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ON THE RH I NE, 
 
 AND OTHER SKETCHES OF 
 
 EUROPEAN TRAVEL. 
 
 LADY BLANCHE MURPHY, T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPE, 
 Mrs. SARAH B. WISTER, EDWARD KING, Etc. 
 
 
 WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 B. LIPPINCOTT & CO 
 
 I 88 I. 
 
Copyright, 1880, by J. B. Lippincott & Co. 
 
 
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2--''^ 
 
 CONTENT.S. 
 
 PACK 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE Lady Blanche Murfhy. 5 
 
 BADEN AND AELERHEILIGEN T. Adolphus Trollope. 75 
 
 WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS ? Sarah B. Wisier. 86 
 
 AMONG THE BISCAY ANS George L. Catlin. in - 
 
 TROUVILLE L. Lejeime. 121 - 
 
 THE JTALIAN LAKES Robert A. McLeod. 133 - 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA W. D. R. 149 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY Alfred T. Bacon. 167 - 
 
 ^GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN J. A. Harrison. 208 - 
 
 TRY NORWAY ! Olive Logan. 230 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES Edward King. 246 
 
 ODD CORNERS OF AUSTRIA Edward King. 276 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE Edward King. 293 
 
 DANUBIAN DAYS Edward King. 311 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 «X 
 
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 ' t*t\c 
 
 
 merchants' exchange at CONSTANCE, WHERE THE COUNCIL MET. 
 
 LIKE a certain old, eternally-young, 
 and dearly-monotonous subject, the 
 Rhine has been an inexhaustible theme 
 for song, legend and romance. Old as 
 is its place in literature, familiar as are 
 
 its shores not only to the traveler in Eu- 
 rope, but to the least well-read of the 
 stay-at-homes, there is always something 
 new to be said about it, or at least it can 
 be viewed in a new aspect. Its early 
 
 5 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 stages are certainly less well known than 
 its middle portion — the Rhine of poetry 
 and legend — but they are equally beau- 
 tiful, and especially characterized by natu- 
 ral scenery of the most picturesque kind. 
 Historical memories are not lacking ei- 
 ther, even within fifty miles of its rise in 
 the glaciers of the Alps, while its early 
 beauty as a mountain - torrent, dashing 
 over the rocks of the Via Mala, has for 
 some a greater charm than even its broad 
 lake-like waters fringed with cathedrals, 
 abbeys, and stately guildhalls, or its wind- 
 ings among "castled crags." 
 
 One branch of the river bursts from un- 
 der a tumbled mass of ice and rock — one 
 of those marvelous "seas" of ice which 
 are the chief peculiarity of the Alps, and 
 which sometimes, as in the case of the 
 glacier of the Rheinwald, present among 
 other features that of an immense frozen 
 waterfall. Passing through the village of 
 Hinterrhein, whose inhabitants are the 
 descendants of a colony planted there 
 by Barbarossa to guard the old military 
 road over the Alps, and which boasts of 
 a Roman temple and other less well-de- 
 fined remains of human dwellings of the 
 same period, the Rhine enters the grand 
 gorge of the Via Mala, between Andeer 
 and Rongella, on the road below the 
 Splugen Pass and village. Every such 
 pass has its Devil's Bridge or its "Hell" 
 or its " Bottomless Pit," and tradition tells 
 of demons who pelted each other with 
 the riven masses of rock, or giants who 
 in malice split the rocks and dug the 
 chasms across which men dared no long- 
 er pass. But it needs no such figures of 
 speech to make a mountain-gorge one 
 of the sublimest scenes in Nature, one 
 which thrills the beholder with simple 
 admiration and delight. The Via Mala 
 is one of the most splendid of these 
 scenes. A sheer descent of two thousand 
 feet of rock, with clinging shrubs, and 
 at the bottom the trunks of pines and 
 firs that have lost their hold and grown 
 into mossy columns stretched across the 
 stream and often broken by its force ; a 
 winding, dizzy road leading over single- 
 arched bridges and half viaducts built 
 into the black rock ; a foam-white stream 
 below ; a succession of miniature water- 
 
 falls, rapids and whirlpools ; spray and 
 rainbow poised over the stream at inter- 
 vals, and here and there the narrowing 
 rocks bending their ledges together and 
 wellnigh shutting out the sun ; the " Lost 
 Hole," where tall firs, with their roots 
 seemingly in space, stand up like a forest 
 of lances, and the very formation of the 
 rocks reminds one of gigantic needles 
 closely-wedged together, — such are the 
 features of the gorge through which the 
 Rhine here forces its way. Then comes 
 Zillis, a regular Swiss village, at the en- 
 trance of the valley of Thusis, which is 
 a broad green meadow dotted with cha- 
 lets, a picturesque, domestic, rural land- 
 scape, a bit of time set in the frame of 
 eternity, and holding in its village chron- 
 icles memories to which distance lends 
 enchantment, but which, in view of the 
 scenes we have just described, seem won- 
 derfully bare of dignity. Here is the 
 castle of Ortenstein, the warrior-abbey 
 of Katsis, the Roman Realta, the castle 
 of Rhaziinz, the bridge of Juvalta, and 
 many castles on the heights overlook- 
 ing the valley, which at the time of the 
 "Black League" of the nobles against 
 the " Gray Confederation " of the citizens 
 (which gave its name to this canton, the 
 Grisons) were so many rallying - points 
 and dens of murder. There is romance 
 in the legends of these castles, but one 
 seldom stops to think of the robbery and 
 lawlessness hidden by this romance. For 
 these knights of the strong hand were 
 no "Arthur's knights," defenders of the 
 weak, champions of the widow and the 
 orphan, gentle, brave and generous, but 
 mostly oppressors, Bedo»ins of the Mid- 
 dle Ages, ready to pounce on the mer- 
 chandise of traveling and unarmed burgh- 
 ers and defy the weak laws of an empire 
 which could not afford to do without their 
 support, and consequently winked at 
 their offences. 
 
 A legend of this part of the Rhine, 
 less well known than those of the Lore- 
 ley, Drachenfels or Bishop Hatto's Tow- 
 er, belongs to Rhaziinz. After the feud 
 had lasted long years between the nobles 
 and the citizens, the young lord of this 
 castle was captured in battle by the Gray 
 Confederates, and the people's tribunal 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 
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DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 condemned him to death. The execu- 
 tioner stood ready, when an old retainer 
 of the prisoner's family asked to be heard, 
 and reminded the people that although 
 the youth's hot blood had betrayed him 
 into many a fray, yet some of his fore- 
 fathers had been mild and genial men, 
 
 JUVALTA, 
 
 not unwilling to drink a friendly glass 
 with their humbler neighbors. For old 
 associations' sake let this custom be re- 
 newed at least once before the execution 
 of this last of the race of Rhaziinz : it 
 was the first and last favor the youth, in 
 his dying moments, requested of them. 
 
 Stone drinking-vessels were brought : a 
 regular carousal followed, and good-hu- 
 mor and good fellowship began to soften 
 the feelings of the aggrieved citizens. 
 Then the faithful old servant began to 
 speak again, and said it would be a pity 
 to kill the young man, a good swordsman 
 too, who, if they would 
 spare his life, would join 
 the Gray Confederacy and 
 fight for instead of against 
 the people — be their cham- 
 pion, in a word, in all their 
 quarrels, instead of their 
 foe and their oppressor. 
 He prevailed, and the 
 youth, it is said, religiously 
 kept the promise made for 
 him. 
 
 Passing the Toma Lake, 
 a small mountain - tarn, 
 whence rises one of the 
 feeders of the Vorder- 
 Rhein, and Dissentis, 
 whose churches are crown- 
 ed with Greek-looking cu- 
 polas set upon high square 
 towers, and whose history 
 goes back to the ravages of 
 Attila's barbarian hordes 
 and the establishment of 
 the Benedictine monastery 
 that grew and flourished 
 for upward of a thousand 
 years, and was at last de- 
 stroyed by fire by the sol- 
 diers of the first French 
 republic, we follow the 
 course of the increasing 
 river to where the smaller 
 and shorter Middle Rhine 
 falls into the main branch 
 at Reichenau. The Vor- 
 der-Rhein has almost as 
 sublime a cradle as the oth- 
 er branch. Colossal rocks 
 and a yet deeper silence 
 and solitude hem it in, for no road follows 
 or bridges it, and it comes rolling through 
 the wildest canton of Switzerland, where 
 eagles still nest undisturbed and bears 
 still abound, and where the eternal snows 
 and glaciers of Erispalt, Badus and Fur- 
 ka are still unseen save by native hunt- 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 
 
 Ks^*-- 
 
 CITY GATE AT ILANZ. 
 
 ers and herdsmen whose homes are far 
 away. Here is the great Alpine water- 
 shed, dividing the basin of the North 
 Sea from that of the Mediterranean. But 
 at Reichenau the Rhine absorbs the in- 
 dividuahty of each of these mountain- 
 torrents, and here we meet with mem- 
 ories of the mediaeval and the modern 
 world curiously mingled in the history 
 of the castle, which has been an episco- 
 pal fortress of the bishops of Chur, its 
 founders, a lay domain when the lords of 
 Planta owned it, and an academy or high 
 
 school when Monsieur Chabaud, the di- 
 rector, gave fourteen hundred francs a 
 year salary to a young teacher of histo- 
 ry, geography, mathematics and French 
 who was afterward the citizen-king, Lou- 
 is Philippe. Here is Martinsloch, where 
 Suwarrow shamed his mutinous Cossacks 
 who refused to attempt the passage of the 
 Alps, by ordering a grave to be dug for 
 him, throwing off his clothes and calling 
 to his men to cast him in and cover him, 
 "since you are no longer my children 
 and I no longer your father." 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 TAMINA. SPRING. 
 
 Ilanz is the first town 
 on the Rhine, and has 
 all the picturesqueness 
 one could desire in the 
 way of quaint architec- 
 ture, bulbous cupolas, 
 steep roofs with win- 
 dows like pigeon-holes, 
 covered gateways, and 
 a queer mixture of 
 wood and stone which 
 gives a wonderfully old 
 look to every house. 
 Chur — or Coire, as it 
 is more commonly 
 called out of Germany 
 and Switzerland — is of 
 much the same charac- 
 ter, an old episcopal 
 stronghold, for its bish- 
 ops were temporal lords 
 of high renown and still 
 higher power. Then 
 the Rhine winds on to 
 another place, whose 
 present aspect, that of 
 a fashionable watering- 
 place, hardly brings its 
 history as a mediaeval 
 
 I spa to the mind. The 
 healing springs at Ra- 
 gatz were discovered 
 by a hunter of the thir- 
 teenth century on the 
 land belonging to the 
 great and wealthy Ben- 
 edictine abbey. For 
 centuries the spring, 
 whose waters come 
 from Pfaffers and Ta- 
 mina, and are brought 
 half a mile to Ragatz 
 through iron pipes, 
 was surrounded by 
 
 I mean little huts, the 
 only homes of the lo- 
 cal health-seekers, ex- 
 cept of such — and they 
 were the majority — 
 as were the guests 
 of the abbey ; but when 
 crowds increased and 
 times changed, the 
 abbey built a large 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 II 
 
 guest-house at the springs. Now the 
 place has passed into the hands of a 
 brotherhood no less well known the 
 world over, and who certainly, however 
 well they serve us, give no room for ro- 
 mance in their dealings with us. The 
 promenade and hotels of the place rival 
 Baden and Homburg, but the old spring 
 of Tamina, in its wild beauty, still re- 
 mains the same as when the mediaeval 
 sportsman stumbled upon it, no doubt 
 full of awe and trembling at the dark, 
 damp walls of rock around him, where 
 visitors now admire and sketch on the 
 guarded path. The only other interest 
 of Ragatz, except its scenery, is Schel- 
 ling's grave and monument put up by 
 Maximilian II. of Bavaria, his scholar 
 and friend. 
 
 Everywhere, as the Rhine flows on, 
 
 the tourist notices its wonderful coloring, 
 a light, clear green, which characterizes 
 it at least as far as the Lake of Constance, 
 iij whose neighborhood the vines first be- 
 gin to bloom and become an important 
 item in the prosperity of the country. 
 Here too the river first becomes navi- 
 gable, and the heavy square punt that 
 ferries you over at Riithi, and the pictures 
 of the old market-ships that preceded the 
 first American steamer of 1824, and car- 
 ried the vine produce to other and dryer 
 places (for in Constance the land lay so 
 low that cellars could not be kept dry, 
 and the surplus of the vintage was at 
 once exchanged for corn and fruit, etc.), 
 are the first signs of that stirring com- 
 mercial life which is henceforth insepa- 
 rably connected with the great German 
 stream. 
 
 Five different governments crowd 
 around and claim each a portion of the 
 shores of the "great lake " of Germany. 
 Yet it is not much more than forty 
 miles long, with a breadth at its widest 
 part of nine. In old Roman times its 
 shores were far more beautiful and wor- 
 thy of admiration than now. Then it was 
 fringed by forests of birch, fir and oak, 
 and its islands were covered with dense 
 groves. The chief beauty of lowland is 
 in its forests : when they are gone the 
 bareness of the landscape is complete. 
 Rocky mountains can afford to be tree- 
 less, but to an artist's eye there is little 
 beauty in treeless plains, and all the 
 boasting of German enthusiasts about 
 this lake cannot hide the fact that its 
 shores are singularly low and bare. But 
 if the landscape is tame, the historical 
 
 recollections of the Lake of Constance 
 are rich and interesting. The oldest 
 town on its shores is Bregenz, the Bri- 
 gantium mentioned by Pliny and Strabo, 
 and Christianized by Saint Gall and Saint 
 Columbanus, the Irish missionaries whose 
 wanderings over Europe produced so 
 many world-famous monasteries. The 
 great abbey of St. Gall was not far from 
 the lake, and Columbanus established 
 his last monastery at Bobbio in Italy. 
 Lindau ("the field of linden-trees"), al- 
 most as old a city as Bregenz, built on 
 an island and connected with the main- 
 land by a long bridge over which the 
 railway runs, was founded by the Ger- 
 mans, and some of the earliest Christian 
 converts built its churches and convents, 
 while later on its commerce grew to be 
 one of the most important in Germany, 
 
DOIVN 771 E RHINE. 
 
 and raised the status of the city to the 
 level of the members of the Hanseatic 
 
 League ; but all this was 
 lost in the Thirty Years' 
 War, when it was devasta- 
 ted and partly burnt : now 
 it ranks as a third-rate Ba- 
 varian town. But it is im- 
 possible to string together 
 all the remembrances that 
 distinguish these lake- 
 towns, many of them now 
 refuges for Englishmen in 
 narrow circumstances, 
 their commerce dwindled, 
 their museums the thing 
 best worth seeing in them. 
 We pass Arbon ; Fried- 
 richshafen, the summer 
 palace of the kings of Wiir- 
 temberg, a sturdy, warring 
 city in the Carlovingian 
 times ; Meersburg, now a 
 fishing-centre, once a 
 stronghold of its martial 
 bishops, and famous in 
 later times as the residence 
 of the baron of Lassberg, 
 a modern savant and vir- 
 tuoso of whom Germany 
 is justly proud; and lastly 
 Constance, the city of the 
 Roman emperor Constan- 
 tius, still beautiful and 
 stately in its buildings. 
 Charlemagne tarried here 
 on his way to Rome on 
 the occasion of his corona- 
 tion, and many German 
 kings spent Christmas or 
 Easter within its walls. 
 Here, in the large but low 
 hall of the Kaufhaus, or 
 Merchants' Exchange, the 
 council of 1414 met, and 
 never did the Greek coun- 
 cils of the primitive 
 Church present more va- 
 ried and turbulent scenes. 
 The walls are paneled and 
 frescoed by Philip Schwor- 
 en, an artist of Munich, 
 and Frederick Pecht, a na- 
 tive of Constance, with rep- 
 resentations of these scenes, but it was 
 rather a rough place in those days, and 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 13 
 
 tapestries and dais, weapons and costly 
 hangings, concealed the unfinished state 
 of walls, floor and roof. The old city has 
 other buildings as intimately connected 
 with the council as this hall — the convents 
 
 of the Dominican and Franciscan friars, 
 each successively the prison of John Huss, 
 the first containing a dungeon below the 
 water-level and foul in the extreme, the 
 second a better and airier cell for prison- 
 
 HANS HOLBEIN. 
 
 ers, as well as a great hall in which seve- 
 ral sessions of the council took place, and 
 where Huss was examined and condemn- 
 ed ; the house where Huss first lodged with 
 a good and obscure widow ; and three 
 miles from the town the castle of Gott- 
 lieben, also a prison of the Reformer, 
 and for a short time of the deposed pope, 
 John XXIII. Little more than a century 
 later the Reformation had grown power- 
 ful in Constance, and Charles V. besieged 
 and, notwithstanding the desperate re- 
 sistance of the burghers, took the town, 
 but not before a rnost murderous defence 
 had been made on the Rhine bridge, the 
 picture of which, after the unsuccessful 
 fight, reminds one of the heroic defence 
 of the dyke at Antwerp against the Span- 
 iards, and even of that other memorable 
 event in Spanish history, the Noche Triste 
 of Mexico. 
 
 As we leave the lake two islands come 
 in sight, Mainau and Reichenau, the lat- 
 ter having a legend attached to it con- 
 nected with the foundation of its abbey 
 which is the counterpart of that of Saint 
 
 Patrick and the snakes and vermin of 
 Ireland. The "water was darkened by 
 the multitude of serpents swimming to 
 the mainland, and for the space of three 
 days this exodus continued," whereupon 
 Saint Firmin founded the abbey, which 
 grew to such wealth and power, both as 
 a religious house, a school for the nobility 
 and a possessor of broad feudal domains, 
 that the abbots used to boast in the twelfth 
 and thirteenth centuries that they could 
 sleep on their own land all the way to 
 Rome. The Rhine issues from the lake 
 at Stein, a picturesque little town of 
 Merovingian times, which has seen as 
 many " tempests in a tea-cup " as any of 
 its grander and more progressive rivals ; 
 and not far off is the castle of Hohen- 
 twiel, built into a towering rock, once 
 the home of the beautiful and learned 
 Hedwige, duchess of Swabia. We need 
 not dwell on Schaff hausen, one of the best- 
 known points of the river, an ancient town 
 overgrown with modern excrescences in 
 the way of fashionable hotels and Paris- 
 ian dwellings. One of the features of 
 
14 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 these river -towns, when they are not 
 "improved," is the crowding of houses 
 and garden-walls sheer into the stream, 
 leaving in many places no pathway on 
 the banks, which are generally reached 
 by steep, mossy steps leading from old 
 streets or through private yards. 
 
 We are nearing the four " forest towns " 
 of the Habsburgs, at the first of which, 
 Waldshut — where stood in Roman times 
 a single fort to command the wilderness, 
 much as the pioneers' outposts used to 
 stand on the edge of the Western forests 
 peopled with hostile Indians — the Aar, 
 the Rhine's first tributary of any conse- 
 quence, joins the great stream. Lauf- 
 fenburg, Sackingen and Rheinfelden, the 
 three other forest towns, each deserve a 
 page of description, both for their scenery 
 and their history, their past architectural 
 beauties, and their present sleepy, mu- 
 seum-like existence ; but rather than do 
 them injustice we will pass on to Bale — 
 or Basel, as it should be written, for the 
 French pronunciation robs the name of 
 its Greek and royal etymology from Ba- 
 sileia. Basel was never lagging in the 
 race of intellectual progress : her burgh- 
 ers were proud and independent, not to 
 say violent ; her university was eager 
 for novelties ; her merchants spent their 
 wealth in helping and furthering art and 
 literature. The Rathhaus or guildhall is 
 a gauge of the extent of the burgher su- 
 premacy : all over Germany and the Low 
 Countries these civic buildings rival the 
 churches in beauty and take the place 
 of the private palaces that are so special- 
 ly the boast of Italian cities. Among 
 the great men of Basel are Holbein and 
 the scarcely less worthy, though less 
 well-known artist, Matthew Merian, the 
 engraver. Of the former's designs many 
 monuments remain, though injured by 
 the weather — a fountain with a fresco of 
 the dance of the peasants, and some 
 houses with mural decorations ascribed 
 to him. Basel has its own modern ex- 
 citements — races and balls and banquets 
 — although the private life of its citizens 
 is characterized by great simplicity. The 
 profession of teaching is in such repute 
 there that many rich men devote them- 
 selves to it, and among the millionaires 
 
 of the old city may be found not a ^&\n 
 schoolmasters. As in Geneva, learning 
 and a useful life are the only things on 
 which the old families pride themselves. 
 
 From Basel, whose every reminiscence 
 is German, and whose Swiss nationality 
 dates only from the epoch of the Refor- 
 mation, the Rhine flows through the 
 "storied" Black Forest, peopled with 
 nixies and gnomes, the abode of the 
 spectre woodcutter, who had sold all 
 power of feeling human joys for the sake 
 of gold, and who spent every night cut- 
 ting down with incredible swiftness and 
 ease the largest fir trees, that snapped 
 like reeds under his axe. Old Breisach, 
 with its cathedral of St. Stephen, and 
 its toppling, huddled houses clustering 
 around the church, is the most interest- 
 ing town before we reach Freiburg. The 
 tendency of mediaeval towns to crowd and 
 heighten their houses contrasts sharply 
 with the tendency of our modern ones 
 to spread and broaden theirs. Defence 
 and safety were the keynote of the old 
 architecture, while display is that of ours, 
 but with it has come monotony, a thing 
 unknown to the builders of the Middle 
 Ages. Houses of each century, or each 
 period of art, have, it is true, a family 
 likeness, but, like the forms of Venetian 
 glass, a pair or a set have minute differ- 
 ences of ornamentation which redeem the 
 objects from any sameness. So it was 
 with all mediaeval art, including that 
 of building the commonest dwelling- 
 houses : there was congruity, but never 
 slavish uniformity. 
 
 The first sight of Freiburg — we include 
 it among Rhenish towns, though it is not 
 on the Rhine — presents a very German 
 picture. Old dormer windows pierce the 
 high-pitched roofs ; balconies and gar- 
 den trellises hang in mid-air where you 
 least expect them ; the traditionary storks, 
 the beloved of Hans Andersen, are real- 
 ities even here on the tall city chimneys ; 
 and no matter where you look, your eye 
 cannot help falling on the marvelously 
 high and attenuated spire of one of the 
 finest cathedrals in the world. Artistic- 
 ally speaking, this church has the unique 
 interest of being the only completed work 
 of ecclesiastical architecture that Ger- 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 ^5 
 
 INTKKTOR OF FREIBURG CATHKORAI.. 
 
i6 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 many possesses. The height of the spire 
 and its position immediately above the 
 great gateway produce here the same il- 
 lusion and disappointment as to the size 
 of the church which is proverbial as re- 
 gards St. Peter's at Rome. This impres- 
 sion soon disappears, and every step re- 
 veals new beauties. Each cluster of sim- 
 ple tall gray columns, supporting massive 
 fourteenth-century arches, is adorned with 
 one carved niche and its delicate little 
 spire sheltering the stone statue of an 
 apostle or evangelist ; the chancel is fill- 
 ed with the canons' stalls, each a master- 
 piece of wood-carving ; and at the east- 
 ern end, beneath the three higher win- 
 dows and separated from the wall, stands 
 the mediaeval high altar with its three 
 carved spires surmounting the reredos, 
 and just below this a " triptych " of enor- 
 mous size, a pictured altar-piece with 
 folding-doors, the latter being painted 
 both inside and out with scriptural sub- 
 jects as quaintly interpreted by the de- 
 vout painters of the early German school. 
 But not only the nave, with its carved 
 pulpit and canopy, its old dark benches, 
 not renewed since the seventeenth cen- 
 tury at least, and its crowds of worship- 
 ers, is interesting to the sight-seer, but 
 each side chapel, rich with what in our 
 times would be thought ample decoration 
 for a large church, is enough to take up 
 one's day. In these and in the aisles lie 
 buried the patrons, founders, defenders 
 and endowers of the cathedral, while in 
 the chapel of the university are laid the 
 masters and doctors whose fame reached 
 over the learned and civilized world of the 
 Middle Ages, and whose labors Holbein 
 no doubt flatteringly hinted at when he 
 chose for the subject of his great altar- 
 piece in this chapel the visit of the Wise 
 Men of the East to the infant Saviour. 
 In each of these chapels are wood-carv- 
 ings of great beauty and variety, and 
 stained glass w^indows whose colors are 
 as vivid as they were four hundred years 
 ago ; and in one is still preserved a heavy 
 Byzantine cross of chased silver, the gift 
 (or trophy) of a crusading knight, for 
 Freiburg too "took the cross " under the 
 enthusiastic direction of that great man, 
 Bernard of Clairvaux. It is not often 
 
 that such a building as this cathedral has 
 such a worthy neighbor and companion 
 as the beautiful exchange, or Kaufhaus, 
 that stands opposite on the "platz." This, 
 though of later date and less pure archi- 
 tecture, is one of the most beautiful build- 
 ings of its kind in Germany. The lower 
 part reminds one of the doges' palace at 
 Venice — a succession of four round arches 
 on plain, strong, Saxon-looking pillars ; 
 at each corner an oriel window with three 
 equal sides and a little steep-pointed roof 
 of its own shooting up to the height of 
 the main roof. The great hall on the 
 same level has a plain balcony the whole 
 length of the building, and five immense 
 windows of rather nondescript form and 
 muUioned like Elizabethan windows, be- 
 tween each of which is a statue under a 
 carved canopy ; and these are what give 
 the characteristic touch to the house. 
 They represent the emperor Maximilian, 
 lovingly called " the last knight," Charles 
 v., " on whose dominions the sun never 
 set," Philip I. and King Ferdinand. The 
 color of the material of which this ex- 
 change is built (red sandstone) increases 
 the effect of this beautiful relic of the 
 Middle Ages. But, though we should be 
 glad to linger here and admire it at our 
 leisure, there are other houses in the city 
 that claim our attention as showing, in 
 their less elaborate but perfectly tasteful 
 decoration, the artistic instincts of those 
 burghers of old. And the fountains too ! 
 Not the bald, allegorical, monotonous 
 and rarely-found (and when found only 
 useless and ornamental) fountains of our 
 new cities, but the lavishly-carved, artis- 
 tic creations of an art-imbued age — the 
 water free to all and flowing for use as 
 well as for show, and the statues of civic 
 patron-saints and occasionally men of 
 local renown ; as, for instance, the single 
 statue of a meditative monk, his left 
 hand supporting his chin, and a closed 
 book in his right hand, Berthold Schwarz, 
 the inventor of gunpowder. 
 
 From this inland side-trip we go back 
 to the now broadening river, the part of 
 the Rhine where the "watch" has been 
 so often kept as well as sung — that part, 
 too, where Roman forts were thickly 
 strewn, and where the Merovingian and 
 
DOIVN THE KH:XE. 
 
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 -"^^^^^^x 
 
 ^■^ 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 >^ 
 
 
 Tx-i' 
 
 THE " DREI EXEN.' 
 
 Carlovingian emperors fought and dis- 
 puted about the partition of their inher- 
 itances. But everywhere in this land of 
 
 2 
 
 Upper Alsace 1870 has effaced older 
 memories, and modern ruins have been 
 added to the older and more romantic 
 
i8 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE 
 
 ones. No foreigner can impartially de- 
 cide on the great question of the day — 
 /'. (?., whether German or French senti- 
 ment predominates — while the interested 
 parties themselves each loudly ignore the 
 no doubt real claims of the other. As a 
 simple matter of fact, Alsace is German 
 by blood and by language, but race-dif- 
 ferences are so often merged in other 
 feelings, the product of kind treatment 
 and domestic ties, that the sympathies 
 of nations may be materially changed in 
 less than a century. We certainly come 
 across a good deal that is very French in 
 the villages between New Breisach and 
 Colmar : the blouse is the costume of the 
 men ; the houses are painted in light col- 
 ors, in contrast to their steep gray roofs ; 
 the women bring refreshments out to the 
 wagoners, and stop for a coquettish gos- 
 sip in a light-hearted, pleasant, vivacious 
 way not seen in other places, whose ma- 
 trons seem graver and more domestic. 
 But Colmar, in its streets, the names over 
 the shops, the old corner-windows, is as 
 German and antique, as good a "speci- 
 men " city, as Nuremberg or Augsburg. 
 Here is the artist's delight and the anti- 
 quary's mine. Colmar, contemptuously 
 styled " a hole" by the great Napoleon, 
 was living enough at the time of the em- 
 peror Frederick II., and was one of the 
 prosperous, haughty, freedom - loving 
 burgher cities to which the sovereigns 
 so gratefully gave the name and priv- 
 ileges of an " imperial " town. This city 
 of ancient Germany is now one of the 
 most stagnant among modern towns, just 
 " advanced " enough to possess corner 
 "loafers," and, we hope, to be ashamed 
 of having publicly burnt the works of 
 Bayle in the market-place ; but its archi- 
 tectural beauties are such and so many 
 that if you are on your way to Strassburg 
 you had better deny yourself the pleas- 
 ure of stopping here. Balconies and gal- 
 leries strike the eye at every turn ; irreg- 
 ular houses, their beams often visible ; 
 doorways of wonderful beauty; and a 
 population nearly as antique, the women 
 carrying loads on their heads and wear- 
 ing short dark stuff gowns, thick blue 
 worsted stockings and wooden shoes. 
 Of course the cathedral is the pride of 
 
 the town, and it has some rather rare 
 characteristics distinguishing it from the 
 rest of the churches of this neighborhood, 
 chiefly its simplicity of decoration. The 
 impression of a noble simplicity is spe- 
 cially borne in upon us by the aspect of 
 the dark, broad chancel with its carved 
 stalls, and little else in the way of orna- 
 ment : the sculptured door leading to the 
 sacristy unfortunately hides a remarkable 
 work of early German art, the Virgin of 
 the Rose-hedge, by Martin Schon. The 
 tower of the cathedral has above it only 
 a small building with a steep, irregular, 
 tapering roof, and here sits the watch- 
 man whistling on his cobbler's stool in 
 a place that would be the envy of many 
 a scholar pestered in his lower dwelling 
 by inconsiderate visitors ; as, for instance, 
 that perfect type of scholars, Isaac Ca- 
 saubon, whose journal bears witness tc 
 his yearning after more time and few- 
 er admiring, consulting and tormenting 
 friends. Not far from Colmar is a castle- 
 ruin with three towers, the "Drei Exen," 
 illustrating an old Alsatian proverb, the 
 translation of which is, in substance, 
 
 Three castles on one hill ; 
 Three churches in one churchyard ; 
 Three cities in one valley, — 
 Such is Alsace everywhere. 
 
 Other castles crown the heights above 
 the villages of Kaisersberg and Rappolts- 
 weiler, but we are getting tired of castles, 
 and this region is abundant in old houses, 
 the; shell of the old home-life which has 
 changed so little in the country. What 
 difi'erence is there between this ruddy, 
 blue-eyed girl, with thick plaits of fair 
 hair and utter innocence of expression, 
 the mother of a future generation as 
 healthy and sturdy and innocent as her- 
 self, and her own grandmother at the 
 same age three generations back ? Nei- 
 ther the village interests nor the village 
 manners have changed : placidly the life 
 flows on, like that of the Rhine water 
 itself, in these broad, level, fruitful plains 
 between the Black Forest and the Vos- 
 ges. And so we seem, in these various 
 houses with wide gables turned to the 
 street, cross-beams and galleries and un- 
 expected windows, outside stairs of ston« 
 or wood climbing up their sides, wide lovi 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 19 
 
 doorways, tiny shrines set in the rough 
 wall, and dizzy roofs pierced like dove- 
 cotes — houses that remind us of Chester, 
 the old English town that has suffered 
 least from innovation, — in these we seem 
 to see some part of the old tranquil home- 
 life of this Alsatian people renewed and 
 re-acted before our eyes. Again the same 
 variety of beautiful 
 houses will meet us at 
 Strassburg, But the 
 woods are no less 
 lovely : old trees 
 round the ruins of 
 St. Ulrich, and on the 
 way to the abbey of 
 Dusenbach, and 
 round the shores of 
 the "White" and the 
 "Black" Lake, bring 
 to the mind a yet old- 
 er picture of German 
 life, that of the free 
 Teutons of Tacitus, 
 the giant men who 
 made it so important 
 to the Romans to 
 have the Rhine, the 
 great natural high- 
 way, strongly fortified 
 from its sources to its 
 mouth. 
 
 Hoh-Konigsburg, a 
 splendid ruin, said to 
 be the loveliest in Al- 
 sace, is now the prop- 
 erty and the pride of 
 the commune of that 
 name, so that the 
 victory of the present 
 over the past is also 
 represented in these 
 living panoramas be- 
 fore us, for there is 
 deep meaning in the 
 possession by the people, as an artistic 
 show, of the very stronghold which was 
 once their bane and their terror. Then 
 we run through Schlettstadt, with its sedgy 
 banks, among which herons and storks 
 are picking up their daily bread : deep 
 shadows of old trees hide the blank walls 
 on the river-side, and its cathedral tow- 
 ers high above the mingled steeples and 
 
 cupolas and nearly as high roofs of some 
 of the larger buildings, while we think 
 of its successful warfare with the bishops 
 of Strassburg, its firm adherence in the 
 thirteenth and fourteenth centuries to the 
 imperial cause, of its sieges and fires, and 
 also its famous "academy" and library; 
 not forgetting, however, its shame in the 
 
 ST. THOMAS'S CHURCH, STRASSBURG. 
 
 sixteenth century, when the Jews wete 
 more signally persecuted here than in 
 many other towns — at a time, too when 
 the fanaticism that had driven so many 
 to change their faith should have taught 
 both parties of Christians some home- 
 lessons. Its neighbor, Strassburg, has 
 nearly as bad a record, but what with 
 the beauty of the latter and its recent 
 
DOIVN THE RHINE. 
 
 FERKEl-MARKT (PIG-MAKKET) AT STRASSBUKC 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 stormy history, its sins are the last things 
 a traveler thinks of. Its cathedral and 
 its clock have been fully described, but 
 other churches of the old city are well 
 worth a visit, that of St. Thomas being 
 a specimen of an architecture essential- 
 ly Christian and anterior to the Gothic, 
 the same whose perfection is seen in 
 many churches in Umbria and Tuscany 
 and Romagna, before the miserable ma- 
 nia of the Renaissance style grew up. 
 What was pardonable in a palace was 
 monstrous in a church, but there was 
 an evil age just before the Reformation, 
 when, if certain learned and elegant and 
 pagan prelates had had their way, Chris- 
 tianity would have been condemned as 
 "barbarism." They were the Voltaires 
 of their day, the disciples of a cultured 
 infidelity which brought on the great rent 
 between Latin and Teutonic Christianity. 
 In Strassburg we have the river 111 and 
 its canal joining the Rhine, and Venice- 
 like scenes, narrow quays, clumsy, heavy 
 punts, fanciful chimney - stacks, crazy, 
 overhanging balconies, projecting win- 
 dows, a stirring human tide, voices and 
 noises breaking the silence, an air of un- 
 consciousness of beauty and interest, an 
 old-world atmosphere ; but there is a new- 
 er side, less attractive, the Place Broglie, 
 crowded with Parisian cafes with all their 
 tawdry paraphernalia, and prim white 
 square houses, proud of their wretched 
 uniform, like a row of charity-school 
 children in England. Here is the fash- 
 ionable centre, the lounging, gossiping 
 dandyism and pretension of the modern 
 world ; but, thank Heaven ! it is only 
 an excrescence. Burn down this part, 
 and the town would look as large and as 
 important, for at every turn of more than 
 two-thirds of the old area you are met 
 by the living pictures that make these 
 market-places, crooked streets and hid- 
 den chapels so familiar to the heart. The 
 rerkelmarkt, or "pig- market," though 
 not in the most famous quarter of the 
 town, is remarkable for its old gabled, 
 galleried houses, while the view of the 
 great spire of the cathedral is also good : 
 not far, again, is a thirteenth - century 
 house, with two stories in the gable and 
 three below, besides the ground-floor. 
 
 which is a shop ; and even many of the 
 common houses, not specially pointed 
 out to the tourist, are beautified by some 
 artistic ironwork about the doors, some 
 carved gateway or window, some wall- 
 niche with a saint's statue, or a broad 
 oak staircase as noble in proportions 
 and beautiful in detail as if it were in 
 a princely abode. The absence of all 
 meanness, of all vulgarity, of all shams, 
 is what strikes one most in examining 
 mediseval domestic architecture. Would 
 we could go to school again in that re- 
 gard ! Just outside Strassburg we come 
 upon a path leading through beech-woods 
 upward toward rocky ledges and walls 
 and a convent; not a ruined one this 
 time, but a most frequented and friend- 
 ly place, built on the top of a hill and 
 presided over by a hospitable sisterhood. 
 This is the scene of the life-history and 
 legends of Saint Ottilia, and the spring 
 for eye-diseases has been from time im- 
 memorial connected with her. The lit- 
 tle chapel over the spring has the charm 
 of small, unpretending, common places, 
 where no show is made and no conven- 
 tional admiration expected. Just as a 
 speaker pauses here and there in his 
 speech, expecting applause for such and 
 such a popular phrase or striking sensa- 
 tionalism, so is our admiration as travel- 
 ers regulated and bespoken beforehand. 
 Here no man with any pretension to edu- 
 cation dare pass in silence or let out a 
 criticism : some things are sacred, like 
 the tradition of the beauty of a faded 
 society -queen. "What has been must 
 always be." But what a relief to find 
 some places you are not expected to go 
 into ecstasies about ! And they are gen- 
 erally worthy of more attention than they 
 get, and if churches they are invariably 
 more likely to move you to devotion. 
 This has been my experience in Europe. 
 The great pageants, gorgeous processions, 
 etc. leave the soul cold, but an empty 
 church, a sparsely - attended service, a 
 lack of music, a quiet frame of mind, 
 unstrained by rushing after this or that 
 picture, this or that monument, — such 
 are the things one remembers with thank- 
 fulness. 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 RHEIN-SCHNAKEN." 
 
 PAST the ruins of Madenburg, we 
 follow the emperor Rudolph's road 
 to Spires (German Speyer), whose cathe- 
 dral is the Westminster Abbey of the 
 German Empire. The tombs of empe- 
 rors and empresses and their children — 
 Swabians, Habsburgs, Nassaus — line the 
 aisles of the cathedral, whose massive 
 Romanesque style shows through the 
 more elaborate, fanciful and somewhat 
 
 22 
 
 disappointing restoration of Louis I. of 
 Bavaria ; for under his hands the old, 
 grim, stately church has come to wear 
 something of a modern look. But the 
 historic recollections are many, and in 
 St. A.fra's chapel we recognize the spot 
 where for five years lay the coffin of 
 Henry IV., the vault where his forefath- 
 ers slept being closed to his body by the 
 ecclesiastical censures he had incurred 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 23 
 
 after his forced reconciliation with his 
 nobles and the Church. 
 
 And now comes the quick - flowing 
 Neckar, rushing into the Rhine, and 
 bidding us go a little up its course to 
 where Heidelberg, its castle, its univer- 
 sity, its active life and its beautiful past, 
 make altogether a place that I should be 
 inclined, from my own recollections, to 
 call the pleasantest in Germany, and 
 
 THE GREAT TUN, HKinET.KERr, CASTl.E. 
 
 which is certainly not one of the least 
 important in the life that distinguishes 
 Germany at this time. And what kind 
 of impression does it make at first on a 
 stranger? A German traveler says that 
 it presented to him a marked contrast 
 with Munich, where, although it is an 
 art-centre, a sort of deadness to intel- 
 lectual concerns characterizes all but the 
 art-students and foreign visitors. Even 
 the Heidelberg porters are lively and crit- 
 
 ical, boast of Bunsen and Vangerov/, 
 and speak proudly of "our" professors 
 and of the last examinations. They do 
 more than merely make money out of 
 their show-city, as do the good-natured 
 but slower-witted Munichers, but some 
 enthusiastic Rhinelanders claim for this 
 difference of temperament a reason not 
 wholly sesthetic — /. e., the influence of 
 Rhine wine, transformed generation after 
 generation into 
 Rhine blood. 
 The foreign trav- 
 eler probably 
 misses all these 
 details, and for 
 him Heidelberg 
 is the student- 
 city and the city 
 of the most re- 
 nowned ruin in 
 Germany. He 
 will find that all 
 the beauty he has 
 read of is real : 
 the castle is all 
 that has been 
 said and sung of 
 it, with its tower 
 shattered and 
 crumbling ; its 
 various facades, 
 particularly the 
 Friedrichsbau 
 and that named 
 after Emperor 
 Otto Henry ; its 
 courtyard with 
 pointed arches ; 
 its ivy-grown 
 fountain; its 
 elaborate Renais- 
 sance niches and 
 armor-clad statues ; its modern loungers 
 sitting over their Rhine wine in chairs 
 that English collectors would give three 
 or four guineas apiece for ; its tangle of 
 flowers and bushes ; its crimson flush 
 when English tourists spend their money 
 in illuminating it with Bengal lights ; its 
 adjacent gardens, where a nearly perfect 
 band plays classical music to critics who 
 are none the less discerning because they 
 look lost in tobacco - smoke and beer- 
 
24 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 fumes ; its background of Spanish chest- 
 nut woods, where I saw the pale-green tas- 
 sels of the blossoms still hanging among 
 the broad leaves that had just reached 
 their summer depth of color, and where 
 wild legends place a "Devil's Den" and 
 a Wolf Spring, a 
 brook where a wolf ^ ~ 
 is said to have torn 
 to pieces the en- 
 chantress Zetta ; — 
 above all, its match- 
 less view sheer 
 down a wall of rock 
 into the rushing 
 Neckar flood, over 
 the vast plain be- 
 yond, and over a 
 wilderness of steep 
 roofs of thirteenth - 
 and fourteenth-cen- 
 tury houses. All 
 this is but a faint 
 description of the 
 impression Heidel- 
 berg leaves on the 
 mind. It would be 
 leaving out an im- 
 portant "sight " not 
 to mention the fa- 
 mous "tun," still 
 stored, but empty, 
 in the cellars of the 
 castle, and the lit 
 tie guardian of the 
 treasure, the gnome 
 carved in wood, 
 whose prototype 
 was the court -fool 
 of one of the Nas- 
 sau sovereigns, and 
 whose allowance 
 was no less than 
 htteen bottles a 
 day. 
 
 But the place has 
 other interests, 
 which even the 
 
 donkey - riders, whom the natives por- 
 tray as rather eccentric in dress and 
 behavior, must appreciate. The high 
 school, which has survived all the deso- 
 lations and wrecks of the Thirty Years' 
 war and the still more cruel French war 
 
 under Louis XIV. and his marshal Tu- 
 renne, dates as far back as 1386, and the 
 university into which it has grown has 
 been since the beginning of this century 
 the cause of the upward growth and pros- 
 perous restoration of the town. The Ger- 
 
 THE SHATTERED TOWER, HEIDELBERn. 
 
 man student-life has been as much de 
 scribed, though perhaps never so truly, 
 as the life of the Western frontiers and 
 prairies, and I will give but one glimpse, 
 because it is all I know of it, though tha 
 glimpse is probably but the outcome ol 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 an exceptional phase of student - life. 
 The person who described the scene and 
 saw it himself is trustworthy. He had 
 been living some months at Heidelberg, 
 on the steep slope leading up to the cas- 
 tle (the short cut), and one night, on 
 locking out of his window, he saw the 
 glare of torches in a courtyard below, 
 several houses, perhaps even streets, off, 
 for the town is built on various levels up 
 the rock. Here were several groups of 
 young men, evidently students, dancing 
 in rings and holding torches, and the 
 scene looked wild and strange and some- 
 what incomprehensible. Next day the 
 spectator found out that this was the 
 peculiar celebration of a death by a club 
 whose rules were perhaps unique. It 
 was an inner sanctum of the ordinary 
 student associations, something beyond 
 the common dueling brotherhoods, more 
 advanced and more reckless — a club in 
 which, if any member quarreled with an- 
 other, instead of settling the matter by a 
 duel, the rivals drew lots to settle who 
 should commit suicide. This had hap- 
 pened a day or so before, and a young 
 man, instead of standing up as usual to 
 be made passes at with a sword that would 
 at most gash his cheek or split his nose, 
 had shot himself through the head. Even 
 m that not too particular community great 
 horror prevailed, and the youth was de- 
 nied Christian burial ; so that his father 
 had to come and take away the body in 
 secret to convey it to his own home. This 
 heathenish death led to an equally hea- 
 thenish after - carousal, the torchlight 
 dance winding up the whole, not per- 
 haps inappropriately. 
 
 Heidelberg has a little Versailles of its 
 own, a prim contrast to its noble chest- 
 nut-groves, yet not an unlovely spot — the 
 garden of Schwetzingen, where clipped 
 alleys and rococo stonework make frames 
 for masses of brilliant -colored flowers; 
 but from here we must skim over the 
 rest of the neighborhood — gay, spick- 
 and-span Mannheim, busy Ludwigshafen 
 and picturesque, ruin - crowned Neckar- 
 steinach, where, if it is autumn, we catch 
 glimpses of certain vintage-festivals, the 
 German form of thanksgiving and har- 
 vest home. But of this we shall see 
 
 more as we journey downward and reach 
 the far-famed Johannisberg and Riides- 
 heim. Still, we cannot forget the vine- 
 yard feature of Rhine and Neckar and 
 Moselle scenery, for it follows us even 
 from the shores of the Lake of Constance, 
 and the wine keeps getting more and 
 more famous, and the wine-industry and 
 all its attendant trades more important, 
 as we go on. The ruins of monasteries 
 are sprinkled among the vine -terraces, 
 for the monks were the earliest owners, 
 introducers and cultivators of the grape 
 — greatly to their credit at first, for it 
 was a means of weaning the Christian- 
 ized barbarians from hunting to tilling 
 the earth, though in later years there 
 grew terrible abuses out of this so-called 
 " poetic " industry. If I were not pledged 
 to eschew moralizing, I should like to 
 have my say here about the nonsense 
 written from time immemorial about 
 "wine, woman and song" — rather worse 
 than nonsense, because degrading to both 
 the latter — but in speaking of the Rhine 
 one cannot but glance at its chief trade, 
 though one can refrain from rhapsodies 
 about either the grape or the juice. The 
 fact is, the former is really not lovely, 
 and th_g artificial terraces of slaty debris, 
 the right soil and the right exposure for 
 the crop, are indeed quite unsightly. 
 The beauty of the vine is far better seen, 
 and is indeed ideal, in Southern Italy, 
 where the grapes hang from luxuriant 
 festoons, cordages of fruit swinging like 
 hammocks from young poplars, and 
 sometimes young fruit trees, while be- 
 neath grow corn and wheat. The wine, 
 I believe, is mediocre — and so much the 
 better — but the picture is beautiful. In 
 Northern Italy the thrifty, practical Ger- 
 man plan is in vogue, and the ideal beau- 
 ty of vines is lost. But where is the vine 
 loveliest to my mind? Out in the for- 
 ests, where it grows wild, useless and 
 luxuriant, as I have seen it in America, 
 the loveliest creeper that temperate climes 
 possess — a garden and a bower in itself. 
 Following the course of the Neckar, 
 and broadening for forty miles before 
 reaching the Rhine, lies the Odenwald, 
 the "Paradise of Germany" — a land of 
 legends, mountains and forests, whose 
 
26 
 
 DOWN THE KHIXE. 
 
 very name is still a riddle which some 
 gladly solve by calling the land " Odin's 
 Wood," his refuge when Christianity dis- 
 
 placed him. riere, under the solemn 
 beeches, the most beautiful tree of the 
 Northern forests, with smooth, gray, 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 27 
 
 column-like trunk and leaves that seem 
 the very perfection of color and texture, 
 lie the mottled deer, screened by those 
 rocks that are called the waves of a 
 "rock ocean," and lazily gazing at the 
 giant trunk of a tree that for many years 
 has lain encrusted in the earth till as 
 many legends have accumulated round 
 it as mosses have grown over it — a tree 
 that California might not disown, and 
 which is variously supposed to have been 
 part of a Druidical temple or part of an 
 intended imperial palace in the Middle 
 Ages. But as we climb up Mount Meli- 
 bocus, and look around from the Tau- 
 nus to the Vosges, and from Speyer to 
 Worms and golden Mayence, we see a 
 ruined castle, that of Rodenstein, with a 
 more human interest in its legend of a 
 rival Wild Huntsman, whose bewitched 
 hounds and horns were often heard in 
 the neighborhood, and always before 
 some disaster, chiefly a war, either 
 national or local. This huntsman wore 
 the form of a black dog in the daytime, 
 and was the savage guardian of three 
 enchanted sisters, the youngest and love- 
 liest of whom once tried to break the 
 spell by offering her love, her hand and 
 her wealth to a young knight, provided 
 he could, next time he saw her, iii the 
 form of a snake, bear her kiss three 
 times upon his lips. He failed, how- 
 ever, when the ordeal came, and as the 
 serpent - maiden wound her cold coils 
 around him and darted out her forked 
 tongue, he threw back his head and 
 cried in an agony of fear, " Lord Jesus, 
 help me !" The snake disappeared : 
 love and gold were lost to the youth and 
 freedom to the still spellbound woman. 
 The legend goes no further, unless, like 
 that of the ruined castle of Auerbach, it 
 hints at the present existence of the for- 
 lorn enchanted maidens, yet waiting for 
 a deliverer ; for at Auerbach the saying 
 is that in the ruins dwells a meadow- 
 maiden whose fate it is to wait until a 
 child rocked in a cradle made of the 
 wood of a cheny tree that must have 
 grown on the meadow where she was 
 first mysteriously found, came himself to 
 break her invisible bonds ; and so every 
 good German (and not seldom the stran- 
 
 ger) that visits Schloss Auerbach does so 
 with a pious intention of delivering the 
 maiden in case he himself may unawares 
 have been rocked in a cradle made of 
 the wonder-working cherry-wood. If the 
 reader is not tired of legends, this neigh- 
 borhood affords him still another, though 
 a less marvelous one, of a young girl of 
 the noble Sickingen stock who lost her- 
 self in a great wood, and who, after be- 
 ing searched for in vain, was guided 
 homeward late at night by the sound 
 of the convent -bell of St. Gall's (not 
 the famous monastery of that name) ; 
 in thanksgiving for which the family offer- 
 ed for all coming ages a weekly batch of 
 wheaten loaves to be distributed among 
 the poor of the parish, and also made it 
 customary to ring the great bell every 
 night at eleven o'clock, in remembrance 
 of the event, and likewise as an ear-bea- 
 con to any benighted traveler who might 
 happen to be in the neighborhood. 
 
 At Ladenburg we pass one of those 
 churchyards that are getting familiar to 
 us at this stage of Rhine-journeying, full 
 of crosses and crucifixes with quaint lit- 
 tle roofs over them ; and at Weinheim 
 we come upon as antiquated a spot as 
 any that exists in our day, a wilderness 
 of old houses, each one of which is worth 
 a detailed picture ; then at Unterland- 
 enbach we find the most famous of the 
 Bergstrasse wines ; and hurrying through 
 modern Darmstadt, with its Munich-rival- 
 ing theatre, museum and galleries, and 
 its heart-core of old houses smothered 
 among ' ' classicalities ' ' in white plaster, we 
 come to the old episcopal city of Worms, 
 where no beautiful scenery distracts the 
 mind from the mighty human recollec- 
 tions of Luther and the Diet and the first 
 strong symptoms of life in the Reform- 
 ation. The Jews' burial-place, however, 
 brings to mind the one-sidedness of the 
 freedom of conscience proclaimed by the 
 Reformers, who could be as intolerant as 
 their forerunners, the powerful bishops 
 of Worms and the persecutors of the 
 Jews in the Middle Ages, as the Luther- 
 ans were in the days of the Renaissance. 
 The massive Roman character of the 
 cathedral is mingled with something 
 airier and more Gothic, but still remains 
 
28 
 
 DOlViV THE RHINE. 
 
 FRIEDRICHSBAU (OR FREDERICK'S BUILDING), HEIDELBERG CASTLE. 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 29 
 
 chiefly a model of the basihca style, with 
 its low, strong round arches, and grafted 
 on these the later, yet not mediaeval, 
 figures of distorted, dwarfed, monstrous 
 animal forms, supposed to represent the 
 demons of heathendom conquered by, 
 and groaning in vain under the yoke of, 
 the Christian Church. But no amount 
 of vague description will bring before 
 the mind's eye these great cathedrals, 
 whereas slighter and lesser subjects are 
 easily made lifelike with the pen ; so, pass- 
 ing by the fountains, the market-places, 
 the ancient fortifications and the splen- 
 did modern monument of Luther sur- 
 rounded by his brother Reformers and 
 their supposed predecessors (altogether, 
 a rather fanciful and motley grouping, 
 morally speaking), we come to the every- 
 day life of the city of to-day. It is strange 
 how many of these old German towns 
 are "resuscitated" (I wish I could find 
 a better word for the meaning), having 
 been wholly crushed in the terrible French 
 war under Louis XIV., and having slow- 
 ly sunk into a seemingly hopeless state 
 of stagnation, and yet within the last 
 fifty years having gathered up their frag- 
 ments anew and started into life again. 
 Commerce, railways, etc. had much to 
 do with this new lease of life, but intel- 
 lectual progress has had almost as large 
 a part in this new birth of the dead cities. 
 Learning grew popular — what a signif- 
 icant difference there is between this fact 
 and that of learning growing fashion- 
 able ! — and men awoke to the need as 
 well as the glory of knowledge — a weap- 
 on which, far more than the sword, qui- 
 etly prepared Germany for the onward 
 stride she has now taken. If the mental 
 progress had not been going on so stead- 
 ily for so many years, the late political 
 triumphs could not have happened. 
 
 The old dominions of Worms had the 
 poetic name of Wontiegau, or the " Land 
 of Delight;" and since the flat, sedgy 
 meadows and sandy soil did not warrant 
 this name, it was no doubt given on ac- 
 count of the same ample, pleasant fam- 
 ily-life and generous hospitality that dis- 
 tinguishes the citizens of Worms to this 
 day. There were — and are — merchant- 
 princes in Germany as well as in Genoa, 
 
 Venice, Bruges, Antwerp and London of 
 old, and though life is even now simpler 
 among them than among their peers of 
 other more sophisticated lands, still it is 
 a princely life. The houses of Worms 
 are stately and dignified, curtained with 
 grapevines and shaded by lindens : the 
 table seems always spread, and there is 
 an air of leisure and rest which we sel- 
 dom see in an American house, however 
 rich its master. The young girls are ro- 
 bust and active, but not awkward, nor is 
 the house-mother the drudge that some 
 superfine and superficial English obser- 
 vers have declared her to be. We have 
 begun to set up another standard of wo- 
 man's place in a household than the beau- 
 tiful, dignified Hebrew one, and even the 
 mediaeval one of the times whence we 
 vainly think we have drawn our new 
 version of chivalry toward womankind. 
 But in many places, even in the "three 
 kingdoms," the old ideal still holds its 
 place, and in the Western Highlands the 
 ladies of the house, unless demoralized 
 by English boarding-school vulgarities, 
 serve the guest at table with all the grace 
 and delicacy that other women have lost 
 since they have deputed all hospitality 
 save that of pretty, meaningless speeches 
 to servants. In Norway and Sweden the 
 old hospitable, frank customs still pre- 
 vail, and in all simplicity your hostess, 
 young or old, insists on doing much of 
 your "valeting ;" and while we need not 
 imitate anything that does not " come 
 natural" to us, we should surely refrain 
 from laughing at and stigmatizing as bar- 
 baric any social customs less artificial 
 than our own. And indeed Germany is 
 blesl in the matter of good housekeepers, 
 who are no less good wives, and espe- 
 cially discerning, wise and sympathizing 
 mothers. A few of the lately-translated 
 German novels show us the most delight- 
 ful and refined scenes of German home- 
 life, and now and then, though seldom, 
 a stranger has a glimpse of some of these 
 German homes, whether rich or not, but 
 generally not only comfortable, but cul- 
 tured. To some English minds — and 
 we fear also to some American ones — 
 of the "hot-house " order there is some- 
 thing absolutely incompatible between 
 
3° 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 THE COURTYARD, HFTDFI HFRG CASFLF 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 31 
 
 grace and work, study and domestic 
 details ; but, letting practical Germany 
 alone, have they ever read Eugenie de 
 Guerin's life and journal, to admire which 
 is almost as much a "hall-mark " of cul- 
 ture as to enjoy Walter Scott and appre- 
 ciate Shakespeare ? And if they have, 
 do they not remember how the young 
 housekeeper sits in the kitchen watching 
 the baking and roasting, and reading 
 Plutarch in the intervals ? And do they 
 not remember her washing-days ? Every 
 thrifty housewife is not an Eugenie de 
 Guerin, but that any absolute incongru- 
 ity exists between housework and brain- 
 work is a notion which thousands of well- 
 educated women in all countries must, 
 from experience, emphatically deny. 
 
 Nor is elegance banished from these 
 German homes : if there are libraries 
 and museums within those walls, there 
 are also drawing-rooms full of knick- 
 knacks, and bed-rooms furnished with 
 inlaid foreign woods and graceful con- 
 trivances covered by ample curtains, pret- 
 ty beds shaped cradlewise, devoid of the 
 angles we seem to find so indispensable 
 to a bed, and corner closets fluted inside 
 with silk or chintz and ornamented with 
 airy vallances or bowed -out gilt rods. 
 Glass doors leading into small, choicely- 
 stocked conservatories are not uncom- 
 mon, or even that crowning device of 
 artistic luxury, an immense window of 
 one undivided sheet of plate-glass, look- 
 ing toward some beautiful view, and thus 
 making a frame for it. All this sounds 
 French, does it not ? but Aix and Cologne 
 and Mayence and Frankfort and Bremen 
 are genuine German cities, and it is in 
 the burgher houses that you find all this. 
 Even very superficial observers have no- 
 ticed the general air of health, prosperity 
 and comeliness of the people. Washing- 
 ton Irving, who traveled in the Rhine- 
 land fifty-five years ago, when critical in- 
 quiry into home-life was not yet the fash- 
 ion for tourists, speaks in his letters of 
 the peasantry of the Bergstrasse being 
 "remarkably well off," of their "com- 
 fortable villages buried in orchards and 
 surrounded by vineyards," of the "coun- 
 try-people, healthy, well-clad, good-look- 
 ing and cheerful." Once again he speaks 
 
 of the comeliness of the Rhine peasants, 
 "particularly on the lower part of the 
 Rhine, from Mayence downward," and 
 elsewhere of the cottages as so surround- 
 ed by garden and grass-plat, so buried 
 in trees, and the moss-covered roofs al- 
 most mingling and blending with the sur- 
 rounding vegetation, that the whole land- 
 scape is completely rustic. " The orchards 
 were all in blossom, and as the day was 
 very warm the good people were seated 
 in the shade of the trees, spinning near 
 the rills of water that trickled along the 
 green sward." This, however, was in 
 Saxony, where the landscape reminded 
 him much of English scenery. Then 
 of the higher middle classes, the bank- 
 ers of Frankfort, he speaks as cultured, 
 enlightened, hospitable, magnificent in 
 their " palaces, . . . continually increas- 
 ing." And these are but cursory pen- 
 cilings, for everywhere he was rather on 
 the watch for the antique than mindful 
 of human and progressive peculiarities. 
 
