a share 
 Of hareli prosperity has some o'erthrown ;" 
 
 and it -seems only fitting to ascribe the failure of many 
 gifted artists to this reason. If you are taken up by a 
 rich man you naturally Submit your judgment to his ; 
 if you are taken up by a great man you naturally follow 
 in his track. But Kaulbach's faults are not entirely 
 owiug to others; I fear he must bear the charge of 
 some of them himself. He is not the first who has 
 taken a compound of intellect and fancy for imagina- 
 tion, nor the first who has attempted subjects far be- 
 
kaulbach's intellect. 151 
 
 yond him, believing Ms admiration of them was the 
 same as inspiration. His astonishing power is enough 
 to veil these defects from many; no wonder, then, if it 
 can veil them from him. Yet one cannot but feel a 
 certain want in his great pictures, a searching, a dis- 
 appointment, a question why does not this impress me 
 as I feel that it should ? The only answer that can be 
 given is, that the painter has no real feeling for his sub- 
 ject ; and in many of Kaulbach's more ambitious works 
 this is only too apparent. It is the more apparent 
 owing to his having chosen subjects which intellect 
 alone is not competent to treat, and in which the want 
 of feeling must be constantly manifest. A notable fea- 
 ture in the history of modern art seems the intrusion of 
 pure intellect into the domain of feeling. Many in- 
 stances of it may be found in aU branches of art, in 
 music and poetry as well as in painting. But several 
 of the intruders have been wise enough to withdraw 
 after a short trial, and have attained eminence in the 
 pursuits for which they were more fitted. Kaulbach 
 has unhappily been encouraged to persevere in a wrong 
 course, and his fame must, more or less, depend on his 
 occasional deviations. 
 
 It is impossible to look at any of his pictures without 
 being surprised by his intellectual power. It breaks 
 through even in works least suited to any display of it, 
 and in those where free scope is given it, the effect is 
 astonishing. " The triumph of intellect " might be the 
 label of his whole pictorial production. An Italian said 
 of Goethe, "he thinks his feelings;" and the sentence 
 is peculiarly applicable to Kaulbach, and explains the 
 
153 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 coldness all others but thinkers feel in his presence. 
 To the applause of literary men he owes much of his 
 reputation, and their applause is earned by his agree- 
 ment with them. Mr. Palgrave has said that to look at 
 the series of pictures in which the chief moments of the 
 world's history are conveyed, is like reading a chapter of 
 Herder or Hegel ; and without having ever read such a 
 chapter one can conceive the truth of the simile. But 
 this style of pictorial history writing, or rather literary 
 historical painting, however it may please men of letters, 
 is repugnant to artists. I have heard painters object to 
 Kaulbach's works because they were literary pictures, 
 aiming at the literary delineation of subjects instead of 
 giving their feeling. To a painter there is an entire 
 lack of unity in works thus conceived, and instead of 
 forming a whole by virtue of the subject, the groups are 
 detached and straggling. The great picture of the Fall 
 of Jerusalem, which occupies a wall in the new Pina- 
 cothek, and must necessarily be seen by all visitors to 
 Munich, is much criticised on these grounds. There is 
 a group of Christians departing ; another of the Wan- 
 dering Jew and the Furies driving him out to wander ; 
 another of the High Priest killing himself; another of 
 the Roman army entering; another of the Prophets 
 denouncing doom, and another of the Angels coming 
 down to execute it. To a literary mind these groups 
 are linked together in the harmony of the subject. All 
 these things, did happen, or might well have happened^ 
 if not at the same moment, at least within a certain 
 time. Given the Fall of Jerusalem for the event, and 
 these detached pictures rise naturally in the mind. 
 
PICTORIAL UNITY. 153 
 
 But a painter is not content to have the subject for the 
 centre, he wants some centre on the canvas. If you 
 are to paint a number of detached incidents which can- 
 not be grouped, you must paint them in a series of 
 detached pictures. It is impossible that aU these things 
 could have happened within the space of one canvas, 
 and by crowding them aU together, you give us not the 
 Fall of Jerusalem but your recollections of it. Thus 
 the words of one of the Fathers apply to the truth of 
 pictorial representation, " sacr amentum veritatis unitas." 
 Objection may also be taken to the groups severally. 
 The Wandering Jew is really a stretch of the mind, and 
 it may be doubted if any one in thinking of the Fall of 
 Jerusalem would remember that legendary character. 
 Why are the Christians going out so peacefully and 
 undisturbed on the same side of the canvas as the 
 brutal soldiery are entering? The device almost re- 
 minds us of the impunity of fugitives in an opera, who 
 stay singing for half an hour on the stage while the 
 whole company is searching for them behind the scenes. 
 But Kaulbach would probably answer such objection as 
 he answered a question about his Battle of Salamis. 
 Some one asked him what authority he had for bring- 
 ing together all these characters and persons of such 
 different times, — where did they ever come together? 
 "In our memory," rephed the painter. In any other 
 country but Germany the answer would be considered 
 conclusive. This arbitrary connection of all things, 
 this habit of hooking anything he wants on to anything 
 else, is one of Kaulbach's strangest characteristics, and 
 ^a natural consequence of modern eclecticism. As Cor- 
 
 H 2 
 
154 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 nelius brings in Hebe and Ganymede simultaneously, 
 so his great pupil gives the reins to association. But is 
 not this rather the same principle as that which pro- 
 duced the ne plus ultra of eclecticism and association, 
 that play in which all memorable events and personages 
 are confused together, Packwood's Razor Strops and 
 Magna Charta, ancient Romans and Knight Tem- 
 plars ? 
 
 It is much pleasanter to dwell on the undoubted ex- 
 cellences of Kaulbach than to trace out his defects, 
 and I do not wonder at the indiscriminate laudation 
 sometimes bestowed on him. His great and genuine 
 power of drawing, his wide sweep of fancy, and his 
 restless intellect, are sufficient merits in themselves, 
 and contribute to produce pictures that we cannot but 
 admire. I have alluded to his chief faults, and I do 
 not wish to be compelled to examine them more fully. 
 But at the same time I protest against indiscriminate 
 praise as no real tribute to any man, and even in allow- 
 ing Kaulbach's beauties I shall do so with whatever 
 reservation is needed. The works that I cannot ap- 
 preciate I will dismiss from sight, the colossal mistakes 
 of the Battle of Salamis, and kindred pictures which 
 seem only executed as tours deforce. I confess that I 
 have never been across the street to look at the works 
 Kaulbach has executed in the manner of Cornelius. I 
 have never even looked up at the roof of the concert- 
 room in the Odeon, often as I have been waiting there 
 without occupation, and it is only from guide-books 
 and authorities that I know of the existence of such 
 paintings. But Kaulbach's genuine works I value very 
 
CHILDREN. 155 
 
 highly indeed. His purely intellectual drawings, the 
 illustrations to Reineke Fuchs, the Cartoon of the Re- 
 formation, his fanciful drawings, especially all those in 
 which children play a part, are perfect in their way. 
 In them we do not miss the imagination that should 
 have inspired his great historical pictures, nor the 
 colour without which it is hard for a painting to excel. 
 In all that regards children Kaulbach deserves a place 
 not far below Correggio. It is perfectly right to talk 
 of children as playing a part in his drawings ; you see 
 them thoroughly at home there with all the funny ways 
 and gestures and sportive extravagances that belong to 
 them. If Correggio's exquisite cherubs are merely 
 glorified children, Kaulbach' s children are cherubs 
 come to earth. There are little tail-pieces in Reineke 
 Fuchs of consummate merit and admirable expression, 
 and Kaulbach's admirers speak of a children's frieze at 
 Berlin in the warmest tones. One of his Goethe draw- 
 ings represents Mignon singing, surrounded by a tribe 
 of dear little faces, every one of which is true to the 
 life, and perfect in chUdish merriment, or that serious 
 attention which is almost more engaging. The bar- 
 barous custom of swathing up babies in a cushion as 
 if they were Esquimaux has no doubt acted on Kaul- 
 bach, in forbidding him to rival the children in arms 
 whom Correggio has made so lovely, and in restricting 
 him to an age more matured. But what he has effected 
 with the materials given him is perfect indeed. 
 
 The illustrations to Reineke Fuchs are tolerably 
 known in England, and are generally valued by us, 
 and all out of Germany, as Kaulbach's chief title to 
 
156 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH, 
 
 distinction. I am inclined to agree with this verdict. 
 It is true that the pictures are not the highest in aim 
 or in thought that he has executed, but they are more 
 carefully and truthfully expressed ; they have more 
 genuine meaning, and are more valuable as comments 
 on the painter's own thoughts than the rest of his work. 
 To satirise men as animals is not a new thought, of 
 course ; but Kaulbach's treatment is more or less new, 
 and his object is his own. The especial value of such 
 unlimited satire is, that you are sure to include many 
 incidental points which were not your original objects, 
 like a man hitting out wildly in a melee. It is an 
 established rule, that any man may interpret any alle- 
 gory in any way ; and in Germany the number of in- 
 terpretations to which Faust and Hamlet have been 
 subjected puts allegorical writing at a premium. If 
 Kaulbach had the Emperor in view in his lion, and the 
 Princes and Electors of the Empire in the subordinate 
 but independent beasts, it must be owned that he chose 
 a most telling parable, and one that his country might 
 well take to heed. But as I have no wish to rival the 
 expounders of kindred riddles, I will not speculate on 
 the innermost meaning of the satire, the more that so 
 many meanings are on the surface. Much of the 
 satire is universal in its application, and much more, 
 if not always certain of its aim, cannot fail to be so in 
 the present state of Europe. Many of the exaggera- 
 tions of Germany which Kaulbach has painted exist 
 among ourselves, in a smaller degree one would hope. 
 The curses of all power, unreasoning obedience, and 
 ultra-subservience, do not belong to that country alone 
 
MEN AS ANIMALS. 157 
 
 in which kings and nobles are found in every district, 
 nor is brutaUty on the part of soldiers and schools 
 masters restricted to Munich and Augsburg. Hypo- 
 crisy, gluttony, and folly of all kinds, are unfortunately 
 inseparable from human nature; many men put them 
 on with their bodies, and their mind is not equal to a 
 struggle against the law of their members. 
 
 "Whether general or individual, Kaulbach's satire is 
 worth careful inspection. How telling is the first 
 picture in Reineke Fuchs, where the lion summons his 
 court, the hog with a large white cravat, and the 
 chamberlain's key stuck in his girdle, laying his hand 
 on his heart, the deeply reverent upward gaze of the 
 ox as he kisses the monarch's hand, the stag a foolish 
 young officer without an idea beyond his sword, the 
 priestly panther with a suspicious side-look at the lion 
 out of the corner of his eye. Then we have the fox 
 as a schoolmaster teaching the hares, and the priestly 
 panther coming up just in time to save the throat of 
 one of the scholars. The picture of a school was never 
 perhaps more faithfully presented, the little hares re- 
 verently and attentively learning their grammar, one 
 of them drawing, all with the awed look of incipient 
 scholars. The fox himself might easily stand for a 
 schoolmaster of the old kind, and the likeness he bears 
 to a human face is very striking when you come to 
 examine the details. His fierce eager mouth snatching 
 up a slight mistake and pillorying it, his rather large 
 wrinkled forehead, whiskers brushed away off the cheek, 
 the skull-cap on his head, and the long robe, with a 
 book stuck into the waistband, are all thoroughly 
 
158 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 human, though without a tincture of humanity. The 
 illusion is so perfect that only one touch more is re- 
 quired to transform the fox into an actual schoolmaster. 
 One cannot but think that the face is a portrait of some 
 real person, especially as the fox's conduct is so exact 
 a counterpart of the conduct of a schoolmaster at Augs- 
 burg of whom I heard the other day that he sent a boy 
 home with half his ear torn off. Another page, and we 
 have the cock pleading before the King with Demos- 
 thenic action, pointing to the corpse of one of his wives, 
 and impeaching the fox. The bull-dog, who is the 
 lion's cook, stands with his mouth wide open in horror 
 behind the throne, the mitred goat, in bishop's robes, 
 sits calmly looking on, reminding us of Sydney Smith's 
 horror at being blandly absorbed by bishops, the two 
 moles as grave-diggers, the badger as relative of the 
 fox turning away with pain and pious awe. Again we 
 have the fox as penitent before the cock, the cock a 
 country squire or magistrate with important spectacles, 
 the fox telling his beads with downcast head, and thick 
 bushy tail curling up between his legs. The picture of 
 the fox stealing a fowl from the priest's table is worthy 
 of Hogarth. The anguish on the face of the priest, 
 throwing himself forward to save the dish on which he 
 had counted the whole day, is admirable. Look how 
 he overbalances himself, knocks over the table, spilling 
 salt without a thought of the ill-luck attending it, while 
 his chair knocks against the shelves behind, and sends 
 the contents of all the dishes, soup, liquids, solids, 
 pouring on his back and down his neck. In the hang- 
 ing scene, which comes early in the book, and which 
 
BEASTS MAKING BEASTS OF THEMSELVES. 159 
 
 makes us wonder how the fox will escape, as we feel 
 certain that he must though the halter is round his 
 neck, see the portly agricultural ox with his great shirt 
 collar, like the pictures of John Bull, and the ape with 
 the thorough face of a convict unawed by the fearful 
 example, the exultation of the fox's enemies, his own 
 edifying repentance, and the general detestation of the 
 animal world. In the next one, the lion on his throne, 
 and the ass consulting a long genealogical table, which 
 he unrols and handles, like a Dryasdust, his pen stuck 
 behind his ear and his dimmed spectacles on his 
 learned nose. The grand feast at Court is full of tell- 
 ing hits against various vices. The lion and lioness 
 are fondling each other on a couch, while the ape ties 
 their tails together without their noticing it. The ox 
 sits like an alderman after a feast with the kid on his 
 lap. The tiger blows out his brains with a pistol, the 
 elephants hold bottles of champagne in their trunks and 
 pour the contents into their mouths, the mastiffs gorge, 
 the donkey waves his champagne glass, and sings, " "We 
 won't go home till morning." Is not this the custom 
 at feasts ? But it is worth observing that the lion and 
 lioness are stretched on a couch formed of deer skins, 
 which, like the tiger skins and bear skins one sees, have 
 the heads left on them. The deers' heads hang over 
 the sides of the couch, and tears are running down 
 their cheeks. Close by lies a book which the lion 
 seems to have flung aside, the title of it is, "Le Roi 
 s' amuse, tragedie, par Victor Hugo." Who is not fami- 
 liar with this kind of allusion? How many instances 
 Hogarth has given of it. Even now it is, perhaps, the 
 
160 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 most successM form of allegory, whether in this picture 
 of Kaulbach's or ia the next, where the fox brains the 
 rabbit before a way-side shrine, the Stunden der Andacht 
 lying on the ground. The fox taking leave of his 
 family, the badger with a pipe stuck through his hat, 
 and ears of com peeping from his pocket, the lion's 
 domestic arrangements, the cranes as physicians, with 
 swords and cocked hats under their arms, looking very 
 jadiciously at the wolf's sufferings, the lion's illness, 
 and the fox holding up a large bottle to the hght in 
 imitation of a well-known Dutch picture, the leopard as 
 soldier keeping the Msts for fox and wolf, and chucking 
 a village maiden, a picture of injured innocence, under 
 the chin, the triumphal entry of the fox and his inves- 
 titure by the lion, are some of the figures and incidents 
 in the other illustrations which have struck me as 
 pecuHarly noticeable. But the whole series may well 
 be studied, and cannot fail to give great pleasure from 
 its ingenuity, as well as from its wit and the power of 
 design. 
 
 Although Kaulbach's drawings of Reineke Fuchs are 
 supposed to illustrate Goethe's poem, they take a very 
 independent position, and open an immense field which 
 might reasonably be worked by others. I have some- 
 where met with a statement that an English body of 
 paiaters refused to take subjects from poetry because 
 they preferred to work independently, and not submit 
 their imagination to that of the poet. But the draw- 
 ings of Kaulbach show that the painter may be quite 
 independent of the poet. The barest text in the book 
 is sufficient to suggest the whole mass of detail, while 
 
GOETHE GALLERY. 161 
 
 at the same time the painter's wandering fancy is kept 
 within those bomids it is too often tempted to exceed. 
 The complaint of the priest, "He stole the fowl from 
 my table \" is the sole warrant in the text for Kaul- 
 bach's animated picture of Hogarthian confusion. No 
 one can deny that the painter's imagination was unfet- 
 tered here, or assert that it was only secondary to the 
 poet's. Nor need any one fear that he will be counted 
 as a mere interpreter or translator, so long as he can 
 furnish such illustrations as these. The Goethe Gallery 
 of Kaulbach may be taken as a sort of return to his 
 earlier love, but it is by no means as perfect as the 
 Reineke Fuch's drawings. The size of the Goethe 
 Gallery almost excludes delicacy, and the figures always 
 seem gigantic. Heine has especially praised Goethe 
 for painting people smaller than the size of life, instead 
 of giving them enormous proportions, and Kaulbach 
 has missed this aspect of Goethe's creatures. " Don't 
 you know," asks Hetue, "that it is much easier to 
 create these ideal images that you boast so highly, these 
 statues worthy to be placed on the altar of virtue and 
 honesty, than the small worldly beings, sinners stained 
 with mortal infirmity, which Goethe gives us in his 
 works ? Don't you know that mediocre painters gene- 
 rally stretch across their canvas the figures of saints as 
 large as life, while it needs a great master to paint with 
 truth and expression a little Spanish beggar hunting for 
 vermin, a Flemish peasant having a tooth pulled out, or 
 one of those ugly old women whom we see in the easel 
 pictures of the Dutch school. In art it is easier to re- 
 present what is grand and terrible, than what is small 
 
163 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 and agreeable. The Egyptian sorcerers imitated several 
 of the miracles of Moses, the serpents, the blood, 
 even the frogs; but when it came to miracles -which 
 seemed much easier, the production of insects, for ex- 
 ample, they avowed their inability, and said, ' that is the 
 finger of God V " 
 
 Probably Kaulbach was ignorant of this simile of 
 Heine's, or he would not have sacrificed the natural 
 grace of Goethe^s characters by adding to their stature. 
 With many charming details, these Goethe drawings 
 are often unpleasing, owing to the great proportions of 
 the centre figures, and it is not easy to do them justice. 
 The one which represents Herrmann and Dorothea 
 coming down the hill side in the evening, the lights 
 beginning to shine through the village windows, would 
 be charming but for this defect. As it is, the eifect 
 conveyed is that of a giant and giantess striding down 
 a mountain, from shelf to shelf of rocky terraces, 
 which to the eye seem made for a giant's staircase. 
 And Lotte cutting bread and butter for the children, 
 has the proportions of the ogress feeding Hop o' my 
 Thumb and his comrades. In the engraving one ceases 
 to perceive this fault, and the grace and delicacy of the 
 design are clearly perceptible. But in the drawings 
 themselves, and in the admirable photographs which 
 reproduce the drawings so exactly, that as some one has 
 said, you can see the strokes of the pencil in them, the 
 size is a great objection. 
 
 It may be interesting to compare Kaulbach's draw- 
 ing of Faust and Gretchen with that of an English 
 artist who was long resident in Munich, and who is 
 
FAUST AND GRETCHEN. 163 
 
 now a conspicuous exhibitor in the Old Water Colour 
 Society. Mr. Burton's Meeting of Faust and Gretchen 
 was in the International Exhibition, and Kaulbach's 
 companion drawing is tolerably well known from the 
 photographs in the Bavarian Court. Mr. Burton's pic- 
 ture is eminently dramatic. By the action both of 
 Faust and Gretchen, you see clearly that Faust has 
 attempted to catch hold of her arm, or to put his arm 
 round her waist; but Gretchen has avoided it by a 
 sort of forward spring. Perhaps the energy of Faust 
 is a little too decided, and the flutter of Gretchen a 
 little too exaggerated. But the admirable colour, so 
 rich and unusual in water^ the power of the male 
 figure, and the pretty young girl, both faces being 
 thoroughly original, in spite of the natural temptation 
 to express a familiar character by a familiar type, 
 give the picture a value of its own. Kaulbach's draw- 
 ing on the other hand is steeped in conventionality, and 
 seems as if the artist was afraid to depart from the 
 usages of Faust's illustration. Instead of an overplus of 
 energy he has given us unbroken repose. Faust is a 
 noble, dignified' philosopher, above human weakness, 
 above anystimulant to action. He stands peaceablyat the 
 corner of the street admiring the figure that has passed, 
 and explaining his admiration to himself and Mephis- 
 topheles, as he might lecture on a Greek statue. On 
 the other hand, the young girl, with her profuse flaxen 
 plaits and German face, walks calmly and deliberately 
 on, unfluttered, unruffled. I need; hardly ask which of 
 the two pictures is truer to nature. But which is truer 
 to Goethe ? One is always accustomed to regard Faust 
 
164 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 as a philosopterj whether he is soliloquising in his study, 
 or hiding from Gretchen in the garden. But it must 
 be remembered that the first step to Faust's enjoyment 
 of life is the putting off his former self, the shedding 
 his skin of abstract learning, and putting on vigorous 
 youth. The witch, when he drank the magic potion a 
 moment before, said, that with that draught in his body 
 he would see a Helen in every woman; and his first 
 words to Mephistopheles after Gretchen had passed, 
 were so decided that the devil was taken aback. It is 
 evident that Goethe did his utmost to get rid of the 
 doctorial element in Faust, by making him act as unlike 
 a learned professor as possible. Nor is the dignity and 
 reserve of Gretchen in the drawing at aU borne out by 
 her speeches in the poem. Mr. Burton has far more 
 truly and more pleasingly pourtrayed her fluttering off 
 like a frightened dove. And yet so important an ele- 
 ment in art-criticism is the national element, that I 
 imagine Germans would prefer the philosophic self-sus- 
 tained rendering of Kaulbach. Singularly enough, 
 Mr. Burton, who has so ably departed from tradition 
 in his view of Faust and Gretchen, has obeyed it in his 
 view of Mephistopheles. Kaulbach is more consistent 
 here, and to my mind both of them are wrong. The 
 conventional portrait of Mephistopheles, with his hook 
 nose and diabolical smile, his cap with the feather and 
 his short mantle, is as familiar as an historical person- 
 age, and the disguise ceases to be a disguise. It would 
 be excessively inconvenient to drag about a gentleman 
 like that in your train, and he would soon be so well 
 known that he could not furnish any assistance. We 
 
THE TIME OF THE REFORMATION. 165 
 
 have gradually revolted against the conventional ex- 
 pression of aU. other characters of whom no authentic 
 likeness exists, and Kaulbach himself has ventured to 
 give us a new reading of Shakspeare in the face of 
 contemporary portraits. But Mr. Burton might have 
 been expected to give us an original Mephistopheles 
 before Kaulbach. 
 
 The admirers of Kaulbach may object to my treat- 
 ment of him, inasmuch as I confine myself to his less 
 important works, his illustrations of others, and make 
 no mention of his great achievements. It certainly 
 does seem ungracious to do so, and would be unpardon- 
 able if I had access to his great works at Berlin as I 
 have to the engravings and photographs of his Goethe 
 drawings. But my object is to reproduce the artistic 
 life of Munich, and |I cannot but exclude the works 
 which are in other parts of Germany. A volume in 
 itself might be made of the products of the modern 
 German school of painting, but those products would 
 have to be visited in many galleries. Although I have 
 spoken unfavourably of Kaulbach's ambitious works as 
 a whole, I am not bhnd to the merits of some of them. 
 One especially may be described, as it was executed 
 during my stay in Munich, the cartoon representing the 
 period of the Reformation. The subject of this cartoon 
 is better chosen than aU the other subjects of the paint- 
 ings in the Berlin Museum. For this one may well be 
 allowed to form a gallery of distinguished contempora- 
 ries, and nothing more is asked of it than to give us 
 a panorama of those among whom the great rehgious 
 change was effected. It is not the reformation itself. 
 
166 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 but the period of the reformation ; the men who were 
 living around it as well as those who moved and had 
 their being in it. Here, therefore, Kaulbach might 
 give the reins to his fancy, being bound by no other 
 chain but the portraits of the characters. It must be 
 admitted that he has produced a noble collection of 
 heads, a portrait gallery in which one would gladly 
 linger. The arrangement of the cartoon is, to some 
 extent, borrowed from the school of Athens, which, I 
 presume, was unavoidable. In the centre, the figure 
 from and to which everything radiates, Luther holding 
 up the open Bible at the stretch of his arms ; on each 
 side of him the work and teaching of Protestantism 
 proceed, communion is given in both kinds, and the 
 Word is expounded. Below, in the foreground are 
 two groups, the left-hand representing science, the right- 
 hand group letters. Between them reclines Hans Sachs, 
 the cobbler poet, counting the feet of his verses on his 
 fingers, and reminding us rather too much of the 
 Diogenes in E-aphaeFs school of Athens by his attitude 
 and posture. The literary group contains Shakspeare, 
 Cervantes, Petrarch, Erasmus, Ulrich von Hutten, Pico 
 di Mirandola : the scientific group, Columbus, Bacon, 
 Vesalius, Harvey. On the steps, above these groups, 
 we see Queen Elizabeth, Gustavus Adolphus, the war- 
 riors and statesmen of the time. But to me the interest 
 is chiefly divided between the two groups in the fore- 
 ground, which were more advanced when I saw the 
 cartoon, and which suggest much matter for discussion. 
 The power and majesty of the figures and faces con- 
 tained in these groups can hardly be overpraised. The 
 
COLUMBUS AND SHAKSPBARE. 167 
 
 representation of Columbus is truly stupendous. He 
 stands like a pillar of the world, towering far above all 
 who surround him, in a posture of self-sustained ma- 
 jesty, his hand resting on that part of the globe he has 
 rescued from nothingness, though his wrists are fet- 
 tered. But the grandeur of his look is beyond even 
 that of his posture. His forehead rises in a mass of 
 power, transcending in height and in command the 
 greatest foreheads we know, and there is a look of reso- 
 lution stamped in every line and feature. I know not 
 if any authentic portrait exists from which this idea is 
 taken, or if the painter has improved on his model. 
 But be the representation authentic or purely imagi- 
 nary, there can be no doubt of its grandeur. 
 
 The novelty Kaulbach has introduced into his por- 
 trait of Shakspeare is enough to petrify the commen- 
 tators. The general expression of the face is preserved, 
 but not one feature is the same as we are accustomed to 
 see it. The shortness of Shakspeare's nose and the 
 length of his upper lip have always been obnoxious to 
 the advocates of a science of physiognomy, except to 
 those mistaken few who raise blemishes to the rank of 
 beauties. Kaulbach has endeavoured to reconcile Shak- 
 speare's physiognomy with his genius. The upper lip 
 is very much shortened, and the nose is lengthened; 
 the forehead preserves its height, but takes quite a new 
 form ; a fire and animation are given to the face which 
 are altogether wanting in the Stratford bust and the 
 early portraits. Kaulbach flatly refuses to accept the 
 Stratford bust as a correct representation of Shakspeare; 
 he denies that King Lear could have come from such a 
 
168 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 facCj and argues that it is his duty to convey the genius 
 of the poet in reproducing his features. The result is 
 that we have here such a Shakspeare as we could wish 
 to have, a study for genius and animation, the fire of 
 his mind bursting out at every pore, in the firm grip of 
 the clenched hand and the firm set of the under thigh. 
 Humanity generally will feel flattered by the portrait j 
 but what will the commentators say ? The question of 
 long upper lips has more than once been debated, and 
 some consider them a necessary accompaniment of ge- 
 nius. Carlyle has spoken in favour of them in one of 
 his Essays as being a sign of power, and his own por- 
 trait is a more important testimony. A writer in the 
 Cornhill Magazine goes further, and assigns them to all 
 men of genius, which can be proved to be an exaggera- 
 tion. In great speakers length of upper lip would 
 doubtless be indispensable, because without speech the 
 oratorical faculty is incomplete. But in poets and 
 artists there is no such need, and the long lip is not 
 found in them generally. Kaulbach urges that the 
 forehead is the seat of intellectual power, and that the 
 possession of it is not affected by the Ups. Be the 
 question as it may, the departure from the traditional 
 portrait is rather bold, and sticklers for Shakspeare 
 are scarcely likely to pardon it. Ludicrously enough, 
 the powerful legs that Kaulbach has given to the poet 
 are equally liable to objection. Some commentator on 
 the Sonnets discovered that Shakspeare was lame. 
 
CHAPTEE X. 
 
 MUNICH ARTISTIC. 
 
 "When I said I would die a bachelor," observes Bene- 
 dick, "I did not think I should live till I were married." 
 When I undertook to give a general view of the art of 
 Munich I did not think that the materials were beyond 
 my reach. Without some guiding thought, or definite 
 purpose, an extended survey of the production of such a 
 town would necessarily be incomplete. It is not easy 
 for any one to take stock of so many pictures which 
 are not regularly exhibited at stated times, and the 
 absence of well-known works to refer to would throw 
 uncertainty on every judgment. Each successive Lon- 
 don season serves as a landmark for the progress of the 
 painters who exhibit in the Royal Academy, and a few 
 days' study suffices to keep both Londoners and strangers 
 from falling behind hand in knowledge of their national 
 art. But in Munich the Kunst Verein is the only 
 regular place of exhibition, and as pictures are sent 
 there every week, and taken away at the end of a week, 
 as the size of the rooms does not permit of large works 
 being hung, and the bad arrangement is so notorious 
 that the best painters regularly absent themselves, it 
 
170 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 cannot be considered adequate for this purpose. By 
 missing one week you may miss the best picture that 
 has been produced during the year, and yet you may go 
 week after week without seeing anything to reward 
 your visit. If you happen on the good picture you are 
 not struck with it as you might be from the want of 
 anything with which you can compare it, and you may 
 even do it the injustice of imagining that its merits 
 proceed from the poverty of the works surrounding. 
 Moreover, the first object of the Kunst Verein is to 
 support poor artists, not to promote the cause of art. 
 With this view the pictures that are bought by the 
 Society are chosen according to the poverty of their 
 painter, not according to their merits. In too many 
 cases the mental poverty of the artists assisted is no 
 less conspicuous than the real poverty which entitles 
 them to support ; sometimes the one is the cause of the 
 other. It is well to have an institution for the pur- 
 pose of aiding strugglers in a laborious career, but it is 
 scarcely well to unite this object with that of promoting 
 the taste of the public. As the Kunst Verein is very 
 largely attended, and all pictures bought by the joint 
 committee of artists and amateurs are supposed to pos- 
 sess some merits, the standard of public taste is lowered 
 by the very means that might be chosen to raise it. It 
 is bad encouragement to a man who has no artistic 
 power to buy his pictures, especially when you exhibit 
 them freely with aU the guarantee of a committee of 
 judges and a public exhibition. 
 
 In describing the New Pinacothek I have gone into 
 details with some freedom, and my object in this 
 
GENERALITIES. 171 
 
 thapter is only to give general views of the state of 
 art in Munich.. It would be impossible to particularise 
 with so vast a field before me^ even if I were willing to 
 sacrifice a considerable time to master all the details 
 presented. My wish had been to give a fuller account 
 of many of the chief painters in Munich than is to be 
 found in any publication, but many reasons have in- 
 duced me to abandon this idea. For to do it any 
 justice a long and exclusive study would be needed, 
 a study not pursued in galleries, but from one atelier 
 to another, under circumstances of much difficulty, and 
 without any certainty of a result. Men who have lived 
 half their lives in Munich in the practice of art, who 
 have gradually massed up their knowledge, and become 
 familiar with styles and schools from daily observation, 
 might give us interesting details and reliable principles ; 
 but even then, in the absence of scholars, with the 
 small interest large masses of men take in criticism 
 which they cannot apply, such writings might be wasted. 
 It may be pleasant for visitors to Munich to compare 
 the pictures in the New Pinacothek with the accounts 
 I have given, or for those at a distance to read a descrip- 
 tion of a famous gallery. But while one valet- de-place 
 is left to take the stranger round the studios, a mere 
 catalogue of those worth visiting would not be suited to 
 my pages. 
 
 The capricious selection of the New Pinacothek has 
 been noticed in its place, though without remarking its 
 widely pernicious effect on the general sphere of art. 
 King Ludwig being till lately the only amateur in 
 Munich, all pictures which he refused to place in his 
 
172 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 gallery had to find purchasers in the other towns of 
 Germany. Remembering that Piloty is Professor in 
 the Munich Academy you look in vain for his Nero — 
 a picture whichj in spite of the heaviness of the colour 
 and the theatrical exaggeration of the figures, shows 
 more grapple, more feeling than the WaUenstein. The 
 reputation of Moriz von Schwind is almost unsupported 
 in Munich. I may seem to do him injustice to those 
 who rank him above Kaulbach, but in the absence of 
 all his chief pictures no other course was open to me. 
 It was not till after Genelli had left Munich that any of 
 his pictures could be known to the public, nor are they 
 known by royal repentance but by private encourage- 
 ment. These diffictdties may serve as mj excuse for 
 bareness of generalisation and want of detail. 
 
 A great predominance of landscape is the first point 
 that strikes one in a general view of the Munich school. 
 Some men have attained eminence in this department ; 
 very many produce pleasing pictures, with or without 
 striking characteristics. Not aiming high, landscapes 
 are generally exempt from searching criticism, and as 
 many scenes in Nature are attractive, though they do 
 not attain to much beauty, so the unpretending sketches 
 of landscape painters may please out of all proportion to 
 their merits. The lakes and mountains of the Bavarian 
 Highlands furnish scenes enough to employ the whole 
 tribe of painters during the summer, and travellers are 
 by no means loth to have the pleasantest bits of their 
 tour recalled on the canvas. How powerftd the attrac- 
 tion of these scenes may be guessed from the fact, that 
 the first picture sold in the International was a Bava- 
 
LANDSCAPE PAINTING. 173 
 
 rian landscape. At the same time the continual repe- 
 tition of favourite lakes, or mountains, or groups of 
 trees, is apt to become tiresome, especially as painters 
 get mannered sooner than Nature. One cannot but 
 recall the story told ia Guy Livingstone of a scientific 
 Frenchman and his abhorrence of the beautes de la 
 Nature, when one sees picture after picture taken up 
 with the Konigssee and the Chiemsee, or with Gebirgs- 
 parthien, and motives from the Isar. A critic of a 
 cynical turn, but of excellent judgment, has remarked 
 that a stranger seeing the pictures of the Munich school 
 would conclude that most of them were painted before 
 the sixth day of creation. Certainly, he says, more 
 oxen and sheep are to be seen on these canvases than 
 men, the men have all been swallowed up in the blue 
 lakes, or engulfed in the mountain ravines. With 
 such predomiaance of landscape, figure painters have 
 not a fair chance. A beginner is always tempted to 
 go with the majority, and a young man who might 
 make a good genre, or historical painter, may be de- 
 coyed into a style for which he is not fitted by the 
 abundance of example and encouragement. 
 
 Fortunately for the foreign reputation of the Munich 
 school, landscape is not so exclusively represented in 
 the New Pinacothek as it is in the Kunst Verein. I 
 have mentioned several figure paintings with praise in 
 my account of that gallery, and though Munich is very 
 far behind France and England in genre, it produces 
 works of considerable merit. Genre is so decidedly 
 native in France, and so secure in its monopoly of 
 patronage in England, that German painters cannot 
 
174 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 pretend to compete; and it must be remembered, to 
 the credit of Germany, that the higher branches of art 
 are not entirely • neglected for the convenience of the 
 careless and the nntaught. When the chief painters 
 are engaged on historical works it is natural that genre 
 should languish, and though one may regret that 
 talent is employed on the work of genius, it seems 
 better that the State should support what can never be 
 popular, and lay a good foundation for future excellence 
 in soundness of tuition. 
 
 The influence of Cornelius does not seem to weigh on 
 the younger school of historical painters. The freer 
 and larger ideas of the great French and Belgian 
 masters have swept out the cobwebs of German national- 
 ism from the minds of the rising youth, and Munich 
 begins to see that Eossini's saying about music applies 
 to painting. Rossini is supposed to have said to some 
 learned gentleman who was entertaining him with a 
 discourse on nationalities in music ; " My dear sir, 
 there is no such distinction as you suppose between 
 Italian, German, French music; there are only two 
 kinds of music, good and bad." There are only two 
 , kinds of painting, good and bad. Of course one allows 
 for degres, as the president of a French tribunal stated 
 to Dumas, but the principle is the same. Some, indeed, 
 would stretch it to admit a third class, like the violin- 
 teacher of George the Third. " There are three classes 
 of violiQ-players, your majesty ; those who can't play at 
 all, those who play badly, and those who play well. 
 Your majesty has now risen to the second class." But 
 two kinds or three kinds, the meaning is, that art must 
 
SCULPTURE. 175 
 
 be gauged by its actual merits. Just as you cannot 
 condemn a painter because he is Grerman, so you cannot 
 praise a painter because he is German. It is no cen- 
 sure on the young painters who have learned ease and 
 grace from France^ to say that they do not paint like 
 Germans. They do not paint like their predecessors, 
 it is true ; but neither did Raphael or Correggio. If 
 the French style is better than the German, take it ; if 
 Delaroche is more religious than Cornelius, and Horace 
 Vernet's battle-pieces better than Adam's, follow Dela- 
 roche and Vernet. Nations have reacted on each other 
 since time began, and every step of national progress 
 may be traced to some foreign inspiration. Why, then, 
 is Art, the great common language of all peoples, to 
 be coilfounded into separate tongues by an arbitrary 
 Babel? 
 
 It is unfortunate that sculpture, which is tied down 
 by no such rules, should have succeeded so badly in 
 Mimich. A reason for its failure may doubtless be 
 found in the general inaptitude of the present age. 
 But Munich sculpture occupies a lower position than 
 that of any other country, in spite of the encourage- 
 ment of King Ludwig, and the presence of so fine a 
 collection of ancient statues. In proportion to its size, 
 Munich has an unusual number of street statues, and as 
 this is a subject which inspires much bitter comment 
 in Londoners, I will dwell ■ on it at more length. 
 Street statues have almost monopolised the production 
 of Munich. There is only one room of modern sculp- 
 ture in the Glyptothek, and that is chiefly occupied 
 with busts. But a great many public works have been 
 
176 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 executed j groups in the temples and churches as well 
 as statues in the squares ; and King Max is following in 
 his father's steps in decorating his new street and his 
 public buildings with statues and bas-reliefs. AU 
 around the Glyptothek are statues in niches; every 
 temple has its obligato groups on the pediments ; and 
 the two classic gates, the Ludwig's Kirche, the Boni- 
 facius Kirche, and four of the public places at least are 
 loaded, or embellished. In the Promenade Platz, in 
 front of the Baierischer Hof — one of the hotels most 
 frequented by English — are five statues: an elector, 
 two composers, and two legislators. In the Wittels- 
 bacher Platz stands Thorwaldsen's statue of the Elector 
 Maximilian J in the Odeon's Platz close by the new 
 statue of King Ludwig, and in the Hall of the Marshals 
 TUly and Wrede. King Max has placed a statue of 
 Schelling in front of the unfinished National Museum, 
 and King Ludwig promises a statue of Schiller for an- 
 other part of the town. There is thus no lack of sculp- 
 ture ; but a favourable opinion cannot be formed of the 
 majority of the statues. 
 
 Thorwaldsen's mounted Maximilian the First is, in- 
 deed, a noble work. The firmness, the dignity of the 
 rider, the fire of the charger, are worthy of the greatest 
 of modern sculptors ; but the execution is surpassed 
 by the aptness with which the artist has caught the 
 character of the monarch. We seem to see in every 
 line of MaximUian's face, in his lofty bearing, in the grand 
 simplicity of his gesture, the man who survived throughout 
 the Thirty Years' War, taking a principal part not only 
 against such antagonists, but under the pressure of such 
 
STREET STATUES j MAX EMMANUEL. 177 
 
 an ally ; the man of whom SchiUer says that his firm- 
 ness only failed after resisting twenty-eight years of the 
 severest trials. Thorwaldsen seems to have cast him in 
 native bronze. This statue is a sufficient example to all 
 future sculptors, and if we had one such in London to 
 point the way, our failures might doubtless be avoided. 
 There is character to some extent in the statues of 
 Kreitmayr and Westenrieder in the Promenade Platz, 
 still more in Gluck and Orlando di Lasso ; but all four 
 are spoiled by the stupid figure of the Elector Max Em- 
 manuel, which has been stuck in their middle. The 
 two musicians were moved from the Odeon^s Platz to 
 make room for King Ludwig, that patron of art having 
 declared that he would not have his statue placed be- 
 tween two fiddlers. The position seems uncomfortable 
 enough to justify the king^s objection. Max Emmanuel 
 is far from being at his ease in the centre of such ex- 
 pressive faces, such noble attitudes. He stands on an 
 exploded shell with an uplifted sword, his face like that 
 of a sheep, his posture that of an awkward fencer, with- 
 out one particle of motion or energy. This tameness is 
 the more inappropriate that the statue is erected to him 
 in his character of stormer of Belgrade. If it had pre- 
 sented him ia the character more familiar to English 
 readers, as father of the prince chosen by the Partition 
 Treaty to govern Spain, or as sharing with TaUard the 
 honour of being defeated at Blenheim by the Duke of 
 Marlborough, some amount of repose would be natural. 
 Still better if the sculptor had intended to copy that 
 French caricature of the Congress at the Hague which 
 is described by Macaulay, and in which "William ap- 
 
 I 2 
 
178 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 peared taking his ease in an arm- chair, with his feet on 
 a cushion and his hat on his head, while the Electors of 
 Brandenburgh and Bavaria, uncovered, occupied small 
 stools on the right and left." Certainly, the Elector 
 could not look more ridiculous in the French caricature 
 than he does on this pedestal. The only explanation of 
 this tameness is that the statement of a German autho- 
 rity, "the garrison and inhabitants of Belgrade fell 
 under the sword of the conqueror," is literally true, and 
 that the Elector is supposed to be quietly cutting them 
 down. 
 
 The statue of Schelling in the Maximilian's Strasse 
 is by the same sculptor as the Max Emmanuel, and the 
 merit of the two works is nearly equal. The figure of 
 the philosopher is highly awkward ; his forehead is well 
 developed, but the lower part of the face is coarse and 
 unmeaning. And yet he shows better here than he 
 does ia his monument at Ragatz in Switzerland, where 
 he is buried. His face there is priggish in the extreme, 
 without the intellectual frontal development that half 
 redeems him here. It is remarkable that the kiag who, 
 in Munich, has placed the inscription, " Schelling, the 
 Great Philosopher: erected by his thankful scholar, 
 Maximilian II.," has called Schelling the greatest 
 thinker of Germany at Ragatz. Are the Swiss sup- 
 posed to be so ignorant of German philosophy as to 
 leave this title unquestioned ? What would Heine have 
 said to it? It would hardly be safe to give Schelling 
 such rank, in the land of Leibnitz and Kant, even 
 though it be considered that to instruct a king is the 
 greatest effort of thought. 
 
STREET STATUES J KING LITDWIG. 179 
 
 It may seem strange that I do not mention Schwan- 
 thaler, who, to some people, is the chief representa- 
 tive of Munich, and whose works have a museum of 
 their own. The sculptor of the splendid Goethe at 
 Frankfort ought not to be passed over in silence, but 
 the works of Schwanthaler in Munich are very inferior. . 
 His friezes and pediments are generally poor, as might 
 be expected from the fatality that attends revivals. 
 Thorwaldsen's John the Baptist preaching in the Wil- 
 derness is the only work of the kind that I can appre- 
 ciate ; and the height at which these works are placed 
 necessarily removes them from our judgment. I greatly 
 regret that no such street statue as the Goethe was en- 
 trusted to Schwanthaler's hand for the city of Munich ; 
 the grandeur of the figure as well as the ability shown 
 in the bas-reliefs on the pedestal would justify the em- 
 ployment of such a sculptor. 
 
 The statue of King Ludwig, erected by the town of 
 Munich in August, 1863, is said to have been taken 
 from an idea of Schwanthaler's, but there is nothing of 
 Schwanthaler in the statue. When the town resolved 
 to record its gratitude to King Ludwig, the architect, 
 Von Klenze, discovered a strikiug resemblance to the 
 king in a sketch made by Schwanthaler for Matthias 
 Corvinus, King of Hungary, and the king, flattered by 
 the comparison, requested that his statue might be mo- 
 delled from the sketch. Historians must determine how 
 far the character of King Ludwig accords with that of 
 Matthias Corvinus : the incidents of their reigns do not 
 possess the slightest resemblance. Perhaps too much 
 freedom and familiarity would be required to pourtray 
 
180 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 King Ludwig during his lifetime with that truth to 
 nature that is the only use of a statue. Some attempt 
 might doubtless have been made to ensure a likeness 
 without absolute disloyalty. Of course one does not 
 expect so literal a portrait as the one I have attempted 
 to give in my chapter on Concerts, although that would 
 be better than the excess of idealism and the utter 
 absence of truth with which we have been presented. 
 The sculptor never seemed to imagine it his duty to 
 hint at the character of the King ; one might look for 
 ever without knowing that the statue represented a 
 patron of art and the embellisher of Munich. King 
 Ludwig is on horseback, holding up a sceptre vrith his 
 right hand, a crown on his head, and a mantle falling 
 from his shoulders. On each side of the horse walks a 
 page ; one bears a tablet inscribed " Gerecht," the other 
 a tablet inscribed " Beharrlich," which two words form 
 the King's motto, and are identical with our old friends, 
 Justum et tenacem of Horace. The attitude would be- 
 come an emperor entering Rome or Frankfort after his 
 election, granting new privileges to his expectant sub- 
 jects, and assuring them of fidelity to his promise. But 
 King Ludwig, who inherited a constitution and had to 
 observe it by resigning his crown, whose kingly actions 
 are those which least bear examination, and who has 
 never been seen on horseback within the memory of 
 this generation, is the last man in the world who should 
 thus be depicted. The uplifted sceptre, the costume, 
 the attendant pages, imply some special grant to the 
 people. If nothing is meant by these attributes, why 
 ar^ they given? It cannot be said that King Ludwig 
 
SATIRE IN DISGUISE. 181 
 
 is SO destitute of character that this unmeaning vague- 
 ness is necessary.* 
 
 In one point alone does the monument hint at the 
 characteristics of King Ludwig's embellishments — in 
 its wonderful mixture of costume. An artist-critic in- 
 forms us that no less than eight different periods have 
 been chosen to clothe the royal figure. His crown is 
 of the eleventh century, his sceptre of the thirteenth, 
 the pages that attend him of the sixteenth ; his mantle 
 dates from the Thirty Years' War, and his tunic from 
 the time of Charlemagne ; his short breeches and stock- 
 ings belong to the eighteenth century, the trappings of 
 his horse are modem Napoleonic, and his sandal-shoes 
 Roman Imperial. If the artist intended to convey the 
 mixture of styles in King Ludwig's buildings by this 
 singular medley, he must be pronounced a satirist of 
 decided originality. 
 
 I am not sure if the porcelain, and painted glass, and 
 similar productions of Munich, should be classed under 
 the head of art or industry. As they might enter iuto 
 either classification, they run the risk of being omitted 
 from both; and yet they are sufficiently creditable in 
 
 * The Life of Rietschel has appeared eince this was in type ; and I 
 am much gratified to find my judgment confirmed by one of the first of 
 modem German sculptors, the pupil of Eauoh, the author of the 
 Luther monument and the group of G-oethe and Schiller at Weimar. 
 Eietschel's words, after seeing the sketch, are, " It is a mistake to erect 
 a mounted statue of King Ludwig, for the simplicity of his Ufe out- 
 wardly, by which he saved thalers, in order to spend millions on works 
 of art, is not characterised by a pathetic and poetic presentation on 
 horseback, with pages at the sides. This may make an interesting 
 work of art, but it will lose all meaning both for the present and 
 posterity." 
 
183 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 both respects to need a detailed examination. Fortu- 
 nately both glass and porcelain were amply represented 
 in the industrial department of the Exhibition. The 
 porcelain paintings strike you by the fidelity with which 
 famihar pictures are reproduced in a more durable 
 form. The intense labour of the artist who has to 
 paint his copy three times over, once after each burn- 
 ing ; the care as well as labour necessary to superintend 
 the burning, when one deviation from the established 
 temperature would be fatal, can hardly be rated too 
 highly. The larger the picture is, the more danger of 
 the plate being cracked, and the porcelain pictiu-es pro- 
 duced in Munich are larger than those of any other 
 manufactory. I have touched upon the practical as- 
 pects of the Munich glass in my industrial chapter. I 
 believe my readers are too familiar with the exquisite 
 colours and carving of Bavarian glass to need a descrip- 
 tion. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 PRACTICAL MUNICH. 
 
 An eminent statesman, who discharged for a time the 
 duties of minister at Munich, and received a consider- 
 able salary for the services he rendered to his country 
 in that responsible post, was in the habit of asking new 
 arrivals if they meant to stay, adding that he wouldn't 
 if he wasn't paid to do it. It is just because they are 
 not paid to do it that most of the English residents take 
 up their abode in Munich. The artistic attractions of 
 the place, its mountain neighbourhood, are often dwelt 
 on, but its cheapness is certainly the great inducement. 
 Prices are much lower than in the other towns of Ger- 
 many ; which is as much as to say that they are a great 
 deal lower than in France or England. Meat costs 
 fourpence or fivepence a poimd, beer twopence half- 
 penny a quart, servants from eight shillings a month 
 upwards, while rates and taxes are almost unknown. 
 No wonder that life seems easier to many families when 
 the weekly bills are thus restricted, and as education is 
 cheap, society not exclusive, climate about as good as 
 anywhere else, it would be unreasonable to expect pay- 
 ment in addition. 
 
184 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 But there is a meanness attached to this cheapness 
 which does not appear on the surface. You pay little 
 because you get little. You live cheaply because you 
 have to go without many things which would seem in- 
 dispensable in England ; and though many of these are 
 not necessaries, and one justly complains at being forced 
 to make use of them, one gets at least the worth of 
 one^s money out of them. In Munich you are not 
 compelled to do certain things by the pressure of public 
 opinion, and the usages of society. You are free to 
 regulate your life according to your means, and need 
 not be in constant fear of Mrs. Grundy. Surrounded 
 by people of limited means, you are not tempted into 
 constant extravagance by their example. You are not 
 lectured by your servants about the rules of living 
 adopted by the first houses, in which they have always 
 been accustomed to serve. These are no doubt great 
 recommendations. The social tyranny that reigns in 
 some parts of our beloved country is such, that many 
 Englishmen take shelter in foreign residence. It is far 
 pleasanter, as well as cheaper, to cut your coat accord- 
 ing to your cloth, than to have your neighbours sitting 
 in judgment on the shape of one, and the quality of 
 the other. But social liberty is not every thing. Even 
 though one protests against doing every thing as the 
 neighbours would have it, one may prefer the custom 
 that is forced upon one, to those from which one is free 
 to choose. And though it is unpleasant to find that 
 life is a luxury one cannot afford in England, it is 
 scarcely better to be reduced to the bare necessaries 
 that prove sufBcient for other nations. 
 
PRICES RELATIVELY. 185 
 
 In Munich, the prices of all things seem absolutely- 
 moderate when they are relatively dear. When you 
 are told that you can live for so many hundreds a-year, 
 you forget to ask on what scale, and with how much 
 enjoyment. You do not consider that there are two 
 kinds of value to every thing, its price and its worth. 
 The fact is forced upon you by daily experience in many 
 of the cheap towns on the Continent. I have met with 
 people who thought England was cheaper than Munich, 
 and who could certainly live more cheaply in England 
 than in Munich. For unless you conform to the man- 
 ners of a people, you gain little advantage by living 
 among them. You have to pay dearly if you import 
 English customs, as you pay a high duty on EngUsh 
 goods. By grafting an English shoot on a German 
 tree, you only get a hybrid kind of fruit, which nei- 
 ther repays the cost, nor the trouble of rearing. I 
 might give many instances of the mistakes into which 
 English people fall in their attempt to have their native 
 comfort at Munich prices. But I will confine myself 
 to more general matters. One of the chief expenses of 
 life is house-rent, and house-rent in Munich is not only 
 relatively but absolutely dearer than in England. Re- 
 member that in London you get a house to yourself, 
 and in Munich only a floor, and you will see the enor- 
 mous disparity of paying as much for the one as the 
 other. It is scarcely possible to get a floor of sis or 
 eight rooms under sixty pounds a year, a price for which 
 many houses of the same size are to be had in London. 
 It is true that the floor may be situated in the better 
 quarters of Munich, and the house in one of the suburbs 
 
186 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of London. It is true that certain additions in the 
 shape of rates and taxes appear in the London budget, 
 and do not in the Munich. But even the rates and 
 taxes represent something definite. If you pay a water 
 rate, you have water to the top of your house; if 
 gas is an expensive item, at least you enjoy the light it 
 gives you. Has any house in Munich gas laid on, or 
 any house, except some of the newest, water ? Even 
 the streets are not lighted on nights when the moon is 
 promised ia the almanack ; so that the gas company may 
 be represented in the character of Bottom, crying, " A 
 calendar, a calendar ! look in the almanack ; find out 
 moonshine, find out moonshine." I have devoted a 
 chapter to the dwelling-houses of Munich, and need 
 not add that there are no such things as closets in 
 them, or anything more than is absolutely necessary. 
 In the majority of them you get the bare walls; in 
 many the walls are bare even of paper. As for shut- 
 ters, bells in the rooms, and all minor comforts, the less 
 said the better. 
 
 In other points, however, Munich prices observe a 
 better proportion. Meat is evidently cheap, and as an 
 article of daily recurrence is important in its efiects on 
 general expenditure. It were to be wished that the 
 butchers would study anatomy, and that the gardeners 
 would grow mint ; the want of the first makes the joints 
 uncertain masses, and the second banishes lamb from 
 your table. Meat is killed much too young in Munich, 
 especially lamb. The partiality of Germans for veal is 
 well known, and in Munich the consumption of. calves 
 is out of all proportion to that of sheep and oxen. A 
 
PRICES POSITIVELY. 187 
 
 report of the rictual market shows that in one year 
 more than a hundred and ten thousand calves were 
 slaughtered^ while oxen, cowsj and young bulls together 
 amounted only to twenty -five thousand^ sheep to twelve 
 thousand^ and pigs to twenty-six thousand. The num- 
 bers given in this report throw a singular light on the 
 national palate. Perhaps it is not strange that mutton 
 is in small repute^ seeing the quality of it is so much 
 inferior to the English. But one would expect to see 
 beef in the first rank of consumption, remembering that 
 the daily food of so many families consists of the Rind- 
 fleish which has been boiled to make soup, and that the 
 roast is a Sunday luxury. In the same year, says the 
 report, twenty-five thousand fowls were sold in the vic- 
 tual market, bringing in between twelve and thirteen 
 thousand florins, that is about lOd. eachj seventy-two 
 thousand chickens, at about 8d. each; two thousand 
 seven hundred and sixty-three turkeys, at about 3s. 6d. 
 each : five thousand seven hundred and three capons, 
 I5. 9c?. each; seventy-nine thousand two hundred and eight 
 geese, at 3s. each, and the same number of young geese 
 at 8d. each; forty thousand ducks at lOd., and twenty- 
 seven thousand ducklings at 3d.; twenty-three thou- 
 sand pigeons at 3d., and fourteen thousand sucking pigs 
 at 5s. But the prices quoted in the report are very 
 much lower than the prices you have to pay. 
 
 I have written this paragraph with the same feelings 
 as those that stir the breast of the sub-editor of a Lon- 
 don paper, taking stock of the number of turkeys and 
 geese which are being fattened in Norfolk for the com- 
 ing Christmas. I can only ask my readers to accept it 
 
188 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 in the same spirit. Grave writers may scoff at the in- 
 troduction of such materialism, but I beheve mankind 
 is always glad to read about eating. I am. 
 
 Little, however, remains to be said upon the practical 
 aspect of eating in Munich. The cosmopohte will find 
 no restaurant worthy of the name, but one or two table 
 d'hotes. In the winter there is a good supply of game, 
 as the produce of all the royal chases goes into the 
 market. Confectionary is much cultivated, and with 
 good results. Beyond this more blame than praise. 
 Milk and butter are in a state of barbarism. The blind 
 economy of some dairies causes their butter to come 
 rancid out of the churn, and even in the better kinds 
 the milk has not been pressed out for fear of diminish- 
 ing the weight. By this excess of prudence half a 
 pound does the work of three-quarters, and the pro- 
 ducer pockets the difference of weight. But as the 
 butter does not taste good, and will not keep, the con- 
 sumer indemnifies himself by using as little as he can, 
 so that the over-cleverness of the producer only suc- 
 ceeds in limiting his sale. It is hard at first sight to 
 tell the difference between cream and milk, and on what 
 principle those names are employed in Munich. But a 
 long experience has shown me that cream is mUk with 
 water put in it, while milk is water with milk put in it. 
 
 I pass on to a question which has given rise to many 
 caricatures and much discussion ia England, as it is 
 worthy of both in all quarters of the globe. The ques- 
 tion of servants. After Swift^s "Directions," this 
 point cannot be dismissed contemptuously as beneath 
 the dignity of history. There has been a slight pro- 
 
SWIFT IN GERMAN. 189 
 
 gress in maimers since the time of Swift, but many of 
 his rules are stUl carefully observed. One would think 
 that a Servants' Edition of his works had been pub- 
 lished in Munichj or that the native sagacity of the 
 Bavarians enabled them to follow his advice without 
 having read it. We see in the conduct of the servants 
 how deeply the zeal for inappropriate ornament has 
 taken root in the people, and how entirely the thought 
 of use is exploded. A Munich servant scarcely ever 
 places anything where it is handy, but where it seems 
 to look well. In setting the dinner-table a symmetrical 
 arrangement is selected, which is really worthy of King 
 Lud wig's bmldings. You may see a dish put before 
 the master of the house, and the plates before the 
 mistress. The soup is invariably put in the middle of 
 the table so as to give the lady of the house the trouble 
 of puUing it to her. I presume there is some meaning 
 attached to this custom ; it is probably handed down 
 from old times, and commemorates the fathers of the 
 nation. But it is so useless and inconvenient that I 
 cannot understand its continuance. That the Munich 
 servants should do it, I allow well ; I have seen them 
 place the soup-tureen in the centre of a clean table- 
 cloth when mats were spread in every other part to 
 preserve its whiteness. The wonderful ideas of the 
 salon that prevail with German servants are only 
 paralleled in that story of Alexandre Dumas showing 
 some guests into his writing-room, " Messieurs, voici 
 le sanctuaire ! Otez vos chapeaux ?" I have known 
 people brought into utter darkness, and left there 
 while the servant went to tell the people of the house, 
 
190 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 who were sitting in another room, that there was a 
 " Besuch im Salon." These things are quoted as na- 
 tional 'pecuUarities. In no countries are servants per- 
 fect; but it is strange to find them acting as social 
 reformers, and expending their strength on artistic 
 combinations which have to be disarranged and put in 
 working order by the master and mistress. 
 
 The same fault strikes you at every turn, in every 
 branch of trade. Simplicity seems perfectly unknown 
 in practical matters, and the flimsiest ornament is more 
 valued than utility. Munichers never understand that 
 if a thing is worth doing at all, it is worth doing well ; 
 that a practical manufacture should be practical before 
 anything in the way of ornament is added, and that the 
 most beautiful object is of no use when something 
 merely practical is required. That hunter in the Fables, 
 who carved his bow till it broke, must have been a 
 native of Munich. Nothing is more common than to 
 find ornamental articles of great merit side by side with 
 the coarsest and most careless objects of use. The 
 carved and coloured glass produced in Munich is well 
 known to all travellers ; a large stand of it was shown 
 iu the International Exhibition, and the shop under 
 the Arcades, in which it is for sale, attrabts every one 
 to its windows. Yet the common table-glass supplied 
 in Munich is as awkward and common as can be con- 
 ceived. Or take the case of china. Munich boasts 
 that its porcelain pictures are larger than those manu- 
 factured at Dresden, or in any of the French establish- 
 ments. Dresden, Vienna, and Berlin sent large shows 
 of porcelain to the International, and there is a royal 
 
CHINA. 191 
 
 manufactory at Nymphenburgh, about three miles from 
 Munich. But if you want a handsome dinner-set or a 
 tea-service you must get either French or English china. 
 The Nymphenburg articles are strong and solid, but 
 their shapes are so ineonvenient, as well as inartistic, 
 that they neither serve for ornament nor use. The 
 plates are made with enormous rims, sloping at such 
 an angle that neither salt nor mustard will stay on 
 them. The dishes are so deep, and so much space is 
 taken up by the size of their rims that carving meets 
 with the most serious difficulties. The recommenda- 
 tion of Montanus in the fourth satire of Juvenal, 
 
 " Testa alta paretur 
 " QuEe teBui muro spatiosum coUigat orbem," 
 
 is greatly wanted in Munich, where an exactly opposite 
 plan of construction has been followed. One would 
 think, however, that with Berlin and Dresden about 
 fifteen hours distant by rail, and Vienna only twelve, 
 it would not be necessary to employ Sevres or Miuton 
 if you w^anted a set of china in Munich. 
 
 One can hardly fail to remark the jealousy with 
 which the German states keep up their home produce, 
 and supply themselves only from the other states with 
 which they are politically allied. The number of Vien- 
 nese articles that are sold in Munich form an additional 
 reason for the Bavarian advocacy of the admission of 
 Austria into the Zollverein. Wurtemberg is closer at 
 hand, and is separated by no custom-houses, but many 
 more Viennese than Wurtemberg articles are to be 
 found in Munich. It strikes one still more when one 
 
192 SOCIAL LIPE IN MUNICH. 
 
 compares the exports from Germany with its home con- 
 sumption. In the ZoUverein department of the Inter- 
 national one admired the beautiful things that came 
 from Germany with a secret wonder that they could not 
 be found in the shops of their native land. The Ger- 
 mans lecture themselves every day on the necessity of 
 supplying their own wants, and of making themselves 
 independent of France, yet they export their best arti- 
 cles, and people living in Germany are driven to use 
 French goods from the vileness of those the Germans 
 would substitute. You can buy better German toys in 
 England than you can in Germany, and you pay less 
 for the good ones in England than for the bad ones in 
 Germany. The Wurtemberg toys in the International 
 were perfect, yet if you want a first-rate toy in Munich, 
 you must get one that comes from Paris. Nor is this 
 impotence of the Germans confined to such luxuries as 
 toys; it is seen in all the productions of Munich. 
 Everything that is really elegant comes from Vienna, if 
 it comes from any part of Germany. And the removal 
 of duties between Bavaria and Austria would be a mea- 
 sure of the utmost benefit to Munich, while the imposi- 
 tion of duties between Bavaria and the states of north 
 Germany would not inflict a corresponding damage. 
 
 The advocates of the admission of Austria into the 
 ZoUverein have generally confined themselves to princi- 
 ples, but the details are the real secret of their advocacy. 
 Take the question of wines. The Austrian and Hun- 
 garian wines would no doubt supplant the Rhine wines 
 in Munich, not being much inferior in flavour, and pro- 
 bably better suited to the chmate. Or take fiirniture. 
 
FURNITITRE. 193 
 
 I read with, surprise that the Bavarian Commissioner at 
 the International was made President of the Jury for 
 furniture on the ground that Germany stood pre-emi- 
 nent among all nations in that branch of industry, and 
 Bavaria had sent several masterpieces of the kind to the 
 Exhibition. I know that furniture in Munich is both 
 bad and dear; awkward shapes are almost invariably 
 selected for easy chairs and sofas, and if you see a 
 graceful fauteuil, ten to one it has come from Vienna. 
 If the awkwardness was purchased by increased solidity 
 one could hardly repine, but this is not the case. Much 
 of the Munich furniture is made of unseasoned wood, 
 which cracks at every change of temperature. Glue 
 does not seem possessed of due powers of sticking, and 
 constant mending is needed with almost every species 
 of article. I never met with a piece of furniture that 
 stood straight, although the unevenness of the floors 
 may be a slight justification for the upholsterers. Vi- 
 enna, on the other hand, exports the most beautiful 
 furniture; easy chairs that are models of luxury and 
 grace, without the over-refinement and consequent 
 want of durability of Parisian work. In a humbler 
 way the light cane chairs of Austria are much to be 
 recommended, being produced at a cheap rate, and 
 combining elegance with solidity. The chairs of the 
 same class made in Munich are either dear or brittle, 
 besides being clumsy and ungraceful. I might touch 
 upon other classes, but I believe these are samples 
 enough. There are many faults to be found in Munich 
 manufacturers which might be bettered by free impor- 
 tation from Austria. The example of Vienna work, 
 
194 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 as well as the stimulus that the home trade of Munich 
 would probably receive from competition, would no 
 doubt have effects on masters and workmen, and I can- 
 not but hope that these effects would be good. There 
 is certainly a great need of them. In spite of the im- 
 pulse just given by a partial relaxation of the guild 
 laws, the trade of Munich is still in a state of bar- 
 barism. It would almost be tedious to specify the 
 inconveniences that arise from careless workmanship, 
 stupidity carried to its farthest extent, and all the con- 
 sequences of these two motive powers acting on the 
 most promising material. Suffice it that the difficulty 
 of getting shoes in Munich is so great that many per- 
 sons have theirs made either in Tegernsee or Ratisbon, 
 the first place being forty miles, the second almost eighty 
 miles distant. 
 
 The matter of shoes is closely connected with that of 
 Pavements, and paving-stones were sent from within 
 four miles of Munich to the Exhibition. I suggested at 
 the time that the specimens ought to be arrested in 
 transit, and applied to the wants of the town. Munich 
 is, I believe, the worst paved, and the least paved, city 
 on the continent. The old parts of the town are paved 
 with little pointed stones which are the destruction of 
 leather, and on which penitents might walk without 
 needing peas in their shoes to carry out their sentence. 
 But the more fashionable part of the town, including 
 the trottoir in front of King Ludwig's palace is a 
 swamp. Mud is the normal state of these side walks 
 the greater part of the year, and the groimd partakes 
 to such a degree of the nature of a quicksand that a 
 
WATER-WORKS. 195 
 
 cartload of gravel is swallowed up in the course of a 
 winter. It seems that the municipal law of Munich 
 leaves the proprietors free to pave, or not to pave, in 
 front of their houses, and the majority of proprietors 
 accept the less onerous liberty in its fullest signifi- 
 cation. 
 
 Great importance is attached to the " water-laws " of 
 Bavaria, and a volume in explanation of them has been 
 published by an eminent jurist. The Isar is particu- 
 larly arranged for the transmission of rafts; slides are 
 contrived in certain places, and the water is dammed 
 in so as .to be under control. And yet in the very midst 
 of this subtle organisation you may see workmen driving 
 piles into the bed of the river by hand, with a fall of 
 water actually washing the piles as they are driven 
 down. It never seems to have occurred to them that 
 the water could have done their work with a tenth part 
 of the trouble, and the great body of the stream is let 
 off without any employment, though its swiftness and 
 strength are enough to flood the town. The fire 
 brigade is in like manner neglected, and the arrange- 
 ments for putting out fires are highly inefficient. I 
 was present one night at a fire, and it took three 
 quarters of an hour to get an uninterrupted stream of 
 water. At first casks and barrels were brought up and 
 pumped dry without the slightest effect. Just as the 
 hose poured forth a good shoot of water, and the fire 
 began to settle down with an uneasy motion, the cask 
 was dry; the fireman shouted "Wasser auf" in vain, 
 and the flames, relieved from their enemy, sprang up 
 more vigorously than before, putting out their tongues, 
 
196 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 as it were, in contempt at the paltry opposition. That 
 no blame attached to the fire brigade, or to any of the 
 people employed, was shown by the result of an inquiry 
 which was instituted to satisfy the numerous com- 
 plainants. The magistrates of Munich declared that 
 the accusations of delay and disorder brought against 
 the fire brigade were unfounded, a decision equivalent 
 to an admission that there was no irregularity, nothing 
 unusual in the proceedings. It takes, therefore, three 
 quarters of an hour for the fire brigade of Munich to 
 extinguish a fire in a shed, and the Government is con- 
 tented with the result, as it refused to sanction the for- 
 mation of a volunteer brigade, the method which, of all 
 others, has proved the most efiective. 
 
 The custom house in Munich occupies the site of an 
 old church, and if you look up from the examination of 
 your goods you see the arches and the vaulted roof 
 of the nave over your head. Ecclesiastical authorities 
 might consider the present use of the buildkig a dese- 
 cration, but the custom house officials have provided 
 against the charge by exceeding deference to the genius 
 loci. The mediaeval spirit in which they transact their 
 business is fully worthy of that ancient monastery in 
 which the friars said mumpsimus instead of sumpsimus. 
 My own experience of the place has fortunately been 
 small. It is tedious to unpack a small box, see the 
 contents of it weighed, one after another, stand at a 
 table while paper after paper is filled with minute de- 
 clarations, and then find that the duty only amounts 
 to a penny farthing. Sheridan was indignant when 
 his servant threw down a plate-warmer without break- 
 
LOCAL MATTERS. 197 
 
 ing anything: "Yqu d — d fool, do you mean to say 
 you have made all that noise for nothing?" — and in 
 like manner one feels wroth at waiting half-an-hour in 
 order to pay a penny farthing with formality enough 
 for ten pounds. But this is nothing to a case that 
 came to my ears. The inventor of a gun brought it to 
 Munich, and submitted it to the Ministry of War. The 
 custom house delivered up the gun to the Ministry on 
 application, but demanded 130 florins duty from the 
 inventor. He did not think it worth his while to pay 
 the money, as the gun was in the hands of the Ministry 
 of War, and paid no attention to the demand. As soon 
 as trial had been made of the gun it was returned to 
 the custom house, but the officials sent to the owner to 
 say that he must come and pay them the money de- 
 manded at first, and take a receipt for it; must then 
 receive the money again and give a receipt for it. 
 
 With these facts before me I think myself justified 
 in passing an unfavourable judgment on the practical 
 side of Munich. It is not as an Englishman that I 
 take this view, for I have endeavoured in all these 
 chapters to emancipate myself as far as possible from 
 national prejudices. But I note these characteristics 
 as the great obstacles to improvement, as blots on the 
 artistic glory which Munich arrogates to itself, and as 
 faults that the boasted merits of the town are far from 
 compensating. If it be urged that these things are 
 matters of local and limited interest, I can only reply 
 that we take interest in the local questions of barbarous 
 countries ; and it can hardly be said that the islands of 
 the Pacific are more attractive and more liable to be 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 BAVARIAN RAILWAYS. 
 