 Mayence, by the bye (or Mainz, as it 
 is in the mother- tongue), was once call- 
 ed the "golden," partly for its actual 
 wealth of old, partly for its agricultural 
 and vineyard riches, and partly as the 
 centre of an immense river-trade that 
 enriched every city on the Rhine, from 
 Worms to Cologne especially. Here 
 the archbishops reigned paramount sove- 
 reigns, and here were fought many hard 
 battles between what called itself the 
 Church and the people. Mayence once 
 cut itself off for several years from all 
 Christian services, and held its spiritual 
 sovereign at bay, though now its relig- 
 ious spirit is undeniable ; but then how 
 much have the representatives of the 
 Church changed! To-day they are 
 humble, poor and accessible to all : then 
 they were haughty, warlike, despotic and 
 rich. To-day, they are wellnigh perse- 
 cuted, and the hearts of the people gen- 
 erously turn to them, and if principle and 
 policy can ever be said to go together, it 
 is so in this case. But let the circum- 
 stances be reversed : I wonder would the 
 lesson be remembered? Here, where 
 Archbishop Willigis in the tenth century 
 persecuted the Jews, and made up to the 
 city for it by building the grand St. Ste- 
 
32 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 phen's and the earliest part of the cathe- 
 dral ; here, where terrific invasions of 
 barbarians and massacres of Christians 
 gave color to the legends that ascribe 
 the foundation of the city to a Trojan 
 hero, Moguntius, or to an exiled wizard 
 of Treves, fourteen hundred years before 
 the Christian era ; here, where ecclesias- 
 tical quarrels and popular tumults were 
 things of daily occurrence, and where 
 one of the best minnesingers, Henry, 
 count of Meissen, surnamed Frauenlob, 
 or "Ladies' Praise,", was carried to his 
 grave in the cathedral by twelve maid- 
 ens of the town, — there stirs to-day a 
 spirited though commonplace life, the 
 link of which with the old life lies in 
 the invention commemorated by Guten- 
 berg's monument, one of Thorwaldsen's 
 best works. Old and new jostle each 
 other in our bewildered minds. There 
 are drawbridges, towers and gates still 
 to be seen ; the old city is a future im- 
 portant military depot; the .Carnival 
 scenes merrily take us back to the cos- 
 tume if not the manners of the Middle 
 Ages ; and some of the old Meenzer dia- 
 lect is still preserved among the quaint 
 knitting-women with frilled caps and un- 
 gainly baskets who drive a small trade 
 in stout stockings for the country-people 
 as they jog in to market. Then we pass 
 St. Alban's church, where Charlemagne's 
 wife Fastrada is buried, and where her 
 husband drew from her dead finger an 
 enchanted ring which he was glad after- 
 ward to throw into the moat at his castle 
 of Nieder-Ingelheim ; and here now is a 
 procession coming out of the church, and 
 the people devoutly following, all chant- 
 ing the solid old hymns, hundreds of 
 years old, which are still the musical A, 
 B, C of every German child. How dif- 
 ferent to what we call hymn - singing ! 
 The Rhineland is intensely Catholic in 
 this neighborhood, and since the unwise 
 ■'Falk laws" many who were before in- 
 different have rallied to their childhood's 
 faith and stood forth as its fiercest cham- 
 pions. Perhaps just now you would not 
 meet a procession, but a few years ago 
 they were common in the streets of May- 
 ence. The cathedral, spite of all polit- 
 ical drawbacks, is being carefully re- 
 
 stored, and the choir, which I remember 
 as especially fine, is looked upon as a 
 triumph of reverent and congruous res- 
 toration. 
 
 On the shores of the river we come 
 upon purely modern life again — the ho- 
 
 AN ALLEY IN THE GARDEN OF SCHWETZINGEN. 
 
 tels, the quays, the tourists, the steam- 
 ers, and the Rhem-schnaken , a species 
 of "loafer" or gossip who make them- 
 selves useful to passengers when the boats 
 come in. These are often seen also al 
 Biebrich, the old palace of the Nassaus, 
 now become the property of the city, 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 zz 
 
 and partly a military school, while the 
 gardens have become the fashionable 
 promenade of Mayence. The formal 
 alleys and well-kept lawns, with the dis- 
 tant view of the Taunus and the Oden- 
 wald on one side, and a glimpse of the 
 
 CATHEDRAL OF ViTORMS. 
 
 opening Rheingau, a famous gorge of 
 the Rhine, on the other, make it a beauti- 
 ful resort indeed, exclusive of the interest 
 which the supposed derivation of its name 
 gives it — i. e., the "place of beavers," an 
 animal that abounded there before man 
 invaded these shores. And now the eye 
 
 can follow the course of the Rhine (from 
 the roof of the palace) as far as Ingel- 
 heim, Ehrenfels, the Mouse Tower, Jo- 
 hannisberg and Riidesheim, and vine- 
 yards climb up the rocks and fight their 
 way into the sunshine ; and we begin to 
 feel that these little 
 shrines we some- 
 times come across, 
 and huts of vine- 
 yard-keepers, and 
 queerly-shaped 
 baskets like some 
 of the Scotch fish 
 "creels," all force 
 on our attention the 
 fact that the grow- 
 ing and making 
 and selling of wine 
 are the most cha- 
 racteristic features 
 of Rhine - life, at 
 least outside the 
 cities. Though the 
 vineyards are not 
 as picturesque as 
 poets insist on 
 making them, yet 
 the vintage-season 
 is full of picturesque 
 incidents. This is 
 a " movable festi- 
 val," and occurs 
 any time between 
 the beginning of 
 September and the 
 middle of Novem- 
 ber, What applies 
 to one district does 
 not to another, and 
 there are a thou- 
 sand minute dif- 
 ferences occasion- 
 ed by soil, weather 
 and custom; so 
 that none of the 
 following observa- 
 tions is to be taken as a generalization. 
 At the outset it is worth notice that the 
 German word Weinberg ("Wine-hill ") is 
 much more correct than our equivalent, 
 for even in the flatter countries where the 
 grape is grown the most is made of ev- 
 ery little rise in the ground. The writer 
 
34 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 of a recent magazine article has exploded 
 the commonly-received idea that in the 
 United States alone more Rhine wine is 
 drunk than the whole Rhine wine-region 
 really produces. The truth is, that it is 
 a problem how to get rid of all that is 
 made. The wine is drunk new bv everv 
 
 I one in the neighborhood, and seils "at 
 prices within the means of all ; and this 
 because there are vineyards by the hun- 
 dred whose exposure does not fit them 
 for the production of the fine wines ea- 
 gerly bought by foreign merchants, and 
 also because manv of the small wine- 
 
 luther's monument at worms. 
 
 growers have no means of getting their 
 wares to the right market. The great 
 traffic is confined chiefly to wholesale 
 growers, rich men who can tide over 
 half a score of bad years and afford to 
 sell the whole crop of those years for 
 next to nothing ; and their wine it is 
 which with us represents the whole Rhine 
 vintage. It is, however, hardly more than 
 a third, and the rest of the wine made on 
 the Rhine is to the untutored taste just 
 as good and just as pleasant. It is said 
 by connoisseurs that all the difference 
 between the wine of good and bad years 
 is in its "bouquet," and the juice of the 
 same grapes brings four dollars and a 
 half a gallon at the vineyard Qx^t. year and 
 can be bought in another year for twenty 
 cents. The wine -trade has developed 
 an odd profession, that of wine -taster, 
 and these skillful critics command high 
 
 v/ages and great consideration. But of 
 course each locality has its own knot of 
 oracles, and the ludicrous gravity with 
 which these village " tasters " decide on 
 the merits of mine host's purchases — or 
 perhaps growths— is a subject not un- 
 worthy the pencil of Ostade, Teniers or 
 Hogarth. The parish priest is not the 
 least learned among these local connois- 
 seurs, and one or two official personages 
 generally form, with him, the jury that 
 decides on the worth of the year's crop. 
 Professional buyers and commissioners 
 from German and foreign firms crowd to 
 the markets where the wine is sold, and 
 after being open to inspection for a week 
 the crop of each grower is generally sold 
 in a lump to some one firm, probably an 
 old customer, for a sum that sounds fab- 
 ulous ; but then the bad years, when just 
 as much expense is lavished on the vines 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 35 
 
 and no returns bring the growers a re- 
 ward, have to be considered as a counter- 
 weight. Of course there is a monstrous 
 deal of " doctoring," and even the purest 
 of the wines are not as they came from 
 Nature's hand ; but in the bad years it 
 is notorious that fortunes are made out 
 of wine sold for a few cents a gallon and 
 exported at a profit of a hundred per 
 cent. Thence, perhaps, comes the by- 
 word about our drinking more wine than 
 the vineyards produce. 
 
 But, leaving the commercial aspect of 
 the trade, let us take a glance at the pic- 
 turesque side. Like the fisheries, this 
 business, that looks commonplace in cel- 
 lars and vaults, has its roots in free, open- 
 air life, and is connected with quaint his- 
 torical details and present customs hard- 
 ly less novel to us. The aspect of the 
 country in autumn, as described in a 
 letter written last year, is lovely- — -"the 
 exuberant quantity of fine fruit ; . . . 
 the roads bordered by orchards of apples 
 and pears, where the trees are so loaded 
 that the branches have to be supported 
 by stakes lest they should break ; . . . 
 men, women and children busy in the 
 vineyards on the sides of the hills ; the 
 road alive with peasants laden with bask- 
 ets of fruit or tubs in which the grapes 
 were pressed. Some were pressing the 
 grapes in great tubs or vats on the road- 
 side. In the afternoon there were con- 
 tinual firing of guns and shouting of the 
 peasants on the vine-hills, making merry 
 after their labor, for the vintage is the 
 season when labor and jollity go hand in 
 hand. We bought clusters of delicious 
 grapes for almost nothing, and I drank 
 of the newly-pressed wine, which has the 
 sweetness of new cider. . . . Every now 
 and then we passed wagons bearing great 
 pipes of new wine, with bunches of flow- 
 ers and streamers of ribbons stuck in the 
 bung." The last cask of the vintage is 
 always honored by a sort of procession — 
 Bacchanalia, an artist might call it — the 
 three or four youngest and prettiest girls 
 mounted on it in a wagon, their heads 
 crowned with grapes and leaves and a 
 heap of fruit in their laps. The men 
 lead the horses slowly home, stopping 
 often to drink or offer to others the new 
 
 wine, and brandishing aloft their clubs 
 for beating the fruit with ; the children 
 run alongside with armfuls of the fruit, 
 and their faces stained all over with the 
 juice, while in some nook, perhaps a stone 
 arbor trellised with vines, sits the portly, 
 jolly owner, with his long-jointed pipe, 
 an incarnation of a German Bacchus, 
 smiling at the pretty maidens, who pelt 
 him with his own grapes. But before the 
 season a very different scene takes place 
 in the "locked " vineyards, closed by law 
 even to their owners, and where at night 
 no one but a lonely watchman, with gun 
 loaded and wolfish dog at his heels, sits 
 in a little straw-thatched, tent-shaped hut 
 to ward off thieves and intruders. When 
 the vineyards are declared open, the best 
 policy is to get in the harvest at once, 
 unless you are rich enough to have your 
 crops carefully watched every hour for a 
 week, when the grapes will certainly be 
 better and the wine more precious. For 
 it is a custom that after the opening, but 
 as long as the vintage is not actually be- 
 gun in any vineyard, the grapes are free 
 to visitors. The guests of the owner are 
 privileged to pluck and eat all through 
 the vintage ; but again custom ordains 
 that if you eat only half a plucked clus- 
 ter, you should hang the remainder on 
 the trellis, that it may not be trodden 
 under foot and wasted. Donkeys and 
 women carrying those odd, heavy bask- 
 ets that decorate the cottages convey the 
 grapes to the pressing-vats in endless and 
 recrossing processio-ns, and not one grape 
 that has been plucked is left on the ground 
 till the morrow : all must be stowed away 
 the same day before dusk. The vintage- 
 days themselves are busy, and the hot 
 and tired workers would wonder to see 
 poets and painters weave their hard labor 
 into pictures and sonnets. But the open- 
 ing day, as well as the closing one, is a 
 festival, often a religious one, and a pro- 
 cession winds its way where laden ani- 
 mals tread all the rest of the week. A 
 sermon is generally preached, and after 
 the ceremony is over the day becomes a 
 kind of holiday and picnic affair. Groups 
 of workers during the vintage sit on the 
 hot slate terraces, shrinking close to the 
 walls for the sake of a coolness that 
 
36- 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 hardly exists save 
 underground in the 
 wide, gloomy cata- 
 combs that undermine 
 the hillside ; and these 
 caverns,, filled with 
 great casks, are not 
 . the least curious sight 
 of the Rhine wine-re- 
 gions. Above ground, 
 you come on little 
 shrines and stone 
 crosses embowered in 
 fruit, the frame of the 
 sorry picture far more 
 beautiful than the pic- 
 ture itself, yet that daub 
 means so much to the 
 simple, devout peasant 
 who kneels or rests un- 
 der it ! The process of 
 picking and pressing 
 is simple and quick. 
 The grapes are picked 
 from the stalks and 
 
 dropped into little tubs, 
 then shaken out into 
 baskets with a quick 
 
 double movement, 
 
 and pressed with 
 
 "juice-clubs" on the 
 
 spot, whereupon the 
 
 load is quickly carried 
 
 off (sometimes carted 
 
 in large casks) to the 
 
 great wine -presses m 
 
 the building provided 
 
 for this purpose. 
 
 There is an overseer 
 
 to each group of woi k- 
 
 ers, who regulates the 
 
 rate and quantity of 
 
 fruit to be thrown at 
 
 once into the first tubs, 
 
 and who takes note of 
 
 the whole day's har- 
 vest, which is reckon- 
 ed by the basketful 
 
 When we come to the 
 
 far - famed JohanniS- 
 
 berg vineyards, whose 
 
 origin lies back in the 
 
 tenth century, when Abbot Rabanus cul- 
 tivated these hillsides that are now partly 
 
 
 MAYENCE KNITTING- WOMEN. 
 
 I the property of some of the Metternich 
 I family, we learn the value of these basket- 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 37 
 
 fuls, each containing what goes to make a 
 gallon ; which quantity will fill four bot- 
 tles, at eight thalers the bottle among 
 friends who take no percentage and give 
 you the pure juice. After that, does any 
 one suppose that he gets Johannisberg, 
 Steinberg or Riidesheim, or Brauneberg 
 and Bernkasteler Doctor, two of the best 
 Moselle wines, when he pays two or three 
 dollars a bottle for this so-called wine in 
 a restaurant? Better call for what the 
 restaurant- keeper would protest was not 
 worth buying, but which the real con- 
 noisseur would agree with the Rhine 
 peasantry in drinking and enjoying — the 
 new, undoctored wine that is kept in the 
 wood and drawn as the needs of cus- 
 tomers require. 
 
 One of the prettiest vintage-sights is 
 the feast of St. Roch, held yearly near 
 Bingen in the Rheingau, on the grounds 
 of the Villa Landy, now belonging to 
 Herr Braun. St. Roch is here consider- 
 ed the patron of the wine-industry, and 
 the festival is held on the Sunday follow- 
 ing the 1 6th of August, the day of the 
 restoration of the old chapel. Against 
 the exterior eastern wall is put up a tem- 
 porary pulpit ; the hill is clothed with 
 white tents gayly decked with leaves, 
 grapes, flowers and ribbons ; refreshments 
 are sold; all the bells of the neighbor- 
 hood peal and jingle ; the country-folk 
 in costume come up in merry groups or 
 in devout processions with their parish 
 clergy, school banners and crosses, sing- 
 ing hymns or reciting the rosary, and 
 after the sermon and prayers scattering 
 through the vineyards and spending the 
 day in what we will hope is no worse a 
 manner than appears to the artist eye. 
 
 There is one peculiarity about the 
 
 Riidesheim vintage-season — its lateness. 
 It begins about the 3d of November, 
 sometimes a little earlier, but still later 
 than most others. Two years ago it took 
 place in this way, after a fortnight's steady 
 fog and weather more like that of a wild 
 northern sea-coast than of the "sunny " 
 Rhine. But this gray, damp air was the 
 very thing wanted, for it slowly rots the 
 grapes and produces from this corruption 
 the most delicious wine. It is said that 
 this Riidesheim custom of a late vintage 
 is due to a fortunate fit of forgetfulness 
 of the abbot of Fulda, who once neglect- 
 ed to give the necessary permission to 
 open the Johannisberg vineyards, and 
 did not remedy his mistake till early in 
 November, when the despairing vine- 
 dressers fancied the crop wholly spoilt ; 
 but another version tells us that it once 
 happened that the vintage was delayed 
 through the circumstances of a war that 
 laid waste most of the neighborhood and 
 claimed the service of every able-bodied 
 man, so that the vine-growers in disgust 
 sold the crop for a mere nothing, and 
 found out afterward what a prize they 
 had let slip through their fingers. It is 
 said to be for the sake of producing this 
 rottenness in the grape before gathering 
 it that in some Greek and Armenian 
 vineyards the vines are sometimes pin- 
 ned down to the hot earth and allowed 
 to creep like ivy over the soil. So at 
 Riidesheim the vintage went on in glee 
 and high expectations, in contrast to the 
 sullen sky and clinging mist, while the 
 foggy nights were disturbed by blazing 
 fires, continuous shots and hymns of 
 joy and jollity sung by the home-going 
 workers. 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 PART III. 
 
 EVENING CONCERT AT WIESBADEN. 
 
 WIESBADEN (the "Meadow- 
 Bath"), though an inland town, 
 partakes of some of the Rhine charac- 
 teristics, though even if it did not, its 
 notoriety as a spa would be enough to 
 make some mention of it necessary. 
 3S 
 
 Its promenade and Kurhaus, its socie- 
 ty, evening concerts, alleys of beautiful 
 plane trees, its frequent illuminations 
 with Bengal lights, reddening the clas- 
 sic peristyles and fountains with which 
 modern taste has decked the town, its 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 39 
 
 airy Moorish pavilion over the springs, 
 and its beautiful Greek, chapel with fire- 
 gilt domes, each surmounted by a double 
 cross connected with the dome by gilt 
 chains — a chapel built by the duke Adolph 
 of Nassau in memory of his wife, Eliza- 
 beth Michaelovna, a Russian princess, — 
 are things that almost every American 
 traveler remembers, not to mention the 
 Neroberger wine grown in the neigh- 
 borhood. 
 
 Schlangenbad, a less well - known 
 bathing-place, is a favorite goal of Wies- 
 baden excursionists, for a path through 
 dense beech woods leads from the stir- 
 ring town to the quieter "woman's re- 
 public," where, before sovereigns in in- 
 cognito came to patronize it, there had 
 long been a monopoly of its charms by 
 the wives and daughters of rich men, 
 bankers, councilors, noblemen, etc., and 
 also by a set of the higher clergy; The 
 waters were famous for their sedative 
 qualities, building up the nervous sys- 
 tem, and, it is said, also beautifying the 
 skin. Some credulous persons traced 
 the name of the "Serpents' Bath" to 
 the fact that snakes lurked in the springs 
 and gave the waters their healing pow- 
 ers ; but as the neighborhood abounds 
 in a small harmless kind of reptile, this 
 is the more obvious reason for the name. 
 I spent a pleasant ten days at Schlang- 
 enbad twelve or thirteen years ago, when 
 many of the German sovereigns prefer- 
 red it for its quiet to the larger and noi- 
 sier resorts, and remember with special 
 pleasure meeting with fields of Scotch 
 heather encircled by beech and chestnut 
 woods, with ferny, rocky nooks such as 
 — when it is in Germany that you find 
 them — suggest fairies, and with a curious 
 village church, just restored by a rich 
 English Catholic, since dead, who lived 
 in Brussels and devoted his fortune to 
 religious purposes all over the world. 
 This church was chiefly interesting as a 
 specimen of what country churches were 
 in the Middle Ages, having been restored 
 in the style common to those days. It 
 was entirely of stone, within as well as 
 without, and I remember no painting 
 on the walls. The " tabernacle," instead 
 of being placed on the altar, as is the 
 
 custom in most churches now, and has 
 been for two or three hundred ye^ars, was, 
 according to the old German custom, a 
 separate shrine, with a little tapering 
 carved spire, placed in the corner of the 
 choir, with a red lamp burning before it. 
 Here, as in most of the Rhine neighbor- 
 hoods, the people are mainly Catholics, 
 but in places where summer guests of all 
 nations and religions are gathered there 
 is often a friendly arrangement by which 
 the same building is used for the services 
 of two or three faiths. There was, I think, 
 one such at Schlangenbad, where Cath- 
 olic, Lutheran and Anglican services were 
 successively held every Sunday morning ; 
 and in another place, where a large Cath- 
 olic church has since been built, the old 
 church was divided down the middle of 
 the nave by a wooden partition about the 
 height of a man's head, and Catholic and 
 Protestant had each a side permanently 
 assigned to them for their services. This 
 kind of practical toleration, probably in 
 the beginning the result of poverty on 
 both sides, but at any rate creditable to 
 its practicers, was hardly to be found 
 anywhere outside of Germany. I re- 
 member hearing of the sisters of one of 
 the pope's German prelates, Monsignor 
 Prince Hohenlohe, who were Lutherans, 
 embroidering ecclesiastical vestments 
 and altar-linen for their brother with as 
 much delight as if he and they believed 
 alike; and (though this is anything but 
 praiseworthy, for it was prompted by 
 policy and not by toleration) it was a 
 custom of the smaller German princes to 
 bring their daughters up in the vaguest 
 belief in vital truths, in order that when 
 they married they might become what- 
 ever their husbands happened to be, 
 whether Lutheran, Anglican, Catholic 
 or Greek. The events of the last few 
 years, however, have changed all this, 
 and religious strife is as energetic in 
 Germany as it was at one time in Italy : 
 people must take sides, and this out- 
 ward, easy-going old life has disappear- 
 ed before the novel kind of persecution 
 sanctioned by the Falk laws. Some per- 
 sons even think the present state of things 
 traceable to that same toleration, leading, 
 as it did in many cases, to lukewarmness 
 
40 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 41 
 
 and indifferentism in religion. Strange 
 phases for a fanatical Germany to pass 
 through, and a stranger commentary on 
 the words of Saint Remigius to Clovis, 
 the first Frankish Christian king: "Burn 
 that which thou hast worshiped, and wor- 
 ship that which thou hast burnt" ! 
 
 Schwalbach is another of Wiesbaden's 
 
 LUTHER'S HOUSE AT FRANKFORT. 
 
 handmaidens — a pleasant, rather quiet 
 spotj from which, if you please, you can 
 follow the Main to the abode of spark- 
 ling hock or the vinehills of Hochheim, 
 the property of the church which crowns 
 the heights. This is at the entrance of 
 the Roman-named Taunus Mountains, 
 where there are bathing-places, ruined 
 castles, ancient bridges, plenty of le- 
 
 gends, and, above all, dark solemn old 
 chestnut forests. But we have a long 
 way to go, and must not linger on our 
 road to the free imperial city of Frank- 
 fort, with its past history and present im- 
 portance. Here too I have some per- 
 sonal remembrances, though hurried 
 ones. The hotel itself— what a relief 
 such hotels are from the mod- 
 ern ones with electric bells and 
 elevators and fifteen stories ! — ■ 
 was an old patrician house am- 
 ple, roomy, dignified, and each 
 room had some individuality, 
 notwithstanding the needful 
 amount of transformation from 
 its old self. It was a dull, wet 
 day when we arrived, and next 
 morning we went to the cathe- 
 dral, Pepin's foundation, of 
 which I remember, however, 
 less than of the great hall in 
 the Rbmer building where the 
 Diets sat and where the "Gold- 
 en Bull" is still kept — a hall 
 now magnificently and appro- 
 priately frescoed with subjects 
 from German history. Then 
 the far - famed Judengasse, a 
 street where the first Roths- 
 child's mother lived till within 
 a score of years ago, and where 
 now, among the dark, crazy 
 tenements, so delightful to the 
 artist's eye, there glitters one 
 of the most gorgeously-adorn- 
 ed synagogues in Europe. A 
 change indeed from the times 
 when Jews were hunted and 
 hooted at in these proud, fa- 
 natical cities, which were not 
 above robbing them and mak- 
 ing use of them even while they 
 jeered and persecuted ! The 
 great place in front of the em- 
 peror's hall was the appointed ground for 
 tournaments, and as we lounge on we 
 come to a queer house, with its lowest 
 corner cut away and the oriel window 
 above supported on one massive pillar : 
 from that window tradition says that 
 Luther addressed the people just before 
 starting for Worms to meet the Diet. 
 This other house has a more modern 
 
42 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 look : it is Goethe's birthplace, the house 
 where the noted housekeeper and accom- 
 plished hostess, "Frau Ratk" — or "Mad- 
 am Councilor," as she was called — gath- 
 ered round her those stately parties that 
 are special to the great free cities 
 of olden trade. Frankfort has 
 not lost her reputation in this 
 line : her merchants and civic 
 functionaries still form an aris- 
 tocracy, callings as well as for- 
 tunes are hereditary, and if some 
 modern elements have crept in, 
 they have not yet superseded the 
 old. The regattas and boating- 
 parties on the Main remind one 
 of the stir on the banks of the 
 Thames between Richmond 
 and Twickenham, where so 
 many "city men" have lovely 
 retired homes ; but Frankfort 
 has its Kew Gardens also, where 
 tropical flora, tree-ferns and 
 palms, in immense conserva- 
 tories, make perpetual summer, 
 while the Zoological Garden 
 and the bands that play there 
 are another point of attraction. 
 Still, I think one more willingly 
 seeks the older parts — the Ash- 
 tree Gate, with its machicolated 
 tower and turrets, the only rem- 
 nants of the fortifications ; the 
 old cemetery, where Goethe's 
 mother is buried ; and the old 
 bridge over the Main, with the 
 statue of Charlemagne bearing 
 the globe of empire in his hand, 
 which an innocent countryman from the 
 neighboring village of Sachsenhausen 
 mistook for the man who invented the 
 Aeppelwei, a favorite drink of Frank- 
 fort. This bridge has another curios- 
 ity — a gilt cock on an iron rod, com- 
 memorating the usual legend of the 
 " first living thing " sent across to cheat 
 the devil, who had extorted such a prom- 
 ise from the architect. But although the 
 ancient remains are attractive, we must 
 not forget the Bethmann Museum, with 
 its treasure of Dannecker's Ariadne, and 
 the Stadel Art Institute, both the legacies 
 of public-spirited merchants to their native 
 town ; the Bourse, where a business hard- 
 
 ly second to any in London is done ; and 
 the memory of so many great minds of 
 modern times — Borne, Brentano, Bettina 
 von Arnim, Feurbach, Savigny, Schloss- 
 en, etc. The Roman remains at Ober- 
 
 JOHN WOLFGANG GOETHE. 
 
 iirzel in the neighborhood ought to have 
 a chapter to themselves, forming as they 
 do a miniature Pompeii, but the Rhine 
 and its best scenery calls us away from 
 its great tributary, and we already begin 
 to feel the witchery which a popular poet 
 has expressed in these lines, supposed to 
 be a warning from a father to a wander- 
 ing son : 
 
 To the Rhine, to the Rhine ! go not to the Rhine ! 
 
 INIy son, I counsel thee well; 
 For there life is too sweet and too fine, and every 
 
 breath is a spell. 
 
 The nixie calls to thee out of the flood ; and if thou 
 
 her smiles shouldst see, 
 And the Lorelei, with her pale cold lips, then 'tis all 
 
 over with thee: 
 
DOIVN THE RHINE. 
 
 43 
 
 For bewitched and delighted, yet seized with fear, 
 Thy home is forgotten and mourners weep here. 
 
 This is the Rheingau, the most beau- 
 tiful valley of rocks and bed of rapids 
 which occurs during the whole course of 
 the river — the region most crowded with 
 legends and castles, and most frequented 
 by strangers by railroad and steamboat. 
 
 The right bank is at first the only one 
 that calls for attention, dotted as it is 
 with townlets, each nestled in orchards, 
 gardens and vineyards, with a churcl* 
 and steeple, and terraces of odd, over- 
 hanging houses ; little stone arbors trel- 
 lised with grapevines ; great crosses and 
 statues of patron saints in the warm, soft- 
 
 goethe's birthplace. 
 
 toned red sandstone of the country ; fish- 
 ermen's taverns, with most of the busi- 
 ness done outside under the trees or vine- 
 covered piazza ; little, busy wharfs and 
 works, aping joyfully the bustle of large 
 seaports, and succeeding in miniature ; 
 and perhaps a burgomaster's garden, 
 where that portly and pleasant function- 
 ary does not disdain to keep a tavern 
 
 and serve his customers himself, as at 
 Walluf 
 
 At Rauenthal (a "valley" placed on 
 high hills) we find the last new claim- 
 ant to the supremacy among Rhine 
 wines, at least since the Paris Exhibi- 
 tion, when the medal of honor was 
 awarded to Rauenthal, which has ended 
 in bringing many hundreds of curious 
 
44 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 JUDENGASSE AT FRANKFORT. 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 45 
 
 connoisseurs to test the merits of the 
 grape where it grows. Now comes a 
 whole host of villages on either side of 
 the river, famous through their wines — 
 Steinberg, the "golden beaker;" Scharf- 
 enstein, whose namesake castle was the 
 refuge of the warlike archbishops of May- 
 ence, the stumbling-block of the arch- 
 bishops of Treves, called "the Lion of 
 Luxembourg," and lastly the prey of the 
 terrible Swedes, who in German stories 
 play the part of Cossacks and Bashi- 
 Bazouks ; Marcobrunnen, with its clas- 
 sical-looking ruin of a fountain hidden 
 among vineyards ; Hattenheim, Hall- 
 garten, Grafenberg; and Eberbach, for- 
 merly an abbey, known for its " cabinet " 
 wine, the hall-mark of those times, and 
 its legends of Saint Bernard, for whom 
 a boar ploughed a circle with his tusks 
 to show the spot where the saint should 
 build a monastery, and afterward tossed 
 great stones thither for the foundation, 
 while angels helped to build the upper 
 walls. Eberbach is rather deserted than 
 ruined. It was a good deal shattered 
 in the Peasants' War at the time of the 
 Reformation, when the insurgents emp- 
 tied the huge cask in which the whole of 
 the Steinberg wine-harvest was stored; 
 but since 1803, when it was made over 
 to the neighboring wine-growers, it has 
 remained pretty well unharmed ; and its 
 twelfth - century chapel, full of monu- 
 ments ; its refectory, now the press-house, 
 with its columns and capitals nearly per- 
 fect ; its cellars, where every year more 
 wine is given away than is stored — z. e., 
 all that which is not "cabinet-worthy" — 
 as in the tulip-mania, when thousands 
 of roots were thrown away as worthless, 
 which yet had all the natural merit of 
 lovely coloring and form, — make Eber- 
 bach well worth seeing. 
 
 Next comes Johannisberg, with its vine- 
 yards dating back to the tenth century, 
 when Abbot Rabanus of Fulda cultivated 
 the grape and Archbishop Ruthard of 
 Mayence built a monastery, dedicated to 
 Saint John the Baptist, which for centu- 
 ries was owner and guardian of the most 
 noted Rhine vintage ; but abuses within 
 and wars without have made an end of 
 this state of things, and Albert of Bran- 
 
 denburg's raid on the monks'^ cellars has 
 been more steadily supplemented by the 
 pressure of milder but no less efficient 
 means of destruction. When Napoleon 
 saw this tract of land and offered it to 
 General Kellermann, who had admired 
 its beauty, he is said to have received a 
 worthy and a bold answer. " I thank 
 Your Majesty," said the marshal, "but 
 the receiver is as bad as the thief." The 
 less scrupulous Metternich became its 
 owner, giving for it, however, an equiva- 
 lent of arable and wood land. The Met- 
 ternich who for years was Austrian am- 
 bassador at Paris during the brilliant 
 time of the Second Empire, and whose 
 fast and eccentric wife daily astonished 
 society, is now owner of the peerless Jo- 
 hannisberg vineyards, among which is 
 his country-house. Go,ethe's friends, the 
 Lade and Brentano families, lived in this 
 neighborhood, and the historian Nicholas 
 Vogt lies buried in the Metternich chap- 
 el, though his heart, by his special de- 
 sire, is laid in a silver casket within the 
 rocks of Bingen, with a little iron cross 
 marking the spot. At Geisenheim we 
 are near two convents which as early 
 as 1468 had printing-presses in active 
 use, and the mysterious square tower 
 of Riidesheim, which brings all sorts 
 of suppositions to our mind, though the 
 beauty of the wayside crosses, the tall 
 gabled roofs, the crumbling walls, the 
 fantastically-shaped rocks, getting high- 
 er and higher on each side, and the per- 
 petual winding of the river, are enough 
 to keep the eye fixed on the mere land- 
 scape. At the windows, balconies and 
 arbors sit pretty, ruddy girls waving their 
 handkerchiefs to the unknown " men and 
 brethren" on board the steamers and 
 the trains ; and well they may, if this 
 be a good omen, for here is the "Iron 
 Gate " of the Rhine, and the water bub- 
 bles and froths in miniature whirlpools 
 as we near what is called the " Bingen 
 Hole." 
 
 As we have passed the mouth of the 
 Stein and recollected the rhyme of 
 Schrodter in his Ki7ig Wines Triumph — 
 
 Wreathed in vines and crowned with reeds comes the 
 
 Rhine, 
 And at his side with merry dance comes the Main, 
 
DOWN THE RHINE 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 47 
 
 While the tnird with his steady steps is all of stone 
 
 (Stein), 
 And both Main and Stein are prime ministers to the 
 
 Lord Rhine — 
 
 SO now we peer up one of the clefts in 
 the rocks and see the Nahe ploughing 
 its way along to meet the great river. 
 Just commanding the mouth is Klopp 
 Castle, and not far warlike Bingen, a 
 rich burgher-city, plundered and half 
 destroyed in every war from those of 
 the fourteenth to those of the eighteenth 
 century, while Klopp too claims to have 
 been battered and bruised even in the 
 thirteenth century, but is better known 
 as the scene of the emperor Henry IV.'s 
 betrayal to the Church authorities by 
 his son, who treacherously invited him to 
 visit him here by night. A little way up 
 the river Nahe, where the character of 
 the people changes from the lighthearted- 
 ness of the Rhine proper to a steadiness 
 and earnestness somewhat in keeping with 
 the sterner and more mountainous aspect 
 of the country, is Kreuznach, (or "Cross- 
 near"), now a bathing-resort, and once a 
 village founded by the first Christian mis- 
 sionaries round the first cross under whose 
 shadow they preached the gospel. Spon- 
 heim Castle, once the abode of Trithe- 
 mius, or Abbot John of Trittenheim, a 
 famous chronicler and scholar, reminds 
 us of the brave butcher of Kreuznach, 
 Michael Mort, whose faithfulness to his 
 lawful lord when beset by pretenders to 
 his title in his own family won for the 
 guild of butchers certain privileges which 
 they have retained ever since ; and Rhein- 
 grafenstein, where the ruins are hardly 
 distinguishable from the tossed masses 
 of porphyry rock on which they are 
 perched, tells us the story of Boos von 
 Waldeck's wager with the lord of the 
 castle to drink a courier's top-boot full 
 of Rhine wine at one draught — a feat 
 which he is said to have successfully ac- 
 complished, making himself surely a fit 
 companion for Odin in Walhalla ; but his 
 reward on earth was more substantial, 
 for he won thereby the village of Hiiffels- 
 heim and all its belongings. In a less 
 romantic situation stands Ebernburg, so 
 called from the boar which during a siege 
 the hungry but indomitable defenders of 
 
 the castle paraded again and again be- 
 fore the eyes of the besiegers, whose 
 only hope lay in starving out the garrison 
 — the property of the Sickengens, whose 
 ancestor Franz played a prominent part 
 in the Reformation and gave an asylum 
 in these very halls to Bucer, Melanchthon, 
 CEcolampadius and Ulrich von Hiitten. 
 Past Rothenfels, where towering rocks 
 hem in the stream, like the Wye banks 
 in Arthur's country on the Welsh bor- 
 ders ; the scattered stones of Disiboden- 
 berg, the Irish missionary's namesake 
 convent, which afterward passed into the 
 hands of the Cistercians ; Dhaum Castle 
 and Oberstein Church, these two with 
 their legends, the first accounting for a 
 bas-relief in the great hall representing 
 an ape rocking a child, the heir of the 
 house, in the depths of a forest, and giv- 
 ing him an apple to eat, — we come to a 
 cluster of castles which are the classical 
 ground of the Nahe Valley. The very 
 rocks seem not only crowned but honey- 
 combed with buildings : chapels stand 
 on jutting crags ; houses, heaped as it 
 were one on the roof of the other, climb 
 up their rough sides, and the roofs them- 
 selves have taken their cue from the 
 rocks, and have three or four irregular 
 lines of tiny windows ridging and bulg- 
 ing them out. 
 
 Taking boat again at Bingen, and 
 getting safely through the Rhine " Hell 
 Gate," the "Hole," whose terrors seem 
 as poetic as those of the Lorelei, we pass 
 the famous Mouse Tower, and opposite 
 it the ruined Ehrenfels ; Assmanshausen, 
 with its dark-colored wine and its custom 
 of a May or Pentecost feast, when thou- 
 sands of merry Rhinelanders spend the 
 day in the woods, dancing, drinking and 
 singing, baskets outspread in modified 
 and dainty pic-nic fashion, torches lit 
 at night and bands playing or mighty 
 choruses resounding through the woods ; 
 St. Clement's Chapel, just curtained from 
 the river by a grove of old poplars and 
 overshadowed by a ruin with a hom- 
 dred eyes (or windows), while among 
 the thickly-planted, crooked crosses of 
 its churchyard old peasant-women and 
 children run or totter, the first telling 
 their beads, the second gathering flowers, 
 
48 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 BINGEN, FROM KLOPP CASTLE. 
 
 and none perhaps remembering that the 
 chapel was built by the survivors of the 
 families of the robber-knights of Rhein- 
 stein (one of the loveliest of Rhine ruins) 
 
 and three other confederated castles, 
 whom Rudolph of Habsburg treated, 
 rightly enough, according to the Lynch 
 law of his time. They were hung wher- 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 49 
 
 ever found, but their pious relations did 
 not forget to bury them and atone for 
 them as seemingly as might be. 
 
 Bacharach, if it were not famed in 
 Germany for its vvine, according to the 
 old rhyme declaring that 
 
 At Wiirzburg on the Stein, 
 At Hochheim on the Main, 
 At Bacharach on the Rhine. 
 There grows the best of wine, 
 
 would or ought to be noticed for its 
 wealth of old houses and its many ar- 
 chitectural beauties, from the ruined (or 
 rather unfinished) chapel of St. Werner, 
 now a wine-press house, bowered in trees 
 and surrounded by a later growth of 
 crosses and tombstones, to the meanest 
 little house crowding its neighbor that 
 it may bathe its doorstep in the river — 
 houses that when their owners built and 
 patched them from generation to gene- 
 ration little dreamt that they would stand 
 and draw the artist's eye when the castle 
 was in ruins. Similarly, the many seri- 
 ous Mstorical incidents that took place 
 in Bacharach have lived less long in the 
 memory of inhabitants and visitors than 
 the love-story connected with the ruined 
 castle — that of Agnes, the daughter of the 
 count of this place and niece of the great 
 Barbarossa, whom her father shut up here 
 with her mother to be out of the way of 
 her lover, Henry of Braunschweig. The 
 latter, a Guelph (while the count was a 
 Ghibelline), managed, however, to de- 
 feat the father's plans : the mother help- 
 ed the lovers, and a priest was smuggled 
 into the castle to perform the marriage, 
 which the father, after a useless outburst 
 of rage, wisely acknowledged as valid. 
 The coloring of many buildings in this 
 part of the Rhineland is very beautiful, 
 the red sandstone of the neighborhood 
 being one of the most picturesque of 
 building materials. Statues and crosses, 
 as well as churches and castles, are built 
 of it, and even the rocks have so appeal- 
 ed by their formation to the imagination 
 of the people that at Schbnburg we meet 
 with a legend of seven sisters, daugh- 
 ters of that family whose hero, Marshal 
 Schomburg, the friend and right hand 
 of William of Orange, lies buried in 
 Westminster Abbey, honored as mar- 
 
 shal of France, peer of Great Britain 
 and grandee of Portugal, and who, for 
 their haughtiness toward their lovers, 
 were turned into seven rocks, through 
 part of which now runs the irreverent 
 steam-engine, ploughing through the tun- 
 nel that cuts off a corner where the river 
 bends again. 
 
 Now comes the gray rock where, as 
 all the world knows, the Lorelei lives, 
 but as that graceful myth is familiar 
 to all, we will hurry past the mermaid's 
 home, where so much salmon used to be 
 caught that the very servants of the neigh- 
 boring monastery of St. Goar were for- 
 bidden to eat salmon more than three 
 times a week, to go and take a glimpse 
 of St. Goarshausen, with its convent 
 founded in the seventh century by one 
 of the first Celtic missionaries, and its 
 legend of the spider who remedied the 
 carelessness of the brother cellarer when 
 he left the bung out of Charlemagne's 
 great wine - cask by quickly spinning 
 across the opening a web thick enough 
 to stop the flow of wine. A curious relic 
 of olden time and humor is shown in the 
 cellar — an iron collar, grim-looking, but 
 more innocent than its looks, for it was 
 used only to pin the unwary visitor to the 
 wall while a choice between a " baptism" 
 of water and wine was given him. The 
 custom dates back to Charlemagne's time. 
 Those who, thinking to choose the least 
 evil of the two, gave their voice for the 
 water, had an ample and unexpected 
 shower - bath, while the wine - drinkers 
 were crowned with some tinseled wreath 
 and given a large tankard to empty. On 
 the heights above the convent stood the 
 "Cat" watching the "Mouse" on the 
 opposite bank above Wellmich, the two 
 names commemorating an insolent mes- 
 sage sent by Count John III. of the cas- 
 tle of Neu-Katzellenbogen to Archbish- 
 op Kuno of Falkenstein, the builder of 
 the castle' of Thurnberg, " that he greet- 
 ed him and hoped he would take good 
 care of his mouse, that his (John's) 
 cat might not eat it up." And now we 
 pass a chain of castles, ruins and vil- 
 lages ; rocks with such names as the 
 Prince's Head; lead, copper and silver 
 works, with all the activity of modern 
 
5° 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 life, stuck on like a puppet-show to the 
 background of a solemn old picture, a 
 rocky, solitary island, "The Two Broth- 
 ers," the twin castles of Liebenstein and 
 Sternberg, the same which Bulwer has 
 
 immortalized in his Pilgrmis of the 
 Rhine, and at their feet, close to the 
 shore, a modern-looking building, the 
 former Redemptorist convent of Born- 
 hofen. As we step out there is a rude 
 
 RHEINGRAFENSTEIN. 
 
 quay, four large old trees and a wall with 
 a pinnacled niche, and then we meet a 
 boatful of pilgrims with their banners, for 
 this is one of the shrines that are still fre- 
 quented, notwithstanding many difficul- 
 
 ties — notwithstanding that the priests 
 were driven out of the convent some 
 time ago, and that the place is in lay 
 hands ; not, however, unfriendly hands, 
 for a Catholic German nobleman, mar- 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 51 
 
 ried to a Scotch woman, bought the 
 house and church, and endeavored, as 
 under the shield of "private property," 
 to preserve it for the use of the CathoUc 
 population of the neighborhood. Last 
 summer an English Catholic family rent- 
 ed the house, and a comfortable home 
 was established in the large, bare build- 
 ing attached to the church, where is still 
 kept the Gnadenbild, or "Grace image," 
 which is the object of the pilgrimage — a 
 figure of the Blessed Virgin holding her 
 dead Son upon her knees. These Eng- 
 lish tenants brought a private chaplain 
 with them, but, despite their privileges 
 as English subjects, I believe there was 
 some trouble with the government au- 
 thorities. H owever, they had mass said 
 for them at first in the church on week- 
 days. A priest from Camp, the neigh- 
 boring post-town, was allowed to come 
 once in a week to say mass for the peo- 
 ple, but with locked doors, and on other 
 days the service was also held in the 
 same way, though a few of the country- 
 people always managed to get in quietly 
 before the doors were shut. On Sun- 
 days mass was said for the strangers and 
 their household only in a little oratory 
 up in the attics, which had a window 
 looking into the church near the roof 
 of the chancel. One of them describes 
 " our drawing-room in the corner of the 
 top floor, overlooking the river," and 
 "our life . . . studying German, reading 
 and writing in the morning, dining early, 
 walking out in the evening, tea-supper 
 when we come home. . . . There are 
 such pretty walks in the ravines and 
 hills, in woods and vineyards, and to the 
 castles above and higher hills beyond! 
 We brought one man and a maid, who 
 do not know German, and found two Ger- 
 man servants in the house, who do every- 
 thing. ... It is curious how cheaply we 
 live here ; the German cook left here does 
 everything for us, and we are saying she 
 makes us much better soups an d omelettes 
 and souffles than any London cook." 
 Now, as these three things happen to be 
 special tests of a cook's skill, this praise 
 from an Englishman should somewhat 
 rebuke travelers who can find no word 
 too vile for "German cookery." 
 
 The time of the yearly pilgrimage 
 came round during the stay of these 
 strangers, "and pilgrims came from Co- 
 blenz, a four hours' walk (in mid-August 
 and the temperature constantly in the 
 nineties), on the opposite side of the 
 river, singing and chanting as they came, 
 and crossed the river here in boats. High 
 mass was at half-past nine (in the morn- 
 ing) and benediction at half-past one, 
 immediately after which they returned 
 in boats down the stream much more 
 quickly. The day before was a more 
 local pilgrimage : mass and benediction 
 were at eight, but pilgrims came about 
 all the morning." Later on, when the 
 great heat had brought "premature au- 
 tumn tints to the trees and burnt up the 
 grass," the English family made some 
 excursions in the neighborhood, and in 
 one place they came to a " forest and a 
 large tract of tall trees," but this was 
 exceptional, as the soil is not deep enough 
 to grow large timber, and the woods are 
 chiefly low underwood. The grapes were 
 srnall, and on the 22d of August the/ 
 tasted the first plateful at Stolzenfels, an 
 old castle restored by the queen-dowager 
 of Prussia, and now the property of the 
 empress of Germany. "The view from 
 it is lovely up and down the river, and 
 the situation splendid — about four hun- 
 dred feet above the river, with high 
 wooded hills behind, just opposite the 
 Lahn where it falls into the Rhine." 
 Wolfgang Miiller describes Stolzenfels 
 as a beautiful specimen of the old Ger- 
 man style, with a broad smooth road 
 leading up over drawbridges and moats, 
 with mullioned windows and machico- 
 lated towers, and an artistic open stair- 
 case intersected by three pointed arches, 
 and looking into an inner courtyard, with 
 a fountain surrounded by broad-leaved 
 tropical water-plants. The sight of a 
 combination of antique dignity with cor- 
 rect modern taste is a delight so seldom 
 experienced that it is worth while dwell- 
 ing on this pleasant fact as brought out 
 in the restoration of Stolzenfels, the 
 "Proud Rock." And that the Rhine- 
 landers are proud of their river is no 
 wonder when strangers can talk about it 
 thus : " The Rhine is a river which grows 
 
■^2 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 MOUSE-TOWER (OR BISHOP HATTO'S TOWER) AND EHRENFELS. 
 
 upon you, living in a pretty part of its its beauties, perhaps exaggerated, unfold 
 course : ... its less beauteous parts have greatly the more you explore them, not 
 their own attractions to the natives, and to be seen by a rushing tourist up and 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 53 
 
 down the stream by rail or by boat, but 
 sought out and contemplated from its 
 heights and windings ... In fact, the 
 pretty part of its course is from Bingen 
 to Bonn. Here we are in a wonderfully 
 
 winding gorge, containing nearly all its 
 picturesque old castles, uninterrupted by 
 any flat. The stream is i-apid enough, 
 four miles an hour or more — not equal 
 to the Rhone at Geneva, but like that 
 
 THE LORELEI ROCK. 
 
 river in France. One does not wonder 
 at the Germans being enthusiastic over 
 their river, as the Romans were over the 
 yellow Tiber." 
 
 Other excursions were made by the 
 Bornhofen visitors, one up a hill on the 
 
 opposite side, oveir sixteen hundred feet 
 high, whence a fine distant view of the 
 Mosel Valley was seen, and one also to 
 the church of St. ApoUinaris, at Rema- 
 gen, at some distance down the river, 
 where are "some fine frescoes by Ger- 
 
54 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 man artists covering the whole inte- 
 rior of the church. One artist painted 
 four or five large ones of the Crucifixion, 
 Resurrection and other 
 events relating to the 
 life of Our Lord ; a 
 second several of the / 
 
 life of St. ApoUinaris, ,, ' 
 
 and two others some 
 of Our Lady and va- 
 rious saints, one set 
 being patron saints of 
 the founder's children, 
 whom I think we saw 
 at Baden — Carl Egon, 
 Count Fiirstenberg- 
 Stammheim. , . . The 
 family -house stands 
 close to the church, or 
 one of his houses, and 
 seems to have been 
 made into a Francis- 
 can convent: the 
 monks are now ban- 
 ished and the churcli 
 deserted, a custodc 
 (guardian) in chargi . 
 We went one day to 
 Limburg to see thi 
 bishop of this diocese 
 a dear old man wh') 
 only speaks German 
 
 so E and C 
 
 carried on all the con 
 versation. The cath( - 
 dral is a fine old Noi - 
 man building with sei - 
 en towers : it is undei - 
 going restoration, and 
 the remains of old fres- 
 coes under the white- 
 wash are the ground- 
 work of renewed ones. 
 Where an old bit is per- 
 fect enough it is left." 
 
 Camp, a mile from 
 Bornhofen, is an insig- 
 nificant place enough, 
 but claiming to have 
 been a Roman camp, 
 and having an old 
 convent as picturesque as those of far- 
 famed and much -visited towns. The 
 same irregular windows, roofed turrets 
 
 springing up by the side of tall gables, 
 a corner -shrine of Our Lady and Child, 
 with vines and ivy making a niche for it. 
 
 A STREET IN LIMBURG. 
 
 mossy steps, a broken wall with trailing 
 vines and steep stone-roofed recess, prob- 
 ably an old niche, — such is a sketch of 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 55 
 
 what would make a thoroughly good pic- 
 ture ; but in this land there are so many 
 such that one grows too familiar with 
 them to care for the sight. Nearly op- 
 posite is Boppard, a busy ancient town, 
 with a parish church beautiful enough 
 for a cathedral — St. Severin's church, 
 with carved choir-stalls and a double 
 nave — and the old Benedictine monas- 
 tery for women, now a cold-water cure 
 establishment. Boppard has its legend 
 of a shadowy Templar and a faithless 
 bridegroom challenged by the former, 
 who turned out to be the forsaken bride 
 herself; but of these legends, one so like 
 the other, this part of the Rhine is full. 
 The next winding of the stream shows us 
 Oberspay, with a romantic tavern, carved 
 pillars supporting a windowed porch, and 
 a sprawling kind of roof; the "King's 
 Stool," a modern restoration of the me- 
 diaeval pulpit or platform of stone sup- 
 ported by pillars, with eighteen steps and 
 a circumference of forty ells, where the 
 Rhenish prince-archbishops met to choose 
 the temporal sovereigns who were in part 
 their vassals ; Oberlahnstein, a town fa- 
 mous for its possession in perfect repair 
 of the ancient fortifications ; Lahneck, 
 now a private residence, once the prop- 
 erty of the Templars ; Stolzenfels, of 
 which we have anticipated a glimpse ; 
 the island of Oberwoith, with an old con- 
 vent of St. Magdalen, and in the distance 
 frowning Ehrenbreitstein, the fortress of 
 Coblenz. 
 
 Turning up the course of the Lahn, 
 we get to the neighborhood of a small 
 but famous bathing - place. Ems, the 
 cradle of the Franco - Prussian war, 
 where the house in which Emperor Wil- 
 liam lodged is now shown as an historic 
 memento, and effaces the interest due to 
 the old gambling Kursaal. The English 
 chapel, a beautiful small stone building 
 already ivied ; the old synagogue, a plain 
 whitewashed building, where the service 
 is conducted in an orthodox but not very 
 attractive manner; the pretty fern- and 
 heather - covered woods, through which 
 you ride on donkeyback; the gardens, 
 where a Parisian-dressed crowd airs it- 
 self late in the afternoon ; all the well- 
 known adjuncts of a spa, and the most 
 
 delightful baths I ever saw, "where in 
 clean little chambers you step down 
 three steps into an ample marble basin 
 sunk in the floor, and may almost fancy 
 yourself a luxurious Roman of the days 
 of Diocletian, — such is Ems. But its en- 
 virons are full of wider interest. There 
 is Castle Schaumburg, where for twenty 
 years the archduke Stephen of Austria, 
 palatine of Hungary, led a useful and 
 retired life, making his house as orderly 
 and seemly as an English manor-house, 
 and more interesting to the strangers, 
 whose visits he encouraged, by the col- 
 lections of minerals, plants, shells and 
 stuffed animals and the miniature zoolog- 
 ical and botanical gardens which he kept 
 up and often added to. I spent a day 
 there thirteen years ago, ten years before 
 he died, lamented by his poor neighbors, 
 to whom he was a visible providence. 
 Another house of great interest is the old 
 Stein mansion in the little town of Nas- 
 sau, the home of the upright and patri- 
 otic minister of that name, whose mem- 
 ory is a household word in Germany. 
 The present house is a comfortable mod- 
 ern one — a chateau in the French sense 
 of the word — but the old shattered tower 
 above the town is the cradle of the family. 
 At the village of Friicht is the family-vault 
 and the great man's monument, a mod- 
 ern Gothic canopy, somewhat bald and 
 characterless, but bearing a fine statue 
 of Stein by Schwanthaler, and an inscrip- 
 tion in praise of the "unbending son of 
 bowed-down Fatherland." He came of 
 a good stock, for thus runs his father's fu- 
 neral inscription, in five alliterative Ger- 
 man rhymes. I can give it but lamely : 
 
 His nay was nay, and steady. 
 His yea was yea, and ready : 
 Of his promise ever mindful. 
 His lips his conscience ne'er belied. 
 And his word was bond and seal. 
 
 Stein was born in the house where he 
 retired to spend his last years in study : 
 his grave and pious nature is shown in 
 the mottoes with which he adorned his 
 home : " A tower of strength is our God " 
 over the house-door, and in his library, 
 above his books and busts and gathering 
 of life-memorials, " Confidence in God, 
 singleness of mind and righteousness." 
 
56 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE 
 
 riis contemporaries called him, in a play 
 upon his name which, as such things go, 
 was not bad, "The foundation-i-/(7«(? of 
 right, the stumbling-^/^?;?^ of the wicked, 
 and the precious stone of Germany." 
 Arnstein and its old convent, now occu- 
 pied by a solitary priest : Balduinenstein 
 and its rough -hewn, cyclo- 
 pean-looking ruin, standing 
 over the mossy picturesque 
 water-mill; the marble- 
 quarries near Schaumburg, 
 worked by convicts ; Diez 
 
 and its conglomeration of 
 
 I 
 
 houses like a puzzle endow- * 
 
 ed with life, — are all on the \ 
 
 way to Limburg, the episco- \ - 
 
 pal town, old and tortuous, 
 sleepy and alluring, with its 
 shady streets, its cathedral 
 of St. George and its mon- 
 ument of the lion-hearted 
 Conrad or Kuno, surnamed 
 Shortbold (Kurzbold), a 
 nephew of Emperor Conrad, 
 a genuine woman-hater, a 
 man of giant strength but 
 dwarfish height, who is said 
 to have once strangled a lion, 
 and at another time sunk a 
 boatful of men with one blow 
 of his spear. The cathe- 
 dral, the same visited by our 
 Bornhofen friends, has other 
 treasures — carved stalls and 
 a m^agnificent image of Our 
 Lord of the sixteenth centu- 
 ry, a Gothic baptismal font and a richly- 
 sculptured tabernacle, as well as a much 
 older image of St. George and the Dragon, 
 supposed by some to refer to the legend- 
 ary existence of monsters in the days 
 when Limburg was heathen. Some such 
 idea seems also not to have been remote 
 
 from the fancy of the mediaeval sculptor 
 who adorned the brave Conrad's monu- 
 ment with such elaborately monstrous 
 figures : it was evidently no lack of skill 
 and delicacy that dictated such a choice 
 of supporters, for the figure of the hero 
 is lifehke, dignified and faithful to the 
 
 //' 
 
 t 
 
 1 
 
 
 CONRAD'S MONUMENT, LIMBURG CATHEDRAL. 
 
 minute description of his features and 
 stature left us by his chronicler, while 
 the beauty of the leaf-border of the slab 
 and of the capitals of the short pillars is 
 such as to excite the envy of our best 
 modern carvers. 
 
s 
 
 
 J^ 
 
 't^'\^E. 
 
 
 1 
 
 ^m 
 
 ^^1^ jaMrB^M^I^^g' 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 CONCLUDING PART. 
 
 CASTLE OF ELTZ. 
 
 COBLENZ is the place which many 
 years ago gave me my first associ- 
 ations with the Rhine. From a neigh- 
 
 boring town we often drove to Coblenz, 
 and the wide, calm flow of the river, the 
 low, massive bridge of boats and the com- 
 
 57 
 
58 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 monplace outskirts of a busy city contrib- 
 uted to make up a very different picture 
 from that of the poetic "castled" Rhine 
 of German song and English ballad. 
 The old town has, however, many beau- 
 ties, though its military character looks 
 out through most of them, and reminds 
 us that the Mosel city (for it originally 
 stood only on that river, and then crept 
 up to the Rhine), though a point of union 
 in Nature, has been for ages, so far as 
 mankind was concerned, a point of de- 
 fence and watching. The great fortress, 
 a German Gibraltar, hangs over the river 
 and sets its teeth in the face of the op- 
 posite shore : all the foreign element in 
 the town is due to the deposits made 
 there by troubles in other countries, rev- 
 olution and war sending their exiles, 
 emigres and prisoners. The history of 
 the town is only a long military record, 
 from the days of the archbishops of 
 Treves, to whom it was subject, to those 
 of the last war. It has, however, some 
 pleasanter points : it has long been a fa- 
 vorite summer residence of the empress 
 of Germany, who not long before I was 
 there had by her tact and toleration re- 
 conciled sundry religious differences that 
 threatened a political storm. Such tole- 
 ration has gone out of fashion now, and 
 the peacemaking queen would have a 
 harder task to perform now that the two 
 parties have come to an open collision. 
 There- is the old "German house" by 
 the bank of the Mosel, a building little 
 altered outwardly since the fourteenth 
 century, now used as a food-magazine 
 for the troops. The church of St. Castor 
 commemorates a holy hermit who lived 
 and preached to the heathen in the 
 eighth century, and also covers the grave 
 and monument of the founder of the 
 "Mouse" at Wellmich, the warlike Ku- 
 no of Falkenstein, archbishop of Treves. 
 The Exchange, once a court of justice, 
 has changed less startlingly, and its pro- 
 portions are much the same as of old ; 
 and besides these there are other build- 
 ings worth noticing, though not so old, 
 and rather distinguished by the men who 
 lived and died there, or were born there, 
 such as Metternich, than by architectural 
 beauties. Such houses there are in ev- 
 
 ery old city. They do not invite you to 
 go in and admire them : every tourist 
 you meet does not ask you how you 
 liked them or whether you saw them. 
 They are homes, and sealed to you as 
 such, but they are the shell of the real 
 life of the countiy ; and they have some- 
 how a charm and a fascination that no 
 public building or show - place can have. 
 Goethe, who turned his life-experiences 
 into poetry, has told us something of one 
 such house not far from Coblenz, in the 
 village of Ehi'enbreitstein, beneath the 
 fortress, and which in familiar Coblenz 
 parlance goes by the name of "The Val- 
 ley" — the house of Sophie de Laroche. 
 The village is also Clement Brentano's 
 birthplace. 
 
 The oldest of German cities, Treves 
 (or in German Trier), is not too far to 
 visit on our way up the Mosel Valley, 
 whose Celtic inhabitants of old gave the 
 Roman legions so much trouble. But 
 Rome ended by conquering, by means 
 of her civilization as well as by her arms, 
 and Augusta Trevirorum, though claim- 
 ing a far higher antiquity than Rome 
 herself, and still bearing an inscription 
 to that effect on the old council-house — 
 now called the Red House and used as 
 a hotel — became, as Ausonius conde- 
 scendingly remarked, a second Rome, 
 adorned with baths, gardens, temples, 
 theatres and all that went to make up 
 an imperial capital. As in Venice every- 
 thing precious seems to have come from 
 Constantinople, so in Trier most things 
 worthy of note date from the days of the 
 Romans ; though, to tell the truth, few of 
 the actual buildings do, no matter how 
 classic is their look. The style of the 
 Empire outlived its sway, and doubtless 
 symbolized to the inhabitants their tra- 
 ditions of a higher standard of civiliza- 
 tion. The Porta Nigra, for instance — 
 called Simeon's Gate at present — dates 
 really from the days of the first Mero- 
 vingian kings, but it looks like a piece of 
 the Coliseum, with its rows of arches in 
 massive red sandstone, the stones held 
 together by iron clamps, and its low, im- 
 mensely strong double gateway, remind- 
 ing one of the triumphal arches in the 
 Forum at Rome. The history of the 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 59 
 
 transformations of this gateway is curi- 
 ous. First a fortified city gate, stand- 
 ing in a correspondingly fortified wall, 
 it became a dilapidated granary 
 and storehouse in the Middle 
 Ages, when one of the arch- 
 bishops gave leave to Simeon, a 
 wandering hermit from Syracuse 
 in Sicily, to take up his abode 
 there ; and another turned it into 
 a church dedicated to this saint, 
 though of this change few traces 
 remain. Finally, it has become 
 a national museum of antiquities. 
 The amphitheatre is a genuine 
 Roman work, wonderfully well 
 preserved ; and genuine enough 
 were the Roman games it has wit- 
 nessed, for, if we are to believe 
 tradition, a thousand Frankish 
 prisoners of war were here given 
 in one day to the wild beasts by 
 the emperor Constantine. Chris- 
 tian emperors beautified the basil- 
 ica that stood where the cathedral 
 now is, and the latter itself has 
 some basilica-like points about it, 
 though, being the work of fifteen 
 centuries, it bears the stamp of 
 successive styles upon its face. 
 To the neighborhood, and also to 
 strangers, one of its great attrac- 
 tions lies in its treasury of relics, 
 the gift of Constantine's mother, 
 Saint Helena, for many hundred 
 years objects of pilgrimage, and 
 even to the incredulous objects of 
 curiosity and interest, for the robe 
 of a yellowish-brown — supposed 
 to have been once purple — which 
 is shown as Our Lord's seamless 
 garment, has been pronounced by 
 learned men to be of very high 
 antiquity. But what possesses the 
 Rhine tourist to moralize ? He is 
 a restless creature in general, more 
 occupied in staring than in seeing 
 — a gregarious creature too, who 
 enjoys the evening table d'hote, 
 the day-old Times and the Brit- 
 ish or American gossip as a re- 
 ward for his having conscientiously done 
 whatever Murray or Baedeker bade him. 
 Cook has only transformed the tourist's 
 
 mental docility into a bodily one: the 
 guidebook had long drilled his mind 
 before the tour - contractor thought of 
 
 :t i 'l C'v' •r~^-i ''^fl '>■'.' 
 