 If you examine a railway map of Europe, you can 
 hardly fail to observe ttat there is an elementary stage 
 which has to be gone through by almost all countries 
 before their communications can be completed. In the 
 infancy of travel one railway is expected to suffice for 
 enormous tracts of countiy, and as towns have a way of 
 lying in nooks and corners, instead of making a direct 
 chain between two given points, the railway has to 
 wander off in search of them. By degrees, as traffic 
 increases, the enormous curves and windings are found 
 inconvenient, and gradually a straight line grows up, 
 fed like a large river by constant tributaries, and taking 
 in at points of junction the contributions of the out- 
 lying towns. The clever arrangement of so many years 
 back is found a great impediment ; the expense of time 
 and fuel required to wander round the country is 
 double what the straight line demands, and with many 
 grumbles at the wisdom of their ancestors, the people 
 begin to rebuild on a better foundation. Now spring 
 up all those tangles of loop lines which make poets 
 compare the map of England to a spider's web, and 
 
THE ELEMENTAKY STAGE. 199 
 
 which can only be matched by Belgium on the Con- 
 tinent. Now the only objection to travel is the dif- 
 ficulty of choosing among so many competitors, and 
 the increasing study of Bradshaw renders a mathe- 
 matical education desirable. If only English railway 
 companies could agree, like birds in their little nests • 
 nor always make blind attempts to feather them at the 
 expense of their rivals ; and if the English railway car- 
 riages were only as convenient as the German, travelling 
 in England would have no impediment. 
 
 The railways in Bavaria are still in the elementary 
 stage. In the last few years some progress has been 
 made with them, great progress for Germans; but so 
 much remains to be done that very many years must 
 elapse before they can at all approach completion. The 
 Government does not care to speculate on the traffic 
 that would no doubt be called into existence in Bavaria, 
 as it has been in all other countries, by supplying it 
 with means of locomotion, and the people are so slug- 
 gish and indifferent that they wait the good pleasure of 
 the Government. Private railway companies are not 
 native on the Continent ; in Bavaria there is only one 
 of them. TiU the year 1856 every strip of railway in 
 Bavaria was in the hands of the State, but in that year 
 a company was allowed to build a railway from Munich 
 to Batisbon, Linz, and Nuremberg, with a promise from 
 the State that no one should make another railway con- 
 necting the same termini for 99 years. The promise 
 implies a very long elementary stage, and one need 
 only trace on the map the line so protected to predict 
 the results of this monopoly. Still the endeavours of a 
 
200 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 few years have been crowned with much success, and have 
 not beeri without good effects. In 1859 the quickest 
 way from Munich to Vienna was by Dresden, a railway 
 journey of thirty-six hours; it can now be done di- 
 rect in thirteen. Any body acquainted with Bavarian 
 Eilwagen will admit that the worst of all railroads is an 
 improvement on them. In 1859 I wanted to go from 
 Munich to Vienna, and tried to catch the steamer from 
 Ratisbon. Seeing that the Eilwagen was advertised to 
 arrive in Eatisbon at the hour the steamer left, I sup- 
 posed that they corresponded, and calculating the 
 distance, I found that going four miles an hour we 
 should have time to do it. And yet we managed to 
 miss the steamer. I do not think even the Bavarian 
 Eilwagen could have done so if it had been left to 
 itself; but in order to lose time they changed the 
 hordes from one carriage to another, which probably 
 just occupied the twenty minutes by which we were 
 too late. To this day I cannot fathom the motives 
 which impelled them to take two horses out of one 
 diligence and put them in another. The horses were 
 just the same, the carriages were just the same, and 
 they were going the same way. I presume it was 
 innate stupidity, very highly developed by constantly 
 driving a Bavarian Eilwagen. Let us be glad we are 
 rid of them at last. 
 
 Besides the direct communication with Vienna, rail- 
 ways have been opened between Munich and Ratisbon, 
 from Ratisbon up to Nuremberg and down the Danube, 
 and from Ratisbon across to Prague. The importance 
 of these eastern railways is very great, especially the 
 
GREAT CIRCLE SAILING.' 201 
 
 line last mentioned. It is but a year ago Prague was 
 only accessible by Vienna, or by Dresden, and the 
 Bohemian baths could only be reached after a long and 
 tedious journey. Of course when the choice lies be- 
 tween going an immense way round by rail, and going 
 straight by road, one would choose the former, for in 
 Bavaria all travelling goes on the principle of great 
 circle sailing, the longest way round the shortest way 
 there. 
 
 Other lines of equal importance have already been 
 decreed, but the slowness of German work will pro- 
 bably cause it to be some time before they are in opera- 
 tion. The trunk line between Munich and Frankfort 
 is to be shortened by two additions, one from Ansbach 
 to Wurzburg, the other from Nuremberg to Wurzburg. 
 The first of these lines makes a difference of 70 miles 
 between Augsburg and Wurzburg, the second makes 
 one of thirty- six miles between Nuremburg and Wurz- 
 burg. At present, though Frankfort is close on the bor- 
 ders of Bavaria, and the main Bavarian line runs from 
 Munich to Frankfort, the trafiBc generally goes through 
 Wurtemburg and Baden. For going through Wurtem- 
 berg and Baden you take ten or eleven hours getting from 
 Munich to Frankfort ; going by the Bavarian line you 
 take thirteen or fourteen. The Wurtemberg line is not 
 as straight as it might be, but the Bavarian might, for 
 any frontier question, be almost direct. The proposed 
 abbreviation will make it the shorter of the two. At 
 present it makes a digression to visit the interesting 
 town of Nuremberg, and, being so far out of its course, 
 there is no reason why it should not go a little further 
 
 k3 
 
203 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 and see Bamberg. Thus it describes an exact semi- 
 circle before it gets to Wurzburg, a proceeding worthy 
 of a Vacation Tourist, but savouring of contemptible 
 weakness in a railroad. The frontiers of Wurtemberg 
 and Austria come down so menacingly to the Lake of 
 Constance, shutting Lindau into so small a space that 
 some people explain the snake-like twistings of the rail- 
 road between Augsburg and Lindau by political neces- 
 sity. But compare the actual frontier inai'ks with the 
 windings of the rail, and you see that there was room 
 enough between the two countries if the Bavarian engi- 
 neers had not preferred a tortuous course. The line 
 from Munich to Salzburg instead of crossing the Isar at 
 Munich, where the banks are lower, makes an enormous 
 curve in order to cross it three miles above. The 
 bridge, which is taken across at this point, is highly 
 vaunted as a marvel of engineering, and it is really said, 
 with perfect gravity, that the engineer chose this most 
 difficult place the more gloriously to overcome the diffi- 
 culties. After this beginning the line goes down tUl it 
 almost touches the mountains, makes a curve upon it- 
 self, and winds out and in of a most picturesque ravine, 
 now leaning on one side, now on the other, to the 
 terror of nervous passengers. Bridge, curve, ravine, all 
 might have been avoided. But with that respect for 
 tradition and for their classical authors that all Germans 
 possess, I presume they feel bound to make their rail- 
 roads on the principle laid down by Schiller. Duty and 
 inclination are not more opposed than straight lines 
 and German, and this passage can be applied to rail- 
 roads as aptly as to conflicting motives. 
 
SCHILLER AS VATES. 203 
 
 " Grad'aus geht dea Blitzes, 
 Grelit des Kanonballs furcliterUcher Pfad — 
 Sennell, auf dem nachsten Wege, langt er an, 
 Macht sich zermalinend Platz, um zu zermalmen. 
 Mein Sohn ! die Strasse, die der Meusoli befahrt, 
 Worauf der Segen wandelt, dieae folgt 
 Der Pliisse Lauf, der Thaler freien E^rummen, 
 Umgeht das Weizenfeld, den Eebeuhiigel, 
 Des Eigenthums gemesa'ne G-ranzen ehrend — 
 So fiihrt aie apater, sicher, dooh zum Ziel." 
 
 PicoOLOMiNl, Act i., Scene 4. 
 
 " Straightforward goes 
 The ightning's path, and straight the fearful path 
 Of the caimon-baU. Direct it fUes and rapid, 
 Shatt'ring that it may reach, and shatt'ring what it reaches. 
 My son ! the road the human being travels, 
 That, on which blessing comes and goes, doth follow 
 The river's course, the valley's playful windings, 
 Curves round the corn-field and the lull of vines, 
 Honouring the holy bounds of property ! 
 And thus secure, tho' late, leads to ita end." 
 
 Colebid&b's Tranalation. 
 
 The aptness of the description, can hardly be dis- 
 puted ; it would seem as if SchUler had possessed the. 
 prophetic eye that once was the poet's attribute. Every 
 detail is faithful and apposite from the windings of the 
 railroad down to its late arrival. It is to be wished 
 that the correctness of the phrase " secure" did not 
 apply to German trains alone, or that an Englishman 
 could touch on that point without admitting that his 
 country has something to learn. 
 
 But, in spite of our natural impatience, we must 
 own that progress has been made, and though while 
 
204 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 things are doing they always seem to go slow, when one 
 looks back one can judge more favourably. The activity 
 of the present reign as compared with the former is 
 shown to some extent in the railway. When King 
 Maximilian ascended the throne in 1848 there were 
 scarcely more than 230 miles of railroad existing, and 
 these, says the writer from whom I take the informa- 
 tion, were scattered fragments without any connection. 
 In 186], on the other hand, there are almost 1,150 
 miles open. It is interesting to compare these facts 
 with the panegyrics passed on King Ludwig as creator 
 of the Bavarian railways. You might as well call the 
 Pope the creator of the Italian railways. No doubt 
 Bavaria had her first Unes opened under King Ludwig, just 
 as the line from Civita Vecchia to Rome has been opened 
 by Pope Pius the Ninth. But the creator of anything is 
 not the possessor of authority which cannot resist its 
 introduction, and unless it can be shown that King 
 Ludwig took any active part in calling the Bavarian 
 railways into existence, the name cannot with any jus- 
 tice be applied to him. 
 
 One cannot but regret that under a government 
 vhich seems really desirous of introducing practical 
 measures, some means are not taken to make the rail- 
 ways more available. The system still pursued is radi- 
 cally defective, and while all the faults of neighbouring 
 countries are preserved, their merits are seldom adopted. 
 For instance, in Wurtemberg the long American cars 
 are in use, and their convenience is evident to all who 
 have travelled in them. In Bavaria the carriages are 
 
DESPOTISM OP GUAllDS. 203 
 
 generally narrow and stuffy, evils which are aggravated 
 by the custom invariably adopted of cramming each 
 separate carriage before opening another. On these 
 lines the guards are officials, and their blue and white 
 uniform is as much respected as if they were generals 
 on parade. In England the guard is content to be the 
 servant of the train ; in Germany he is in command of 
 the passengers. "When is the train going on," asked 
 an Englishman once of a foreign guard. " Whenever I 
 choose," was the answer. To judge from the delays 
 the trains make at some stations, one would suppose 
 that the guard had uncontrolled power of causing stop- 
 pages. You see him chatting, with the station-master 
 for several minutes after all the carriages have been 
 shut up, and at last, when the topics of conversation are 
 exhausted, he gives a condescending whistle to the 
 engine-driver. Time seems never to be considered by 
 either guards or passengers. Bavarians always go to 
 the station half an hour before the train is due, and 
 their indifference to delay is so well known that the 
 directors can put on their time-book, " As the time of 
 departure from small stations cannot be guaranteed, the 
 travellers must be there twenty-five minutes before- 
 hand." 
 
 As an Englishman who respects the liberty of the 
 subject, and endeavours not to sin against time, I con- 
 sider this rule one of the most flagrant offences to both 
 that can be devised. But I cannot help owning its 
 necessity. It alludes to goods trains carrying pas- 
 sengers, and it is quite impossible to fix the time at 
 which a goods train will arrive at any station. You 
 
206 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 may easily allow a few minutes for passengers getting 
 in and out; and even if there is an unusual number, 
 the time will hardly be over-passed. But no calculation 
 can be made of the delay to which a goods train may 
 be subjected. A man may want to send up bars of iron 
 from a small station, where there is no possibility of 
 loading it before the train arrives, and only one porter 
 to load it then. There is a great deal of goods traffic 
 on the Bavarian lines, and therefore full-time must be 
 allowed. Of course I object as strongly to the prin- 
 ciple of combining goods trains and passenger trains; 
 a principle which is mischievous as well as mistaken. 
 But with a great amount of goods traffic, and with pas- 
 sengers whom you can use at your own good pleasure, 
 with single lines moreover, and great curves and climb- 
 ings, which render fast travelling impossible, it can 
 hardly be avoided. If it were not for the meekness of 
 Germans, however, some steps would have to be taken 
 to remedy it. On what English line would the pas- 
 sengers allow themselves to be ordered about in such a 
 way, to be put in goods trains, and desired to come five 
 and twenty minutes before the time stated on the train 
 bUls? And what English line exists which does not 
 put on more passenger trains than the most important 
 lines in Bavaria ? I have lived long enough on bye-lines 
 to know how Englishmen are treated when they do not 
 travel, and have seen trains almost empty performing 
 their journeys with the same zeal as if they had been 
 full. But in Bavaria, where people do travel, and an 
 empty carriage is an exception, you have at the most 
 two nassenger trains a day, and four or five goods 
 
SINGLE LINES. 207 
 
 trains -with passengers. How comes it that there is so 
 much goods traffic that the passenger traffic is sacri- 
 ficed to it? Or is it that the meekness of the pas- 
 sengers entitles them to he classed with goods, being 
 quite as unresisting, and even more easily managed, 
 because they have not to be lifted ? 
 
 One of the causes of this paucity of trains is the 
 predominance of single lines, though there is no reason 
 why five or six goods trains should do the Work of pas- 
 senger trains on this account alone. Single lines of 
 course interfere with, in fact destroy the possibility of, 
 quick travel and activity. But they exist almost through 
 the whole of Bavaria; it was only the other day a 
 double line was laid between Munich and Augsburg. 
 "With single lines you have not only to arrange the 
 times of trains running in the same direction, but also 
 of the trains meeting each other. AU trains must 
 meet at a station, as only there is a possibility of pass- 
 ing. A complete regulation of the whole traffic is thus 
 necessary, and no alteration can be made without alter- 
 ing the whole, and if one train is at all behind its time, 
 the whole hne suffers for it. The train that has to meet 
 at one station must be kept back, for fear of a colUsion; 
 this train is also thrown out of its time, and the delay 
 is felt again further down the line. This acts and re- 
 acts throughout the day; so that the old proverb is 
 verified, that if you lose half an hour in the morning, 
 you will never catch it up again, if you run after it till 
 the evening ; and Bavarian trains do not run after the 
 time they have lost. 
 
 I need hardly say that the rate of travelling is ex- 
 
208 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 ceedingly slow. Express trains sometimes attain twenty- 
 seven miles an hour, excluding stoppages; but ordi- 
 nary passenger trains do not seem to get beyond fifteen 
 to eighteen, and goods trains, I should judge, about ten. 
 I counted more than thirty waggons in a goods train 
 by which I travelled, and on tlie long .curves I saw the 
 engine at least a quarter of a mile a-head, and had 
 some difficulty in believing it had any connection with 
 my carriage. Formerly, the express train from Paris 
 used to arrive in Augsburg five minutes after the express 
 for Munich had left, and the passengers had to go on 
 by goods train. This, however, was remedied a few 
 years ago, and the intimate acquaintance with the 
 manners and customs of the people which is gained by 
 travelling in their most national train, was no longer 
 imposed on express passengers. One or two similar 
 reforms have also been introduced within my recollec- 
 tion. The fast trains now leave Munich at six, formerly 
 they left at five. Formerly, too, the train at this hour 
 was the only fast train ; so that you had only a choice 
 between getting up at three, and Bavarian travelling. 
 Now there is a train at night. 
 
 But these reforms are brought in with all possible 
 deliberation. How long was it before the bridge was 
 built over the Rhine at Strasbourg, and that tedious 
 omnibus journey supplanted by the rail? Of course 
 the bridge could not be built without forts being planted 
 at each end, to blow it up at an instant's notice; in 
 fact, to many, the forts are more essential parts of the 
 work than the bridge. And even when the bridge was 
 built, efiecting a saving of two hours time, it was a 
 
POLITICAL ECONOMY OF KAILROADS. 209 
 
 year and a-half before any acceleration of the trains 
 took place to correspond. So far from this, the time 
 between Munich and Paris was longer the year after 
 the bridge was built than the year before. We have to 
 go to Austria to find a parallel for this, in the stoppage 
 of the express train between Vienna and Trieste, be- 
 cause it wore out the rails, and did not pay. 
 
 The political economy of raiboads seems not to be 
 understood by Germans. They do not see that by cul- 
 tivating passengers you make them increase; that by 
 throwing facilities in their way you entice them to 
 travel. An express train between such places as the 
 capital of Austria and its sea-port town, is not a matter 
 of speculation ; it is a duty to civilisation. Do the 
 night mails in England pay? I have been the only 
 through passenger in one. If the letters make them 
 pay, and not the passengers, the same would apply to 
 the mail between Vienna and Trieste, especially as the 
 postal system adopted in Germany is not the uniform 
 rate, but the rate by distance. It is not in this point 
 alone that Germans seem ignorant of railway economy. 
 The chief thing to be saved by railway travel is time, 
 and that we have seen to be squandered, and how much 
 money is thrown away on the stations, instead of being 
 employed on the trains. 
 
 Mr. Kuskin inveighs eloquently against ornamenting 
 railway stations ; he need only come to Bavaria to find the 
 most grievous offences against his law. The railway sta- 
 tion in Munich is as elegant as any of the other public 
 buildings ; only the other day frescoes were painted in 
 
210 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the large hall whence the trains take their exit, and 
 into which they have their entrance. 
 
 Moreover, royal travellers are strangely considered in 
 the building of railway stations. In the Munich sta- 
 tion there is a K'dnig' s-salon, king's saloon, in which 
 royal passengers take their meals, and at the door of 
 which a Suisse is posted, as if it was a palace chamber. 
 The furniture of the saloon, as I saw once when pass- 
 ing, is luxurious and elegant, and the porter of the sta- 
 tion^-not porter in the English sense, but in the Suisse 
 — was standing outside with cocked hat, long fur -bor- 
 dered coat, and mace, to receive the guests of distinc- 
 tion. Is it too much to ask whose money pays for all 
 this finery ; whose money keeps a Suisse at a railway 
 station in grand livery, and a saloon fitted up like one 
 in king's houses? Surely not the public money, nor 
 that of the passengers. I cannot believe that either 
 taxes or fares would be squandered so uselessly, that a 
 royal person may pass through a furnished saloon to his 
 carriage, or may take his meals in a public building, 
 instead of going to a palace or an hotel. 
 
 Royal personages need not wait for trains because 
 trains wait for royal personages. And those who are 
 actually royal, not half-royal, or ex-royal, have trains 
 to themselves. But the public does need some accom- 
 modation in Bavarian stations. Mr. Uuskin's reason 
 for objecting to every kind of ornament in railway sta- 
 tions is, that we don't want to stay in them longer than 
 we can help. But the Bavarians, who come an hour 
 before the time, must be catered for differently. Some 
 
MUNICH AND PADDINGTON. 211 
 
 diversion must be found for people who pass their life 
 preparing for their journeys, and to these Mr. Ruskin's 
 premisses do not apply. But I agree with his conclu- 
 sion on entirely different grounds. The money that is 
 earned by traffic should not be invested in such frippe- 
 ries. Double lines, and sufBcient trains, ought to pre- 
 cede frescoes and architectural designs, and it will be time 
 to think of the latter, if a surplus remains after the 
 completion of all practical arrangements. The sight of 
 a well-appointed train steaming at speed, with well- 
 subordinated guards and free passengers, is infinitely 
 more gratifying to the eye than frescoes symbolising a 
 progress that is not yet attained. 
 
 That same mistaken principle, which appears in 
 almost every public work in Munich, is conspicuous 
 in these frescoes. The ornaments superimposed on 
 useful buildings are more considered than the use for 
 which the buildings are designed. Perhaps this is 
 more apparent in the railway station than elsewhere. 
 Compare the Munich station with that of the Great 
 Western in London, the fittings of which are so splendid, 
 and which we boast with justice to be the finest work of 
 the kind in England. The arrangements of the Munich 
 station are defective from a practical point of view, 
 while those at Paddington are in every way suited to 
 the convenience of travellers. Prom the outside the 
 Paddington station does not present the artistic appear- 
 ance of the Munich station, and absence of striking 
 effects and harmonious colours on the inside is suffi- 
 ciently shown in Mr. Frith's great picture. Mr. Frith 
 would have done better to select the inside of the 
 
212 SOCIAL LITE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Munich station to form a background to his very 
 dramatic train ; no grey monotony there, but a banquet 
 of colour, and profusion of elaborate workmanship. 
 Above the white- curtained windows of the resta.urant at 
 the end of the hall are the new frescoes, painted by 
 a pupil of Kaulbach named Echter, to whose hands are 
 due the immense frescoes on the staircase of the Mu- 
 seum in Berlin. Nor are these two unworthy of the 
 student of such a master. They represent allegorically 
 the two motive powers of modern traffic, steam and elec- 
 tricity. The telegraph is symboUsed by a female form 
 rising from the earth, her hair flying wildly from her 
 head in threads like the far- stretching lines of wire. 
 On one side of her is another nymph whispering a 
 message into the ear of a pendulous child, and the 
 message darts through a chain of floating children to a 
 nymph on the opposite side, who writes it down. In 
 the picture of Steam we have a female figure who has 
 yoked the spirit of steam to her car, and is borne along 
 by his mighty efibrts. He is a strong, muscular man, 
 puffing out full breaths of steam, and labouring onwards 
 with gigantic power and energetic display of anatomy. 
 Before him the barriers of different countries crack and 
 tumble right and left, crushing the old pigtailed figure 
 of restriction in their fall. Passports, wanderbuchs, 
 permis de depart are sent flying " a thousand leagues 
 into the devious air," like the manifold objects sent by 
 Milton's scorn to people the Paradise of Fools. Grace- 
 ful and good design must be allowed to these frescoes, 
 with the great merit of presenting allegory successfully. 
 They are placed too high, and are quite out of place. 
 
TRANSCENDENTALISM. 213 
 
 but the painter's share in them is only worthy of 
 praise. 
 
 " The beautiful thought/' says an ultra-philosophical 
 critic in one of the German papers^ " that a town like 
 Munich ought to show its character as art-town to the 
 stranger at the first moment, on the threshold of his 
 entry, is so evident that one can but wonder that it has 
 only now come to be accomphshed. We greet this ac- 
 complishment the more gladly that we have had to wait 
 so long for it. Under the present system of travel the 
 railway station is, in some measure, the threshold of a 
 town. The railway station is the place where the cha- 
 racter of the town is first displayed," and so on. If this 
 be true, the character of Munich is certainly well shown 
 in its railway station. When the passenger who arrives 
 has to get out in the rain and walk in it a hundred yards 
 before reaching the covered hall, which is filled up with 
 the goods-waggons, he may cast a hasty glimpse up to 
 the frescoes, and ask why they are not turned into a 
 covering against the rain. And the parting guest who 
 has learned the character of Munich, will hardly need 
 the further instruction afforded by a station in which 
 the frescoes are placed in the hall, but the passengers 
 for whose gratification they were painted are kept out of 
 their sight in the waiting-room. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY. 
 
 Why is it called Royal? The Royal Court and State 
 Library. Is it so exclusively used, first by Royalty, 
 then by the Court, and lastly by the State ? Far from 
 it ; it is more public in its nature than the British Mu- 
 seum which pretends to no such exalted titles. And 
 yet the British Museum has more right to such names 
 than the library in Munich, for George the Fourth's pri- 
 vate collection was to some extent the nucleus of, at all 
 events a great addition to, the present library, and with- 
 out some introduction no reader is admitted. In Mu- 
 nich any one may read in the library without being 
 introduced. I believe the books have been collected 
 chiefly from old monasteries ; the sums required by the 
 library are voted by the Chamber, and the costs of 
 building do not appear in the list of King Ludwig's dis- 
 bursements. By what right, therefore, is the library 
 royal? But call it public, and see how Bavarian loyalty 
 vrill be offended : and yet, to my mind, public is a more 
 honourable title than royal. A library freely open to 
 all, as the Munich library is, seems to me public in the 
 largest sense. And I readily admit the merits of the 
 
A PRELIMINARY REMARK. 215 
 
 Municli library ; it is generous and hospitable to stran- 
 gers as to natives; it grudges nothing that is in its 
 power, nor could it well be expected to give more than 
 it gives. One is apt to forget that Munich is only the 
 capital of Bavaria, and seeing it do so much, one thinks 
 that it might easily do more ; and one's English notions 
 of the practical are too susceptible. Let me not be 
 deemed ungrateful to a library whence I have received 
 so much assistance, and where I have been treated with 
 so much consideration, if I seem to dweU more on its 
 defects than on its merits, more on what it wants than 
 on what it possesses. 
 
 As I have mentioned the British Museum in connec- 
 tion with the Munich Library, and as many readers are 
 probably familiar with the former, I can best make the 
 Munich system clear by contrasting the two. There 
 can be no greater contrast. The English and the Ger- 
 man are as fully shown in their libraries as in any other 
 subject of comparison. The ideas of the two nations, 
 their manner of life, appear in every detail. In the 
 British Museum everything is done that can promote 
 the comfort of the readers. There is a large class of 
 attendants constantly running backwards and forwards 
 with piles of books and MSS.; original documents to 
 aid the researches of a historian, heraldic tomes for 
 some gentleman deep in families, a three volume novel 
 for a young student who prefers the lighter side of 
 national life; there is an elaborate catalogue ready to 
 hand, and sufficient to suggest subjects of study to 
 those in want of literary employment; not to mention 
 the minor comforts of a pleasant room, lofty and well 
 
316 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 ventilated^ those comfortable chairs, the desk for each 
 reader with his book supporter and blotting pad, the 
 countless books of reference within every one's reach, 
 the map of the room, that guides you to every subject 
 represented on its walls. There is nothing of this in 
 the Munich library. The reading-room is low and 
 dark, vaulted like a crypt, with heavy pillars; the fit- 
 tings consist in two long bare tables, at which every one 
 reads, without a desk to support books, or any conve- 
 nience for transcribing. Neither catalogue nor books of 
 reference are in the room, nor are they to be had with- 
 out special permission. But the chief inconvenience is 
 that you may have only one book at a time, and you 
 must bespeak that the day before. The result is that 
 the reading-room is very scantily tenanted, and the 
 power of taking books away leads all who can to read at 
 home. There is no lack of civility or willingness on the 
 part of the employes, but they are very few, .are probably 
 overworked, and underpaid. 
 
 The chief difference between the Munich system and 
 the London system lies in the permission granted to all 
 properly authenticated readers to take books home. 
 This is of itself sufficient to alter the whole manner of 
 study. But there are some minor differences which I 
 will treat first in order. The number of feast-days and 
 their rigid observance is very obnoxious to regular 
 students. One never knows exactly when the library is 
 going to be open. One day it is shut because it is the 
 King's nameday, another because it is the Queen's; 
 one day because there is a procession down the Lud- 
 wig's Strasse, another because there is a procession 
 
A ROYAL KOAD TO LEARNING. 217 
 
 down the Maximilian's Strasse. Then there are three 
 days during the October feast^ and odd days about 
 Christmas tide. I do not complain of the holidays 
 granted to the attendants, but of their uncertainty and 
 their irregularity. Again, in London, while great 
 eiforts were made to adorn the inside of the reading- 
 room with fitting splendourj the outside and the ap- 
 proach are by no means magnificent. In Munich the 
 outside is gorgeous, and the inside is mean. The build- 
 ing, designed by Gartner, is a noble work in the Byzan- 
 tine style, by far the finest in the Ludwig's Strasse. 
 On entering you ascend a superb staircase, the wonder 
 of all visitors, and the subject of praise to all valets-de- 
 place. The steps are of marble, broad and easy, the 
 walls adorned with medallions, and the head flanked 
 by two statues of princes of the Bavarian house. There 
 can be but one opinion of the splendour of this stair- 
 case, and but one opinion of its unfitness. In a palace 
 built entirely for show and for luxury, it would be 
 graceful and becoming. But when it leads you to the 
 dingy reading-room without one fitting either for com- 
 fort or for show, when you notice the poverty of the 
 internal arrangements and the want of attendants, and 
 are told that the library is too poor to afford anything 
 better, you ask why was not the staircase turned into 
 something useful. But this is the plan King Ludwig 
 has followed in every one of his buildings. In every 
 one purpose is sacrificed to outward show, and comfort 
 is bought off by splendour. It is indeed reported— I 
 know not with what truth — that the grand staircase 
 was originally intended for the King alone, and that the 
 
218 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 readers were to find their way through winding pas- 
 sages, across an open court and up a narrow flight of 
 steps. Of course none but ultra-loyals would put up 
 with such treatment, and scarcely even ultra-loyals 
 after 1848. Still it is merely the logical consequence 
 of the rest of the system. 
 
 I believe that a register is kept of all books applied 
 for in the British Museum in order that those which 
 are most in demand may be placed in the reading- 
 room. In Munich a register is also kept, but in a dif- 
 ferent way. The books that each person has had from 
 the Library are entered under his name. I do not know 
 with what object this register is kept, unless it is that a 
 surveillance may be exercised over each one's studies. 
 There is a story told to show the completeness of the 
 Austrian system of police which seems to have sug- 
 gested this scheme to the Munich officials. An Aus- 
 trian mother, whose son had run away from home, 
 came to the police to ask for information about him, 
 and was told every single thing he had done since he 
 left her roof. Not one of his least actions was omitted 
 from their register, no journey, no word, no thought 
 even was permitted to escape them. Or perhaps that 
 book of Edgar Quinet's, " Histoire de mes Idees," in 
 which he traces the rise and progress of his thoughts, 
 may have helped to suggest it. The Bavarian Govern- 
 ment is evidently desirous of following the thought of 
 each of its citizens, that if any one enters on a danger- 
 ous course of study he may be checked before he goes 
 too far; that if any one writes a dangerous book the 
 Government may know the sources whence he gained 
 
MUNICH AND OXFORD. 219 
 
 his inspiration. I do not know if this register is kept 
 of all books read in the Libraiy, or only of those taken 
 away from it. 
 
 I need not say that the permission granted to take 
 books home from the Library is a great convenience, 
 but it has some ills attending it. In London, of course, 
 such a system would be impossible, for London is the 
 literary capital of England, besides being the largest 
 city in the world ; and though regular readers are few 
 in comparison to the population, the occasional readers 
 would exhaust the Library. But in Munich it can 
 hardly be avoided, and it must be owned that the per- 
 mission is granted on a most liberal scale. The few 
 people who go to Oxford with a view to opening books 
 are aware that the Bodleian is rendered almost useless 
 by adhering to the system of the British Museum, and 
 Munich bears a very close resemblance to Oxford. 
 Even if a luxurious reading-room existed in Munich, 
 it could hardly be used. Professors who have occupa- 
 tions beyond reading, lectures to deliver, disputations 
 and official meetings to attend, could hardly spend 
 their days in the Library as is done by so many 
 readers in the British Museum. I can hardly form an 
 idea of the result of confining all students in Munich 
 to one reading-room. It would become the dwelling of 
 all the learned population of the town, it would have to 
 accommodate a quarter of the inhabitants, and would 
 soon become a bookish version of the Baths of Cara- 
 calla. As all Paris is concentrated in the Bourse, so 
 all Munich would dwell in the reading-room, and it 
 
230 SOCIAL LTFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 would be necessary to provide a kitchen below, turn 
 on beer, and allow smoking. 
 
 Still, when books are allowed to be taken from the 
 Library, certain regulations ought to be made and 
 observed strictly. Otherwise it becomes a race for 
 precedence, and the few are apt to be served at the 
 expense of the many. It is plain what these regula- 
 tions should be. There ought to be a certain time 
 fixed, at the expiration of which books must be re- 
 turned. No one should be permitted to keep books 
 beyond this time, be he Professor, be he even King. 
 Books of reference ought never to be taken away from 
 the Library. An extension of the time might readily 
 be allowed if no one else had applied for the book, but 
 no high person should be favoured by getting a book 
 called in before the time for which it was granted to 
 another had expired. Even if these rules were strictly 
 kept, there might be some inconvenience, for it fre- 
 quently happens that two men are reading books on 
 the same subject, and it may not suit one to wait till 
 the other has had them the full time. A month is 
 allowed— nominally — in Munich as the time that books 
 may be kept, and a month is not too much for most 
 books, hardly enough for some. With the British 
 Museum system you have only those books in use that 
 you are actually using, and if a book that is kept for 
 you is wanted by another, he can have it for a time, till 
 you want it again. But in Munich, if a man is reading 
 a dozen different subjects he may have all the books on 
 them at home, and till he returns them finally they 
 
PLEASURE OF PRIVILEGE. 221 
 
 are out of your reach. It is of course convenient to 
 Mm to write with his books around him, but it may be 
 qiiestioned how far it is fair to others. As it iSj each 
 Professor has a small private library of reference at the 
 expense of the National Library. And what makes it 
 worse is, that the rules which I have mentioned, and 
 which I venture to believe indispensable for the general 
 utUity are never observed. The time allowed is only 
 nominal, books of reference are lent out, and great 
 favour is shown to privileged people. 
 
 At the top of the receipt you sign for a book ; it is 
 stated that it, must be returned at the end of four weeks, 
 and at the end of four weeks if you do not bring the 
 book back, and if any one else has applied for it, the 
 Librarian is supposed to send for it. But in fact, if 
 you are a Professor you may keep a book almost any 
 time, and any number of persons may ask for it with- 
 out your being troubled by an application. I have 
 heard men say that they have kept books a year, and 
 I once heard the Librarian observe, on returning a 
 receipt to a man, that it had been there three years. 
 Month after month I have written down the name of a 
 book without ever being able to get it, and as it was a 
 book on a special subject in a foreign language it was 
 evidently kept by the same person. But if you are not 
 privileged, and a privileged being wants the book you 
 have got, it will instantly be called in. An English- 
 man was reading one of Prescott's works on Spain, and 
 had only kept it a fortnight when it was sent for. The 
 King was meditating a journey to Spain, and wanted 
 to get up the history beforehand. Perhaps it is in 
 
222 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 this sense the Library is called Royal; that the King 
 is favoured at the expense of humble readers. But on 
 this principle everything, not in Bavaria alone, but 
 even in other lands, would bear the same title. And 
 so far from grudging the King an early perusal of 
 Prescott, an Englishman ought to be gratified by the 
 reception English literature has met with in high places. 
 For the same reason, when the Edinburgh Review does 
 not appear in the periodical-room till a month after its 
 arrival in Munich, every one knows that the King is 
 keeping it, and no one envies him the careful study 
 he bestows on it. Dr. Johnson's explanation of the 
 superior attractions of a Countess may well be applied 
 to the case of Royal study, for with any other mortal 
 one is apt to complain bitterly. But the imagination 
 is excited at the thought of a King reading the Edin- 
 burgh Review ! 
 
 And really the King is not so much given to keeping 
 books as some of his subjects. One is always tempted 
 to visit the slightest neglect on the part of royalty 
 with much greater severity than grave offences on the 
 part of the Commons, because it is far pleasanter to shy 
 one's stone at a prominent object, and the chance of 
 hitting is far greater. When Theodore Hook uttered 
 the pious wish, " To-day is George the Fourth's birth- 
 day ; God save my detaining creditor ! " he did not re- 
 flect how many debtors were locked up by their tailors 
 or butchers, who did not vent their feelings with the 
 like acrimony on their creditors' birthdays. The books 
 in the Munich Library certainly find many worse de- 
 taining creditors than the King. There are professors 
 
KINGS AND PROFESSORS. 
 
 223 
 
 who have their supply not by volumes, but by shelves ; 
 who, instead of taking out books, take out libraries. 
 One of my friends has a room full of books, I should 
 judge about five hundred volumes. Some one remarked 
 that a furniture waggon would be needed to take them 
 all back to the Hbrary, as it probably would if they 
 ever went back there. A story is current, which I 
 ought to be the last to believe, as I invented it myself, 
 of one of those large waggons in which families move 
 their heavy articles from one house to another, being 
 seen at a professor's door. The professor asked what it 
 came for, was told that it came to take back his books 
 to the library, and replied, " But I never send my books 
 back to the library." The story is of course exagge- 
 rated; but it is a genuine subject of wonder how so 
 many books can go back without horse power. 
 
 The books which are kept so long are just the books 
 that ought to stay at the library, for the only books 
 you would keep so long would be books of reference. 
 You do not take out five hundred volumes to read ; 
 that would overtax the powers of Francis Horner, who 
 was remarkable for devising extensive plans of study, 
 and then doing nothing towards realising them. If 
 there was a convenient room, fitted with all the usual 
 books of reference, there would be httle excuse for tak- 
 ing them away, but there is no such room. Books of 
 reference generally are kept in the catalogue room, 
 where there are no conveniences for consulting them, 
 and where you are constantly in the way. There is no 
 security for finding the book you want. Thus, the man 
 who wants to verify a fact or a date, takes the book 
 
224 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 home with him, and finds that keeping it on his shelves, 
 with a mark in the place, is less trouble than copying 
 out the passage. While in the catalogue room, it may- 
 be expedient to mention the catalogue, that cause of 
 such universal annoyance to those who prepare it, and 
 those who use it. In Munich, as in many other conti- 
 nental libraries, the catalogue is not at every one^s dis- 
 posal. In Paris, when I asked for it, I was told, " on 
 ne la communique pas," and being fresh from the luxury 
 of the British Museum, I could not remember the 
 name of a book without its assistance. Here you need 
 a special permission from the chief librarian ; but as a 
 compensation you are saved the necessity of observing 
 press-marks with that nicety that is so often fatal to 
 inconsiderate readers in London. The catalogue is 
 written on loose sheets, which are kept in pasteboard 
 cases. 
 
 The labour of the attendants is greatly increased by 
 the reservation of the catalogue. In London, when 
 you have written down your book on the ticket, the 
 attendant has only to follow the directions of the press- 
 mark. But in Munich you can, of course, give no 
 more than the name of the author, and the name of the 
 book ; the attendant has to find out its situation from 
 the catalogue. And even those persons who are allowed 
 to use the catalogue themselves, are in the habit of 
 leaving the attendants to find out the press-marks ; 
 partly because there are no slips of paper or pens in the 
 catalogue room. This tax on the attendants to some 
 extent justifies the inconvenient regulations about be- 
 speaking books, and the inconvenient hours of closing. 
 
CURIOSITIES OF LITERATtrRE. 225 
 
 The library is only open from eight till one^ but the 
 attendants are engaged the whole afternoon in looking 
 out the books for the next day. There are frequently 
 two hundred books to be searched out in the catalogue, 
 and got down from their places. And, in spite of the 
 boasted convenience of the arrangements of the library, 
 this cannot but take a long time with the small existing 
 staff of attendants. The morning is pretty well occu- 
 j)ied with getting an occasional volume for a privileged 
 person, and in showing the curiosities to strangers. 
 The readers at the British Museum made complaints 
 enough when any of their hours of study were taken 
 for showing the reading room, and students generally 
 gnash their teeth at curiosities. However, they are the 
 only parts of the Munich Library deemed worthy of 
 mention in Murray, so they ought to be treated with 
 respect. I have seen them once without very distinct 
 recollection. But the other day one of the librarians 
 of St. Petersburgh gave his opinion on the curiosities 
 of the Munich Library, and the officials in Munich 
 were not very well pleased, to judge from their fero- 
 cious underscoring of the review of his book in the 
 AtheruBum, 
 
 Eight to one, it will be remarked, are thoroughly 
 German hours ; but even if you rise as early as the 
 Germans do, you can hardly find the hours convenient. 
 The morning is so naturally adapted to working at 
 home, that one grudges any trespass on it, and a visit 
 to the library is sure to trespass heavily. Moreover, 
 the necessity of bespeaking a book the day before you 
 can get it breaks into two mornings for each book, and 
 
 l2 
 
226 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 if on coming the second day you fiud^ as is too often tlie 
 case, that the book is lent ont, you have given up two 
 mornings for nothing, I suppose, however, unless con- 
 siderably more was spent on the library, these defects 
 could not be remedied. And it is a question if the 
 Chambers would grant more than the 39,000 florins 
 (£3,300), they grant at present. Great were the dis- 
 putes about the money spent on Quatremere's books, 
 almost £10,000, which was merely an extraordinary ex- 
 pense to buy a renowned library. All Paris cried out 
 against the emigration of Quatremere^s books to Ger- 
 many; yet Germany did not seem to welcome them 
 with corresponding enthusiasm. I am not aware how 
 much is spent on the British Museum ; but I saw in a 
 report that one hundred and two officials were employed 
 in the department of printed books, and in the reading 
 room, and I doubt if more than twenty are employed in 
 Munich. Of the 39,000 florins granted to the library, 
 I believe 16,000 are spent on buying books. But these 
 details are not always easily ascertained. All that sta- 
 tistical books tell you of the Munich Library is, that it 
 is the second in Europe, exceeding the British Museum 
 in the number of its volumes, and only yielding to the 
 library in Paris. 
 
 To literary men in Munich it is, of course, more im- 
 portant that the money should be spent in buying 
 books than that it should be spent on the arrange- 
 ments. A student prefers to get a useful book after 
 two days than to have speedy attendance and a scarcity 
 of books. And I cannot but think that Quatremere's 
 library was a great addition, so far as my own expe- 
 
THE WEAK POINT. 227 
 
 rience serves. The weak point of the Munich library 
 lay in the English poets. Those of the present day 
 were probably ignored ; till Tennyson's works came out 
 in the Tauchnitz edition, his name was not in the cata- 
 logue, and Browning is not there yet. But there was 
 also a want of the classical English poets in good editions. 
 Neither Scott's "Dryden" nor Scott's "Swift" are in 
 the library, and till Quatremere brought the Tonson of 
 1 760, the only edition of Dryden was the version of his 
 works contained in the Edinburgh collection of British 
 Poets. I presume this hiatus occurred from the way in 
 which the library was formed. At present a very fair 
 assortment of recent English works is added to the 
 library; a natural preference is shown to standard 
 books, and a little too much prominence given to theo- 
 logy. The new books lie for some time on the Libra- 
 rian's table, but they often take an inordinate time in 
 finding their way into the catalogue. It is an obvious 
 abuse to allow professors to take these new books 
 home, and keep them by the week or the month. I 
 have known books to take three months to appear in 
 the catalogue, ovriag to their detention by some inte- 
 rested reader. 
 
 A special room is devoted to periodicals, and to this 
 room an introduction is needed. The piles of German 
 magazines lying on the table are enough to impress one 
 with a vivid sense of the literary activity of the nation, 
 especially if you open one of them by chance and find 
 the length to which historical or philosophical disquisi- 
 tions reach, and the solid manner in which they are 
 written. We frivolous English think our Quarterlies 
 
228 SOCIAL LIFE IN MTTNICH. 
 
 models of gravity and weight ; but the Germans send 
 out monthly, or even fortnightly, piles of laborious 
 matter which would hardly find acceptance even in our 
 most ponderous pages. Most of the English Quarter- 
 lies are taken in, though, strangely enough, the Na- 
 tional Review is not among the number. The Saturday 
 Review and Athenaeum represent weekly literature, and 
 keep the Librarian au courant with new publications ; 
 the CornhUl, and some scientific works, the monthly. 
 The weekly papers are the only ones that come regu- 
 larly, the rest generally take two months to arrive. 
 The Times appears on the table exactly a month after 
 date, being provided by one of the town reading-rooms 
 when its own demand is appeased. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE THEATRE IN MUNICH. 
 
 If I am generally liable to the accusation of judging 
 things in Munich, by an English standard, I must be 
 acquitted as regards the present chapter. A man need 
 only frequent the London theatres very sparingly to 
 know their deficiencies, and if he is acquainted with the 
 stages of France, Germany, and Italy, he will have little 
 temptation to make comparisons in favour of those at 
 home. Of course any comparison with France or Italy 
 would at once lead to the remark that their impression- 
 able nations are nations of actors, that with them every 
 gesture is dramatic, and that consequently the stage has 
 an easy task in reflecting the life that goes on around 
 it, and the authors in transferring that life to their 
 dialogues. But with Germany no such answer can be 
 made. The Germans are far less dramatic than the 
 English, they have an almost entire absence of good 
 writers for the stage, and a very small number of natu- 
 rally-gifted actors; their gestures, though plentiful, are 
 rude and undignified, and their organs of wit, if they 
 exist at all, unguided and ill-developed. And yet you 
 can go to a theatre in Germany for other reasons than 
 
230 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 to see one actor adapt all existing parts to tlie charac- 
 ter lie prefers to assume, and to the play of muscles for 
 which his face is most peculiarly suited. You may see 
 Shakspeare's dramas acted as if they had been written 
 to be acted, and not to serve as a kind of showman^s com- 
 mentary on a scenic diorama. If you can overcome 
 your natural laziness, you may hear the unacted drama, 
 and even see a poet bow his acknowledgments. When 
 we remember that Schiller was able to support himself 
 by his plays, and consider what would have been the 
 fate of them ia England, we can form some conception 
 of the different state of the drama in the two coun- 
 tries. 
 
 The great objection Englishmen make to the German 
 stage is very natural and well founded ; it is not amusing. 
 When we go to see Robson or Buckstone we go to laugh, 
 and it must be owned that we are fully gratified. More- 
 over we have more serious dramas — taken from the 
 French, it is true — for which we do not lack actors, 
 and which do not bore us. How far the amusement 
 we find is only national I cannot determine. I do not 
 know what would be a Prenchman's or an Italian's 
 verdict on our plays, and Germans are too easily 
 amused by their own to be severe on ours. They are 
 certainly amused by their own, if that is a sufficient 
 answer to the English objection. They sit through 
 plays which have not even the poetic merits of Schiller 
 and Goethe with unexampled patience, and laugh at 
 comedies which have neither dialogue nor incident. 
 To an Englishman Goethe and Schiller seem more 
 suited to the closet than the stage, for the poetry which 
 
THE GEEMAN DRAMA. 331 
 
 raises their dramas above those of their successors is 
 not a thing to be appreciated in declamation. Charles 
 Lamb attempts to prove that Shakspeare would be more 
 appreciated if he never was acted, although the dramatic 
 power of Shakspeare is as wonderful as any of his 
 secondary attributes. But Goethe is not dramatic at 
 allj and Schiller has a decided leaning to the melo- 
 dramatic. The idea of Faust being acted would never 
 occur to any but Germans, unless the essential parts 
 of Faust were taken away and the hero simplified by 
 being made merely a seducer. Wallenstein, with all 
 its merits, is so long that it has to be spread over three 
 nights, and the amount of action in it is out of all pro- 
 portion to its length. These, however, are general con- 
 siderations, which are out of place in treating of the 
 Munich theatre. 
 
 It would of course be unfair to compare any German 
 theatre with those of France, and perhaps it would be 
 equally so to compare Munich with Vienna or Berlin. 
 One of the causes of the excellence of the theatres in 
 those two cities must be the amount of competition 
 existing, the absence of which is a great cause of the 
 poverty of Munich. The theatre is the only resort of a 
 large class of people, the seats are convenient, and even 
 luxurious, and there is no second house to divide the 
 crowd. If there were a decent peoples' theatre instead 
 of two miserable booths, the Court theatre would no 
 doubt be driven to cater for the general amusement. 
 But at present it is sure of being fiUed to suffocation, 
 even in the heats of summer, whether anything decent 
 is given or not. People who subscribe for their seats 
 
232 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 by the quarter find that they can knit in the parterre 
 as comfortably as they could at home. Even the dra- 
 matic critics in the Munich newspapers complain that 
 the public is too easily pleased, and unfortunately the 
 public has the sole power of putting any pressure on 
 the management. Neither public nor management 
 have paid any attention to statements of the faults of 
 the system ; the management is indifferent to the claims 
 of art, is content to make the theatre a mere specula- 
 tion, and the public goes all the same. 
 
 Making the theatre a mere speculation sounds well 
 enough to English ears, because by that we understand 
 a very different kind of speculation from the one prac- 
 tised in Munich. All our managers conduct their 
 theatres as speculations, and their success may generally 
 be taken as some criterion of their merits. It is certain 
 that they must have pleased the public in some way 
 when they have attracted it to their performances, and 
 we do not ask them to give high art and ideal poetry 
 to empty benches. But in Munich the phrase means 
 that the management trades on the indifference of the 
 public. A theatre, which is supported to some extent 
 by the State, and bears the sounding title of the Royal 
 Court and National Theatre with an etat of £25,000, 
 has a very different aim before it than one of the Eng- 
 lish theatres, and must be judged by a much higher 
 standard. If the public is quite indifiierent to the 
 merit of the performances, and goes whether they are 
 good or bad, the more reason for making them good. 
 In Dresden, the smaller capital of a smaller kingdom, 
 there is no such carelessness and stinginess. And if 
 
SEATS. 233 
 
 Dresden is called the Northern Florence, does not 
 Munich claim to be the Modern Athens ? 
 
 Modern Athens^ however, is content that its theatre 
 should be the largest in Germany, should have statues 
 and ornaments, marble staircases that can be described 
 in guide-books, and frescoes over the portico that 
 excite the admiration of art critics from the Far West. 
 I am pleased to find that the interior is not neglected 
 for the sake of this outward show, and that the seats 
 are really comfortable. The greater part of the floor 
 is occupied with what the Grermans call Sperr-sitz, and 
 we call orchestra stalls. The boxes are all open, with- 
 out any divisions, save in the case of those allotted to 
 royalty, and of one or two others in the middle. But 
 all the boxes are held by subscription, and the only 
 places to be had by casual theatre-goers are the stalls 
 below, and a balcony running round the first tier, called 
 the Galerie noble. The front seats in this balcony are, 
 perhaps, the best in the house; each one has a large 
 fauteuil, and a ledge in front for resting the play-bill, 
 arms, or opera-glass. The back seats are uncomfort- 
 able, yet with the usual absurdity of Munich arrange- 
 ments the price is the same for both. A gentleman 
 naturally goes to the stalls, and a lady would do the 
 same if any decent garde-robe were attached to them. 
 But while there is a special attendant upstairs to take 
 charge of cloaks, downstairs you must go unprotected 
 through the passages and across the large draughty 
 hall to the general garde-robe, crowded with all the 
 out-come of pit and galleries — gentlemen who very 
 often do not stand on ceremony. I once saw a ruflSan 
 
334 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 in this room, finding his progress checked by a number 
 of ladies, draw back two steps and rush through them. 
 Knowing that Munich enjoys a considerable police force, 
 and is entirely under the control of that estimable power, 
 one naturally asks why some steps are not taken to en- 
 sure order, or at least decency, in such crowded places ? 
 The same want of it is observable at the morning dis- 
 tribution of tickets. Every one fights for the first place, 
 and if a woman happens to be before a man the man 
 does not scruple to tear off her shawl or her bonnet in 
 order to deprive her of precedence. I do not imagine 
 the lower order in Munich are naturally polite. I have 
 certainly seen examples of the most extreme boorishness 
 among them individually, and in a crowd the roughness 
 and brutality come out in their strongest colours. Till 
 lately it was impossible to get a good seat, save by being 
 a friend of the Cassier, or by shoving. The Cassier 
 kept the best places for some friends who applied a few 
 days beforehand, and gave aU others to the leaders of 
 the crush. But he always denied that any places were 
 reserved, and when I, after coming first in the morning, 
 and finding all the front places taken, ascertained from 
 some acquaintances that they had reserved their seats 
 some days before, and taxed the Cassier with his par- 
 tiality, he told me that I lied. A short time ago, 
 however, a stop was put to this system of favouritism, 
 much to the disgust of the Munich public. It is now 
 possible for any one, whether known to the Cassier or 
 not, to retain his place by paying a small extra sum, a 
 measure which at once precludes fighting at the door, 
 and unfairness within. To strangers this regulation 
 
ON THE BOARDS. 235 
 
 cannot fail to prove highly acceptable. But the Munich 
 people view it in the light of a concession to strangers 
 at the expense of the children, and as one half of them 
 is known to the Gassier, and the other half is fond of 
 fighting and shoving, it is evident that their view is 
 correct, 
 
 The stage, however, is the most important part of the 
 theatre, great as the rush may be for the best places. 
 And it is on the stage that the stinginess and indiffer- 
 entism I have recorded have the most effect. Not 
 enough pains are taken to superintend the production of 
 pieces, the actors are allowed too much scope, and do 
 not seem to be checked or guided by any competent 
 authority. Either want of taste or parsimony at first 
 provided a bad set of actors^ who are neither got rid of 
 now that their faults are patent, nor taught to do better. 
 New actors and new singers are very rarely added to 
 the company, and while great talents are allowed to 
 find their way to other theatres, those who are utterly 
 destitute of talent are engaged. One of the most 
 popular actresses on the German stage, the daughter of 
 a Municher, was coldly treated, and suffered to make 
 her fortune in Vienna. It is true^ that while the majo- 
 rity of actors are so inferior, one or two good ones 
 would only make the general poverty more apparent. 
 But this is unfortunately the prevailing custom in other 
 countries, when actors of some repute are managers, 
 and want a monopoly of applause. They said that 
 Ristori was so jealous of all competitors, that she inva- 
 riably dismissed any one of her company who was above 
 mediocrity ; and it is certain she travelled with such in- 
 
236 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 efficient helpers, that some in London likened her to a 
 viper in a bundle of sticks. And yet you go to see 
 Ristori alone, but you stay away when there is a dead 
 level, without one striking talent to redeem it, 
 
 As it is, enough variety exists on the Munich stage to 
 show how much below mediocrity is the place of some of 
 the actors. It would cost money, no doubt, to get rid of 
 these, and replace them ; but with support from the state, 
 and a fair certainty of support from the public, I do not 
 see why it should not be done. Every now and then 
 comes a star from Berlin or Vienna on his usual summer 
 round, and the few who have taste, ask despairingly 
 why he cannot be engaged for Munich. Bad as the 
 starring system may be, it is the only means afforded to 
 some towns of comparing their actors with the general 
 standard. I confess that I never knew how bad some of 
 the Munich actors were till I saw them with a star from 
 Vienna, in a piece which had once delighted me in 
 Vienna. It was a play called the Journalists, by Gustav 
 Freytag, author of " Debit and Credit," and in Vienna 
 it really seemed an exception to the tame run of Ger- 
 man comedies. But in Munich it was as heavy as ever. 
 The same was the case with a French piece I saw trans- 
 lated in Vienna, after seeing it acted by French actors 
 — Octave Feuillet's " Roman d'un jeune homme 
 pauvre." The faults of the Viennese were the more 
 unpardonable here, because as a rule they are able and 
 intelligent men, and because a slight glance at the novel 
 would have given them every shade of the characters. 
 We should not then have seen the little dry notary, the 
 essence of whose being consists in the short calm man- 
 
RANT. 237 
 
 ner in which he utters all his sentiments, transformed 
 into a stage honest lawyer, delivering his points as if he 
 was a rhetorician, and mouthing out sounding words 
 like an elocutionist. We should not have had the rival 
 lover, a man of the world, and an easy-going gentle- 
 man, putting on the villain of the old melo-drama. 
 For example, where the hero springs on a horse which 
 won't stand, the rival in the French play says care- 
 lessly, " Oh, then, he's a clown ; play him an air, 
 and he'll dance." The Viennese representative deli- 
 vered this little bit of harmless sarcasm as if he had at 
 last discovered the other's character, and the secret of 
 his success. Again, when the French notary gives the 
 hero an account of the persons among whom he is to 
 live, he says of mother and daughter " caractere noble," 
 in his Httle dry way, without moving a muscle. The 
 Vienna notary rang the changes on the word noble like 
 a teacher of declamation reading a passage from some 
 play or speech to his pupils. In a word, he ranted. 
 
 Rant is the most natural resource of poor actors, or 
 of actors who do not understand their parts. In Mu- 
 nich one has plenty of it. German pieces give great 
 temptation to ranting, and Schiller's admirers must 
 admit that in most of his plays — Tell always excepted — 
 the players need not supply the rant themselves. Its 
 introduction serves as a means of evading the old rule 
 about moving others, which is laid down by Horace. 
 If you would make me feel you must feel yourself; but 
 none says that to over-awe others you must be over- 
 awed yourself, and those who find feeling out of their 
 power take refuge in magniloquence. In comedy pure 
 
238 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 there is not much chance of ranting : but there are not 
 many comedies on the German stage. Translations 
 from the French of course occur, but not in the same 
 proportion as in London. Happily the playbills are 
 honest enough to confess the origin of pieces whose 
 paternity it is not hard to discover, and no one enjoys 
 a French play the less for not having to guess the 
 changes and interpolations of the adapter. The most 
 national German play is the Show-play, a name which 
 embraces an enormous number of varieties. The his- 
 torical play, which is not exactly tragic is, perhaps, the 
 highest order of show-play, and the lowest is probably 
 the domestic play, which is not exactly comic. The 
 tragic poet is allowed to give a picture of a period with- 
 out bringing in any denouement to disturb his reflective 
 audience; the comic dramatist is allowed to depict 
 family life as it may really exist without violating the 
 propriety of nature by any incidents or any dialogue. 
 Of course there are many pieces of the name which do 
 not take advantage of these privileges, but such privi- 
 leges should be granted to none. When a country is 
 fortunate enough to have writers for the stage, she 
 should insist on their obeying the requirements of the 
 stage. You buy dramatic authors at too high a price, 
 when you permit them to write without reference to the 
 laws of the drama. 
 
 A report of one year's doings in the Munich theatre 
 informs us that twenty new pieces were produced, three 
 of which attained to seven representations. I do not 
 find, however, any statement of a point which rather 
 affects this new production, if these twenty pieces were 
 
NAMES OF AUTHORS. 239 
 
 only new to Munich, or were brought out for the first 
 time on the Munich stage. Many of these, I am 
 aware, were written expressly for Munich ; but I doubt 
 if all of them were. The number of performances at- 
 tained by various authors are, fifteen by Frau Birch 
 Pfeififer, eleven each by Schiller and Scribe, ten each by 
 Benedix and Oscar von Redwitz, nine by Shakspeare, 
 and five each by Goethe, Lessing, and Heinrich Laube. 
 In opera, Meyerbeer had sixteen representations (chiefly 
 owing to Dinorah, which was given for the first time 
 that year), Weber fifteen, Mozart thirteen, Rossini and 
 Halevy seven each ; Donizetti's name appears once, 
 and Bellini's not at all. Gluck's operas were revived, 
 says the report rather pompously, meaning that one of 
 Gluck's Iphigenias was given twice. 
 
 Prom the dramatic report it appears that Prau Birch 
 Pfeiffer is the most popular playwright in Germany, as 
 she appears to be the most prolific. I must own myself 
 unacquainted with her plays. In opera the predomi- 
 nance of Meyerbeer is partly to be explained by his 
 present popularity, partly by the Munich custom of 
 having a grand opera every Sunday night. Mozart and 
 Rossini, as humble composers, are good enough for one 
 evening in the week which has an opera, but for Sunday 
 evening the grand operas of Meyerbeer and HaMvy are 
 essential. The predominance of French and German 
 music over ItaUan may seem strange at the opera, how- 
 ever fitting in the concert-room and at gatherings of 
 instrumentalists. That Rossini with his string of 
 matchless operas should take rank with Halevy is not so 
 remarkable as that both should be represented by one 
 
240 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 work alone. I do not remember to have seen Halevy's 
 name on the Munich bills, save as composer of the 
 Juive, or Kossini's, save as composer of the Barbiere_ 
 Has Verdi appeared in Munich? Hardly after 1859. 
 For Munich carries prejudices, which are foolish in 
 themselves, into matters where they are doubly out of 
 place. Auber's Muette was forbidden about the time of 
 the taking of Gaeta ; and during the Italian campaign 
 Schiller's William Tell and Maid of Orleans were with- 
 drawn from the stage. It was but a pitiful deed on the 
 part of high authorities to have the great work of so 
 great a living composer silenced in order to express 
 their sympathy with an infamous cause, and to show 
 their admiration of heroism that was ridiculous. But 
 it was natural that Munich, which was heart and soul 
 with Austria, should forbid the Maid of Orleans, which 
 glorified that very French valour which was then 
 triumphing at Magenta ; and Tell, which recorded the 
 first great popular uprising against Austrian tyranny — 
 the prototype of Italy's rise. 
 
 The name of Wagner does not occur in this list of 
 performances, though his operas are given in Munich. 
 There was a slight attempt to get up a national move- 
 ment in favour of Wagner when his Parisian experi- 
 ment failed. A small popular paper in Munich called 
 on aU German managers to give the Tannhauser, as it 
 had been hissed oflf by Parisian ignorance and inso- 
 lence. But the managers did not respond to the call. 
 It is dreary work organising music into a political 
 demonstration when no one sympathises either with the 
 politics or with the music. 
 
NATURE ON THE STAGE. 241 
 
 On Shrove Tuesday there is always a morning , per- 
 formance at the theatre, attended by all the grandees of 
 Munich, and at this performance a new play is gene- 
 rally given. One year a very amusing piece was pro- 
 duced, which is interesting to critics as being a nearer 
 approach to national comedy than is generally seen even 
 in original pieces, and to students of Munich customs 
 as based on the much-agitated trade question. M. Es- 
 quiros has remarked of our English pieces that their 
 duels, their profusion of doors communicating with 
 adjoining apartments sufficiently show their Gallic 
 origin. Indeed it is rare to find houses on the stage 
 which can be matched by existing buildings. The same 
 neglect of nature is observable in a crowd of minor 
 details, showing that dramatic authors do not think it 
 necessary to avoid inconsistencies which would be se- 
 verely censured in novelists. This Munich play was a 
 striking exception. You might have matched the scenes 
 in many houses in the town, just as you could have 
 found the characters. Indeed, they say that many of 
 the characters were studied from life by the actors, and 
 that the King recognised some of his own tradesmen on 
 the stage. The piece took its name from one of the 
 technical terms most frequently recurring in all writ- 
 ings on the trade question, " Ansassig," meaning esta- 
 blished. An important word it is, for it implies marry- 
 ing and settling, and the permission to use it is obtained 
 with great difficulty. On the characters depended the 
 interest of the piece, for situation and dialogue were not 
 abundant. But the characters were new, and drawn 
 from the life, and were skilfully woven into the old 
 
 M 
 
243 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 comic positions. Instead of the hard-hearted uncle 
 there is the master-taUor, possessed of a concession 
 which ensures him a monopoly, rude and overbearing, 
 insulting his customers, turning away the journeyman 
 who has been with him eighteen years because he 
 applies for a concession, and abusing the " radical- 
 national-social-liberal " party in terms borrowed from 
 one of the speakers against free trade in the Chambers. 
 The dashing young lover is of course the head journey- 
 man, who has been engaged an immense time to the 
 demoiselle du comptoir, and who can only marry by 
 obtaining a concession. The intriguing lady of a cer- 
 tain age, who is to entice the lover from his allegiance 
 and the uncle from his respectability, is a tailor's 
 widow, who has already buried two husbands, and can 
 command any further number by virtue of the Real 
 Eight she has inherited. Given the system of trade 
 (and it is given in another chapter) and such characters 
 are predicable. Nor are they at all exaggerated ; every 
 one acquainted with Munich tradesmen can tell you of 
 similar instances. The master-tailor in the play tells 
 his customer that his coat will be ready whenever he 
 (the tailor) chooses, that he makes for the King, and 
 does not care for commoners' money. A man brings 
 back a coat to be mended. " I won't mend your coat 
 for you," growls the tailor. " But you made it," urges 
 the servant. " That's an honom* for the man who wears 
 it," the tailor replies. Do you think this is overdrawn? 
 What do you say to this ? An Englishman ordered a 
 coat, was measured, and asked when it would be ready 
 to be tried on. " Tried on ! I make for Count This 
 
JULIUS CjESAR K , TAILOR IN MUNICH. 243 
 
 and Prince Thatj and they never have their coats tried 
 on. If you want to have your coat tried on, you must 
 go to some other tailor." The coat comes home, and is 
 large enough to accommodate another gentleman at the 
 same time as the one for whom it was made. It is 
 sent to the tailor to be altered, but he makes for Count 
 This and Prince That, and they never want their coats 
 altered . 
 
 Sticklers for the dignity of the Court and National 
 Theatre might object to this piece as wanting in reserve 
 and decorum. It seemed to take generally with the 
 public, though probably a great many of the spectators 
 were engaged in trade, and several were on the side of 
 monopoly. But the blindness of satirized persons to the 
 mutato nomine is proverbial, and Julius Caesar, when 
 held up to execration under another name, remains 
 as unmoved as other Caesars threatened obliquely with 
 his fate. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 CONCERTS IN MUNICH. 
 
 A STRANGER who should arrive in Munich about half- 
 past five in the afternoon, would he astonished at the 
 sight of parties of ladies, their evening dress partially- 
 hidden under cloaks, and their elaborate coiffures under 
 mufflers, walking down all the streets towards one cen- ' 
 tral point. If he inquired the meaning of it, the only 
 answer would be, that one of the concerts of the Mu- 
 sical Academy was to be held that evening ; and a little 
 more information would make him thoroughly au fait 
 with the oddity of the sight. All these ladies, not one 
 of them attended by a gentleman, some in parties, some 
 with a servant, some quite alone, are going an hour 
 before the concert begins. Presently you meet troops 
 of servants coming away from the building with the 
 cloaks and mufflers their mistresses have worn, and 
 from the entire absence of men you begin to think that 
 Munich is peopled on the same principle as the female 
 town in Tennyson's Princess. 
 
 It is almost worth while going early, and taking a 
 place in order to watch the process of filling. The con- 
 certs of the Musical Academy are held in the Odeon of 
 
BAVARIAN LOGIC. 24i3 
 
 Munich, a large building, the chief hall of which holds 
 a thousand people without squeezing. There are rows 
 of chairs aU down the body ; but they are none of them 
 numbered, and no seats are reserved, save the first 
 row, by courtesy, for the high society. The real reason 
 for not numbering the chairs is, of course, that there 
 may be no Hmit to the number of tickets issued ; and 
 the reason why the people do not remonstrate against 
 the inconvenience is, that the tradespeople, by going 
 early, can get the best seats without extra charge. And 
 the people of Munich never seem to object to waiting. 
 The room is always full half an hour before the concert 
 begins. At three quarters of an hour before, it begins 
 to fill rapidly ; and at the half hour there is not another 
 seat to be had. But the reason assigned for leaving the 
 places to be scrambled for is, that the concerts are pri- 
 vate ; that every one present is the guest of the Musical 
 Academy; and that if the seats were numbered, the 
 privacy would cease. Certainly scrambliug is the 
 strangest sort of privacy ; and one would thiak that by 
 securing each one a seat, and only issuing as many 
 tickets as there were places, you would be treating your 
 hearers more as guests than by the present method. 
 But logic is not the strong point of the Bavarian mind. 
 ' Let us suppose, however, that you have overcome the 
 natural repugnance of an Englishman to go an hour 
 before the time of beginning, and have taken a good 
 place near the door, so as to get out among the first. 
 At the three quarters the people pour in ; and if you 
 are a lady, the examination of their toilettes will suffi- 
 ciently occupy your time. Full dress is considered 
 
346 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 requisite for these concertSj though at the Opera no such 
 custom prevails. Nothing but ladies ; generally family 
 parties of nine or ten at a time ; certainly ten ladies to 
 every gentleman. For gentlemen are not supposed to 
 sit down; so they mostly come later, and stand down 
 the sides of the room. All the ladies who come first 
 take seats down the middle, on either side of the pas- 
 sage, instead of getting near the door, with a view of 
 being spoken to by the king. Here comes a blind 
 school, tied together by ropes, and led to their places, 
 each one feeling the direction taken by the one before, 
 and the procession headed by a man who sees. 
 
 At about six, when the body of the hall is full, and 
 no more seats to be had, save by dexterity and quick- 
 ness of sight, the orchestra begins to arrive, and the 
 fashionable people. These take their places in front, 
 immediately behind the chairs reserved for the Royal 
 Pamily. If you want a seat now, yom- only hope is to 
 detect some lady sitting on two or three chairs, for the 
 better exercise of her prerogative, as wearer of crino- 
 line. Many ladies begin by assuming two chairs, at 
 the least ; a family party of three will sometimes take 
 six between them, and be gradually reduced to their 
 own number. The manoeuvres of mothers who have 
 ' come late with their daughters, or middle-aged ladies 
 who have consented to chaperon young tribes, are quite 
 interesting. The quick scent they have for empty 
 chairs under masses of crinoline would make the for- 
 tune of foxhounds, and they ferret out seats in the 
 most crowded rows as trained dogs smell out truffles. 
 I once noticed a lady whose soul, eyes, and ears, were 
 
HOW TO ENJOY A CONCERT. 247 
 
 all devoted to advantageous places. Before the concert 
 began^ she had placed her young charge in different 
 rowSj and every minute she was up on tiptoes, examin- 
 ing, and peering aU. round her. Now she suddenly left 
 her chair, and darted off after one that was vacant, beck- 
 oned one of her girls from a distant row, and trans- 
 planted her. The faintest movement of a chair during 
 the symphony struck her practised ear, and her head 
 was instantly round in that direction. 
 
 It is now half-past six, and we only wait for the king. 
 But we could not think of beginning without him. 
 Not a sign of impatience is shown by people who have 
 been sitting an hour, though time is fully up, and every 
 thing is ready. The king, like ourselves, is a guest of 
 the Musical Academy, and they cannot but wait for 
 their most distinguished guest. At last he comes ; 
 everybody stands up; he sits down; everybody sits 
 down; and the concert begins. First comes a sym- 
 phony, which is generally well chosen, and always well 
 played. The Munich orchestra is justly celebrated for 
 its united powers, and it produces solo players on occa- 
 sion who are worthy of equal praise. The poor part of 
 the concert is generally the vocal part ; the pieces are 
 not well chosen, the singers are poor, and the general 
 execution is faulty. But to the people who frequent 
 the concerts, the music seems only a secondary consi- 
 deration. T do not dispute their taste ; they seem to 
 enjoy music when it is good, though they do not abomi- 
 nate it when it is bad. But the crowd at every concert 
 is a matter of fashion and of custom. .Most people go 
 because the rest go ; a great many because they hope 
 
248 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH, 
 
 to be spoken to by the king ; a great many more be- 
 cause tbeir husbands have gone to their clubs, and they 
 have nothing to do at home. Even if the taste of the 
 people is good as regards their own music, it has no 
 idea of Italian music. Chapel-master Lachner, a com- 
 poser of some eminence in Germany, and admirably 
 adapted for his biton of conductor, is supposed to have 
 called Eossini a fiddler; and the general distaste of 
 Munich for Italian music is only too notorious. Even in 
 Vienna there is a want of spirit in giving Italian music ; 
 the time drags, and the brio is suffered to evaporate. 
 Yet in Vienna there has been an Italian o^era time out 
 of mind. Cimarosa composed his greatest work for 
 Vienna; Rossini was feted and idolised there. 
 