 / 
 
 
 t-^ 
 
 s 
 
 J' 
 
 RUINS OF THE CAbTLE OF AUERBACH. 
 
 drilling his body and driving willing 
 
 gangs of his species all over the world. 
 
 There is a funny, not over-reverent, 
 
6o 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 legend afloat in Trier to account for the 
 queer dwarf bottles of Mosel wine used 
 there : it refers to a trick of Saint Peter, 
 who is supposed to have been travelhng 
 in these parts with the Saviour, and when 
 sent to bring wine to the latter drank 
 half of it on his way back, and then, to 
 conceal his act, cut the cup down to the 
 level of the wine that remained. These 
 measures are still called Miserdbelchen, 
 or "wretched little remainders." 
 
 The Mosel has but few tributary- 
 streams of importance : its own course 
 is as winding, as wild and as romantic 
 as that of the Rhine itself. The most 
 interesting part of the very varied scenery 
 of this river is not the castles, the antique 
 towns, the dense woods or the teeming 
 vineyards lining rocks where a chamois 
 could hardly stand — all this it has in com- 
 mon with the Rhine — but the volcanic 
 region of the Eifel, the lakes in ancient 
 craters, the tossed masses of lava and 
 tufa, the great wastes strewn with dark 
 boulders, the rifts that are called valleys 
 and are like the Iceland gorges, the poor, 
 starved villages and the extraordinary rus- 
 ticity, not to say coarseness, of the inhab- 
 itants. This grotesque, interesting country 
 — unique, I believe, on the continent of 
 Europe — lies in a small triangle between 
 the Mosel, the Belgian frontier and the 
 Schiefer hills of the Lower Rhine : it goes 
 by the names of the High Eifel, with the 
 H igh Acht, the Kellberg and the Niirburg ; 
 the Upper ( Vorder) Eifel, with Gerolstein, 
 a ruined castle, and Daun, a pretty vil- 
 lage ; and the Snow-Eifel [Schnee Eifel), 
 contracted by the speech of the country 
 into Schneifel. The last is the most cu- 
 rious, the most dreary, the least visited. 
 Walls of sharp rock rise up over eight 
 hundred feet high round some of its 
 sunken lakes — one is called the Powder 
 Lake— and the level above this abyss 
 stretches out in moors and desolate 
 downs, peopled with herds of lean 
 sheep, and marked here and there by 
 sepulchral, gibbet - looking signposts, 
 shaped like a rough T and set in a heap 
 of loose stones. It is a great contrast to 
 turn aside from this landscape and look 
 on the smiling villages and pretty wood- 
 •ed scenery of the valley of the Mosel 
 
 proper ; the long lines of handsome, 
 healthy women washing their linen on 
 the banks ; the old ferryboats crossing 
 by the help of antique chain-and-rope 
 contrivances ; the groves of old trees, 
 with broken walls and rude shrines, re- 
 minding one of Southern Italy and her 
 olives and ilexes ; and the picturesque 
 houses in Kochem, in Daun, in Trar- 
 bach, in Bernkastel, which, however un- 
 tiring one may be as a sightseer, hardly 
 warrant one as a writer to describe and 
 re-describe their beauties. Kliisserath, 
 however, we must mention, because its 
 straggling figure has given rise to a local 
 proverb — "As long as Kliisserath;" and 
 Neumagen, because of the legend of Con- 
 stantine, who is said to have seen the 
 cross of victory in the heavens at this 
 place, as well as at Sinzig on the Rhine, 
 and, as the more famous legend tells us, 
 at the Pons Milvium over the Tiber. 
 
 The Mosel wine-industry has much 
 the same features as that of the Rhine, 
 but there is a great difference between 
 the French wines, which are mostly red, 
 and the German, which are mostly white. 
 Among the latter hundreds of spurious, 
 horrible concoctions for the foreign mar- 
 ket usurp the name of Mosel wine. It 
 is hardly necessary even to mention the 
 pretty names by which the real wines 
 are known, and which may be found on 
 any wine-card at the good, unpretending 
 inns that make Mosel travelling a spe- 
 cial delight. The Saar wines are included 
 among the Mosel, and the difference is 
 not very perceptible. 
 
 The last glance we take at the beau- 
 ties of this neighborhood is from the 
 mouth of the torrent - river Eltz as it 
 dashes into the Eifel, washing the rock 
 on which stands the castle of Eltz. The 
 building and the family are an exception 
 in the history of these lands : both exist 
 to this day, and are prosperous and un- 
 daunted, notwithstanding all the efforts 
 of enemies, time and circumstances to 
 the contrary. The strongly-turreted wall 
 runs from the castle till it loses itself in 
 the rock, and the building has a home- 
 like, inhabited, complete look; which, 
 in virtue of the quaint irregularity and 
 magnificent natural position of the castle, 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 6r 
 
62 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 standing guard over the foaming Eltz, 
 does not take from its romantic appear- 
 ance, as preservation or restoration too 
 often does. 
 
 Not far from Coblenz, and past the 
 island of Nonnenwerth, is the old tenth- 
 century castle of Sayn, which stood until 
 the Thirty Years' War, and below it, 
 quiet, comfortable, large, but unpretend- 
 ing, lies the new house of the family of 
 Sayn-Wittgenstein, built in 1848, where, 
 during a stay at Ems, we paid a visit 
 of two days. The family were great 
 Italian travellers, and we had met in 
 Rome more than twenty years before, 
 when the writer and the boys, whom I 
 met again — the one as an officer of the 
 Prussian army, and the other as a Bonn 
 student — were children together. At din- 
 ner one evening at this new Sayn house, 
 as we were tasting some Russian dish of 
 soured milk (the mother was a Russian), 
 we reminded each other of our ball on 
 Twelfth Night at Rome, when the young- 
 est of these boys happened to become 
 king "by the grace of the bean," and 
 spent some hours seated in state with 
 gilt-paper crown and red-velvet mantle 
 till he was too sleepy to oversee his sub- 
 jects' revels any longer ; of a day when 
 the pope was to "create" several car- 
 dinals, and of the young "king's" un- 
 shaken belief that he would have the 
 scarlet hat sent him if he only waited 
 long enough at the window to look oiit 
 for the messengers, and of his consequent 
 watch all day, seeing the carriages pass 
 and repass and the bustle of a festa go 
 on, till the sunset flushed over St. Peter's 
 in the distance, and the disappointment 
 became certain at last. Of not much 
 more manly pastimes did the Bonn 
 student have to tell, for the slitting of 
 noses was then in high favor, and a bit 
 of advice was gravely recounted as hav- 
 ing come from a doctor to an obstinate 
 duellist, " not to get his nose cut off a 
 fifth time, as the sewing had got so 
 shaky by repetition that he could not 
 answer for the nose sticking on if touch- 
 ed once more." The house was really 
 beautiful, and furnished with a taste which 
 had something Parisian, and yet also 
 something individual, about it. The par- 
 
 quet floors of inlaid and polished wood 
 used in Germany were here seen to their 
 greatest perfection in some of the rooms ; 
 but what most struck me was a Moorish 
 chamber lighted from above — a small, 
 octagon room, with low divans round 
 the walls and an ottoman in the centre, 
 with flowers in concealed pots cunning- 
 ly introduced into the middle of the 
 cushions, while glass doors, half screen- 
 ed by Oriental-looking drapery, led into 
 a small grotto conservatory with a foun- 
 tain plashing softly among the tropical 
 plants. There was also a good collection 
 of pictures in a gallery, besides the paint- 
 ings scattered through the living rooms ; 
 but the garden was perhaps as much a 
 gem to its owner's mind as anything in 
 the house, as an " English " garden al- 
 ways is to a foreigner. There, in the late 
 afternoon of that day, came one of the 
 Prussian royal family and paid the mis- 
 tress of the house an informal friendly 
 visit, taking "five-o'clock tea" in the 
 English fashion, and with a retinue of 
 two or three attendants making the tour 
 of the close-shaven lawns, the firm grav- 
 elled walks and the broad and frequent 
 flights of steps that led from one terraced 
 flower-garden to another. These were 
 courtly and educated descendants of ter- 
 rible scourges of mankind in old days — 
 of Sayns who were simply robbers and 
 highwaymen, levying bloody toll on the 
 Coblenz merchants' caravans, and of 
 Brandenburgs who were famous for their 
 ravages and raids. Times have changed 
 no less than buildings, and the houseful 
 of pictures and treasures is no more un- 
 like the robber- nest destroyed in war by 
 other robbers than the young Bonn stu- 
 dent is unlike his rough-and-ready fore- 
 fathers. 
 
 As we push our way down the Rhine 
 we soon come to another such contrast, 
 the little peaceful town of Neuwied, a 
 sanctuary for persecuted Flemings and 
 others of the Low Countries, gathered 
 here by the local sovereign. Count Fred- 
 erick 111. He gave them each a plot of 
 land, built their houses and exempted 
 them from all dues and imposts, besides 
 granting them full freedom of worship ; 
 but not for them alone was this boon, for 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 63 
 
 as other wars made other exiles, so were 
 all and every welcome to Neuwied, and 
 the place even now contains Catholics, 
 -Lutherans, Calvinists, Mennonites and 
 Quakers, all living in peace together. 
 The United Brethren (or Moravians) 
 founded a colony here in 1750. The 
 honesty of these people is proverbial, 
 their simplicity of life is patriarchal, and 
 the artist at least will not object to their 
 manners, for the sake of the pleasing cos- 
 tume of their women, whose white caps 
 look akin to the peaceful, rural back- 
 ground of their life, red and blue bands 
 on these caps respectively distinguishing 
 the married from the unmarried women. 
 The little brook that gives its name to 
 the village runs softly into the Rhine 
 under a rustic bridge and amid murmur- 
 ing rushes, while beyond it the valley 
 gets narrower, rocks begin to rise over 
 the Rhine-banks, and the scenery after 
 Andernach becomes again what we so 
 admired at Bingen and Bornhofen. 
 
 Andernach is the Rocky Gate of 
 the Rhine, and if its scenery were not 
 enough, its history, dating from Roman 
 times, would make it interesting. How- 
 ever, of its relics we can only mention, 
 en passant, the parish church with its 
 four towers, all of tufa, the dungeons 
 under the council -house, significantly 
 called the "Jews' bath," and the old 
 sixteenth- century contrivances for load- 
 ing Rhine-boats with the millstones in 
 which the town still drives a fair trade. 
 At the mouth of the Brohl we meet the 
 volcanic region again, and farther up the 
 valley through which this stream winds 
 come upon the retired little watering- 
 place of Tonnistein, a favorite goal of 
 the Dutch, with its steel waters ; and 
 Wassenach, with what we may well call 
 its dust-baths, stretching for miles inland, 
 up hills full of old craters, and leaving 
 us only at the entrance of the beech- 
 woods that have grown up in these caul- 
 dron-like valleys and fringe the blue 
 Laachersee, the lake of legends and of 
 fairies. One of these Schlegel has ver- 
 sified, the "Lay of the Sunken Castle," 
 with the piteous tale of the spirits im- 
 prisoned ; and Simrock tells us in rhyme 
 of the merman who sits waiting for a 
 
 mortal bride ; while Wolfgang Miiller 
 sings of the "Castle under the Lake," 
 where at night ghostly torches are light- 
 ed and ghostly revels held, the story of 
 which so fascinates the fisherman's boy 
 who has heard of these doings from his 
 grandmother that as he watches the en- 
 chanted waters one night his fancy plays 
 
 
 ORTENSTEIN. 
 
 him a cruel trick, and he plunges in to 
 join the revellers and learn the truth. 
 Local tradition says that Count Henry 
 II. and his wife Adelaide, walking here 
 by night, saw the whole lake lighted up 
 from within in uncanny fashion, and 
 founded a monastery in order to coun- 
 teract the spell. This deserted but scarce- 
 ly-ruined building still exists, and con- 
 
64 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 tains the grave of the founder : the 
 twelfth-century decoration, rich and de- 
 tailed, is almost whole in the oldest part 
 of the monastery. The far-famed Ger- 
 man tale of Genovefa of Brabant is 
 here localized, and Henry's son Sieg- 
 fried assigned to the princess as a hus- 
 band, while the neighboring grotto of 
 Hochstein is shown as her place of 
 refuge. On our way back to the Rocky 
 Gate we pass through the singular little 
 town of Niedermendig, an hour's distance 
 from the lake — a place built wholly of 
 dark gray lava, standing in a region 
 where lava -ridges seam the earth like 
 the bones of antediluvian monsters, but 
 are made more profitable by being quar- 
 ried into millstones. There is some- 
 thing here that brings part of Wales to 
 the remembrance of the few who have 
 seen those dreary slate-villages — dark, 
 damp, but naked, for moss and weeds 
 do not thrive on this dampness as they 
 do on the decay of other stones — which 
 dot the moorlands of Wales. The fences 
 are slate ; the gateposts are slate ; the 
 stiles are of slate ; the very "sticks " up 
 which the climbing roses are trained 
 are of slate ; churches, schools, houses, 
 stables, are all of one dark iron-blue 
 shade ; floors and roofs are alike ; hearth- 
 stones and threshold-stones and grave- 
 stones, all of the same material. It is 
 curious and depressing. This volcanic 
 region of the Rhine, however, has so 
 many unexpected beauties strewn pell- 
 mell in the midst of stony barrenness 
 that it also bears some likeness to Na- 
 ples and Ischia, where beauty of color, 
 and even of vegetation, alternate sur- 
 prisingly with tracts of parched and 
 rocky wilderness pierced with holes 
 whence gas and steam are always 
 rising. 
 
 Sinzig, on the left bank of the last gorge 
 of the Rhine, besides its legend of Con- 
 stantine has a convent said to have 
 been built by the empress Helena; and 
 in this convent a mummied body of 
 a long -dead monk, canonized by pop- 
 ular tradition, and remarkable for the 
 journey to Paris which his body took 
 and returned from unharmed in the days 
 of Napoleon I. On the opposite shore. 
 
 not much lower down, is another of the 
 numberless pilgrimage - chapels with 
 which the Rhine abounds, and the old 
 city of Linz, with an authentic history 
 dating from the ninth century, telling 
 of an independence of any but nominal 
 authority for some time, and at last of a 
 transfer of the lordship of the old town 
 from the Sayns to the archbishops of Co- 
 logne. This supremacy had to be kept 
 up by the "strong hand," of which the 
 ruined fortress is now the only remind- 
 er; but there is a more beautiful mon- 
 ument of old days and usages in the 
 thirteenth-century church of St. Martin, 
 not badly restored, where the stained- 
 glass windows are genuinely mediaeval, 
 as well as the fresco on gold ground rep- 
 resenting the "Seven Joys of Mary," 
 painted in 1463. Just above Remagen 
 lies the Victoria -berg, named after the 
 crown-princess of Prussia, the princess- 
 royal of England, and this is the even- 
 ing resort of weary Remageners — a love- 
 ly public garden, with skilfully - man- 
 aged vistas, and a "Victoria temple," 
 placed so as to command the five pret- 
 tiest views up and down the stream, as 
 well as over the woodland behind the 
 town. Let not the classic name of " tem- 
 ple" deceive us, however, for this is a 
 genuine G^^man arbor, picturesque and 
 comfortable, with a conical roof of state- 
 ly and rustic pillars, seats and balustrade 
 rising from the steep bank on which the 
 ' ' lookout "is perched. The winding Ahr, 
 coming from the tufa-plateau of the Eifel 
 and watering a pretty valley full of old 
 castles and churches, rolls its waters into 
 the Rhine in this neighborhood, and in 
 summer no trip is so pleasant to the cit- 
 izens of Bonn and Cologne, and indeed 
 to many tourists if they have time to 
 breathe. But in winter the scenery is 
 worthy of the New World. The dark 
 rocks and narrow slits of valleys piled 
 with snow and crusted with ice, the lock- 
 ed waterfalls and caves with portcullises 
 of icicles let down across their mouths, 
 make a pendant for the splendid and lit- 
 tle-known scenery of American moun- 
 tains in January. By one of the castles, 
 a ruin belonging to the Steins of Nas- 
 sau, poetically called Landskrone, or the 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 65 
 
 " Land's Crown," from its beautiful situa- 
 tion on a basalt hill, is a perfectly-pre- 
 served chapel perched on the top of the 
 rock, where, says the legend, the daugh- 
 ter of the besieged lord of the castle once 
 took refuee during: a local war. The 
 
 sacristy has an unusual shape, ^ and is 
 hewn out of the rock itself; and here it 
 was that the maiden sat in safety, the 
 rock closing over the cleft by which she 
 had crept in, and a dove finding its way 
 in every day with a loaf to feed her, while 
 
 COURT OF JUSTICE, AHRWEILER. 
 
 a spring within the cave supplied her with 
 water. Legends have grown over every 
 stone of this poetic land like moss and 
 lichen and rock-fern ; and at Beul, a 
 small bathing-place with a real geyser 
 and a very tolerable circle of society, 
 
 we come across the universal story of 
 a golden treasure sunk in a castle-well 
 and guarded by a giant. The old, world- 
 forgotten town has its hall of justice and 
 all the shell of its antique civic parapher- 
 nalia, while at present it is a sleepy, con- 
 
66 
 
 DOWN TBE RHINE. 
 
 tented, rural place, with country carts and 
 country riders by families crowding it on 
 market-days, and making every yard of 
 the old street a picture such as delights 
 the traveller from cities whose plan is 
 conveniently but not picturesquely that 
 of a chess-board. The baths, like those 
 of Schlangenbad, are in great favor with 
 nervous women, and like that neighbor- 
 hood too, so has this its miniature Olivet 
 and Calvary, the devout legacy of some 
 unknown crusader, who also founded 
 at Ahrweiler the Franciscan monastery 
 called Calvary Hill. These " calvaries," 
 in many shapes and degrees, are not 
 uncommon in Catholic Germany ; "sta- 
 tions of the cross" — sometimes groups 
 of painted figures, life-size, sometimes 
 only small shrines with a framed picture 
 within — mark the distances up the hill, 
 at the top of which is a representation of 
 the crucifixion ; and as the agony in the 
 garden is not included in the "stations," 
 there is generally at the foot of the hill 
 an additional shrine in a natural cave 
 or surrounded by artificial rock -work. 
 The prettiest part of the Ahr valley is 
 at and about Walporzheim, which the 
 Diisseldorf artists have, by reason of its 
 famous wine quite as much as of its ro- 
 mantic scenery, chosen for the place of 
 their frequent feasts, half picnic, half 
 masque, when their get-up rivals that of 
 any carnival, not even excepting that of 
 the '' Krewe of Komus " or those other 
 displays peculiar to Belgium and Hol- 
 land of which the late celebration of the 
 "Pacification of Ghent" was an example. 
 The Rhine once more ! and now in- 
 deed we shall hardly leave it again, but 
 this is the last part in which we can en- 
 joy the peculiar beauties that make it 
 different from any other river in the 
 world. The Swiss Rhine is a mountain- 
 torrent, the Dutch Rhine a sluggish mud 
 puddle, but the German Rhine is an his- 
 toric river. Quite as legendary as his- 
 toric, however; and perhaps that has 
 made its charm in the eyes of foreign- 
 ers even more than its national associa- 
 tions, dear to the native mind ; and here, 
 between Rolandseck, Nonnenwerth and 
 Drachenfels, poetry takes precedence of 
 history, and we do not want the antic ua- 
 
 ry to come and shatter the legend of 
 Roland of Roncesval's fidelity to the 
 Lady of Drachenfels, even after her 
 vows in Nonnenwerth convent, with his 
 pitiless array of dates and parade of ob- 
 vious impossibilities. But I pass over the 
 legendary details that make this region 
 so interesting. What will better bear 
 repetition is some description of the sce- 
 nery lying inland from the shores, the 
 natural Quadrilateral, containing minor 
 mountains, such as the Siebengebirge (or 
 the Seven Hills) and the Bonner Alps, 
 and encircling also the volcanic region 
 between Honnef and DoUendorf. These 
 hills with their step - and - terrace forma- 
 tion were once fortified by Valentinian 
 against the formidable Frankish hordes, 
 and German poetry early began to find 
 scenery in them worthy of its national 
 epic, and so laid the scene of the Saga 
 of Wilkina among these mountains and 
 valleys. Here, above the legends of 
 Roland and Siegfried and the Christian 
 captive, who, exposed to the dragon of 
 the rock, vanquished him by the cross, 
 so that he fell backward and broke his 
 neck, is the solid remembrance of castles 
 built on many of these Rhine - hills, de- 
 fences and bulwarks of the archbishops 
 of Cologne against the emperors of Ger- 
 many. But Drachenfels keeps another 
 token of its legend in its dark-red wine, 
 called "dragon's blood." (Could any 
 teetotaller have invented a more sig- 
 nificant name ?) One has often heard 
 of the unbelieving monk who stumbled 
 at the passage in Scripture which de- 
 clares that a thousand years are but as 
 one day to the Lord, and the consequent 
 taste of eternity which he was miracu- 
 lously allowed to enjoy while he wan- 
 dered off for a quarter of an hour, as he 
 thought, but in reality for three hundred 
 years, following the song of a nightin- 
 gale. The abbey of Heisterbach claims 
 this as an event recorded in its books, 
 and its beautiful ruins and wide naves 
 with old trees for columns are, so says 
 popular rumor, haunted by another wan- 
 derer, an abbot with snow-white beard, 
 who walks the cloisters at night counting 
 the graves of his brethren, and vainly 
 seeking his own, which if he once find 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 67 
 
 / 
 
 /" 
 
 IJ y 
 
 
 
 DRACHF.XFF.LS. 
 
68 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 his penance will be over. This part of 
 the Rhine was the favorite home of many 
 of the poets who have best sung of the 
 national river : a cluster of townlets re- 
 calls no less than five of them to our 
 mind — Unkel, where Freiligrath chose 
 his home ; Menzerberg, where Simrock 
 lived ; Herresberg, Pfarrins's home ; 
 Konigswinter, Wolfgang Miiller's birth- 
 place ; and Oberkassel, that of Gottfried 
 Kinkel. Rhondorf shows us a monu- 
 ment of one of the last robber-lords of 
 Drachenfels, and Honnef a smiling mod- 
 ern settlement, a very Nice of the North, 
 where the climate draws together people 
 of means and leisure, litterateurs, retired 
 merchants and collectors of art-treasures, 
 as well as health-seekers. These little 
 colonies, of which most of the large cities 
 on the Rhine have a copy in miniature, 
 even if it be not a bathing-place, are the 
 places in which to seek for that domestic 
 taste and refinement which some hasty 
 and prejudiced critics have thought fit 
 to deny to the Fatherland. 
 
 The scenery of the Rhine begins to 
 lose its distinctive features as we near 
 Bonn : plains replace rocks, and the 
 waters flow more sluggishly. Bonn is 
 alive enough : its antiquities of Roman 
 date are forgotten in its essentially mod- 
 ern bustle, for the heart of its prosperity 
 is of very recent date, the university hav- 
 ing been founded only in 1777, and after 
 the troubles of the Revolution reorgan- 
 ized in 1 81 8. It has grown with a giant 
 growth, and has reckoned among its pro- 
 fessors Niebuhr, Schlegel, Arndt, Dahl- 
 mann, Johann Miiller, Ritschl, Kinkel, 
 Simrock and other less world-famous but 
 marvellous specialists. Then there is the 
 memory of Beethoven, the honor of the 
 town, which is his birthplace and has 
 put up a monument to him, and the last 
 modern element that has effaced the old 
 recollections — the numerous English col- 
 ony — not to mention the rich foreigners 
 whom perhaps the university, perhaps 
 the scenery, and perhaps the heedless 
 fashion that sets in a tide now toward 
 this place, now toward that, have drawn 
 to the new Bonn. Poppelsdorf Castle, 
 now the museum of natural history, and 
 the fine groves and gardens attached to 
 
 it, now a public promenade, have the 
 brisk, business-like look of a "live" 
 place : the building, it is true, is modern, 
 having been built in 17 15. But if we are 
 obstinate enough to search for signs of 
 the days when archbishops ruled instead 
 of dukes and kings, we shall find old re- 
 mains, the cathedral of course included, 
 and nowhere a more curious one than 
 the Kreuzberg, a place of pilgrimage, 
 where the church of 1627 has replaced 
 an old wood-shrine : its rich gateway was 
 intended to represent the front of Pontius 
 Pilate's palace at Jerusalem, and on it are 
 frescoes of the various scenes of the Pas- 
 sion. Within this thirty marble steps lead 
 up into a vestibule in imitation of the 
 Scala Santa in Rome, and pilgrims went 
 up these stairs only on their knees. The 
 vaults used until lately to contain a quan- 
 tity of dried or mummied bodies of Ser- 
 vite monks (that order once had a con- 
 vent here), reminding one of the ghast- 
 ly Capuchin crypts in Rome, in Syracuse 
 and in Malta. This neighborhood is rich 
 in pilgrimage-shrines and legends, and 
 Simrock has preserved a tale of the Devil 
 which is a little out of the common run. 
 He and the Wind, it is said, once went 
 by a certain Jesuit church in company, 
 and the former begged the latter to wait 
 a moment for him, as he had some busi- 
 ness within. The Devil never reappear- 
 ed, and the Wind is still blowing perpet- 
 ually round the building, waiting and 
 calling in vain. The old myth of Bar- 
 barossa waiting in his cave, his beard 
 grown round and round the stone table 
 on which he leans his sleepy head, which 
 in another form meets us in the Mosel 
 Valley, repeats itself in Wolfsberg, not 
 far from Siegburg, near Bonn. I won- 
 der whether the English anglers and 
 oarsmen, and the pretty girls ready to 
 flirt with the students and give away the 
 prizes at an archery-meeting or a regatta, 
 ever think of these musty old legends 
 looked up by scholars out of convent 
 chronicles and peasants' fireside talk ? 
 The difference between past and present 
 is not greater or more startling than is 
 their likeness, the groundwork of human 
 nature being the same for ever. Especial- 
 ly in these old lands, how like the life of 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 69 
 
 MARKET-PLACE AT WORMS. 
 
7° 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 to-day to that of hundreds of years ago 
 in all that makes life real and intense ! 
 The same thing in a mould of other 
 shape, the same thoughts in a speech a 
 little varied, the same motives under a 
 dress a little less natural and crude — 
 even the same pleasures in a great de- 
 gree, for the wine-flask played fully as 
 great a part in old German times as it 
 does now. 
 
 " Holy Cologne " seems at first an im- 
 personation of the olden time, but its 
 busy wharves, crowded shipping and tall 
 warehouses tell us another tale. Indeed, 
 Cologne is more rich than holy, and its 
 commercial reputation is quite as old as 
 its religious one. The country around is 
 flat and uninteresting, but Cologne mer- 
 chants have made Briihl a little paradise 
 in spite of this ; and their country-houses 
 of all styles, with balconies, verandas, 
 porches, piazzas, English shrubbery and 
 flower-gardens, conservatories and gay 
 boats, lawns and statues, make even the 
 monotonous banks of the sluggish Rhine 
 beautiful in spite of Nature. Then comes 
 a reminder of old times — the towers 
 and fortifications, which are still stand- 
 ing, though now turned into public gar- 
 dens and drives that stretch out both on 
 the river and the land side ; but the for- 
 mer, Am Thurinchen, forming a sort 
 of parapeted quay, crossed by massive 
 battlemented gateways, is the most fash- 
 ionable and commands the best views. 
 The trees almost hide the shipping, .as 
 their predecessors no doubt did eighteen 
 hundred years ago and more, when the 
 Ubier tribe of barbarians, a commercial 
 as well as warlike people, undertook to 
 ferry over the whole of Cresar's army to 
 the right bank of the Rhine in their own 
 boats. The quays swarm now with ho- 
 tels, and these in summer swarm with 
 strangers from all countries — pilgrims of 
 Art and Nature, if no longer of religion 
 — and the old town becomes in their 
 eyes less a solid, real city with a long 
 history than a museum opened for their 
 special behoof. And indeed these Ger- 
 man places seem to take kindly to this 
 part, for they rival each other in modern 
 amusements and gauds set out to lure 
 the light-minded. Music-halls and beer- 
 
 gardens, theatres and cafes, illuminated 
 promenades and stalls full of tempting 
 flagons labeled "genuine eau de Co- 
 logne," are cunningly arrayed to turn 
 away the mind from the stately antique 
 churches and houses of Cologne. Every 
 one has heard of the cathedral, many 
 have seen it, and more have seen at least 
 photographs of great accuracy, and pic- 
 tures of it which, if less strict in detail, 
 give it a more lifelike look and include 
 some of its surroundings. The church 
 of St. Gereon, a martyr of the Theban 
 Legion massacred at Cologne to a inan 
 for refusing to worship the imperial en- 
 signs, under which no one denied that 
 they had fought like lions, is a massive 
 Romanesque building older than the ca- 
 thedral, dating from the days of Constan- 
 tine and Saint Helena. The church of 
 the Holy Apostles is a basilica with 
 rounded apse and four octagon towers, 
 one at each corner of the nave. St. 
 Peter's church, the interior terribly mod- 
 ernized by the Renaissance, has for an 
 altar-piece Rubens's picture of the Cf'u- 
 cifixion of Saint Peter. The Giirzenich 
 House, now used for public balls and 
 imperial receptions, is a magnificent fif- 
 teenth - century building, adorned with 
 dwarf towers at each corner, a high, 
 carved and stone-roofed niche with statue 
 over the round -arched door, transom 
 windows filled with stained glass, and 
 carvings of shields, animal heads, col- 
 onnettes and other devices between and 
 above these windows. The council- 
 house or town-hall has a beautiful col- 
 onnade supporting arches, and a quaint 
 nondescript creature whose abyss -like 
 maw opens wide and gapes horribly at 
 the beholder each time the clock strikes. 
 A bas-relief in the hall represents a cu- 
 rious incident in the civic history of the 
 town, the successful struggle of Burgo- 
 master Gryn with a lion, the show and 
 pet of some treacherous nobles who in- 
 vited Gryn to dinner, and under pretence 
 of showing him their very unusual ac- 
 quisition, pushed him into the stone re- 
 cess and closed the gate upon him. The 
 burgomaster thrust his hand and arm, 
 wrapped in his thick cloak, down the 
 animal's throat, while he pierced him 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 71 
 
 
72 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 throu.E^h and through with the sword in 
 his other hand. The struggles between 
 Cologne and her archbishops were hot 
 and incessant, much as they were in 
 other ecclesiastical sovereignties. Of 
 these there is no longer a trace in the 
 present, though the might of the burghers 
 exists still, and the city that was once call- 
 ed the kernel of the Hanseatic League, and 
 boasted of its Lorenzo de' Medici in the 
 person of the good and enlightened Mat- 
 thias Overstolz, has now almost as proud 
 a place among merchants as Hamburg or 
 Frankfort. Before we pass to more mod- 
 ern things let us not forget the shrine of 
 the Three Kings in the cathedral, which 
 is simply a mass of gold and jewelry, in 
 such profusion as to remind one of noth- 
 ing less than the golden screen studded 
 with uncut gems called the Palla d' Oro 
 at San Marco, directly behind the high 
 altar, and the Golden Frontal of St. Am- 
 brose at Milan — golden altar it might 
 more fitly be named, as each side of the 
 altar is a slab of solid gold, almost hid- 
 den by its breastplate of precious stones. 
 The same warrior-archbishop, Conrad of 
 Hochstaden, who, driven from Cologne, 
 transferred his see to Bonn, was the first 
 founder of the cathedral, though in those 
 days of slow and solid building to found 
 was not to finish. The cathedral is not 
 finisJied even yet. The present scenes 
 in which Cologne shines are many — for 
 instance, its lively market on the Neu- 
 markt, and the country costumes one 
 sees there each week as the stalls and 
 carts, easily drawn by dogs and donkeys, 
 are set up in the square ; the parade of 
 the old guard, called the " Sparks of Co- 
 logne " from their scarlet uniforms ; and 
 the Carnival, a high opportunity for fun 
 and display, and specially seized upon 
 to reproduce historic figures and inci- 
 dents, such as the half-comic Ceckcr- 
 Berndchen, a typical figure in red and 
 white, the colors of the town, with a 
 shield in one hand and a wooden sabre 
 in the other, shouting the traditional warn- 
 ing cry, " Geek los Geek e/atis /" the an- 
 tique procession of burgher youths and 
 maidens, the latter with large white caps 
 and aprons, and the former in three-cor- 
 nered hats, black breeches and stockings 
 
 and thick low shoes. Then follows a 
 fancy ball in the Giirzenich House, in 
 which the lineal descendants of the 
 burgomasters and councillors of old 
 come out in ancient family trappings of 
 black cloth or velvet, stiff whiite ruff and 
 heavy gold chain from shoulder to shoul- 
 der, which their forefathers once wore in 
 earnest. Among the museums and oth- 
 er additions of modern taste is the beau- 
 tiful botanical garden and large conser- 
 vatory, where flourish tropical plants in 
 profusion — a thing we find in many even 
 of the secondary German towns. 
 
 The Rhine itself is becoming so un- 
 interesting that it is hardly worth while 
 lingering on its banks, and as we get 
 near thrifty Holland the river seems to 
 give itself up wholly to business, for 
 between Cologne and Aachen (Aix-la- 
 Chapelle) are miles upon miles of manu- 
 factories, workshops and mills ; ware- 
 houses connected with coal-mines ; dirty 
 barges blackening the water ; iron-works 
 and carpet-mills ; cloth and paper-mills 
 and glass-works— a busy region, the mod- 
 ern translation of the myth of gnomes 
 making gold out of dross in the bowels 
 of the earth. 
 
 Aachen has a double life also, like 
 many Rhine towns : it is the old imperial 
 coronation city, the city of Charlemagne, 
 with a corona of legends about it ; and 
 it is also the modern spa, the basket of 
 tempting figs with a concealed asp some- 
 where within, a centre of fashion, gossip 
 and gambling. How is it that people 
 who profess to fly from the great capi- 
 tals for the sake of a "little Nature " are 
 so unable to take Nature at her word 
 and confess her delights to be enough for 
 them ? They want a change, they say ; 
 yet where is the change ? The table is 
 the same, high-priced, choice and varied ; 
 the society is the same, the gossip is the 
 same, the amusements are the same, the 
 intrigues the same ; the costume equally 
 elaborate and expensive ; the restless 
 idleness as great and as hungry for ex- 
 citement: all the artificiality of life is 
 transported bodily into another place, 
 and the only difference lies in the frame 
 of the picture. Exquisites from the cap- 
 ital bring their own world with them, 
 
DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 73 
 
74 
 
 DOWN THE RHINE. 
 
 and their humbler imitators scrape to- 
 gether their hard winter's earnings and 
 spend them in making an attempt cava- 
 lierly to equal for a short time the tired- 
 out "man of the world" and "woman 
 of fashion." Some come to find matches 
 for sons and daughters ; others to put in 
 the thin end of the wedge that is to open a 
 way for them "into society ;" others come 
 to flirt; others to increase their business 
 relations ; others to out-dress and out- 
 drive social rivals ; others to while away 
 the time which it is unfashionable to spend 
 cheaply in the city ; others for — shall we 
 say higher ? because — political causes : 
 few indeed for health, fewer still for rest. 
 You see the same old wheel go round 
 year after year, with the same faces grow- 
 ing more and more tired and more and 
 more hopeless. 
 
 Of Aachen's legendary, historical, ro- 
 mantic side who has not heard ? — of the 
 castle of Frankenburg on the outskirts, 
 where Charlemagne's daughter carried 
 her lover Eginhardt through the snow, 
 that their love might not be betrayed by 
 a double track of footsteps ; of Charle- 
 magne's palace, where his school, the 
 Palatine, presided over by English Al- 
 cuin, was held ; and the baths where a 
 hundred men could swim at ease at one 
 time; and Charlemagne's cathedral, of 
 which the present one has preserved only 
 the octagonal apse ; of his tomb, where 
 he sat- upright after death in imperial 
 robes and on a marble throne (the latter 
 is still shown) ; of the columns brought 
 from Rome and Ravenna; of the mar- 
 vellous and colossal corona of wax-lights 
 which hangs by a huge iron chain from 
 the vaulted roof; of the bronze doors. of 
 the western gateway, now closed, but 
 whose legend of the Devil is commem- 
 orated by the iron figure of a she-wolf 
 with a hole in her breast, and that of 
 a pineapple, supposed to represent her 
 spirit, of which she mourns the loss with 
 open jaws and hanging tongue? The 
 Devil is always cheated in these legends, 
 and one wonders how it was that he did 
 not show more cleverness in making his 
 bargains. The cathedral still claims to 
 possess precious relics — of the Passion, 
 the Holy Winding-sheet, the robe of the 
 
 Blessed Virgin and the blood - stained 
 cloth in which the body of Saint John 
 the Baptist was wrapped. These in- 
 volve a yearly pilgrimage from the near- 
 er places, and a great feast every seventh 
 year, when a holy fair is kept up for weeks 
 round the cathedral. There is no better 
 living specimen of the Middle Ages than 
 such gatherings, and no doubt then, as 
 now, there was some undercurrent of 
 worldly excitement mingling with the 
 flow of genuine devotion. Aachen's old 
 cornhouse, the bridge gate and the many 
 houses full of unobtrusive beauties of 
 carving and metal-work lead us by hook 
 and by crook — for the streets are very 
 winding — out on the road to Burtschied, 
 the hot-water town, whose every house 
 has a spring of its own, besides the very 
 gutters running mineral water, and the 
 cooking spring in the open street boiling 
 eggs almost faster than they can be got 
 out again in eatable condition. This is 
 another of the merchant villeggiaturas 
 of Germany ; and a good many foreign- 
 ers also own pretty, fantastic new houses, 
 planted among others of every age from 
 one to eight hundred years. 
 
 It is so strange to come upon a purely 
 modern town in this neighborhood that 
 Exefeld strikes us as an anachronism. 
 It is wholly a business place, created by 
 the " dry-goods " manufactures that have 
 grown up there, and are worth twenty 
 million thalers a year to the enterprising 
 owners, who rival Erench designs and 
 have made a market for their wares in 
 England and America. This is a great 
 foil to old Roman Neuss, with its mas- 
 sive gates, its tower attributed to Drusus 
 — after whom so many bridges and tow- 
 ers on the Rhine are named — and even 
 to Diisseldorf, which, notv/ithstanding its 
 modern part, twice as large as its old 
 river front, has some beautiful antique 
 pictures to show us, both in the costumes 
 of its market-women, who wear red pet- 
 ticoats with white aprons and flapping 
 caps, and stand laughing and scolding in 
 a high key by their dog-drawn carts, and 
 in its council-house, an early Renaissance 
 building with square, high-roofed turrets 
 overlooking the market-place. In that 
 little house, in a narrow street leading 
 
BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 75 
 
 to the market, Heine was born ; in that 
 wretched little architectural abortion, the 
 theatre, a critical audience listened to 
 Immermann's works ; and in the Kurz- 
 enstrasse was born Peter von Cornelius, 
 the restorer of German art. Schadow 
 succeeded him at the head of the Acad- 
 emy, and a new school of painting was 
 firmly established in the old city, which 
 had energy enough left in it to mark out 
 another successful path for itself in trade. 
 The new town is handsome, monotonous, 
 rich and populous, but the galleries and 
 museums somewhat make up for the lack 
 of taste in private architecture. One of 
 the most beautiful of the town's posses- 
 sions is the old Jacobi house and garden, 
 rescued from sale and disturbance by the 
 
 patriotic artist-guild, who bought it and 
 gave the garden to the public, while the 
 house where Goethe visited his friend 
 Jacobi became a museum of pictures, 
 panelling, tapestry, native and foreign 
 art-relics, etc., all open to the public. 
 The gardens, with their hidden pKJols 
 and marble statues, their water-lilies and 
 overarching trees, their glades and lawns, 
 have an Italian look, like some parts of 
 the Villa Borghese near Rome, whose 
 groves of ilexes are famous ; but these 
 northern trees are less monumental and 
 more feathery, though the marble gods 
 and goddesses seem quite as much at 
 home among them as among the laurel 
 and the olive. 
 
 Lady Blanche Murphy. 
 
 1/ 
 
 BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 BEFORE the change which has re- 
 cently befallen the chief German 
 watering - places, Baden — or, as it was 
 more commonly called, Baden-Baden — 
 was the most frequented, the most bril- 
 liant and the most profitable " hell " in 
 Europe. Its baths and medicinal waters 
 were a mere excuse for the coming thith- 
 er of a small number of the vast con- 
 course which annually filled its hotels. 
 In any case, they sank into compara- 
 tively utter insignificance. It was not for 
 water — at least not for the waters of any 
 other stream than that of Pactolus — that 
 the world came to Baden. Of course, 
 the sums realized by the keepers of the 
 hell were enormous ; and they found it 
 to be their interest to do all that contrib- 
 uted to make the place attractive on a 
 liberal scale. Gardens, parks, miles of 
 woodland walks admirably kept, excel- 
 lent music in great abundance, vast sa- 
 lons for dancing, for concerts, for read- 
 ing-rooms, for billiard-rooms, etc. — all 
 as magnificent as carving and gilding 
 and velvet and satin could make them 
 — were provided gratuitously, not for 
 those only who played at the tables, but 
 
 for all those who would put themselves 
 within reach of the temptation to do so. 
 And this liberal policy was found to an- 
 swer abundantly. Very many of the 
 water-cure places in the smaller states 
 of Germany had their hells also, and did 
 as Baden did, on a more modest scale. 
 Then came the German unification and 
 the great uprising of a German national 
 consciousness. And German national 
 feeling said that this scandal should no 
 longer exist. A certain delay was ren- 
 dered necessary by the contracts which 
 were running between the different small 
 governments and the keepers of the 
 gambling - tables. But it was decreed 
 that when the two or three years which 
 were required for these to run out should 
 be at an end, they should not be renew- 
 ed. It was a serious resolution to take, 
 for some half dozen or so of these little 
 pleasure-towns believed, not without good 
 reason, that the measure would be at 
 once fatal to their prosperity and well- 
 nigh to their existence. And of course 
 there were not wanting large numbers 
 of people who argued that the step was 
 a quixotic one, as needless and fallacious 
 
76 
 
 BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 in a moral point of view as fatal on the 
 side of economic considerations. Could 
 it be maintained that the governments 
 in question had any moral duty in the 
 matter save as regarded the lives and 
 habits of their own people ? And these 
 were not imperilled by the existence of 
 the gambhng-tables. For it was notorious 
 that each of these ducal and grand-ducal 
 patrons of the blind goddess strictly for- 
 bade their own subjects to enter the door 
 of the play-saloons. And as to those 
 who resorted to them, and supplied the 
 abundant flow of gold that enriched the 
 whole of each little state, could it be sup- 
 posed that any one of these gamblers 
 would be reformed or saved from the 
 consequences of his vice by the shutting 
 up of these tables ? It was difficult to an- 
 swer this question in the affirmative. No 
 liquor law ever prevented men from get- 
 ting drunk, nor could it be hoped that 
 any closing of this, that or the other hell 
 could save gamblers from the indulgence 
 of their darling passion. Nevertheless, it 
 can hardly be seriously denied that the 
 measure was the healthy outcome of a 
 genuinely healthy and highly laudable 
 spirit. "Ruin yourself, if you will, but 
 you shall not come here for the purpose, 
 and, above all, we will not touch the 
 profit to be made out of your vice." This 
 was the feeling of the German govern- 
 ment, and, considering the amount of 
 self-denial involved in the act, Germany 
 deserves no small degree of honor and 
 praise for having accomplished it. 
 
 And now it is time to ask, Has Baden 
 — for we will confine our attention to this 
 ci-devant queen of hells — has Baden suf- 
 fered that ruin which it was so confident- 
 ly predicted would overtake her ? Baden 
 Revisited, by one who knew her well 
 in the old days of her wickedness and 
 wealth, supplies the means for replying 
 to the question. Unquestionably, in the 
 mere matter of the influx of gold the town 
 has suffered very severely. How were 
 some four -and -twenty large hotels, be- 
 sides a host of smaller ones, which often 
 barely sufficed to hold the crowds at- 
 tracted by the gambling-tables, to exist 
 when this attraction ceased ? It might 
 have been expected that a large number 
 
 of these would at once have been shut 
 up. But such has not been the case. I 
 believe that not one has been closed. 
 Nevertheless, a visitor's first stroll through 
 the town, and especially in the alleys and 
 gardens around the celebrated "Conver- 
 sations-Haus," as it hypocritically called 
 itself, is quite sufficient to show how 
 great is the difference between Baden as 
 it was and Baden as it is — between Baden 
 the wealthy, gaudy, gay, privileged home 
 of vice, and Baden moralized and turned 
 from the error of its ways. And it can- 
 not be denied that, speaking merely of 
 the impression made upon the eye, the 
 difference is all in favor of vice. "As 
 ugly as sin " is a common phrase. But, 
 unfortunately, the truth is that sin some- 
 times looks extremely pretty, especially 
 when well dressed and of an evening by 
 gaslight. And it did, it must be owned, 
 look extremely pretty at Baden. The 
 French especially came there in those 
 days in great numbers, and they brought 
 their Parisian toilettes with them. And 
 somehow or other, let the fact be ex- 
 plained as it may — and, though per- 
 haps easily explicable enough, 1 do not 
 feel called upon to enter on the explana- 
 tion here — one used in those wicked old 
 days to see a great number of verv pretty 
 women at Baden, which can hardly be 
 said to be the case at Baden morahzed. 
 The whole social atmosphere of the place 
 was wholly and unmistakably different, 
 and in outward appearance wicked Baden 
 beat moral Baden hollow. It would not 
 do in the old time to examine the gay 
 scene which fluttered and glittered before 
 the eyes much below the absolute exterior 
 surface. The little town in those old 
 days, as regarded a large proportion of 
 the crowd which made it look so gay, 
 was — not to put too fine a point upon it 
 — a sink of more unmitigated black- 
 guardism than could easily be found con- 
 centrated within so small a compass on 
 any other spot of the earth. A large 
 number of the persons who now con- 
 gregate m this beautiful valley look, to 
 tell the truth, somewhat vulgar. "\''ulgar ? 
 As if the flaunting crowds which seemed 
 to insult the magnificent forests, the crystal 
 streams and the smiling lawns with their 
 
BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 77 
 
78 
 
 BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 finery were not saturated with a vulgarity 
 of the most quintessential intensity ! Yes, 
 but that only showed itself to the moral 
 sense of those who could look a little be- 
 low the surface, whereas the vulgarity 
 that may be noted sunning itself in the 
 trim gardens and sprawling on the satin 
 sofas which are the legacy of the depart- 
 ed wickedness is of the sort that shows 
 itself upon the surface. In a word, moral 
 Baden looks a little dowdy, and that 
 wicked Baden never looked. 
 
 The general determination at Baden 
 when the terrible decree which put an 
 end to its career of wealth and wicked- 
 ness came upon it like a thunderbolt was 
 of the kind expressed by the more forci- 
 ble than elegant phrase, " Never say die !" 
 The little town was determined to have a 
 struggle for its existence. It still had its 
 mineral waters, so highly valued by the 
 Romans. The Romans, it may be re- 
 marked en passant, seem to have dis- 
 covered and profited by every mineral 
 spring in Europe. Hardly one of the 
 more important springs can be named 
 which cannot be shown, either by direct 
 historic testimony or by the still existing 
 remains of baths and the like, to have 
 been known to the universal conquerors. 
 Well, Baden still had its waters, good for 
 all the ills to which flesh is heir — capiti 
 fluit utih's, utilis alveo. It still had its 
 magnificent forests — pine and oak and 
 beech -in most lovely juxtaposition and 
 contrast. It had the interesting and 
 charmingly picturesque ruins of its an- 
 cient castle on the forest-covered hill 
 above the town, perched on one mighty 
 mass of porphyry, and surrounded by 
 other ranges of the same rock, thrown 
 into such fantastic forms that they seem 
 to assume the appearance of rival castel- 
 lated ruins built on Nature's own colos- 
 sal plan, and such a world of strange 
 forms of turrets and spires and isolated 
 towers and huge donjons that the Devil 
 has "pulpits" and "bridges" and "cham- 
 bers" there, as is well known to all "tour- 
 ists to be his wont in similar places. It 
 had its other mediaeval baronial resi- 
 dences situated in the depths of the for- 
 est at pleasant distances for either driv- 
 ing or walking. It had its delicious parks 
 
 and gardens, beginning from the verv 
 door of the " Conversations-Haus," with 
 brilliantly-lighted avenues, gay withshops 
 and gas-lamps, and gradually wandering 
 away into umbrageous solitudes and hill- 
 side paths lit by the moon alone — so grad- 
 ually that she who had accepted an arm 
 for a stroll amid the crowd in the bright 
 foreground of the scene found herself en- 
 joying solitude a deux before she had 
 time to become alarmed or think what 
 mamma would say. Then it had still 
 the gorgeous halls, the ball-rooms, the 
 concert-rooms, the promenading-rooms, 
 with their gilding and velvet and satin 
 furniture, which had been created by a 
 wave of the wand of the great enchanter 
 who presided at the green table. Why 
 should not all these good things be turned 
 to the service of virtue instead of vice ? 
 Why should not respectability and moral- 
 ity inherit the legacy of departed wicked- 
 ness ? Why should not good and virtuous 
 German Fraiileins, with their pale blue 
 eyes and pale blond hair, do their in- 
 nocent flirting amid the bowers where 
 the Parisian demi-monde had outraged 
 the chaste wood-nymphs by its uncon- 
 genial presence ? The loathsome patch- 
 ouli savor of the denizens of the Boule- 
 vard would hardly resist the purifying 
 breezes of one Black Forest winter. The 
 notice to quit served on Mammon would 
 be equally efficacious as regarded the 
 whole of his crew. The whole valley 
 would be swept clean of them, and sweet- 
 ened and restored to the lovers of Na- 
 ture in her most delicious aspect. Baden, 
 emerging from the cold plunge-bath of 
 its first dismay, determined that it should 
 be so. The hotel-keepers, the lodging- 
 house-keepers, the livery-stable-keepers, 
 the purveyors of all kinds, screwed their 
 courage to the sticking-place and deter- 
 mined to go in for virtue, early hours and 
 moderate prices. Well, yes ! moderate 
 prices ! This was the severest cut of all. 
 But there was no help for it. Virtue does 
 prefer moderate prices. There could be 
 no more of that reckless scattering of gold, 
 no more of that sublime indifference to 
 the figure at the foot of the bill, which 
 characterized their former customers. 
 What mattered a napoleon or so more 
 
BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 79 
 
 or less in their daily expense to him or 
 her whose every evening around the 
 green table left them some thousands 
 of francs richer or poorer than the morn- 
 ing had found them ? There can be no 
 doubt, I fear, that Baden would have 
 much preferred a continuance in its old 
 ways. But the choice was not permitted 
 to it. It is therefore mailing a virtue of 
 necessity, and striving to live under the 
 new regime as best it may. And I am 
 disposed to think that better days may 
 yet be in store for it. At present, the 
 preponderating majority of the visitors 
 are Germans. There are naturally no 
 French, who heretofore formed the ma- 
 jority of the summer population. There 
 are hardly any Americans, and very few 
 English. Those of the class which used 
 to find Baden delightful find it, or con- 
 ceive that they would find it, so no more. 
 And English and Americans of a different 
 sort seem to have hardly yet become aware 
 that they would find there a very differ- 
 ent state of things from that which they 
 have been accustomed to associate in 
 idea with the name of the place. It must 
 be supposed, however, that they will short- 
 ly do so. The natural advantages and 
 beauties of the place are so great, the ac- 
 commodation is so good, and even in some 
 respects the inheritance of the good things 
 the gamblers have left behind them so 
 valuable, that it is hardly likely that the 
 place will remain neglected. Where else 
 are such public rooms and gardens to be 
 found ? The charge made at present for 
 the enjoyment of all this is about six or 
 eight cents a day. Such a payment could 
 never have originally provided all that is 
 placed at the disposal of the visitor. He 
 used in the old times to enjoy it all abso- 
 lutely gratuitously, unless he paid for it 
 by his losses at the tables. Play pro- 
 vided it all. But it is to be feared that 
 the very modest payment named above 
 will be found insufficient even to keep up 
 the establishment which Mammon has 
 bequeathed to Virtue. The ormolu and 
 the carved cornices, and the fresco-paint- 
 ed walls and the embroidered satin 
 couches and divans, and the miles upon 
 miles of garden-walks, have not indeed 
 disappeared, as, according to all the or- 
 
 thodox legends, such Devil's gifts should 
 do, but they will wear out ; and I do not 
 think that any eight cents a, day will 
 suffice to renew them. But in the mean 
 time you may avail yourself of them. 
 You may lounge on the brocade-cover- 
 ed divans which used to be but couches 
 of thorns to so many of their occupants, 
 undisturbed by any more palpitating 
 excitement than that produced by the 
 perusal of the daily paper. The lofty 
 ceilings echo no more the hateful warn- 
 ing croak of the croupier, " Faites votre 
 jeu, messieurs. Le jeu est fait !" which 
 used to be ceaseless in them from mid- 
 day till midnight. There are no more 
 studies to be made on the men and wo- 
 men around you of all the expressions 
 which eager avarice, torturing suspense 
 and leaden despair can impart to the 
 human countenance. The utmost you 
 can hope to read on one of those placidly 
 stolid German burgher faces is the out- 
 ward and visible sign of the inward op- 
 pression caused by too copious a repast 
 at the one-o'clock table d'hote. It is the 
 less disagreeable and less unhealthy sub- 
 ject of contemplation of the two. But 
 the truth remains that virtuous Baden 
 does look somewhat dowdy. 
 
 Just seventy-three years ago a change 
 as great as that which has transformed 
 Baden happened to an establishment 
 which represented the old-world social 
 system of Europe as completely and 
 strikingly as Baden the "watering-place" 
 — that is the modern phrase — did the Eu- 
 rope of the latter half of the nineteenth 
 century. In another green valley of 
 this region, as beautiful as, or even more 
 beautiful than, that of Baden, there exist- 
 ed a gathering-place of the sort produced 
 by the exigencies of a different stage of 
 social progress — the convent of Aller- 
 heiligen, or, as we should say. All Saints 
 or AUhallows. It is within the limits of 
 an easy day's excursion from Baden, and 
 no visitor who loves "the merry green 
 wood" should omit to give a day to Al- 
 lerheiligen, for he will scarcely find in 
 his wanderings, let thein be as extensive 
 as they may, a more perfect specimen of 
 the loveliest forest scenery. It is an old 
 
8o 
 
 BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 remark, that the ancient ecclesiastics 
 who selected the sites of the monastic 
 establishments that were multiplied so 
 excessively in ever)' country in Europe 
 showed very excellent judgment and 
 much practical skill in the choice of 
 them. And almost every visit made to 
 the spot where one of these cloister homes 
 existed confirms the truth of the observa- 
 tion, more especially as regards the com- 
 munities belonging to the great Bene- 
 dictine family. The often-quoted line 
 about seeking " to merit heaven by mak- 
 ing earth a hell," however well it may be 
 applied to the practices of some of the 
 more ascetic orders, especially the men- 
 dicants, cannot with any reason be con- 
 sidered applicable to the disciples of St. 
 Benedict. In point of fact, at the time 
 when the great and wealthy convents of 
 this order were founded it was rather out- 
 side the convent-wall that men were 
 making the world a hell upon earth. 
 And for those who could school them- 
 selves to consider celibacy no unendura- 
 ble evil it would be difficult to imagine a 
 more favorable contrast than that offered 
 by " the world " in the Middle Ages and 
 the retreat of the cloister. A site well 
 selected with reference to all the require- 
 ments of climate, wood and water, and 
 with an appreciative eye to the beauties 
 of Nature, in some sequestered but fa- 
 vored spot as much shut in from war and 
 its troubles as mountains, streams and 
 forests could shut it in ; a building often 
 palatial in magnificence, always comfort- 
 able, with all the best appliances for study 
 which the age could afford ; with beauti- 
 ful churches for the practice of a faith 
 entirely and joyfully believed in ; with 
 noble halls for temperate but not ascetic 
 meals, connected by stairs by no means 
 unused with excellent and extensive cel- 
 lars ; with lovely cloisters for meditative 
 pacing, and well-trimmed gardens for 
 pleasant occupation and delight, — what 
 can be imagined more calculated to en- 
 sure all the happiness which this earth 
 was in those days capable of affording ? 
 Such a retreat was the convent of AUer- 
 heiligen. It was founded for Premonstra- 
 tfcnsian monks at the close of the twelfth 
 century by Uta, duchess of Schawenburg, 
 
 who concludes the deed of foundation, 
 which still exists, with these words : "And 
 if anybody shall do anything in any re- 
 spect contrary to these statutes, he will 
 for ever be subject to the vengeance of 
 God and of all saints." Poor Duchess 
 Uta ! Could her spirit walk in this val- 
 ley, as lovely now as when she gave it to 
 her monks, and look upon the ruins of 
 the pile she raised, she would think that 
 the vengeance of God and all saints had 
 been incurred to a considerable extent 
 by somebody. The waterfalls — seven of 
 them in succession — made by the little 
 stream that waters the valley immediate- 
 ly after it has passed through the isolated 
 bit of flat meadow-land on which the con- 
 vent was built, continue to sing their un- 
 ceasing song as melodiously as when the 
 duchess Uta visited the spot and mark- 
 ed it out for the " Gottes Haus " she was 
 minded to plant there Her husband, 
 the duke Welf, who had married her 
 when she was a well -dowered widow, 
 had been a very bad husband, which 
 naturally tended to lead his neglected 
 lady wife's mind in the direction of found- 
 ing religious houses. He was duke of Alt- 
 orf and Spoleto, the one possession lying 
 on the shores of the Lake of Lucerne, and 
 the other among the ilex-woods that over- 
 look the valley of the Tiber — a strange 
 conjunction of titles, which is in itself il- 
 lustrative of the shape European history 
 took in that day, and of the preponderat- 
 ing part which Germany played in Italy 
 and among the rulers of its soil. Being 
 thus duke of Spoleto, Welf resided much 
 in Italy, but does not seem to have found 
 it necessary to take his German wife with 
 him to those milder skies and easier so- 
 cial moralities. Uta stayed at home amid 
 the dark-green valleys of her native Black 
 Forest, and planned cloister -building. 
 Before the chart, however, which was 
 to give birth to Allerheiligen was sign- 
 ed, Duke Welf came home, and having 
 had, it would seem, his fling to a very 
 considerable extent, had reached by a 
 natural process that time of life and that 
 frame of mind which inclined him to 
 join in his long-neglected wife's pietist- 
 ic schemes. So they planned and drew 
 up the statutes together, and the con- 
 
BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
82 
 
 BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 vent was founded and built, a son of Uta 
 by her first husband being, as is record- 
 ed, the first prior. 
 
 It was not long before the young com- 
 munity became rich. Such was the ordi- 
 nary, the almost invariable, course of 
 matters. Property was held on very un- 
 stable conditions even by the great and 
 powerful. The most secure of all tenures 
 was that by which the Church held what 
 was once her own. And in a state of 
 things when men were persuaded both 
 that it was very doubtful whether they 
 would be able to keep possession of their 
 property, especially whether they would 
 be able to secure such possessions to 
 those who were to come after them, and 
 that the surest way to escape that retribu- 
 tion in the next world which they fully 
 believed to have been incurred by their 
 deeds in this world was to give what they 
 possessed to some monastic institution, 
 it is not difficult to understand how and 
 why monasteries grew rich. And it is 
 equally intelligible that the result should 
 have followed which did, as we know, 
 follow almost invariably. As the mon- 
 asteries became rich the monks became 
 corrupt — first comfortable, then luxuri- 
 ous, then licentious. The Benedictines 
 escaped this doom more frequently than 
 the other orders. Even after their great 
 convents had become wealthy and pow- 
 erful landlords they were often very good 
 landlords, and <"he condition of their lands 
 and of their tenants and vassals contrast- 
 ed favorably with that of the lands and 
 dependants of their lay neighbors. The 
 superiority of the Benedictines in this re- 
 spect was doubtless due to their studious 
 and literary habits and proclivities. It is 
 constantly urged that the cause of learn- 
 ing and of literature owes a great debt of 
 gratitude to the monks, but it should be 
 said that this debt is due almost, exclu- 
 sively to the sons of St. Benedict. 
 