 Besides their natural want of taste for Italian music, 
 the people of Munich object to it on political grounds. 
 Politics influence these things in the most remarkable . 
 way throughout. Germany. At present the universal 
 hostility felt for the French is obtruded on all questions 
 of art, and the antipathy of retrograde Munich to Italy 
 shows itself with equal strength. During the war of 
 1859, a French company of actors, which was accus- 
 tomed to make the tour of Germany, was not allowed 
 to perform; and a German poet, who translated some 
 poems of Giusti, was accused of treason to his country. 
 When Gounod's Faust was given in Munich, a musical 
 critic began his account of it by remarking that it might 
 safely be applauded, as it had no affinity with the exist- 
 ing dynasty. The mode of judging was strange, but 
 the reason assigned was yet stranger. One of the 
 librettists of Faust had written a volume of severe poems 
 
AN INDEX TO MUSICAL TASTE. 249 
 
 against the Napoleonic dynasty, called lambes. It 
 turned out, after all, that these poems were written by 
 a namesake of the librettist. 
 
 But in spite of aU these unfavourable symptoms, I 
 believe that many persons frequent the concerts for the 
 sake of the music. There is a perceptible difference in 
 the number of people according as a symphony of 
 Beethoven is given, or a symphony of Schumann. And 
 therefore a list of the production of the concerts will 
 give not quite an exact, but certainly some idea of the 
 musical taste of Munich. 
 
 In 1860, the Musical Academy celebrated its golden 
 weddiag, the fiftieth anniversary of its foundation. On 
 this occasion a little book was published, giving a list of 
 all the pieces that had been performed during this fifty 
 years existence. In symphonies Beethoven bears away 
 the palm, his symphony in A having been given tvrenty- 
 three times ; Mozart is second : in overtures Beethoven 
 is again the first, with sixty-eight performances; Weber is 
 second, with forty-nine; Cherubini third, with forty-fivej 
 then Vogler thirty, Spontini twenty-one, Mehul twenty, 
 Rossini sixteen, and Mozart twelve. In oratorios, 
 Haydn^s Creation, seventeen times ; Beethoven's Mount 
 of Olives, eleven times ; Mozart's Requiem, three ; 
 Handel's Messiah and Judas Maccabeus, two, and his 
 Alexander's Feast, four. I need not go into the enu- 
 meration of cantatas and arias, save to mention that in 
 arias Rossini has that undisputed pre-eminence which 
 should have been given him in overtures also ; but in 
 the few kinds I have selected, English judgments will 
 find much food for remark. We should probably not 
 
 M 2 
 
350 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 care to hear Beethoven^s symphonies quite so often to 
 the exclusion of his competitors^ and we should cer- 
 tainly find the arrangement of the oratorios both strange 
 and reprehensible. The Creation is not ranked in Eng- 
 land so high as it seems to be ranked in Munich, and 
 our favourite Messiah is unduly neglected. Where 
 is Mendelssohn too, and that Elijah, which must in- 
 augurate every musical festival in England? There is 
 not one mention of it in the book. Paulus has been 
 given once it seems, and in other branches Mendelssohn 
 is not absent from the scene. But that monopoly of 
 musical genius that many English minds would accord 
 him, that constant repetition and constant imitation of 
 our concert-leaders, is not his in Germany. I do not 
 think it is any disrespect to his name to prefer the 
 works in which he succeeded to those in which he fell 
 very far short of his models, to praise his really admi- 
 rable works, and abstain from hearing those which were 
 beyond him. 
 
 To me the injustice shown by the Musical Academy 
 to Italian music, far outweighs any injustice to German. 
 It is possible that singers may be wanted to do justice 
 to the oratorios of Handel, as the vocal part of the 
 concerts is always the weakest. And we English are 
 become by constant hearing as great idolators of Handel 
 as Germans are of Beethoven. I own that I have a 
 thorough English appreciation of Handel; but it is 
 entirely owing to my Enghsh opportunities of hearing 
 him. No other nation, however musical it may be, has 
 the same love for him as the English. North Germans 
 of musical education have very little acquaintance with 
 
CIMAROSA, 251 
 
 him, while in Italy you would find his name positively 
 unknown. But I cannot by any such arguments ex- 
 cuse the neglect and the ill favour shown by Munich to 
 the music of Italy. A nation so cultivated as the Ger- 
 mans ought to have greater tolerance towards the styles 
 of other nations, and Munich, which prefers Strauss to 
 Mendelssohn, ought not to sacrifice Rossini to Bee- 
 thoven. The deaf Polyphemus of Vienna might growl 
 in his cavern against the Ulysses who was sailing pros- 
 perously away, but there is no need for Beethoven's 
 admirers to echo his injustice. We shrug our shoulders 
 when reminded that Beethoven called Rossini a scene 
 painter, who might have been a good musician if his 
 master had flogged him more, but we can but sneer 
 when Capellmeister Lachner calls Rossini a fiddler. 
 
 Nor is this injustice merely confined to the more 
 modern ItaUan school. I once went to the opera in 
 Munich to hear Cimarosa's "Matrimonio Segreto," a 
 work of such fame and eminence, that to this day the 
 story is told how the Emperor of Austria had it given 
 twice over the same evening. It contains, too, an air 
 for the tenor (the celebrated Pria che spunti), which is 
 considered by good authorities the first tenor air in the 
 world, superior even to Mozart's II mio tesoro. The 
 air would be remarkable enough from its origin; for it 
 is said that Cimarosa was walking about the hills that 
 surround Prague, when it suddenly came into his mind. 
 One would think that in giving such an opera, the 
 Musical Academy could supply a tenor fit to sing more 
 than concerted pieces, and would feel bound to devote 
 some care and energy to the study and production. So 
 
252 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 far from this, the gem of all opera buffas was turned 
 into a low German Posse ; one of those farces given in 
 suburban booths or beer gardens. Some of the best 
 duets were left out, many other airs were turned into 
 recitations, and the gem of the whole, the air which I 
 went to the opera to hear, not so much as hinted at. 
 In a capital which had the slightest pretension to mu- 
 sical taste, such an outrage could not pass unnoticed ; 
 but not one of the audience seemed to be aware that 
 anything was wanting. Herr Lachiier did not think it 
 necessary to direct the performance himself, sufficiently 
 showing his estimation of Cimarosa. After this, who 
 would say that the play of Hamlet, with the part of 
 Hamlet left out, is a phrase that has been too often 
 repeated ? 
 
 These thoughts are supposed to pass through our 
 minds during the symphony. After the symphony 
 there is a pause, generally of half an hour; and this 
 pause is the most characteristic part of the concert. 
 The king now goes round the hall, speaking to the 
 people. You now see why all they that came first took 
 seats down the middle, and by watching attentively you 
 enjoy a most original and most exciting spectacle. The 
 reigning king, Maximilian, seldom appears at these 
 concerts, and his journeys round the room are far less 
 complete than those of his father. It is the ex-king, 
 Ludwig, who generally comes to the concerts, and whose 
 proceedings are so well worth watching. I confess I do 
 not go merely for the purpose of seeing him, as many 
 of the audience seem to do j but in writing of the con- 
 certs he is certainly the chief figure. He first goes 
 
"so HE WENT BOBBING AROUND ! " 253 
 
 round the court circle at the top^ with a word to the 
 chief nobles, and a few smirks for each of the ladies. 
 Then he suddenly darts off down the room, and is seen 
 " bobbing around," like the refrain of that American 
 song which has been naturalised in England. 
 
 It must be premised that in figure and character the 
 old king is decidedly strange. Look, voice, gestures, 
 are all funny. He is given to saying rude things, 
 which of course cannot be resented. He is quite deaf, 
 though he believes that he was cured of deafness by 
 Prince Hohenlohe's miracles, and that he can hear as 
 well as the rest of mankind. For in Prince Hohen- 
 lohe's miracles faith was the essential, and generally 
 faith was all that came of them. If you submitted 
 yourself to the prince, and were not cured, he answered 
 that youi' faith failed ; and he warned you beforehand 
 that, unless you had faith, no cure could be worked on 
 you. King Ludwig's faith certainly did not fail, nor 
 has it failed yet; but unfortunately his deafness has 
 kept pace with it. He won't allow people to speak 
 loud to him, nor to speak close to his ear, teUing them 
 that he hears perfectly. As a rule, he does not hear a 
 word, and generally abuses people for not speaking loud 
 enough, and then abuses them again if they shout. At 
 the concerts, however, the replies are given more in 
 pantomime than iu speech; and you can often tell 
 from the other end of the room what is being said, as 
 well as the king who is close. You can always tell 
 where he is, by seeing a respectful circle of faces and a 
 head bobbing violently in the midst. There is a large 
 bump on his forehead, which is supposed to have arisen 
 
254 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 from one of these bobs ; for he is also in the habit of 
 pulling people towards him and speaking close in their 
 ears. 
 
 There are some anecdotes recorded of him in con- 
 nexion with these concerts. 
 
 It is said he once went up to a young lady, to whom 
 he was a stranger, and began to question her. " Mar- 
 ried?" he asked, in a loud tone. 
 
 " No, your majesty." 
 
 "Children?" he went on, not having heard the first 
 answer. 
 
 "No," exclaimed the young lady; this time loud 
 enough for the word to catch the royal ear. 
 
 But in German, and especially in South German, the 
 word no and the number nine are pronounced exactly 
 alike ; and the king interpreted the young lady's answer 
 as being numeral instead of negative. 
 
 " Nine children !" he said ; " too many, too many \" 
 
 I was myself present when the following one occurred. 
 
 A young Jewess, who kept a shop, and was very vain 
 of her personal appearance, went very early to the con- 
 cert, and took a seat in the middle. Being short of 
 stature, she had added several inches in her coiffure; 
 and, it is needless to add, had dressed herself up to her 
 coiffure. When she saw the king coming, she stepped 
 forward, so that he could not fail to see her ; and no 
 doubt she expected a comphment. But he was not as 
 much captivated as the admirers who daily frequented 
 her shop ; and he burst forth, " Not pretty, not pretty 
 at all! more likely hideous. Too high; too high!" 
 putting his hand about a foot over his head, in allusion 
 
EOYAL AFFABILITY. 255 
 
 to her coiifure. And then he turned back to a lady 
 near, and said, "That's truej isn't it? Not at all 
 pretty?" 
 
 Generally, however, to judge from the pleased faces 
 of the audience, the king is more easily suited. The 
 proud, happy smiles and the minute curtseys of the 
 elder ladies, with whom he holds long familiar chats, 
 while the orchestra is waiting, speak to their honest 
 contentment. The myth of the sunflower, always turn- 
 ing to the sun, is here a reality. The whole room basks 
 in the smiles of royalty. Meanwhile strangers are in- 
 dignant at the enormous pause between the parts, and 
 wonder at the excess of loyalty which permits no stamp- 
 ing or shufHing. But as every French soldier was said 
 to carry a marshal's baton ia his knapsack, so every one 
 in the hall thinks the king may come round that way 
 and speak to him. Expectation sits in the air, and 
 scarcely misses the more prosaic seat that has been 
 purchased by so long an attendance. 
 
 The excellence of the orchestra, and the presence of 
 ihe court, make these concerts the principal ones in 
 Munich. But they are by no means the only ones. 
 Every now and then an organist of one of the churches, 
 or a quartet of the young musicians, or a travelling 
 virtuoso, hires a room and performs ; though generally 
 with results very different from those I have described. 
 A winter or two back came a brace of English violinists, 
 brothers, who trusted too far to the artistic reputation 
 of Munich, and did iiot clear their expenses. A Prus- 
 sian gentleman, however, who has been settled a little 
 time at Munich, and who gives chronological perform- 
 
256 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 ances on the piano, is more fortunate. It must be 
 owned that his play is perfect, and to some extent free 
 of the coxcombry which pianists are so much given to 
 affecting. Perhaps he has "taken out" enough cox- 
 combry in his general appearance, and in the French 
 name he has manufactured by a literal translation of 
 his original German name, to be able to spare the piano 
 all the airs and aftectations of ordinary players. 
 
 But we breathe a very different atmosphere from 
 that of these gas-lit rooms, brilliant though the com- 
 pany, and brilliant the play, when we get out into the 
 open air, to one of the many gardens about Munich. 
 How pleasant it is to sit on a bench and listen to the 
 music of some military brass band or society of in- 
 strumentalists ! It is May ; but this year everything 
 is early, and the leaves already form a dense canopy 
 around and above. The air is thick with the smeU of 
 lilac, which in its different shades of hue is massed on 
 the bushes. The sounds of merry laughter and voices 
 singing glees come, with the splash of oars, from the 
 near lake. The benches are thronged with quiet family 
 parties, drinking their coffee or beer y the ladies knitting 
 as hard as ever, and the gentlemen smoking. In one 
 corner, the children of several families have got toge- 
 ther, into a large swing-boat, and are being swung by 
 an energetic boy in his shirt-sleeves. And so perfect 
 is the picture of enjoyment and content, that even 
 professors of theology pause as they pass by, and look 
 with friendly eyes on the paradise of their humbler 
 countrymen. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 BEER. 
 
 Foe what is Municli most celebrated ? For Art, would 
 be the reply of passing visitors, learned in guide-books. 
 But the inhabitants pay very little regard to this dis- 
 tinction; art has had no civilising or ennobling effect 
 on them ; their knowledge of it is small, and their ap- 
 preciation small; and the chief names in Munich art 
 are of men from other countries. Liebig, would be 
 the reply of men of science. But Liebig is more known 
 in England than in Munich, and certainly more justly 
 valued. The only feeling a true Bavarian has for Liebig 
 is jealousy; is he not a North German and a Protestant? 
 In his eyes social progress is of more account than fer- 
 vent faith, and he believes that a knowledge of the laws 
 of our being does more to promote the welfare of a 
 nation than blind trust in a continual overruling of 
 those laws. He must be put out of the question, and 
 Art being also excluded, only one answer remains. 
 Munich is most celebrated for its beer. 
 
 Listen to the conversation of Bavarians, it turns on 
 beer. See to what the thoughts of the exile recur, to 
 the beer of his country. Sit down in a coffee-house or 
 
258 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 eating-house and the waiter brings you beer unordered, 
 and when you have emptied your glass, replenishes it 
 without a summons. Tell a doctor the climate of 
 Munich does not agree with you, and he will ask you 
 if you drink enough beer. Arrive at a place before the 
 steamer or train is due, and you are told you have so 
 long to drink beer. Go to balls, and you find that it 
 replaces champagne with the rich and dancing with the 
 poor. (I once went to a servants' ball and stayed there 
 some timcj but when I came away dancing had not 
 begun, and all the society was sitting as still as ever 
 drinking beer.) Moreover, Bavarian beer goes to all 
 other towns in Germany, and is drunk in each with 
 more rapture than its native beverage. You get it in 
 Stockholm, and it is even imitated in Norway, though 
 the strong flavour of turpentine that hovers through 
 the Norwegian "Bayerskt 01" is an addition, and not 
 an improvement. Aye, Paris with all its most exquisite 
 wines is not too proud to put placards of Bi^re de 
 Baviere in its windows, to vie with the porter-bier 
 (stout) on the cartes of the most fashionable restaurants. 
 I am sure that many a traveller after spending his 
 morning in the galleries and churches, after being 
 marched through the palace and round the large empty 
 frescoes during weary hours, has felt real pleasure in 
 sitting calmly down behiud a stone-mug of cool beer, 
 and has called it the genuine art of Munich. Here for 
 the first time he finds life and soul, nature and expres- 
 sion. He sees the people enjoying themselves, and 
 knows more of their habits and their way of thinking 
 than any number of the sights can teach him. And as 
 
GENUINE ART. 359 
 
 he stretches his weary limbs and rests his burning eyes, 
 and his head begins to feel less giddy, and his brain 
 expands again to its natural size, he asks why this 
 national life was not encouraged and developed; why 
 nothing was left to grow out of this popular taste in- 
 stead of the crude unmeaning art that has been forced 
 on a nation without feeling for it ? How much more 
 genuine it would have been, in Mr. Ruskin^s sense of 
 the word, if King Ludwig had built a large beer-hall 
 and let all his artists adorn it with frescoes that could 
 speak to the people, instead of all his temples and 
 Italian copies and histories of saints and mediaeval Ger- 
 mans ! And when the traveller looks back gratefully 
 on his summers abroad, Munich is associated solely 
 with his stone-mug of beer, a pleasant picture of pe- 
 rennial coolness amidst " the dust and din of London 
 life." 
 
 It is, indeed, much to be regretted that the goddess 
 of Munich joy and coolness, should not have chosen a 
 fitter dwelling. Art, both ancient and modern, is 
 splendidly housed ; the old pictures have their Italian 
 palace, and the statues their Ionic temple, while the 
 new pictures have a large and convenient building 
 which typifies modern art as aptly as palace and temple 
 typifies the ancient. Learning has its noble Byzantine 
 library, war its colonnade, and victory its triumphal 
 arch. Royalty is enclosed by a street front in imitation 
 of the Pitti and a Palladian garden front; everything 
 has its splendid halls and its copious ornaments ; — only 
 beer, the darling of the people, the genius that presides 
 over all their festivities, has no worthy abode. The 
 
* 
 260 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Court brew-house, tlie chief resort of all beer- drinkers, 
 and the producer of the best beer, is disgracefully neg- 
 lected. You find your way through narrow streets, old 
 remnants of medisevalism that still exist close to the 
 centre of modern civilisation, to a bare place with low 
 doorways and a mean aspect. This small square is 
 called the Platzl, and one house in it is celebrated as 
 having been the residence of the composer Orlando di 
 Lasso, who died in 1599; the house still bears his 
 name, and sells beer under it. Under one of the low 
 archways in this square you pass, and come to a yard 
 full of people. Some stand in groups in the middle, 
 holding glasses of beer in their hands ; if a cask hap- 
 pens to stand there it is used alternately as a chair and 
 a table. The yard is long and narrow, and on one side 
 a number of tables stand out from the wall, looking 
 more like stalls in a stable with their high wooden par- 
 titions and the narrow roof over them to keep off the 
 rain. On the other side of the yard is a small doorway 
 which leads to the kitchen and bar. Men pass in and 
 out bringing back plates of meat or cheese, or often a 
 sausage and bread from the kitchen, and stop to buy 
 radishes from an itinerant vendor just outside the door. 
 The bar, if the name be at all applicable, has a fountain 
 of running water, and two stands of stone mugs, one on 
 each side of the fountain. You take a mug and wash it 
 at the spout, then walk to the table and have it filled 
 from a cask. With this you go in quest of a table, and 
 if you can find one empty, and a bit of newspaper to 
 wipe off the cheese parings and turnip parings accumu- 
 lated upon it, you may consider yourself settled. An 
 
OLD STAGERS. 261 
 
 old man hovers about the tables, and when your first 
 quart is drunk you may be able to dispense with the 
 trouble of getting yourself a second. After each quart 
 such trouble becomes greater, and the old man's assist- 
 ance will be the more wdlingly remunerated the more 
 often you feel bound to call for it. 
 
 If the old man were not called too often, and had 
 time enough left him to write his autobiography, a most 
 instructive volume might be produced. A place which 
 is the rendezvous of all the nationalism in Munich, and 
 which has its old habitues, must have witnessed many 
 singular scenes, and must have curious anecdotes to 
 relate. Those old men who sit day after day in the 
 Court brew-house, surely they might be as interesting 
 characters as the old club frequenters in London. But 
 it is not worth one's while to spend one's time drinking 
 beer in this miserable yard on the chance of picking up 
 some good characters among them ; one might risk the loss 
 of one's powers of observation and one's memory if one 
 drank enough beer to occupy the time of one's stay, and 
 without drinking beer, how could one stay in such a 
 place? Attempting to get characters of old topers in 
 the plural, one might only succeed in getting the cha- 
 racter of one in the singular, and though at first the 
 danger seems small, there is no knowing what might 
 not be done by the force of habit. How else explain 
 the daily presence of professors and men of learning; 
 how else account for the first authorities on abstruse 
 subjects of study passing every evening of their lives in 
 the company of beer? Yet one would like to know 
 with certainty if all the stories one hears is true. One 
 
263 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 would gaze, not exactly with admiration but with the 
 feelings of a scientific explorer, on people who drink 
 thirty quarts of beer a-day ; and one cannot accept 
 from mere hearsay that story of beer drunk for a wager, 
 when the victor drank eighty quarts at a sitting. Why 
 does not some Munich artist give us a picture of the 
 Hofbrauhaus or the Bockkeller, as a companion to 
 Hogarth's Beer Street ? Faithfully rendered, such a 
 picture would serve to fill up the want of the old man's 
 autobiography, and would enable us to judge better of 
 the truth of the anecdotes in circulation. Nor, if 
 rumour is to be believed, are the painters of Munich 
 ignorant of these places. They would hardly feel any 
 unwillingness in making studies of Prae-Raphaelite 
 truthfulness for such a picture. 
 
 The scene I have described is the normal state of the 
 Hofbrauhaus. Summer and winter the same drinking 
 goes on, and it is reported that in the olden days, be- 
 fore the discovery of the Bavarian Highlands, the cool 
 beer cellar was the summer retreat of the Munich 
 world. But there are other places of resort, which are 
 only open at certain times of year. Two sorts of 
 Munich beer are only allowed limited times for brew- 
 ing ; the celebrated Bock which is brewed and drunk 
 only in May, and the Salvator beer only in March. 
 Old privileges and old restrictions are the causes both 
 of the permission to brew these stronger kinds, and of 
 the short period in which they may be dispensed. A 
 controversy took place in the Munich newspapers 
 touching the origin of Bock, one party declaring that 
 it owed its strength and excellence to its being brewed 
 
ORIGIN OF BOCK. 263 
 
 on the English principle ; the other that it came origi- 
 nally from Eimbeck in Hanover, adding, that the word 
 Bock is only a corruption of Eimbeck. One would 
 gladly believe the first story if the arguments against 
 it were not strong, for the excellence of Bock is such 
 that English brewers should be proud to recognise it 
 as their ofispring. It is said that Maximilian the First 
 of Bavaria, the Elector or Kurfiirst, whose name occurs 
 so often in the History of the Thirty Years^ War, and 
 who alone of all the principal actors in that drama 
 survived to the end, consulted an English doctoi', whose 
 acquaintance he had made in some of his campaigns, 
 about the health of the Electress. The doctor recom- 
 mended her porter, and ordered several casks of it. 
 The Kurf iirstin thrived under the treatment ; but as it 
 cost very much to have the casks brought from Eng- 
 land, and as the length of the journey caused much 
 of the drink to be spoiled, the Kurfiirst sent his head 
 brewer to England to study the English system of 
 brewing. In a year the brewer returned, and the first 
 porter-beer concocted on the English principle was 
 brewed in 1633, and the first glass of it put on the 
 table on the 13th of October, the name-day of the Kur- 
 fiirst. At first it was only used medicinally, but after a 
 time it was generally adopted as a drink, and brewed 
 fourteen days before and fourteen days after Coi'pus 
 Christi, from the middle of May to the middle of June. 
 In answer to this story it is urged that in a paper, ex- 
 isting in the archives of Munich, an Erfart burgher is 
 authorized to transport Eimbeck beer to Munich in 
 1553 ; that in one of the accounts of the Munich Court, 
 
264 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 dated 1574^ Eimbeck beer is also mentioned; and that 
 in a police decree of 1616 the name Bock is found as 
 the name of a beer to be brewed only for the sick. 1 
 fear these facts are sufficiently conclusive to deprive 
 England of the glory of originating Bock. But we are 
 not altogether deprived of it, even if our brewers did 
 not supply the model ; for the statement which annuls 
 the claim of England gives us the more reason to 
 rejoice in the joy of Hanover. 
 
 Even if we are still inclined to doubt of the origin of 
 Bock, unwilling to surrender our national monopoly of 
 all good beer, and saying with the hero of Maud, " I 
 know not whether it came in the Hanover ship,^' we must 
 at least admit its excellence, a point on which there can 
 be no dispute. I could linger long on the subject were 
 it not that a friend has already exhausted it in the 
 columns of the Parthenon. And as I can add nothing 
 to his description I must be silent, merely quoting the 
 words in which Heine has preserved the memory of 
 Bock, in the exquisitely satirical poem he addressed to 
 Dingelstedt on taking the direction of the Munich 
 Theatre : — 
 
 " That's a lovely situation ! 
 
 Grlorious Bock, too, sparkles hsira, 
 Pliantasy, imagination 
 
 Stirring up, the best of beer." 
 
 I cannot call to mind the tradition relating to the 
 origin of Salvator beer. Of course there is some tradi- 
 tion to account for the privilege of brewing it being 
 granted, and for the especial time chosen for brewing 
 it. The weeks before Easter are the time, and a brewer 
 
SALVATOR BEER. 265 
 
 living beyond the Au suburb is the privileged person. 
 The right bank of the Isar rises in a hill looking down 
 on the flat ground on the left bank where the town of 
 Munich is built, and this high bank is mounted during 
 the month of March by many weary pilgrims to the 
 refreshing shrine. Before you reach the shade of trees 
 varied by fluttering flags and attracting with the sound 
 of music, you pass the brewery with a little fountain 
 sparkling in the sun, and a neat airy look of well-being. 
 A few paces further is the scene of action. You enter 
 grounds which want dusting and keeping, and find 
 tables set out among the trees, and seats occupied by 
 men and women of all classes. At the end is a large 
 shed with flags over the doorway, and within are crowds 
 of people waiting for their stone mug of beer. Radishes 
 wander about as in the Hofbrauhaus, and plates of 
 meat and bread come out of the shed as well as beer. 
 It was a bright sunny day when I came to the Salvator 
 Cellar with a comrade, and we chose seats in the shade 
 while we drank. All the tables were full, and half 
 Munich was either there already, or coming there. The 
 band played at intervals, and every tongue was loosed 
 by the strong beer. For Salvator is the strongest of all 
 that is brewed in Munich, and is eschewed by many 
 prudent topers. Men who drink beer all day, and then 
 take a glass of Bock every morning in May as a cure 
 for drinking too much all the year round, avoid Sal- 
 vator, or take it in extreme moderation. People are 
 supposed to get drunk in March, and every one who 
 does not walk with the firmness of a sentry is said to 
 be suflering under the influence of the season. As we 
 
 N 
 
266 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 came back from our moderate indulgence, my comrade 
 was taxed with an unsteady gait by friends wbo met us, 
 though he was a north German and averse to deep pota- 
 tions. The tongue, however, is apt to be loosed after 
 Salvator beer, and if the Pere Bouhours was to meet 
 Germans returning from that draught, he might answer 
 his famous question in the affirmative. Est-ce qu'un 
 Allemand peut avoir de V esprit ? would not again be 
 uttered, unless French wine- drinkers should allege that 
 the German wit was only esprit de Mere. But a Ger- 
 man has such a hearty contagious way of making jokes 
 that you cannot resist chiming in with his laughter. 
 I remember as we walked back through the Au suburb, 
 which is so singular a contrast to the regularity of Munich, 
 its low village cottages piled together in face of some 
 grand building, and its out-of-the-way streets seeming 
 a poor threshold to the great new church with the 
 Gothic pinnacles and painted glass, that we stopped be- 
 fore a little hovel on which was written " Real beer 
 tavern." Next door to it was a similar cottage labelled 
 Upholsterer's, and a small piece of a bedstead was 
 propped up outside to certify the fact. Nothing larger 
 than a chair could have got in at the door of the uphol- 
 sterer's, nor could a stout drinker have found his way 
 out of the door of the beer-house. " But observe the 
 importance of the adjective," said my companion. 
 "Real, you see, emphatically real — not ideal." Just 
 after this he was accused of unsteadiness in his gait. 
 
 The Bavarians attribute the excellence of their beer 
 to the strictness of the regulations on brewing. Twice 
 a year the Government fixes the price at which beer is 
 
COURT INSTITUTIONS. 267 
 
 to be sold, one price for summer beer, another for 
 winter. If a brewer, or beerhouse-keeper, sells any 
 below the Government price, he is fined, just as he 
 would be if his tankards were not of the right measure. 
 By such stringent rules it is supposed that a monopoly 
 of beer by the great houses is prevented, and the 
 natural results of a monopoly, carelessness and bad- 
 ness. Yet if there is such a desire to banish monopoly 
 in this point, why is it left to flourish in all others? 
 Why does restriction, which produces such bad effects 
 in the general trade of Munich, produce good ones in 
 the matter of beer ? The trade laws are in all other 
 matters promoters of monopoly, and encourage bad 
 workmanship. It is also worthy of remark that the 
 Court brewery is about the only institution of the kind 
 that flourishes. The Royal Porcelain Manufactory is 
 so celebrated for the bad quality of its ware that at- 
 tempts are at last being made to have it transferred to 
 private hands. The Bronze Foundry never paid its 
 expenses, nor turned out good workmanship till it 
 passed out of the hands of royalty. But the Hofbrau 
 beer is universally admitted to be the best in Munich, 
 and about mid-day the crush of servants bringing their 
 jugs, or masspots, for their masters' dinner is very great. 
 For in Munich it is not the custom to have beer in 
 casks or in bottle. Everybody sends out just before 
 dinner, generally to the nearest beer-house, for the 
 quantity required. In London the experiment perhaps 
 would hardly answer, for public-house beer has not 
 quite the reputation of Bass. But there are very many 
 good beer-houses in Munich in proportion to the extent 
 
268 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of the town, and if one does not suit, it is easy for the 
 servant to go to another. About the dinner hour you 
 meet servants of every rank going in quest of beer. 
 Not only those families who cannot afPord to buy it 
 by casks, or to drink it in bottles, but all families, from 
 the least to the greatest. I have never seen the royal 
 flunkeys walking across the street to bring the Queen 
 that beer she is so fond of drinking, but I have seen a 
 very grand footman in livery stroUing leisurely home 
 with a great glass jug of beer in his hand. The beer 
 glasses of Germany are well known, and I think Mu- 
 nich produces as good specimens as Bohemia or Hun- 
 gary. You may give as much as i6l3 for a very refined 
 pint glass with exquisite carving, and a top of oxidised 
 silver on the shield of which your crest is engraved. 
 
 Little more need be said of the beer-gardens of Mu- 
 nich after the Salvator Cellar. With slight variations, 
 a description of the wine-gardens of the Rhine and of 
 the out-of-door places of resort in Berlin and Dresden 
 would apply to them, and so much has been written on 
 the subject that nothing new remains to be told. Who 
 has not read of the music playing in one part, and the 
 tables set out all round, the happy family groups knit- 
 ting 01 sewing while sipping their coffee, or drinking 
 their beer? Gardens such as these abound in the 
 neighbourhood of Munich, in the English garden and 
 up the Isar, besides those in the more open part of the 
 town. There is an establishment on an island at the 
 end of the new Maximilian Strasse, called the Prater, 
 where are fireworks in summer and masked balls in the 
 Carnival. In another part are great halls which are 
 
THE DIGNITY OF PHILOSOPHY. 369 
 
 used for balls and assemblies^ dropping for a time their 
 exclusive connection with beer. The sarcasms that 
 Byron showered on the romantic names of dismal 
 streets in London suburbs might not be inapplicable 
 to the names of some of these places. " The Meadow " 
 seems almost too idyllic a title for the scene of masked 
 balls frequented by the lower orders ; the Elysium is 
 only the Elysium of people without refinement of taste, 
 and the Westend hall would not be accepted as having 
 any connexion with the west end of London. There is 
 a Schiller garden and a beer-house called after the 
 composer Orlando di Lasso, but a man who wanted to 
 call his beer-house after the philosopher Schelling was 
 prevented. The magistrate, with whom the decision 
 rested, said it was not meet that the name of Schelling 
 should be coupled with a beer-shop, and thus the (phi- 
 losopher of Munich was refused the modern title to 
 eminence, the fame accorded to Gibbon. "Gibbon," 
 says Mr. Bagehot, in his Essays, "still retains a fame 
 unaccorded to any other historian : they speak of the 
 Hotel Gibbon; there never was even an Estaminet 
 Tacitus, or a Cafe Thucydides." It is amusing to con- 
 jecture the reasons which prevailed on the magistrate to 
 refuse the permission. Is Schelling so much more 
 reverend than Schiller; is philosophy less addicted to 
 beer than poetry ? Or was it that the sagacious magis- 
 trate feared the introduction of anything ideal into the 
 real world of beer-houses, and knowing the doubt and 
 distraction that have been caused by German philoso- 
 phy, would have no such cobwebs floating in the minds 
 of the votaries of beer ? 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HOUSES. 
 
 For some time past the demand for houses in Munich 
 has greatly exceeded the supply, and the usual conse- 
 quences of an understocked market have arisen. Hents 
 have increased out of all proportion to other prices; 
 house-owners have grown insolent and tyrannical; spe- 
 culators have run up bad buildings, and made ill-gotten 
 gains, which have prospered ; and families have been at 
 the mercy of all three. Moreover, the law in Munich 
 is on the side of the owner, and the tenant has no pos- 
 sible redress. Now, at last, steps have been taken to 
 create a much greater supply of lodgings, and to alter 
 the iniquitous law against lodgers. But in the mean- 
 time let me sketch the state of dwelling-houses in Mu- 
 nich, and put down my sad experiences. 
 
 As in continental towns generally, we inhabit floors. 
 Much has been said for and against this system, to 
 which Englishmen submit willingly enough in Pari^ 
 and Rome, but which they consider unsuited to English 
 notions in London. The houses in Victoria Street are 
 pointed to as proofs of this assertion ; though the enor- 
 mous rents demanded, the gloomy and low situation, 
 
HOUSES IN FLATS. 371 
 
 are probably better reasons for their failure than any- 
 thing in the English character. Few, even, of the 
 richer classes in Munich, have a house to themselves, 
 save in the case of people living in smaU houses beyond 
 the limits of the actual town, and the majority of houses, 
 both old and new, were built on the principle of sepa- 
 rate floors. One inconvenience this system certainly 
 possesses, you cannot buy your own house. If you buy 
 it, that is, you must buy other people's at the same 
 time ; from a tenant you must become a landlord. In 
 the present defenceless state of tenants they would be 
 glad enough if each could buy his own floor ; but few 
 would care to rise suddenly into the onerous and de- 
 tested position of landlord of a four-storied house, even 
 if they could afford the outlay. 
 
 But, even with this disadvantage, the flat, system has 
 many points superior to the ordinary Enghsh manner of 
 building. Being all on the same floor, the rooms are 
 almost invariably en suite, convenient, as giving you 
 a greater command over your space, a power of mar- 
 shalling your rooms when you wish to receive company, 
 and as enabling you to avoid cold passages. The mul- 
 tiplication of doors is perhaps an evil, especially when 
 the jft'imitive notions of Munich architects have led 
 them to put the doors in the most inconvenient places. 
 Moreover, as Alfred de Musset has proved in one of his 
 exquisite Proverbes, II faut qu'une porta soit ouverte ou 
 fermee, both of which alternatives are apt to be incon. 
 venient. Again, the parte cochere is an immense con- 
 venience, which ladies going out to balls or parties in 
 the snow or rain can perfectly appreciate. It has always 
 
272 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 been a wonder to me how a lady can come down those 
 three steps that lead from the door of a London house 
 to the streetj through those open pillars that do not 
 give the slightest protection, and then cross the side 
 pavement to get to her carriage, without being drenched, 
 her satin shoes ruined, and her dress destroyed. Yet, 
 unless a lady is carried in a sedan chair from the hall 
 into her carriage, as a shell is put in the mouth of a 
 gun, I cannot conceive her escaping. With the porte 
 cochere there is no fear of the least damage to ball dress 
 or ball shoes. Yet there is a disadvantage attending on 
 the porte cochere, which is most sensibly felt in the 
 crowded part of a town. It implies a court in the 
 centre of the house, and rooms looking on that court ; 
 of course, in the centre of the town there cannot be 
 much room allotted to this court, and the rooms that 
 look on it are necessarily dark and dreary, each one 
 moreover commanded by the windows of all the others. 
 The ghastliness of many of the rooms looking into 
 these courts in the older parts of Munich can hardly be 
 imagined, save by those who have seen the gloomy side 
 of German life. In the freer quarters the objection has 
 been overcome by making the entrance at the back 
 under cover, so that the front of the lower floor is not 
 broken, and there is a free circulation round the house. 
 But of course this can only be done where you have 
 sufficient space at your disposal. And there is, after 
 all, no great choice between back rooms, and rooms on 
 a court. 
 
 The disadvantages attendant on Munich houses do 
 not spring from this or that system of building, but 
 
THE POWER OP LANDLORDS. 273 
 
 from bad laws, bad landlords, and bad building, aU three 
 to some extent the growth of the Bavarian character. 
 To begin with the landlords ; the power that excess of 
 demand has given them has made them in the highest 
 degree despotic and overbearing. I find that this class 
 of beings is generally unpopular; in Paris they are 
 made the constant butt of caricaturists and comic 
 writers, and philosophers have seriously discussed the 
 advisability of hanging one-half of them. The remedy 
 would probably have some good efiects in Munich. 
 Here the house-owners exact the most absurd conditions 
 from their tenants. You see advertisements of apart- 
 ments to be let only to. childless families, as if a family 
 could dispose of its children at a moment's notice, to 
 please the landlord's fancy. In furnished apartments, 
 where there are rich carpets and elegant fittings, you 
 can understand some such clauses as these being in- 
 serted ; but in Munich houses this exaggerated delicacy 
 is peculiarly out of place. Again, I heard of a land- 
 lord who gave his tenant notice to quit because the 
 tenant's wife did not bow to the landlord's wife. And 
 not only are these men thus exacting and uncivil, but 
 they will not take care o^ their own houses. Whatever 
 repairs have to be made it is useless to expect the land- 
 lord to make them. Their first word is, when you go 
 to look at a house, " I do nothing ;" and if the floors 
 are broken, the paint rubbed off, the paper torn, you 
 need expect no remedy from them. If you are incau- 
 tious enough to do anything yourself towards making 
 the house more comfortable, beware ! So far from feel- 
 ing gratitude to you for repairing his property and doing 
 
 N 2 
 
374 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 his duty, the landlord instantly raises your rent. Houses 
 in Munich are taken from six months to six mouths, 
 and fourteen days are allowed after each term day for 
 landlord and tenant to make up their minds. If, there- 
 fore, you come in at Michaelmas, and begin to paper 
 your room before the fourteen days are expired, the 
 landlord is sure to wait on you at the end of the four- 
 teen days, with the announcement, that after next term 
 you must pay so much more rent. To such a pitch is 
 the despotism of landlords carried, that a story was 
 spread about Munich to the eifect, that the editor of a 
 paper, whose politics were obnoxious to genuine Bava- 
 rians, could not find a house to hold him ; and though 
 this was not true, yet it was very difficult for the news- 
 paper in question to find an office. One editor had to 
 buy a house, and become proprietor in Munich, owing 
 to a league that was formed against him, and many 
 other tenants would be happy if they had the same 
 command of money, and could also be independent of 
 the race of owners. 
 
 An Englishman will naturally ask, — Why not make 
 the man give you a lease? And many Germans ask 
 the same question. The lease would get rid of all the 
 difficulties, draw the teeth of the landlords, give rest to 
 the tenants, and after a time even the landlords would 
 discover that it was more their interest to behave 
 honestly and uprightly than to turn a few knavish pen- 
 nies, and perhaps be ruined in the end. But here the 
 law steps in with its admirable provisions. There is a 
 little clause in Munich law which says, " Kauf bricht 
 Miethe," that is, sale breaks hire. A more admirable 
 
STRENGTH OF LANDLORDS THE LAW. 375 
 
 device for worrying the tenant can hardly be conceived. 
 If a man buys the house in which you live he can in- 
 stantly raise your rent, and, if you refuse to pay any 
 move, can turn you out at a fortnight^s notice. You 
 may have a lease for any number of years, but it is 
 null and void. And the especial disadvantage that meets 
 you is this, that if you are turned out at a fortnight's 
 notice in the middle of term you can find no other house 
 to take you in. The evil has become so palpable, and 
 has grown to so unbearable a pitch, that a petition was 
 presented to the last Chamber by many inhabitants of 
 Munich, begging that the clause might be rescinded. 
 It can easily be imagined what a field was here pre- 
 sented to knavish speculators. One man runs up a 
 house when there is a great demand for houses, and 
 lets all the apartments at a certain rate. As soon as 
 all are let, for the rent asked in a new house is not 
 generally large, he sells it to another. The second man 
 comes round to all the tenants, and with profuse apo- 
 logies raises the rents all round. He talks of the great 
 outlay he had made, the high price of the house, &c., 
 and the tenants, sooner than be turned into the street 
 when no other place can be had, calculating the ex- 
 pense of moving their furniture, and the damage that 
 every move entails, consent to pay the addition. The 
 man instantly goes off and sells it to a third, pocketing 
 of course a higher price than he had paid, because the 
 house has risen in value, owing to his raising the rents. 
 And so on till the patience of the tenants is exhausted. 
 
 These f^re the landlords and the laws under which 
 they flourish. But we have by no means got to the 
 
276 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 end of grievances when we have settled these two 
 matters. The unpractical nature of the people, as 
 shown in their building and fittings, is even more an- 
 noying than their hoorishness, as shown in their land- 
 lords, and their helplessness, as shown in their laws. 
 The chief point of distinction between the houses in 
 Munich is their age, for the general run of houses seem 
 to be built with much the same characteristics. De- 
 scending to details, of course you may find a weU-built 
 house side by side with a badly-built one ; but the pro- 
 bability is, that their rents will be the same, according 
 to the situation and the number of rooms. In Munich, 
 badness or goodness does not seem to influence rents, 
 in fact good houses are often cheaper than bad ones. 
 In the course of my rounds, before finding a lodging 
 to suit me, I went into two houses not far from each 
 other, and found one which was built with unusual con- 
 veniences, was rented for £5 a year less than the other, 
 which had one room less and an utter want of every 
 comfort, even to bareness. These were houses built 
 within six months of each other, but one was run up by 
 a speculator to satisfy the demand. I trust there are 
 ■ not many such houses in Munich, and as my fate com- 
 pelled me to live in one during the first six months of 
 my stay, I can only pity those who find nothing else at 
 their disposal. 
 
 But, as I have just observed, the age of houses in 
 Munich is their distinguishing mark, and the only 
 means of classifying them. I take it that there are 
 three periods of houses; old houses dating from any 
 time till King Ludwig's improvements; houses built 
 
WATER-COLOURSj WHERE WATER IS WANTED. 277 
 
 under King Ludwig, and houses built under tlie pre- 
 sent King. Certainly these are divided into three dis- 
 tinct styles. The old houses are those picturesque old 
 German buildings which give their character to such 
 towns as Niu-emberg and Augsburg, and which appear 
 in the water-colours of Prout, and of the many artists 
 who spend their summers in sketching over the Con- 
 tinent. We know those high roofs pierced with tiers 
 upon tiers of gable windows, that fantastic ornamenta- 
 tion of scrolls meandering round the projecting windows 
 of the lower stories, the quaint, graceful irregularity of 
 design that relieves the eye after modern uniformity. 
 But no Englishman would care to live in one of these 
 houses, however much he may be charmed by their out- 
 sides, or by their interiors on the walls of the Water 
 Colour Society. The Germans have not yet achieved 
 any great triumphs in the art of building, and in earlier 
 ages they could hardly be expected to supply the wants 
 which they neglect even now. I have seen houses of 
 great age in which the front rooms were reaUy grand in 
 their proportions, furnished with mirrors set in the 
 walls, console tables below them, and marble mantel- 
 pieces; but the practical arrangements at the back of 
 the house were quite disproportioned to this splendour. 
 Besides this, the old houses generally have a smell be- 
 longing to them which dwells in all the passages, broods 
 over the staircases, and even issues in solid columns out 
 of the front door. Every house which has long been 
 inhabited by Germans of the middle classes seems to 
 gain this smell, which is partly the result of sauer 
 kraut, but is still more owing to that neglect of Liebig's 
 
278 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 teaching, which was fully stated in one of the Registrar- 
 General's reports. The mania for niching little rooms 
 into impossible little corners, which is not yet extinct 
 in German builders, naturally prevails in these old 
 houses in the crowded part of the town. Where an 
 English architect would gladly leave a little open space, 
 a German thrusts in a closet without light or air, which 
 is called a magd-kammer, and is considered enough for 
 a servant to sleep in. I cannot conceive how a bed 
 can be got in at all in many of the magd-kammers I 
 have seen: I am sure the servant must stand on the 
 bed to dress herself. And yet from the invariable 
 custom of advertising an apartment of so many rooms 
 with magd-kammer it is evident that these closets are 
 used for servants. The offices are sadly neglected in 
 old Munich, and the general result of an inquiry into 
 certain parts of household arrangements is by no means 
 satisfactory to English families. 
 
 The houses dating from the time of King Ludwig 
 are mostly very uniform, filling the streets which he 
 laid out, and planned according to his taste. They are 
 more or less Italian-looking outside, and are in general 
 fairly comfortable within. I am speaking of the best 
 houses, those in the Ludwig's Strasse, and the better 
 streets that run off from it. The houses built under 
 King Max are almost invariably of the modern French 
 style, and while some are well built, and are perhaps 
 the best residences in Munich, after the private houses 
 of the nobUity, others are hastily, carelessly, and cheaply 
 run up. However, in all the houses in Munich, as in 
 all branches of life, there is a want of the commonest 
 
WALLS AND SHUTTERS. 279 
 
 precautions to insure comfort, an amount of oversight 
 which is really inexcusable. I doubt if in all Munich 
 there is a piece of furniture that stands, or a floor that 
 is level. The state of the walls generally is infamous, 
 wherever a nail is driven in there is a ran of sand or a 
 shock against a stone, and wooden pegs have to be 
 struck in before anything will hold. The annoyance 
 caused by blinds and curtains is enough to wear out 
 any master of a house, for servants never attempt to 
 remedy the evil, and it is of almost daily recurrence. 
 Some of the houses are destitute of the minor comforts 
 that are supposed to form the chief merit of German 
 dwellings ; draughts make their way through double 
 windows unimpeded, and revel around the ill-closing 
 doors. 
 
 But the most serious evil, which dates from King 
 Ludwig, is the outward uniformity of the streets, and 
 the necessity of submitting your comfort to the caprices 
 of high place. I do not know what grudge the autho- 
 rities of Munich have against jalousies. Any one who 
 has lived in a hot climate knows that they are indispen- 
 sable to life, and every one who has seen their artistic 
 effect in French and Italian towns will own that they 
 are a most graceful ornament. But in Munich, though 
 for four months the sun is as powerful as in the south, 
 though the new streets have been built excessively wide, 
 so that they may have the full benefit of the sun during 
 winter, you may count the houses with outside shutters 
 on your fingers. Even the new ones which are built in 
 open imitation of Paris, do not possess the great conve- 
 nience of Parisian houses. Nor is the intense glare of 
 
280 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the sun the only evil which would be avoided by shut- 
 ters ; there is a greater scourge yet which alone should 
 have suggested their adoption. Its exposed situation 
 and the neighbourhood of the mountains lay Munich 
 open to storms that are only known in mountain re- 
 gions. The size of the hailstones which fall, and the 
 violence with which they sweep the houses, are scarcely 
 conceivable to those who have not witnessed such tem- 
 pests. It was only the other day .that a storm passed 
 over Augsburg, levelling trees, destroying all the fruit 
 and the harvest, and breaking every window on the 
 exposed side of the chief street of the town. It is by 
 no means uncommon for every window to be broken on 
 one side of the Ludwig's Strasse when such storms pass 
 over Munich, and such storms are no rare visitors. I 
 have seen people throw their windows wide open and 
 let the rain beat in, putting cloths to sop it up, sooner 
 than have to pay a glazier's bill for every pane in their 
 windows. 
 
 The cost of putting up shutters would probably be 
 less than that of having your windows broken every 
 summer, and many people would long ago have put 
 them up if the law did not interpose. But the law for- 
 bids you to alter the outside of your house without per- 
 mission, and if you live in certain streets without the 
 most especial permission. Here is a gentle reminder 
 on the part of the authorities, which I cut out of a paper 
 in April, 1863. 
 
 " WITH REGARD TO THE PAINTING OF HOUSES." 
 
 "1. When the first coating has been laid on a house. 
 
POLICE REGULATIONS. 281 
 
 or the old one has been freshened up, pure white is not 
 to be employed, but a mild, so-called stone colour which 
 does not hurt the eyes. 
 
 "2. It cannot, however, be permitted that two or 
 more houses which form an architectonic whole should 
 be painted differently. Nor is the colouring of the 
 woodwork, of the window frames and shutters, of the 
 house doors, &c., to have a different tint from the 
 facade. 
 
 " 3. If, therefore, the owner of such a house wishes 
 to alter or to renew the painting of his facade, he must 
 agree with the owners of the other houses as to the 
 colour to be employed, and the time at which it shall 
 take place. 
 
 "4. If they cannot agree, any one may make an 
 apphcation, producing a pattern of the colour he 
 wishes to employ, whereupon further steps will be taken. 
 
 "5. For those houses near the old Schwabinger Gate, 
 that is on the Odeon's Platz, in the Wittelsbacher Platz, 
 the first and last houses in the Brienner Strasse, and 
 those in the Ludwig's Strasse, the painting is submitted 
 
 to HIGHER APPROVAL. 
 
 " 6. The painting of the houses along the English 
 Garden has to be submitted to the Intendant of the Hof 
 Garten. 
 
 " 7. A weekly report is to be made by the Master of 
 the Works of aU alterations in the painting of the 
 houses. 
 
 "8. Whoever breaks these rules is liable to have a 
 stop put to his proceedings, and to be punished by fine 
 or arrest." 
 
383 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Uniformity is^ therefore, the order of the day in 
 Munich as well as in Paris, reminding us of the sol- 
 dier's plan for laying out a city which M. About has 
 given in Pougas. In Paris there is some excuse for 
 monotony, for everything springs up at the will of one 
 man and at fabulous speed. But in a town like Mu- 
 nich, where the filling up of streets has to be entrusted 
 to private builders, there is neither the same excuse nor 
 the same necessity. The present King might have been 
 warned by the spectacle of the Ludwig's Strasse not to 
 lay out his Maximilian's Strasse with the same uni- 
 formity. And yet we have the same design : 
 
 " Grove nods at grove, each alley has a brother, 
 And half the platform just reflects the other." 
 
 In truth, the new street is more faulty than the old. 
 It is very prettily laid out with gardens and trees in 
 front, and the houses standing back ; but the result is, 
 that the pavement is of no use to the houses, and you 
 have to wade through mud, or dismount in mud, if you 
 would get to them. The houses are generally biult 
 without any carriage entrance, but they have exces- 
 sively high sham double doors, about one-third of 
 which is actually door, the rest being the wall of a room 
 on the first storey. Besides which, having been run up 
 by speculators, not often the most honest or the most 
 enlightened of men, some of these houses have not one 
 convenience, nothing but the bare walls. Some of them 
 had no bells at the front door, and families 'inhabiting 
 them were compelled to wait for half-an-hour in the 
 snow till they could attract the attention of some one 
 
HOW RTJSKIN IS STUDIED. 283 
 
 inside. In most other countries the last builder natu- 
 rally adopts the existing conveniences, and endeavours 
 to add more, that his house may be an improvement on 
 earlier ones. But in Munich builders abandon the 
 good that existed before, without substituting aught of 
 their own. 
 
 Perhaps the most remarkable point in Munich build- 
 ing is, that house architects seem to have studied 
 Euskin in order to avoid his suggestions and to adopt 
 what he condemns. Thus, all the railway stations in 
 Bavaria are pretty, and the Munich station was embel- 
 lished the other day with frescoes. I do not myself 
 agree with Ruskin, in condemning pretty railway sta- 
 tions, and it must be remembered that his premises do 
 not apply in Bavaria. But every one will agree in his 
 judgment against placing ornaments too high to be 
 seen, as they have done in Munich with the bas-reliefs 
 in the new National Museum. And all readers of the 
 Edinburgh Lectures must join in the condemnation of 
 the staring, goggle-eyed lion's heads which adorned 
 some building, and with which Millais' spirited drawing 
 of a tiger's head is so admirably contrasted. It was 
 only the other day that I saw the newest house that is 
 being built in Munich, and on its outside, at an 
 enormous height from the ground — it contains seven 
 storeys — were several lion's heads, which, so far as I 
 could make them out, seemed literal copies of the sam- 
 ples in the Edinburgh Lectures. 
 
 It is generally asserted that German houses have a 
 great advantage over English and French houses in cold 
 weather, because the custom of putting up double win- 
 
284 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 (lows prevails throughout Germany. A political philo- 
 sopher observed that the only reason why Austria had 
 so great an influence over Italy was, that Germany had 
 a mission to teach the Italians the use of stoves and 
 double windows, and that the war of 1859 was a just 
 punishment to Austria for having been false to her 
 mission. One need only pass a winter day in Venice to 
 see the necessity of German appliances, and to feel the 
 want of them ; but there is no need to compassionate 
 the English as not possessing double windows. An 
 English window is generally made to close tightly, and 
 the glass is so much thicker and better fitted, that it 
 serves the double purpose of keeping out draughts, and 
 keeping the warmth in. The glass in Munich is so 
 thin that it needs reinforcing in winter, and the win- 
 dows close so badly, that but for the double windows 
 and the moss between, the cold air would drive in by 
 volumes. I was once witness in London to a scene of 
 amatetir burglary, a gentleman breaking into his own 
 house. In Munich a slight tap would send almost any 
 window in ; but in London the man had to kick with 
 all his might against the sheet of glass for full two 
 minutes, and the glass broke, and fell with a crash, like 
 thick ice flung heavily on the pavement. 
 
 But if the Munich glass is thin and light, compared 
 with the glass of London windows, it must be admitted 
 that in another point Munich studies to provide heavi- 
 ness and solidity, where London aims at lightness and 
 elegance. I need hardly say that I allude to door-keys. 
 " Latch-key " would be inappropriate to describe the 
 German article, and the possession of one ceases to be 
 
HOW A PEIVILEGE BECOMES A CUESE. 285 
 
 a privilege, coveted and obtained by exemplary conduct, 
 but becomes a duty, a heavy duty. If you could take 
 the aspiring youth who looks forward to the attainment 
 of a latch-key, with the trembling hope, " a tip-toe for 
 the blessing of embrace/' with which poets invest 
 young lovers, and show him German middle age groan- 
 ing under the weight of its key, you would achieve a 
 warning worthy to be ranked with that famous one 
 against finery uttered by the Turk. " My son, if ever 
 you forget God and the Prophet, you may come to 
 pok like that ! " pointing to a dapper French dandy. 
 It is no exaggeration to say that the German door-key 
 as a weapon of defence, would be effectual against ga- 
 rotters, and that, armed with it, the worst districts of 
 London might safely be traversed. But in peaceful 
 Munich you cannot carry such a murderous implement 
 in your hand without fear of being arrested, or without 
 the danger of terrifying the whole population. And 
 no pockets that can be made are capacious enough to 
 contain the key, or hardy enough to endure under its 
 weight. A series of amusing pictures appeared in the 
 Fliegende Blatter, the comic paper of Munich, illus- 
 trating this topic. A man was represented going off 
 with his key sticking a yard out of the flap pocket of 
 his coat ; he shuts the door hastily, and key and coat- 
 tail are shut in, the key standing out immense and 
 cumbrous within the door, as large as the man on the 
 other side. But even this one great key is not the only 
 burden imposed on the householders of Munich. Each 
 house has an outer door, which also boasts a key, and, 
 as by police regulation the outer door must be shut 
 
286 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 every niglit at nine^ if you stay out beyond that hour, 
 you must carry two keys in your pocket. Fancy the 
 horror of a stranger at some convivial meeting, hearing 
 at each movement of his neighbours an ominous clank- 
 ing of iron on iron ! Would he not fancy that he was 
 in an assembly of escaped convicts, dragging about the 
 remnants of their chains; or of ticket-of-leave men, 
 whom a sensible government had rendered harmless, as 
 their nature was thus publicly affiche ? 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 VILLAGE LIFE IN BAVAKIA. 
 
 Entering on foreign travel^ the first thing that strikes 
 you as a pleasant contrast to England, is the gaiety and 
 brightness of continental towns. Eetuming to Eng- 
 land, the first thing that strikes you is the beauty of 
 the country. It is not pleasant to enter London at the 
 east, passing over countless roofs of houses, all grimy 
 and bleak, under the fog that serves them for climate, 
 looking down on gloomy streets of drear uniformity, 
 with only the gold letters of public-house boards to 
 relieve it, when you have just left the sunny Boulevards, 
 and the avenues of the Bois de Boulogne. But how 
 cheering it is to be whirled through the rich meadows 
 of Kent, with their neat hedges and green stretches of 
 sward, the lazy kine pausing as you fly past them, and 
 honouring you with a philosophic look, after the wide 
 plains of the Continent, the puzzling strips and patches 
 of culture, and ever-recurring sameness of trees. An 
 Englishman, too apt to be vain of his nationality, would 
 claim a greater merit for the pre-eminence of England 
 by quoting Cowper: " God made the country, and man 
 made the town," as^he is given to quoting a line of 
 
288 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Garrick's, to justify a preference of good English meat 
 to good Frencli cookery. But the cosmopolitan makes 
 no invidious distinctions, and while justly proud of his 
 native country, has always his meed of praise to bestow 
 on the bright cities of other lands. 
 
 The root of this difference between the aspect of 
 England and of the Continent lies in their very dif- 
 ferent modes of life, and in the singular contrast pre- 
 sented by the English custom to that of almost all 
 other nations. The country with us is the home of so 
 many families of good means and refined habits that 
 there is no very sensible gulf between it and the town. 
 Abroad, the country is little more than the summer 
 residence of all who can afford the luxury, and the 
 town is the winter residence of the whole civilised com- 
 munity. A town is looked on as a sort of association 
 for cheating the inclement season, and the country a 
 place for refreshment in the heat of summer. In Eng- 
 land, on the other hand, the dwellers in London do not 
 get down to the coimtry tiU the fine weather is half 
 over, and they stay in it till winter is hesitating before 
 it goes. The consequence is, that the country in Eng- 
 land is dotted with good houses, and the roads between 
 them have to be kept up for winter use as well as for 
 summer. The inhabitants of the villages see more of 
 what may be called manners, and strike a sort of balance 
 between their pristine roughness and the over-refine- 
 ments of the city. Moreover, the clerical profession in 
 England, being taken almost exclusively from the gentry, 
 has an effect on the villagers and on village life which is 
 vVanting on the Continent. 
 
PROTINCIAL AKCADIAS, 289 
 
 Civilised communities seem every now and then to 
 get tired of civilisation, and discover all sorts of merit 
 in villages, and among peasantry. Much has been 
 written of late years from this point of view, and some 
 novelists think that a sentiment has only to be ex- 
 pressed in a provincial dialect to be deep and philoso- 
 phical. In Germany this idea does not prevail as 
 widely as in England, but it is supposed to prevail even 
 more widely, and the stories of Auerbach are quoted 
 to support the supposition. Any one who should read 
 the story which is ranked as Auefbach's best, Bar- 
 fiissele, would not form a very pleasant idea of the 
 peasantry whom he is taken to glorify. The hero and 
 heroine are of course idealised, but the other characters 
 are generally more true to nature. The heroine's 
 guardian does nothing to help her, but is indignant 
 when she herds geese, because he is accused of having 
 driven her to it ; his son turns her out of the house at 
 night because his sister's sweetheart has diverted his 
 affections to her ; the sister knocks her down and hits 
 her in the face ; the whole village is vexed with her and 
 her brother because they don't go to America. This 
 miserly spirit and brutality are not exactly the same 
 feelings as those imagination assigns to the idyllic 
 life of German villages. But so far as my experience 
 serves, they are much more appropriate. The peasants 
 in Upper Bavaria, between Munich and the mountains, 
 as I have seen them, are not figures to be placed in a 
 picture of Arcadia. Even if their stinginess be excused 
 under the name of frugality, their greed cannot be 
 softened away. They are almost invariably overbearing 
 
290 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 and disobliging, and being mostly in easy circumstances, 
 can afford to foUow their instincts. A village carpenter 
 will tell you that because you gave a piece of work to 
 another man you may have everything else you want 
 done by him. An inn-keeper will tell you that unless 
 you buy all your meat from him you need not ask him 
 to sell you any. Peasants will ask you town prices for 
 the products of the country, and reply to your com- 
 plaints with a defiance of logic that almost amounts to 
 depravity. And as you are in aU things at their 
 mercy, as the inn-keeper has a monopoly of almost 
 everything you want, there is no chance of rebelling. 
 One would almost be tempted to paint the whole tribe 
 of peasants in the blackest colours, when one thinks of 
 the many cases of insolence and arrogance one has 
 seen or heard of; but this would be to sacrifice truth 
 to clearness, and to forget the rule of mixed motives, 
 which must be observed by every faithful delineator of 
 character. I fancy the hearts of most of these people 
 are in the right places, although the avenues leading to 
 them are choked up by obnoxious weeds. One trait I 
 have noticed which is exceedingly singular. Some of 
 the peasants will go a great deal out of their way to 
 oblige you when nothing is to be gained by it, while 
 others will not even stir a step for you when it is a 
 question of money. In other words, some will do a 
 kindness for nothing, while others will not do their duty 
 for money. An inn-keeper who had let a room to a 
 stranger would not get up at night to let him in ; but a 
 woman who had walked nine miles that day went all 
 about the house till she found out the waitress, and got 
 
THE LIFE OP COWS. 291 
 
 the door opened. And tliis was pure civility, without 
 hope of reward, or connexion with the inn. Another 
 time two women gave up half-an-hour to assist an 
 Enghsh lady in finding her way home after a storm, 
 wading up to their knees in search of a dry path for 
 her, and refused to take any reward. I do not know 
 if these are merely exceptional cases, or if the women 
 generally are better than the men. In driving bargains 
 the women are certainly not more generous than the 
 men. In many countries a peasant will bring out some- 
 thing of his store, and make a present of it, thinking 
 himself amply requited by the honour you have done 
 him in entering his house. But in a Bavarian village a 
 rich farmer's wife brings out a dozen dried up pears 
 and asks if you would like to buy them. A party of 
 children stop at a farm and ask for a glass of milk. 
 The woman grunts out question after question, " if they 
 will not take a quart?" and only serves them on their 
 taking a quart, for which she charges them the town 
 price. These were not poor people; the one owned 
 wardrobes fuU of linen, and the other had ten or twelve 
 cows in her stable. 
 
 An English girl fresh from the country thought the 
 strangest thiug on the Continent was that she never 
 saw any cows in the fields. In Bavaria they are kept 
 up the whole summer, and only turned out in October. 
 Then they are herded, as all things, even geese, are 
 herded on the Continent, and the continual cracking of 
 whips kept up by the boys who watch them, is enough 
 to distract them from eating their fill. Milk and butter 
 suffer for the want of fresh air and unceasing mastica- 
 
292 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 tion. In the stable the cows are fed only twice a day 
 on grass, with an addition of swill as a midday meal. 
 Some people keep their stahles clean, and give a little 
 more food ; but I have seen stables in which the cows 
 seemed to be littered on filth, and the whole floor was 
 floating with it. The stables almost invariably form 
 the hinder end of the house, and above the stable is the 
 hay loft. This explains the great length of all Bava- 
 rian peasants^ houses and their division in two, the fore 
 part being of stone and plastered, the hinder part of 
 wood with jalousies. Where the stable is left as dirty 
 as that I have described, the house is impregnated with 
 the smell, for only a door separates the house from the 
 stable. But when the stable is clean, with the fragrance 
 of the hay acting as a purifier, no ill effects are found, 
 and you might hve less agreeably in the neighbourhood 
 of men than you do with the cows so close to you. The 
 great houses of landed proprietors have also farm-houses 
 attached to them as a rule, and, unless the farm is let 
 out, it adds greatly to the trouble of an estate. 
 
 The chief produce of these small farms is a kiad of 
 lard called schmalz, which is made by boiling down 
 butter, and which enters largely into all country cook- 
 ing. In winter the peasants will not sell either milk or 
 butter, as they use up all their produce in making 
 schmalz, and even in summer, when the town people 
 are living in the country, the peasants revolt against 
 supplying them. I am not myself versed in farm 
 economy, but I fancy this mode of applying butter is 
 not the most profitable. The quantity of schmalz used 
 by the peasants is inordinate, especially on feast-days ; 
 
rOOD OF THE PEASANTS. 293 
 
 and it seems to be valued as the breath of their nostrils. 
 Their food consists chiefly of things cooked in it^ for 
 they eat little meat, alleging that they could not work 
 on meat as well as on balls of flour cooked in lard. 
 These balls of flour are the national food of Bavaria, 
 and are susceptible of many varieties. The generic 
 name of them is nudel, but six or eight qualifying 
 adjectives are applied to them. The nudel pure is mad^ 
 of flour and yeast with eggs and milk, and is fried in 
 schmalz; another kind is made with curds, and is called 
 curd nudel; a still richer kind is made at the great 
 village festival which takes place every year, and is called 
 kirchweih nudel, from the name of the festival ; while a 
 fourth kind, better still, is made in Munich, and, under 
 the name of steam nudel, attains to the dignity of a 
 pudding. Of course the plainest kind is most eaten by 
 the peasants, the better kinds being reserved for Sun- 
 days and great feast days. 
 
 The only feast-day that is kept in most of these vil- 
 lages is the annually recurring kirchweih, the anniver- 
 sary of the dedication of the village church. This day 
 is almost invariably in summer, when the light lasts 
 long enough for plenty of dancing and feasting, and 
 when all relations can come from far and near to be 
 present at the family rejoicing. Inclement weather and 
 bad roads interfere with any such meetings at Christmas 
 and the New Year ; moreover, the shortness of the days 
 would entail an expense of candles that cannot be con- 
 templated. Kirchweih has thus to replace all other 
 festivals, and the peasants take care that it replaces 
 them amply. All the houses in the village entertain, 
 
294 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 and eating goes on from morning till night. Not only 
 are piles of kirchweih nudels cooked, and pans of schmalz 
 kept bubbling continually, but even meat is bought and 
 put before the guests, and beer is generally got down 
 from Munich, or from some reliable tap. When it is 
 fine, the open space before the door of each house is 
 used for sitting out and dancing; a patch of grass is 
 mowed close and smooth, or gravel and stones are swept 
 off the ground. Some sit on the bench under the bal- 
 cony looking on while the couples dance to rude music j 
 close by the fountain keeps up its trickling from the 
 wooden spout into the oblong trough, the invariable 
 accompaniments of all village houses. All the neigh- 
 bours round pay visits at this season, and the same hos- 
 pitality is shown to all. Of course everybody wears best 
 clothes, so that the time is favourable for observing 
 costumes. After church time you see the roads and 
 fields dotted with men and women in gay colours and 
 quaint dresses. All the men wear long coats going down 
 to the ground, and adorned with white metal buttons. 
 These coats are never left ofi" even in the heat of 
 summer, though they are cumbrous enough; you see 
 peasants very often with long cloth cloaks when you are 
 perspiring in brown hoUand. The white metal buttons 
 are sometimes silver coins stitched on, so that a man 
 may carry his wealth about him. The married women 
 wear black hats made of otter's fur, in shape like a muff 
 sewed up at one end ; the body of their dress is mostly 
 black silk, with a handkerchief over their shoulders, 
 and an apron. Apron and handkerchief relieve the black 
 silk with their gaudy colours ; at one feast I saw two 
 
VILLAGE DANCING. 295 
 
 women, one with a bright crimson, the other a bright 
 light-blue apron, like living pieces of colour under a 
 brilliant flood of sunlight. Unmarried women have 
 Vandyke hats with twisted gold cords, more pic- 
 turesque, though not so quaint as the fur caps with 
 which the elders emulate the mihtary bear-skin. 
 
 Besides these private festivities, the inn is largely fre- 
 quented. A band is kept there during Kirchweih, and 
 dancing goes on most of the day. The Bavarian na- 
 tional dances are highly eccentric, and often attract 
 strangers to witness them. The waltz is the foundation 
 on which they are built ; but ornaments and variations . 
 are superadded, like fioriture on airs, tOl the original 
 dance succumbs under the weight of accessories. The 
 men revolve in the centre of a ring, the outside edge of 
 which is composed of the women dancing round alone, 
 and keep time with slapping of their thighs, frequently 
 hopping at the same time; not to mention whooping 
 and whistling, pardonable eccentricities under so much 
 excitement. Each dance is ended with a stamp that 
 makes the floor shake ; a proceeding that is sometimes 
 adopted in more polished circles. Weddings are cele- 
 brated by similar scenes, and are held in the village inn 
 from morning till evening, with, a slight interval for the 
 religious ceremony. But the wedding guests are not 
 entertained at the expense of the bride's father; they 
 are expected to pay their share of the entertainment, 
 and the chief costs of the music and food are defrayed 
 by their contributions. Many peasants absent them- 
 selves from marriages on this account : and at a mar- 
 riage which took place during my stay in the country. 
 
296 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 some made the excuse that neither bride nor bridegroom 
 had been long natives of the village. But the ceremony 
 in the church was generally attended, even by those 
 who held aloof from the feasting. Before the bridal 
 procession came, the church was being prepared with 
 unusual importance. Two violins and a chorus climbed 
 up into the organ-loft. The sacristan went about get- 
 ting things in order, and spectators took their places in 
 the gallery, or waited outside for the procession. When 
 the bridal train had entered, the best man brought in a 
 basket with two bottles of wine, and gave it to the 
 sacristan. First came the marriage service, the priest 
 binding together the hands of the man and woman with 
 two lappets that hung from his shoulders. After this 
 came the mass, with full orchestral accompaniment. 
 The parish priest seemed scarcely accustomed to so 
 grand a service, and decidedly puzzled by the require- 
 ments of Gregorian intonation. But he was resolved 
 to shirk no part of his duty. Having to sing certain 
 words to certain notes, he fulfilled the double task by 
 pronouncing the words first, with an amount of quaver- 
 ing that was really unique, and then huddling in all 
 the notes by themselves. The orchestral efiect was 
 creditable, so long as instruments and singers kept toge- 
 ther ; but every now and then an ambitious voice would 
 break forth into a solo, and the solo would generally 
 end in a squeak, which had to be drowned by vigorous 
 ensemble. When the mass was over, the sacristan 
 brought out the two bottles of wine, and the priest 
 stood at one side of the altar, with a glass in his hand. 
 A plate was put on each side of the altar, and another 
 
JACK OF ALL TRADES, AND MASTER OP NONE. 397 
 
 at the beginning of the chancel. Then the wedding 
 party passed round behind the altar in rotation, each 
 putting a piece of money in every one of the plates, 
 and drinking some of the wine, the priest holding the 
 glass to their lips. The bridegroom drank first, then 
 the bride, then the men, and then the women. Having 
 to make offerings in so many plates, each one took out 
 change from the first, and afterwards bride and bride- 
 groom gave away copper pieces to the girls and boys of 
 the village. 
 