 But something more than this may 
 be said for the community founded by 
 Duchess Uta, the beautiful ruins of whose 
 dwelling now complete the picturesque 
 charm of this most exquisite valley. By 
 a rare exception history has in truth noth- 
 ing to say against them. Their record is 
 quite clear. All remaining testimony de- 
 
 clares that from their first establishment 
 to the day of their dissolution the Aller- 
 heiligen monks lived studious and blame- 
 less lives. Possibly, the profound seclu- 
 sion of their valley, literally shut in from 
 the outer world by vast masses of thick 
 roadless forests, may have contributed to 
 this result, though similar circumstances 
 do not in all cases seem to have ensured 
 a similar consequence. Good fortune 
 probably did much in the matter. A 
 happy succession of three or four good 
 and able abbots would give the place a 
 good name and beget a good tradition in 
 the community ; and this in such cases is 
 half the battle. "Such and such goings- 
 on may do elsewhere, but they won't suit 
 Allerheiligen " — such a sentiment, once 
 made common, would do much for the 
 continuance of a good and healthy tra- 
 dition. 
 
 Accordingly, it was long before the 
 sentence of dissolution went forth against 
 the monastery of Allerheiligen — that sen- 
 tence which was to produce a change in 
 the place and all around it as momentous 
 as that other sentence which some seventy 
 years later went forth against Baden-Ba- 
 den. It was not till 1802 that the mon- 
 astery of Allerheiligen was dissolved ; 
 and its extinction was due then not to 
 any reason or pretext drawn from the 
 conduct of the inmates, but to the re- 
 ligious dissensions and political quarrels 
 of princes and governments. But the 
 doom was all the more irrevocably cer- 
 tain. In all the countries in which mon- 
 asteries have been abolished and Church 
 property confiscated tales eagerly spread, 
 and by no means wholly disbelieved 
 even by the spoilers themselves, are 
 current of the "judgments" and retri- 
 bution which have sooner or later fallen 
 on those who have been enriched by the 
 secularization of Church property or who 
 have taken part in the acts by which the 
 Church has been dispossessed. But rare- 
 ly has what the world now calls "chance" 
 brought about what the Church would 
 call so startlingly striking a manifesta- 
 tion of the wrath of Heaven against the 
 despoilers of "God's house." St. Nor- 
 bert was the original founder of the Pre- 
 monstratensian rule. And it was pre- 
 
BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 83 
 
 cisely on St. Norbert's Day next after 
 the dissolution of the monastery of Al- 
 lerheiligen that a tremendous and — the 
 local chroniclers say — unprecedented 
 storm of thunder, lightning and hail 
 broke over the woodland valley and the 
 devoted fabric in such sort that the light- 
 ning, more than once striking the build- 
 ings, set them on fire and reduced the 
 vast pile to the few picturesque ruins 
 which now delight the tourist and the 
 landscape painter. Could the purpose 
 and intent of the supernal Powers have 
 been more strongly emphasized or more 
 clearly marked ? Truly, the scattered 
 monks may have been excused for re- 
 calling with awe, not unmingled with a 
 sense of triumph, the prophetic denun- 
 ciation of their foundress Uta, which has 
 been cited above, against whoso should 
 undo the pious deed she was doing. 
 For more than six hundred years her 
 work had prospered and her will had 
 been respected, and now after all those 
 centuries the warning curse was still po- 
 tent. Neither thunder nor lightning, nor 
 the anger of St. Norbert, however, avail- 
 ed to rebuild the monastery or recall the 
 monks. Their kingdom and the glory 
 thereof has passed to another, even to 
 Herr Mittenmeyer, Wzrth und Gastgeber, 
 who has built a commodious hostelry close 
 by the ruins, which are mainly those of 
 the church, and on the site of the mo- 
 nastic buildings, and who distributes a 
 hospitality as universal, if not quite so 
 disinterested, as that practised by his 
 cowled predecessors. There, for the 
 sum of six marks — about a dollar and 
 a half — per diem you may find a well- 
 furnished cell and a fairly well-supplied 
 refectory, and may amuse yourself with 
 pacing in the walks where St. Norbert's 
 monks paced, looking on the scenes of 
 beauty on which they gazed, and casting 
 your mind for the nonce into the mould 
 of the minds of those who so looked and 
 mused. You may do so, indeed, thanks 
 to Herr Mittenmeyer, with greater com- 
 fort, materially speaking, than the old in- 
 mates of the valley could have done. For 
 the most charming and delicious walks 
 have been made through the woods on 
 either side of the narrow valley, and 
 
 skilfully planned so as to show you all the 
 very remarkable beauties of it. These, 
 in truth, are of no ordinary kind. The 
 hillsides which enclose the valley are 
 exceedingly steep, almost precipitous 
 indeed in some places, though not suf- 
 ficiently so to prevent them from being 
 clothed with magnificent forests. Down 
 this narrow valley a little stream runs, 
 and about a quarter of a mile from the 
 spot on which the convent stood, and the 
 ruins stand, makes a series of cascades 
 of every variety of form and position 
 that can be conceived. All these falls, 
 together with the crystalline pools in 
 huge caldrons worn by the waters out 
 of the rocks at their feet, were no doubt 
 well known to the vassal fishermen who 
 brought their tribute of trout to the con- 
 vent larder. But the majority of the 
 holy men themselves, I fancy, lived and 
 died without seeing some of the falls, for 
 they would be by no means easily ac- 
 cessible without the assistance of the 
 paths which by dint of long flights of 
 steps, constructed of stones evidently 
 brought from the ruins of the abbey, 
 carry the visitor to every spot of vantage- 
 ground most favorable for commanding 
 a view of them. If, however, you have 
 the advantage over the monks in this 
 respect, your retreat will be less adapted 
 to the purposes of retirement in another 
 point of view. Ten or a dozen carriages 
 a day filled with German tourists, all in 
 high spirits and all very thirsty (" Thanks 
 be !" says Herr Mittenmeyer), are not ap- 
 propriate aids to the indulgence of con- 
 templation. Scott advised his readers if 
 they "would view fair Melrose aright, to 
 visit it by the pale moonlight." And to 
 those who would view Allerheiligen aright 
 I would add the recommendation that the 
 moon should be an October moon. The 
 usual holiday - making months in Ger- 
 many are by that time over. The pro- 
 fessors have gone back to their chairs 
 in the different universities ; the privat- 
 docents have reopened their courses ; 
 the substantial burghers have returned 
 to their shops ; and the rat/is of all sorts 
 and degrees have ensconced themselves 
 once more behind their official desks, and 
 have ceased to "babble of green fields " 
 
84 
 
 BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 any more till this time twelvemonth. The 
 tourists will have gone, and the autumnal 
 colors will have come into the woods. 
 There is much beech mixed with the pine 
 in these forests, and the beech in October 
 is as gorgeous a master of color as Rubens 
 or Veronese. HerrMittenmeyer'smind, 
 too, will have entered into a more placid 
 and even - tempered phase. A stout, 
 thickset man is Herr Mittenmeyer, with 
 broad, rubicund face and short bull neck, 
 of the type that suggests the possibility 
 of an analogous shortness of temper un- 
 der the pressure of being called in six 
 different directions at once. Altogether, 
 it is better in October. The song of the 
 waterfall will not then be the only one 
 making the woods melodious. There 
 will be a fitful soughing of the wind in 
 the forest. There will be a carpeting of 
 dry, pale -brown oak -leaves on all the 
 paths which "will make your steps vo- 
 cal." Again and again, when slowly 
 and musingly climbing the steep home- 
 ward path up the valley in the dark 
 hour, when the sun has set and before 
 the moon has yet risen, you will fancy 
 that you hear the tread among the leaves 
 of a sandalled foot behind you. But it is 
 well that the path leads you, for there is 
 no more any vesper-bell flinging its sweet 
 and welcome notes far and wide over hill 
 and vale to guide the returning wanderer 
 through the forest. 
 
 Then the whole of this Black Fotest 
 region is full of legends and traditional 
 stories, which live longer and are more 
 easily preserved among a people where 
 the sons and the daughters live and mar- 
 ry and die for the most part under the 
 shadow of the same trees and the same 
 thatch beneath which their fathers and 
 mothers did the same. Of course, the 
 Black Huntsman is as well known as 
 of yore, though perhaps somewhat more 
 rarely seen. But his habits and special- 
 ties have become too well known to all 
 readers of folk-lore to need any further 
 notice. Less widely known histories, 
 each the traditional subject of inglenook 
 talk in its own valley, may be found at 
 every step. There is a rather remark- 
 able grotto or cavern in the hill above 
 Allerheiligen, the main ridge which di- 
 
 vides that valley from Achern and the 
 Rhine. It is, you are told, the Edel- 
 frauengrab (the "Noble Lady's Grave"). 
 And you will be further informed, if you 
 inquire aright, how that unhallowed spot 
 came to be a noble lady's grave, and 
 something more than a grave. 'Twas 
 at the time of the Crusades — those mis- 
 chief-making Crusades, which, among 
 all the other evil which they produced, 
 would have absolutely overwhelmed the 
 divorce courts of those days with press 
 of business if there had then been any 
 divorce courts. This noble lady's lord 
 went to the Crusades. How could a gal- 
 lant knight and good Christian do aught 
 else ? Of course he went to the Crusades ! 
 And of course his noble lady felt extreme- 
 ly dull and disconsolate during his ab- 
 sence. What was she to do ? There 
 was no circulating library ; and even if 
 there had been, she would not have been 
 able to avail herself of its resources, for, 
 though tradition says nothing upon the 
 subject, it may be very safely assumed 
 that she could not read. And needle- 
 work in the company of her maids must 
 have become terribly wearisome after a 
 time. She could go to mass, and to ves- 
 pers also. Probably she did so at the 
 new church of the recently - established 
 community nestling in so charming a 
 spot of the lovely valley beneath her. 
 Let us hope that it was not there that 
 she fell in with one whom in an hour 
 of weakness she permitted to console her 
 too tenderly for the absence of her cru- 
 sading lord. Had she waited with pa- 
 tience but only nine months longer for 
 his return, all would have been well. 
 For he did return as nearly as possible 
 about that time ; and, arriving at his own 
 castle-door, met one whom he at once 
 recognized as his wife's confidential maid 
 coming out of the house and carrying a 
 large basket. The natural inquiry whith- 
 er she was going, and what she had in 
 her basket, was answered by the state- 
 ment — uttered with that ingenuous fluen- 
 cy and masterly readiness for which la- 
 dies' maids have in all countries, and 
 doubtless in all ages, been celebrated — 
 that the basket contained a litter of pup- 
 pies which she was taking to the river 
 
BADEN AND ALLERHEILIGEN. 
 
 85 
 
 to drown. Alas ! the girl had adhered 
 but too nearly to the truth. There were 
 seven living and breathing creatures in 
 the basket, and the confidential maid 
 had been sent on the very confidential 
 errand of drowning them. Woe worth 
 the day ! They were seven little un- 
 christened Christians, doomed to die one 
 death as they had been born at one birth 
 — the result of that erring noble lady's 
 fault. The methods of injured husbands 
 were wont to be characterized by much 
 simplicity and directness of purpose in 
 those days. The noble crusader invoked 
 the aid of no court, either spiritual or lay. 
 He happened to remember the existence 
 of a certain dismal cavern in the sand- 
 stone rock not far from his dwelling. 
 The entrance to it was very easily wall- 
 ed up. That cavern became the noble 
 lady's prison and deathbed, as well as 
 her grave ! And a valuable possession 
 has that lady's death and grave become 
 to the descendants of her lord's vassals, 
 for many a gulden is earned by guiding 
 the curious to see the spot and by retail- 
 ing the tragic history. 
 
 Well ! and of the two changes,- the two 
 abolitions, which have been here record- 
 ed, which was the most needed, which 
 the most salutary, which the least min- 
 gled in its results with elements of evil? 
 Poor Baden piteously complains that it 
 does not take half the money in the 
 course of the year that it used to receive 
 as surely as " the season " came round in 
 the old times. And the poor, wholly un- 
 converted by maxims of political econ- 
 omy, declare that there have been no 
 good times in the land since the destruc- 
 tion of the monasteries. After all, Ab- 
 bot Fischer (that was the name of the 
 last of the long line) and his monks were 
 less objectionable than M. Benazet and 
 his croupiers. Could we perhaps keep 
 the scales even and make things plea- 
 sant all round by re-establishing both 
 the abolished institutions — restoring the 
 croupiers and "makers of the game" to 
 their green table, and requiring them out 
 of their enormous gains to re-endow the 
 convent ? " C'est une idee, comme une 
 autre !" as a Frenchman says, 
 
 T, Adolphus Trollope. 
 

 
 
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 WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 PART I. 
 
 THE RUE DE RIVOLI AND THE TOUR ST. JACQUES. 
 
 " A LL roads lead to Paris," said the 
 ■L\- wise and witty Doudan : "it is the 
 Rome of the new era." I will not offend 
 my readers by repeating a native witti- 
 cism which has become a proverb. Amer- 
 86 
 
 icans — good and bad — are not the only 
 foreigners who congregate in Paris. Pa- 
 ris was the first stage in the grand tour 
 of the last century ; French comedies and 
 caricatures of fifty years ago abound in 
 
WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 representations of the English ; some of 
 the noblest names of Great Britain are 
 now more identified with Paris than with 
 London. The Irish Jacobites who emi- 
 grated in a body after the triumph of 
 William of Orange were soon incorpo- 
 rated into the French Legitimist society. 
 That which now stands for the court of 
 Poland has its seat in Paris : the Hotel 
 Lambert is occupied by the Czartoryskis, 
 who represent the extinct royalty in vir- 
 tue of their descent from kings of Poland 
 of their own name and from the Sapie- 
 has, who also sat upon that rickety throne. 
 They form a centre for the Polish society 
 of Paris, amidst which they preserve a 
 semblance of regal dignity and the eti- 
 quette of a court, reproducing the Stuart 
 court at St. Germains in the seventeenth 
 century. There is also a high Spanish 
 society, with Queen Isabella at its head. 
 Much foreign royalty finds a home and 
 holds a certain state there. The emperor 
 Julian the Apostate liked Paris because 
 it was quiet : it may be doubted whether 
 many people have resorted to it since his 
 time for that reason, yet it draws and 
 holds the grave as well as the gay. Cho- 
 pin went thither on a visit, and remain- 
 ed there for ever after : it was a joke of 
 his to the last that he was merely pass- 
 ing through Paris. Heine found him- 
 self moored there for life : his yearnings 
 for the Fatherland always produced a 
 reaction toward France. In his night 
 thoughts sleepless fancy brings before 
 him the oaks and lindens of Germany 
 ♦ and his old mother, whom he has not 
 seen for ten years ; but it ends — 
 
 Thank Heaven ! through my window streams 
 The Frankish sun with gladsome beams : 
 Here comes my wife, as fresh as day. 
 To laugh my German griefs away. 
 
 It is hard to say wherein this univer- 
 sal charm lies. Paris is the least cos- 
 mopolitan of great cities — she is only 
 French : the complaint of the nation 
 has been that Paris stands for the whole 
 country, whereas there is much of France 
 which is not Parisian, much of it which 
 shows the influence of Paris less than 
 some circles of American society did ten 
 years ago (just now they take their tone 
 from Marlborough House and Sandring- 
 
 ham). Yet, though it is true that Paris is 
 not all France, she is French, essentially 
 French ; and there must be something in 
 the nature of her inhabitants which offers 
 points of sympathy to the variety of na- 
 tions and dispositions gathered together 
 there. There is extreme diversity in the 
 range of French character, which may 
 easily be observed in the difference of 
 their public men, the reserved scholarly 
 type being as distinct as the theatrical or 
 the satirical. Notwithstanding a prone- 
 ness to violence in the national temper- 
 ament, which breaks out in times and in 
 ways at which all Christendom stands 
 aghast, and other tendencies peculiar- 
 ly repugnant to the Anglo - Saxon, the 
 French possess qualities which raise 
 their standard to a higher level than 
 that of their decorous neighbors. The 
 notions of honor and glory which have 
 been turned into a scoff by people in- 
 capable of understanding the ideal are 
 familiar to them from the cradle : such 
 seed, falling on good soil, brings forth 
 flowers of chivalry like Larochejacquelin 
 and some of the men who fought for us a 
 hundred years ago. But there are home- 
 lier virtues which the French practise 
 more assiduously than any other people 
 — thrift, for instance. There is nothing 
 which strikes us open-handed, over-care- 
 less Americans more disagreeably on go- 
 ing abroad than the perpetual wrangle 
 over candle-ends and cheese -parings, 
 farthings and halfpence. I am not speak- 
 ing now of the customary fleecing of for- 
 eigners and travellers, but of the habit- 
 ual economy ; and the form which this 
 takes in England is what we call "mean- 
 ness " — a parsimony which, besides 
 pinching itself, makes use of every small 
 and shabby trick for saving at the ex- 
 pense of others. In Germany also this 
 necessity, though more self-respecting, 
 has a sordid aspect. In Italy it gayly 
 sacrifices the necessaries of life to the 
 luxuries, and induces the majority of 
 the middle class, and not a few of the 
 nobility, to stint themselves in food and 
 fuel for the sake of opera -tickets, an 
 afternoon drive, a hohday suit of clothes 
 — not from ostentation, but from a prefer- 
 ence for what is amusing- to what is sub- 
 
JVJ/y BO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 stantial. But in France the sense of or- 
 der and fitness is perpetually gratified by 
 the proportion and relation preserved be- 
 tween people's means and their lives ; 
 by the unusual neatness and grace with 
 
 which even poverty can be invested ; by 
 the cheerftilness with which lifelong toil 
 and a hard lot are borne ; by the spirit 
 and good sense which season much work 
 with a little play. Courtesy of the finest 
 
 kind is an almost invariable rule, in spite 
 of threadbare stories of Frenchmen who 
 take the wing of a chicken and the best 
 seat in the railway - carriage : the Eng- 
 lishman or German who will not take 
 the whole chicken or the only seat is the 
 
 exception. The American criterion of 
 good-nature and good manners must not 
 be carried across the Atlantic. Another 
 hackneyed reproach against the French 
 which we have taken up from the Eng- 
 lish is, that they have no home-life, be- 
 
IVJIV no WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 cause they live on flats and eat at res- 
 taurants. The reply is now almost as 
 familiar as the accusation, yet it must 
 be repeated as long as the accusation is 
 brought : The family tie is a warmer and 
 closer bond in France than in England, 
 or even with us ; the grandfather or 
 grandmother is the cherished and re- 
 vered centre of a circle which often in- 
 cludes a bachelor uncle or spinster cou- 
 sin ; and cold pudding for poor relations 
 is unknown. There is a sort of unself- 
 ishness practised among all classes in 
 France of which we have very little 
 knowledge : it is a common act for a sis- 
 ter to renounce her share of the parental 
 inheritance to give a brother the means 
 of starting in life, or for several members 
 of a family to unite in the same sacrifice 
 to make up a sister's dower : this gene- 
 rally implies for all but the chosen one 
 straitened means and single lives — for 
 women often a convent — while that one, 
 if a man, becomes in return the stay and 
 support of the rest; if a woman, their good 
 angel. A comparison of the virtues of the 
 Latin and other races might explain much 
 of the charm of Latin countries. These 
 amiable qualities, although unknown to 
 the greater number of strangers who fre- 
 quent Paris, or denied by them, help to 
 produce that agreeable temperature of 
 cheerfulness and satisfaction which goes 
 for a great deal in one's enjoyment of 
 a place. But the positive resources for 
 tastes of every sort are inexhaustiblg;___ 
 To begin with, there is scarcely a pur- 
 suit, whether serious or frivolous, which 
 may not be followed to greater advantage 
 in Paris than in any other European city. 
 There is not such an accumulation of 
 amusements as in London during the 
 season, but, on the other hand, there 
 is no dead season in Paris, as in almost 
 all other capitals. The great galleries 
 are open the whole year round, and so, 
 practically, are the theatres and opera- 
 houses, for their short vacations do not 
 occur simultaneously : good music and 
 acting are always to be found. The 
 rush of social gayety is over before the 
 spring exhibition of paintings opens; 
 there is no custom among the richer 
 people of leaving town in a body, such 
 
 as prevails in London and our great 
 cities, so that Paris never wears a dreary, 
 deserted aspect ; the display in the shop- 
 windows does not lose its sheen, nor the 
 Champs Elysees their life, nor the Bois 
 de Boulogne its fashion, at any time of 
 year. Most people like a place the out- 
 ward aspect of which puts them in good 
 spirits. 
 
 This feature of Paris must have been 
 less prominent before the reign of Na- 
 poleon 111. and M. Haussmann. Those 
 who love the architectural expression of 
 what is venerable, picturesque and en- 
 crusted with historical associations watch- 
 ed the progress of their improvements 
 with grief. It was curious to observe as 
 the emperor's popularity declined how 
 the tone of the people and the press 
 changed in regard to this magnificent 
 clearing out. At first it was spoken of 
 as the "embellishments," then as the 
 "alterations," then as the "demolition:" 
 an illustrated paper constantly published 
 woodcuts of buildings which were disap- 
 pearing under the title of " Paris qui s'en 
 va." It was natural that many Parisians 
 should bewail the destruction of so much 
 thatwas old and beautiful, and that many 
 visitors like myself should have mourned 
 to find the goal of a pilgrimage only the 
 site of a former shrine. But the grand 
 avenue beginning at the beautiful old 
 church of St. Germains I'Auxerrois, em- 
 bracing the palace and courts of the 
 Louvre, the palace, pavilions and gar- 
 dens of the Tuileries, the Place de la 
 Concorde with its fountains and obelisk, 
 the festive Champs filysees, all sunshine 
 and leafy shade, is worth a great many 
 old bits and odd corners. Let us re- 
 member, too, that the immense life of 
 a million and a half of inhabitants and 
 the incalculable currents of travel were 
 forced into those narrow, crooked streets, 
 blind alleys, dark passages, and we shall 
 admit the need of the straight channels 
 and the open thoroughfares. The mod- 
 ernization of ancient and picturesque cities 
 is a constant and natural subject of lam- 
 entation, but modern life requires modern 
 accommodation : it is impossible that the 
 capital of Austria or Italy in the nine- 
 teenth century should remain as it was 
 
9° 
 
 WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 in the Middle Ages. Paris, as was in- 
 evitable, has changed far more than Vi- 
 enna, far more than the Eternal City will 
 ever change, let us hope, but she is not 
 bereft of all her ancient ornaments. If 
 we are most interest- 
 ed by the far past, as 
 the citizens of a new 
 country are apt to be, 
 let us begin by look- 
 ing around at some 
 of the relics which 
 still remain, without 
 departing from the 
 beaten track. 
 
 No street is so in- 
 separably connected 
 with the modern 
 and American idea 
 of Paris as the Rue 
 de Rivoli, a broad, 
 light -colored vista 
 of hotels, handsome 
 houses and spark- 
 ling shop-windows : 
 following it to the 
 end, we come to the 
 Tour St. Jacques, a 
 fine fragment of late 
 Gothic rising nearly 
 two hundred feet 
 from the pavement, 
 like a steep rock 
 from a plain. It is 
 the last vestige of a 
 church begun under 
 Louis XII., finished 
 in the palmy days of 
 Francis I. and de- 
 molished by the mob 
 in 1789. Under the 
 pointed arch of the 
 lowest story stands a 
 statue of Pascal, who 
 made some of his 
 philosophical exper- 
 iments in this tower. 
 From its s u m m i t , 
 
 once crowned by a lovely spire, there is 
 a magnificent view of Paris. From that 
 height the Seine seems to flow almost at 
 our feet, dividing around the island on 
 which stands Notre Dame, whose mighty 
 towers are close over against us. We look 
 
 down into thelittle, narrow streets near the 
 cathedral, and they swarm with shadowy 
 historical figures, but the personages of 
 Victor Hugo's novel Notre Dame de Paris 
 — or, as we call it, The Hunchback of 
 
 THE STE. CHAPELLE. 
 
 Notre Dame — drive out the real and 
 rightful ghosts. . It is a handbook for 
 this part of Paris, in- which one may 
 find the city restored as it was three 
 centuries ago and as great part of it re- 
 mained until recent times. The island 
 
IV//V no WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 91 
 
 seems one to us looking down, but it is 
 several islets pieced together and bridged 
 across. ' Still gazing from the Tour St. 
 Jacques, we see with a shudder how hard- 
 ly the exquisite Ste. Chapelle escaped the 
 flames of the Commune : when the fire 
 had all but reached the walls it stopped 
 as if by a miracle, and this gem of early 
 florid architecture survived. A special 
 providence watches over this little church, 
 small in comparison with its great neigh- 
 bor. It was built by the royal St. Louis 
 to receive relics of peculiar sacredness 
 from Palestine, part of the true cross and 
 the crown of thorns. The two octagonal 
 towers are encircled halfway up by a 
 crown of thorns in stone : the same fan- 
 cy has carved and bristled the pinnacles 
 with little spikes which mingle with the 
 foliage of the crockets and produce a 
 luxuriant decoration. In 1618 the Ste. 
 Chapelle was endangered by a fire which 
 destroyed one of the finest halls of the 
 adjacent Palais de Justice ; twelve years 
 later its own beautiful spire was burnt, 
 and not replaced until 1853 ; in 1776 all 
 the buildings actually adjoining it were 
 consumed; in 1781 the conflagration 
 raged about it, sweeping away monu- 
 ments and mementos of every period, 
 but sparing the splendid reliquary : the 
 jewel-like glass of the windows, coeval 
 with the church, escaped the fury of the 
 Revolution. The church has been re- 
 stored with extreme care from remains 
 of the "old wood - carving, frescoes and 
 sculpture, so that we look upon its beau- 
 ties as they delighted the devout heart of 
 its royal founder on the eve of departure 
 for his first ill-starred crusade,.JjNotwith- 
 standing the flaws in his character, Louis 
 IX., like St. Elizabeth of Hungary, is one 
 of those mediseval physiognomies whose 
 enthusiasm and childlike simplicity, un- 
 spotted through life, make us forget their 
 shortcomings : in those days the great of 
 the earth, whatever their faults, had often 
 an unworldliness which imparts a sin- 
 gular purity and luminousness to their 
 memory. 
 
 The island well illustrates how crowd- 
 ed every rood of the old city is with 
 places of interest. In this small space 
 alone there are the cathedral, the Ste. 
 
 Chapelle, the Palais de Justice, the 
 church of St. Louis en I'lle — a small 
 church built in 1664, but interesting 
 from its connection with the University 
 of Paris ; the Hotel Dieu, the most an- 
 cient hospital in Paris, the origin of 
 which dates from Merovingian times ; 
 the " Hotel Lambert, a lordly mansion 
 which appears in the memoirs of the 
 seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, 
 and now, by the occupancy of the Czar- 
 toryskis, represents the court of Poland; 
 the Conciergerie. Many of the oldest 
 edifices are built over still more vener- 
 able ones, of which the foundations and 
 other portions are still visible : many 
 contain smaller independent structures, 
 like the ancient church of St. Julien des 
 Pauvres within the precincts of the Hotel 
 Dieu. Paris may be studied like a huge 
 palimpsest in stone and mortar, where 
 beneath the new is something old, and 
 beneath the old something older. The 
 superb brand - new Tribunal de Com- 
 merce is a case in point : between the 
 antique piles of the Palais de Justice and 
 the Hotel Dieu its modern Corinthian 
 architecture is strikingly out of place. 
 The grandiose, heavily-handsome stair- 
 case and cupola and the Cour d'Honneur, 
 built like the court of an Italian palace 
 of the Renaissance, have neither state- 
 liness nor meaning in their present po- 
 sition : the building belongs to the new 
 quarters, to the city of Napoleon III. and 
 M. Haussmann ; but it stands on the site 
 of a Roman prison and of the medieval 
 church and convent of St. Bartholomew. 
 There never were such people as the 
 French for literally tearing themselves 
 to pieces. Between Notre Dame and the 
 river, where there are an open walk and 
 a modern fountain, stood not fifty years 
 ago the splendid palace of the archbish- 
 ops of Paris, rich with the ecclesiastical 
 treasures of seven centuries. During the 
 political disturbances which attended the 
 accession of Louis Philippe the palace 
 was sacked by the mob, headed, it is 
 said, by officers of the National Guard : 
 everything in it was broken, stolen or 
 thrown into the river, and the building 
 itself was so nearly destroyed that it 
 could not be rebuilt. The archbishop 
 
92 
 
 IVI/y DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 of that time, Monseigneur de Quelen, a 
 man eminent for piety, courage and ev- 
 ery other virtue, twice narrowly escaped 
 death at the hands of that most awful of 
 all mobs, the mob of Paris, who were 
 clamoring for his head on the strength of 
 absurd reports of arms and ammunition 
 
 concealed in the vaults of Notre Dame. 
 His life was shortened by these agitations 
 and revulsions of feeling. Within the 
 last hundred years four archbishops of 
 Paris have died a violent death, begin- 
 ning with the unworthy Gobel, who was 
 guillotined in 1794. They have been a 
 
 line of martyrs ; Mgr. de Quelen was a 
 martyr in all but the mere fact ; Mgr. 
 Afifre fell in attempting to persuade the 
 insurgents of the Faubourg St. Antoine 
 to disperse in the revolution of 1848 : he 
 was shot on the barricade with words of 
 peace on his lips and the olive-branch in 
 
 his hand. He had put aside entreaties and 
 warnings with the words, " The Good 
 Shepherd gives his life for the sheep :" 
 his dying ejaculation was, " May my 
 blood be the last to be shed !" His 
 successor, Mgr. Sibour, was assassinated 
 by a renegade priest in 1857 as he was 
 
tV//¥ DO WE LIKE PARIS P 
 
 93 
 
 performing the great annual service in 
 honor of Ste. Genevieve, the patroness of 
 Paris. The blood of the last archbishop, 
 Mgr. Darboy, is scarcely dry in the ditch 
 of the Grande Roquette, where he was 
 shot by the Communists in May, 1871. 
 The humblest missionary to African sav- 
 ages is in less danger than these magnif- 
 
 PORTE ROUGE, NOTRE DAME. 
 
 icent prelates. We do not like Paris so 
 much when we think of all the blood that 
 has been shed here : the blood-stains of 
 the Commune are still fresh, and, go- 
 ing back as far as we can, we find the 
 damned spot everywhere. One of the 
 most beautiful bits of Notre Dame is the 
 Porte Rouge on the north side, which 
 may be translated the "Door of Blood," 
 and which was built by John the Fearless, 
 duke of Burgundy, in expiation of the 
 murder of the duke of Orleans in 1407. 
 The valor and other princely qualities 
 of Jean sans Peur and the odious cha- 
 racter of his victim, who was the very 
 curse of France, bias us in favor of the 
 former notwithstanding the treachery of 
 his deed. Their enmity had been bitter 
 and of long standing, but they met for 
 
 formal and public reconcihation, attend- 
 ed mass and received 'the sacrament to- 
 gether, and ended the day by a banquet. 
 On his way home the duke of Orleans 
 was surrounded and assassinated : the 
 story goes that one wrapped in a mantle 
 and scarlet hood, so as to conceal his 
 face and figure, suddenly came out of a 
 house and struck the final, fatal blow, 
 and that this was the duke of Burgundy. 
 The duke of Orleans had offered him an 
 unpardonable insult by placing the like- 
 ness of the duchess of Burgundy among 
 the portraits of his mistresses. It is fur- 
 ther said that the duke of Burgundy had 
 received intelligence of a plot to assas- 
 sinate himself, and merely got the start 
 of his foe. His atonement was splendid, 
 according to the notions of those times. 
 About ten years afterward he paid the 
 natural penalty of his great crime, and 
 was slain in his turn on the bridge of 
 Montereau during a parley with the dau- 
 phin, afterward Charles VII. His tomb 
 is at Dijon, the place of his birth, beside 
 that of his father, Philippe le Hardi ; his 
 duchess Margaret lies by his side coronet- 
 ed and in daisy-sprinkled robe ; around 
 the base of the monument troops of little 
 monks mourn the death of their prince 
 with every demonstration of grief. But 
 under the rich Gothic canopy which forms 
 the porch of the Porte Rouge the duke 
 and duchess of Burgundy kneel in per- 
 petual repentance amid a crowd of divine 
 and sacred figures. 
 
 The combination of richness in detail 
 and simplicity of general plan is the cha- 
 racteristic beauty of Notre Dame. The 
 eye comprehends its grand proportions 
 at the first glance : it is pervaded by a 
 sublime repose which is undisturbed by 
 the prodigality of sculpture on the triple 
 portal, the flying buttresses, the rose- 
 windows, the three galleries. Pointed 
 Gothic cannot go further in the union 
 of majesty and grace. 
 
 Even amid these magnificent land- 
 marks of the old French monarchy the 
 imagination of a traveller, tracing the 
 footprints of history, is preoccupied by 
 recollections of the First Revolution. His 
 path is constantly crossing the seared, 
 ensanguined track. In 1872 the marks 
 
94 
 
 fVBV DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 of the Commune hardly seemed fresher 
 than those of 1792. Here, in the island, 
 the round turrets of the Conciergerie, 
 flanking its arched gateway facing the 
 river and seen from the opposite quay, 
 divide our thoughts with the Gothic mag- 
 nificence, with the holy, heroic, fierce, ro- 
 mantic traditions of earlier times. The 
 Conciergerie was a dungeon ages ago, 
 when the Palais de Justice was a royal 
 residence : it had its terrors, its exe- 
 cutions, its oubliettes ; but it is as the 
 prison of the Revolution that it keeps 
 its horrible fame. Nor is it only that 
 the Conciergerie was the prison, but 
 the prison of the doomed — one huge 
 condemned cell. Here the Girondists 
 supped together on the night before 
 their execution with jest and song and 
 speech, with some show of theatrical 
 bravado, with noble acts of real cour- 
 age, like Vergniaud's throwing away 
 the poison of which there was not 
 enough for his friends : hither came 
 Charlotte Corday and Madame Ro- 
 land from the Abbey, Marie Antoi- 
 nette from the Temple, the Jacobins 
 from the Luxembourg — one last jour- 
 ney more for them all. These went 
 forth to death, but hundreds were per- 
 fidiously discharged and sent back to 
 life, to meet a more appalling fate at 
 the gates by the hands of the mob. 
 Twice the apartment in which Marie 
 Antoinette spent her last two months 
 on earth has been consecrated to her 
 memory by paintings, inscriptions, rel- 
 ics : they were torn out and dispersed 
 in 1830; it was again restored and re- 
 stocked during the Second Empire, when 
 the empress Eugenie had set a fashion of 
 enthusiasm for the unfortunate queen ; 
 but it was again pillaged by the fury of 
 the Commune, and the very cell itself 
 destroyed in May, 1871. 
 
 There are occasional exhibitions of 
 ferocity in the lives of individuals and 
 nations on which it is wise not to dwell 
 if we wish to keep our faith in human 
 nature. It is better to leave the island 
 and its still unvisited curiosities and cross 
 to the left bank of the Seine. This is the 
 Rive Gauche, which many think the most 
 interesting and agreeable part of Paris, 
 
 and where they find the best reasons for 
 a sojourn there. The quays are the fa- 
 vorite haunt of bric-a-brac lovers, collec- 
 tors of old books and rare engravings. 
 New books too may be bought at the sec- 
 ond-hand stalls for a song : I have seen 
 a complete edition of Sainte-Beuve, near 
 forty volumes, as fresh as if just from Ha- 
 chette's shop, for something between fif- 
 teen and sixteen dollars. The Pont St. 
 
 CHAPEL OF THE HOTEL DE CLUNY. 
 
 Michel leads from the island to the Latin 
 Quarter, so well known to students, espe- 
 cially students of medicine. It is a lab- 
 yrinth of streets with learned names, the 
 Rue Gerson, Rue Amyot, Rue Descartes, 
 Rue Laplace : the stranger expects ser- 
 mons from their stones and supposes 
 every house to be an abode of learning. 
 Here are the Sorbonne, or theological 
 seminary, the College de France, the 
 Ecole Polytechnique, the Ecole Nor- 
 mal e, while colleges and lycees by the 
 score shoulder one another. But this 
 scholastic realm is the centre of the vie 
 de Boheme, that country without con- 
 fines, the land of the prodigal and ne'er- 
 
WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 95 
 
 do-weel, where many a sober citizen, 
 many a member of the learned profes- 
 sions in the Old and New Worlds, have 
 sowed their wild oats, and some have 
 made them into pipes and blown blithe- 
 ly and tunefully thereupon. Victor Hugo 
 is cicerone for the lie de la Cite, and to 
 Henri Murger belongs the Pays Latin, 
 with its larks, its devil-may-care laugh- 
 ter, its wit, poetry, pathos, its transient 
 yet sometimes tragic loves, its harrowing 
 and horrible destinies. Parisians assert 
 that there is no longer such a life, such 
 a country ; that it has been divided like 
 Poland and its autonomy destroyed ; that 
 Murger's and Mussel's novels are tales 
 from ancient history. If this be true, so 
 much the better : idleness, improvidence 
 and vice are less dangerous when they 
 do not wear sentimental faces and as- 
 sume idyllic attitudes. For one man who 
 came scot-free out of the ordeal, how 
 many left health, happiness, wholesome 
 habits behind them ! The preface to 
 Murger's Vie de Bohhne and Musset's 
 Frederic et Beriierette are the best hom- 
 ilies on the subject — Murger's own sad 
 story the best moral. 
 
 The outward aspect of the quarter, al- 
 though not new, is prosaic enough until 
 suddenly we come upon a Gothic gate- 
 way in an old wall ; and here are the an- 
 cient Lutetia and mediaeval Paris again. 
 It is the entrance to the Hotel de Cluny, 
 a noble specimen of fifteenth-century do- 
 mestic architecture. It may be called the 
 city palace of the abbots of Cluny, as 
 Lambeth is the London house of the 
 archbishops of Canterbury. Down in 
 Burgundy, on the quiet banks of the 
 Saone, stand the magnificent ruins of 
 the abbey of Cluny, founded in the soli- 
 tude by a duke of Aquitaine in 920. 
 It rose rapidly in importance and in- 
 fluence, and the abbot became one of 
 the great ecclesiastical powers of Europe. 
 About a hundred years from its founda- 
 tion, Hildebrand — afterward the great 
 pope Gregory VII. — retired thither to 
 find a stricter rule of life than in his 
 convent at Rome. In another hundred 
 years the post of abbot was filled by Peter 
 the Venerable, an erudite, generous, zeal- 
 ous man, a prominent Church politician. 
 
 He accomplished a great work for the ab- 
 bey, reforming its loosened manners and 
 relaxed rule, obtaining valuable privi- 
 leges and strengthening its prerogatives 
 by the favor of kings and popes. All this 
 makes no difference now to any human 
 being alive, but Peter the Venerable is 
 remembered as the friend of Abelard 
 and Heloise, the most famous pair of 
 lovers the world has ever known. He 
 gave shelter and sympathy to Abelard 
 when that thrice-unhappy man was si- 
 lenced, banished and threatened with 
 excommunication for his independent 
 thinking and speaking. The compas- 
 sion of Peter the Venerable survives with 
 the sorrows of Heloise and Abelard : the 
 tears which he shed over the recital of 
 their misfortunes, his letter of condo- 
 lence to Heloise on Abelard's death, his 
 tenderness for the latter's memory, are 
 preserved in the heavy, correct, unclas- 
 sical tomes of the Bibliotheca Veierum 
 Patrimt, where few people will look for 
 them ; but everybody may see the beau- 
 tiful tomb in the cemetery of Pere la 
 Chaise at Paris which was made by 
 Peter's order for Abelard. Modern lov- 
 ers still make sentimental journeys to 
 the tomb : it is covered with wreaths on 
 All Souls' Day — most of them, sad to 
 say, crowns of everlasting flowers or still 
 more frightful ones of black and white 
 beads. After Peter's death the abbey 
 continued to flourish until it became 
 the head of nearly two thousand religious 
 houses and had a revenue of sixty thou- 
 sand dollars a year. No wonder that the 
 abbot required a town-house at the cap- 
 ital for greater convenience in looking 
 after so many interests, temporal and 
 spiritual ; and toward the close of the fif- 
 teenth century this stately palace arose. 
 It was far from being dedicated exclu- 
 sively to clerical use, however. Soon 
 after it was finished, Mary Tudor, the 
 sister of Henry VIII. of England, lived 
 here while widow of Louis XII. of France, 
 previous to her marriage to Brandon, duke 
 of Suffolk — the unromantic heroine of a 
 romantic love-story. Her bedroom bears 
 the pretty but misleading title of " Cham- 
 bre de la Reine blanche," in allusion to 
 the white mourning which the queens of 
 
96 
 
 WHY DO WE LIKE PARTS? 
 
 France wore as weeds. Here too James 
 V. of Scotland, superfine, poetical, chiv- 
 alrous, ill-fated personage, was married 
 to Madeleine, the daughter of Francis 1. 
 Later, the Guises made a stronghold of 
 
 the place : it served as a refuge of the 
 doves of Port Royal and their abbess ; 
 as the barracks of a company of actors ; 
 as the head - quarters of Marat in '93, 
 until Charlotte Corday's knife stopped 
 
 INTERIOR OF STE. GENEVIEVE (THE PANTHEON). 
 
 the murderous business which was doing 
 there. Its late purpose, horrible as it is 
 to remember, probably saved the Hotel 
 de Cluny from the destruction which 
 overtook the mother - house. On the 
 banks of the Saone two ruined towers 
 and a dilapidated wall are all that re- 
 main of the glorious abbey of Cluny ; 
 
 but the hotel was spared by the sans-cu- 
 lottes, and its regeneration after Marat's 
 occupancy began by its being used in 
 part as a stable, in part as a cooper's shop 
 and for similar harmless purposes. At 
 length it was bought by the accomplish- 
 ed and enthusiastic M. de Sommerard, 
 author of Les Arts' au Moyen Age, to 
 
WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 97 
 
 receive his collection of historical spe- 
 cimens and relics of the early arts in 
 France. The government bought it of 
 his heirs in 1843, ^^''d keeps it as a mu- 
 seum of national antiquities. The lofty 
 rooms with muUioned windows are filled 
 with splendid old furniture, tapestry, lace, 
 pottery, armor, weapons, trinkets and 
 curiosities too various to classify. They 
 are haunted by students and connois- 
 seurs of bric-a-brac ; by artists making 
 sketches of the gorgeous Arras and 
 Gobelin hangings or of those magnifi- 
 cent carved and sculptured mantel- 
 pieces which figure in so many water- 
 color drawings and on so many can- 
 vases ' by actors careful of accuracy in 
 the costume of an historical part ; but 
 most of all by lovers of the past and the 
 picturesque. It is a grand old curiosity- 
 shop. One of the strangest relics in the 
 collection is a set of crowns belonging to 
 the Gothic period in Spain : they consist 
 of a king's, a queen's, and those of six roy- 
 al infants : any well-read child will imme- 
 diately remember Hop-o'-my-Thumb's 
 host, the ogre, in whose family a crown 
 was also an indispensable article of attire. 
 
 The gem of the building is a chapel 
 adjoining the apartment of Mary Tudor: 
 its vaulted roof is supported by a single 
 slender, octagonal column ; the fan-tra- 
 cery of the roof is filled in with a pro- 
 fusion of delicate leafage ; the lectern, 
 credence and other pieces of church fur- 
 niture are carved in the most elaborate 
 manner; the walls are enriched with 
 Gothic niches of exquisite form and de- 
 sign : grace and elegance control the pro- 
 portions and decorations, yet the whole 
 effect is cold and depressing. A church 
 in which men no longer worship can no 
 more retain its aspect of a sanctuary than 
 an uninhabited house the atmosphere of 
 a home ; arm-chairs, tables, sofas, chairs, 
 books, writing-materials cannot preserve 
 an apartment from the mildew of deser- 
 tion which overspreads it when human 
 life no longer abides there ; and so, in 
 spite of the altar and its appointments, 
 the Divine Presence seems to depart from 
 the temple no longer warmed by prayer 
 and praise. 
 
 From the chapel a winding stone stair- 
 7 
 
 case leads down to the older building, 
 the palace of. the emperor Julian and of 
 the Merovingian and Carlovingian kings 
 — the Palais des Thermes, as it is called, 
 nothing but the great Roman bathing- 
 establishment being left. The principal 
 chamber is a vast vaulted hall, with walls 
 as thick as a fortress, which has been con- 
 verted into a museum of Roman antiqui- 
 ties. This opens upon a little grassy area, 
 as quiet, trim and green as a convent-gar- 
 den, which is also filled with fragments 
 of sculpture. It is a common practice 
 abroad to convert the waste spaces in 
 and about fine ruins into gardens, and 
 the charm of these spots is indescribable. 
 One sits on the capital of a fallen pillar 
 or the head of a gargoyle imbedded in 
 close -shorn turf, with brilliant, formal 
 flower-beds on every side like the trays 
 of a jewel-case ; the lights and shadows 
 of the greenery overhead waver on gray 
 crumbling battlements or sculptured tra- 
 cery ; and whether a vision of old build- 
 ers and denizens fills the place, or noth- 
 ing moves except the silently-shifting sun- 
 light and the birds which hop and peek, 
 the moments glide away like flowing wa- 
 ter in these retreats where time has come 
 to a stop. The longer we stay the harder 
 it is to get up and go away, and many an 
 hour slips by in this tranquil enclosure, 
 which contains an epitome of the history 
 of Paris, and the foot lingers as we pass 
 through the old Gothic monastery-porch, 
 which lets us through to the Hotel Cluny 
 and out into the streets of modern Paris 
 again. It was by another of those hair- 
 breadth escapes which saved the Ste. 
 Chapelle that these precious monuments 
 and treasures missed being blown to at- 
 oms in 1 87 1. It was a question of hours : 
 the vaults of the neighboring Pantheon 
 were full of gunpowder, but the troops 
 got possession of the building before the 
 Communists could explode their mines, 
 or the whole quarter, with its hoards of 
 antiquities, art, books, manuscripts, scien- 
 tific apparatus, military trophies — all that 
 piety, learning, valor, taste, intelligent in- 
 dustry, patriotism, delight in — would have 
 been reduced to a heap of rubbish. 
 
 The Pantheon looks as modern as any 
 building in Paris, and it is as difficult to' 
 
WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 admire its eighteenth - century Renais- 
 sance as the eighteenth -century Corin- 
 thian of the Madeleine. The original 
 church was built by Clovis early in the 
 sixth century at the instance of his queen, 
 Clotilde, through whom he was convert- 
 ed to Christianity, and of Ste. Genevieve, 
 the gentle shepherdess and patron saint 
 of Paris. It was first dedicated to Sts. 
 Peter and Paul, but on Ste. Genevieve's 
 death she was buried there and the church 
 renamed in her honor. Nothing of stone 
 and mortar lasts thirteen hundred years 
 except ruins : even a church requires ren- 
 ovation after a millennium. The first 
 church of Ste. Genevieve was burned 
 by the Northmen A. D. 857, and rebuilt ; 
 in the last century it had to be rebuilt 
 again ; and the present edifice was begun 
 once more by command of a king, Louis 
 XV., and at the request of a woman, 
 Madame de Pompadour ! The chaste 
 shades of Ste. Genevieve and Queen 
 Clotilde probably fled before this unhal- 
 lowed reconstruction, and there is noth- 
 ing to call them back to the present fane, 
 superb as it is in dimensions and decora- 
 tion. One traveller at least must con- 
 fess to finding neither edification nor en- 
 joyment in the redundant modern statu- 
 ary representing France and her peculiar 
 virtues and attributes, her great repre- 
 
 sentative men, her goddesses and genii, 
 nor in the showy historical and allegor- 
 ical paintings, although they are signed by 
 the hands of Gros and Gerard. Every step 
 that one takes suggests a sardonic reflec- 
 tion. On the piers which support the dome 
 are bronze tablets to those who fell in the 
 revolution of 1830 : their monuments will 
 endure longer than brass, for they are 
 protected and entirely hidden by the 
 wainscoting which has been placed over 
 them. There is something ludicrous as 
 well as hideous in the way in which each 
 political party in France, as it gets the 
 upper hand, flings the relics of its pre- 
 decessor out of window, like a ghastly 
 parody of Box and Cox's breakfast. The 
 Revolution rushes in ; out goes the dust of 
 saints and kings, that philosophers, athe- 
 ists and sans -culottes may be solemnly 
 entombed in their stead : back comes 
 authority, albeit a National Convention ; 
 away with the bones of Voltaire, Rous- 
 seau, Mirabeau, Marat, the last — who 
 can wonder? — to the common sewer: 
 royalty returns and scrapes together its 
 scattered ashes and restores the broken 
 noses of its effigies ; the Commune comes 
 and blows everything to indiscriminate 
 sherds. These parallels obtrude them- 
 selves too pertinaciously at the Pantheon. 
 
IVHV DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 99 
 
 WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 CONCLUDING PART. 
 
 PALACE OF THK LUXEMBOURG. 
 
 LET us go on to the palace of the Lux- 
 embourg, which is close at hand; 
 not without painful memories, it is true — 
 where in Paris, where on earth, can one 
 escape them? — but with pleasant ones 
 too, and a host of agreeable suggestions 
 and recollections. On this ground in the 
 
 sixteenth century stood the handsome 
 house and gardens of Harlay-Sancy, a 
 great political and financial personage 
 in those days. After passing through the 
 hands of a duke d'Epinay-Luxembourg, 
 who gave the habitation his name, which 
 it has kept in spite of half a dozen other 
 
lOO 
 
 WJiy DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 appellations, it was bought by Marie de 
 Medicis when queen-regent. In mem- 
 ory of her home she caused a palace to 
 be constructed on the model of the Pitti 
 Palace at Florence, but, although the 
 general plan and style of the two are 
 alike, the Luxembourg is a poor repro- 
 duction of its massive Italian prototype. 
 Marie de Medicis bequeathed it to her 
 son, Gaston of Orleans, and although the 
 property frequently changed owners, 
 it as constantly reverted to the Orleans 
 family up to the time of the First Revo- 
 
 lution. Then for a brief terrible time it 
 was used as a prison. "Nightly come 
 the Tumbrils to the Luxembourg with 
 the fatal Roll-call — list of the batch of 
 to-morrow. Men rush toward the gate ; 
 listen if their name be in it. One deep- 
 drawn breath when the name is not in : 
 we live still one day-! And yet some 
 score or scores of names were in. Quick 
 there ! They clasp their loved ones to 
 their heart one last time ; with brief 
 adieu, wet-eyed or dry-eyed, they mount 
 and are away. This night to the Con- 
 
 THE PAVILLON DE FLORE OF THE TUILERIES. 
 
 ciergerie ; through the Palais misnamed 
 of Justice to the Guillotine to-morrow."* 
 Government in the shape of the Direc- 
 tory took its seat there, to be succeeded 
 by the Consulate : then it became a par- 
 liamentary building. Palace of the Sen- 
 ate, the Chamber of Peers, Palace of the 
 Senate again, according to the order or 
 disorder of the day, until, on the destruc- 
 tion of the Hotel de Ville in 187 1, it had to 
 be appropriated to the Municipal Coun- 
 cil and the offices of the department of 
 
 * Carlyle's History of the French Revolution. 
 
 the Seine, otherwise the municipality of 
 Paris. 
 
 On my first visit to the Luxembourg it 
 was the wife of the prefect of the Seine 
 for the nonce who graciously showed 
 our party over the palace, which was 
 not then open to the public. She was 
 a trig little woman, with fine dark eyes, 
 nice teeth and that charm of courtesy 
 and readiness which does duty so often 
 and so well in France for wit and beau- 
 ty. The lively little lady considered her 
 residence in the Luxembourg as exile, and 
 
IVJ/V DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 when we admired the spacious rooms, the 
 really royal lodging, she shrugged her 
 shoulders gracefully and assured us that 
 her own hotel on the other side of the 
 river was much more attractive. It might 
 be more homelike and more in the taste 
 of the present day, but the Luxembourg 
 
 struck us as at once stately and cheerful 
 — a very pleasant palace. The paintings 
 and statues are by the best artists of the 
 century, and there is a succession of pillar- 
 ed halls with cupolas, of lofty, light saloons 
 with painted ceilings profusely carved and 
 gilded, of corridors and galleries lined 
 
 TOMB OF NAPOLEON 1. 
 
 with busts and statues — all bright and 
 airy, not gloomy and dull like many 
 monarchs' homes. Marie de Medicis's 
 own suite of rooms is splendid and lux- 
 urious, befitting a queen of France and 
 daughter of the Italian Renaissance ; 
 the furniture is gold and crimson vel- 
 vet ; the pictures are by Poussin, Phi- 
 lippe de Champagne and Rubens, who 
 might be called her painter - laureate. 
 There is a miserable contrast between 
 her life here and her end in the dismal 
 lodgings at Cologne. Adjoining the 
 principal palace there is a small one — 
 or more properly a hotel in the French 
 acceptation of the word as a private 
 house of some pretension — called Le 
 Petit Luxembourg : it was built by Car- 
 dinal Richelieu, and given to his niece, 
 the duchess d'Aiguillon, one of the great 
 ladies and great beauties of her time, 
 and it was the scene of brilliant assem- 
 blies and secret councils in that gay, ar- 
 rogant, aristocratic life of Paris in which 
 social frivolity and the momentous issues 
 of the day were intermixed. Attached to 
 
 this building there is a little cloister — part 
 of a convent that disappeared long ago — 
 which has been roofed over with glass 
 and turned into a conservatory : it makes 
 the most charming of winter - gardens, 
 and a cool resort for summer evenings 
 too, when its stone arches are open to 
 the night air and the fountain plashes in 
 the centre of the quadrangle. The Petit 
 Luxembourg has its own private garden 
 with fine old trees, and the feudal rural 
 appendage of a dovecote. 
 
 Our amiable conductress took leave 
 of us after doing the honors of the pal- 
 ace and its dependencies, and we found 
 our way into the picture-gallery. It was 
 originally formed by Louis XV. in 1750 
 to exhibit paintings and other works of 
 art which were packed away in the gar- 
 rets of the Louvre and the cabinets of 
 Versailles. But the number of these is 
 not large, and the interest of the collec- 
 tion, which is two -thirds modern, may 
 be inferred from the fact that it is made 
 up of recognized masterpieces. If I re- 
 member rightly, the pictures have all 
 
IVHV no WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 taken a first prize at the annual exhibi- 
 tion known as the Salon : they belong to 
 the government, and are kept here dur- 
 ing the artist's life, to be after his death 
 eventually transferred to the Louvre, or, 
 if their popularity does not stand the test 
 of time, to be sent into honorable retire- 
 ment in one of the provincial galleries. 
 Here, then, we see the most celebrated 
 canvases of the French contemporary 
 
 FONTAINE MOLIERE. 
 
 school. Among others are La Source, 
 by Ingres, a cool, chaste nymph issuing 
 from a rock : her lovely naked body has 
 all the pearly freshness of dew ; the gray 
 cliff and a garland of humid green make 
 up a picture of exquisite purity and re- 
 finement. Couture's Decadence covers 
 an immense surface of wall : it shows 
 the influence of the Venetian school, 
 which first roused his genius in child- 
 hood. It is an historical painting, typi- 
 fying the decline of the Roman Empire 
 by a huge orgy, steeped in sensuality, 
 but not revolting : men and women with 
 beautiful forms and faces press grapes 
 into golden cups, scatter roses, recline 
 on ivory couches and purple draperies, 
 burn incense for the perfume, not for 
 
 worship ; two philosophers stand apart 
 smiling and moralizing; somewhere in 
 the background, I think, a Christian is 
 brought in. It is a theatrical, scenic pic- 
 ture, of which this is but a skeleton de- 
 scription. Hebert's Malarie depicts a 
 boatload of Italian peasants slowly fall- 
 ing down the imperceptible current of 
 a stream which traverses the Pontine 
 Marshes : the fever has laid its hot hand 
 on their drooping heads, on the slug- 
 gish stream, on its parched yellow 
 banks, on the heavy air. It is a 
 picture full of sentiment and mel- 
 ancholy : the doom of a race is 
 there. Regnault is the latest idol 
 of the French artist and literary 
 world : he was good, gifted, brave, 
 handsome, young ; he threw away 
 his life and his blossoming promise 
 in the trenches at the siege of Paris; 
 he was killed by the last volley the 
 Prussians fired. The Luxembourg 
 has two of his pictures — the eques- 
 trian portrait of General Prim, a 
 wonderfully strong, spirited per- 
 formance, which shows the influ- 
 ence of Velasquez and the noble 
 Spanish school; the other is a 
 ghastly Eastern execution. 
 
 From the picture-gallery to the 
 garden it is but a step — the beau- 
 tiful, celebrated old garden, full of 
 great chestnut trees and marbles 
 and twittering birds. This is not a 
 gay garden, a fashionable lounge, 
 like the promenade of the Tuileries, with 
 its orange trees in tubs before the Com- 
 mune. It is a garden of bygone days, 
 and a spirit of seclusion broods over 
 the walks and groves, although they are 
 not deserted. Studious youths from the 
 benches of the neighboring colleges come 
 here book in hand ; old soldiers from the 
 asylums sun themselves on the terrace ; 
 fond couples meet by stealth under the 
 trees ; white - capped nurses gossip with 
 each other while the children toddle and 
 skip along the gravel. The grounds have 
 been ruthlessly sliced and shaved by the 
 new streets and boulevards, but even in 
 their reduced condition they retain so 
 much dignity and charm that their ob- 
 literation, which is sometimes talked of. 
 
fVJIY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 103 
 
 would rob one side of Paris of its chief 
 beauty. 
 
 The painters of the great pictures in 
 the gallery of the Luxembourg are al- 
 most without exception pupils of the 
 Ecole des Beaux Arts. That famous 
 school has its seat in a large modern 
 building, a patchwork of relics and rem- 
 iniscences of the most distant countries 
 and ages : Grecian porticos of recent 
 
 erection are clapped against sculptured 
 Gothic walls of the thirteenth and four- 
 teenth centuries ; scraps of the most ex- 
 quisite French Renaissance, if so we may 
 call that graceful and original style which 
 Italian architects devised for the Valois 
 kings, are intercalated with genuine an- 
 tiques ; yet the external effect is fine and 
 agreeable, and within the discrepancies 
 belong to every academy of fine arts. 
 
 LA MAISON DE MOLIERE. 
 
 In the amphitheatre where the prizes 
 are awarded is Delaroche's great com- 
 position, as familiar in this country as 
 te Europe by the engravings and pho- 
 tographs which were at one time to be 
 seen in every print-shop. I first made 
 its acquaintance in this form with secret 
 scepticism as to the merits of the orig- 
 inal. It looks finely when seen in its 
 right place, which is, after all, the true 
 way to see every work of art, and it is 
 a comprehensive muster of all the great 
 — and many of the lesser — artists of the 
 world. Their physiognomies may be ac- 
 centuated to bring out their individual- 
 ity, but that very fact enables one to pick 
 out the faces like names in a directory. 
 But the room of capital interest is that 
 called the Gallery of Prizes, containing 
 the works which have gained the grand 
 
 prix de Rome, which entitles the suc- 
 cessful competitor to a four years' sojourn 
 in Rome, or, if he prefer it, to two years 
 there and two of travel and study at the 
 expense of the government. The whole 
 work of the school is competitive : the 
 pupil is expected to study alone ; at cer- 
 tain intervals a session is held and a 
 subject for illustration is given ; the stu- 
 dents are required there and then to 
 produce a study of it, whether in paint- 
 ing, sculpture or architecture ; the best 
 attempts are rewarded by an honorable 
 mention or prizes of different degrees; 
 once a year comes the great struggle for 
 the prix de Rome ; the study which takes 
 that prize remains in this hall. It is very 
 curious to compare these first assertions 
 of genius with the mature productions 
 of the same hands : in many the divine 
 
104 
 
 PVHY no WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 spark gleams unmistakably, in others by 
 no less celebrated names we are forced 
 to admire the sharpness of sight which 
 could discern it. But how many of these 
 efforts, some of them giving evidence of 
 remarkable talent, are signed by names 
 unknown to fame ! What becomes of all 
 this promise ? What is the obscure and 
 melancholy end of these disappointed 
 hopes and ambitions, these unredeem- 
 ed pledges ? The whole world knows the 
 history of a Corot or a Meissonier, but 
 who were the candidates of the year 
 before or the year after ? If they died 
 young, the gods loved them, and it, is 
 well ; but if they have lived, where and 
 what are they now ? 
 
 From the Palais des Beaux Arts we turn 
 out upon the quays, and the river -view 
 bursts upon the sight. Up the stream are 
 the towers of Notre Dame, downward the 
 bridges in close succession, until the curv- 
 ing channel brings the trees of the two 
 banks together. Opposite are the Louvre, 
 the Tuileries — the Tuileries, alas ! no 
 more — the ruins of the beautiful • Pa- 
 vilion of Flora, the fountains and ob- 
 elisk of the Place de la Concorde. We 
 are on the Quai d'Orsay, the edge of the 
 Faubourg St. Germain, where it is in bad 
 taste to allude to the " Marseillaise," the 
 assumptionbeing that everybody's grand- 
 father was beheaded to that tune: it is 
 the last retreat of conservatism, Ultra- 
 montanism, aristocracy — the old aris- 
 tocracy, which looks down upon the Na- 
 poleonic courts and the nobility of Louis 
 Philippe as parvenus, and on the sove- 
 reigns themselves as pretenders. Here 
 are the streets so familiar in novels of Pa- 
 risian life, Balzac's, About's, Feuillet's — 
 the Rue de Bellechasse, Rue de Varenne, 
 Rue St. Dominique, Rue de Crenelle ; 
 here is the Rue du Bac, named from the 
 ferry at its foot which plied across the 
 Seine before Mansard built his bridge, 
 the Pont Royal, not two hundred years 
 ago. Madame de Stael in exile on the 
 Lake of Geneva sighed for the gutter of 
 the Rue du Bac, for which countless fair 
 Americans likewise sigh, as on its mar- 
 gin stand the famous shops of the Bon 
 Marche and Petit St. Thomas, two of the 
 prime attractions of Paris to a large class 
 
 of our countrywomen. Why the latter 
 should be so called I never could divine, 
 unless it takes its name from the neigh- 
 boring church of St. Thomas Aquinas, 
 who may be called the Less in respect 
 to Thomas surnamed Didymus, although 
 the Angelic Doctor was the superior in 
 faith, and appears never to have doubt- 
 ed anything. The European custom of 
 giving names to shops as well as inns 
 puzzles Americans at first, but there is 
 something specially incongruous in buy- 
 ing gewgaws, or even plain dry goods, 
 under the patronage of a saint. 
 
 The principal feature of this part of 
 Paris is the Hotel des Invaiides, the 
 great military asylum, an immense, airy, 
 cheerful, uninteresting building, and its 
 church, containing the tomb of Napo- 
 leon I. W^hatever may be the rank of 
 Mansard as an architect of palaces — and 
 I am inclined to think that much of the 
 beauty and dignity are due to his pecu- 
 liar style — it must be a strange taste that 
 can tolerate his ecclesiastical buildings. 
 Everything at the church of tne Inva- 
 iides corresponds to its architecture — 
 the sculpture, paintings and monuments. 
 The crypt occupies the same position in 
 the church that the ladies' cabin does in 
 an ocean-steamer, part above, part be- 
 low, deck. There is nothing imposing or 
 beautiful in the interior ; the square pil- 
 lars do not suit the round vault ; Pradier's 
 colossal statues, representing twelve of 
 Napoleon's victories, are big but not 
 great. The tomb alone and the thought 
 of it make the place solemn, awful. There 
 are certain phrases to which no French- 
 man is insensible. " The sun of Auster- 
 litz," "the cannon of Areola," are words 
 which thrill a chord in the coldest heart 
 of even a Legitimist. It is trite to say 
 that glory is what all Frenchmen prize 
 above everything on earth and in heav- 
 en, and that Napoleon is the incarnation 
 of Glory : no nation, almost no individ- 
 ual, is inaccessible to the same enthusi- 
 asm. There is a magic in the names of 
 conquerors — Alexander, Caesar, Charle- 
 magne, William of Normandy ; the most 
 dauntless courage, the highest military 
 talent do not possess it ; there must be 
 victory besides. For the space of a gen- 
 
1879-] 
 
 WHY DO- WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 105 
 
 eration this man's life was a gigantic vic- 
 tory, a prolonged triumph : the imagina- 
 tion cannot resist the impression. The 
 execration of Byron and Wordsworth 
 could find no comparison for his over- 
 throw but the fall of the archangel. It 
 
 is not the hero of the French nation, but 
 something more tremendous, which rests 
 in that sarcophagus — one of the Titanic 
 race, who strides across the earth, leaving 
 a memory to endure as long as time. It 
 is to be remembered, above all things. 
 
 GRAND STAIRCASE OF THE TRIBUNAL DE COMMERCE. 
 
 that this man slew the Revolution. It is 
 true that the monster was gorged with the 
 blood of her own children, the Gironde, 
 the Mountain, the Convention, and that 
 many blows and wounds had been dealt 
 her by the exasperated nation; but the 
 
 death - stroke was given by Napoleon 
 when he fired on the mob on the 5th of 
 October, 1795, and he stamped out the 
 last spark of life four years later, when he 
 seized upon the divided government and 
 cried, " I will have no more factions." 
 
io6 
 
 IVI/y no IV£ LIKE PARIS? 
 
 [June, 
 
 It was but a week or two after that 
 fateful 13th Vendemiaire that the Place 
 de la Revolution (formerly Place de Lou- 
 is XV.), purged of its guillotine, was re- 
 named Place de la Concorde.* Leavingr 
 
 tOYER OF THE ^EW OPERA-HOUbE 
 
 the Rive Gauche without exploring a 
 tithe of its noteworthy places, we cross 
 the Pont de la Concorde and return to 
 the Rive Droite, entering at once the 
 
 * Galignani's Guide-book says in 1800 ; Mignet's 
 History, 28th October, 1795, or 4th Brumaire. 
 
 vast splendid square. The fountains 
 bulge like great crystal goblets in the 
 sunshine, the obehsk of Luxor cuts sharp 
 against the blue sky, the marble horses 
 prance in eternal struggle with their 
 marble grooms : on 
 one hand is the riv- 
 er, beyond it the 
 facade of the Legis- 
 lative Palace, above 
 which looms the 
 dome of the Inva- 
 lides; on the other, 
 between two palaces 
 with arcades and por- 
 ticos, the broad Rue 
 Royale displays the 
 pillared Corinthian 
 front of the church 
 of the Madeleine ; 
 before us is the ver- 
 dure of the Champs 
 Elysees. All the gay 
 life of Paris is glan- 
 cing through this 
 i^rena on the way to 
 and from the Bois 
 de Boulogne, yet 
 who can see it for 
 the first time and 
 forget that hither the 
 tumbrils brought 
 their load ; that here 
 stood the guillotine 
 like a Moloch which 
 France fed with her 
 children by heca- 
 tombs ; that here fell 
 the head of an inno- 
 cent king and queen, 
 of their saintly sister 
 Madame Elizabeth, 
 of countless men 
 and women whose 
 only crime was be- 
 ing holy or brave or 
 noble, of many who 
 had already shed 
 their blood for their country ? Let French- 
 men remember it, and let others forget 
 it if they can; but this is not easy with 
 the ruins of the Tuileries in sight, with 
 "Liberte, Egalite et Fraternite " of the 
 Commune, that "brotherhood of Cain," 
 
WHY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 107 
 
 stamped like a red hand everywhere 
 on walls and parapets. Order and taste 
 are always busy in France repairing the 
 ravages perpetrated by the love of de- 
 struction which seems inherent in the 
 people : it seems as 
 if France had two 
 hands, one of which 
 is for ever undoing 
 the work of the oth- 
 er. It is not easy to 
 say how long it will 
 be before the deft 
 and diligent hand 
 can heal and hide 
 the gashes and scars 
 of that spring of 1 87 1 . 
 One of the most piti- 
 lessly devastated and 
 disfigured regions is 
 the B o i s de Bou- 
 logne, and here Na- 
 ture alone can recre- 
 ate the beauty of the 
 place: she takes time 
 for her tasks; the 
 next generation will 
 never know the en- 
 chantment of that 
 spot under the Sec- 
 ond Empire. The 
 lake, the islets, the 
 cascades, the lawns, 
 the shrubberies still 
 make it the prettiest 
 and most fairy-like 
 of public parks in its 
 artificial features; 
 but the woods, the 
 noble trees which 
 with patient energy 
 had twice within a 
 century spread their 
 branches over its 
 heights and hollows, 
 are gone : the stumps 
 which cover the long 
 bare hillsides are all 
 that remain of them. In some directions 
 there are still thick copses through which 
 the rider turns his horse's head and can- 
 ters along as solitary as on a forest-path ; 
 but he soon emerges upon a scene of 
 desolation which turns him back to the 
 
 frequented parts of the park, among the 
 barouches and landaus and crowds of 
 people on foot and on horseback, to ask 
 for beer at one of the chalets or for milk 
 at the dairy of the Pre Catalan. 
 
 STREET OF OLDEN PARIS, BY G. DORE. 
 
 Of the infinite variety of amusement 
 and pastime which Paris offers I have 
 heard my country - people speak most 
 often and lovingly of the theatres, in- 
 cluding the opera : as comparatively few 
 of them mentioned concerts, it is to be 
 
io8 
 
 IVBY DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 supposed that the dramatic and scenic 
 elements of the performance count at 
 least for as much as the music in their 
 enjoyment. This preference would not 
 seem strange if it were not so often ex- 
 pressed by Americans who do not un- 
 derstand French. Yet even with this 
 limitation it will not surprise anybody 
 who has been much at the French the- 
 atres. The part of every actor in the 
 drama, the very plot of the play, can be 
 guessed by our quick wits, thanks to the 
 perfection with which every one fills his 
 or her character. In spite of Puritanism 
 and Quakerism, we are a playgoing peo- 
 ple, and although there is little in the 
 present standard of our stage, as regards 
 either the drama itself or its representa- 
 tion, to cultivate the taste of an audience, 
 the least critical spectator feels the relief 
 from the intolerable inequalities of the 
 star system, the charm of a performance 
 in which every walking gentleman plays 
 his part and preserves his character as 
 carefully as the hero and heroine of the 
 piece. This is true not of the Theatre 
 Fran^ais alone, the Comedie Franqaise, 
 or, as it is proudly and popularly known, 
 Le Franqais, the foremost theatre of the 
 world, the home of the classics, of high 
 tragedy and genteel comedy, but of any 
 third-rate theatre of Paris. If the Fran- 
 9ais is to be considered first-rate, if no oth- 
 er is to be included in the same class on 
 account of the choice of subjects, the clas- 
 sic drama is admirably performed at the 
 Odeon, and the range of the Gymnase is 
 good. It is the character of the plays 
 rather than the performance which de- 
 termines the standing of the theatre in 
 Paris, but the plays in a measure make 
 the performers. The Palais Royal is 
 first-rate of its kind : it was there that 
 the Grande Duchesse de Gerolstein made 
 Offenbach famous and set the fashion of 
 the opera bouffe in 1867. The opera 
 bouffe was run into the gutter : the old 
 graceful, lively opera comique has come 
 into favor again, and the Palais Royal 
 entertains its audiences with farces. 
 
 "The Comedie Fran^aise," says £mile 
 Augier, the author of Les Fourchambault, 
 the successful play of last summer, "has 
 the honor of being the sole institution of 
 
 the old monarchy which has survived it, 
 with the exception of the French Acad- 
 emy : it is already two centuries old, a 
 longevity which is becoming more and 
 more rare with us. It is not only a na- 
 tional monument, but an historical monu- 
 ment intimately connected with the histo- 
 ry of our literature. ' ' Moliere's troupe, per- 
 forming his plays under his direction, be- 
 came so popular that the duke of Orleans, 
 brother of Louis XIV., invited them to 
 perform in his palace, the Palais Royal, 
 and the edifice in which their direct dra- 
 matic successors perform his comedies 
 to-day is a portion of the Palais Royal, 
 and was begun by another duke of Or- 
 leans, the notorious Philippe Egalite, a 
 few years before the Revolution. Mo- 
 liere is the genhcs loci : the neighboring 
 street and fountain bear his name ; hard 
 by is the house in which he died, bearing 
 an inscription to commemorate its pre- 
 mature loss: he was but fifty -one years 
 old. He still remains the presiding spir- 
 it of the Fran^ais : for every play of Cor- 
 neille's or Racine's they give three at 
 least of MoHere's. A classic drama per- 
 formed by that company is one of the 
 most complete and consummate intel- 
 lectual enjoyments which civilization af- 
 fords. In reading Le Cid, Athalie or Le 
 Misanthrope one may fancy that the 
 verse is too stately, too stilted perhaps, 
 the subject too remote from our sympa- 
 thies to excite emotion of any sort, but 
 hear them at the Franqais and we are 
 surprised into tears and laughter. There 
 is no subject about which everybody is 
 so ready to turn laudator temporis acti 
 as the stage. I was told that Bressant, 
 the Brohan sisters. Mademoiselle Plessy 
 were good, certainly, but that I could 
 form no idea of the way in which cer- 
 tain parts should be given unless I had 
 seen Lafon and Mademoiselle Mars, who 
 died long ago. Augustine Brohan is dead 
 too now, Bressant and Madeline Bro- 
 han have retired, Delaunay has given 
 up youthful parts, and I cannot think 
 that Croizette and Mounet-Sully replace 
 them : there is something rough and raw 
 in their acting compared to the perfect 
 finish of the others. They were brought 
 up on a different drama — Sardou's plays, 
 
IVB'V DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 109 
 
 dramatized stories like Le Sphinx. There 
 is nothing to train them to personate such 
 noble folly as Bressant's rendering of 
 
 Si le roi m'avait donne 
 Paris, sa grande ville, etc., 
 
 such exquisite tenderness as Delaunay's 
 reading aloud Agnes's love-letter in 
 L ' Ecole des Femmes, such 
 delicate ridicule as Coque- ( ^ 
 
 lin's recitation of 
 
 Au voleur, au voleur, au voleur. 
 
 As the tradition of fine 
 manners is lost in private 
 life, it must decline on the 
 stage, or the latter would 
 cease to fulfil our first de- 
 mand and hold the mirror 
 up to Nature. \i\hQgrand 
 Steele is as obsolete as the 
 age of Pericles, its mode 
 and style maybe discard- 
 ed from the stage like 
 mask and cothurn, but it 
 will be vain to expect ac- 
 tors to produce them now 
 and then as a dramatic 
 curiosity : the smooth pol- 
 ish, the fine edge, will be 
 gone. The loss of this 
 training will be destruc- 
 tive of shades in acting, 
 and these are not con- 
 fined to the older drama, 
 although there are fewer 
 niceties in modern plays. 
 Any one who remembers 
 Bressant's lofty " Misfor- 
 tune is always respect- 
 able " in the tipsy scene 
 of Le Jeune Mart, or the 
 combination of dignity 
 and impertinence' of his 
 "Je m'appelle Gaston" in 
 Le Gendre de M. Poirier, 
 will understand what I 
 mean. It is well known 
 that when from bad lives or failing pow- 
 ers or any other cause great actors lose 
 their general finish and perfection, they 
 fall back \x^on points , the telling speeches 
 and gestures which bring down the house. 
 To produce striking effects becomes their 
 sole aim : the whole quality of their act- 
 
 ing deteriorates under this fatal system 
 until it becomes as coarse and unnatural 
 as poor scene-painting. What is true of 
 individuals will become true by degrees 
 of the whole stage, and of the drama 
 itself, if the success of a play, whether in 
 the composition or the performance, de- 
 
 pends on situations and climaxes. The 
 Theatre Fran^ais is a bulwark against 
 such decline : the fine critical percep- 
 tions of the French people maintain its- 
 integrity. The government pays the 
 Frangais and the Odeon a yearly sub- 
 sidy on the condition of the perform- 
 
fVJ/y DO WE LIKE PARIS? 
 
 ance of a certain number of standard 
 dramas and the production of one or 
 more new plays of merit. The regular 
 members of the company are pension- 
 ed, which ensures them against want in 
 their old age and protects them from 
 the temptation and degradation of mere 
 money-making by "starring." 
 
 The opera too is subsidized by the 
 government. There are three recog- 
 nized operas in Paris, besides a yearly 
 fungus -growth which takes possession 
 of smaller theatres and disappears at 
 the close of the season. There is the 
 Opera Comique, the most national of 
 all, standing as it should on the Place 
 Boieldieu, named from the composer 
 of La Dame Blanche. The comic opera, 
 though not a native of France, is natural- 
 ized there, and long is the list of charming 
 compositions, little masterpieces, which it 
 has produced : some of them are often per- 
 formed in our country — Les Diainattts de 
 la Couronne and Fra Diavolo — and there 
 are many others which would be equally 
 liked if they were known, the delightful 
 Pre aux Clercs, for instance. There is the 
 Italian Opera, the name of which speaks 
 for itself and conjures up a phantom Car- 
 nival, a long procession of romantic fig- 
 ures — Norma the Druidess, the Venetian 
 Desdemona, the coquettish Rosina with 
 fan and mantilla, Figaro, Edgardo — and 
 beneath their disguise we recognize the 
 statuesque Pasta, the impassioned Mali- 
 bran, the glorious Grisi, Lablache, Tam- 
 burini, Rubini, Mario — vanished faces, 
 silent voices, which once enraptured na- 
 tions. The Italian Opera has lately be- 
 come bankrupt, owing to the change of 
 musical taste. I have proceeded in in- 
 verse order, for by rights the Opera Co- 
 mique comes last, and first the Grand 
 Opera, called also the National Acad- 
 emy of Music and French Opera-house. 
 The last achievement, or rather attempt, 
 of Napoleon II. to prop his throne with 
 playthings was the present house, which 
 was not finished until after the fall of the 
 Empire. It fronts on the Boulevard des 
 Capucines, and has sufficient space to 
 be seen on all sides. The building is 
 excessively rich and ornate, covered 
 with statuary and sculptured decoration, 
 
 but there is great diversity of opinion 
 as to its architectural merit. To me it 
 wants stateliness, grace, character : the 
 groups of statues flinging about their 
 arms and legs have neither meaning 
 nor dignity. Opinions differ also about 
 the auditorium, which has the capital de- 
 fect of not being good for sound through- 
 out. The staircase and foyer are mag- 
 nificent: they may not be in faultless 
 taste, but every one finds them splendid 
 and elegant. The paintings by Baudin 
 are real works of art. The polished mar- 
 ble floor, the shining colonnades of this 
 long and lofty hall, remind me, more by 
 freak of fancy than from real resem- 
 blance, of the aisles of St. Paul-without- 
 the- Walls at Rome — a superb basilica 
 which has been constructed during the 
 present century on the site of a church 
 of the earliest Christian ages burned 
 down in 1823. 
 
 These novelties must not make us for- 
 get that the right bank of the Seine has 
 old quarters too — the Marais, a region in- 
 tersected by streets with delightful names 
 — Rue des Francs Bourgeois, Rue des 
 Manteaux Blancs, Rue Neuve des Petits 
 Champs bringing to mind former strug- 
 gles for municipal privileges — and con- 
 vents standing on the green hem of the 
 town. This was the Paris of the Valois 
 dynasty and of the Guises, the principal 
 scene of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 
 the centre of the cabals for and against 
 Richelieu and Mazarin. The streets are 
 lined with fine old hotels spotted with 
 sun - dials, stimulating to curiosity : we 
 should like to go into them all, but there 
 is not time for one. We have not even 
 looked into the Louvre, the finest museum 
 of art in the world, which escaped the de- 
 struction that overtook the Tuileries on 
 the 22d of May, 1 87 1 , though its fate hung 
 on a breath : it was filled with powder 
 and petroleum : a match, a spark, the 
 slamming of a door, would have been 
 the signal for an explosion. It was 
 saved by the decision and courage of 
 three men — the marquis de Sigoyer, 
 commanding the Twenty -sixth battal- 
 ion, and two captains of engineers, MM. 
 Delambre and Riondel. To them we 
 owe it that those marvels of beauty and 
 
AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 ITl 
 
 genius remain to instruct and enchant 
 two hemispheres. 
 
 In this rapid, disconnected review I 
 have enumerated a few of the attractions 
 of Paris, of her curiosities, her wonders, 
 her sources of interest and enjoyment, 
 yet enough to detect some ingredients 
 of her spell for all minds and moods. 
 To some people the magic lies in what 
 she is, to others in what she has been ; 
 to some in what she gives, to others 
 
 in what she suggests ; to most people in 
 the combination of all these, Which pro- 
 duce a composite influence acting differ- 
 ently upon different natures. Merely to 
 try and skim the cream of pleasure from 
 the surface of life in Paris by a single 
 article is like nothing but the tiresome 
 old woman of whom we have often heard 
 who tried to bale out the ocean with a 
 pint pot. Sarah B. Wister. 
 
 AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 APPROACH FROM THE SEA — OFF MOUNT SORRANTO. 
 
 THE traveller approaching for the 
 first time the northern coast of 
 Spain from the Bay of Biscay will be 
 surprised and charmed by the grandeur 
 of the mountain - scenery which meets 
 his view. At a distance of seventy miles 
 at sea, on a clear day, the snow-capped 
 peaks of the Cantabrian Pyrenees are 
 visible, first like islands here and there 
 rising out of the bosom of the deep, but 
 gradually shaping themselves, as the be- 
 holder draws nearer, into connected por- 
 tions of a continuous coast-line. Grand- 
 
 er still is the effect when, the approach 
 having been made under cover of night, 
 the voyager mounts to the deck in the 
 first cool flush of early morning to find 
 his vessel riding the waves like a sea- 
 bird under the shadow of these giant 
 mountains, which, descending in green 
 cultivated slopes to the very water's edge 
 before him, stretch away in bold bluffs and 
 fantastic promontories to the east and west, 
 seeming to offer an impassable barrier to 
 the farther progress of his journey. 
 Yet this coast, to all appearance so 
 
AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 inhospitable, is in reality indented with 
 numerous bays and inlets where ocean- 
 vessels may enter and find havens land- 
 locked and secure, amid poplar -lined 
 banks, fertile vineyards and hillsides 
 from which the chimes in hoary church- 
 towers ring out the passing hours and 
 summon the faithful to their devotions. 
 Such is the charming contrast that awaits 
 the voyager who, after having tossed 
 about for a night or two on the Biscay 
 waters, finds his vessel safely moored 
 in the quiet waters of the Bilbao River, 
 a little stream winding in and out among 
 the mountains, and affording navigable 
 
 PI LOT -TOWER AT THE ENTRANCE TO THE 
 BILBAO RIVER. 
 
 communication between the sea and the 
 city of Bilbao, eight miles inland. 
 
 It must be admitted that one's impres- 
 sions of Spain as derived from first con- 
 tact with her people and civilization in 
 the persons of the pilot and custom-house 
 officer are not as favorable as might be 
 desired. While the arriving steamer is 
 still well out at sea an open boat, pulled 
 by ten or a dozen swarthy oarsmen — pic- 
 turesque-looking fellows in caps of red 
 or blue flannel, but otherwise conspicuous 
 for their scantiness of habiliments — comes 
 alongside, and one of its occupants clam- 
 bers up the ladder with the agility of a 
 cat, mutters a greeting to the captain, and 
 proceeds to take command of the ship. 
 There is a troublesome bar at the mouth 
 of the river, and for a paltry matter of 
 
 I five or six dollars, to be divided among 
 them all, this adventurous boat's crew 
 have put out to sea at one or two o'clock 
 in the morning to take their chance of 
 putting a pilot on some incoming ves- 
 sel. Standing on the bridge, his eye in- 
 tently fixed on the signal-tower in the 
 river yonder, where, by a flag waved to 
 the right or left, the vessel's course is 
 directed, our pilot has the air of a lazy, 
 good-natured good-for-nothing — a sort 
 of marine Rip Van Winkle, who only 
 works because he has to, and who will 
 probably lie asleep all the afternoon un- 
 der the shade of some friendly tree, con- 
 tent until the few pesetas earned by this 
 morning's work are gone. But, for all 
 that, he brings us safely over the bar, 
 we steam triumphantly past the pilot- 
 tower, the captain passes, around a bran- 
 dy-bottle and glass among the swarthy 
 oarsmen, and a few moments later the 
 pilot has gone and the ship's whistle 
 is blowing for the customs officer, who 
 comes aboard at Portugalete. Although 
 addressed as " Senor Don So-and-So," 
 a rare specimen of the shabby-genteel 
 functionary is the moustached individual 
 in cocked hat, cloak and rusty uniform 
 who steps aboard, follows the captain 
 down to the after cabin, inspects our 
 trunks — or pretends to — signs his name 
 with a magnificent flourish, gulps down 
 a stiff glass of brandy, and leaves again. 
 On his coat-sleeves, covered with tatter- 
 ed lace, one can read the story of all the 
 faded glories of Spain. But he looks hap- 
 pier when he departs than he did when he 
 stepped on board. " Que voulez-vous f" 
 says our captain, who is a Frenchman. 
 " The poor fellow's salary is a mere pit- 
 tance, he tells me he has six children, 
 and — " He shrugs his shoulders. We 
 are left to infer the rest as to what has 
 passed between them. 
 
 Portugalete, the little town opposite 
 which we have stopped for a few mo- 
 ments, runs straggling up the hillside, 
 with several steep streets no wider than 
 a Fifth Avenue sidewalk. But they are 
 densely populated with old women, ba- 
 bies and dogs, and but sparse glimpses 
 of blue sky can be seen between the 
 overhanging eaves and windows above. 
 
AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 "3 
 
 At the summit of the knoll up which 
 any one of these streets leads, stands, 
 amid a grove of ancestral poplars, the 
 old church of Santa Maria, in which 
 during the late Carlist war some three 
 hundred of Don Carlos's tatterdemahons 
 took refuge when closely pursued by the 
 victorious royalists after the decisive bat- 
 
 tle of Somorrostro. But vainly did they 
 seek refuge " even at the horns of the 
 altar." The royal troops promptly oc- 
 cupied half a dozen of the neighboring 
 heights with their batteries, knocked 
 away a goodly portion of the church- 
 tower, clock, chimes and all, sent hun- 
 dreds of shells down through the tiled 
 
 DELIVERY OF AMERICAN PETROLEUM IN SPAIN. 
 
 roof into the midst of the enforced wor- 
 shippers within, and finally compelled 
 the surrender of the entire party. Amid 
 the hush and quiet now pervading the 
 interior of this grand old edifice one 
 finds it hard to realize that it has so 
 recently witnessed such a scene of car- 
 nage. There are, to be sure, some jagT 
 ged portions of the bell -tower yet un- 
 repaired, and the parish schoolhouse ad- 
 joining it still stands roofless and dis- 
 mantled. But the chimes have been re- 
 placed, the hands once more mark the 
 hours on the dial, and the inscription 
 over the doorway, "Non est hie aliud 
 nisi Do7nus Dei et Porta Cceli" reminds 
 us as we enter that, notwithstanding 
 man's profanation, this is still God's 
 house only. 
 
 Santa Maria Church — it is a cathedral 
 in fact — was built late in the fifteenth 
 century, although the earliest inscrip- 
 tion visible dates from early in the six- 
 teenth (1532), when, as a tablet informs 
 
 us, " Don Pedro de Salazar and his be- 
 loved wife brought the remains of the 
 former's father to this spot, and caused 
 them to be interred in this chapel." 
 There is another very curious chapel 
 dating from 1560, and a costly bronze 
 reredos in scriptural bas-reliefs extend- 
 ing from the floor to the roof in the rear 
 of the chancel, which must have griev- 
 ously taxed the purses of the faithful. 
 
 Under the hill, and fronting directly 
 on the river, is a new Portugalete — a 
 long, terraced avenue with stone bal- 
 ustrade in front, and lined on its inner 
 side with elegant granite dwellings of 
 modern construction, much similar to 
 those seen on upper Fifth Avenue about 
 Central Park. Hither in summer come 
 the wealthy Bilbaoans to enjoy the sea- 
 breezes and forget the cares of city-life. 
 Many of these dwellings, now rebuilt, 
 were destroyed by Don Carlos's artil- 
 lerists, while others adjoining them, and 
 belonging to adherents of the cause, were 
 
114 
 
 AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 left untouched. The Carlists, it seems, 
 knew well at which to direct their aim. 
 
 Opposite Portugalete, on the point 
 formed by the river's entrance into the 
 bay. is the bathing-resort of the Bilbao 
 people — Las Arenas, with a gently-slop- 
 ing beach of fine hard sand and the 
 usual seaside medley of bath-houses, 
 saloons and pavilions, such as one sees 
 at Coney Island, Atlantic City or any 
 other American salt-water resort. A 
 submarine cable from Point Lizard, Eng- 
 land, comes in here. The irrepressible 
 Yankee is represented too, by advertise- 
 ment at least. The writer saw the post- 
 er of a well-known American sewing- 
 machine company glaring at him in 
 flaming letters as he sat on the veran- 
 da of one of the hotels waiting depart- 
 ure by the horse - railway, which fur- 
 nishes communication every fifteen min- 
 utes during the day between Las Arenas 
 and Bilbao. Advertising, in fact, is con- 
 ducted on a polyglot basis in this region. 
 All the way up along the river there may 
 be seen over the store doorways signs 
 in Spanish, French and English. The 
 horse - railway track follows the river- 
 bank all the way to Bilbao, the cars be- 
 ing drawn by mules, and resembling in 
 external appearance those in general use 
 in American cities, though the rate of 
 speed is considerably greater. The eight 
 miles are made in about an hour, the 
 mules going at a gallop most of the dis- 
 tance. So well patronized is the road, 
 especially in summer, that the company 
 is taxed to its utmost to provide trans- 
 portation for the crowds of passengers, 
 and consequently another railway, to 
 follow the opposite bank of the river, 
 is already talked of. 
 
 We pay our ten-cent fare to a spruce- 
 looking chap in uniform with the label 
 "Conductor " on his cap, and he in turn 
 "punches with care in the presence of 
 the passengaire" by tearing out from a 
 coupon -book and handing us a ticket 
 entitling the holder to two sections in the 
 first-class compartment of the car. In 
 the second class we discover a motley 
 gathering of workmen, market-women 
 and peasantry, yet, for that matter, the 
 Spanish horse -car is democratic enough 
 
 throughout. It is no uncommon sight to 
 see a dark-complexioned donna in veil 
 and mantilla standing outside on the rear 
 platform. Inside or outside everybody 
 smokes, regardless of the presence of 
 the gentler sex. The lady who " likes 
 the odor of a good cigar" is altogether 
 a superfluity in Spain. 
 
 The roadway skirting the river is well 
 built up for nearly its entire length, if 
 we except two or three intervals where 
 wheat -fields or vineyards come strag- 
 gling down to its border. At every quar- 
 ter of a mile is seen a sentry-box, where 
 a carabinero, gun in hand, stands watch- 
 ing for any attempt at smuggling. There 
 are several villages on one side or the 
 other, the two principal ones on the op- 
 posite bank, San Nicolas and Luchana, 
 being the ore-loading stations or termini 
 of the various railways connecting with 
 the iron -mines in the mountains a few 
 miles back. Farther up, within a mile 
 and a half of the city, is Oleavaga, the 
 station at which petroleum-vessels have 
 to come to anchor. One is almost cer- 
 tain at any time to find an American 
 vessel or two anchored at this point. 
 The writer saw a three-master from 
 Richmond, Virginia, discharging a car- 
 go of oil there. The blue-topped casks, 
 so familiar to the eye of any one who 
 has ever visited the petroleum -region, 
 are lowered over the ship's side into 
 barges, v/hich are towed up to town by 
 lines of women, whose labor can be 
 hired for less than that of mules. The 
 condition of the women of the poorer 
 classes here is abject and pitiable in- 
 deed. Women may be seen every- 
 where, in the fields, on the roads, on 
 the wharves, in the quarries, toiling like 
 cattle, with very little prospect of earn- 
 ing more than the provender necessary 
 to keep them alive. 
 
 Far above the housetops at Oleavaga, 
 along the steep mountain - side, over 
 arches and through cuts, runs the dus- 
 ty turnpike-road connecting Bilbao with 
 Santander. In the morning and even- 
 ing the diligence — for stage-travel must 
 always remain the principal means of 
 communication in this mountainous 
 country — goes dashing by with three 
 
AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 115 
 
 horses tandem, a great snapping of whip- 
 lashes, occasional volleys of oaths, and a 
 cloud of dust enveloping all. He who 
 desires to study Spain and her people 
 from an inside point of view should take 
 one ride in any of these mountain -dili- 
 gences, but only one : he will never want 
 another. 
 
 Just before reaching the stone post 
 which marks the city limit one sees on 
 the river-bank the English burial-ground, 
 a shaded enclosure of an acre or so, with 
 a neat chapel and gateway at the en- 
 
 trance, and thickly planted with willows 
 and shrubbery, from the midst of which 
 a snow - white monument or gravestone 
 here and there peeps out. Of late years 
 the iron-ore trade has attracted to Bilbao 
 hundreds of Enghsh residents and sail- 
 ors, and in this quiet spot has been laid 
 to rest, far from home and kindred, many 
 a poor fellow whom the rigid interment- 
 laws of this priest-ridden land have ex- 
 cluded from burial in the public cemetery. 
 Like Washington, Bilbao may be term 
 ed a "city of magnificent distances," her 
 
 THE ENGLISH BURIAL-GROUND. 
 
 limits extending out into the fields and 
 up the mountain -sides far beyond her 
 thickly -settled centre. This it was that 
 enabled Don Carlos during his siege of 
 the city to boast in turgid rhetoric that 
 he had "captured a portion of Bilbao." 
 His pickets, in fact, were posted on all 
 the country roads in the environs, many 
 of them within the city lines and within 
 talking-distance of the sentries, but none 
 of them ever actually entered the city 
 proper except as prisoners. The siege 
 lasted for one hundred and two days ; 
 the inhabitants were reduced to a diet 
 of horse-flesh ; upward of five thousand 
 shells were thrown into the city from the 
 forts on the neighboring mountain-tops ; 
 houses, churches, and, among other ob- 
 jects, a very handsome wire suspension 
 
 bridge spanning the river, were demol- 
 ished ; yet the brave Bilbaoans held out, 
 and finally had the satisfaction of seeing 
 Don Carlos and his ragged cohorts beat 
 a precipitate retreat over the adjacent 
 mountains. To-day the Spanish gov- 
 ernment is replacing at its own expense 
 all buildings destroyed by the besiegers' 
 guns, and Bilbao shows but few traces 
 of her recent trials. 
 
 One's impressions of the city on enter- 
 ing it by the horse-railway from down 
 the river are very pleasing. Rows of 
 palatial dwellings, with gardens before 
 them, line the road on the left : to the 
 right, extending along the river-front, is 
 a park with flower-beds, shrubbery and 
 fountains, shaded by a dense growth of 
 forest trees and thronged every afternoon 
 
ii6 
 
 AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 with well - dressed promenaders of both 
 sexes. On the other side of the park can 
 be caught glimpses of steamers, sailing- 
 vessels and smaller craft lying at anchor 
 in the river or discharging their cargoes 
 at the quay ; and beyond them, in turn, 
 may be seea the mountain-slope ascend- 
 ing abruptly on the other side. 
 
 Most Spanish cities are famous for 
 nothing if not their antiquity, but this 
 one, with its thirty-and-one thousand in- 
 habitants, is an exception to the rule in 
 that it has both an antiquated and a 
 modern side to it. The centres of the 
 
 THE GREAT SEAL OF BILBAO. 
 
 old and the new town are very clearly 
 defined even to the oesual observer. An 
 old New Jersey farm-house with a fanci- 
 ful Mansard-roofed wing looking haught- 
 ily down upon it, or a half-ruined cha- 
 teau upon which some ambitious owner 
 of later days has built up a brand-new 
 , modern villa, aptly typifies this little city, 
 which in spite of its five or six hundred 
 years of existence is to-day in many re- 
 spects as wide awake and enterprising 
 in its habits and ideas as any of our live 
 American towns. 
 
 Bilbao is built, as it were, in the bend 
 of a figure 5 formed by the river, the 
 more ancient quarter of the city being 
 at the upper end of the curve. At this 
 point the river is spanned by an anti- 
 quated stone bridge of two arches, now 
 closed to travel. Yet one looking at its 
 form and architecture, ixdolent of the 
 past, cannot but picture to himself the 
 pageants of mail-clad horsemen, with 
 all their pennants and blazonry and 
 nodding plumes and martial music, that 
 
 on many a triumphal occasion in days 
 long gone by have passed over its now 
 cruinbling roadway. The old bridge 
 and the large church adjoining it, which 
 is now used as the municipal building, 
 have been adopted as a device for the 
 great seal of Bilbao. A wide quay be- 
 fore the city hall and the arcaded side- 
 walks adjoining it are used as the pub- 
 lic market-place, and at any time before 
 noon the spot is crowded with chatter- 
 ing venders of fish, flesh, fruit, vege- 
 tables and a thousand varieties of no- 
 tions and knickknacks. The river, at this 
 point seems, too, to be utilized as a sort 
 of public washtub, for from sunrise to 
 dark there may be seen at frequent in- 
 tervals along the banks groups of a doz- 
 en or so of barefooted laundresses in 
 gaudy-colored skirts and kerchiefs wash- 
 ing out their family linen or putting it on 
 the rocks to dry. 
 
 At every turn in this quarter of Bilbao 
 the stranger meets with much to enter- 
 tain him. Dark and narrow streets, with 
 family crests and escutcheons quaintly 
 carved over every doorway ; long wind- 
 ing stairways straggling up the hillsides, 
 with a resting-place or landing before 
 each door on the way up; alley -ways 
 ending abruptly in walls of rock ; a jum- 
 ble of shops and chapels and convents, 
 — all recall some bit of canvas torn from 
 a mediceval painting, and suddenly re- 
 produced here before the admiring eyes 
 of to-day. But follow the river around 
 for a distance of half a mile, and the 
 scene is changed at once. Here are a 
 modern railway-depot built in the style 
 of a Swiss chalet, and said to be the 
 finest in Spain ; a theatre where you 
 may hear the Ballo in Maschera or Lii- 
 cia di Laimnennoor sung by an Italian 
 troupe of more than usual merit ; a club- 
 house where, if fortunate enough to have 
 the privilege of admission, you may dai- 
 ly read the London Times or any of the 
 principal Paris papers ; an hotel where 
 for a dollar and a half a day may be 
 found all the comforts of the large ho- 
 tels in any European capital ; a public 
 park, a telegraph- office, and stores stock- 
 ed with a bewildering and brilliant vari- 
 ety of merchandise. The boulevard and 
 
AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 117 
 
 park extending along the river-front be- 
 fore the Hotel d'Inglaterra will prove 
 an attractive place for the visitor. At 
 early morning he may stand there and 
 see the sunrise, breaking over the moun- 
 tains, successively tipping each peak with 
 gold while the base is still swathed in its 
 garment of nocturnal shadows. During 
 the afternoon come throngs of well-dress- 
 ed ladies and gentlemen promenading, 
 and toward sunset the shaded walks and 
 lawns are resonant with the shouts and 
 laughter of hundreds of joyous chil- 
 dren. And when night has settled down 
 
 upon the scene, and the gas-lamps glim- 
 mer through the shade, there may be 
 heard now and then the musical tum- 
 tum of a guitar and a voice trolling out 
 a lively bolero as some group of merry- 
 makers go by, with perhaps a couple or 
 two of dancers with joined hands whirling 
 in pirouettes through the dim-lit shadows 
 in advance of them. 
 
 To the student in ethnology it is inter- 
 esting to note the strongly - contrasted 
 types met with in the faces of the peo- 
 ple. The swarthy Moorish complexion, 
 black eyes and raven hair predominate. 
 
 RIVER-FRONT, SHOWING BOULEVARD AND PARK. 
 
 yet the Northern Goths have left their 
 traces too in the clear skin, ruddy 
 cheeks, flaxen locks and blue eyes not 
 unfrequently encountered. Courtliness 
 and dignity of manner, without the ex- 
 cessive complaisance of the French, are 
 noticeable everywhere among the "senor 
 dons" and " caballeros." Most of the 
 men dress in the fashionable styles usu- 
 ally seen on the Paris boulevards, though 
 here and there the sugar-loaf hat and 
 ample cloak, its folds partially held up 
 before the wearer's face, are still seen. 
 The ladies cling more tenaciously to the 
 traditional costume of their sex, the veil 
 and mantilla, very few of them appear- 
 ing on the streets with cloaks or bon- 
 nets. Housemaids too have their dis- 
 
 tinguishing coiffure, a double braid of 
 hair falling over the back and some- 
 times reaching nearly to the ground. 
 
 French is quite generally spoken, and 
 forms, as almost everywhere else in Eu- 
 rope, the chief means of communication 
 between foreigners and the people them- 
 selves. At the table-d' hole dinner at the 
 Hotel d'Inglaterra one day during the 
 writer's stay there were seated twelve 
 guests, ten of whom were conversing to- 
 gether in French on the subject of the 
 New York Herald's weather-reports. Yet 
 of those ten, one was a German, two were 
 English, two Moors, two Spaniards, one 
 an American, and only two real French- 
 men ; who, by the way, must have rel- 
 ished the' babel of varied accents with 
 
ii8 
 
 AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 which their mother - tongue was being 
 served up by the assembled guests. 
 
 The churches of Bilbao, while outward- 
 ly plain and uninviting, are extremely 
 costly and attractive in their internal 
 decoration. The faithful must, howev- 
 er, forego the luxury of chairs or cush- 
 ions, and whether rich or poor must alike 
 kneel upon the hard stone floor. As ear- 
 ly as five in the morning one finds nume- 
 rous worshippers, mostly women. But 
 early rising is no difficult matter in Bil- 
 bao, thanks to a quaint custom still ex- 
 tant. From midnight to six A. M. the 
 hours, as they are successively rung out 
 by the chimes in the principal cathedral- 
 tower, are.repeated by the watchman sta- 
 
 A BILBAO MILKMAN. 
 
 tioned in the street below, and from him 
 in turn the words are caught up and re- 
 uttered by every other watchman in the 
 city. The effect is indescribably novel 
 and beautiful. The writer chanced to be 
 awakened one morning by hearing the 
 neighboring chimes strike three. An in- 
 stant afterward a clear, loud, ringing ten- 
 or voice in the street below chanted in 
 a strange but not unmusical monotone 
 the words. Las tres — seretio ("Three 
 o'clock, and clear"), and a moment 
 later the still air of morning was reso- 
 nant far and near with re-echoed cries 
 of Las tres — sej-eiio, coming back from 
 
 out the distance like the tinklings of a 
 hundred silver bells. 
 
 It is a pity to have to record of Bilbao, 
 with all her churches, that she indulges 
 in the luxury of occasional bull -fights. 
 Four days of every August are set aside 
 for this edifying sport, and during that 
 period the great amphitheatre, seating 
 fourteen thousand people, is daily pack- 
 ed to repletion with men, women and 
 children of all classes, the peasantry 
 coming in by swarms from a distance 
 of twenty or thirty miles around to ap- 
 plaud the torreadores, and scream Bravo ! 
 at the senseless slaughter of scared bulls 
 and jaded horses. Six bulls are daily led 
 into the ring, and as each bull, before 
 being despatched, is allowed to 
 kill five horses, and no more, it is 
 , not difficult to figure up the sum- 
 \ total of quadrupeds, bovine and 
 ^ equine, offered up on the altar of 
 ~] this barbarous custom during its 
 four days' annual duration. But 
 — there is an undercurrent of public 
 opinion opposed to all this cruel- 
 ty. Many Spaniards when the 
 sport is mentioned smile and in- 
 timate that, as conducted at the 
 present day, it is an arrant hum- 
 = bug. The horses are poor, used- 
 up creatures, unfit for further ser- 
 vice ; the bull generally asks no 
 better than, hke the "erring sis- 
 ters," to be allowed to depart in 
 peace ; while the gallant torrea- 
 dor, so often sung in verse and 
 portrayed on canvas, is a very 
 ordinary sort of fellow — agile, it 
 is true, as any circus-jumper, but never, 
 in reality, exposed to any great danger 
 from his incensed buUship. It is safe to 
 predict that in another half century bull- 
 fighting will have become one of the lost 
 arts in Bilbao. 
 
 Street -venders are as numerous and 
 as odd here as anywhere in Europe. 
 The cigar -shops along the sidewalks 
 are neat and convenient, and offer a 
 capital cigar for five cents. The matu- 
 tinal milkman is perhaps the most in- 
 teresting character-study in Bilbao. He 
 reminds one of the herdsman Tityrus, 
 that bucolic swain whom Virgil apostro- 
 
AMONG THE BISCAYANS. 
 
 119 
 
 phizes as making the woodlands vocal 
 with strains to his loved Amaryllis. In 
 the early morning hours — and none too 
 early at that — when the slothful house- 
 maid begins to bestir herself and the city 
 awakens to its daily life, a hei'd of ten or a 
 dozen goats, marshalled by an ill-favored 
 but faithful shepherd-dog and driven by 
 this Spanish Tityrus, may be seen com- 
 ing lazily down the street. The goatherd 
 is a picture in himself, the 
 very personification of 
 a whole pastoral poem. 
 On his head is a slouch 
 cap of blue flannel ; he 
 wears a short blouse ; he 
 carries a shepherd's 
 staff in his hand ; and 
 ever and anon as he ap- 
 proaches the house of a 
 customer he trolls out a 
 ditty as shrill as a mock- 
 ing-bird's whistle from 
 a reed flute which he 
 raises to his lips. The 
 goats know where to 
 stop, the door is opened, 
 the servant-maid ap- 
 pears, and the penny- 
 worth or two of milk is 
 served fresh and steai 
 ing, the other goats a I 
 the dog meantime Stan 1 
 ing idly by, waiting tL_ 
 signal to resume their 
 march. 
 
 A description of the Biscay province 
 would be incomplete without some men- 
 tion of its inexhaustible iron-mining re- 
 sources, which have of late years been 
 developed to an extraordinary extent, 
 principally by the aid of a million and 
 a half pounds sterling of British capital. 
 During 1878 over thirty - five hundred 
 vessels, of which upward of two thour 
 sand were steamers, came to Bilbao for 
 iron-ore. England's foundries are large- 
 ly supplied from these mines, the famous 
 Creusot Iron Company of France pro- 
 cures much of its material here, and 
 Krupp, the great German manufacturer 
 of cannon, has four vessels running reg- 
 ularly between this port and Rotterdam. 
 There are direct lines to Cardiff", Swan- 
 
 sea, Middleboro' and Newcastle, to Ant- 
 werp, to Dunkerque, Boulogne, Bayonne 
 and La Rochelle, and shipments are made 
 even to American ports. A trim Yankee 
 brig, the Eugene Hale, Captain John E. 
 Lord, of Calais, Maine, recently brought 
 out a cargo of wheat from New York, and 
 has long ere this landed her return cargo 
 of Spanish iron-ore at its destination on 
 the Jersey City docks. 
 
 RAILROADING IN THE PYRENEES. 
 
 When Pliny, the Bayard Taylor of Ro- 
 man days, wrote home from this region 
 that he had seen "a mountain made of 
 iron," he scarcely exaggerated the truth. 
 The Triano Mountains, to which it is 
 supposed he referred, might with some 
 slight allowance for the tales of a trav- 
 eller be fairly described in those terms. 
 From time immemorial there have been 
 numbers of little forges or blacksmith- 
 shops scattered through these mountains, 
 but only during the past ten years or so 
 has there been a systematic effort made 
 to develop the resources of the mines. 
 There are now five lines of railway, va- 
 rying from six to eight miles in length, 
 connecting the river with the mountain- 
 fastnesses where the ore is taken out. 
 
AMONG THE B ISC A VANS. 
 
 Of these roads, three were built by Eng- 
 lishmen, one by the Franco-Belgian Com- 
 pany and one by Bilbao enterprise. Eng- 
 lish skill and English industry are visible 
 everywhere, and have dotted these once 
 desolate mountain - sides with populous 
 villages. The locomotives are from Bir- 
 mingham, the cars from Manchester, the 
 tools from Sheffield, and even the tele- 
 graphic-apparatus in many of the stations 
 is found to bear the mark of an English 
 maker. But that which most commands 
 admiration is the bold engineering genius 
 which has carried these roads, with dou- 
 ble tracks, tunnels and solid granite em- 
 bankments, up from the river-level, over 
 gorges, around giddy precipices and 
 through the very bowels of the cliffs, to 
 summits whence one can look down upon 
 other mountain-tops, upon village-dotted 
 vales "stretching in pensive quietness 
 between," and upon the soft blue waters 
 of the Bay of Biscay beyond. Such is 
 the view commanded from the village of 
 Galetta, which has sprung into existence 
 on the mountain-top around the Caesar 
 and San Miguel mines. Its houses, its 
 walls, its tiny church and its hotel, where 
 "coffee and billiards" are pretentiously 
 announced, are all built of iron-red mud, 
 which by- exposure to the sun has become 
 as hard as iron itself Its streets strag- 
 gle up and down the mountain - side, 
 anywhere and everywhere, regardless 
 of surveyors' lines ; yet it has a mayor, 
 enjoys the honor of being a railway -ter- 
 minus, and is apparently happy. About 
 six hundred miners, all Spaniards, live 
 here, earning sums equal to a dollar and 
 a dollar and a half a day. The Bis- 
 cayans are good workmen, industrious, 
 temperate and saving, the English say. 
 Most of them own small farms, which 
 they leave in charge of their wives dur- 
 ing their absence here in the mines. 
 When the wet season comes, however, 
 they go home to look after their affairs, 
 and then the mining company is com- 
 pelled to replace them temporarily by 
 Castilians, who as a rule are quarrel- 
 some, indolent fellows, much given to 
 play and drink. A fair illustration of 
 their character is afforded by an incident 
 that occurred a few months ago. The 
 
 overseers reported one day that most of 
 the men had quit work or were practical- 
 ly doing nothing. Inquiry was at once 
 ordered, resulting in the discovery that 
 a rivalry had arisen between a couple 
 of workmen and their respective adhe- 
 rents as to which of the two could do 
 the most rock-drilling in a given time. 
 A sum amounting in value to five hun- 
 dred dollars had been wagered by the 
 competitors and their friends, a day was 
 set apart for the trial for the champion- 
 ship of the Pyrenees, and by general 
 consent work had been suspended to 
 enable the miners to watch the prog- 
 ress of the contest. 
 
 One who has any taste for the adven- 
 turous will find a rare delight in the re- 
 turn ride by railway down the mountain 
 from Galetta to the river. He must 
 crowd in with the engineer and fireman 
 on the locomotive, for passenger-coaches 
 are a luxury unknown on this line. The 
 rapidly-descending grade of eight hun- 
 dred feet in six miles renders the use 
 of steam entirely superfluous ; and with 
 thirty or forty ore-laden cars adding their 
 impetus, the train, with brakes all on, 
 goes rattling and clattering down the 
 mountain-side at a rate of speed which 
 makes the unaccustomed passenger hold 
 his breath, and perhaps at times fervent- 
 ly wish the journey were over. Yet, with 
 all its spice of danger, the trip is intense- 
 ly exciting. The fresh, cool mountain- 
 breeze, the unsurpassed scenery, made 
 up on the one side of wild ravines, yawn- 
 ing gorges and bold acclivities, and on 
 the other of a green carpeted landscape 
 bounded by the river far below, — all 
 these combine to elicit an involuntary 
 exclamation of delight from the passen- 
 ger, and make him forget whatever dan- 
 ger, if any, there may be in the long and 
 rapid descent. And when, having reach- 
 ed once more the river-bank, where the 
 steamer ready for sea is perchance await- 
 ing him, he turns for a farewell glance at 
 the cloud-capped heights from which the 
 iron horse has in safety transported him, 
 it is with a soul filled with new concep- 
 tions of the glory of God's creation and 
 the grandeur of man's triumphs. 
 
 George L. Catlin. 
 
^ 
 
 TROUVILLK 
 
 A STREET. 
 
 ONE of the characters in Les Facheux, 
 a sort of disinterested Colonel Sel- 
 lers of the seventeenth century, had a 
 scheme for increasing the prosperity of 
 France by converting its entire coast-line 
 into seaports. His project was received 
 with that laughter which it is the province 
 of comedies and great inventions to call 
 forth ; nevertheless, we have seen it real- 
 ized, with the difference that the whole 
 French coast from Cape Grisnez to the 
 mouth of the Bidassoa is spangled, not 
 with ports of commerce, but with gay wa- 
 tering-places. Each summer some reign- 
 ing queen discovers a bit of seaboard, 
 where the shrimps are in their primitive 
 wildness and the bathers have never yet 
 thrown a rope over the arching neck of 
 the wave, and triumphantly takes pos- 
 session with her little court. An hotel 
 
 makes its appearance ; villas, by ones, 
 by twos, by threes, gather around it ; a 
 casino rises from the waves ; a mush- 
 room church in the style of the Second 
 Empire springs out of the sand ; and the 
 new resort is a fact. The Romulus of 
 one of these summer cities is not infre- 
 quently some popular artist or author. 
 Le Puy, near Dieppe, was one of the 
 creations of Alexandre Dumas y?/y/ Al- 
 phonse Karr presided over the new birth 
 of Etretat ; and Trouville was invented 
 somewhere about 1830 by two marine 
 painters, Charles Mozin and Isabey. 
 Rambling along the Norman coast in 
 search of subjects, chance led the two 
 artists one day to a humble fishing- 
 village at the mouth of the Toucques, 
 where the rugged faces and quaint cos- 
 tumes of the inhabitants promised excel- 
 
 121 
 
TROUVILLE. 
 
 lent spoil for the brush. They sought en- 
 tertainment under the sign of the Agneau 
 d'Or, sole inn of the village, where La 
 Mere Auzeraie ruled the roast or its fishy 
 substitute without a rival, and hopefully 
 spread their canvases for the prey. The 
 elder Dumas paid them a visit and gave 
 Mother Auzeraie some lessons in cook- 
 ing. In the Salon of 1834 some Paris- 
 ians noticed the new name, Trouville, 
 under that of Mozin on two marines, 
 and the name stuck in their memories. 
 They met with it again in an article by 
 Dumas, and when the hot weather came 
 round they made application for admis- 
 sion to the Agneau d'Or, taking it and 
 Trouville on the trust of the painter and 
 the novelist. Madame Auzeraie — she was 
 Mother Auzeraie no longer —had the te- 
 merity to ask three francs a day for board 
 and lodging. Parisian economy, wrath- 
 ful at being thus fleeced for the benefit 
 of the Golden Lamb, grasped its axe and 
 fell to the erection of villas, thus laying 
 the foundation of Trouville. 
 
 It was not, however, till a score of years 
 later, under the Empire, that Fashion 
 smiled upon the new resort. The im- 
 perial magistrates and officials were ill 
 at ease on the strand of Dieppe, where 
 the royalists had their summer quarters, 
 and began to look about for a surf in 
 which they could disport themselves with 
 a sense of being at the same time polit- 
 ically in their element. Dieppe had been 
 started by the duchesse de Berry, and 
 was absorbed by the sets of the Fau- 
 bourg St. Germain and the Faubourg 
 St. Honore. Its shore was trodden by 
 the feet of the Forty Immortals, who 
 at that time nearly all belonged to the 
 Orleanist party, and by the deposed 
 statesmen of that party, among them 
 M. Thiers. The irhperial court had aban- 
 doned Dieppe to the opposition, and be- 
 taken itself to Biarritz, but Biarritz was 
 too far from Paris for the lesser officials 
 and busy men of the party to follow. Trou- 
 ville offered them a bathing-place within 
 six hours of the capital, and thither they 
 repaired. Speculation soon became so rife 
 in the village that a square foot of sand on 
 either side of the Honfleur road rose to 
 a price equal to that of a square foot of 
 
 solid ground in the neighborhood of the 
 Pare Monceaux. Villas sprang up quick- 
 ly ; an hotel de ville in the style of Louis 
 XIII. was erected, and followed by two 
 parish churches : law and rehgion were 
 thus installed as adjuvants of fashion. It 
 is a watering-place religion which the 
 faithful practise at Trouville — light, ele- 
 gant and modish, as suits the season, the 
 place and the toilettes. The elegant and 
 modish architecture of the larger church, 
 Notre Dame de Bon Secours, which is 
 modelled on that of the Trinite in the 
 Chaussee d'Antin, forms an appropriate 
 setting for this religion, and supplies the 
 scenery for masses arranged on the plan 
 of operas, in which groups of priests and 
 choir-boys in rich vestments, with flowers, 
 hghts, stained windows, bells and chants, 
 make an ensemble of operatic beauty and 
 impressiveness. Notre Dame de Bon Se- 
 cours is in the business-street of the town, 
 where the butchers and bakers, the vend- 
 ors of fruit, flowers and other merchan- 
 dise, carry on their trades. Between this 
 street an.d the sea is the visitors' quar- 
 ter, which pi'esents a jumble of hotels, 
 villas, casino, milliners' and pastry-cooks' 
 shops, elbowing each other as closely as 
 if confined by the walls of a city. There 
 is little room for gardens, which do so 
 much to beautify and freshen a water- 
 ing-place: the Hotel de Paris, the most 
 expensive in the place, is the only one 
 which offers its guests the luxuries of a 
 little shade and a few flower-beds. This 
 absurd mania for packing the houses to- 
 gether and building upward in narrow 
 aspiration, instead of spreading out com- 
 fortably along the shore, makes Trouville 
 resemble a great anthill, and renders it 
 disappointing to those who go there for 
 the unsophisticated object of breathing 
 the sea-air and taking sea-baths. Hence 
 it has always been distasteful to the Eng- 
 lish, whose open - air instincts cannot 
 comprehend that passion for his native 
 boulevards which leads a Parisian in 
 search of recreation to plunge into an- 
 other multicolored and many - voiced 
 crowd. 
 
 On Sundays this crowd is increased by 
 a cargo of excursionists brought over by 
 the steamer from Havre, and by a freight 
 
TROUVILLE. 
 
 123 
 
124 
 
 TROUVILLE. 
 
 of busy husbands and fathers whom the 
 Saturday-evening train bears away from 
 their desks and the Bourse to snatch a 
 brief draught of domestic feHcity from 
 the whirlpool of froth and fashion in 
 which their better halves are revolving. 
 During the races the rash stranger who 
 visits Trouville without having engaged 
 
 a lodging may have to wander a long time 
 without a shelter, and may be thankful if 
 he find one of any quality or at any price 
 The week of the races is to Trouville 
 what the Carnival is to Nice — a climax 
 of gayety, uproar and extravagance. Be- 
 fore the first of August the only summer 
 migrants who have arrived are the occu- 
 
 SHRIMP-FISHING. 
 
 pants of villas : by the twentieth every- 
 body is there, and the beach has its full 
 complement of children, students and 
 lawyers in the vacation. Travellers who 
 wish to see the most characteristic fea- 
 tures of different countries are recom- 
 mended to visit southern lands in sum- 
 mer and northern ones in winter — to 
 greet Naples under the focus of a June 
 sun, and find St. Petersburg locked in 
 its December frosts. To seize Trouville 
 at the moment when it is most itself, the 
 visitor should drop bravely down upon 
 it in all the discomforts of the racing- 
 week. He will find everything dearer 
 than at any other time ; he will be bad- 
 ly served ; he will have great difficulty 
 in hiring a carriage, finding a place at 
 the table -d'hote or getting hold of an 
 unoccupied bathing - house ; but he will 
 have the reward of having really seen 
 Trouville. "See Trouville, and — see it 
 
 no more," is the heartfelt utterance of 
 many a disgusted sojourner as he climbs 
 on the train which is to take him away 
 on the last day of the racing-week. And 
 his dissatisfaction is not without cause. 
 Trouville, like many other fashionable 
 resorts — like Newport and Cowes, for in- 
 stance — was not made for passing stran- 
 gers, who have no open sesame to its vil- 
 las. The real life of the place, with its 
 pleasures and its brightness, is not in the 
 Casino or the large hotels : it is in the sa- 
 lons. To the favored ones who give the 
 watchword of Parisian society, Trouville 
 society opens its store of distractions, 
 filling the hours with concerts, amateur 
 theatricals, improvised balls and cha- 
 rades. But the sojourner at the Hotel 
 de Paris or the Hotel des Roches-Noires, 
 if he have no introductions, is restricted 
 to the dissipations of the Casino, which 
 have a certain cheap monotony. The 
 
TROUVILLE. 
 