 The inn where all these rejoicings are held, is a large 
 straggling building, with bare blank walls, and many 
 small windows outside, and low ceilings, which have a 
 gloomy and heavy efi'ect within. The innkeeper has a 
 monopoly of all the food of the neighbourhood ; he is 
 butcher and baker himself, besides owning a flour mill, 
 and is at once independent of the peasants, and lord of 
 the village. If he does not choose to bake, you must 
 go without bread ; if he will not kill, you must put up 
 with any bits of meat you can find, and when he does 
 kill, you must take what he gives you. This necessity 
 of subordination matters little to the peasants, who 
 bake their own bread when they have got their wheat 
 in, and only eat meat on Sundays. But towns-people, 
 who are passing the summer in the domain of a des- 
 potic innkeeper, are much dissatisfied with his rule. 
 One cannot understand the principle on which inn- 
 keepers and farriers in the country refuse to earn money. 
 Whenever you want anything done, you are told that it 
 will pay them better not to do it, and they always 
 find that they can earn more florins by their own 
 
 o 2 
 
298 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 little peddling jobs, tlian by pocketing a good round 
 sum for your service. But the natural result of their 
 conduct is that strangers avoid this part of the country, 
 or pay more to other people to have their commissions 
 executed. Any way the money they would not earn 
 goes away from them, and the time must come when 
 they will feel their error. An innkeeper who locks out 
 his guests, and will not get up at ten at night (eight 
 being his hour of going to bed) to let them in, can 
 hardly count on their coming back to him ; and yet it 
 must be important to an innkeeper at some period of 
 his career to be able to count on it. Now that the inn 
 has only one guest-chamber it may seem immaterial ; but 
 is it to he always as it is now ? If one man does not suit 
 travellers, another may be found to build an opposition 
 house, which might prove the ruin of the original mono- 
 polist. Herr Steub, a Munich writer on the Bavarian 
 highlands, reports that he advised the mistress of a 
 small inn to build another with twenty-five rooms, to 
 accommodate the crowd of strangers visiting the place. 
 Her answer contained the pith of the Bavarian hotel 
 system. She shrugged her shoulders, and expressed 
 the most complete indifference to people who came in 
 the evening, called at once for a bath and a barber, and 
 wanted roast fowl at three in the morning. It requires 
 a vivid imagination to draw this picture of guests call- 
 ing for a bath or a roast fowl in a Bavarian village inn, 
 even if they asked for them at three in the afternoon. 
 They would, no doubt, be told, that all the hens were 
 wanted for laying eggs, and for a bath woidd be sent to 
 wash at the pump, as the village washes itself. 
 
VILLAGE HOUSES, 
 
 299 
 
 The guest-chamber in the inn that I am describing 
 was a large long low room, with four beds, and a heavy 
 old-fashioned wardrobe, full of the Wirthin's best 
 clothes. It has a counterpart in all the better houses 
 in the village. In all these houses the smallness of the 
 windows strikes you uncomfortably from without, and 
 within the lowness of the ceilings adds to the effect of 
 the small windows. One would suppose there was a 
 heavy window-tax levied according to size, or that the 
 ceiling served to keep the young men below the mili- 
 tary standard of height. In front of the house the 
 inseparable fountain is running, and on the door is some 
 such inscription as this^ in rude rhymes : — 
 
 " The loTe of God rest on this house ! 
 Bring me no tattle in, and take none out, — 
 So may the lore of G-od rest on this house." 
 
 On a tree-top, close to the side of the house, a scythe 
 is stuck up, and_ glitters in the sunlight, to attract the 
 hawks by its sheen as they soar by, and entice them to 
 swoop down and transfix themselves on it. The kitchen 
 is generally primitive ; a flat open space of brick serves 
 for hearth, and pots are suspended over a fire of sticks 
 in the gipsy fashion. The best room is seldom or never 
 used by the family. It is generally a repository for the 
 household stores of linen and flax ; the trousseau is put 
 away in great wardrobes, and never touched. In some 
 houses are piles of linen which were given at marriage, 
 and will be kept sacred tiU death. The wedding clothes 
 are also cherished up in these wardrobes, and in glass 
 
300 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 cases round the room are the little wax nicknacks, of 
 which the peasants are so fond, with perhaps a pair of 
 fancy garters which it would be a profanation to wear. 
 The hesitation of Isaac of York, before putting the 
 last gold piece in the bag, was once equalled by an old 
 woman in the village wavering between two of her wax 
 treasures. A present had been given her, and she felt 
 that she ought to make some return : but she could not 
 make up her mind which she should give of two little 
 nicknacks, and at last she put them both back in their 
 places. 
 
 A singular feature in Bavarian village life is the ab- 
 sence of family names, the substitution either of nick- 
 names or of professional names, which may be noticed 
 in Auerbach's Barfiissele. In Auerbach's village not 
 one surname occurs ; the farmers have the nearest ap- 
 proach to a surname when they are not called from any 
 of their belongings ; some people have nicknames, and 
 some only adjectives attached to their Christian names. 
 The same is the case in Bavarian villages. A farmer 
 sometimes has his name given him so far as this, that 
 he is called the StofiFelbauer if his name be Stoffel, as if 
 a farmer named Smith were called the Smith-farmer. 
 But generally the occupation gives the name. There is 
 the Forester, the Groove-cutter, the Blue Miller, the 
 Innkeeper's Miller, the Saw Miller, the Miller by the 
 Stream. Not one of these seems to have a surname 
 belonging to him; they are all known through the 
 country by their professions. In some cases the name 
 goes with the house ; as a man and wife are called the 
 saddler and saddleress, because the house they live in 
 
A VILLAGE BUMAL. 301 
 
 was formerly occupied by a saddler. Another peasant 
 is called Neuhauser^ " of the new house," because the 
 house he inhabits was once new, though now it is old. 
 
 An event which very much stirred the village during 
 my stay was the death of the innkeeper's wife. Every- 
 one said it was a pity she died, as she had brought six- 
 teen thousand florins into the house; every one con- 
 doled with the innkeeper, as she had done all the work; 
 and every one said it was very hard that she should die 
 on the day of kirchweih, so that there could be no 
 dancing or music at the inn on the only day in the year 
 on which they were wanted. Like George the Second, 
 the innkeeper announced before his wife's death that he 
 would not marry again, but would retire from the busi- 
 ness and invest the sum realized by selling it for the 
 benefit of the children. But a short time after her 
 death he was looking out for a working wife, and re- 
 fused the daughter of another innkeeper with forty 
 thousand florins, because she would be too much of a 
 lady. The burial of the wife was attended by about 
 two hundred people from all the country round, and 
 mass said for her a week after by a hundred, who were 
 fed by the innkeeper as at a wedding, or kirchweih, save 
 that he had to bear the expense. He had to bake 
 quantities of bread and distribute it in the church to 
 all who were present. There is an old story of a frugal 
 couple of aged people who took it into their heads that 
 they were going to die, and were alarmed at the costs of 
 the funeral. After they had reckoned up everything, 
 and were in despair at the expense attendant on paying 
 the debt of nature, the old man suddenly found a gleam 
 
303 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 of hope. " After all, my dear/' he said, " perhaps we 
 may not die this time." "I hope not," replied the 
 wife, "for I am sure we can't afford it." The story is 
 exceedingly applicable to the Wirihin's burial. Not 
 only were these multitudes fed, but the dead was laid . 
 out with the most wanton extravagance. They sent up 
 to Munich and had a new dress of black satia made for 
 her, and a collar and cap of blonde lace, in which she 
 was to be buried. During her hfe she would never 
 have dreamt of wearing such things as these that she 
 was to take iuto the grave. The dying thoughts of 
 Pope's Narcissa are more excusable than the idea of 
 deckiag a plain working woman with such finery in 
 order to lay her in the earth, like the miser who 
 intended to take his money with him. But in justice 
 to the viUage it must be said, that the custom which 
 prevails in Munich is far more reprehensible. 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 LAWS OF TRADE. 
 
 I HAVE abused the tradesmen of Munich, but their 
 faults are not entirely their own. If I have dwelt 
 too much upon the inconvenience arising from those 
 faults, it is not without fuU willingness to admit that 
 there is one palliation of them. With the regulations 
 that still exist, the guilds and corporations, the restric- 
 tions on every side, a more intelligent body of trades- 
 men could hardly have existed. Such a premium is 
 placed on dulness that ability is driven out of the 
 market. Indeed it is singular to trace the effect of the 
 paternal system adopted by German Governments on 
 the national prosperity. Why is it that Germans in 
 America thrive to an extent unknown in their native 
 country? Why is it that Paris and London take the 
 most intelligent workers away from Germany, and that 
 the labour of Germans in those two capitals is so 
 different from any that you can command in their own 
 cities? Because the German Governments put every 
 impediment in the way of their people. Because there 
 is neither proper instruction, nor proper energy; no 
 encouragement of the best workmen, no reward for 
 
304 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 merit. And of all places in Germany, Munich is pro- 
 bably the head-quarters of this backwardness, the city 
 where work is most inefficient, and restriction the most 
 galling, where the least is done to aid activity, and the 
 most is done to retard it. 
 
 The ancient system of guUds, which seems to have 
 prevailed generally in the beginnings of commercial 
 life, has subsisted, with very slight modifications, in 
 Germany down to the present time. Absolute freedom 
 of trade, the right of every man to earn his bread 
 according to his capacity, has only lately been intro- 
 duced. Before 1859 it existed only in Prussia and in 
 the Rhine provinces of Bavaria, besides some smaller 
 places, while even in Prussia its workings were some- 
 what impeded. Austria adopted it at the end of 1859, 
 and her example was speedily followed by many of the 
 smaller states, Nassau, Saxony, Baden, and Wurtem- 
 berg. The only states which resist it still are Hanover, 
 the two Hesses, and Bavaria. In 1861 an attempt was 
 made in the Bavarian Chambers to have freedom of 
 trade introduced, but the only result was a certain 
 relaxation of the existing laws. These laws had come 
 in course of time to form a compromise between the 
 wants of the people and the antiquated system on which 
 the existence of trade was based. The guilds arose origi- 
 nally, says a pamphleteer in his historical sketch of the 
 Bavarian system, by the union of tradesmen in the 
 towns, and, as in the middle ages all towns were exclu- 
 sive, the trade guilds became exclusive as a necessary 
 consequence. In 1616 the strictness of the guilds was 
 somewhat relaxed, and in 1731 an Imperial decree 
 
HISTORY OF TRADE LAWS. 305 
 
 formed the law of handicraft. At the beginning of the 
 present century the influence of the French Revolution 
 and of Adam Smith had some operation. Formerly no 
 one might exercise more than one trade, or sell any- 
 thing he had not made himself; each permission was 
 purely personal, and could not be inherited, being, 
 moreover, often attached to the house in which it was 
 exercised, and expiring if the house was pulled down. 
 In 1804 the power of inheriting real rights was granted, 
 and in 1807 several relaxations were made, although 
 instantly withdrawn owing to the rush of competitors 
 that ensued. In 1825 a great reform was introduced 
 with a view to bring about total freedom in the course 
 of time. But the reform was so much attacked in the 
 next years that a reaction took place, a measure was 
 brought into the Chambers to restrict the workings of 
 the former law. The Chambers, however, modified the 
 reactionary measure laid before them, the King refused 
 to pass it with their amendments, and, on their disso- 
 lution, issued an instruction to his ministers to protect 
 the interests of trade and of the trades-unions which 
 had now succeeded to the guilds. A similar order was 
 issued in 1853, and the effect of both was to throw 
 back the development of trade. The relaxation effected 
 in 1861 only amounted to a return to the law of 1835 
 from the two instructions of 1834 and 1853, that is, 
 to an acknowledgement that the right path had been 
 chosen thirty-six years before, had been blocked up by 
 subsequent efforts, and must now be sought out again. 
 
 The mass of notes, pamphlets, newspaper cuttings, 
 proceedings in the chambers, debates, committees, 
 
306 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 through which I have waded before writing this chap- 
 ter, may probably have a puzzling effect upon me, and 
 may deter the reader from entering into the subject. 
 It is difficult for an Englishman to appreciate the mass 
 of orders and instructions which are necessary in Ger- 
 many to excuse or explain any step of the Government, 
 and the quantity of details that overload state papers 
 is positively repugnant to us. Where can be the good 
 of defining, with legal precision, what are the different 
 steps on the ladder of trade; which members of the 
 body may carry on their business without special leave, 
 which may be exempted from examination? Why 
 must the State take care that none enters into trade 
 who is not fit for it, that all the business houses in its 
 dominion have sufficient capital, and run no risk of 
 bankruptcy? Surely things can go on in their own 
 course without aU this supervision. Surely it is not 
 necessary for Government to poke its nose into aU pri- 
 vate concerns, to have magistrates, and police, and com- 
 mon councUs, and commercial councils, and overseers of 
 the poor, to control the affairs of the citizens, and to 
 protect what is in no need of protection. If Germans 
 are really such babies that they cannot rely on them- 
 selves for such matters, how comes it that their colonies 
 flourish ? And if there is a want of employment, and 
 so many idle hands that tasks must be found for them 
 by the State, would it not be more profitable to advance 
 the general interest than to obstruct it ? Some work 
 might be found which would be useful to the commu- 
 nity. Or if not, better pay people to do nothing than 
 to impede others. This is so obvious to'English minds, 
 
A SKETCH OF THE SYSTEM. 307 
 
 that I must ask pardon for dwelling on it. But it 
 seems only known to the higher thinkers in Germany, 
 and it finds antagonists even among those who might 
 be credited with practical intelligence. In the debate 
 on freedom of trade in the Bavarian Chambers, the 
 opponents of the measure were not those only who 
 benefited by monopoly, nor is it rare to find the old 
 system of restrictions defended by men of education. 
 
 Let me briefly sketch the system of trade as it existed 
 till July, 1862, when the relaxations authorised by the 
 Chambers in the preceding year came into efiect. The 
 principle on which the old laws were based was that of 
 complete supervision. No one, so far as I can ascer- 
 tain, was allowed to carry on any occupation without 
 permission. On the great majority of trades, appren- 
 ticeship, journeymanship, travelling, and examinations 
 were imposed ; the time of each being regulated, and 
 numerous details added to ensure their efficacy. Hav- 
 ing passed through all these grades with a good cha- 
 racter, the beginner was at liberty to apply for a con- 
 cession to carry on his trade. So far there does not 
 seem to be any great hardship. It is a law of nature, 
 that any one who would succeed in anything must learn 
 it first, and the course of study prescribed by a man's 
 own conscience is often far severer than any course 
 prescribed him from without. It is surely well in the 
 abstract, that the learner in trade should have a prac- 
 tical teacher, should serve a short time after he has been 
 taught under a competent and experienced master, 
 should travel to learn the ways and cities of many men 
 of business, and should give some guarantee to the 
 
308 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 public by passing an examination. If anything can 
 secure good work, one would think this system would, 
 especially when it is added that a power is provided to 
 pimish incompetent workmen. But unfortunately na- 
 ture resents this encroachment on her province. She 
 replies that she has herself provided rewards and pun- 
 ishments amply sufficient, that if a man will not learn 
 his trade he is punished by want of employment, that 
 an examination far severer than any prescribed by 
 Government must be passed before the public, and that 
 while the protective system is liable to constant evasion 
 her system is infallible in the end. And thus, as the 
 admirable means appointed for making all English gen- 
 tlemen finished classical scholars is found to fail of its 
 end, so the means for making Bavarian trade the best 
 of all trades, has had an opposite effect. The failure is 
 sufficiently explained when we examine the regulations 
 in detail. In the first place, the teaching and examina- 
 tions are prescribed only for the simple branches of 
 trade, not for the more difficult. Such trades as the 
 making mathematical, physical, optical, or hydraulic in- 
 struments, engraving, preparing cosmetics or perfumes, 
 making artificial flowers, chocolate, mineral or metallic 
 colours, are exempted. A woman may make ladies' 
 dresses without any permission being needed, but a man 
 may not. Artists' brushes may be made freely, but the 
 brushes for house-painters cannot be made without re- 
 gular education. 
 
 The relations of the pupil to his teacher are strictly 
 defined. The pupil must give the teacher that tribe of 
 of certificates which Germans consider indispensable, cer- 
 
YEARS or TRAVEL. 309 
 
 tificate of his birth, of his vaccination, of the character 
 he bears in his parish, and of his having completed his 
 time of schoohng. The teacher is bound to instruct 
 the pupil in his trade, make him attend school on 
 Sundays and feast-days, and accustom him to a moral 
 course of life, employing, if necessary, discipline to him, 
 and has to give a certificate of his conduct every year. 
 The time of pupilage varies from three to five years, 
 and at the end of that time a certificate of moral and 
 religious conduct has to be produced by the pupil ; he 
 has to pass an examination, and prepare a sample of 
 his workmanship. After this he becomes a journey- 
 man for five years, part of which must be spent in 
 travel. The rules of wander schaft have become relaxed, 
 says one writer; journeymen are no longer sent, from 
 one place to another at the caprice of the police official 
 who visas their passports, nor are they subjected to 
 countless brutalities and vexatious regulations; they 
 may travel like other men, and employ their time in 
 learning their trade, as best becomes them. Still they 
 are not entirely free. They may only visit such states 
 as are entered in their passport, and they are expressly 
 forbidden to go into Switzerland or into Bremen. To 
 become a master, a new certificate of character and 
 attendance at school must be produced, and another 
 examination passed. Such is the course through which 
 the bulk of trades-people must pass. All must pass 
 alike, the clever one must learn as long as the stupid, 
 and a good worker may be deprived of his bread if he 
 does not attend the Sunday school, or cannot accom- 
 modate himself to his master's disposition. To keep 
 
310 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 up the system of private tuition, youths are forbidden 
 to pass their time of apprenticeship in a manufactory, 
 although perhaps the teacher makes nothing himself, 
 finding it more profitable to retail goods supplied from 
 some manufactory. 
 
 Supposing, however, a man to have gained his meister- 
 recht, the freedom of his company. The mere fact of 
 having gained it by no means qualifies him for in- 
 dependent exercise of his business. He must first of 
 all apply for a concession. Concessions are to be given 
 for capacity and good character, by priority of applica- 
 tion. So far as capacity can be tested by examinations 
 no doubt it is tested, but the good conduct clause is 
 entirely futile. It merely serves to give the police an 
 entire control over the trading population ; the slightest 
 black mark during the years of apprenticeship vitiates 
 the whole time of good character, and as concessions 
 may at any time be withdrawn on account of dis- 
 obedience to the authorities, a man's life is not safe if 
 he expresses his opinions. One writer teUs of a shoe- 
 maker who applied for thirty years for a concession, 
 and adds, that ten years is no infrequent period. The 
 question of marriage is so closely mixed up in the trade 
 question that the obstacles are doubled, and the question 
 of marriage I must postpone to a separate chapter. But 
 the process to be gone through generally comprises both 
 applications, and the process is thus sketched by a jour- 
 nalist of unusual clearness and ability : — " A journey- 
 man taUor applies for the right of practising as a master. 
 He procures the whole apparatus of certificates needed, 
 — birth, vaccinationj school, examination, fee, &c. With 
 
APPLYING rOK, A CONCESSION. 311 
 
 these he betakes himself to the office, and sets the official 
 on duty at work to register his application. The ap- 
 plication is posted up publicly, and invites all the other 
 journeymen tailors in the town to offer themselves as 
 competitors. However helpless their chance may be, 
 they cannot help competing, for in granting concessions 
 a preference is always given to the oldest applicant, 
 which puts a premium on entering the lists early. The 
 applications of these competitors are also registered ; on 
 this the whole ranks of the guild are put in motion to 
 state by protocol to the court, and with full convincing 
 proofs, that the trade is overburdened with masters, 
 and that therefore the applications must be dismissed. 
 This protest causes reference to the council of trade j 
 the council of trade meets, deliberates, and delivers its 
 judgment. If, as is generally the case, the application 
 ioi a concession is made in conjunction with one for 
 settling down and marrying, it must also be referred to 
 two other boards, the common council and the overseers 
 of the poor, who have a report brought in, deliberate on 
 it, and deliver their judgment to the magistrate. On 
 this follows an examination of the papers, the reporter 
 of the court draws up his report, the court deliberates 
 and resolves, the determination is communicated to the 
 parties concerned by protocol, and the expenses are 
 collected. As the great majority of those who apply 
 for concessions are met with a refusal, there is no lack 
 of appeals to the higher powers. In the years 1859-60 
 one hundred and sixty-five appeals were made against 
 the decision of the Munich magistrates. On this the 
 second part of the machinery is set in motion. An 
 
313 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 advocate is employed to examine the deeds, and draw 
 up an appeal, whicli is forwarded to the upper court, 
 with a statement from the magistrate. An official of 
 the district looks through the papers, and makes a 
 report to the board. The board deliberates and de- 
 termines, draws up its resolution, and communicates 
 it through the magistrate to the appellant. The fees 
 and legal expenses are collected, and the curtain falls 
 a second time. Complaints on the score of nullity 
 and appeals to the ministry, are a common afterpiece. 
 And what is the result of this endless, yearly recurring 
 consumption of labour, time, and money? That one 
 lundred men are confirmed by law in the possession of 
 a right with which they were born, and another hundred 
 are by law deprived of that right. Individuals have 
 frequently to suffer inconvenience for the general good, 
 but what good does society gain from these individual 
 sacrifices ? Does the general good consist in securing a 
 comfortable existence to some privileged masters by 
 legal restriction and suppression of concurrence, in 
 blunting the strongest incitements to industry, in driv- 
 ing the best workers to freer countries, in causing the 
 consuming public to be served worse, slower, and dearer? 
 Only one branch of production has reached great ac- 
 tivity under the prevailing system, that is the produc- 
 tion of illegitimate children; and only one branch of 
 industry, the marriage of the widows of masters with 
 young apprentices. A loss to the public is caused by 
 the system ; it is not that individuals are sacrificed to 
 the general good, but the general good is sacrificed to 
 some privileged individuals." 
 
VEXATIOUS OPPOSITION. 313 
 
 There is no exaggeration in this statement. One has 
 only to ohserve the reports of the magistrate's sittings 
 to find cases which substantiate it. In one report I find 
 twenty-eight applicants for concessions as tailors, the 
 eldest having served 34 years, two others 38 years, one 
 27, two 34, four 31, and three 30. In almost every 
 session of the magistrates a number of permissions are 
 refused ,- none have been vacated, or there does not 
 seem a call for any more. So accustomed was every 
 one to the old order of things, that after the new regu- 
 lation came in force, nine concessions to bakers and six 
 to saddlers were granted on the same day, to the uni- 
 versal astonishment of the town, and of eighty-two shoe- 
 makers who applied, twenty were allowed to practise. 
 The numbers may seem great in a small town like 
 Munich, but the testimony they bear to the long exist- 
 ence of the coercive system is still more remarkable. 
 
 Nor are the troubles over when the concession is 
 granted. Restrictions are always coming in the way, 
 and any extension of business, or removal from one 
 town to another, must be obtained with as much diffi- 
 culty as the original permission. All the idle and in- 
 competent masters in every trade, the monopolists, and 
 the busy-bodies are on the watch for any infringement 
 of their privileges, and their time is passed in protesting 
 and complaining instead of improving their business. 
 Any report of the magistrates' sittings may be referred 
 to for instances of vexatious opposition. In one, several 
 master tailors are warned because they have cloth not 
 made up in their shops, while their concession only 
 allows them to have made-up goods. A second-hand 
 
314 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 bookseller wishing to remove his business from Bay- 
 reuth to Munich meets with protests from the Common 
 Council, the overseers of the poor, the Board of Trade, 
 and the Booksellers^ Guild ; but on appeal to the Go- 
 vernment, his application is granted, because there has 
 been no augmentation of that branch of trade since 
 1834. The police recommend that a hundred more 
 cabs be brought into the town, the livery stables pro- 
 test, and the existing number of cabs is increased by 
 forty-eight only. The police authorities also desired to 
 have one-horse cabs with four seats, as there are in all the 
 chief capitals of Europe, but the Society for the Protec- 
 tion of AnimaTs protests, and the project is abandoned. 
 The Guild of Shoemakers complain that the salt- 
 pounders wear shoes made of old patches, and the ma- 
 gistrate forbade the salt-pounders to wear them any 
 more ; but the salt-pounders appeal to Government, and 
 gain a victory over the shoemakers. Two men appeal 
 to Government for permission to exercise a clothseller's 
 privilege in common, the magistrate having refused his 
 consent. The Government reverses the magistrate's 
 decision, because all such applications go to Govern- 
 ment in the first instance, but refuses the application 
 because wholesale businesses are never carried on by 
 joint partners. These are merely stray cases copied out 
 of the newspaper reports, and it would doubtless be easy 
 to find others more striking. For where such regula- 
 tions exist as those excluding women as a rule from any 
 trading privileges, save as dressmakers (including orna- 
 mental work for ladies, sewing, &c.), or as widows of 
 masters ; those forbidding a man to keep two places for 
 
LIMITS OF EACH TRADE. 315 
 
 the sale of his goods, or to trade in articles not made by 
 himself; a natural desire to circumvent the law is almost 
 certain to be found. Moreover, the arbitrary divisions 
 of all trades, which have been fortunately remedied to 
 some degree by the instruction of 1 862, could not fail to 
 cause constant collisions. I have mislaid a note I made 
 of a case in which a poor woman having a permission to 
 bake dumplings, baked a few cakes as well, and was 
 fined for overstepping her privilege, and I need not 
 quote such examples, though they are by no means 
 exceptional, to prove the folly of these strict definitions. 
 I will only observe that this is, perhaps, the most incon- 
 venient part of the system to consumers. Every piece 
 of work has to pass through the hands of so many 
 traders that regularity and punctuality are impossible. 
 But this comes within another division ; I am at pre- 
 sent dealing with the vexations that attend the pro- 
 ducer. One writer points out the advantage given to 
 manufactories over tradesmen. The manufacturer, for 
 instance, merely advances so much money, and is 
 allowed to turn out anything complete. If he opens a 
 carriage manufactory he may produce carriages without 
 doing anything towards them himself; but a carriage 
 maker, who has had to learn his trade, pass examina- 
 tions, &c., must have the help of six other masters, a 
 locksmith, a blacksmith, a saddler, a glazier, a painter, 
 and a bucklemaker, before he can make a carriage com- 
 plete. And if he dispensed with the services of any one, 
 the guild would instantly lodge a complaint against him, 
 " In Nuremberg," says the same writer, "joiners are 
 divided into five distinct classes, and if the traders in 
 
316 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 Nuremberg -were like those in Munich, there would be 
 constant complaints about trespass. But they are too 
 clever and industrious in Nuremberg to waste time and 
 money in complaining of others ; they find it is more 
 profitable to do their work well than to have it pro- 
 tected from encroachment. In Munich, on the other 
 hand, there are shoals of masters who can't do their 
 own work, but are always ready to keep others from 
 doing it." The old story of the dog in the manger ! 
 
 I come now to the results of this system on the trade 
 of Bavaria in general, and its efiect on the consumer. 
 The statistics issued sufficiently show that trade has 
 been crippled by these restrictions, and in twelve years 
 the number of persons engaged in trade went down 
 nine per cent. The best workmen emigrated by thou- 
 sands ; in Paris alone, says onp writer, there are 60,000 
 German handicraftsmen. To compare the state of 
 Bavaria on the right bank of the Rhine with the 
 provinces on the left bank which have had freedom of 
 trade since 1791, tells the same tale. No answer to the 
 figures can be made by the defenders of the monopoly, 
 and it is not worth my while to detail the arguments 
 they proffer. But I must dwell a little longer on the 
 effects produced on individuals, especially as grievances 
 are more felt as they become individual, and are more 
 liable to be redressed by individual combination. One 
 cannot but feel interested in any prospect of reform 
 when one has felt the inconveniences of the existing 
 system, and though the opponents of reform threaten us 
 with fearful consequences in the event of change, we 
 know that a change for the worse is almost impossible. 
 
MINOR DETAILS. 317 
 
 I have spoken of tlie annoyance of having to employ a 
 separate workman for every separate branchy and I will 
 give some details on the subject. If you have a set of 
 double windows made, you cannot give an order to a 
 tradesman to make them for you ; you must have a car- 
 penter to make the frames, a glazier to take them away 
 and put in the glass, a smith to fit them in and put the 
 hooks and eyes in their right places. You can't have 
 your hair cut and be shaved in the same shop ; the one 
 must be done by a hairdresser, the other by a barber, 
 and the two trades are never carried on in common. 
 There is a story of a man who wanted a wheelbarrow, 
 and who ordered it of a carpenter. The wheelbarrow 
 came home, but without the wheel ; and the man had to 
 carry it to a wheelwright. But the wheelwright, after 
 putting in the wheel, could not put the iron on it, and 
 the man had to carry it to a blacksmith. When the 
 iron was on, the wheelbarrow still wanted painting, and 
 the man had to take it to a painter. The same process 
 was once gone through by an Englishman who wanted 
 a bucket. The man who made the staves could not 
 make the hoops; the man who made the hoops could 
 not make the handle; the man who made the handle 
 could not paint the bucket, so that an independent 
 functionary had to be sought out for each of these 
 offices. Such a chain of events was surely never seen 
 since the time of the old woman with her refractory pig. 
 The same Englishman had an adventure with a barber 
 which deserves to be quoted. He was in the habit of 
 being shaved by an apprentice of a barber in his neigh- 
 bourhood. One morning the apprentice informed him 
 
318 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 ttiat another would liave to shave him in future, as he 
 was going to change masters. The Englishman, accus- 
 tomed to be always shaved by this apprentice, objected 
 to changing, but he was told that the law forbade any 
 apprentice to take any customer away from his former 
 master, and that to prevent a customer being taken 
 away, a month's time was interposed, during which the 
 apprentice must have no dealings with the customer. I 
 need hardly record the Englishman's indignation, his 
 remarks that the law had no monopoly of shaving him, 
 and his determination to break or evade the obnoxious 
 clause. Suffice it that the apprentice continued to shave 
 him, was informed against by his old master, and pun- 
 ished ; and that the Englishman was told that he might 
 be shaved by any one he liked except the one he wanted. 
 The relations between fathers and sons are very 
 strongly affected by the Bavarian laws of trade. In 
 most places the son follows the same trade as his father, 
 assists his father during his life, and succeeds him at his 
 death. If the father is old and infirm, he leaves the 
 business in the hands of his son, and the son has a 
 natural inducement to improve the business, as he will 
 shortly inherit it. But in Munich the father cannot 
 resign his concession to his son, and if the son carries 
 on the trade with greater activity than before, he has no 
 guarantee that he will profit by it. There the singular 
 phenomenon is presented of a son following a difierent 
 trade from his father. I was greatly suprised to meet 
 with a father carrying on a grocer's business while his son 
 was working as a shoemaker. The idea struck me as 
 thoroughly incongruous. In all working trades one 
 
WANT or INHERITANCE. 319 
 
 supposes that a man brings up his sons in his own pro- 
 fession, that they may have the advantage of his expe- 
 rience, of his name, and of his establishment. Even in 
 the higher professions it is a common sight to see the 
 sons following their father's steps, though the higher 
 professions have not often the hereditary advantages of 
 the lower. But ia trade the value of inheritance is 
 obvious ; it includes the start in life, and often a main- 
 tenance for hfe. The successor receives the old custo- 
 mers as if they were entailed upon him, and without 
 making any decided effort himself has all the fruit of 
 the continued effort of his predecessor. But this does 
 not hold good if he changes his trade. No one employs 
 a shoemaker because he has dealt for years with his 
 father in grocery, nor is the reputation of a tradesman 
 available beyond his sphere of action. One must there- 
 fore censure the law of concessions which does not 
 allow a father to ensure his business to his son, as 
 depriving tradesmen of the best incitement to activity. 
 At the same time there is an exaggeration of inherit- 
 ance in another branch of trade which causes the chief 
 difficulty in settling the question. The real rights, as 
 they are called, which are hereditary, and are valued as 
 real property, are the great obstacles to the introduction 
 of freedom of trade. If these real rights are to be 
 bought up before trade can be liberated, we must wait a 
 great many years, for there are more than seventy thou- 
 sand such rights in Bavaria, and their value is some- 
 times reckoned as high as forty million florins. And if 
 they are not bought up, the owners of them would con- 
 sider themselves robbed. Having been accepted as real 
 
320 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 property, loans have been contracted upon the rights, 
 widows and orphans subsist upon them, and it is urged 
 that any violation of the principle would be iniquitous 
 to creditors and pensioners. I am not myself convinced 
 that there would be any injustice in leaving the real 
 rights to find their own level. The owners of them 
 have evidently an advantage over aU new competitors, 
 the advantage of an established position, a name, and a 
 custom. Moreover, time presses, freedom is loudly de- 
 manded, and no means of satisfying the real rights is 
 discoverable. But without a fuller knowledge of the 
 cause in question than I am able to command, it would 
 be useless to argue it. 
 
 A word on the debate which preceded the issue of the 
 instruction of 1862, and another on the changes intro- 
 duced by the instruction, and my task is completed. 
 The proposal to introduce freedom of trade was made 
 by the representatives of Nuremberg, the most import- 
 ant place of business in Bavaria, and was met by instant 
 protests from the more backward districts, headed by 
 the trade authorities of Munich. It is a notable fact 
 that the towns where business was conducted on a large 
 scale abstained from protests against the change, or 
 signed petitions in favour of it ; while those which were 
 notorious for their stagnation and incompetence were 
 the most active opponents of it. An ultramontane 
 paper in Munich moved heaven and earth to avert free- 
 dom; another paper called the change a menacing 
 stroke, and praised the measures taken by the trade 
 council to defeat it. The members for the Rhine Pro- 
 vinces where freedom existed, voted for its introduction 
 
"take up my hope, and prophesy!" 321 
 
 tlirouglioiit Bavaria; the members for those districts 
 where it had never existed, voted against it. All the 
 clerical members, twelve in number, voted against free- 
 dom ; and the landowners and farmers with the clergy 
 composed the majority of the opponents. Brewers, 
 tavernkeepers, tradesmen, landowners, and priests, spoke 
 against the change as decided antagonists ; but the half 
 opponents carried the day. One speaker, a chapel 
 singer and keeper of a cafe in Altotting, the Loretto of 
 Bavaria, prophesied the most fatal consequences to his 
 native land if free trade were allowed, following the ex- 
 ample of kindred speakers in other countries, and re- 
 membering that excellent maxim, " If you can't argue, 
 prophesy!" Another clerical speaker announced that 
 in the morning he had passed by the pillar erected to 
 the Virgin in the old market-place of Munich, to com- 
 memorate the victory of true religion in the person of 
 Elector Maximilian, and to implore the Virgin's protec- 
 tion against the plague, and seeing thousands praying 
 before it, he could not but utter a hope that the Virgin 
 might ward oif this new and terrible plague, liberty of 
 trade. Prayer and prophecy are not entirely unknown 
 in English debates, although they are not carried to 
 such lengths as this. To be sure, in the House of 
 Commons shrines are not represented by their singers, 
 nor is the priestly element introduced without some lay 
 coating, however slight. 
 