 125 
 
 Casino at Trouville is a large, ugly build- 
 ing, constructed on the plan of a French 
 railway -station. Its chief advantage is 
 its situation close to the sea, and it is 
 one which had nearly cost it its exist- 
 ence in the great tide of October, 1876. 
 It is composed of a covered terrace, 
 where coffee may be sipped in full view 
 of the sea, a billiard -room, a gaming- 
 hall, a reading-room, a dancing-hall and 
 a large saloon surrounded by a gallery 
 which serves for theatrical representa- 
 tions, concerts and large balls. Here 
 one may have the good fortune now and 
 then to see two or three of the company 
 of the Varietes in one of the little demi- 
 nioftdaine plays of Meilhac and Halevy, 
 or the greater treat of watching one of Oc- 
 tave Feuillet's comedies mondaines ren- 
 dered by two or three celebrities from the 
 
 Fran^ais. Mesdames Judic, Theo and 
 Croizette are yearly visitants at Trou- 
 ville ; and it was on its beach that the 
 equestrian portrait of the latter, with its 
 background of sea, was painted by her 
 brother-in-law, Carolus Duran. When 
 there are no dramatic stars at Trouville 
 the evening's entertainment consists of 
 the regular concert, often preceded by a 
 children's hop, which breaks up at half- 
 past nine. The orchestra of the Casino 
 is a good one, and the music is generally 
 well chosen, but it is wellnigh impossible 
 to hear anything, as the habitues consid- 
 er the concert a mere accompaniment 
 to their conversation. Any stranger who 
 should take exception to this custom, and 
 exhibit an ill-judged desire to hear the 
 Pastoral Symphony or the waltz from the 
 Roi de Lahore, would be set down as an 
 
 MUSSEL-FISHING. 
 
 outer barbarian, probably as an English- 
 man recently imported from Shanghai or 
 Brighton. 
 
 The American element introduced the 
 "Boston glide" a few years ago at the 
 Casino balls, where it has happily su- 
 perseded the deux temps. These Casino 
 balls are very pleasant if one has a large 
 acquaintance, but there is nothing free 
 
 and easy about them : introductions are 
 as necessary as at private entertainments. 
 In spite of its reputation as a "fast " place, 
 Trouville has preserved a touch of exclu- 
 siveness peculiar to itself, and has drawn 
 the line with admirable precision between 
 the inonde and the demi-monde — more 
 careful in this regard than Biarritz and 
 other watering-places, where the mix- 
 
126 
 
 TROUVILLE. 
 
 ture of the two elements forms a hetero- 
 geneous society which might not inaptly 
 be termed le monde et demi. Trouville 
 society is not to be arithmetically meas- 
 ured by this mixed number : it solves the 
 great social problem not by addition, but 
 by division, with rigorous proof. It ad- 
 
 heres rigidly to the convenances, and 
 surrounds its "rosebud garden of girls" 
 with the thorniest hedge of propriety. A 
 man should be aware of danger in order 
 to avoid it : -it is easy to recognize one of 
 these damsels. Their hats are simpler, 
 their lap-dogs a trifle larger, their cos- 
 
 types OF fishermen in holiday costume. 
 
 tume and their tone more subdued, than 
 is the case with married women. The 
 latter pass from one dazzling combina- 
 tion to another with a variation of mag- 
 nificence which leaves the lilies of the 
 field and the monarch -sage in all his 
 glory at equal disadvantage : the train 
 
 from Paris is not unfrequently delayed, 
 owing to the accumulation at the Gare St. 
 Lazare of the leathery structures where- 
 in all this glory is enshrined. Half a 
 dozen transformations a day is the usual 
 number undergone by the human butter- 
 fly of the beau sexe at Trouville. First, 
 
1879-] 
 
 TROUVILLE. 
 
 a morning toilet, to be displayed in 
 strolling on the board walk ; this gives 
 place to a driving-costume in the after- 
 noon, which is changed again at four 
 o'clock, when every one adjourns to the 
 
 127 
 
 beach ; at six o'clock, dressing for dinner ; 
 and at nine another metamorphosis into 
 full evening-dress. As at Newport, bath- 
 ing finds little place. A wide board walk 
 extending the whole length of the beach 
 
 INTERIOR OF A FISHERMAN'S HUT. 
 
 from the pier to the Hotel des Roches- 
 Noires is the general rendezvous before 
 breakfast, and again before dinner. At 
 these hours the products of worm and 
 Worth sweep over its boards in pano- 
 ramic changes, unceasingly watched on 
 
 either side by a sedentary audience, who 
 from the shade of pavilions or of spread- 
 ing umbrellas well rooted in the sand 
 survey the walkers with vigilant eyes. 
 It is under these umbrella trees that the 
 cabalistic potins are held where the birth 
 
128 
 
 TROUVILLE. 
 
 of each flirtation is registered and its 
 growth measured — where the costumes 
 are subjected to an ordeal of criticism, 
 the rights of each new arrival to the con- 
 sideration of society are carefully weigh- 
 ed, and questions of etiquette and pre- 
 cedence settled. 
 
 Could the smallest part of these com- 
 ments and decisions become suddenly 
 audible to their objects filing by in state- 
 ly procession, they would with one ac- 
 cord flee those treacherous boards and 
 regard light umbrellas as toadstools of 
 the Evil One for ever after. But all the 
 heads thus sheltered on the sands at 
 Trouville are not concocting the venom- 
 ed poison oithet potins. Some are brought 
 together in milder confidences, and not a 
 lew are virtuously poring over, the Revue 
 des Deux-Mondes, which at this season 
 of the year always prints a novel of Oc- 
 tave Feuillet, the gentle romancer of the 
 Second Empire and a prime favorite with 
 the ladies who summer at Trouville. It 
 is for them that the new novel is writ- 
 ten : it forms a regular part of their regi- 
 men, like the baths and the sea-air. It 
 is soothing, invigorating, and, above all, 
 it is the fashion. Un Mariage dans le 
 Monde and the Jourtial d'une Femvie 
 have been decried by some persons as 
 false in tone and setting up a false ideal. 
 It is to be feared that their critics did not 
 read them at Trouville, in which case 
 their carpings are of no account, for 
 Feuillet's novels were made to be read 
 at Trouville, as mangoes were made to 
 be eaten in Cuba. 
 
 Below the promenade, on a firm, smooth 
 beach which slopes almost imperceptibly 
 into the sea, are the bathing -houses, so 
 arranged that the two sexes are kept at 
 a puritanical distance froin each other, 
 the ladies' quarters being guarded by a 
 vigilant sentinel who bears the nickname 
 of Pere la Pudeur. The beach looks to 
 the north, and is in some respects an ex- 
 cellent one. Its chief defect is its flatness. 
 Even at high tide the bather who wishes 
 to stand up to his neck in water must 
 walk a long way before he can accom- 
 plish his end. There are not many, how- 
 ever, who are fired with such ambition. 
 Good swimmers sometimes like to gain 
 
 more exhilaration and a sense of being 
 wet by striking out for the boats and 
 diving from them. The majority of faint- 
 hearted bathers — and they are in a lar- 
 ger majority on the coast of Norman- 
 dy than on the sands of New Jersey — 
 dabble placidly in the saucer-like shal- 
 lowness near the water's edge, tethered 
 by ropes to the shore, looking as con- 
 tented and as out of place as ducks upon 
 dry land. This method of bathing has, 
 besides its tameness, the inconvenience 
 of displaying plenty of models for a Dau- 
 mier, but few enough for a Canova. Sen- 
 sitive bathers, who may wish to preserve 
 their anatomy from the searching exam- 
 ination of the numerous glasses levelled 
 seaward, have the privilege of hiring a 
 cabine aflot, and being drawn through the 
 waves to a deeper bathing -place. The 
 French ladies imprison their hair most 
 scrupulously in the unbecoming turban 
 of oilskin, having a deeply -rooted con- 
 viction that salt water changes its color 
 or causes it to fall out. American ladies 
 know better, and the Greek maidens sub- 
 mitted their locks without injury to the 
 caresses of the waves, following the ex- 
 ample of their sea-born goddess : 
 
 Quand Venus Astarte, fille de I'onde amere, 
 Secouait, vierge encore, las larmes de sa mere, 
 Et fecondait le monde en bordant ses cheveux. 
 
 Trouville offers other amusement dur- 
 ing the day besides bathing, promenad- 
 ing and dressing. The country in which 
 it is situated, if not exactly picturesque, 
 is smiling and verdant, and excursions 
 are made in all directions by long cav- 
 alcades mounted on donkeys. It is the 
 regular thing to go in this way to the 
 chateau of Bonneville, which is supposed 
 to have been the residence of WiUiam 
 the Conqueror. All that is left of its glo- 
 ry is a heap of ruins tumbling over into 
 the moat, an ogive door being still erect, 
 with a single tower, the Tour du Ser- 
 ment, where William is said to have 
 bound Harold by an oath to assist him 
 in the conquest of England. There is a 
 fine view from the foot of the tower over 
 the valley of the Toucques and the 
 beaches of Trouville and Deauville. A 
 woman from the neighboring farm serves 
 as guide to the ruins, and dangles a can- 
 
TROUVILLE. 
 
 129 
 
 die on the end of a string in the black 
 depths of the oubliette to chill the souls 
 of visitors by the sight of a. ghastly heap 
 of bones at the bottom — bones of feudal 
 knights or of contemporary sheep. When 
 Bonneville has been explored the excur- 
 sionist may proceed along the road lead- 
 ing to Pont-l'Eveque, cross the Toucques 
 and arrive at the ruins of St. Arnould 
 
 and of Lassay. The priory of St. Ar- 
 nould dates from the beginning of the 
 twelfth century : the only part still in 
 existence is the crypt, which is strewn 
 with remains of tombs. Under a group 
 of trees is a more modern chapel, and 
 a spring whose waters are reported to 
 have a miraculous power of healing. 
 They have at least that of refreshing and 
 
 THE HARBOR. 
 
 cooling, so the spring is not wholly a 
 humbug. Farther on, a venerable stair- 
 case, supported by ivy-mantled walls, is 
 all that is left of the chateau of Las- 
 say, whose history has been narrated 
 by Saint-Simon. 
 
 A pleasant drive can be taken to Hon- 
 fleur, where we see the last of the Seine 
 as it disappears into the Channel. The 
 road thither from Trouville winds along 
 the shore, which is bordered by steep and 
 irregular rocks. In the opposite direction 
 a smoother road leads beside the sea past 
 a string of bright and coquettish little 
 towns, each with its casino, from which 
 9 
 
 lively strains of music issue forth. It 
 takes a whole day to accomplish this 
 excursion pleasantly, driving through 
 Villers, Houlgate, Dives, Cabourg, and 
 halting at Dives to make acquaintance 
 with the excellent dinners which are 
 served up at the Hostellerie de Guillaume 
 le Conquerant. Dives is one of the nu- 
 merous Norman towns which claim to 
 have speeded the parting Conqueror on 
 his celebrated trip across the Channel. 
 But if this distinction is worn rather 
 threadbare, and strict authenticity de- 
 nies to our Hostellerie the fame of hav- 
 ing provided the farewell feast on that 
 
13° 
 
 TROUVILLE. 
 
 occasion, the homely little Norman inn 
 may still thrive on its good cheer of to- 
 day and its quaint furniture of antique 
 andirons, spits and candlesticks, old 
 Rouen faience, Middle-Age tables and 
 chairs, wood - carvings, and other curi- 
 osities which make its dining-room wor- 
 thy of being set down intact in the Hotel 
 de Cluny. The owner of these treasures 
 of bric-a-brac steadfastly refuses to part 
 with a single chip of it, to the despair, 
 no doubt, of scores of longing collectors. 
 If we allow ourselves to be fascinated 
 into making any sojourn in one of these 
 
 smaller watering-places, we should carry 
 our entertainment with us or have the 
 power of doing without, for each village 
 is the resort of a particular coterie who 
 rather monopolize its amusement and 
 advantages, leaving but a meagre op- 
 portunity of diversion for the casual vis- 
 itor. If the latter wearies of a tete-a-tete 
 with the sea and the game of looking on, 
 his only resource will be to drive, at the 
 highest speed which his hack will accom- 
 plish — about six miles an hour perhaps — • 
 back to Trouville. 
 
 Here one is not so dependent on so- 
 
 THE JETTIES. 
 
 ciety to fill up the time : the beach pre- 
 sents a kaleidoscope of life and gayety ; 
 there are the intellectual resources of the 
 books at the bookseller's and the news- 
 papers at the Casino ; the consolation of 
 an excellent ctdsine is always at hand ; 
 there are the excitements of crab-racing, 
 of catching shrimps and gathering mus- 
 sels. The mussels — called in the Nor- 
 man patois cciieux — are found clinging 
 to the blackish rocks which are left bare 
 at low tide on the sands between Trou- 
 ville and Villerville. The mussel is 
 scorned in America : let me say a good 
 word for him, and testify that, cooked a 
 
 la mariniere, he is well worthy of regard. 
 The shrimps found at Trouville are small 
 but delicate. They are of the same kind 
 as the river-shrimps at New Orleans. It 
 is not upon shrimps and mussels that the 
 seven hundred native fishermen of Trou- 
 ville expend their large energies. They 
 have the reputation of being bold and 
 active seamen. Despite the invasion of 
 fashion which they have submitted to — 
 and profited by — for the last forty years, 
 they remain the same as when Charles 
 Mozin painted them in his Fisherme7t 
 drazuing in their Nets, 1834. They ad- 
 here to the traditional costume — a striped 
 
TROUVILLE. 
 
 131 
 
 woollen cap, a suroy or stout jacket of 
 tarred cloth, trousers of the same, and 
 unmense boots, which they replace when 
 on shore by the classic sabots. Every 
 night, except on the eve of a fete-day, 
 they put out to sea in a fleet of about a 
 hundred small barques, and every morn- 
 ing, if the weather renders it possible, 
 they come in again with the spoils of 
 their chaluts, as the large nets are called. 
 They seem to have no restlessness or 
 desire to escape from the hardships of 
 their life. The money which the sum- 
 mer transformation of their native town 
 brings in to them makes their homes 
 somewhat more comfortable and the 
 fisl^wives' caps more resplendent with 
 laces than before : that is all the change. 
 Fishermen they will die, and their sons 
 will be fishermen after them. A few 
 here and there have sold their fishing- 
 boats to go into the lucrative profession 
 of bathing - attendants, which enables 
 them to enjoy a double portion of cal- 
 vados, a popular beverage composed of 
 cider and brandy, but the majority stick 
 to their chaluts. 
 
 Trouville harbor is formed by the 
 mouth of the Toucques. Outside is a 
 channel fifty metres wide enclosed be- 
 tween two piers — one two hundred and 
 twenty, the other four hundred, metres 
 long. In i860 a floating dock was built 
 at a cost of two and a half millions of 
 francs : its sluice is larger than any oth- 
 er in the country except that of the new 
 dock at Havre. The navigation of the 
 port averages about six hundred vessels, 
 without counting the fishing-boats. The 
 old village of Trouville — the Trouville 
 of Mere Auzeraie and Pere Dumas, the 
 nucleus of the brilliant seaside city — lies 
 close to the harbor, and is to be avoided 
 by sensitive nostrils. It has to be gone 
 through, however, in order to reach 
 Deauville on the other side 01 the riv- 
 er, and most of the Trouville people do 
 go to Deauville several times a week. 
 
 Deauville is the Faubourg St. Germain 
 of Trouville. To cross the bridge over 
 the Toucques is like passing into anoth- 
 er world — a world wrapped in ennui and 
 stately reserve. From the shades of its 
 ennui it looks with saturnine disdain at 
 
 the glare and life of its brilliant vis-a-vis. 
 Deauville wears an air of blue-blooded 
 and ancient respectability rather prema- 
 ture, since, in its present stage of exist- 
 ence, it is the younger of the two resorts. 
 In i860 it was a mere hamlet perched on 
 the brow of a hill, with a church whose 
 brevet of antiquity, dug up in its parson- 
 age garden, consisted of eight hundred 
 gold coins bearing the effigy of Philip 
 the Fair. A new era dawned in the his- 
 tory of the village on the day when the 
 due de Morny, after an unsuccessful at- 
 tempt to find a villa at Trouville, cross- 
 ed the Toucques with a party of friends, 
 came to Deauville, saw and acquired 
 it. A great speculator as well as a great 
 dandy, he no sooner sniffed the air from 
 its shores than he scented the chance 
 which lay in buying up a quantity of 
 that cheap, sandy waste, setting it in 
 vogue, and thus raising its value a hun- 
 dred-fold. He set the ball of popularity 
 in motion by building a villa there him- 
 self, the Villa Morny, which changed its 
 name to Villa Sesto when the duchesse 
 de Morny carried it over, by a second 
 marriage, to the duke of that name. A 
 rich manufacturer, M. Donon, who had 
 joined the scheme, built the next villa, 
 which, with its square battlemented tow- 
 er, now covered with ivy, is one of the 
 most striking on the terrasse at Deau- 
 ville. M. John Oliffe, the princess Lise 
 Troubetzkoi, Prince Demidoff and others 
 followed suit, the fashionable world rally- 
 ing to the aid of its ingenious leader with 
 no want of alacrity. A race-course was 
 started in the meadows by the Toucques, 
 liberally endowed by the duke and put 
 in the hands of the Jockey Club. Ital- 
 ian palaces with their stately colonnades 
 and statues, Swiss chalets and Dutch 
 cottages, sprang into being as if by en- 
 chantment, till the little Norman village 
 could boast of a Street of Nations almost 
 as curious and varied as that at the Champ 
 de Mars last year. 
 
 Everything was done to conceal the nat- 
 ural disadvantages of the place. Its pa- 
 trons imported vegetable earth and trans- 
 planted ready-grown trees to the new gar- 
 dens. They built a casino far exceeding 
 that of Trouville in beauty and conveni- 
 
132 
 
 TROUVILLE. 
 
 ence. In time, the due de Morny died, but 
 Deauville was already lance : it paused a 
 moment to raise a statue to its founder, 
 and went on building. It had one enemy, 
 however, and that a powerful one. The 
 sea looked with sullen disfavor upon the 
 new speculation, and droned out an un- 
 ceasing homily on the text of laying foun- 
 dations upon sand. Year by year it re- 
 ceded slowly, till the villas, which in the 
 days of the due de Morny had been ca- 
 ressed by the tide at high water, became 
 in the time of the due de Sesto green 
 oases in a desert of yellow sand. Deau- 
 ville is now as proverbially dusty as 
 Pekin or Boston in an east wind. The 
 irate sea has thrown up an immense 
 sandbank which chokes the beach and 
 leaves the bathers to disport themselves 
 in a briny pond not more than three feet 
 deep. The bleaching sands stretch drear- 
 ily away as far as the eye can reach, with 
 no trees, no sunshades or flashing toilettes 
 to break their monotony, which is as des- 
 olate as that of the Ostende beach in mid- 
 winter. 
 
 Once a year, however, the neglected 
 watering-place has a sudden renewal of 
 animation and brightness. During the 
 races it wakes from its sleep and thrills 
 again with life. Then the huge hotel 
 alongside of the Casino becomes at least 
 half full, and, by levying a double tax 
 on its customers, contrives to make bus- 
 iness pay for the week. A well-known 
 "turf-character, M. Joachim Lefebvre, 
 paid a thousand francs a day for the priv- 
 ilege of sojourning there with his family. 
 Some gentlemen who have got tired of 
 meeting little bills of this kind prefer to 
 visit Deauville in their yachts, and live 
 on board during the semaine des cotirses. 
 The prince of Wales sailed there in 1877, 
 and was carried ashore from his yacht on 
 the shoulders of one of his sailors : this 
 created a rage for that mode of transport 
 which lasted the whole season. The ca- 
 bine afiot, with its harnessed quadruped, 
 was left high and dry on the sand, while 
 the Trouville dandies rode forth into the 
 waves on the shoulders of brawny bath- 
 ing-attendants. L. Lejeune. 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 .1 IW"- 
 
 
 'j^ 
 
 > 
 
 1 
 
 
 MONTE SAN SALVAT ORE fLAGO DI I.UGANO 
 
 THE numerous lakes over which the I a striking variety of aspect. Those which 
 AIDS throw their long shadows offer | lie to the north of this chain have m gen- 
 ^ 133 
 
134 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 eral an aii of rugged and sombre gran- 
 deur — a mysterious air, as if accustomed 
 to veil their charms in mountain - mist 
 and obscure their history with doubtful 
 legends — an air, even in midsummer, 
 of uncertain warmth, as if conscious 
 that peaks of eternal snow and leagues 
 of untrodden ice-fields lie between them 
 and the sun. The Italian lakes, on the 
 other hand, stretching to the south of the 
 great mountain-barrier, and shielded by 
 it from the cold winds of the German 
 plain, join to the wildness of Alpine 
 scenery the smile of a genial sky and 
 the luxuriance of a southern vegetation. 
 They have the prestige, too, of an earli- 
 er civilization than their northern neigh- 
 bors. For while Lake Leman was still 
 reflecting the rafts and the uncouth hel- 
 mets of the Helvetians, and while along 
 the Austrian lakes the rude Pannonian 
 was still hunting the wolf and the bear, 
 the borders of the southern lakes, of 
 Garda and Como, Lugano and Mag- 
 giore, were already covered with vine- 
 yards and olive-groves and dotted with 
 the luxurious villas of a rich and cultured 
 people. Catullus had his home here, and 
 the two Plinies and many minor lights 
 of Roman letters. Since that day the 
 language, the religion, the government 
 and the manners of the inhabitants of 
 this region have completely changed. 
 Only the rocks and mountains, the wa- 
 ters and the verdure with which Nature 
 yearly renews her youth, remain the 
 same. But there is in those permanent 
 features a rare beauty which has de- 
 lighted travellers of every age and has 
 been celebrated in the literature of ev- 
 ery country. 
 
 It was toward the end of last October 
 that I strolled away from my occupa- 
 tions in the French capital to spend a 
 fortnight on the Italian lakes. Of the 
 many rr utes which from time immemo- 
 rial have served for the invasion of Italy 
 by the barbarian and the tourist, I chose 
 on this occasion the Brenner. Apart 
 from the pleasing views it offers, this 
 Alpine pass is interesting as being the 
 first over which the Romans ventured to 
 lead their legions, and the first upon which 
 a railway was constructed. I halted at 
 
 Trent, and it was several days before I 
 could free myself from the charm of the 
 Etruscan city and plan my departure. 
 
 One afternoon I was making inquiries 
 at the office of the diligence which runs 
 to Riva on the Lake of Garda, when a 
 newly-married German couple offered to 
 share with me a private carriage which 
 they had just hired for the same journey. 
 I accepted at once, and in an hour we 
 were off. The sober gray suit trimmed 
 with green in which Hans was attired 
 contrasted oddly with the brilliant pur- 
 ple travelling-dress of his fair -haired 
 Gretchen. I wondered at first that they 
 should have been willing to embarrass 
 themselves with a sti-anger, until I per- 
 ceived that my presence was no hinder- 
 ance at all to their demonstrations of 
 affection. We climbed up by a steep 
 and winding road to a narrow defile 
 which the impetuous Vella almost fills. 
 One day, when St. Vigilius was too much 
 pressed for time to walk over the moun- 
 tain, he wrenched it apart and made 
 this passage. The imprint of his holy 
 hand is still to be seen on the rock. 
 Passing under the cyclopean eyes of 
 scores of Austrian cannon which now 
 defend this important military position, 
 we began to descend the valley of the 
 Sarca. It is a wild region, where every 
 hamlet has a ruined castle and a legend 
 of knight or robber, saint or fairy. The 
 picturesque remains of the Madruzzo Cas- 
 tle bring to mind the celebrated portraits 
 which Titian painted of members of this 
 noble family. The artist's colors have 
 survived the last of a long line, and will 
 doubtless outlive as well the crumbling 
 stones of their stronghold. As we skirt- 
 ed the little Lake of Dobling its still 
 waters reflected rocks and trees, sky and 
 mountain, in an enchanting manner. 
 
 "Lovely!" I exclaimed. 
 
 "Lovely!" echoed Gretchen, without 
 taking her eyes off Hans. 
 
 "Lovely I" answered Hans, still watch- 
 ing the beautiful things reflected in her 
 eyes. 
 
 After crossing the rapid Sarca and 
 traversing a desolate tract where rocks 
 of every size, fallen from the overhang- 
 ing mountain, lie strewn about in chaotic 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 135 
 
136 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 confusion, we reached Arco. This sunny 
 village nestles at the foot of an immense 
 detached boulder whose dizzy summit is 
 crowned by mediaeval battlements and 
 towers. Home fit only for birds of prey, 
 this castle was long the nest of a family 
 of robbers. Scarcely had we lost in the 
 distance this greatest wonder of the val- 
 ley when a sharjj turn of the road brought 
 Riva and the Lake of Garda full in view. 
 It was a prospect of singular beauty. 
 The sun had already set except on the 
 highest peaks, and a part of the lake 
 was wrapt in purple shadows. Another 
 part, however, was as clear and light 
 as the sky above it, and all aglow with 
 the images of crimson and orange-tinted 
 clouds. A shrill cry — of delight, I thought 
 — burst from Gretchen's lips. I was mis- 
 taken. Hans had pulled off too rudely 
 a ring from her finger, and the fair one 
 was in tears. 
 
 Half an hour more of fast driving 
 brought us to Riva, which we entered 
 by the Porta San Michele, one of the 
 four ancient and imposing gateways of 
 which the town boasts. Two good inns 
 offered their hospitality. I chose the 
 Golden Sun, but my romantic compan- 
 ions preferred the Garden. The land- 
 lord informed me that the two steamers 
 which daily make the tour of the lake, 
 one along the eastern and one along 
 the western shore, would both start be- 
 fore sunrise. Unwilling to leave Riva so 
 soon, I determined to lie over one day. 
 My windows overlooked the beach, and 
 I fell asleep to the monotonous plash of 
 the wave and to the buzz of noisy talk 
 in the streets, which continued to a late 
 hour. 
 
 In the morning I go out to see the 
 local sights. In ten minutes I am sat- 
 isfied that there is nothing here in the 
 way of painting or architecture worth 
 seeing. But if these are wanting, there 
 are plenty of curious narrow streets, 
 where the houses lean over the way 
 toward each other in a friendly but most 
 unstable manner ; there are gardens of 
 blooming oleanders ; there are gaudy 
 house -fronts, whose frescoes seem to 
 have waged a hard battle with Time. 
 Above all, there is the animation of the 
 
 port and the free, happy, open-air hfe 
 on the beach and in the two large 
 squares. Here every face, every cos- 
 tume, every word, every gesture, is Ital- 
 ian. The harmony between the land- 
 scape and the people is perfect, save 
 that over La Rocca, the fortress on the 
 shore, waves the black -and -yellow flag 
 of Franz Joseph, and that here and there 
 an Austrian uniform mars the picture, 
 and that now and then harsh German 
 accents fall on the ear like a discord in a 
 fine strain of music. An unpleasant fact 
 is forced upon the attention. The home 
 of these Italians is as yet no part of It- 
 aly : Riva and a small portion of the 
 lake still belong to Austria. 
 
 In the afternoon I take tl>e famous 
 walk to the Ponale waterfall. The road 
 thither ascends continually. It has been 
 skilfully led along the ledges of a pre- 
 cipitous cliff which borders the lake to the 
 west of Riva, arwi occasionally pierces the 
 mountain by short tunnels. After pass- 
 ing through the third tunnel I come to a 
 wooden bridge, under which the Ponale 
 dashes just before taking its final leap 
 into the lake. The frail structure on 
 which I stand trembles and is wet with 
 spray, and the air is full of the roar and 
 gurgle of the waters. But for me the 
 main charm of the walk is not the sight 
 of this noisy torrent, but the superb view 
 of Riva that I get on my way back upon 
 issuing from one of the tunnels. The 
 eye, accustomed for a moment to the 
 darkness, is all the more sensitive to the 
 rich soft light which bathes the moun- 
 tains and the town. A gentle breeze 
 ripples the lake, and the brightly-paint- 
 ed houses that fringe the beach are seen 
 indistinctly in the water, where they look 
 like a line of waving banners. Half a 
 dozen steeples and bell - towers rise 
 gracefully from among the roofs, and 
 their presence explains the surprising 
 frequency with which the hours of the 
 night are struck. From this height I 
 can distinguish the low walls which sur- 
 round the town and compress its four 
 thousand inhabitants into the area of a 
 small quadrilateral. But Riva, though 
 still fortified, has a thorough look of 
 peaceful commercial prosperity, and has 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 137 
 
 quite laid aside the warlike air she wore 
 in the Middle Ages. In those troubled 
 times this town saw countless wars and 
 sustained many sieges ; belonged now to 
 
 Venice, now to Milan, now to Austria ; 
 and at times was independent and able 
 to defy even a bull of the pope or a re- 
 script of the emperor. 
 
 Two incidents of these wars of the 
 fifteenth century deserve mention. Pic- 
 cinino, a leader of mercenary troops in 
 the Milanese service, was besieged in 
 
 Riva by Francis Sforza, who, thirsting 
 for the blood of his adversary, had of- 
 fered a large reward for his head. Pic- 
 cinino, seeing that the town was hard 
 
138 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 pressed and likely to fall, thought it 
 wise to make his escape. First, he had 
 it given out that he had died of the plague : 
 then had himself sewed up in a sack and 
 let down by a rope from the town-wall. 
 There a soldier took the sack on his back 
 and carried it through the enemy's lines, 
 ringing a bell all the while to warn every- 
 body to keep out of the way and avoid 
 contagion. The ruse succeeded, and be- 
 fore it was found out the cunning condot- 
 tiere was out of Sforza's reach. 
 
 It was on another occasion, when this 
 same Piccinino held all the lower part of 
 the lake and the Venetians had access 
 only to the upper part, that the other in- 
 cident occurred, Hannibal crossed the 
 Alps with elephants and Napoleon with 
 cannon, but Sorbolo, a native of Candia, 
 in some sort outdid them both, for he 
 dragged a whole fleet over a mountain 
 which is almost as high as the great St. 
 Bernard Pass. He brought thirty -one 
 Venetian ships as far as he could up the 
 Adige, and then, with the aid of two thou- 
 sand oxen, hauled them in fifteen days 
 over Monte Baldo and let them down by 
 ropes into the lake. 
 
 Torbole, the village where this costly 
 enterprise ended, is about three miles 
 from Riva. It is much visited — by epi- 
 cureans for its good fish, by artists for its 
 picturesque surroundings, and by enthu- 
 siastic climbers, who there begin the as- 
 cent of Monte Baldo. 
 
 Long before daybreak the next morn- 
 ing the great red and green eyes of two 
 small steamers are looking around for 
 passengers, and their whistles screeching 
 that it is time to get up. I have chosen 
 the boat which skirts the western bank. 
 It starts an hour later than the other, but 
 it is not yet sunrise when we push off. 
 The after-deck is thinly peopled, chiefly 
 by tourists, but the fore-deck, where the 
 seats are cheaper, is crowded. We pass 
 by the tumbling and roaring Ponale, and 
 before many minutes we cross the invis- 
 ible boundary-line between Austria and 
 Italy. The motion of the boat is hardly 
 felt, for we are sailing with a strong cur- 
 rent. The high peaks to the north have 
 already caught the first rays of the sun : 
 masses of white vapor which have been 
 
 sleeping in the mountain -hollows are 
 roused up and put on a rosy tint. The 
 sky is without a cloud, the lake without 
 a ripple : we seem to be floating in mid- 
 air. 
 
 Limone, the first stopping-place, is quite 
 given up to the culture of the fruit from 
 which it takes its name. A row of cy- 
 presses gives a gloomy air to the village 
 and awakens a melancholy recollection. 
 It was here that, in 1810, Andreas Hofer, 
 the Tyrolese patriot, was arrested by or- 
 der of Napoleon. A boat conveyed him 
 to the prison of Peschiera, and he was 
 soon afterward shot in the citadel of 
 Mantua. 
 
 We next stop before Tremosine, a vil- 
 lage perched high up on a rock, and to 
 which no visible road leads. On the other 
 side of the lake, which is here narrow, the 
 white houses of Malcesine cluster around 
 the base of an imposing castle. This 
 stronghold of the Middle Ages, one of 
 the few in this neighborhood which Time 
 has not been suffered to destroy, was built 
 by Charlemagne, and was formerly the 
 boundary between Austria and the Vene- 
 tian territory ; but it is chiefly interesting 
 from an adventure which here befell 
 Goethe. He had sat down in the court- 
 yard, and was sketching one of the quaint 
 old towers, when the crowd that had gath- 
 ered around him, taking him for a spy, 
 fell on him, tore his drawings to pieces 
 and sent for the authorities to arrest him. 
 Fortunately, there was in the village a 
 man who had worked in Frankfort and 
 knew the poet by sight, and through his 
 influence Goethe was set free. 
 
 Behind Malcesine the ground rises 
 slowly in gentle undulations until the 
 long ridge of Monte Baldo, its summit 
 bare, its sides clothed with chestnut and 
 myrtle and scarred by deep ravines, 
 closes the view. A strong north breeze, 
 which the captain calls the sover, has 
 sprung up. It swells the sails of the 
 little barks that dot the lake, and under 
 its influence the water takes a hue of 
 pure ultramarine. Keeping along, close 
 under the wild and steep bank, we ar- 
 rive at Gargnano, the warmest spot in 
 Northern Italy and the favorite resort 
 of the Brescian aristocracy. Low hills. 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 139 
 
140 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 covered with lemon-groves and fig trees, 
 form the background of this lovely vil- • 
 lage, while gay villas and beautiful gar- 
 dens line the shore. Not far away, at the 
 water's edge, a small column is erected 
 opposite the spot where six members of 
 the same family perished when, in 1866, 
 an Italian gunboat was sunk by the Aus- 
 trian fleet. 
 
 The lake widens fast as we advance. 
 Suddenly the bay of Salo opens to the 
 right, and we enter it to search out the 
 little town of that name, which is quite 
 hidden among orange and mulberry 
 trees. It is ten o'clock when, emerging 
 from this bay, we pass through a narrow 
 strait between a group of islands and the 
 mainland. The breeze gradually dies 
 away, a few minutes of perfect calm 
 succeed, and then fitful gusts agitate 
 the surface of the lake. 
 
 "II lago si volta!" exclaims the cap- 
 tain ; and the meaning of the phrase is 
 soon evident, for the south wind sets 
 in strongly and the color of the water 
 changes, first to the deepest possible 
 blue, and then to a bright grass-green. 
 A burly priest at my side tells me that 
 this singular phenomenon occurs in fine 
 weather at the same hour every day. It 
 is a lake in the morning, he says, but a 
 sea in the afternoon ; and, quoting Vir- 
 gil's famous line, 
 
 Fluctibus et fremitu assurgens, Benace, marino, 
 
 he assures me that in violent storms he 
 has seen the waves run as high here as 
 in any part of the Mediterranean. His 
 conversation occupies my attention for 
 the rest of the journey. Pointing to the 
 town of Garda, faintly seen on the op- 
 posite shore, he tells me, among other 
 things, that he was born there ; that in 
 the castle there the virtuous Adelaide, 
 queen of Italy, was imprisoned ; and that 
 the lake, called Benacus by the Ro- 
 mans, assumed its modern name some 
 centuries ago, when it fell under the 
 dominion of the counts of Garda. Just 
 behind Garda is the village where Na- 
 poleon gained one of his most brilliant 
 victories and Massena the title of duke 
 of Rivoli. 
 
 We are soon abreast of the peninsula 
 
 of Sermione, on which stood the house of 
 Catullus. This long and narrow strip of 
 land, in shape like an arrow, divides the 
 southern end of the lake into two bays, 
 on each of which is situated an import- 
 ant town. Peschiera, to the east, is one 
 corner of the famous Italian Quadrilat- 
 eral : to the west lies Desenzano, toward 
 which our steamer is heading — one of 
 the chief grain -markets of Lombardy. 
 Midway on Sermione is a castle with 
 three picturesque towers built by the 
 Scaligers, and at the very end of the 
 peninsula are extensive Roman ruins, 
 now known as the Grotto of Catullus. 
 At the sight of these venerable arches 
 the priest grows enthusiastic. 
 
 " Quam te libenter, quamque laetus inviso ! 
 Salve, O venusta Sirmio !" 
 
 he exclaimed. "Virgil visited these 
 shores : Dante, when an exile in Vero- 
 na, accepting the 
 
 cortesia del gran Lombardo 
 Che'n su la scala porta il santo uccello, 
 
 made frequent excursions upon and 
 around our lake and drew many pic- 
 tures of its scenery. But Catullus lived 
 here : this was his home. How often 
 has his eye rested on each point of this 
 wonderful landscape, the mountains, the 
 valleys, this broad expanse of v/ater, the 
 bold headlands and the curving beach ! 
 How often has he watched with delight 
 the changes which the hours and sea- 
 sons work in their appearance ! Here 
 he sung his love for Lesbia in words that 
 still thrill us, and here he mourned the 
 death of her sparrow. His whole poetry 
 is but the reflection of the beauty which 
 Nature daily spread before him." 
 
 Scarcely are the ruins out of sight 
 when we enter the harbor of Desen- 
 zano. After landing I have just time to 
 take lunch and to cast a hurried glance 
 over certain Roman antiquities and rel- 
 ics of the Stone Age found here, before 
 the train starts, and carries me off with 
 it toward Lecco, on the Lake of Como. 
 
 The environs of Lecco are not want- 
 ing in beauty. The swift Adda rushes 
 by, bearing off the clear waters of the 
 lake ; to the east a fantastic mountain, 
 the Resegone or "Great Saw," lifts up 
 its long teeth against the sky ; to the 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 141 
 
 STREET IN TREMEZZO. 
 
 west, across the water and at the en- 
 trance of the Val Madrera, the village 
 of Malgrate offers a charming prospect. 
 The town itself is given up to iron-foun- 
 dries, cotton -mills and silk -looms, and 
 has little of interest to detain the travel- 
 ler except perhaps a museum of instru- 
 ments of torture. But Manzoni, who 
 
 placed in this neighborhood some of 
 the best scenes of his Proniessi Sposi, has 
 endeared the spot for ever to the literary 
 world, and many a tourist now spends a 
 day in Lecco, less to inspect its manufac- 
 tories or to satisfy his eye with a pleas- 
 ing landscape than to search out in the 
 streets and the market-place counter- 
 
142 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 parts of the characters of the famous 
 novel. 
 
 On the map the Lake of Como looks 
 like an inverted and somewhat irregu- 
 lar Y, or, still more, like a child's first 
 attempt to draw a man, who without 
 arms and with unequal legs is running 
 off to the left. Just at the moment his 
 picture is taken he has one foot on Lecco 
 and the other on the town of Como. The 
 hilly district between the two southern 
 branches of the lake is known as the 
 Brianza, and is noted for its bracing air, 
 its fertile soil and the coolness of its 
 springs. The Brianza ends at the mid- 
 dle of the lake in a dolomite promontory 
 several hundred feet high, on whose west- 
 ern slope lies the village of Bellaggio. 
 This point commands the finest views 
 in every direction : it is near the most 
 interesting of those villas which are open 
 to the public, and it abounds in good ho- 
 tels. To visit Bellaggio is therefore the 
 aim of every tourist who passes this way. 
 My journey thither it is best to pass over 
 in silence, for I see nothing, and what I 
 feel is indescribable. I am shut up dur- 
 ing a furious storm of wind and rain in 
 the cabin of a little steamer which is as 
 nervous and uneasy as if on the Atlantic. 
 I am told, however, that in this part of 
 the lake the banks are lofty and steep, 
 and frequently barren, and that there are 
 marble-quarries to be seen, and cascades 
 and houses and villages crowning the 
 cliffs. • 
 
 On arriving at Bellaggio, I take lodg- 
 ing in the Villa Serbelloni, one of the 
 many magnificent residences which pov- 
 erty has induced the Italian nobles to 
 put into the hands of hotel-keepers. The 
 house stands high up on the very end of 
 the promontory, and adjoining it is an 
 extensive park, on which the ruins of a 
 robber's castle look down. The pano- 
 rama which on a fine day spreads it- 
 self out before one who walks in these 
 grounds is of singular beauty. The 
 northern arm of the lake, wider and 
 more regular than the others, opens up 
 a long vista of headlands and bays and 
 red -roofed villages as far as where Do- 
 maso peeps out from a grove of giant 
 elms. Beyond, the view is bounded by 
 
 the snow-covered Alps. Close at hand, 
 near Varenna, the Fiume di Latte, a 
 milk-white waterfall, leaps down from 
 a height of a thousand feet. Toward 
 Lecco huge walls of barren rock arise 
 and wrap every thing near them in som- 
 bre shadows. Toward Como the tran- 
 quil water is shut in by hills and low 
 mountains, whose flowing lines blend 
 gracefully together. Some of these 
 slopes are dark with pines, some are 
 gray with the olive, some are garlanded 
 with vines which hang from tree to tree, 
 while others are clothed in a rich green 
 foliage, amid which glistens the golden 
 fruit of the orange and the lemon. The 
 banks are lined with bright gardens and 
 noble parks and villas, whose lawns run 
 down to the water's edge and are adorn- 
 ed with fountains, statues, masses of bril- 
 liant flowers and clumps of tall trees. 
 Above is a sky of Italian blue, and be- 
 low is a crystal mirror in which every 
 charm of the landscape is repeated. 
 The impression made by all this loveli- 
 ness is increased by the air of happiness 
 that pervades the spot. It is the haunt 
 of the rich, the gay, the newly-married : 
 music and song, laughter and mirthful 
 talk, are the most familiar sounds. The 
 smile of Nature seems here to warm men's 
 hearts and drive away the cares they have 
 brought with them. 
 
 It is on this site that Pliny the Young- 
 er is believed to have had the villa which 
 he called Cothurnus or "Tragedy." The 
 present building is several centuries old. 
 Tradition relates that a certain countess, 
 one of its first occupants, had a habit of 
 throwing her lovers down the cliff when 
 she was tired of them. Making this de- 
 lightful abode iny head-quarters, I spend 
 a week, partly in agreeable sight-seeing 
 and partly in still more agreeable idle- 
 ness. I visit villas, towers, fossil -beds 
 and waterfalls — in short, everything in- 
 teresting and accessible — now going on 
 foot, now borne from point to point in 
 one of the sharp-prowed rowboats which 
 are in use here, and now taking the 
 steamer up to Colico or down to Como 
 and back. 
 
 At half an hour's walk from here, on 
 the Lecco arm of the lake, is the Villa 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 143 
 
144 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 Giulia. It was the favorite residence of 
 the late Leopold, king of Belgium, and, 
 although now a hotel, it is worth a visit 
 for the beautiful grounds that surround 
 it and for the charming view it affords 
 in the direction of Bellaggio. It is here 
 that, while strolling in the garden one 
 afternoon, secretly coveting the wonder- 
 ful camellias and hortensias, I catch the 
 whisper of familiar voices, and stumble 
 suddenly upon an arbor where, under 
 the shadow of countless roses, I descry 
 a gray-and-green arm around a purple 
 waist. The moment I am seen there is 
 a scream and a flutter, and then a cordial 
 recognition. Hans and Gretchen tell me 
 they are making the same tour that I am, 
 and they hope to meet me again. 
 
 Much closer at hand, on the Como 
 arm, is the Villa Melzi. It was built in 
 1810, in plain but pure style and at great 
 cost, for that Melzi who was publicly 
 embraced by Bonaparte at Lyons and 
 made by him vice-president of the Cis- 
 alpine Republic, and afterward duke of 
 Lodi. The interior of the villa is rich- 
 ly decorated, elegantly furnished and 
 adorned with objects of art of every 
 kind. One of the duke's ancestors was 
 the pupil and friend of Leonardo da 
 Vinci, and succeeded him as master in 
 the school he had founded. Four mono- 
 chromes illustrate this interesting remi- 
 niscence. Then there is a bust of Michel 
 Angelo by himself, and various works in 
 marble 'by those two friends and gen- 
 erous rivals, Canova and Thorwaldsen. 
 The most remarkable painting is a por- 
 trait of Bonaparte, taken from life in 1 802 
 by Appiani. The First Consul of France 
 and President of Italy was then thirty- 
 three years old. Richly attired, but pale 
 and thin, he rests his hand upon the 
 map of Italy, the scene of his greatest 
 exploits, and fixes his piercing eye full 
 on the spectator with a glance that recalls 
 the past and seems to predict the future. 
 In the garden the most showy flowers 
 and the rarest trees from every clime 
 are tastefully disposed, while here and 
 there the whiteness of a marble statue 
 contrasts pleasingly with the green of 
 the surrounding vegetation. The bust 
 of Alfieri occupies the highest point of 
 
 the grounds ; those of Madame LetiMa 
 and Josephine are half hidden by en- 
 croaching vines ; Dante and Beatrice, 
 standing together, overlook the lake. 
 At the end of the garden, under the 
 dome of a small chapel encircled by 
 tall cypresses, rest the ashes of the duke 
 of Lodi. His grandson is the present 
 owner of the villa, but he spends here 
 hardly a fortnight in the year. The por- 
 ter says that his master finds more to 
 amuse him in his town-palaces, of which 
 he has half a dozen in different parts of 
 Italy ; but the gardener tells me that this 
 spot awakens too painful memories of a 
 wife tenderly loved and early lost. 
 
 Across the lake from here is the Villa 
 Carlotta, called after its former owner, 
 the princess Charlotte of Prussia. Step- 
 ping out of his boat, the visitor ascends 
 the marble stairs which lead up from the 
 shore. After a few steps across the gar- 
 den he reaches the villa, passes through 
 a porch fragrant with jasmine, and is at 
 once ushered into a small room where 
 are some of the finest works of modern 
 sculpture. Canova's Mars and Venus 
 and Palamedes are here, and they are 
 most admirable, but they are surpass- 
 ed in charm by the famous group in 
 which Psyche is reclining and Cupid 
 bending fondly over her. The best 
 piece of the collection is the frieze that 
 runs round the room. It is from the 
 chisel of Thorwaldsen, and represents 
 Alexander the Great's triumphal entry 
 into Babylon. Full of the beauty of 
 youth, the conqueror advances in his 
 chariot ; Victory comes to meet him ; 
 vanquished nations bring presents ; 
 while behind him follow his brave 
 Greeks on horse and on foot, dragging 
 along with them the prisoners and the 
 booty. The subject was suggested by 
 Napoleon, who intended the work for 
 the Ouirinal. It is in high relief, and 
 in general effect resembles strongly the 
 frieze with which Phidias encircled the 
 Parthenon. It is a pity that these mas- 
 terpieces are shown first, for after seeing 
 them one does not fully enjoy the statues 
 and paintings in the other rooms. 
 
 Two hours may be delightfully spent 
 in making the journey by steamboat from 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 145 
 
 4, 
 
 
 
 a 
 
 3 -^H ^^- f "^ 
 
 '*" 
 
 1^-"^^ 
 
 
 
 
 r'©'^ 
 
146 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 Bellaggio to Como. Here the lake is so 
 narrow and winding that it seems to be a 
 river. At every moment bold mountain- 
 spurs project into the water, appearing to 
 bar all passage, and one's curiosity is 
 continually excited to find the outlet. 
 The views shift and change with sur- 
 prising quickness, for the boat stops at 
 a dozen little towns on the way, and for 
 this purpose keeps crossing and recross- 
 ing from shore to shore. 
 
 The quaint village of Tremezzo is one 
 of the first stopping-places. It is built 
 on the side of a steep hill, and seems to 
 be in constant danger of slipping down. 
 Soon the island of Comacina is passed, 
 now a barren rock with only a small 
 chapel upon it, but once the site of an 
 important town and fortress. Farther 
 on, close to the water's edge, is a pyra- 
 mid which an obscure Austrian, emu- 
 lous of the long -lasting fame of the 
 Egyptian kings, caused to be erected to 
 his own memory. To the right rises the 
 lofty Monte Bisbino, the weather-prophet 
 of the neighborhood, for when he puts on 
 his cap of clouds it is sure to rain. 
 
 Se il Bisbin mette il cappello, 
 Corri a prendere I'ombrello, 
 
 says a local proverb. From this point on 
 to Como both shores are studded with 
 villas of every size and style, but all, 
 with one exception, bright and gay. A 
 rich milliner built one ; a great dancer 
 another; a third belongs to Madame 
 Musard, the owner of the open-air con- 
 cert-grounds at Paris. One was the re- 
 treat of Judith Pasta, the famous singer 
 for whom Bellini composed Norma and 
 La Sonnambula ; in another Bonaparte 
 lodged ; another was for many years the 
 home of his great-niece, the charming 
 Madame Rattazzi ; in another lived the 
 unfortunate Queen Caroline, wife of 
 George IV. The only one among them 
 all that looks gloomy and forbidding is 
 the Villa PUniana, built three centuries 
 ago by Count Anguissola, one of the four 
 assassins of Duke Farnese. The name 
 it bears was given to it because it stands 
 near a curious spring minutely described 
 in one of Pliny's letters. 
 
 Como itself is a quiet, sleepy, town. 
 It is justly proud of having given birth 
 
 to the two Plinies and to Volta. The 
 statue of the electrician stands in the 
 middle of a grass -grown square : those 
 of the great naturalist and his accom- 
 plished nephew sit in marble arm-chairs 
 on each side of the cathedral-door. With 
 the ruined castle of Baradello, which 
 looks down on Como, is connected the 
 story of a dreadful retribution. In the 
 thirteenth century the archbishop Otto 
 Visconti, having won a battle and taken 
 his rival, Napo della Torre, prisoner, put 
 him naked into an iron cage which he 
 suspended from the projecting parapet 
 of this castle. After enduring for a few 
 days the jeers of the populace and the 
 pangs of hunger, the unhappy man put 
 an end to his life by beating his head 
 against the bars. One's pity for his suf- 
 ferings is lessened on learning that he 
 once had a friend of Visconti's in his 
 power and kept him shut up in a wood- 
 en cage under the steps of the town- 
 hall at Milan for twelve years. 
 
 From Bellaggio to Luino, on the Lago 
 Maggiore, by way of the Swiss town of 
 Lugano, is a short day's journey, thanks 
 to the admirable combination of steam- 
 boats and diligences. That part of the 
 Lake of Lugano which is traversed is at 
 first wild and sombre, with inaccessible 
 cliffs rising on either hand. By degrees 
 the landscape softens, and on turning a 
 point Lugano comes in sight, nestling in 
 a hollow between two mountains. One 
 of these, the Monte San Salvatore, has a 
 most graceful outline : it is three thou- 
 sand feet high, beautifully wooded, of 
 easy ascent, and is said to offer from its 
 summit an enchanting prospect. But 
 neither its charms nor those of the town 
 at its foot induce me to tarry. I hasten 
 on to Luino, gathering on the way, from 
 my seat on top of the diligence, a bewil- 
 dering series of mountain -pictures, with 
 which mingles the memory of many a 
 smiling village and many a lovely garden 
 — of a pure air and a perfumed breeze, 
 with here and there a pair of bright eyes 
 or a pretty face or a band of sun-brown- 
 ed children hanging on to the coach be- 
 hind like a cluster of bees. 
 
 Luino is neither pretty nor clean, nor 
 has it a single monument or inscription 
 
THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 147 
 
 to tell that Bernardo Luini was born 
 here, the celebrated painter whose fres- 
 coes adorn many churches and monas- 
 teries in the neighborhood. Tired with 
 the day's travel, 1 climb at an early hour 
 into an enormous bed of state which my 
 landlord has assigned to me and try to 
 forget its grandeur in sleep. I lie awake, 
 however, a great part of the night, listen- 
 ing perforce to a quarrel among certain 
 stage-drivers who have taken their stand 
 under my window. It is carried on by 
 six voices at once in angry tones, but al- 
 ways in polite language. Amiable race ! 
 Where a Celt or an Anglo - Saxon would 
 curse and swear, an Italian contents 
 himself with crying out " Pazienza ! 
 pazienza!" 
 
 In the morning the arguments of an 
 honest - looking boatman persuade me 
 not to wait for the steamer, but to take 
 a small boat with four rowers down to 
 Stresa. Once afloat, it is easy to see 
 why this lake has received the name of 
 Maggiore. Though really smaller than 
 the Lake of Garda, it looks larger, for it 
 is in general wider, and there are no 
 precipitious banks to confine the view. 
 The mountains that enclose it are low 
 and retreating, and the eye sweeps over 
 a vast and varied horizon. At my re- 
 quest we gain at once the opposite shore. 
 On an island opposite Cannero the re- 
 mains of two dismantled castles trace 
 grotesque silhouettes against the sky. 
 One of the boatmeii tells me the story 
 of five robber-brothers named Mazzardi 
 who lived there long ago with their fol- 
 lowers and ravaged the surrounding 
 country with impunity. He follows this 
 up with other legends of the lake, and 
 dwells especially upon the happy case 
 of a certain Albert Besozzi, a rich prof- 
 ligate, likewise of ancient memory, who, 
 being thoroughly frightened one day by 
 a narrow escape from shipwreck on these 
 waters, dedicated the worthless remain- 
 der of his life to Heaven and finished his 
 days in a hermit's cell. 
 
 Meanwhile, we have turned into the 
 beautiful bay of Pallanza, and my com- 
 panions cease rowing for a while to re- 
 fresh themselves with bread and wine. 
 The steamer comes along, touches at the 
 
 Pallanza wharf and puts off again. Im- 
 mediately afterward there iff a great com- 
 motion. A woman in purple on the deck 
 of the boat is frantically imploring the 
 captain to stop, while a young man on 
 the pier seems to be preparing to jump 
 into the water. Hans has stepped ashore 
 to buy fruit, and has been left behind. 
 The captain is inexorable, the steamer 
 keeps on its course, and every moment 
 the breach becomes wider between those 
 whom no man should put asunder. 1 
 take the unhappy man into my boat, and 
 by pulling in a straight line for Stresa we 
 arrive there almost as soon as the steamer, 
 which has followed the wide curve of the 
 bay. What appears in the distance to be 
 a singular monument on the end of the 
 Stresa wharf turns out on nearer approach 
 to be Gretchen standing on a trunk and 
 drying her handkerchief in the breeze. 
 
 The four islands that we have passed 
 on the way are known as the Borromean 
 Islands, because they belong for the most 
 part to the rich and powerful Borromeo 
 family. The rare beauty of one of them 
 makes it the wonder of the lake. It was 
 toward the middle of the seventeenth 
 century that Count Vitaliano Borromeo, 
 finding himself the possessor of almost 
 the whole of this island, which was then 
 a barren rock, resolved to make it his 
 residence, and to surround himself with 
 gardens that should rival those of Armi- 
 da. For more than twenty years archi- 
 tects, gardeners, sculptors and painters 
 labored to give material form to the 
 count's fancies. A spacious palace was 
 erected on one end of the island : on the 
 other ten lofty terraces rose one above 
 the other, like the hanging-gardens of 
 Babylon. The rock was covered with 
 good soil, and the choicest trees and 
 shrubs were brought from every land. 
 Only evergreens, however, were admit- 
 ted into this Eden, for the count would 
 have about him no sign of winter or 
 death. In 1671 the work was finished. 
 The island was called Isabella, after the 
 count's mother — a name which has since, 
 by a happy corruption, become changed 
 to Isola Bella. 
 
 It is on a sunny afternoon that I direct 
 my bark toward the "Beautiful Island." 
 
148 
 
 THE ITALIAN LAKES. 
 
 I look on the landing-place with respect, 
 for it is worn by the footsteps of six gen- 
 erations of travellers. The interior of 
 the palace, which I visit first, is fitted up 
 with princely magnificence and is rich 
 in art -treasures. Mementoes of kings 
 and queens who have accepted hospi- 
 tality here are^ shown, and a bed in 
 which Bonaparte once slept. There is 
 a chapel where a priest daily says mass ; 
 a throne -room, as in the palaces of the 
 Spanish grandees ; and a gallery with 
 numerous paintings. A whole suite of 
 rooms is given up to the works of Peter 
 Molyn, a Dutch artist, fitly nicknamed 
 "Sir Tempest." This erratic man, hav- 
 ing killed his wife to marry another wo- 
 man, was condemned to death. He es- 
 caped from prison, however, found an 
 asylum here, and in return for the pro- 
 tection of the Borromeo of that day he 
 adorned his walls with more than fifty 
 landscapes and pastoral scenes. 
 
 The garden betrays the epoch at which 
 it was laid out. Prim parterres, where 
 masses of brilliant flowers bloom all the 
 year round, are enclosed by walks along 
 which orange trees and myrtles have 
 been bent and trimmed into whimsical 
 patterns. There are dark and winding 
 alleys of cedars where at every turn 
 some surprise is planned. Here is a 
 grotto made of shells — there an obe- 
 lisk, or a mosaic column, or a horse of 
 bronze, or a fountain of clear water in 
 which the attendant tritons and nymphs 
 would doubtless disport were they not 
 petrified into marble. There is one 
 lovely spot where, at the middle point 
 of a rotunda, a large statue of Hercules 
 stands finely out against a background 
 of dark foliage. Other Olympians keep 
 him company and calmly eye the visitor 
 from their painted niches. Not far from 
 there is a venerable laurel on which Bo- 
 naparte cut the word "Battaglia" a few 
 days before the battle of Marengo. The 
 B is still plainly visible. 
 
 Pines and firs planted thickly along 
 the northern side of the island defend 
 it from cold winds. In the sunny nooks 
 of the terraces the delicate lemon tree 
 bears abundant fruit and the oleander 
 grows to a size which it attains nowhere 
 
 else in Europe. The tea -plant from 
 China, the banana from Africa and the 
 sugar-cane from Mississippi flourish side 
 by side : the camphor tree distils its aro- 
 matic essence and the magnolia loads 
 the air with perfume. The cactus and 
 the aloe border walks over which the 
 bamboo bends and throws its grateful 
 shade. Turf and flower-beds carpet 
 each terrace, and a tapestry of ivy and 
 flowering vines conceals the walls of 
 the structure. From the summit a huge 
 stone unicorn looks down upon his mas- 
 ter's splendid domain. He overlooks 
 also a corner of the island where his 
 master's authority is not acknowledged. 
 The small patch of land on which the 
 Dolphin Hotel stands has for many cen- 
 turies descended from father to son in a 
 plebeian family, nor have the Borromeos 
 ever been able to buy it. They have to 
 endure the inn, therefore, as Frederick 
 endured the mill at San-Souci and Na- 
 poleon the house he could not buy at 
 Paris. 
 
 At last the moment comes when I 
 must quit Stresa, not, however, before I 
 have visited the remaining islands and 
 other points of interest. The steamer 
 puts off, and soon separates me from the 
 landscape that has been my delight for 
 three days — the blue bay with its verdant 
 banks, the softly-shaded hills which en- 
 close it, the snow-covered chain of the 
 Simplon in the background. As we ap- 
 proach the southern end of the lake a 
 colossal bronze statue of San Carlo Bor- 
 romeo on the summit of a hill near Aro- 
 na comes into sight. From head to foot 
 the saint measures little less than eighty 
 feet, and the pedestal on which he stands 
 adds to his height half as much more. 
 His face is turned toward Arona, his na- 
 tive town, and one hand is extended to 
 bless it. With my glass I descry a party 
 of liliputian tourists engaged in examin- 
 ing this great Gulliver. Most of them 
 are satisfied when they have reached the 
 top of the pedestal and have ranged them- 
 selves in a row on one foot of the statue. 
 Others, more daring, climb up by a lad- 
 der to the saint's knee, where they disap- 
 pear through an aperture in the skirt of 
 his robe. From this point the ascent con- 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 149 
 
 tinues inside of the statue, by means of 
 iron bars, to the head, in which four per- 
 sons can conveniently remain at once. 
 
 At Arona the railway-station and the 
 wharf are near each other, and in a few 
 minutes after I have landed an express- 
 train starts and bears me away from the 
 region of the Italian lakes. When we 
 have passed the last houses of Arona 
 
 and gained the open plain the statue of 
 the great Borromeo with his outstretched 
 arm comes again for a few moments into 
 view. Perhaps the uncertain light of 
 evening and the jolting of the train de- 
 ceive me, but I fancy that the good old 
 saint is waving his hand in the familiar 
 Italian way, as much as to say, "A ri- 
 vederci !" Robert A. McLeod. 
 
 /f.Q>^ n 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 A THOUSAND miles in six-and-thirty 
 hours and the blue Mediterranean 
 and sunshine in exchange for London 
 fog and soot ! The temptation was irre- 
 sistible to the Chancery barrister, wea- 
 ry of stuffy courts and sunless cham- 
 bers ; it fascinated the Eton assistant- 
 master, brain-misty with boys' multifari- 
 ous blunderings ; and the very next morn- 
 ing after courts and schools were closed 
 for Easter vacation the pair were seated 
 in the early continental mail from Victo- 
 ria Station, bound for Mentone. Paris 
 is not reached till half-past six p. m., and 
 
 the Marseilles express leaves the Gare 
 de Lyons at a quarter after seven ; but 
 the doiianiers are merciful to us, and our 
 cocker \)n'^\ so we just catch the train, 
 happily forgetful, in the excitement of 
 the start, that the prosaic but generally 
 necessary ceremony of dinner has some- 
 how got crowded out of the day's pro- 
 gramme, and that a night and a long 
 morning lie between us and the flesh- 
 pots of Marseilles. 
 
 Day is just breaking when we draw 
 up at Lyons, and the passengers uncurl 
 themselves and tumble sleepily out of 
 
15° 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 their carriages to scarify their throats 
 with scalding chocolate or coffee. In 
 vain the manager of the refreshment- 
 room blandly reiterates the assurance — 
 a perfectly true one — that nobody need 
 hurry. Three minutes of painful deglu- 
 tition at the cost of a franc a head (what 
 a Tom Tiddler's Ground one of those 
 large French station - restaurants must 
 be !), and the carriages are full again, 
 and our ulsters, cloaks, plaids and wraps 
 of all sorts begin to open and disclose 
 fellow-passengers to one another. This 
 morning the predominant element is mil- 
 itary — a cluster of smooth-faced youths, 
 gay in red and blue uniforms, on their 
 way from some military school to pass 
 six months in barracks at Toulon. Speed- 
 ing due south alongside the brown Rhone, 
 we are perceptibly and visibly passing by 
 rapid stages into a warmer climate. First, 
 mulberry-plantations, the nurseries of the 
 Lyons silk-trade ; then olives — starveling 
 specimens the northernmost ones, but 
 gradually increasing in size and num- 
 ber as the Mediterranean is approach- 
 ed ; and soon, when Marseilles has been 
 reached and passed, the orange, the 
 pomegranate and the aloe. 
 
 Lazily, all a long afternoon, the train 
 dawdles eastward, now skirting the pla- 
 cid sea and playing hide-and-seek with 
 it through a bewildering series of little 
 tunnels — now making a short cut across 
 a peninsula and giving the bent farm- 
 laborers an excuse for the elevating rec- 
 reation of a stare. Only a two minutes' 
 halt at Frejus, but it well deserves at least 
 a day to itself. In the days when the ma- 
 sonry of that graceful amphitheatre hard 
 by the station was new, Forum Julii was 
 a port that had received those five hun- 
 dred galleys which Augustus took at Ac- 
 tium, and as little dreamed of being silt- 
 ed up into an obscure inland town as of 
 having its name shrivelled into Frejus. 
 But your modern traveller is a Gallio 
 in Old -World matters of this kind, and 
 steams on with a light heart to a more 
 congenial halting -place a score of miles 
 farther on, where there are no associa- 
 tions older than Lord Brougham, who 
 may fairly be said to have invented 
 Cannes. Less than half a century ago 
 
 the place was an insignificant fishing- 
 village, and now a costly crowd of trim- 
 gardened villas in every style of inap- 
 propriate architecture, Gothic, Doric and 
 Castellated, jostle one another jealous- 
 ly, backed up by a satellite town of ho- 
 tels and pettsions and doctors. Bright 
 and pretty it looks in the light of the 
 westering sun, and a tempting resting- 
 place indeed after a long, dusty journey 
 in the train. So, obviously, thinks that 
 plethoric little plutocrat travelling with 
 his young wife in the solitary state of a 
 reserved coupe under the dominion of a 
 sallow-faced courier. But his pleadings 
 are in vain : the courier has arranged 
 otherwise, and is sole master of the plans, 
 the purse and — the language ; so his em- 
 ployer humbly falls back upon petition- 
 ing to be allowed a glass of fruit -syrup 
 (which the courier graciously orders and 
 pays for) from the orange-woman on the 
 platform, and is helped back into his 
 coupe to doze away another hour or two 
 of exquisitely beautiful scenery in the 
 comfortable assurance that he is "do- 
 ing" the Riviera. 
 
 There is a good deal of interesting 
 sightseeing to be had in and about 
 Cannes. The oddly -shaped umbrella- 
 pines just on the outskirts of the vil- 
 ladom are a novelty to most people. 
 Within easy reach lie Grasse, most apt- 
 ly named of villages, where all that's 
 odorous in scents and all that's luscious 
 in fruits glaces are manufactured, and 
 Vallauris, where the descendants of a 
 line of potters said to have lasted un- 
 broken from the days of Roman rule 
 turn out bowls and pots and vases of a 
 rough earthenware, simple but excellent 
 both in form and coloring, and indeed 
 everything that could be wished but for 
 an excess of porousness. Then, again, 
 it is but a short sail — or even row — to the 
 island of Ste. Marguerite, where you may 
 realize the scene of Marshal Bazaine's 
 sensational escape from prison and ver- 
 ify the truth of Thackeray's eulogistic bal- 
 lad by lunching on bouillabaisse, Cannes 
 certainly is — at least for everybody ex- 
 cept the strangely - constituted beings to 
 whom shops, toilettes, theatres and bus- 
 tle are the sutnmum bonum — a far pleas- 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 151 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 anter resting-place than its big neighbor 
 Nice ; which latter, too, lying exposed as 
 it does at the foot of a trough in the 
 mountains through which the piercingly 
 cold mistral comes sweeping down from 
 •■he north-west, is a delusion and a snare 
 >o the invalids who come in hopes of find- 
 %ng a mild winter there. Nor is this all. 
 Of late years Nice has suffered from the 
 addition of a very undesirable element 
 to its population — that of the gamblers 
 attending the casmo at Monte Carlo, who 
 find in a big town like Nice ample and 
 handy head-quarters, and bring in their 
 train a camp-following of not merely in- 
 different but offensive characters. Peo- 
 ple of this class so throng the afternoon 
 and evening trains on the short section 
 of line between Nice and IVIonte Carlo — 
 the notorious gaming-house moiety of 
 the prince of Monaco's liliputian domin- 
 ion — as to make the transit positively 
 disagreeable to the ordinary traveller. 
 From the time a party of these habitues 
 of the roulette -table enter a carriage till 
 the train stops at their destination their 
 tongues keep up a ceaseless clatter in 
 the jargon of the game. Every one of 
 them seems to remember, with quite 
 marvellous accuracy, all the winning 
 numbers and all the runs upon the 
 red and black of the previous even- 
 ing. There are jokes too, and laughter 
 in plenty, but — perhaps it is that some 
 are all the time secretly smarting over 
 losses — there is a smack of malice in 
 the fun and an uncomfortable hoUow- 
 ness in the laughter. One is glad when 
 they are gone and one has a few min- 
 utes of quiet to gather together the mis- 
 cellaneous paraphernalia of travel before 
 arriving at Mentone. 
 
 Provided only that one's lodging is as- 
 sured, it is a distinct advantage to reach 
 a journey's end after nightfall. There 
 is a delicious curiosity generated by the 
 shrouding darkness, a weirdness about 
 the silent roads and shapes of trees and 
 buildings, a pleasant excitement as to 
 what to-morrow will disclose, a restful 
 consciousness that the present physical 
 instinct for repose may be indulged not 
 only without loss, but with the certainty 
 of a fresher and more appreciative sus- 
 
 ceptibility to first impressions in the morn- 
 ing. And in the mean time what an ex- 
 tra zest, after six-and-thirty hours of con- 
 tinuous travelling, in the hearty welcome 
 of hospitahty ! We can hardly, in the 
 dark, make out the outline of the villa, 
 but the bright-green door, the tile-floored 
 entrance-passage and the slippery stone 
 staircase italicize it unmistakably, while 
 the comfortable curtains and Turkey car- 
 pets, the Nineteenth Ce7itury and Nation 
 on the table, the pictures and china on 
 the walls and an indefinable air of cozi- 
 ness in every room, attest quite as plainly 
 an English-speaking home. Of course 
 the new-comers from London have a 
 store of "Skinner's Best Bird's-eye" (a 
 thing quite unpurchasable at Mentone) 
 in their pouches, and equally of course 
 the whereabouts and doings of a host 
 of common friends have to be commu- 
 nicated, and the affairs of the day, cer- 
 tain to gravitate into the interminable 
 Eastern Question, must be discussed ; so 
 it is considerably east of midnight before 
 the pipe-ashes are finally shaken out and 
 all is quiet inside the sheltering mosquito- 
 curtains. 
 
 Oh the surprise and delight of the scene 
 revealed on throwing open the lattices in 
 the morning I — from the horizon to one's 
 very feet the sunbeams drawing a daz- 
 zling golden line athwart the water-way ; 
 to the right the rippling wavelets break- 
 ing white against the olive-crested point 
 of Cap Martino ; in the left foreground 
 the picturesquely huddled buildings of 
 the town running out to the old Genoese 
 fort, and behind them a jagged moun- 
 tain-screen of Alps, past which the eye 
 can just catch the sunlit walls of Bordi- 
 ghera. Proverb-mongers may prate what 
 they will : I decline to believe that famil- 
 iarity can breed aught but increased love 
 and admiration for such a spectacle as 
 this. 
 
 Quickly out into the garden. Look ! 
 the trees all round the house are golden 
 with oranges and lemons ; the walks are 
 strewn with the red and yellow fruit, that 
 of almost every tree having a quite dis- 
 tinguishable flavor of its own ; a gigan- 
 tic aloe, right opposite the front door, is 
 thrusting across the drive a lusty sword- 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 153 
 
»54 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 arm that seems determined soon to block 
 the way ; blushing rose and ungainly cac- 
 tus in juxtaposition, suggestive of Beauty 
 and the Beast ; and on the slopes be- 
 hind terraced vines and figs and patri- 
 archal olive trees — a feast for our eyes 
 in the present, and for the housewife a 
 treasure of unsophisticated marmalade 
 and sun-dried figs and oil in the not dis- 
 tant future. 
 
 There will be ample time before de- 
 jeuner to stroll out to the headland of 
 Cap Martino ; and one need not seek a 
 better standpoint from which to get a 
 general panoramic idea of Mentone and 
 its surroundings. The curve of the shore 
 is broken abruptly into two bays by a 
 narrow hump, topped by the remains of 
 a castle (now converted into a cemetery) 
 and crowded with the buildings of the old 
 town, while west and east along the coast 
 stretch the hotels and pensions and vil- 
 las of these latter days. Half a mile in- 
 land rises an isolated knoll crowned by 
 a Capuchin monastery, and to the north, 
 north-west and east the background is 
 closed in by a semicircle of mountains, 
 spurs of the Maritime Alps range, fend- 
 ing off every wind except those from the 
 west and south. The east bay is the 
 more sheltered, so there the wintering 
 invalids abound ; and equally of course 
 the robuster ones, residents and tran- 
 sients alike, prefer the west bay, where, 
 too, they get ampler space, more trees, 
 something of a public garden and a daily 
 band into the bargain. 
 
 The sea of the Riviera has been stig- 
 matized as fishless, but the accusation 
 must be accepted, if at all, cuin inultis 
 grams. The watcher perched up aloft 
 there in the cross-trees of a sort of bear- 
 pole overhanging the transparent sea is 
 directing the nets of his comrades in the 
 boats below to a glancing shoal of an- 
 chovies that, not reddened by pickling, 
 but in their natural gudgeon-like white- 
 ness, will satisfy, or even glut, the mar- 
 ket this afternoon ; and several other 
 palatable species of the finny tribe — 
 fresh sardines, soles, loi{fis de tner, biaji- 
 chetti (a delicate and diminutive white- 
 bait), and in short all that go to make up 
 bouillabaisse — are sufficiently plentiful. 
 
 The supply of particular kinds, though, 
 is so variable that anchovies will be three 
 sous the kilogramme one day and two 
 francs another. 
 
 Is it the southern sun or the indescri- 
 bable suggestion of dolce far niente, that 
 seems to pervade everything and every- 
 body here, that is the cause ? Only a few 
 hours ago I was scanning those sharply- 
 outlined peaks, L'e Berceau and the rest, 
 with an Alpine Clubbist's eagerness to 
 assail them all, and already, as we sit 
 after dejeuner with coffee and cigars 
 under a shady carouba in the garden, 
 it seems more pleasant to rest content 
 with looking at them. An English vis- 
 itor has dropped in with the benevolent 
 object of inducing our host — who is un- 
 derstood to be in incubation over a mon- 
 ograph on Mentonese antiquities — to take 
 some promising young native as an as- 
 sistant, and is urging his protege's claims 
 with an amusing confusion of metaphors : 
 " He is a very mine of information about 
 the local archaeology, my dear sir. Tap 
 him anywh-ere, and I'll warrant him to 
 flow. Where you find a real spark of 
 native talent like this, it's a positive duty 
 to water it. And it's indeed a privilege 
 to have all the strata of society rallying 
 round you in your useful task." And so 
 on, till the party attacked surrenders at 
 discretion and escapes from the subject 
 by proposing a visit to Dr. Bennet's 
 garden. 
 
 On a steep southward -fronting slope 
 to the east of the town, and close upon 
 the Italian frontier (across which it is a 
 temptingly easy stroll to buy and smug- 
 gle a pocketful of those long black acrid, 
 straw - cored cigars in which some smo- 
 kers find a perverse delight), Dr. Henn,- 
 Bennet, an English physician resident 
 at Mentone, has formed, evidently with 
 much devotion of time and thought and 
 loving patience, a very notable garden. 
 Up till one o'clock every day it lies free- 
 ly open to everybody, hospitably chal- 
 lenging a visit by the inscription ''Salvete 
 avticV carved over its entrance. Here, 
 on a staircase of terrace-walls rising one 
 above another up the hill, a collection 
 of strange fleshy plants that Kew might 
 well envy flourishes in the open air, in 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 ^55 
 
156 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 company with palms, camellias, blood- 
 red ranunculus, the spiny -leaved sola- 
 num, delicate creepers of a pink tissue- 
 paper aspect, and a peculiar dull-pink 
 variety of stocks. Goldfish sail about 
 bumptiously in the necessary water- 
 tanks, as if they would cheat you into 
 thinking that the water is stored up there 
 expressly to show them off, and in a cun- 
 ningly-sheltered corner swings a siesta- 
 bidding hammock. Not against sun so 
 much as against wind this shelter has 
 been devised, for somehow the chilling 
 mistral intrudes even here at times. The 
 gardener propounds, with a fine confi- 
 dence, his explanation of how this ne- 
 farious wind contrives to blow upon his 
 treasures. Sweeping down from the 
 north, it dashes upon the Esterel Moun- 
 tains, glances off them into the sea, and 
 thence is deflected or refracted back, so 
 that it comes in round the corner, in the 
 deceitful guise of a south - west wind, 
 upon Mentone ! An Oxford professor 
 of our party, more skilled maybe in Ar- 
 istotle and Aldrich than in the physical 
 sciences, is so overcome by the effort 
 requisite to tal<e in this bewildering the- 
 ory that we have to leave him to seek 
 innocent refreshment in a suburban va- 
 cherie while we ramble home through the 
 devious streets of the old town. Near 
 the spectacular stairways that lead up 
 to the open space — the only one in the 
 town — in front of the parish church a 
 tablet let into a wall overhanging the 
 narrow thoroughfare piously commem- 
 orates the spot from which, " Lutetia Ro- 
 mam redux," a pontifical Pius blessed 
 the assembled crowd. Lower down, the 
 market-place teems with vegetables and 
 volubility. Beans, peas, artichokes, cel- 
 ery and potatoes are recommended by a 
 score of shrill voices, or you may have 
 newly -pressed figs or grapes, or half a 
 dozen kinds of cheese and macaroni. 
 The barrister's eye chances to rest upon 
 some queer-shaped loaves displayed at 
 a bakery-door hard by, and in the twink- 
 ling of an eye the lady-bakeress insists 
 upon a purchase. A feeble plea of the 
 impracticability of getting them home is 
 promptly overthrown by "Comme, mon- 
 sieur est jeune ! He will carry them 
 
 bravely himself;" and Hortensius finds 
 there is nothing for it but to accept the 
 compliment to his youth and lug an 
 armful of bread along the staring prom- 
 enade. 
 
 From early morning till sundown there 
 is always abundance of life in the streets 
 and alleys of Mentone. The genial sun- 
 ny climate has naturally induced habits 
 of outdoor life. The average native 
 Mentonese gets all the society he wants 
 in the streets (where everybody is on 
 the familiar footing of nicknames with 
 everybody else), and probably keeps up 
 a very limited and frugal establishment 
 at home ; and needs every centime of a 
 scanty income to do that. Anyhow, he 
 certainly is not given to hospitality. You 
 may have been for years a resident and 
 proprietaire , and on the friendliest terms 
 with all your Mentonese neighbors, but, 
 though habitually kindly, they will never 
 ask you to take bite or sup in their houses. 
 A dinner-party of numerous courses, pre- 
 ceded by five-o'clock tea and Albert bis- 
 cuits, is veraciously reported to have been 
 given a few years ago at a private house 
 in one of the outlying villages ; but the 
 hosts were new-comers from somewhere 
 near Paris, and no doubt in their vil- 
 lage they lacked the economical alter- 
 native of street society. 
 
 The servant - system that obtains at 
 Mentone is in several respects peculiar. 
 A new domestic comes, in the first in- 
 stance, for eight days on trial, after which 
 the hiring is a monthly one, but termi- 
 nable at any moment by either party on 
 the terms of the master or mistress, in 
 the case of a dismissal, paying — or the 
 servant, on voluntarily leaving, forfeit- 
 ing — eight days' wages. This power of 
 instantaneous leaving, whatever the in- 
 convenience caused, must be a potent 
 weapon in, say, a cook's hands. And 
 it is just this fiery -tempered but prosaical- 
 ly necessary class of servants who alone 
 have an evil reputation for dishonesty at 
 Mentone, where the domestics, though 
 inclined to be lazy, are for the most part 
 honest, and house-doors stand open and 
 unguarded without theft ensuing. The 
 cook, here as elsewhere, has a passion for 
 perquisites, and is unweanable from illicit 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 157 
 
158 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 traffickings with the butcher and charcu- 
 tier. She persuades herself that the lard 
 which she resells to them amounts to a 
 quite unappreciable trifle on the kilo, 
 and if she is found out will tranquilly 
 assure her mistress that she "considered 
 it not comme il fauV to serve all the fat 
 with the beef. , As for certificates of cha- 
 racter, they are about as trustworthy as a 
 batch of formal testimonials. The best 
 servants are found in Briga, a picturesque 
 village some distance inland in the hills, 
 where mountain air and simple living 
 have made hardy industry a second 
 nature. 
 
 But the number of foreign proprietaires 
 occupying houses and lands of their own 
 at Mentone is very small. The great 
 body of the temporary residents for the 
 season (which extends from October to 
 April) are housed in the many large and 
 prosperous-looking hotels and pensions 
 which, bearing the names of wellnigh ev- 
 ery country under heaven, line the shores 
 of both the bays and occupy the neigh- 
 boring knolls and slopes. No less than 
 thirteen hundred and thirty-six families 
 came from different parts of the world to 
 pass the winter of 1876-77 at Mentone. 
 The English-speaking element was, as 
 usual, the strongest, consisting as it did 
 of three hundred and seventy -four fam- 
 ilies from Great Britain, fifty from the 
 United States and two or three from 
 Canada. Next came the French vis- 
 itors, with two hundred and forty - five 
 families, and after them the Germans 
 with one hundred and ninety and the 
 Russians with one hundred. Represen- 
 .tatives of every other European country, 
 and several families of Brazilians and 
 Japanese, made up the cosmopolitan 
 tale. 
 
 The number and variety of the excur- 
 sions that may be made on foot, on mule- 
 back and by carriage from Mentone make 
 it pre-eminently good head-quarters. It 
 is an easy day's walk to visit one or more 
 of half a dozen mountain-villages almost 
 indistinguishable in general color from 
 the rocks to which they cling, and from 
 which in old days the inhabitants de- 
 scried betimes the pirates who were apt 
 to pay them unwelcome visits. Rocca- 
 
 bruna is a fairly typical sample of these 
 villages, and the stroll up through olive- 
 woods (where, according to the amount 
 of light upon the leaves and the nature 
 of the background to them, they vary be- 
 wilderingly in predominant tone between 
 green and blue and gray), with occasion- 
 al bits of green sward decked with nar- 
 cissus, till through groves of lemon you 
 suddenly emerge upon the houses pen- 
 dent on the precipitous crag, is as charm- 
 ing a way of spending a long afternoon 
 as need be desired. The professor, scorn- 
 ing to waste shoe-leather and economize 
 francs, began the ascent on a mule steer- 
 ed by a woman holding on to the beast's 
 tail ; but, whether it was that the motion 
 was uncomfortable, or that its incompat- 
 ibility with pedestrians' pace engendered 
 a feeling of solitariness, or that the pro- 
 ceeding struck him as a trifle ludicrous, 
 it was not long before the professorial 
 lips mildly whispered, ''Ho avuto assai : 
 vuolo descendere" (the professorial Ital- 
 ian for "I've had enough, and want to 
 get down"), and our friend exchanged 
 the saddle for a convenient wayside wall, 
 whereon he sat and discoursed to us upon 
 many things till time and the hour had 
 worn out so much of the afternoon that 
 we had scarcely daylight enough left to 
 achieve the object of our walk. Rocca- 
 bruna is a close -packed nest of houses, 
 pierced by narrow, tortuous lanes arched 
 over here and there, sorely perplexing to 
 a stranger enemy no doubt, and super- 
 latively defensible, crowned and domi- 
 nated by an ancient moated castle, from 
 the battlements of which one might throw 
 a stone down on to any one of the wea- 
 therworn, bamboo - looking tile roofs of 
 the little town. The church is relatively 
 spacious, and hung with the gaudy red 
 damask so common in Italy. Through 
 the doorways of their dark cellar - like 
 houses the housewives are visible, en- 
 gaged in roasting coifee, chopping wood 
 and what not, while a good many of the 
 men seem to be content to sit and lounge 
 about smoking. They are not greedy of 
 high wages, and prefer being masters of 
 their own time to being servants of other 
 people's money. Themselves perched 
 above the route of any thoroughfare. 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 159 
 
i6o 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 they look down upon no less than four 
 lines of road passing between their eyrie 
 and the sea. Topmost, the famous Cor- 
 niche road from Mentone to Nice winds 
 along the mountain-sides ; below it runs 
 the road to Monaco ; below that, again, the 
 steep gradients of the old Roman way ; 
 and lowest of all the level railroad-track. 
 A shorter walk, suitable for the fag- 
 end of a rainy day, when the sand-path 
 will be firm, and all the way up there 
 will be a grand view of jagged crests 
 standing out dark and clear-cut from 
 wreathing clouds, leads to the top of an 
 isolated conical hill on which stands the 
 
 monastery Dell' Annunciate. The walls 
 of the little chapel of the Capuchin broth- 
 ers are thickly hung with ex-voto and 
 •z/i2?z^y(zz/ pictures, rudely-drawn but high- 
 ly-colored and sensational representa- 
 tions of manifold accidents — shipwrecks, 
 firework-explosions, crushings under dili- 
 gence wheels and falling olive trees, and 
 so on — from which the offerers gratefully 
 acknowledge themselves to have been 
 saved alive by the special interposition 
 of Our Lady ; while other still more real- 
 istic votaries have brought here memo- 
 rial relics of their disasters — crutches, 
 rope -ends and gun-stocks — to dangle 
 
 CASTLE OF MONACO. 
 
 perennially from the rafters. The way- 
 side "stations" on the approach-path 
 would be the seemlier for a charitable 
 coating of the paint that the votaries 
 daub so liberally upon the records of 
 their own sufferings. Meanwhile, pla- 
 cidly unconscious, one hopes, of these 
 incongruities, the monks pace up and 
 down the pleasant promenades of their 
 level yard. Vines cover the slopes of 
 their sunny hill, and contribute, maybe, 
 to the monasterial purse like the famous 
 produce of the Chartreuse. At present 
 the brethren are merely conversing in 
 pairs, with gesticulations appropriate to 
 tlie old men in Fmist ; but there is a 
 
 smooth stretch of ground under the 
 trees that is suggestive of a snug game 
 of bowls now and then, when no trou- 
 blesome visitors are about. 
 
 Then, again, it is only a five -miles' 
 journey, by road or rail, to Monaco, to 
 which diminutive principality, indeed, 
 both Mentone and Roccabruna belong- 
 ed till about thirty years ago, when, 
 goaded beyond endurance by a petty 
 tyranny which obliged every subject to 
 deal only with the butcher, baker and 
 olive -presser holding the prince's mo- 
 nopolies, they rebelled and joined them- 
 selves on to what then was Savoy, and 
 has since, by purchase, become France. 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 i6i 
 
 Monaco is assuredly a thing (it is real 
 ly too small for the big word principal 
 ity) to be visited and re- 
 membered. Upon a di- 
 minutive peninsula of rock 
 rising sheer out of the sea 
 .the narrow - streeted little 
 capital hangs on to as much 
 of space as was left after the 
 pirate- princes of the house 
 of Grimaldi had taken what 
 they wanted for their cas- 
 tle, gardens and parade- 
 ground. The castle — or 
 rather palace — a really fine 
 bit of Italian Renaissance- 
 work, is a thorough show- 
 place, and apparently ex- 
 ists for the benefit of a corps 
 of sleek personages in liv- 
 ery, each of whom does a 
 strictly limited portion of 
 the lionizing and expects 
 a separate fee. One shows 
 the state apartments, dis- 
 tressingly stately and gild- 
 ed, with canopied bed- 
 steads, ornamental chairs 
 and shiny floors, quite un- 
 associable with any idea of 
 actual use and habitancy ; 
 another descants upon Ca- 
 ravaggio's frescoes in the 
 gallery of the court ; and a 
 third picks up the visitor at 
 the staircase foot and acts 
 showman to the garden. 
 Escaping at last, an easy 
 descent — first across the 
 palace^/a^i?, where, as like- 
 ly as not, the only living 
 beings in sight will be a 
 couple of the superfine- 
 blue-cloth-dressed warriors 
 of the princedom listlessly 
 pelting one another with the 
 gravel, and then through 
 streets honored by the con- 
 sular escutcheons of a sur- 
 prising number of useful 
 and important states of the 
 Hayti and Ecuador class — 
 leads down to a narrow slip of land, the 
 Condamine, which, skirting the shore of 
 II 
 
 the harbor, connects Monaco with its 
 all-important suburb and complement, 
 
 the promontory of Monte Carlo. " Fa- 
 cilis ascensus Averni." An excellent 
 
l62 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 wide road leads up to the plateau, where, 
 surrounded by lovely gardens and look- 
 ing out upon such a panorama of moun- 
 tain, wood and water as hardly another 
 spot even on the Riviera can show, the 
 gaming-saloons of the late M. Charles 
 Blanc (he died a few months ago, worth, 
 it is said, some ninety millions of francs) 
 stand invitingly open to the stranger pub- 
 lic. Yes, here is indeed in all serious- 
 ness a veritable "Cercle des Etrangers." 
 No subject of the prince is allowed to 
 set foot within its doors : such is the pa- 
 ternal care of His Highness the prince 
 sovereign for the pockets of his people, 
 who moreover, thirty-four hundred souls 
 in all, enjoy the unique fehcity of paying 
 absolutely no taxes at all, the demands 
 upon the public revenue being complai- 
 santly met by the Monte Carlo author- 
 ities out of the moneys daily left in their 
 cashier's hands by visitors. The theory 
 of the gaming-house being a private club 
 is kept up by a regulation (not very strict- 
 ly insisted upon) requiring every visitor, 
 before entering the saloons, to obtain, in 
 exchange for his (or her) visiting-card, a 
 ticket of membership for the day. That 
 formality complied with, the whole build- 
 ing, with its rouge-et-noir and roulette 
 tables, its concert- and reading-rooms, 
 is at your service ; and if you have been 
 prudent enough to come provided with 
 a return ticket (ensuring your retreat to 
 Mentone, Nice or wherever you may be 
 staying), a hearty antecedent meal (en- 
 suring you against starvation till you are 
 at home again), and no more cash about 
 your person than you could afford to lose 
 in the course of an evening's whist with- 
 out annoyance, a single day at Monte 
 Carlo will probably do you no very last- 
 ing harm. Indeed, if a gambler goes 
 farther and fares worse to the extent of 
 staking and losing his all at the tables, 
 the "administration," keenly alive to the 
 ,"olic> of avoiding scandal, will be gene- 
 rous enough to dole out to him the price 
 of a railway-ticket to — almost anywhere 
 — provided he takes himself off out of the 
 principality without fuss or outcry. A 
 short time ago, though, they were finely 
 caught at their own game. One after- 
 noon, when the play was at its fiercest, 
 
 a stranger was seen to rush out of the 
 saloons with despair apparent in his ex- 
 cited strides, wild-staring eyes and ruffled 
 hair, and to hurry out of sight into one 
 of the secluded corners of the adjacent 
 gardens. Soon the not unfamiliar bang ! 
 bang ! of a revolver rang through the 
 air : one of the attendants ran in the 
 direction of the sound, found the stran- 
 ger stretched motionless, the smoking 
 revolver in his hand, upon a path, and 
 at once, with much presence of mind and 
 obedience to the standing orders of the 
 administration, stuffed the pockets of the 
 fallen with bank-notes enough to con- 
 vince the most prejudiced anti-Blancite 
 that the catastrophe could not have been 
 the result of ruin at the tables, and then 
 sped off to give the alarm. A few min- 
 utes and a cloud of would-be witnesses 
 were on the spot ; but, lo and behold ! 
 there was nothing for them to witness. 
 The stranger and the notes had vanished. 
 Seriously, though, this flaunting Monte 
 Carlo establishment is a curse to the whole 
 neighborhood. Not only does it lead di- 
 rectly to a yearly tale of suicides and find 
 infatuated victims in chance visitors from 
 all countries under heaven, but it fills all 
 the neighboring towns with swarms of 
 profligates, and tempts such people as 
 local station - masters, petty tradesmen, 
 and even domestic servants, to embez- 
 zlement, bankruptcy and theft. The in- 
 habitants of the principality itself being, 
 as I have said, strictly debarred from en- 
 tering the Cercle, the chief sufferers are 
 the residents in the French departments 
 surrounding it ; and these have lately 
 presented a vigorous memorial to the 
 senators and deputies of France pray- 
 ing them to take steps to abate the 
 nuisance. They argue, not unreasonably, 
 that France has the right, as well as the 
 might, to do so. Even if Monaco, with 
 its right princely and (on paper) impos- 
 ing array of courtly functionaries and its 
 army of seventy men, is to be account- 
 ed an independent state (though in truth 
 the telegraph, post-office, railway and 
 customs services are all entirely under 
 French control), still the maxim "Sic 
 utere tuo, ut alienum non Isedas," must 
 apply to it, and its neighbors cannot be 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 163 
 
 bound to submit to such a pest as Monte 
 Carlo is to them, merely that His High- 
 ness of Monaco may live in luxury at 
 Paris as the pensionary of a gaming- 
 house director. It is to be hoped that 
 the death of M. Blanc will soon be fol- 
 lowed by the extinction of the establish- 
 
 ment so disastrously associated with his 
 name. 
 
 But enough of this disagreeable sub- 
 ject. Let us shake off from our feet 
 the dust of Monte Carlo, and follow the 
 Riviera eastward from Mentone. 
 
 It is a perfect morning, as indeed morn- 
 
 BORDIGHERA. 
 
 ings commonly are hereabouts. Our open 
 carriage is early at the villa -gate, and 
 proves good-humoredly accommodating 
 in the disposal of our very miscellaneous 
 belongings — oranges, chocolate - cakes, 
 rolls, newspapers, Baedekers, a bottle of 
 Bordeaux, sunshades, overcoats and the 
 
 professor's cache -nez. But where is our 
 host ? At last he emerges, laughing, from 
 the house, to tell us how, while he was sit- 
 ting alone in the breakfast -room finish- 
 ing his coffee, a well-to-do but penurious 
 old lady of the neighborhood, finding the 
 house and room doors open, had coolly 
 
1 64 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 walked in upon him, and, pinning him 
 down with some cock-and-bull story 
 about her son, had reduced him to pur- 
 chasing his escape by giving her a five- 
 franc piece, which she had condescend- 
 ingly pocketed with an intimation that 
 she would return in a fortnight to finish 
 her story and borrow something more. 
 
 After crossing the Italian frontier just 
 beyond the outskirts of the town the 
 road gradually ascends, sheltered here 
 by magnificent olives, between which 
 one gets delicious peeps downward of 
 bright lemon-groves backed by lustrous 
 sea. Then comes a succession of sudden 
 zigzag bends and ups and downs in plen- 
 ty, following the contour of the mountain- 
 sides, and then a brisk rattle down a long 
 slope ends in the steep streets of the pic- 
 turesque fortress of Ventimiglia. Here 
 it is de rigiieur to halt and visit an old 
 church in whose crypt one of the sup- 
 porting pillars is an undoubted Roman 
 milestone, bearing the inscription, " An- 
 toninus PIUS IMPERATOR AUGUSTUS CU- 
 RAVIT, Dxc." And the veriest Gallio in 
 the matter of such relics will feel well 
 repaid for having given in to this bit of 
 sightseeing by the memorable view of a 
 row of snow-capped giants of the Mar- 
 itime Alps that is commanded from a 
 little square hard by the church. 
 
 Our cocker is in no particular hurry ; 
 so, before making a fresh start, we stroll 
 through the narrow (and, if truth be told, 
 not too savory) sireets on the prowl for 
 something characteristic to buy. We 
 scorn the professor's prosaic purchase 
 of a three -franc comforter, and invest 
 in some specimens of roughly-glazed red 
 pottery — tiny pipkins at a sou apiece, 
 that, whatever they may have been in- 
 tended for, will serve aptly for cigar-ash 
 trays — and oil-cruets of the coarsest glass, 
 but noteworthy for the grace of their long 
 slender necks and curved spouts. 
 
 Ventimiglia passed, the road drops 
 sharply almost to the sea -level, and 
 stretches across an unctuous expanse 
 of water-meadows to the promontory on 
 which Bordighera basks sleepily in the 
 sun. Here is the Paradise of palms, 
 combining, as it does, the two condi- 
 tions — "its feet in the water and its head 
 
 in the sun" — under which the palm best 
 flourishes. In the gardens of the French 
 consulate and other villas fine specimens 
 have been gathered together in showy 
 profusion ; but all about the outskirts of 
 the town they are cultivated on strictly 
 commercial principles, the young shoots 
 being covered up and hidden from the 
 light to keep them white, as required in 
 the market for which they are destined, 
 that of the purveyors of palms for the 
 Palm-Sunday observances of Rome. To 
 most visitors, though, the neighborhood 
 of Bordighera has its chief associations 
 in being the scene of Ruffini's famous 
 novel Doctor Antonio, and they will be 
 trying to pick out the wayside house in 
 which that Admirable Crichton of a doc- 
 tor healed and lOved as they drive along 
 the shaded road beyond the town, and 
 will perhaps feel rather annoyed by the 
 obtrusive self-assertion with which the 
 big white villa of M. Garnier (the archi- 
 tect of the new opera-house at Paris), 
 with its gossamer tower, dominates the 
 view ; which indeed, as we open out La 
 Colla nestling on the mountain-side and 
 Ospidaletto on the bay below, is surpass- 
 ingly beautiful. It is not much farther to 
 San Remo. The wealth of fleshy plants 
 and mesymbrianthemum with its pink 
 and yellow flowers that fill the gardens 
 of the Hotel de Londres bears eloquent 
 testimony to a geniality of climate which 
 recommends this spot above all others to 
 many of the health-seeking visitors to the 
 Riviera. The lover of the picturesque 
 will perhaps find his chief attraction in 
 the close -huddled buildings of the old 
 town, which covers the steep sides of an 
 isolated hill crowned by the invariable 
 castle. High up in the air the narrow 
 alleys are bridged at short intervals by 
 slender arches of brickwork, the mean- 
 ing and use of which become apparent 
 when one learns that the place is from 
 time to time disturbed by earthquake- 
 shocks, which this clamping together of 
 the houses gives them the best chance of 
 weathering. As to the products of San 
 Remo, the present writer's most vivid 
 recollection is of a variety of smells un- 
 equalled even by Cologne ; but it must 
 also be recorded to its honor that here. 
 
EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 X65 
 
i66 
 
 EASTER ON THE RIVIERA. 
 
 at last, the professor 
 chanced upon and pur- 
 chased the ideal Hat 
 that he had sought in 
 vain for many a weary 
 day — a soft, broad- 
 brimmed, conical prod- 
 igy, the like of which, 
 gentle reader, 1 venture 
 to assert you will not 
 see until you have the 
 good fortune to come 
 across our professor. 
 The local red wine, too — 
 by name Dolciacqua — 
 may fairly claim a good 
 mark for San Remo. 
 
 It is not a little enter- 
 taining and instructive 
 to occupy the seat be- 
 side the driver on a Ri- 
 viera excursion. If he 
 is a Frenchman, he will, 
 as likely as not, have 
 served in the disastrous 
 campaign of 1870, and 
 will have plenty to say 
 about the selfishness of 
 the Second Empire and 
 the abuses in army or- 
 ganization that were re- 
 vealed in the war and 
 have since been cor- 
 rected. "Ah, now,'' he 
 will tell you, "every 
 one is a soldier: no 
 substitutes are allowed. 
 C est juste. The young 
 subalterns now -a- days 
 have to look after their 
 work, and have no ser- 
 V a n t s . As for Ger- 
 many — Well, every 
 Frenchman has some- 
 thing in his head.'' 
 And then he will go off 
 into anecdotes and 
 scraps of information 
 suggested by passing 
 objects, and gossip 
 about local customs — 
 as, for instance, that at 
 Mentone it is forbidden 
 to plant timber - trees — 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 167 
 
 the eucalyptus, for example, within two 
 and a half metre.s, and oranges within 
 two metres, of a neighbor's boundary — 
 and practical hints as to where one may 
 best buy the dolce tobacco of Italy for 
 five-and-fifty centimes the packet. 
 
 It is perhaps one of the many "things 
 not generally known" that the district 
 of Mentone possesses quite a distinct 
 Romance dialect of its own, in the in- 
 vestigation of which the philologically in- 
 clined may find a very interesting field 
 
 of study. The ground has recently been 
 broken by two diligent and careful works 
 by Mr. J. B. Andrews, an American gen- 
 tleman resident at Mentone, who has for 
 the first time reduced Mentonese to gram- 
 mar and exhibited it in a printed vocabu- 
 lary. But much yet remains to be done in 
 settling the orthography and orthoepy of 
 the dialect, and there is reason to believe 
 that any one who is ambitious to be the 
 founder of a literature may find a virgin 
 opportunity in Mentonese. W. D. R. 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY. _^ 
 
 LA FAVORITA. 
 
 EARLY on the morning of the first 
 of February we stood on the deck 
 of the steamer for Palermo, watching the 
 sun rise over the water. Far away in the 
 south the blue edge of the sea began to 
 grow bluer with the rising of the distant 
 
 land. A fresh breeze blew from the 
 shore — not a pleasant feature in Febru- 
 ary weather at home, but suggesting com- 
 parisons with the warmest morning of a 
 New England May. With the swift ad- 
 vance of the steamer the blue line in the 
 
i68 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 south rapidly rose above the level of the 
 sea into the definite shape of a rugged 
 mountain-range : gradually the blueness 
 of distance changed to rich shades of 
 brown and red on the jagged, treeless 
 summits, and to deepest green where 
 long orange -farms border the bases of 
 the mountains. 
 
 Who has not longed to see Sicily ? 
 Every one who loves poetry, romance or 
 the history of ancient civilization must 
 often turn in thought to this beautiful 
 and famous Mediterranean island. To 
 the most ancient poets it was a mys- 
 terious land, where dwelt the monster 
 Charybdis and the bloody Laestrigones ; 
 where Ulysses met the Cyclops ; where 
 the immortal gods waged battles with 
 the giant sons of Earth, and bound 
 Enceladus in his eternal prison. No 
 doubt it was the terrific natural phe- 
 nomena of Sicily — the earthquakes and 
 the outbursts of Etna — which rendered 
 it so much a land of horrors to the early 
 Greek imagination. But in that far-dis- 
 tant age it was not only the terrors of 
 the place that had worked upon the 
 imaginative Greeks : the almost tropical 
 luxuriance of the country, the unrivalled 
 scenery, the brilliancy of the sky, made 
 it a fitting ground for the adventures of 
 nymphs, heroes and gods. In the foun- 
 tain of Sicilian Ortygia dwelt Arethusa, 
 the nymph dear to the poets ; beside the 
 Lake of Enna, where rich vegetation 
 overran- the lips of the extinct volcano, 
 was the spot called in mythology the 
 meeting -place of Pluto and Proserpine 
 — the power of darkness and the spring- 
 ing plant personified ; and so through 
 all the country places were found made 
 sacred by the presence of the great di- 
 vinities, and temples were erected in 
 their honor. 
 
 When the age of fable had passed 
 away, far back in the early dawn of Eu- 
 ropean history begins authentic know- 
 ledge about Sicily. While wicked Ahaz 
 reigned in the kingdom of Judah, and 
 Isaiah had not ceased to utter his proph- 
 ecies, the Greek colonization of Sicily 
 began. Seven hundred and thirty-five 
 years before Christ, Theocles with his 
 band of Greeks from Euboea founded 
 
 Naxos on the coast, hard by the fertile 
 slopes of Etna. Within three centuries 
 from that time the whole Sicilian coast 
 had been studded with Greek cities, and 
 to such wealth, power and splendor of 
 art had they attained that all succeeding 
 epochs of the island's history seem de- 
 generate times when compared with that 
 early golden age. 
 
 It has beert truly said that " there is 
 not a nation which has materially in- 
 fluenced the destinies of European civ- 
 ilization that has not left distinct traces of 
 its activity in this island." PhcEnicians, 
 Greeks, Romans, Saracens, Normans, 
 Spaniards, French and English have 
 successively occupied the island, and 
 noble monuments of the varied civiliza- 
 tions are standing to this day. Scatter- 
 ed through the island, their architectural 
 remains crown the mountain-tops or lie 
 in confusion along the Mediterranean 
 shore, a series of ruins extending througl: 
 twenty-five centuries, unmatched in anj- 
 other country for variety of age and style. 
 
 At ten o'clock our steamer entered the 
 Gulf of Palermo, passing near the base 
 of Monte Pellegrino, a wild promontory 
 which towers up two thousand feet from 
 the sea. On the day before I had enter- 
 ed for the first time the famous Bay of 
 Naples, but with less delight than I now 
 looked upon the beauties of this Sicilian 
 gulf. Flanked with lofty mountains, color- 
 ed* with the matchless blue of the Mediter- 
 ranean, studded with picturesque lateen 
 sails, the bay is a fitting entrance to this 
 fair historic island : a more beautiful ap- 
 proach could hardly be imagined even to 
 thfe Islands of the Blessed. 
 
 The Italians call Palermo la felice 
 ("the happy "). It is most happy in its 
 climate, its situation and its noble streets 
 and gardens. Below the city lies the 
 lovely bay : behind it stretches back for 
 miles, between converging mountain- 
 chains, the fruit -producing level of the 
 Golden Shell (Za Conca d'Oro). The 
 plain is one vast orchard of oranges and 
 lemons which every year distributes its 
 huge crop over half the habitable globe. 
 The city is worthy of its position. The 
 chief streets are broad, clean and hand- 
 somely built — a contrast to the universal 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 169 
 
 CATHEDRAL OF PALERMO. 
 
I70 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 shabbiness and squalor we had found in 
 Naples. 
 
 A traveller is sure to be put in a good 
 humor with the place by the many and 
 unusual comforts which he meets in the 
 great sea -fronting hotel; and the first 
 look from the windows of his apartment 
 confirms the opinion that Palermo is the 
 fairest of Southern cities. The outlook 
 is upon the grand seashore drive, the 
 Marina, as gay and pretty a sight as can 
 be found in any European capital. The 
 broad, tree-shaded avenue, bordered on 
 one side by hotels and palaces, on the 
 other by the waters of the bay, is throng- 
 ed with private carriages. Beginning at 
 the sea-facing gate of the city, the road 
 commands through all its length a view 
 of the mountains, the bay and the open 
 sea : at its terminus lie the public flower- 
 gardens — acres of our choicest hothouse 
 plants growing in tropical profusion. 
 
 In Palermo, as in so many European 
 towns, the cathedral is the chief archi- 
 tectural attraction. To approach it from 
 the bay the whole length of the city must 
 be traversed on the Corso Vittorio Em- 
 manuele, the chief business street. This 
 coi'so is crossed at the centre of the town 
 by another of equal width, which also 
 coinmemorates by its name Italian unity 
 — the Corso Garibaldi. There is one 
 other broad and important street which 
 no American can enter without remem- 
 bering that even in this distant land the 
 interest and sympathy of the people have 
 been with our country in its struggles and 
 successes : it is the Via Lincoln. 
 
 The drive up the Corso gives an op- 
 portunity for seeing a remarkably hand- 
 some street lined with gay shops, and for 
 studying the peculiar and often fine faces 
 of the Sicilian people ; but nothing of 
 striking interest appears until, near the 
 centre of the town, a street opening on 
 the left discloses a vista ending in a 
 small forest of white marble statues. On 
 a nearer view it is found that the statues 
 belong to the immense fountain of the 
 Piazza Pretoria, a work erected about 
 A. D. 1550 by command of the senate of 
 Palermo. It is perhaps the largest and 
 most elaborate fountain in Europe, and, 
 though it is easy to criticise the countless 
 
 sculptures that adorn it, the whole effect 
 of their combination into an architectural 
 unit is most imposing. 
 
 Continuing the drive up the Corso, a 
 broad piazza suddenly opens on the right, 
 flanked by the cathedral. The abrupt- 
 ness of the transition from between the 
 dark lines of buildings into the sunlight 
 of the square adds to the first strong im- 
 pression produced by the beauty of the 
 vast duomo. In its external architecture 
 the church is unique : the charm of it to 
 one who has been travelling through Italy 
 is its utter dissimilarity to all the Italian 
 churches. Architectural writers call it a 
 building of the " Sicilian Gothic style;" 
 and, though the expression does not con- 
 vey a vivid image except to the student 
 of art, any one can see its essential dif- 
 ference from the style of the North, and 
 can recognize the rare grandeur and 
 beauty of the church. The form is sim- 
 ple, but the dimensions are grand. With- 
 out the boldness of outline of true Gothic 
 churches, the walls are so covered with 
 ornaments of interlacing arches, cornices 
 and arabesque slightly raised on the ma- 
 sonry as to produce an effect of wonder- 
 ful richness. The style is peculiarly Si- 
 cilian, yet every observer of mediaeval 
 churches will at once detect the Nor- 
 man, Italian and Saracenic influences 
 blended in an exquisite harmony. Con- 
 nected with the church by light arches, 
 but separated from it by a street, stands 
 the campanile, a mass of enormous solid- 
 ity, terminating in many pinnacles and 
 one slender and graceful tower rising 
 above them all. Four other lofty towers, 
 springing from the corners of the church, 
 give additional lightness to its elegant 
 design : they were added to the building 
 nearly three centuries after the Norman 
 conquest of Sicily, and yet their minaret- 
 like form and pointed panel ornaments 
 show how strong and lasting had been 
 the influence of Arabian art upon the 
 mediaeval architects of Sicily. 
 
 It is seven hundred years since the 
 foundations of the duomo were laid. In 
 that distant age, and in a land so remote, 
 it is a curious circumstance that its found- 
 er was an Englishman : Gitalterio Offa- 
 milio is the amusing Italian corruption 
 
A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 171 
 
 by which the name of Walter of the Mill I ter Roger and his Normans had driven 
 was suited to the Southern tongue. Af- I from Sicily the Arab power ^which had 
 
 held the land for more than two centu- 
 ries, and when Christianity had succeed- 
 ed the Mohammedan religion throughout 
 
 the island, Archbishop Walter assumed 
 spiritual sovereignty in Palermo, and 
 founded this cathedral on the site of an 
 
172 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 ancient mosque. Only a part of the 
 original building remains in the crypt 
 and two walls of the present church. 
 All subsequent ages have changed and 
 added to its original simple form, but 
 often have taken from its beauty. With- 
 in the church only a part of the south 
 aisle commands close attention : there 
 in canopied sarcophagi of porphyry re- 
 poses the dust of Roger, king of Sicily 
 (1154), of Henry VI., emperor of Ger- 
 many, and of Frederick II., Roger's 
 most illustrious grandson, king of Sicily, 
 king of Jerusalem and emperor of Ger- 
 many. In a chapel at the right of the 
 high altar, sacred to Santa Rosalia, rest 
 the bones of the saint enshrined in a sar- 
 cophagus of silver. Thirteen hundred 
 pounds of the precious metal are wrought 
 into the shrine, and the whole chapel is 
 sumptuous with marble frescoes and gild- 
 ing, for to the pious souls of Palermo this 
 is the very holy of holies. The cathedral 
 is dedicated to Rosaha, and almost di- 
 vine honors are paid to her by the city 
 from which she fled in horror at its wick- 
 edness. 
 
 Every summer a festival of three days 
 is held in honor of this favorite saint ; 
 and again in September a day is kept 
 to commemorate her death, when a vast 
 concourse of people from Palermo climb 
 the side of the neighboring Monte Pelle- 
 grino to worship at the grotto of St. Ro- 
 salia, a natural cavern situated under an 
 overhanging crag of the summit. Here 
 the faithful Sicilians believe that the holy 
 maiden dwelt in solitude for many years ; 
 and here were found in 1624 the bones 
 of the saint, which put a stop to the plague 
 then raging in Palermo. The cave has 
 been made a church by building a porch 
 at the entrance. Twisted columns of ala- 
 baster support the roof of the vestibule, 
 but within the cavern the walls are of the 
 natural rock, contrasting strangely with 
 the magnificent workmanship of the high 
 altar, beneath which lies the marble statue 
 of the saint overlaid with a robe of gold, 
 while about the recumbent figure are 
 placed a book and skull and other ob- 
 jects of pure gold. It is a figure of a fair 
 young girl, represented by the artist as 
 dying, with her head at rest upon one 
 
 hand. Though the statue is the work of 
 no very famous artist, Goethe in the nar- 
 rative of his Sicilian travel has truly said 
 of it, "The head and hands of white mar- 
 ble are, if not faultless in style, at least 
 so pleasing and natural that one cannot 
 help expecting to see them move." 
 
 Under the southern precipices of this 
 Mountain of the Pilgrim lies a royal 
 park, and in the midst of it stands a 
 gaudy and fantastic villa called La Fa- 
 vorita. -The house is worth a visit for 
 the sake of seeing what a half- crazy 
 fancy will produce when united with 
 royal wealth. King Ferdinand I., dur- 
 ing his stay in Sicily early in this cen- 
 tury, amused himself by building this 
 country palace in the style of a Chinese 
 villa, and adorned it with innumerable 
 little bells, to be rung by every move- 
 ment of the wind. 
 
 It was in the Favorita that the old 
 king found himself cornered by Lord 
 William Bentinck and his army during 
 the British occupation of the island in 
 1S12. It is said that his faithful subjects 
 from Palermo encamped by thousands 
 in the neighborhood — not, however, for 
 the sake of defending their aged mon- 
 arch, but to enjoy the fun of witnessing 
 a fight in which both sides were hated 
 by them with equal cordiality. 
 
 To an enterprising traveller some of 
 the pleasantest hours of a long tour are 
 those when, cutting loose from all guides 
 and books, he wanders alone through 
 the streets of an old city, enjoying with 
 a sense of discovery the scraps of an- 
 tiquity not described in any book which 
 he is sure to meet with. Palermo and 
 its neighborhood afford a most fertile 
 field for such researches. The Saracenic 
 villas of the suburbs and the early Nor- 
 man buildings of the town will repay 
 considerable patience spent in looking 
 up the beauties to be found in the de- 
 tails of their construction. For instance, 
 in the plain old church of S. Agostino 
 there is a doorway and wheel window 
 one sight of which is an ample reward 
 for much wandering and searching. 
 
 On a morning too fresh and beautiful 
 for staying in the city we rendered a 
 vivacious cabman ecstatically happy by 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 173 
 
 
 an engagement to drive us to Monreale. 
 A brisk drive past the royal palace, out 
 of the southern 
 gate and five miles 
 across the orange- 
 covered plam 
 brought us to the 
 foot of an abrupt 
 mountain. Not a 
 half mile away, 
 but far above, on 
 the seemingly 
 unapproa chable 
 heights, was perch- 
 ed the quaint vil- 
 lage which was our 
 destination : its an- 
 cient towering 
 buildings glittered 
 white and hot in 
 the February sun 
 under the canopy 
 of cloudless blue. 
 Ascending for half 
 an hour on the 
 well- constructed 
 zigzag road, we 
 stopped at the gate 
 in the town-wall to 
 buy the luscious- 
 looking fruit of the 
 cactus from a road- 
 side vender, one 
 of those ideal hags, 
 apparently pre- 
 served by desicca- 
 tion under the tor- 
 rid sun, whom only 
 Italy can produce 
 in perfection. 
 Then onward and 
 upward we push- 
 ed through the 
 village street — a 
 street characteris- 
 tic of these South- 
 ern walled villages, 
 narrow, dark, fes- 
 tooned above with 
 interminable lines 
 of drying macaro- 
 ni, covered below with abundant filth, and 
 bordered by house - walls of enormous 
 thickness, built for resisting heat. At 
 
 every house-door or on the pavement in 
 front sits the man of the house plying his 
 
 ^:.' 
 
 "ffliiiiiiiiii'iii ifiiiiiiiiiii 
 
 11 1[ 
 
 trade, that all the world may know whe- 
 ther his goods are well made or ill. Up 
 and down the street flow the lines of dark- 
 
t74 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 eyed, swarthy people — women robed in 
 rags, occasionally set off by a bit of stri- 
 king color ; children who in their aston- 
 ishment become rigid at the sight of a 
 foreigner ; here and there an officer of 
 the Italian army carefully picking his way 
 through the mud ; and everywhere pro- 
 duce-laden asses driven toward Palermo 
 by the most picturesque of cut - throats, 
 for without its ever-present force of sol- 
 diers Monreale would at once relapse 
 into a hotbed of brigandage, as its re- 
 cent history shows. 
 
 Almost . at the summit of the town, 
 facing a broad, paved square, stands the 
 cathedral and its adjacent Benedictine 
 monastery, both built upon the brink of 
 the precipitous mountain, and both in 
 external appearance severely plain, al- 
 most to shabbiness. 
 
 William II., king of Sicily, called the 
 Good, founded on this Royal Mount a 
 monastery for the Benedictine friars, and 
 built it up with all the strength of a fort- 
 ress and the magnificence of a palace. 
 Little is left of that original building, 
 which was finished in 1174, but in its 
 few remains have fortunately been pre- 
 served the most splendid of cloisters. 
 This scene of centuries of Benedictine 
 meditations is a large quadrangle sur- 
 rounded by an arcade of multitudinous 
 small pointed arches resting upon pairs 
 of slender white marble columns, like 
 stalks of snow-white lilies in their grace 
 and lightness. Some of the marble shafts 
 are wrought with reliefs of flowers and 
 trailing vines, while most of them were 
 inlaid in bands or spirals of mosaic in 
 gold and colors, now injured by age. 
 The capitals which crown these shafts 
 are exquisitely carved, and all mythol- 
 ogy, the legends of the Church and the 
 book of Nature have been ransacked to 
 furnish subjects for the designs ; so that 
 out of two hundred or more no two are 
 similar. All the decaying magnificence 
 of the great building is pervaded by an 
 oppressive silence, for it is one of the 
 innumerable religious houses suppress- 
 ed by the Italian government. 
 
 From the monastery to the cathedral 
 is a walk of but a few steps. All disap- 
 pointment at the external plainness is 
 
 forgotten in approaching the chief en- 
 trance of the church. Michael Angelo 
 said of Ghiberti's doors at Florence that 
 "they were worthy to be the entrance to 
 Paradise." They have rightly become 
 famous through all the world, and yet 
 these doors of Monreale leave on the 
 mind of the beholder a strong impres- 
 sion of their beauty not less lasting than 
 the Baptistery gates at Florence. In the 
 execution of the biblical reliefs which 
 completely encrust the massive leaves 
 of bronze they must yield, of course, to 
 the mature art of Ghiberti's later age ; 
 but the stately height of the solid metal 
 doors, the alternate bands of mosaic and 
 wrought - stone arabesques which flank 
 them and surround over head the Ara- 
 bian arch, and, above all, the sense that 
 they conceal from view unparalleled 
 splendors beyond, leave on the mind 
 an impression which cannot be effaced. 
 Perhaps no other building deserves the 
 epithet "splendid" so exactly as the ca- 
 thedral of Monreale : the whole interior 
 is radiant from the vast extent of its pic- 
 tured walls. All the walls and vaulting 
 of the nave and aisles, transepts and 
 tribune, are overspread with ancient mo- 
 saics on a golden ground. It is natural 
 to compare St. Ivlark's cathedral at Ven- 
 ice with this church, on account of its 
 immense mosaic - covered surface: its 
 sumptuous interior delights every be- 
 holder with the satisfying completeness 
 which belongs to it ; yet in all the Orien- 
 tal splendor of the Venetian church noth- 
 ing can equal in impressiveness a glance 
 down the nave of Monreale. Wherever 
 the eye turns it rests upon the glowing 
 colors of some sacred picture — scenes 
 from the Old Testament history, bright- 
 robed figures of flying angels, haloed 
 saints in the quaint Byzantine style, 
 apostles and m.artyrs, patriarchs and 
 prophets, and, high above them all, 
 from a great picture in the vaulting of 
 the apse, a startling face of Christ look- 
 ing solemnly down through the length of 
 the cathedral. Half the stiffness which 
 characterizes these early mosaics seems 
 to have been cast aside in treating this 
 supreme subject. The colossal size of 
 the figure, the hand raised in blessing 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 175 
 
 the multitude, the sad but awful expres- [ pervading presence in the church. Amid 
 sion of the countenance, make it an all- | all the glittering splendor of the building, 
 
 while the gorgeous pomp of a holiday mass 
 progressed and rippling strains of organ- 
 music ran echoing through the arches, 
 
 through all the bewildering brightness of 
 the spectacle, the majesty of that Presence 
 could not for a moment be forgotten, nor 
 
176 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 could the eyes avoid straying off from the 
 ghtter below to answer again and again 
 to that solemn gaze above. 
 
 It is impossible, in any ordinary pic- 
 ture, to convey more than a very faint 
 idea of this building, in which the pecu- 
 liar beauties are dependent upon color, 
 unlike the Gothic churches of the North : 
 nothing but an oil painting of minute de- 
 tails could render the effects produced by 
 the bars of sunshine descending through 
 the twilight of the church and striking on 
 the glowing, pictured walls. The extent 
 of surface covered by the mosaics is said 
 to be more than sixty thousand square 
 feet. 
 
 By the bounty of the same pious mon- 
 arch who endowed the neighboring mon- 
 astery the cathedral was completed just 
 seven hundred years ago. His body lies 
 entombed in the transept : his monument 
 is the wonderful pile whose construction 
 has made his name to be remembered 
 by succeeding ages more than all his 
 other deeds. 
 
 Outside the cathedral, adjoining the 
 monastery -wall, a commanding terrace 
 is built upon the verge of the precipice. 
 Leaning from its edge, we gazed almost 
 vertically into the orange-groves below, 
 where the ripe fruit glowed with the bright- 
 ness of a flame contrasted with the dark- 
 ness of the foliage. Far and wide were 
 spread the fruit-gardens over the plain, 
 to where the mountains towered up in 
 the east,- and northward to the city and 
 the sea. It is one of those bright and 
 satisfying scenes from which a traveller 
 can hardly turn away without a tinge of 
 bitterness in the thought of never seeing 
 them again. 
 
 The drive back to the town was pleas- 
 antly varied by a detour which brought 
 us to the Capuchin monastery and the 
 Saracenic villa of La Ziza. The vaults 
 of the monastery are mentioned as one 
 of the interesting sights, but it must be 
 a very ghoulish soul that would take 
 pleasure in them. The horrors of the 
 more famous Capuchin vaults at Rome 
 are tame in comparison with these. 
 There the ornaments are skulls and 
 skeletons in a tolerable state of clean- 
 liness : here the departed brethren have 
 
 been subjected to some mummifying 
 process, and as they lie piled in hideous 
 confusion their withered faces stare hor- 
 ribly in the twilight of the cellar. Nu- 
 merous fiery -eyed cats run about with 
 much scratching and scrabbling over 
 the dry bodies, making the place none 
 the pleasanter with their uncanny wails. 
 A very brief visit is sufficient. 
 
 La Ziza, the only Saracenic house of 
 this region which is still inhabited, is 
 simply a massive, battlemented tower 
 of unmistakably Arabian appearance. 
 The outside walls are adorned with the 
 depressed panels characteristic of the 
 Saracenic style, but within the Oriental 
 look has almost vanished under the re- 
 pairs and decorations of many centuries. 
 Only the lofty hallway, arched above 
 with a kind of honeycomb vaulting and 
 cooled by a little cascade of water rush- 
 ing through it, retains much of the Orien- 
 tal beauty, and seems like a hall of the 
 Alhambra. Along a wall of the vesti- 
 bule runs an inscription in Arabic which 
 has been a puzzle to Orientalists, and of 
 which no undisputed interpretation is giv- 
 en. The palace was built as a country 
 pleasure-house by one of the Saracenic 
 princes of Palermo, and can be little less 
 than a thousand years old ; indeed, an 
 inscription on its walls, inscribed by one 
 of the Spanish proprietors, claims for 
 the house an antiquity of eleven hun- 
 dred years. 
 