 By the new instruction, which was issued in accord- 
 ance with the vote of the Chambers in this debate, 
 some important reforms were effected. A sort of com- 
 petitive examination was substituted for seniority in 
 
 p 2 
 
3.22 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 deciding applications, personal capacity being made the 
 sole test, and no regard being paid to the claims of the 
 existing members of any trade for protection and main- 
 tenance. Women were allowed to carry on trades j 
 widows allowed to employ head men instead of trade 
 managers; one man might exercise several trades at 
 once, and not only were many others united, but the 
 police were enjoined to facilitate every further junction. 
 Instead of there being six kind of smiths, nailsmiths, 
 locksmiths, kntfesmiths, swordscourers, windlass makers, 
 and blacksmiths, one kind iacludes them all. For- 
 merly, no one man could make a fur coat ; the tailor 
 had to make the coat, and the furrier add the fur: 
 now the same may do both. I cannot forget the rap- 
 ture of a jeweller with whom I dealt, and who till 
 the new law had only been allowed to work in gold 
 and jewels, when he was able to show a silver teapot 
 without fear of being denounced by all the silversmiths 
 in Munich. On all sides one sees the effect of the 
 relaxation. Competition and energy are coming into 
 play ; new shops are being opened and old ones beau- 
 tified in all quarters of the town, and the progress 
 that has been effected within four or five months is 
 a hopeful sign for the future of this city. But much 
 remains to be done. Work must advance very rapidly, 
 and business habits must be taught by competition. 
 The duties on imports must be lowered, and the 
 custom-house reformed from its foundation, I trust 
 that the somewhat tardy wisdom which has made 
 the changes already mentioned may learn its other 
 duties more quickly, and that Munich may not always 
 occupy the rearguard of Europe. 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 LAWS or MAREIAGE. 
 
 Among the attributes of a perfect wife with which Mr. 
 Tennyson has invested his Isabel, we read, 
 
 " The laws of marriage cKaraoter'd in gold 
 "Upon the blanched tablets of her heart." 
 
 Fully appreciating the poet's admirable picture, and 
 intending no thought of irreverence, may I venture to 
 express a hope that these marriage laws were not those 
 of Bavaria ? 
 
 That the Bavarian marriage laws do harm to morality 
 is generally admitted, but it is supposed that the harm 
 done to morality by a strict regulation of marriage is 
 less important than the burden of pauperism that would 
 otherwise fall on society. It is purely on grounds of 
 political economy that marriage is regulated, and the 
 laws of marriage are so closely connected with the laws 
 of trade that the one chapter leads on to the other. So 
 far as I can gather, it is incorrect to say that marriage 
 is actually forbidden by any law, as the somewhat hasty 
 statements of the antagonists of the present system 
 
324 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 would lead one to suppose. But tlie prohibition is 
 none the less effectual for the indecision of the law, 
 and for the latitude given to those who superintend 
 the execution. The mode of operation is the following. 
 In Bavaria the old system of communities exists in its 
 fall force. Each community is bound to support any 
 of its members who are deprived of the power of sup- 
 porting themselves, and of course it follows from this 
 that each community is very careful not to admit too 
 many to its privileges, and still more careful to see 
 that every one admitted is duly qualified to keep him- 
 self off the parish. It is this consideration that operates 
 so effectually in limiting the number of tradesmen, lest 
 too much competition should ruin any of them, and 
 they should fall on the community. And of course it 
 applies more strongly to marriages and the creation of 
 families. 
 
 Such is the principle of the old system, and the 
 details dovetail very neatly into each other. Every one 
 who would be a member of a community must obtain 
 its permission to establish himself in it, and there are 
 four conditions of establishment, for all who are not 
 government functionaries. You must either possess 
 landed property, or a real right, or a concession, or 
 any other permanent and assured means of subsistence. 
 If you can prove the possession of any of these you can 
 get permission to establish yourself; but simple as the 
 conditions may seem, it is not always so easy to comply 
 with them. The first two require capital, and such 
 capital as is inherited, for it is rare that in countries 
 where marriage is left fi;ee, the rising man waits for a 
 
PAPER WALLS. 325 
 
 wife till lie has purchased a business or an estate. The 
 last chapter has shown the difficulties attending on con- 
 cessionsj and the fourth condition leaves the appHcant 
 entirely in the power of the community. What means 
 of subsistence are permanent and assured? Trade? 
 Your customers may leave you for a competitor. Your 
 own work? But your working powers may fail you. 
 An allowance from your father? And if your father 
 fails, what becomes of your allowance ? It is evident 
 that any curmudgeon of a community may raise ob- 
 jections to the certainty of any income, as all human 
 things are subject to uncertainty, and the reluctance of 
 communities to increase their numbers is thus provided 
 with double weapons. The instinct of human nature 
 leads one to look for evasions of the law, as soon as the 
 stringency of its provisions is ascertained. Unfortunately 
 no evasion exists ; every possibility of one has been fore- 
 seen. Each stranger taking up his quarters in any 
 place has to lodge his passport with the police, and take 
 out a permission to reside, and the owner of the house 
 in which he lives must vouch for the accuracy of his state- 
 ments. Germans are shut up in such paper walls that 
 something presents itself at every turn. Gretna Green 
 is quite out of the question, because by an article of the 
 Police Code, every man who marries abroad without 
 permission of the mother country is liable to a fine of a 
 hundred florins, or thirty days' imprisonment. In the 
 Palatinate there is perfect freedom in the matter of 
 marriage and estabhshment, but only for the natives of 
 the place. Immigrants from the other provinces of 
 Bavaria are treated according to their own laws, and 
 
326 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 many poor couples who have been denied the right of 
 marrying at home have spent their last savings in 
 journeying across the Rhine, hoping in vain to find 
 liberty there. 
 
 All evasion is thus provided against, and the regula- 
 tions of marriage are quite effectual. The State has 
 deputed to each community the right of protecting its 
 own interests, and the communities have not shrunk 
 from their duty. It remains to be seen if the results 
 are as effectual as the workings, if the harm done to 
 morality is outweighed by the good done to society ; if, 
 in short, the public is really benefited at the expense 
 of the domestic happiness of the greater number. But 
 first a word upon the abstract question. I do not 
 attempt to discuss the right of a State to put impedi- 
 ments in the way of marriage ; more reading and more 
 thought than I can command would be necessary to 
 influence the decision. Yet I cannot but think that if 
 the measures taken by the Bavarian Government are 
 found to have an evil effect, both on morality and 
 economy, measures adopted, as they are, with the 
 greatest care, and carried out with the greatest work- 
 ing efl&ciency, the general question must, to some ex- 
 tent, be effected by their failure. It would of course be 
 of no use to forbid marriage if it could be contracted 
 without permission; the blockade must be effectual. 
 The Bavarian government do everything in their power 
 to enforce the rule; the minute surveillance of the 
 police in every town is such that a secret marriage 
 could not by any possibility be made; unmarried 
 couples may not live together. I do not know what 
 
MILL ON LIBERTY. 337 
 
 more could be done to make tlie marriage law binding, 
 except perhaps one thing, to refuse the legitimation 
 of children bom out of wedlock, and I question if this 
 would not increase the misery of natural children in- 
 stead of deterring their parents from cohabitation. 
 Nor would one willingly see- any further measures 
 adopted, when one knows the misery caused by the 
 present regulations. Still it may be said that illegi- 
 timate births would be much lessened by the removal 
 of the subsequent remedy, and in some degree I must 
 admit the force of the argument. And yet it is evident 
 from the official statistics of births and marriages that 
 the measure would by no means put a stop to illegi- 
 timate births, and that it would not seriously diminish 
 their number. For in one year there were seventeen 
 hundred and two illegitimate births (not counting 
 seventy-six still born) in Munich, and only four hundred 
 and seven legitimated by subsequent marriage. I must, 
 therefore, put in these facts as an appeal against the 
 judgment of one of the greatest living authorities, who 
 has ventured to approve of the system of restriction. 
 "The law, which in some countries," says John Stuart 
 Mill in his book on Liberty,* " forbids those to marry 
 who cannot maintain a family, does not exceed the 
 powers of government, and although such a law may 
 have its inconveniences, it cannot be said to be a viola- 
 tion of liberty." 
 
 I presume Mr. Mill reasons that those who cannot 
 support a family have no right to marry, that liberty 
 
 * I translate the passage from a French, work, in which it is quoted, 
 not having the original In hand. 
 
328 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 only extends to such things as are of right, and that 
 the State is qualified to interfere to procure the ob- 
 servance of rights. It is perfectly true that those who 
 cannot maintain a family have not the right to marry, 
 and that reasoning men, under such circumstances, 
 would consider themselves forbidden by a higher law 
 than that imposed by any State. No man can wish 
 to entail poverty and misery upon a wife and children, 
 and without some prospect, or some hope, however 
 vague, one can scarcely conceive that any one would 
 be so reckless as to marry. Men are, no doubt, given 
 to be extravagant in hope, to expect a competence with- 
 out having to labour for it. But experience gradually 
 cures this evil, and the man who looks forward to con- 
 quering the world at twenty is apt to be ultra-practical 
 at thirty. In many cases, too, people are prompted to 
 violent exertions by the pressure of want, and an idle 
 man is turned into a willing worker. These are the 
 operations of the laws of Nature, of whose laws it is 
 scarcely possible for any one to be ignorant. She warns 
 beforehand of the consequences, and holds out every 
 inducement to disarm them. Her punishments are 
 effectual, but they are not without their remedy; her 
 sentences may often be diminished by good conduct, 
 and are sure to be aggravated by bad. She holds out 
 comfort and contentment as the reward of diligence 
 and thrift; she imposes care and want upon idleness, 
 but lets repentance help to redeem the penalty. Self^ 
 reliance and forethought are inculcated by all her 
 teaching. But when the State interferes, the law of 
 nature is sure to be disregarded. Subjects who are 
 
THE STATE V. NATURE. 329 
 
 accustomed to have their affairs managed for them by 
 superior authority are deprived of all power of self- 
 reliance, and are as helpless as children whenever the 
 State fails them. Moreover, the intervention of the 
 government cannot be half as effectual as the prohibi- 
 tions imposed by nature, because the government can 
 only put obstacles in the way and inflict punishment 
 if these are disregarded. The State cannot say to a 
 man as Nature says to him, " If you do this you shall 
 starve :" the most she can say is, " I will punish you if 
 you do not respect my injunctions." Naturally, too, 
 the punishment that the State can inflict for such dis- 
 regard of her laws is very limited, because imprudence 
 is not a crime, and the higher penalties must be re- 
 served for crimes. If you punish an imprudent mar- 
 riage as you punish seduction or robbery, do you not 
 imply that there is as little guilt in seduction or rob- 
 bery as there is in making an imprudent marriage? 
 And yet the laws of Nature leave crime almost un- 
 punished while they enforce prudence by threats of the 
 most terrible meaning. 
 
 What I would argue is, that the interference of the 
 State in these things is ineffectual, both as it fails in its 
 own workings, and impedes the workings of nature's 
 law. The man left to himself, sees that if he marries 
 without means, he reduces himself and his wife to po- 
 verty, and that if he has a large family without a cor- 
 responding income, he entails poverty on his children. 
 But when the State forbids him to marry, and have 
 children, a certain term of punishment is substituted 
 for poverty in case he is able to elude the vigilance of 
 
330 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 the State. With this prospect before him, there are 
 two very simple ways of eluding the Government ; he 
 can either get married elsewhere, and accept thirty 
 days imprisonment, or he can get children without 
 going through any form of marriage. In either case 
 the weight is thrown on the State. The State is re- 
 garded as the opponent of marriage, and the disgrace of 
 illegitimacy is transferred to the laws which make it 
 necessary. Are not these the necessary results of State 
 interference ? 
 
 The results in Bavaria are far worse than anything I 
 have stated in discussing the general question, and if I 
 give an account of them, I believe it will be of more 
 effect than any argument upon the principle. Mr. Mill 
 admits that " such a law may have its inconveniences ;" 
 and it is a question if the inconveniences are not inse- 
 parable from it. Be it understood that in describing 
 the Bavarian system, I do not imply that a better sys- 
 tem might not be adopted ; that the excess of bureau, 
 cracy inherent in the German nature might not be 
 avoided in other countries; that obstacles might not 
 be put in the way of imprudent marriages, without re, 
 ducing the poor to a worse state of poverty than even 
 imprudent marriages would reduce them. I am only 
 showing the circumstances in which one nation has 
 placed itself by endeavouring to forbid marriage, and I 
 leave more skilful legislators to discover means less open 
 to reproach. In the chapter on Trade Laws, I quoted 
 from a German writer that an application for a conces- 
 sion was generally accompanied by a demand for the 
 right of establishment. Such a demand is referred to 
 
LONG ENGAGEMENTS. 331 
 
 the common council, and the trustees for the poor, to 
 decide if the applicant's means are sufficient. In some 
 cases a concession is granted without the right of mar- 
 riage ; but the difficulty of obtaining concessions is so 
 great, that a man who has not capital to marry, has 
 very little chance of being allowed to practise his trade. 
 But the marriage requirements do not press so much on 
 these classes as on the poorer people. Servants, and all 
 who depend on personal employment, are perhaps the 
 greatest sufferers. Their applications are certain to be 
 rejected, on the ground that their subsistence is not 
 assured. I have known cases in which servants have 
 asked their masters to make an agreement to keep them 
 for ever, because such an agreement would guarantee 
 the certainty of their means of subsistence. And yet 
 it is scarcely to be expected that any master would sign 
 such a document, if there was a chance of his being 
 kept to his word. If you inquire of the servants in 
 Munich, you will find that almost every one is engaged, 
 and almost every female servant above a certain age has 
 one or two children. One cook that I had was engaged 
 eighteen years, and had two children out at nurse. 
 Another was engaged seven years, in the middle of 
 which her lover left her, and married another who had 
 more money, returning to her on the death of his first 
 wife. I have heard of a case of two poor people having 
 to wait fifteen years for permission to marry, and spend- 
 ing 200 florins on applications. One of the writers on 
 the subject gives the following instance. An operative 
 earning twelve shilhngs a week, was engaged to a girl 
 earning seven, and owner of a house valued at £120, 
 
332 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 and a cow. They applied for permission to marry, and 
 were refused) "means of subsistence not assured." 
 Time went on, they had two children, and still their 
 application was refused on the same ground. The 
 owner of the manufactory took up their cause, and 
 pleaded it himself with the official, saying, that this 
 refusal was not what was intended by the Government. 
 The official replied curtly, " What does that matter to 
 us; the Government may have its own ideas on the 
 subject, but we have ours, and I in particular am of 
 opinion that such marriages are neither right nor use- 
 ful.-" The author from whom I quote this, adds, 
 "While I am writing, my servant girl, aged fifteen 
 years, comes in dressed for a feast-day, and says that 
 her father and mother are to be married to-day, and she 
 must henceforth be called by her father's name. Twelve 
 times her father's application for license to marry was 
 rejected, and each time he had to pay fees and ex- 
 penses, lawyer's bills," &c. &c. 
 
 This is the way the system works. Unless a man can 
 show that there is no human likelihood of his coming 
 on the parish, he is deprived of the most powerful in- 
 ducement to exertion, and all his savings are gradually 
 absorbed by the expense of the applications he must 
 make, by the costly organization of a bureaucratic 
 authority. Thus, with a view to encourage prudence, an 
 actual waste of money is effected, and instead of bid- 
 ding poor people accumulate their savings, and marry 
 upon them, you make the savings go to maintain an 
 anti-matrimonial jurisdiction. Nor is this the only 
 breach of economy. The expense of two people living 
 
THE LEGAL REMEDY. 333 
 
 apart, and keeping their illegitimate children out at 
 nurse, is far greater than it would be for a family to live 
 together. It has often been maintained that what is 
 enough for two is enough for three ; it is certain that a 
 small increase is sufficient to support an additional person, 
 and that nothing is more expensive than separate mainte- 
 nance. The most expensive form of life is therefore forced 
 upon people who are considered too poor to carry on the 
 most frugal. I was very much touched by hearing the his- 
 tory of a poor artist in Munich, one of those thoroughly 
 artistic temperaments one reads of, absorbed in his own 
 world, and unable to obey the demands of the practical 
 world around him. He was a widower, and wished to 
 marry the maidservant in his house. Of course he 
 could not get permission, and as he had a child by her, 
 she was removed from his house, and made to take ser- 
 vice elsewhere. The child was put out to nurse, the 
 father had to pay a certain sum towards the support of 
 the child and the mother, while deprived of the help of his 
 servant, and not allowed the help of a wife. It may easily 
 be supposed how unfitted an artist of this class would be 
 to do all the duties of his house, how much more it 
 cost him to make an allowance to the mother of his 
 child, without any equivalent, than it would have cost 
 for the family to live together ; and how little chance 
 there would be for any of them bettering themselves by 
 their work, as there would have been if they had lived 
 together. This is not nature's penalty for imprudence j 
 this is only the misery the State can inflict on those 
 who are too weak to oppose it. 
 
334 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 It is not private economy alone that suffers in Ba- 
 varia ; the public funds are also heavily taxed by the 
 results of the marriage law. The communities profess 
 to restrain marriage out of regard for their own purses ; 
 they forbid the rearing of families, lest the children 
 should come on the parish. But by this short-sighted 
 policy they cause the parishes to be burdened with ille- 
 gitimate children, who have no responsible parents to 
 support them, and who are therefore sure to be an ex- 
 pense to the community. Honest people, who have 
 married, and have got a family too large for their means, 
 feel the promptings of honour, and bear up to the last 
 moment, sooner than give up their children. But no 
 one has the same sense of duty with regard to illegiti- 
 mate children, who do not bear his name, and whose 
 legal claim on him is limited. And thus the commu- 
 nities procure a certainty of charge by wishing to avoid 
 a chance of it. The same short-sightedness is found in 
 the restrictions imposed on military marriages. No 
 soldier is allowed to marry before thirty, and their 
 children are pensioned up to the age of eighteen. The 
 result of this is, that when the father dies he is almost 
 sure to leave children younger than eighteen, who have 
 to be supported at the public expense. It is, I believe 
 established, that young marriages are not so prolific as 
 those marriages contracted above the age of thirty; 
 and as all marriage laws are devised with a view to 
 limiting the number of births, it is clear that these laws 
 defeat their object. Certainly, if the father married 
 younger, there would be more chance of his children 
 
WHAT FIGURES SHOW. 335 
 
 having attained the age of eighteen before he died. 
 As it is, tribes of young children are saddled upon the 
 public purse. 
 
 The statistical tables of kingdoms in which marriage 
 is restricted, and especially the tables of Bavaria, hold 
 out warnings against the continuance of the system. 
 To the triumphant question of a Conservative writer 
 " What would become of towns if every body in them 
 was allowed to marry ?" one may oppose a dismal pic- 
 ture of the present state of towns in which every one is 
 not allowed to marry. It was found iu Baden that the 
 old families rapidly disappeared in towns where the 
 right of establishing and marrying was not left free, 
 and in many such towns it was quite impossible to make 
 up the number of recruits for the army, as the popula- 
 tion had so much diminished, that all the young men in 
 the place did not suffice. Illegitimate births seem to 
 keep pace in an exactly corresponding ratio to the regu- 
 lations on marriage. In Lower Bavaria illegitimate 
 births are one in four ; in the Palatinate, where free- 
 dom from vexatious laws produces a less proportion of 
 crime, more contentment, and far greater prosperity, 
 they are one in nine ; and in Saxony and Prussia one 
 in thirteen. In Munich, in one year, there were 1,762 
 legitimate, and 1,702 illegitimate births ; nor is it rare 
 for the illegitimate births in one month to exceed the 
 legitimate. But the worst side disclosed by these sta- 
 tistics is the proportion of deaths. In the whole of 
 Bavaria more die under fourteen than over ; and the 
 number that die before attaining one year is four times 
 as great as the number which comes next to it, grown 
 
336 
 
 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 up people, who die between sixty and seventy. That is, 
 in one year more than 69,000 children died, and only 
 62,000 persons over fourteen. Of these children 53,000 
 were under one year, whereas the greatest number of 
 deaths above fourteen were 13,000, of people between 
 sixty and seventy. If these figures do not open one's 
 eyes to the results of the system pursued in Bavaria, I 
 do not know what will. And yet without due commen- 
 tary the figures do not tell half the tale. It would 
 seem strange that while the illegitimate births in Mu- 
 nich so nearly approach the legitimate, the deaths of 
 people over fourteen exceed the deaths under fourteen, 
 while in many country places the children die faster 
 than they are born. The secret of this is, that most of 
 the illegitimate children are put out to nurse in country 
 places, and that people from the country come up to 
 Munich, that their shame may not be public at home. 
 In all the villages round the chief cities of Bavaria, 
 children are commited to the care of licensed nurses ; 
 only a small sum is paid for their maintenance, and 
 they are starved out of the world. Thus, in the towns 
 of Nuremberg and Wurzburg, the deaths above four- 
 teen exceed. But in the districts of Nuremberg and 
 Wurzburg, the deaths under fourteen are by far the 
 most numerous. 
 
 I need scarcely enlarge on the moral results after 
 producing these figures. It is evident that small regard 
 is paid to the life that God has implanted in all His 
 creatures, be they born in wedlock or notj and what 
 regard can be paid to the sanctity of family relations, 
 of the marriage tie, of the chain of duties and affections 
 
THE RESULTS. 337 
 
 that binds parents and children together, when every 
 single one of them is thus profaned ? There can be no 
 respect of marriage if it is to be only a civil observance, 
 contracted by those whom the community recognises as 
 respectable ; nor can a family grow up in one after years 
 of separation and estrangement, when the children have 
 been stealthily begotten, and have been born in shame. 
 On these grounds alone a revision of the law is needed ; 
 and if, as some argue, the nation is not fitted to walk 
 by itself, and cannot be trusted to provide for its own 
 wants, the sooner it is freed from these leading-strings 
 the more chance of its learning. 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 LAWS OP POLICE. 
 
 Theke is a mysterious power in Munich^ almost answer- 
 ing to the old secret tribunals of the Vehm, or the ter*- 
 rible messengers of state-punishments in Venice, to 
 judge by the fear it inspires. It takes cognisance of 
 every stranger and sojourner ; its functions range from 
 the highest departments to the lowest; it is never 
 spoken of but in whispers, and while no definite know- 
 ledge of its details seems to exist, its measures are 
 severely, though secretly denounced, by foreign re- 
 sidents. Till about a year ago there was no means 
 of ascertaining the crimes it was allowed to visit and 
 the penalties it was in the habit of inflicting. The 
 extent and accuracy of its information, whether gathered 
 from known or unknown sources, the prying into do- 
 mestic life with which it has been charged, have rendered 
 it an object of wonder to the inhabitants of Munich, 
 and of hatred to the sons of freer countries. It is dif- 
 ficult to converse with an old resident on the ways of 
 Munich without hearing fearful denunciations of the 
 police authorities, backed by stories that seem marve - 
 Ions, though they only want substantiation, not founda- 
 tion in fact. 
 
SKETCHINESS OF THIS CHAPTER. 339 
 
 I have not exatnined the judicial organisation of 
 Bavaria. In the absence of plentiful and reliable ma- 
 terials, I have been content to neglect the duties of a 
 philosophic inquirer, especially as I found very great 
 difficulties in the way. It has not been my object to 
 go to the root of these mattei's, and with the existing 
 obstacles to inquiry, no one who was ,not willing to 
 break the ice and iavestigate every nook and cranny, 
 could arrive at any results. Nor do I imagine that the 
 results would repay him for his trouble. The mysteries 
 of Munich cannot be so deep or exciting as those of the 
 great capitals which have afforded fields for so much 
 romance ; and though, perhaps, the uader current may 
 be more rapid and turbid than the placid surface, the 
 diver might bring up nothing worthy of public ex- 
 amination. Would it interest the English public to 
 hear that in very truth the Munich police employed 
 a gentleman's maid-servant to ascertain the nature of 
 her master's relations with his house-keeper; or that 
 a Frenchman was really separated from his travelling 
 companion on grounds of public morality? Both 
 stories may be true, as the police is legally empowered 
 to provide against all moral offences. But if I were to 
 tell all the tales that I have heard of the Munich police, 
 and leave the natural inferences to be drawn from them, 
 I should be conveying a very different idea from that 
 which seems to be legitimate. There is no doubt a 
 considerable amount of over-legislation in Munich, as 
 there is throughout the Continent. Germans, especially, 
 seem unable to dispense with it ; and if they do not feel 
 the inconvenience of their present system, the authori- 
 
340 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 ties are hardly called upon to alter it. Thus much is 
 certain^ that the smallness of crime and the orderliness 
 of public life in Munich contrast very favourably with 
 the state of English towns^ while the boorishness of the 
 population would lead one to form the very worst 
 opinion of their capacity for discipline. 
 
 The police system in Munich is based on the same 
 principle as the laws of trade and of marriage. Every 
 crime is provided for, and every inducement is put for- 
 ward to make good citizens of the people. The police 
 code, which was drawn up by the Chambers in 1861, 
 and came in force 1st July, 1862, contains 231 articles, 
 and out of a population of 140,000 twelve to fifteen 
 hundred persons are punished every month. In one 
 month I find the following number given : — 3 for 
 breaking the Sunday; 319 for breaking the laws of 
 the strangers' police; 1 for putting his things up to 
 lottery without permission ; 40 for breaking the servants' 
 laws; 34 for giving too late notice of having engaged 
 servants; 15 for breaking the sanitary laws; 7 for 
 breaking the fire laws; 3 for breaking the raft laws; 
 1 for stealing flowers from the cemetery ; 3 for damage 
 to fields; 18 for cruelty to animals; 39 for breaking 
 the fiacre and driving laws ; 66 for offences against the 
 street police; 14 for not observing the police hour; 
 37 for making Blue Monday and arbitrarily absenting 
 themselves from their work ; 25 for defrauding the 
 town dues; 1 for quackery; 17 for hawking; 43 for 
 breaking the dog laws ; 70 for dissoluteness, and 16 for 
 favouring the same ; 1 for usury ; 261 for ill-treatment, 
 injuries, and similar excesses; 17 for theft; 4 for em- 
 
PERMISSIONS TO LIVE. 341 
 
 bezzlement; 2 for insulting the gendarmerie; 215 for 
 idle vagabondage; and 34 for begging. In another 
 month one person was punished for taking children to 
 nurse without permission, six for taking part in lot- 
 teries of other people's effects. It will be seen by this 
 list that the chief numbers refer to offences which are 
 left unpunished in other countries. Of the large num- 
 bers, "261 for injuries, brutalities, and the like," is 
 the only clause likely to figure in a less governed 
 country; and this one speaks badly for the state of 
 public civilisation. But in all other respects the crimes 
 are ridiculously light. Munich is, perhaps, the only 
 place left where the strangers' police is enforced with 
 such rigour. I beheve permissions to reside are no 
 longer necessary in Vienna; they had been much re- 
 laxed in Venice, till the war of 1859 brought them in 
 again. But the restrictions on trade and marriage 
 make them still necessary in Munich, ridiculous as 
 they may seem. So accustomed are dwellers in these 
 German towns to police supervision that a German 
 once declared life to be unsafe in America owing to the 
 absence of a polizei, and an Englishman who had been 
 long in Munich asked if the police in London allowed 
 you to take a house where you liked, and to live as you 
 felt disposed ? 
 
 When seventy-four persons are punished in one month 
 for ofiences against the laws relating to servants, one is 
 tempted to inquire into the nature of such laws, and 
 the effect they have on those subject to them. It is 
 notorious throughout Germany that servants in Munich 
 are bad, and yet the police take every precaution to 
 
 q2 
 
342 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 ensure their good behaviour. Every servant has to keep 
 a book, stamped by the police, and containing certifi* 
 cates of character, signed by each successive employer. 
 On entering a person^s service, a servant has to take her 
 book to the police, with a paper from her new master, 
 stating the date of her entry into his house, which date 
 is written in her book, with the name and address of 
 her master, and guaranteed by the official stamp. On 
 the blank page opposite, her character is written by the 
 employer when she leaves his service, so that each 
 period of her life is accounted for, and bad conduct 
 would seem impossible against so sure a penalty. In 
 spite of all these precautions, the tribe of servants in 
 Munich seems to deteriorate instead of improving, and 
 the characters given in their books are by no means 
 reliable. Like the naval certificate, according to which 
 every officer conducts himself with diligence, sobriety, 
 and attention, and is always obedient to command, the 
 certificate that Munich servants have always been honest 
 and diligent, may be capable of considerable stretching. . 
 And thus the same conclusion is forced on us by the 
 police regulations, as St. Paul formed with regard to 
 the Jewish law ; if there had been a law given which 
 could ha-^e given life, verily righteousness should have 
 been by the law. 
 
 But while the police authorities are engaged in taking 
 care of public morals, and in the higher works of the 
 law, their actual province is neglected. The street 
 police is inefficient in the extreme. It never seems to 
 cross the minds of the people of Munich, that the great 
 body of officers which they keep up should be employed 
 
QUIET STREETS. 343 
 
 in works of real utility^ and wliile the gensdarmes are 
 looking after morality, or seeing that no one takes a 
 house without permission to reside, the streets are in a 
 state of anarchy. A friend, who is far more familiar 
 than I am with Munich life, but who perversely leaves 
 me to write the book that he should have written, has 
 mentioned many little facts of this nature in a letter to 
 the Parthenon. He gives a strange picture of brewer's 
 drays stopped exactly on a crossing, in order that the 
 drayman may chat for half an hour with a friend, while 
 aU foot-passengers have to wade through the mud ; of 
 houses being repaired, and no temporary foot-path made 
 in front ; of shops being altered, and the whole pathway 
 blocked up by a great wooden booth, in which the 
 shopkeeper takes up his abode for the timej of the 
 most unpleasant trades being practised in the open 
 street, a coppersmith rivetting his cauldron, a tinman 
 soldering the pipe of a house; while sawing, chopping, 
 ramming and pounding wood, goes on all day in front 
 of every one's windows. With such noises, added to 
 the detestable drums of the immense garrison, the quiet 
 streets of Munich are almost worthy of the name in the 
 ironical sense of London satirists. 
 
 It may be a question how far the police are entitled 
 to interfere in the matter of public morality. Some 
 interference is obviously required. No thinking man 
 can defend the existing state of London streets, and a 
 comparison of Parisian morals and Parisian decency, 
 with London morals and London decency, would suf- 
 fice to prove the necessity of Government supervision. 
 Unfortunately, Englishmen are, more than any other 
 
344 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 nation, under the influence of phrases, and, sooner than 
 allow a cant phrase to be employed against them with 
 some show of truth, will submit to the greatest prac- 
 tical annoyances. In Loudon we have the extreme of 
 lawlessness, and it is universally admitted that our 
 system is wrong. But the other extreme is by no 
 means perfect, although public decency is preserved, 
 and no sign of vice transpires. Rome and Munich are 
 about the only two cities in Europe where prostitution 
 seems unknown. In Rome it is positively forbidden by 
 the government of a priesthood j in Munich, I believe, 
 it is licensed to the most limited extent, for strangers 
 only. One result of such measures is, that nothing can 
 be known about the dark side of the town. In London* 
 vice is open to the most casual observer ; any one 
 may take his stand at the corners of streets and com- 
 pute the numbers engaged in vicious pursuits ; the 
 haunts of vice are public and notorious. In Paris, too, 
 the workings of the system can be watched without 
 much difficulty ; and the police provide statistical in- 
 formation which seems not altogether inaccessible. But 
 in Rome and Munich no idea can be formed of the 
 state of public morals. In no large city can one expect 
 to find purity, and the accounts given of Rome below 
 the surface are considered by many as an additional 
 proof of the incapacity of the priestly government. In 
 About's " Question Romaine" — a book which, however 
 venomous in its spirit, has been shown to understate 
 the facts bearing on the temporal power — there is an 
 allusion to the results of this compulsory virtue ; and 
 a full statement of them was made by a Roman in a 
 
PUBLIC MORALITY. 345 
 
 pamphlet following the celebrated manifesto of " Le Pape 
 et le Congres." If one may judge from what one hears, 
 the same evils exist in Munich. The diflSculties thrown 
 in the way of marriage contribute to sap the virtue of 
 poor women, and the men, not finding any outlet for 
 their passions, are naturally on the search for adven- 
 tures. 
 
 " Munich," says Murray, " has the reputation of 
 being a very dissolute capital." If the statistics of ille- 
 gitimate births were to be trusted implicitly, such a 
 reputation were certainly deserved. A stranger, how- 
 ever, coming from London or Paris with the usual 
 idyllic ideas about Germany, would be far from coming 
 to such a conclusion. In the quiet of the streets, the 
 absence of all show of temptation, he would read a con- 
 firmation of that public virtue traditionally preserved 
 from the times of Tacitus, and confirmed by Madame de 
 Stael. Estimates of national character are almost always 
 unsatisfactory, and in setting down whole nations as 
 virtuous people forget that in every country the majority 
 gives way to its instincts, and that a community with- 
 out vice is a moral impossibility. Even in the time of 
 the patriarchs the social evil was not unknown, although 
 it had not arrived at such a pitch as to demand a polite 
 inuendo to describe it. The words in which Heine 
 analyses the ideal pictures of Madame de Stael are not 
 inappropriate to characterise the real aspect of Ger- 
 many, and the fancy views which are often formed of it. 
 " Madame de Stael only sees one side of German life j 
 she praises the intellectual part, the idealism of Ger- 
 many, in order to attack the realism that was then pre- 
 
346 SOCIAL LIFE IN MUNICH. 
 
 vailing in France. Her book resembles in this respect 
 the Germania of Tacitus, who probably had the same 
 object in view, to satirise his countrymen indirectly by 
 apologising for Germany. Madame d6 Stael only saw 
 across the Rhine what she wished to see; a nebulous 
 land of spirits, where men without bodies and all virtue 
 walked on fields of snow, conversing only on meta- 
 physics. Oh ! what delightful freshness in your woods, 
 she would cry, what delicious scent of violets ; how 
 peacefully the canary birds sing in their little German 
 nests ! You are a good and virtuous people, and you 
 have no idea of the corruption that exists amongst us in 
 France, in the Rue du Bac ! She sees nothing but 
 spiritualism around her; she praises our honesty, our 
 probity, our morality, our admirable intellects, and our 
 admirable hearts ; she has no idea of our houses of cor- 
 rection, our sloughs of prostitution, our barracks, &c., 
 &c." Such is the judgment of a German upon the 
 morality of his native land, such the terms in which he 
 rejects the exaggerated praise of a stranger. 
 
 I have merely touched on this subject incidentally, 
 because the surface of Munich life might mislead 
 passing visitors. But I leave it for others to sum up 
 the facts bearing on the case, and either to acquit the 
 town of the charge made against it, or to pronounce it 
 guilty. My own conclusion is, that while some cities 
 are more guilty than others, none can be accounted as 
 innocent, and it is better to grant the unfortunate ne- 
 cessity for all large towns than to claim an exemption 
 for some, at the risk of their faults being more severely 
 scrutinised and more decidedly condemned. 
 
LEWIS AND SON, PRINTEE-S, SWAN BOILDlNiiS, MOORGATE STREET,