 From the battlements of La Ziza one 
 has the loveliest near view of Palermo 
 and the plain of the Golden Shell. An 
 enthusiastic verse, written over the door- 
 way of the palace, declares it to be the 
 most beautiful scene upon our planet, 
 and while the eyes are resting on the 
 view it is easy to believe the poet ; but 
 many of the mountain -views about the 
 city surpass it. 
 
 One of the most attractive of the 
 mountain - excursions from Palermo is 
 that to the monastery of San Martino. 
 At a height of seventeen hundred feet 
 above the city, in a lonely spot, the 
 monastery stands on another flank of 
 the mountain on which Monreale is 
 also perched. The mule-path from the 
 suburban village of Boccadifalco to San 
 
A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 ^n 
 
178 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 Martino would be worth traversing for 
 its own wild beauty alone. It first en- 
 ters a gorge between grand cliffs : then, 
 climbing a rocky ascent which com- 
 mands a superb view of the plain, it 
 runs through a fruitful valley, where the 
 monastery suddenly appears in the front. 
 
 The monastery of San Martino has 
 been the wealthiest in Sicily. The en- 
 trance-hall is on a scale of regal mag- 
 nificence, adorned with many -colored 
 marbles. The brethren were all of noble 
 extraction. Though the external archi- 
 tecture of the building is not in the best 
 taste, the grand scale on which it is built, 
 and still more the wild, picturesque site, 
 give to the monastery a beauty which 
 even an Italian architect of the last cen- 
 tury could not disfigure. Ascending a 
 grand staircase with balustrades of pur- 
 ple marble, an upper hall is reached, 
 from which the wonderful view may be 
 seen to the best advantage. Turning 
 the eye to the north and east across the 
 savage-looking mountains, a short reach 
 of the coast is seen, and beyond is the 
 boundless expanse of sea, dotted on the 
 horizon by the volcanoes of the .^olian 
 Islands, which lie more than a hundred 
 miles away. The abbey abounds in pic- 
 tures by masters of the seventeenth cen- 
 tury, and there is also a museum of Greek 
 and Saracenic remains, but nothing with- 
 in the walls compares with the interest of 
 the window-views. 
 
 Attractive as are the sights of Palermo, 
 most of them must be passed over or 
 very hastily visited if the tour of the isl- 
 and is to be made in a month, for the 
 Greek cities beyond demand a greater 
 share of time by reason of their immense 
 antiquity and the grandeur of their re- 
 mains. 
 
 Being well prepared for the inland 
 journey, and eager to see antiquities 
 so little known to the outer world, one 
 question arose to give us pause — a ques- 
 tion which every year keeps thousands 
 of prudent tourists from exploring a 
 country as full of glorious scenery as 
 Switzerland, possessing more of Greek 
 antiquities than Greece itself, and a far 
 lovelier winter climate than Italy — " Is 
 it safe ?" The doubtful question whether 
 
 this rarely-attempted journey should be 
 accomplished was settled by the friendly 
 advice of the courteous consul of the 
 United States at Palermo. That advice 
 may be of use to travellers in the future : 
 it was to the effect that for two American 
 gentlemen travelling alone and without 
 ostentation through Sicily there is no 
 more danger of capture or violent death 
 than in any civilized country. It is ad- 
 mitted that highway robbery is not im- 
 possible, as in many places nearer home, 
 but the simple preventive is to carry as 
 little ready money as possible over the 
 short spaces of unsettled country, and to 
 forward superfluous baggage by steamer. 
 That there are banditti in certain districts 
 of the island no one denies, but their ob- 
 ject is the capture of wealthy Sicilians, 
 whose ransom is sure and ample, while 
 that of a foreigner is uncertain and ne- 
 cessarily long delayed. 
 
 A dark afternoon found us comfortably 
 established in the best seats of an old- 
 fashioned stage-coach in front of the gen- 
 eral post-office of Palermo, whence the 
 stage-lines radiate to the various parts 
 of the island. After the long delibera- 
 tion which seems to characterize all busi- 
 ness ( especially official business ) trans- 
 acted outside of England and America, 
 the mail-bags were delivered, and our 
 journey began in the midst of a shower 
 descending with all the tremendous im- 
 petuosity of a semi-tropical rainy season. 
 The cumbersome vehicle dashed on with 
 considerable spirit through streets almost 
 emptied by the violence of the shower, 
 and out through the broad arch of the 
 stately Porta Nuova crowded by multi- 
 tudes seeking shelter from the storm. 
 Late twilight found us at the end of the 
 first stage in Monreale. From thence on- 
 ward the journey continued for a while 
 through pitchy darkness. The broad 
 highway is engineered with admirable 
 skill along the sides of mountains and 
 over deep ravines, through a region of 
 most uncommon beauty, it is said, bui 
 now hidden from us by the impenetrable 
 gloom. However, as the night advanced 
 the clouds rolled away with surprising 
 suddenness, and left a bright moon rising 
 over the mountains. We besran to see 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 179 
 
 something of the beautifully varied coun- I through the narrow window of a covered 
 try, though viewing it at a disadvantage I coach. Wherever the rugged nature of the 
 
i8o 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 country permitted every rood of ground 
 was under exquisite cultivation, and al- 
 ready had its first soft covering of spring- 
 ing vegetation. The night-air was sweet 
 with the spring-like odors of freshly-turn- 
 ed earth and of wild-flowers : from time to 
 time white masses of flower-laden almond 
 trees flashed past the window, looking in 
 the moonlight wonderfully like the snow- 
 drifts which at this season line the roads 
 in New England. 
 
 After nightfall the surface of the rich 
 and well - cultivated country seemed as 
 solitary as a wilderness : not a creature 
 was stirring along the road. The intense 
 silence of the night was broken only by 
 the hum of our coach -wheels and the 
 sharp snap of hoofs from our cavalry 
 guard. How unlike were all the sur- 
 roundings to those of an ordinary mod- 
 ern night -journey over the mail -routes 
 of Europe ! The primitive conveyance, 
 the quiet of the lonely road, the arms of 
 the attendant troop of horsemen flash- 
 ing in the light of the moon, — all the 
 concomitants of an old-time night-jour- 
 ney seemed to carry us back from the 
 age of railroads to an earlier time. 
 
 Eleven drowsy hours of staging, and 
 then a long, slow ascent, brought us up 
 to the hilltop where stands the village of 
 Calatafimi. The chief inn of the town is 
 probably not surpassed in Europe in the 
 number of its small discomforts, animate 
 and inanimate, but it must be made the 
 base of operations for visiting the ruins 
 of Segesta. The remnant of the night 
 spent in sleep prepared us for our inves- 
 tigations on the following day. It was 
 pleasant, rising in the cool early morn- 
 ing, to step out from the comfortless in- 
 terior of the tavern to enjoy on a south- 
 ern balcony the temperate warmth of the 
 low sun and to look down on the lovely 
 landscape. Before us lay a fertile roll- 
 ing country clad with verdure, and rising 
 gradually upward toward the south to an 
 elevation deserving to be called a moun- 
 tain from its great height, yet from its 
 gentle slope and cultivated sides rather 
 to be called a hill. A field near the crest 
 of that distant hill, marked only by a few 
 white crosses, is a spot memorable in 
 Sicilian history, for there lie the heroes 
 
 who fell fighting with Garibaldi for the 
 unity of Italy on May 15, i860. Sicily 
 has in all ages been a battle-ground for 
 the contending races of two continents : 
 on Sicilian soil Athens received her most 
 disabling blow, and here too the Punic 
 power was broken ; yet there is hardly 
 one among the battlefields of Sicily upon 
 which greater destinies have been settled 
 than on this field of Calatafimi. 
 
 Before the morning was far advanced 
 we started out in search of the village 
 cure, the unfailing friend of strangers, 
 that we might inquire of him about the 
 safety of visiting the ruin and in regard 
 to the pleasantest way of reaching it. 
 Picking our way about through the mud 
 of the squalid village, we at length found 
 the old gentleman just coming from his 
 little church on the side of the castle hill 
 at the end of the town. Filled with un- 
 feigned delight that the monotony of his 
 existence should be broken by the ad- 
 vent of two foreigners, especially such 
 living wonders as Americans, the benigt. 
 priest took a lively interest in our case 
 gave us the information for which wt.*^ 
 had asked, vouching for the safety oi 
 the country, and begged us to walk on 
 with him. For five minutes we followed 
 on together the road cut in the hillside 
 beneath the walls of the Saracenic cita- 
 del, our companion all the while talking 
 vehemently, and helping out our lame 
 knowledge of the language with gestures 
 so dramatic that an understanding of his 
 words was hardly needed. Suddenly the 
 road curved round the side of the hill ; 
 we stood on the floor of a deserted quar- 
 ry ; the old man ceased speaking and 
 pointed forward: "Ecco /" Before us the 
 hill dropped abruptly down in a preci- 
 pice : far belov/ a deep valley spread out 
 before our eyes, "fair as the garden of 
 the Lord." As the light of the morning 
 sun streamed down through its length 
 bringing out in great brilliancy the fresh 
 green of spring, it looked like a paradise 
 of luxuriant vegetation. The gray of 
 olive trees and the darkness of orange- 
 groves contrasted with the color of spring- 
 ing plants, and everywhere were scatter- 
 ed the pink-and- white plumes of the blos- 
 soming almonds. Beyond the valley a 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 rugged, saddle-shaped mountain rose to 
 an imposing height, and upon the sum- 
 mit - Une stood in sohtary majesty the 
 Doric temple of Segesta, each column in 
 •clear relief against the blue of the sky. 
 It is so far removed from all abodes of 
 men, standing alone for thousands of 
 years in the region of the clouds — so 
 grand in its severe and noble outlines — 
 so venerable in its mysterious antiquity 
 — so blended with the natural beauties of 
 the place, — that it seems rather to belong 
 to the power that raised the mountains 
 than to any workmanship of man. The 
 world cannot show a more wonderful ex- 
 ample of art exquisitely harmonized with 
 the grandeur of natural scenery. 
 
 Eager for a closer view of the temple, 
 we returned immediately to the town, and, 
 being provided with a guide and a beast, 
 were soon on the way down the winding 
 road to the valley. A bridle-path diverged 
 from the main road : an avenue of over- 
 arching olive trees shaded the way, and 
 ■on all sides here, as everywhere through 
 the country, the orange -crop loaded the 
 trees almost to breaking — the most beau- 
 tiful of all crops as the fruit hangs upon 
 the branches. As we passed the lower 
 -slopes dotted with browsing sheep, and 
 began the rugged ascent of the mountain 
 ■on which the temple stands, the pathway 
 •crept up the edge of a profound gorge : it 
 was a perilous way, clinging close to the 
 ■edge of the bank, and at some points, 
 where we could look down a thousand 
 feet to the torrent below, the path was so 
 narrow and broken that even our sure- 
 footed mountain-donkeys hesitated to ad- 
 vance. The picturesque but hard climb 
 at length came to an end at the edge of 
 the broad, flattened summit of the moun- 
 tain. Again the temple suddenly came in 
 sight, but now near at hand. The moun- 
 tain - shepherds have planted with wheat 
 the level of the summit, and the pale yel- 
 low of the volcanic rock from which the 
 temple is built harmonizes well with the 
 •color of its surroundings. It cannot be 
 called a ruin. It stands as the builders 
 left it in the fifth century before Christ. 
 Not a column is broken, not a stone has 
 fallen. The interior was never finished, 
 ibut the outside is perfect. 
 
 The pure outlines of a Doric temple 
 are beautiful in any situation, but the 
 impression which this one made upon us 
 in the bright morning sunlight, standing 
 in the midst of verdure and flowers on 
 the brink of that stupendous chasm and 
 overlooking that glorious country, is not 
 a thing to be conveyed in words. 
 
 The interest of the temple is comprised 
 in its size, antiquity and beauty, for no 
 mention of it is made in history. Its ap- 
 proximate age is inferred from the inter- 
 nal evidence of the structure. The sub- 
 jection of the city of Segesta from B. c. 
 409 to the powers of Carthage and Rome 
 successively, and the subsequent decline 
 of its own power and wealth, render it 
 certain that no such work as this temple 
 would have been undertaken after that 
 date : moreover, the purity of its simple 
 Doric form places it in the earlier age? 
 of Sicilian history The Carthaginiai. 
 invasion of the island was doubtless the 
 event which arrested the building. Cice- 
 ro has described a wonderful statue of 
 Diana in bronze which the people of 
 Segesta showed him with pride as the 
 greatest ornament of their city : it was 
 of colossal size and faultless beauty, be- 
 longing to the best period of Greek art. 
 As the statue was in existence before the 
 Carthaginian invasion, it seems to me 
 highly improbable that the citizens of 
 Segesta would have built so grand a 
 temple for any other purpose than to 
 enshrine their most admired and revered 
 statue and to make it a place of worship 
 for Diana. This theory may explain in 
 part the reason why the building was ar- 
 rested, for it is known that the image was 
 stolen to adorn the city of Carthage,* and 
 its loss, as well as the subsequent poverty 
 of Segesta, would have been a sufficient 
 reason for ceasing to build a temple to 
 contain it. Diana's worshippers of old 
 must have looked upon these lovely 
 mountain - ranges as an abode dear to 
 the queen of the nymphs and the hunt- 
 er's patron deity. It seems as if noth- 
 ing less than the presence of the moun- 
 tain-goddess lingering round her shrine 
 could have kept the temple in its mar- 
 vellous perfection through the lapse of 
 
 * The statue was restored to Segesta by Scipio. 
 
l82 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 ages in a land of wars and earthquakes. 
 The houses of the neighboring city are 
 indistinguishably levelled with the earth, 
 but hardly a stone of the sacred building 
 is displaced. 
 
 The position of the temple was outside 
 and below the limits of the ancient city. 
 The mountain-ridge rises near at hand 
 to a somewhat greater height, and ter- 
 minates in a peak, on the summit and 
 sides of which the town was built. Warn- 
 ed by the decline of the sun, we turned 
 from the Segestan house of worship and 
 began to climb the slope toward the Se- 
 gestan place of amusement : the Greek 
 theatre still remains with little loss or 
 change. The ascent was interrupted by 
 many lingering backward looks toward 
 the grand colonnade as it appeared at 
 fresh- points of view from above. Hardly 
 a living creature appeared on the lonely 
 heights, except that one wandering shep- 
 herd, seeing the dress of foreigners, came 
 forward to offer his little stock of coins 
 ploughed from the earth or found in an- 
 cient buildings. As usual, most of the 
 pocketful were corroded beyond recog- 
 nition, but one piece bore a noble head 
 executed in the Greek style, and the clear 
 inscription, 11 A NOP MIT A N, a coin of 
 Panormus; which is, in modern speech, 
 Palermo. A few coppers were accepted 
 as an ample equivalent for a coin which 
 will not circulate. 
 
 The scattered fragments of a fortress 
 crown the peak ; and immediately be- 
 low, cut in the solid rock of the western 
 slope, lies the theatre. It is not large as 
 compared with buildings of its class at 
 Athens and Syracuse, yet I believe that 
 in its seating capacity it exceeds any 
 opera-house of our time. Entering by 
 a ruined stage -door and crossing the 
 orchestra, we rested on the lower tiers 
 of seats. The great arc, comprising two- 
 thirds of a circle, upon which the spec- 
 tators were ranged, has still its covering 
 of fine cut -stone seats, complete except 
 at one extremity. Every part of the des- 
 olate building gains a new interest when 
 peopled in imagination with its ancient 
 occupants, and when we recall to mind 
 the vast multitudes of many generations 
 who have watched with breathless and 
 
 solemn interest the stately progress of 
 Greek tragedy before that ruined scena. 
 
 As we lounged upon the lowest seats, 
 whereon the high dignitaries of the town 
 used to sit, and looked across *he open 
 space of the orchestra, there at the cen- 
 tre of its farther side lay the slab which 
 supported the altar of Bacchus, where 
 stood the chorus -leader: near it a line 
 of stone marks the front of the stage, 
 and beyond it is spread an expanse of 
 stage -scenery such as no modern royal 
 theatre can boast. The whole broad 
 prospect commanded from the colon- 
 nade below is seen across the stage of 
 the theatre, but widened by the greater 
 height and finished in the foreground 
 by the majestic presence of the temple. 
 All the north - western mountains of the 
 island are taken in with one glance of 
 the eye : beneath us the valley of the 
 little river Scamander opens a long vista 
 northward to the Mediterranean Sea, and 
 far away the port of Castellamare glitters, 
 in contrast with the blue, as white as a 
 polished shell upon the shore. Most dis- 
 tant among the group of peaks is Mount 
 Eryx, the lonely rock by the sea on whose 
 summit stood the temple of Venus Ery- 
 cina, more renowned in the ancient world 
 than all other shrines of the goddess. 
 
 We climbed to the brow of the hill in 
 order to descend through the entire length 
 of the city. Hardly one stone is left upon 
 another of all the streets through which 
 the Segestans proudly conducted Cicero. 
 Here and there appear the circular open- 
 ings of cisterns which occupied the centres 
 of ancient courtyards. The stones once 
 hewn and carved which are strewn over 
 the slope are now reduced to the rough- 
 ness of boulders, so that one might cross 
 the tract and catch no sign that it was 
 once a city. Little has been done to dis- 
 cover what remains lie beneath the sur- 
 face, but at one point, where a small ex- 
 cavation has been made, a heap of fall- 
 en Ionic columns cover the fragments of 
 a tomb built on a scale of regal magnif- 
 icence ; and a little lower on the moun- 
 tain two rooms of a house have been ex- 
 humed, the floors of which are still cov- 
 ered with beautiful mosaics. 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 183 
 
 PART II. 
 
 A, B, C, D, temples of the acropolis ; E, F, G, temples of the neapolis ; I, I, walls of ancient harbor. 
 
 SELINUS. 
 
 NOT many miles from the western 
 cape of Sicily twin bluffs rise side 
 by side vertically from the southern sea. 
 Their sloping sides are separated by a 
 river : their parallel ridges, running in- 
 land, are lost in the high adjacent moor- 
 land. On the crests of the cliffs, one 
 hundred feet above the sea, stood the 
 acropolis and the neapolis of Selinus, 
 two divisions of the great and free Greek 
 city which once held sway in all this 
 quarter of the island. 
 
 The lapse of two thousand years has so 
 changed the outline of this southern coast 
 that now no natural harbor offers an an- 
 chorage safe from the violence of the 
 sirocco ; but a deep valley cuts in half 
 the cliff-built city, and in old times an 
 inlet ran up from the sea to meet the 
 valley-brook. This narrow inlet, deep- 
 ened and improved with all the skill of 
 ancient engineering, was lined with mas- 
 sive quays. Selinus was strong in ships 
 of war, but the citizens of the great com- 
 mercial town must have looked with not 
 less satisfaction on the multitudinous fleet 
 of m.erchant-craft that whitened the wa- 
 ters of their bay, and brought to them 
 from all foreign lands the wealth which 
 
 they lavishly bestowed in adorning their 
 homes and in building up the temples 
 of their gods. Along the edge of the 
 port were ranged, of course, the lines 
 of warehouses essential to an extensive 
 foreign trade, but no vestiges of the an- 
 cient town are seen along the valley, for 
 the malarial dampness of the lowlands 
 drove the population to the sides and 
 summits of the enclosing bluffs. 
 
 Imagine the beauty of a town thus 
 situated! Range above range on the 
 two hills rose the outlying villas and the 
 more crowded dwellings of the town. We 
 know from one admiring epithet of Vir- 
 gil's that these ancient houses of Selinus 
 were overshadowed by groups of palm 
 trees. What lovely homes they were ! 
 Filled with all luxuries that endless 
 wealth could buy, adorned with the skill 
 of Grecian art — which in our day we 
 wonder at and imitate, but never hope 
 to equal — the houses were so placed upon 
 the hill that the patrician landowner from 
 his shaded roof might watch far up the 
 valley -roads the lines of heavy-laden 
 beasts bringing down for export the pro- 
 ducts of his estates, and the merchant 
 from the terrace of his home, looking 
 
1 84 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 across the sea toward Africa, could catch 
 the most distant glimmer of the sails of 
 his corn - freighted ships bringing back 
 wealth to him from the Carthaginian 
 markets. 
 
 By far the greater part of the ancient 
 population gathered around the acropolis 
 on the western hill. Above the dwellings 
 of the slope a theatre and other public 
 buildings rose conspicuously ; and higher 
 still, all along the edge of the broad and 
 flattened summit, the massive city-wall 
 enclosed the acropolis, lifting against 
 the background of blue sky its diadem 
 of towers. But the chief features which 
 made Selinus famous for its beauty in 
 the ancient world were its temples. 
 
 On the highest crest of the acropolis 
 stood side by side three Doric temples, 
 facing the rising sun, while across the 
 harbor, on the corresponding western 
 height, three other temples, even greater 
 and more splendid, were built to perfect 
 the symmetry of the magnificent city. 
 Some of these temples glittered in snowy 
 whiteness: others, in contrast, were re- 
 lieved with many bands and ornaments 
 of gorgeous colors — colors so brilliant 
 and enduring that to this day they best 
 reveal to us the beauty of the Grecian 
 polychromic style. Some were of most 
 venerable age, coeval with the colony 
 itself, while others, built with more fin- 
 ished art, were barely completed at the 
 downfall of the city. One bore on its 
 front the earliest works of the Greek 
 chisel which are known in our time : 
 another, on the opposite height, dis- 
 played on its lofty frieze the batdes of 
 the giants wrought in the archaic but 
 spirited style of a century later. Above 
 the turmoil of the surrounding city the 
 sacred buildings stood apart in two ma- 
 jestic ranks within their own consecrated 
 grounds : the tumultuous noise of the town 
 came from a distance, and, mingling with 
 the roar of the sea that beat the rocks a 
 hundred feet below, echoed through the 
 sacred quiet of the colonnades. All the 
 temples of these two groups towered so 
 high upon the cliffs that peasants labor- 
 ing on the inland plain or shepherds on 
 the distant hillside might always keep in 
 sight the sacred buildings which sym- 
 
 bolized to them the greatness of their 
 gods. Mariners sailing on the African 
 Sea, between the east and the west of 
 the ancient world, might discern, even 
 far out upon the sea, the innumerable 
 columns rising upon the hilltops. 
 
 Such was the aspect of Selinus in 
 the time of its grandeur five hundred 
 years before Christ. In the year 409 
 B. c. a Carthaginian army under Han- 
 nibal, son of Gisco, besieged Selinus. 
 For nine days the Selinuntians made a 
 brave resistance, and then the city fell. 
 The people were butchered or sold, the 
 walls destroyed, the temples plundered. 
 Afterward the town revived, and led a 
 feeble existence for another century ; but 
 now for two thousand years the ground 
 has been desolate, a terror to all set- 
 tlers from the miasma which haunts the 
 marshes. 
 
 The pleasure of visiting these ruins 
 cannot be attained without paying a 
 penalty. Three times a week a small 
 vehicle connects at Calatafimi with the 
 stage-coach from Palermo, carrying the 
 mails to the southern parts of the island. 
 " Darkly at dead of night " we were sud- 
 denly transferred — out of the frying-pan 
 into the fire — from the poor consolation 
 of a Sicilian bed to the utter discom- 
 fort of a nondescript conveyance bound 
 for Castelvetrano. However, much trav- 
 elling teaches how to sleep through all 
 circumstances, and broken repose came 
 in spite of much lurching and many 
 bumps. When at last we were roused 
 by the breaking day, our road had al- 
 ready passed from the mountainous in- 
 terior into a rolling country. The sun 
 rose into the cloudless and pure bril- 
 liancy of a winter sky, and lighted up 
 a land carpeted with soft green. The 
 slopes became by degrees more gentle 
 as we approached the southern coast, 
 till at last we reached a plain, and came 
 to the queer old town of Castelvetrano 
 standing in the midst of it. It would be 
 hard to find in all Europe another large 
 town as much cut off from the world. 
 As we alighted from the coach in the 
 central piazza the throng of men in out- 
 landish costumes politely made room for 
 us to pass, but attempted no conceal- 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 185 
 
 ment of their curiosity at the sight of 
 foreigners. An inspection of the hotel- 
 book in the only locanda of the place 
 showed that for nearly a year no Amer- 
 ican or English traveller had visited this 
 region, so powerful is the danger of ban- 
 ditti and the certainty of bad lodging to 
 keep away visitors from the grandest 
 group of temples in Europe. 
 
 There is a peculiar pleasure in pass- 
 ing from the chief lines of travel into the 
 less-frequented parts of the Italian king- 
 dom, for otherwise it is hardly possible to 
 meet familiarly with the educated middle 
 class and to understand the best side of 
 the Italian character. In the cities of the 
 Peninsula the better class of inhabitants 
 shrinks from contact with the promiscuous 
 horde of foreigners which every winter 
 pours down upon them from the North ; 
 but in these remote towns of Sicily the 
 freemasonry of good -breeding is strong 
 in the narrow circle who share in it ; and 
 an educated foreigner, even though he 
 may have no introductions, can hardly 
 remain long without receiving many kind 
 attentions. A pleasant instance of this 
 national courtesy we met in Castelve- 
 trano. A gentleman of the town volun- 
 teered to take the walk of eight miles 
 to Selinunto that we migbt have his gui- 
 dance through the ruins. His thorough 
 acquaintance with the place gave addi- 
 tional interest to the excursion. 
 
 A flourishing notice posted in the town 
 declared to travellers that the govern- 
 ment had just completed a highway to 
 the ruins. It was a pleasing surprise, 
 suggestive of an hour's drive in an easy 
 carriage instead of a long jog on donkey- 
 back ; but no such pleasure was in store. 
 In all the town of twenty thousand in- 
 habitants no wheeled vehicle could be 
 had for love or money. The only con- 
 veyance for passengers or freight is on 
 the backs of animals. 
 
 I have dwelt upon the beauty of Se- 
 linus as it was, yet it must be acknow- 
 ledged that now its buildings are inferior 
 in beauty to the perfect temples of Gir- 
 genti, Segesta or Paestum. They cannot 
 boast of colonnades unharmed by the 
 lapse of ages, but even though pros- 
 trated the Selinuntian temples are a 
 
 more interesting study than even those 
 of Paestum, and display more richness 
 of ornament and more grandeur of de- 
 sign than any other Sicilian ruins. 
 
 The temples seem to have outlasted 
 the sieges and vicissitudes of the city : 
 even its final destruction left them still 
 standing in desolation upon the heights. 
 At last some terrible but unrecorded 
 earthquake shook these hills to their 
 foundations, and the columns which had 
 withstood the wear of ages fell by hun- 
 dreds in one catastrophe. Not one re- 
 mained unbroken. 
 
 For seven miles we plodded across the 
 plain. The road runs straight through a 
 succession of olive-farms, and is border- 
 ed here and there with cork trees, but 
 there are few habitations or other signs 
 of life. Far away we hear the roar of 
 the surf, and soon a lovely column with- 
 out a capital rises above the dark foliage 
 against the darker sky: then half an hour 
 more of tramping brings us to the sum- 
 mit of the eastern bluff and into the ruins 
 of the neapolis. There is a curious irony 
 in the name of the place — the neapolis — 
 the "new city" ! It has been a desolate 
 heap of ruins for two thousand years, 
 yet the neighboring acropolis was old 
 when even this was new. 
 
 I am glad to have seen Selinunto as it 
 was on that day. The gloomy landscape 
 was in keeping with the aspect of the 
 desolated city. The sea bellowed loud 
 on the rocks below, and, stretching away 
 southward to an horizon indefinite with 
 mist and rain, its whole expanse was 
 lashed into white-caps. To the east the 
 coast extended in curves of yellow beach 
 miles away to the heights of San Marco, 
 half hidden from sight by a transparent 
 veil of showers. The plain and the in- 
 land mountain -ranges were black with 
 the shadows of low -brooding clouds, 
 while around us on the cliffs were strewn 
 the tokens of departed splendor, complet- 
 ing the grim desolation of the prospect. 
 
 The temple which we first approach is 
 the most northern of the neapolis, by long 
 usage designated by the letter G. It is 
 the most ruinous, the most recent, and by 
 far the greatest, of the Selinuntian tem- 
 ples. No sacred building in the Greek 
 
i86 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 world surpassed it in size except the tem- 
 ple of Diana at Ephesus and that of Jove 
 at Agrigentum. It is the only one of the 
 
 group which seems to have been wreck- 
 ed by human agency : probably the Car- 
 thaginian army, made furious by long 
 
 resistance, spent their rage in overthrow- 
 ing the greatest pride of the humiliated 
 city. In the other temples drums and 
 capitals lie in long lines side by side, as 
 
 they fell levelled by one blow, and their 
 plan can easily be traced ; but here ev- 
 erything has toppled down in a confused 
 mound of ruins : the walls and columns, 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 187 
 
 formed of some of the hugest masses of 
 stone ever wrought by men, pediments, 
 entablatui 3S, capitals and triglyphs, have 
 been hurled into a shapeless heap, while 
 a lofty but imperfect column stands alone 
 in the midst of the wreck. We stopped 
 by the side of the ruin to notice one of 
 the capitals which lies flat upon the 
 ground with the square abacus upward. 
 Our companion called it "the dancing- 
 floor." The peasants from the country 
 around come here to the Pillars of the 
 Giants, as they call them, and hold their 
 rustic jollifications. This is the dancing- 
 ground. The huge slab lies nearly four- 
 teen feet square, making room for a coun- 
 try-dance of several couples. 
 
 The drums which compose these tower- 
 like Doric columns lie scattered about : 
 their diameter is so great that as they 
 lie upon one side one can scarcely reach 
 their centre, and as they stand upright 
 one's back fits comfortably to the curve 
 of the enormous flutes. The difficulty of 
 transporting such masses of stone must 
 have been enormous, and yet scores of 
 such columns supported the roof, making 
 a colonnade one thousand feet in circuit. 
 
 It would have been occupation enough 
 for a day to study this one ruin and puz- 
 zle out the plan of the building ; but the 
 brooding clouds broke at last, and the 
 irresistible violence of the shower sent 
 us flying to the next temple, where a 
 shelter is made by broken masses of 
 stone piled up at the rear of the edifice. 
 In a kind of cavern walled and roofed 
 with Doric fragments we sat down to 
 pass a rainy half hour over the cleanest 
 and most delicate viands that the restau- 
 rateurs of Castelvetrano could furnish — 
 hard-boiled eggs, olives and wine. It 
 was a curious dining-room. The rub- 
 bish of ages has only of late years been 
 cleared away, exposing the long-buried 
 surface of the stones, which still retains 
 uninjured the coating of fine-grained 
 stucco, and bears many traces of the 
 red and green colors which relieved 
 the whiteness of the surface. 
 
 This central temple of the eastern hill 
 is very similar in size and shape to its 
 near neighbor on the right — so much so 
 that it is natural to regard them as a pair. 
 
 They are commonly designated by the 
 letters F and E respectively. An in- 
 scription lately exhumed on the spot 
 indicates that the former was sacred to 
 Hera : what divinity was worshipped in 
 the latter is unknown. Both were of 
 pure Doric architecture, and lacked but 
 a few feet to equal in length the Parthe- 
 non of Athens. Both were adorned with 
 metopes sculptured in relief representing, 
 with the vigor of the archaic Greek style, 
 the battles of the gods and giants. Both 
 were finished with many ornaments of 
 color, and bear to this day on their deli- 
 cate mouldings much of the red, black and 
 yellow with which they were adorned. 
 
 As we have come to the threshold, en- 
 ter with me one of these Greek temples. 
 We descend by a slight incline from the 
 present surface of the ground to the old 
 level, and stand at the foot of the temple- 
 steps. A flight of magnificent breadth 
 ascends to a stone-paved level, and be- 
 yond that another flight, as wide as the 
 temple-front, brings us to the colonnade. 
 We pass between the bases of two fallen 
 columns : on either hand rise the broken 
 shafts of unequal heights, but the posi- 
 tion of even the fallen one is clear from 
 some standing fragment. We are within 
 the porch of the temple. Through an- 
 other line of columns we pass within the 
 cella, the holy place of the temple. There 
 is much sombre picturesqueness about 
 the interior. On the right and left shafts 
 rise in broken gray ranges, and beyond 
 the walls are seen other columns lying 
 on the ground, prostrate but perfect. 
 There is no vestige of a roof overhead, 
 but the low - driving clouds match with 
 the color of the masonry and seem al- 
 most to rest upon the ruins. The floor 
 of the sacred apartment by the zeal of 
 antiquaries has been cleared of its long 
 accumulations, except that some frag- 
 ments, thrown inward by the earth- 
 quake, lie as they fell. We walk with- 
 out obstruction through the great length 
 of the consecrated room, though around 
 us fallen triglyphs and fluted drums lie 
 here and there upon the pavement. We 
 reach at last the farther end of the sacred 
 hall, where we find the altar of the god- 
 dess in its old position, while beyond it is 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 the pedestal from which her image is 
 gone. Beside the altar we stoop to no- 
 tice the channels cut in the floor to col- 
 lect the streaming blood of the victim. 
 
 Some feeling of awe in this place is 
 irresistible. The impression of solitude 
 and hoary antiquity brought a sense of 
 reverence for the place almost like that 
 which the suppliant of old times might 
 have felt when advancing through the 
 temple to throw himself before the altar. 
 To stand in the temple and at the very 
 altar of Hera, to see the spot where, 
 carved in marble, the haughty goddess 
 stood, brings up with wonderful vivid- 
 ness all the old heathen worship. Even 
 a dull imagination can picture the priest 
 at the altar, the burning victim, the bend- 
 ing worshipper. Men, struggling and 
 tempted, have come here to seek from 
 Heaven redress of wrong, expiation of 
 sin, divine aid for human weakness. 
 And who can know that their cries were 
 not heard and answered from Heaven ? 
 They worshipped ignorantly, but they 
 perished from the earth centuries be- 
 fore the Child was born in Bethlehem 
 of Judea. 
 
 The interest of this temple was so great 
 that it was hard to allow a fair share of 
 time for the acropolis, but it must be seen 
 "now or never." So we were obliged to 
 turn our backs on the neapolis, and hurry 
 down the precipitous slope across the val- 
 ley for half a mile, and then up through 
 a gateway in the prostrate city-wall to the 
 summit of the western cliff. 
 
 Here, as on the other height, Doric 
 remains lie in confusion about us, and 
 on all sides is spread out the same wild 
 landscape. The buildings are so utterly 
 overthrown that a general view is only 
 perplexing ; but as we stood gazing there 
 emerged from the ruined temples the man 
 whose presence is most to be desired in 
 this place — Signor Cavallari, the best 
 authority on Sicilian antiquities. 
 
 A careful excavation of the acropolis 
 has been carried forward by government 
 within the last year under the superin- 
 tendence of Signor Cavallari. From the 
 point of excavation to the edge of the 
 cliff a little railroad was laid in order that 
 the debris might be discharged into the 
 
 sea ; and already the digging had so far 
 advanced that the old chief thoroughfare 
 of the town, passing at the rear of the 
 temples, was laid bare for many rods. 
 It was a privilege adding vastly to the 
 interest of the place to explore the an- 
 cient city under such guidance, to walk 
 over the pavement trodden by the con- 
 quering army of Hannibal, to wander 
 among the temples where every stone 
 was known to our leader, to notice the 
 appliances of the heathen worship still 
 remaining, while we listened to the story 
 of Cavallari's rich discoveries from his 
 own lips. 
 
 There is so much similarity of design 
 in all pure Doric temples that a descrip- 
 tion of each one upon the acropolis would 
 become tedious. The chief claim to 
 special interest which these possess is 
 their extreme antiquity, for it is believed 
 that no trace exists of any older Doric 
 temple, unless it be in one group of col- 
 umns standing on the Plain of Corinth. 
 Certain peculiarities of architecture in 
 the temples marked upon the plans by 
 the letters C and D show that they were 
 completed before the establishment of 
 the Doric canon in architecture. Their 
 age is plainly greater than that of the 
 other buildings, and C is probably the 
 older of the two, for the hideous sculp- 
 tured metopes exhumed among its frag- 
 ments are the earliest and rudest works 
 of the Greek chisel which have ever 
 come to light. No doubt it is almost 
 coeval with the city, and was founded 
 twenty-five centuries ago. 
 
 The temporary home of the venerable 
 antiquary is in a little stone cabin, snug 
 but primitive in its arrangements, which 
 is perched on the very edge of the crag. 
 Under its roof, while we were fortified 
 with hot coffee to face again the chilly 
 storm, we were feasted with our host's 
 discourse of his travels and discoveries 
 — of ancient Greece and Young Amer- 
 ica ; of adventures in Yucatan, and un- 
 easy nights passed in the crater of 
 Etna while aiding Baron Sartorius in 
 preparing his work on that volcano. All 
 the pauses of the conversation were fill- 
 ed with the solemn music of the sea 
 rhythmically beating on the crag far be- 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 neath our feet. With the fading of light 
 we passed outside the city-wall and down 
 across the old harbor, which is now dry 
 land. There we parted from our enter- 
 tainer, leaving him standing on the sea- 
 shore in the light of the low sun, which 
 broke from the clouds at setting. It was 
 a venerable but erect figure, clad in a 
 graceful Italian cloak ; a fine face and 
 head, beautified by snow - white hair — 
 a presence in harmony with the hoary 
 grandeur of the buildings among which 
 he dwells and labors. 
 
 To penetrate the country lying east of 
 Castelvetrano is no easy matter. There 
 is no steam communication, no diligence, 
 no carriage to be hired, no road, nor can 
 anything deserving the name of a sad- 
 dle be obtained. Two flattened lumps 
 of white rags were bound to the backs 
 of two raw-boned horses : on the top of 
 these our baggage, ourselves and our 
 two drivers were stacked up in a man- 
 ner peculiar to the country. For twenty- 
 seven weary miles we rode with unstir- 
 ruped feet across wild moors, through 
 fords made dangerous by the recent 
 storm, and over long reaches of sea- 
 beach, till, mounting the promontory of 
 San Marco, we came under the walls of 
 Sciacca. 
 
 The mediaeval remains of Sciacca are 
 worthy to receive some attention from a 
 traveller, but with the light of the next 
 day came a clear sky and west wind, 
 making it possible to continue the jour- 
 ney toward Girgenti by a sailboat — too 
 good a chance to be lost by delay. A 
 zigzag path, steep as a stairway, descend- 
 ed from the city to the sea. Attended by 
 two wizened fishermen, who bent beneath 
 a load of boat-supplies, we came down to 
 the shore, and then, without delay, our 
 pretty little craft rushed impetuously out 
 to the open sea. It was only a rough 
 fishing-boat, yet the grace of the lateen 
 sail and the quaint costumes of the skip- 
 per and his man seemed got up for scenic 
 effect. An exhilarating wind blew fresh 
 out of the west, sending us on our course 
 with the speed of a bird. 
 
 We continued looking back on the town 
 we had left until it faded in the distance. 
 I have not seen in any country so beau- 
 
 tiful a site as that of Sciacca. A range 
 of bare stone peaks, which glowed with 
 many tints in the morning light, rose be- 
 hind the city from bases of rich verdure ; 
 on either hand promontories shut off the 
 violence of the waves ; the sea was blue 
 with that brilliancy not known in our 
 Northern waters. In the centre of the 
 scene towers the city, built on the edge 
 of an enormous rock, the massive and 
 battlemented town -wall pierced by im- 
 posing gateways ; and the towers and 
 palaces rising above it give an impres- 
 sion of majesty which is enhanced by the 
 height of the cliff. It is like one of those 
 ancient fortresses that we see in Dore's 
 fantastic pictures — a citadel of the Mid- 
 dle Ages, fit to be the home of crusaders. 
 For many miles at sea the gleam of its 
 white walls is unmistakable. 
 
 Far beneath a blazing vault, 
 Sown in a wrinkle of the monstrous hill. 
 The city sparkles like a grain of salt. 
 
 The whole sail of forty miles from 
 Sciacca to the port of Girgenti, follow- 
 ing the line of the coast, is a panorama 
 of delightful pictures. Cliffs and beaches, 
 mountains and rolling country, flew past 
 us alternately as we ran along steadily 
 at nine knots. Our skipper was a man 
 of incomprehensible tongue, but at the 
 start he pointed significantly to the figure 
 2 on my watch-dial, and, true to his word, 
 before that hour we came to Porto Em- 
 pedocle, the harbor of Girgenti, and, 
 riding ashore on the fishermen's shoul- 
 ders, were unceremoniously dumped on 
 the beach. 
 
 As viewed from the sea, the town seem- 
 ed near at hand, for it is most conspic- 
 uous, standing on a ridge a thousand 
 feet above, yet even by rail it is almost 
 an hour's journey, for the grades are 
 tremendous and the road of course wind- 
 ing. This railway will soon be complet- 
 ed to Palermo, and then it is to be hoped 
 that Girgenti will become familiar to trav- 
 ellers ; for, excepting Athens, there is 
 hardly another place which so abounds 
 in Greek antiquities. Now the remote 
 ruins of Egypt are better known to the 
 travelling public than the remains of 
 Acragas. 
 
 The present town of Girgenti occupies 
 
IQO 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 the height which was the citadel of the 
 Greek Acragas and the Roman Agri- 
 gentum. Below the town, on the south, 
 lies an undulating plateau which was over- 
 
 spread by the ancient city, and beyond 
 that the mountain -side slopes abruptly 
 to the sea. When at last our train had 
 climbed the mountain and we were run- 
 
 ning at better speed across this plateau, 
 the early winter sun was already setting, 
 and here and there lovely pictures, framed 
 with rocks and green trees, flashed be- 
 
 fore our eyes, visions of majestic Greek 
 buildings casting across the green sward 
 the long shadows of evening, and, most 
 beautiful of all, one superb Doric temple, 
 
A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 191 
 
 unmarred by time, with the soft yellow 
 of its colon lade transformed to the bril- 
 liancy of gold by the flood of dying sun- 
 shine. From the station there is yet a 
 long ascent by carriage to the town, and 
 it was dusk when we passed the city-gate 
 and drove up through the length of the 
 main thoroughfare — a dark street, rather 
 narrow and less clean than could be de- 
 sired, but at every corner the eye was 
 charmed with glimpses down the slop- 
 ing side-streets, for each glimpse reveal- 
 ed a view bounded only by the horizon : 
 the eye runsbeyond the town-walls, across 
 the fields and down the slope to the sea, 
 a thousand feet below. 
 
 Girgenti is picturesque when you are a 
 few miles from it, but the enchantment 
 of distance is needed to enjoy it: within 
 the walls it is agreeable neither to the eye 
 nor nose. The population is mewed up 
 within the limits of the mediseval forti- 
 fications, and therefore all buildings are 
 closely packed and run high in air, mak- 
 ing the streets appear like the poor quar- 
 ters of a dense metropolis. There is hard- 
 ly a trace to be found within the town of 
 the ancient citadel which stood upon the 
 same hill. 
 
 To the vast majority of readers whose 
 classical studies are rusty the name of 
 Acragas conveys a rather vague image. 
 Perhaps the thought arises that some 
 such town, whose situation is but half 
 remembered, was a rival of the more 
 famous Syracuse : perhaps with it are 
 associated thoughts of Theron, the ideal 
 despot, or of Phalaris, most infamous of 
 tyrants. The city which men of our age 
 have so much forgotten was in its time 
 vast, populous, rich, magnificent. Half 
 a million of souls, it is thought, dwelt 
 within its walls : in luxury it rivalled 
 Sybaris ; in power it was second only 
 to Syracuse among the Greek colonies. 
 It was of the citizens of Acragas that 
 Empedocles said that they built as if 
 they hoped to live for ever, and lived as 
 if they thought to die to-morrow. Pindar 
 rapturously calls Acragas " the fairest of 
 mortal cities." Nor was its glory that of 
 mere barbaric magnificence and power. 
 The boundless wealth of its rulers and 
 citizens was spent to advance high art. 
 
 Except Athens, hardly another Greek 
 city could boast of more perfect culture. 
 Here was the home of famous statesmen, 
 artists, philosophers. Theron and Em- 
 pedocles were men of Acragas : works 
 of Zeuxis and Myron adorned the line 
 of temples which were the glory of the 
 city. 
 
 The rise of Acragas to the zenith of its 
 power was astonishingly rapid. Found- 
 ed by colonists from Gela in the year 580 
 B. c, in little more than one century it 
 advanced to a degree of influence which 
 in later times it could never equal. It 
 can hardly be doubted that the swift ad- 
 vancement of the young colony was due 
 in a great degree to the skilful govern- 
 ment of the tyrant Phalaris. When the 
 city was but ten years old he usurped the 
 supreme power by the appropriation and 
 free use of funds entrusted to him, and 
 ruled the people with a rod of iron for 
 twelve years. That he governed with 
 skill is certain from the great material 
 prosperity of the city under his control. 
 He seems to have been a patron of let- 
 ters and the fine arts, and in his time Ac- 
 ragas grew in power and magnificence ; 
 but this is almost forgotten by the an- 
 cient writers, who rarely mention him 
 except in connection with the brazen 
 bull in which he is said to have roast- 
 ed his enemies. 
 
 Acragas owed much to Phalaris, but 
 more to Theron, who extended the do- 
 minions of the city across the island to 
 the Tyrrhene Sea, and in company with 
 Gelon destroyed the vast fleet of Car- 
 thage on the day most memorable in the 
 history of Greek civilization ; for on that 
 day, it is said, the strength of the African 
 city was shattered by Theron, while, un- 
 known to him, Themistocles was con- 
 quering the Asiatic hordes of Xerxes at 
 Salamis. 
 
 The victory of Himera brought Acra- 
 gas to the highest point of her grandeur : 
 wealth poured into the city, luxury in- 
 creased. The army of Carthaginian pris- 
 oners reduced to slavery was employed 
 by the government in building the tem- 
 ples and other public works which made 
 the city one of the most splendid that 
 have ever existed, and which even aftei 
 
192 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 two thousand years astonish every visitor 
 to their ruins. For nearly a century more 
 the prosperity of Acragas was uninter- 
 rupted, but in the year 406 b. c. the Car- 
 thaginian army, fresh from the destruc- 
 tion of Selinus, came upon the city, and 
 after a fearful siege it fell. Some years 
 afterward Timoleon rebuilt Acragas, and 
 again it became flourishing, but never re- 
 covered its former greatness ; and in the 
 
 Roman period it was a town of small im- 
 portance. 
 
 A warm evening and a full moon were 
 strong temptations to make a visit to the 
 temples on our first night in Girgenti, 
 for first impressions of a ruined city can 
 never be so charming as in the full moon- 
 light ; but the distance to the old south- 
 ern wall by which the ruins stand seemed 
 too great after a fatiguing day of travel- 
 
 TOMB OF THERON. 
 
 ling, and a prudent citizen strongly ad- 
 vised against venturing out of the city- 
 gates at night. The value of the warn- 
 ing appeared on the following morning, 
 for some event drew a multitude of coun- 
 trymen into the town, and the main street 
 was half full of the most savage-looking 
 ruffians I have ever met. 
 
 Grote expends some pity on the de- 
 feated Agrigentines, because, in addition 
 to the horrors of the siege, they were 
 
 driven from their homes on a December 
 night. If their sufferings were from cold, 
 it must have been a very different winter 
 day from that on which I first walked 
 through the ancient city. Under a bla- 
 zing afternoon sun we followed a rough 
 footpath which leads most directly from 
 the town to the ruins, down over ledges 
 of bare rock which radiated an intense 
 heat. Here, as elsewhere about the tity, 
 a vast extent of the shelving rocks is hon- 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 193 
 
 eycombed with graves. They have long 
 been emptied of their contents, but the 
 myriads of them that are found give a 
 clew by which the huge population of 
 Acragas can be estimated. So about Se- 
 linus, Syracuse and other ancient cities 
 the graves and memorials of the dead 
 are always amazing in multitude. 
 
 After this first declivity our path for 
 two or three miles undulated across the 
 rolling land once wholly covered by the 
 city. It is a well-cultivated country, plant- 
 ed with olive, orange and almond trees, 
 but there are few antique remains to ar- 
 rest the attention. A lofty ruin, which 
 stands on a height to the west, we pass- 
 ed without a visit : it is a Saracenic bath, 
 and can claim an antiquity of only one 
 thousand years, which in this part of the 
 world is a very insignificant age. The 
 farm -walls which border our way seem 
 to be largely built of antique materials : 
 much of the stone is wrought, and here 
 and there an elegant fluted column is 
 piled on roughly, like the glacial bould- 
 ers around our Northern farms. As we 
 approach the southern boundary of the 
 Greek city the evidences of ancient life 
 are seen more and more : around the 
 wayside convent of Santo Nicola are 
 strewn architectural fragments of great 
 beauty which have been dug from the 
 fields. But while traversing for miles 
 the site of Acragas hardly a standing 
 wall or column of its ten thousand build- 
 ings is seen till we come upon the temple 
 of Juno Lucina, situated at the south- 
 eastern angle of the plateau. 
 
 The position of this temple was quite 
 the most beautiful in the city. The great 
 natural platform on which Acragas was 
 built is bounded on the seaward side 
 by a short precipice, beyond which the 
 mountain slopes steeply to the shore. 
 This long, low cliff extends from east to 
 west for more than a mile, and, turning 
 inland at right angles, formed the strong- 
 est natural defence on three sides of the 
 lower city. On the brow of this cliff five 
 of the Agrigentine temples stood in line, 
 overlooking, like the temples of Selinus, 
 a wide extent of country, and, like them, 
 seen far out at sea. 
 
 It is at the angle where this precipitous 
 13 
 
 boundary turns from east to west that the 
 ruined temple of Juno stands. Jts remains 
 are full of dignity and beauty. It is ruin- 
 ed, but not prostrate. Earthquakes and 
 other destroying agencies of time have 
 shattered the walls, and the pavement 
 and cornice have disappeared, but all 
 the columns of the northern line are 
 perfect, still bearing the architrave upon 
 their capitals. The shafts of the south- 
 ern side, roughened by centuries of the 
 south wind from Africa, are less regular : 
 many have lost their capitals, and some 
 have fallen. So much remains of the 
 building that the plan and dimensions 
 are evident at a glance, and yet the 
 marks of time are so unmistakable that 
 even when seen at a distance of miles, 
 towering upon its pedestal of rock, the 
 rugged outline of the ruin always sug- 
 gests the thought of its immense an- 
 tiquity. 
 
 The building belongs to the best period 
 of Doric architecture, and must have been 
 erected little less than five hundred years 
 before Christ. It is called the temple of 
 Juno, and, though we have not the best 
 reasons for giving that name to the tem- 
 ple, it is not improbable that this was the 
 building which contained the picture of 
 Juno for which, as Pliny relates, Zeuxis 
 chose as his models the five most love- 
 ly damsels of Acragas, combining their 
 several beauties in one feminine figure of 
 superhuman perfection. The picture of 
 Juno was the great artist's masterpiece. 
 
 The second temple of the line upon 
 the cliff is seen to stand at a consider- 
 able distance. The pathway to it follows 
 the ancient city -wall, which in this part 
 is a low parapet of enormous thickness 
 crowning the verge of the precipice : it 
 is not built up of stones, but is formed 
 of the natural rock scarped on both sides. 
 Along the wall are curious sepulchres of 
 many chambers hewn in the rock. 
 
 A walk of several hundred yards brought 
 us near the so-called temple of Concord, 
 a building of nearly the same age as the 
 first temple. Unlike the other Greek 
 structures of Sicily, the temple of Con- 
 cord is not a ruin, nor is it, like the tem- 
 ple of Segesta, unfinished. The front, 
 which is first approached from the east. 
 
194 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 mmii'mm^m\\\^^\\ iiiii'iil"fl II '"'ll'lfi III) 
 
 seems to be without flaw or blemish of 
 any kind : there is but one other build- 
 ing on the earth which has stood for 
 twenty -four centuries with so little in- 
 
 jury. The temple is a perfect example 
 of the best Doric order — simple, yet full 
 of grandeur. 
 
 In coming upon an edifice so impos- 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 195 
 
 ing and without any appearance of di- 
 lapidation, it is a strange sensation to 
 find only solitude and silence : it seems 
 but natural to hope that some priest or 
 worshipper may descend the steps ; but 
 hardly a habitation is in sight except the 
 white houses of the city gleaming far 
 away upon the hill ; only the strong sea- 
 wind, shaking the trees, breaks the quiet 
 of the place ; no living creature is visible 
 but passing flocks of birds. The temple 
 cannot be approached without command- 
 ing the deepest admiration of the behold- 
 er : the perfect symmetry of the struc- 
 ture, the look of repose and of unshaken 
 strength, the simple inajesty of Greek art, 
 the thought of its changeless existence 
 through a score of centuries, give to it a 
 sublimity equalled by fev/ architectural 
 works. Yet, standing before the fault- 
 less portico, it is not easy to realize that 
 its columns were reared when the long 
 drama of European history was just open- 
 ing : they are still so unyielding in their 
 strength that they seem destined to stand 
 while the solid cliff below remains un- 
 moved. 
 
 To pass within the shade of the portico, 
 and follow around the temple the long 
 walk of the peristyle which runs be- 
 tween the wall and the outer colonnade, 
 increases the feeling of wonder at the 
 marvellous preservation of the building. 
 It explains in some degree the reason 
 why it has been preserved to note the 
 exquisite finish of the mason's work ; 
 every stone is so finely fitted to its neigh- 
 bors that a needle would hardly slide be- 
 tween them. 
 
 In passing from the portico to the cella 
 of the temple the absence of a roof is first 
 noticed : as it was supported in its place 
 by beams of wood, it must have disap- 
 peared when the building was compar- 
 atively new ; but within, as without, the 
 completeness of the temple is wonderful. 
 The only alterations which have been 
 made seem to be the removal of a par- 
 tition which anciently divided the in- 
 terior, and the cutting of arched open- 
 ings in the walls for the admission of 
 light. These changes were the result of 
 adapting the heathen temple to the pur- 
 poses of Christian worship. The extra- 
 
 ordinary preservation of this most perfect 
 monument of antiquity wfe owe to the 
 medieval Christians, who dedicated it 
 in honor of St. Gregorio delle Rape. A 
 curious feature of the interior is the pair 
 of spiral staircases at the corners of the 
 edifice. They afford a safe and unbroken 
 means of ascent to the top of the build- 
 ing, but the hard stone of the steps is 
 worn almost to a continuous slope by 
 the tread of eighty generations of men. 
 ' Seated upon the top of the cornice, we 
 lingered long to enjoy the most beautiful 
 view that can be obtained in this region : 
 it embraces the rolling country with its 
 ruins, the modern city, the mountains 
 and the sea. 
 
 Continuing westward from the temple 
 of Concord, we soon came upon the high- 
 road leading to the port. It descends 
 through the cliff from the plateau to the 
 slope below by a broad inclined plane 
 cut in the rock. It is a cutting of an- 
 cient origin, for this was the great sea- 
 gate of Acragas. Standing before the 
 gateway, it is not hard to imagine it the 
 most splendid entrance that any ancient 
 city could boast, for on the one hand the 
 ruined temple of Hercules lies on the 
 verge of the cliff: on the other are the 
 fragments of the Olympieum. 
 
 As we stood before the gateway some 
 solitary armed horsemen at long inter- 
 vals, and now and then a group of load- 
 ed mules toiling up toward Girgenti, were 
 the only reminders of the roaring tide of 
 traffic which in old times rushed through 
 it. In those days the road to the sea was 
 bordered by the mausoleums of the Ag- 
 rigentine nobles, but the destruction of 
 them began as far back as the Carthagin- 
 ian siege of Acragas, when Hannibal the 
 elder used them as quarries to aid his 
 military operations. Some were spared, 
 but the only trace of them all that now 
 remains is a lonely tomb in the form of 
 an Ionic tower, commonly called the 
 "tomb of Theron." The magnificent 
 mausoleum of Theron mentioned by old 
 writers probably stood near this spot. 
 It is said that its destruction, when com- 
 manded by Hannibal, was arrested by a 
 sign from Heaven ; but it is no longer 
 standingf. That which is called Theron's 
 
196 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 tomb is a graceful but plain structure : 
 the walls are simply adorned with sunk- 
 en panels, and at the corners are four 
 slender columns of the Ionic order ; but 
 it corresponds in no way with the royal 
 grandeur of Theron's tomb as described 
 by Diodorus. 
 
 The two temples which overlook the 
 sea-gate, flanking it on either side, were 
 the grandest architectural works of the 
 city. That which stood upon the east- 
 ern side is believed to be the temple 
 of Hercules, referred to by Cicero in his 
 charge against Verres. Its remains show 
 it to have been a temple built after the 
 usual Doric pattern, but with proportions 
 of remarkable grandeur. It was little in- 
 ferior to the Parthenon in size ; but, great 
 as this building was, it was so dwarfed by 
 the neighboring temple of Jupiter that 
 we hear more of the works of art pre- 
 served in it than of its own beauty. In 
 regard to the statue of Hercules which 
 it contained, Cicero, living among the 
 collected art -treasures of Rome, gave 
 this testimony: "I cannot say that I have 
 ever looked on a thing more beautiful." 
 Another work of even greater fame, en- 
 shrined in this edifice, was the picture of 
 Alcimene by Zeuxis. He painted it for 
 the Agrigentines without recompense ; 
 "For," he said, "the painting is price- 
 less, therefore I will receive no price." 
 The ruins of this temple are disappoint- 
 ing to one just coming from a Greek 
 building in perfect preservation. At first 
 sight it seems but a mound of fragments, 
 heaped about one lonely column, but a 
 walk across the stylobate or stone plat- 
 form of the temple gives an idea of the 
 grand scale of the building, and is inter- 
 esting for the sake of the associations of 
 the place. 
 
 The Olympieum, or temple of Olym- 
 pian Zeus, which flanked the sea-gate on 
 the western side, was one of the great- 
 est architectural wonders of the world. 
 Among all the temples reared by the 
 Hellenic race it was inferior in size only 
 to the temple of Diana at Ephesus. The 
 dimensions of the building were equal to 
 those of a large mediaeval cathedral. It 
 was referred to by the ancients in terms 
 which show that they regarded it as a 
 
 thing little less astonishing than any of 
 the world's Seven Wonders. The design 
 was peculiar : unlike the other Sicilian 
 temples, which were usually surrounded 
 by a colonnade, the external walls of the 
 Olympieum were adorned only -^ith en- 
 gaged columns of enormous size. Dio- 
 dorus, in a passage often quoted regard- 
 ing the ancient splendor of Acragas, thus 
 describes these columns : " Their circum- 
 ference in the outer portion is twenty feet, 
 so that a man's body can be contained 
 in one of the flutes ; and the breadth of 
 the part within is twelve feet. The size 
 and height of the porticoes are amazing. 
 In the part looking toward the east was 
 represented the battle of the gods and 
 the giants, excellent for size, beauty and 
 fine workmanship. In the pediment to- 
 ward the west was represented the cap- 
 ture of Troy, in which each one of the 
 heroes, elaborately sculptured, can be 
 known by his own characteristics." 
 
 The interior decorations of this build- 
 ing were of a peculiar character. Against 
 the four walls it seems that huge pilasters 
 rose two-thirds the height of the build- 
 ing, and each was surmounted by the 
 figure of a giant supporting the roof on 
 his uplifted hands. These ranks of co- 
 lossal figures were the mpst original and 
 perhaps the most impressive feature of 
 this temple's architecture. They seem- 
 ed to bow beneath the weight imposed 
 upon them, and symbolized to the wor- 
 shippers of Zeus his conquest of the 
 giants, who, as tradition said, reigned 
 in Sicily until the power of Zeus became 
 supreme. 
 
 I wandered about among the ruins of 
 the Olympieum in a state of simmering 
 indignation, unable to forgive or forget 
 the stupidity of the mediaeval inhabitants 
 of Girgenti. They wanted a mole to im- 
 prove their bad harbor, and found ma- 
 terials for it in this building, though stone 
 in abundance may be quarried at half 
 the distance from the sea. In conse- 
 quence of this devastation the remains 
 of the edifice are comparatively scanty, 
 though enough is left to afford material 
 for more than one temple of moderate 
 size. Several acres are strewn with the 
 wrought stones, each of Which weighs 
 
A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 197 
 
 many tons ; but nothing stands except 
 the basenient - walls, which rise above 
 the surface of the ground to the level 
 of the temple - floor. Even the stone 
 flooring is torn up, and the space en- 
 closed by the foundations is overgrown 
 with wild flowers. 
 
 As we climbed up into the area of the 
 temple the one object which seized and 
 held our attention was the monstrous 
 figure of a giant in stone which lies 
 stretched out upon the floor : it is the 
 only one which remains of the roof- 
 supporting colossi, and indeed the only 
 
 TEMPLE OF CASTOR AND POLLUX. 
 
 remnant of the wealth of sculpture which 
 once adorned the building. Flocks were 
 cropping the pasturage of the temple- 
 floor, and the figure of their shepherd, 
 resting against the statue, set off" by con- 
 trast its huge proportions. The length 
 of the recumbent form is twenty -six feet : 
 it lies with arms upraised, as if the giant 
 slept with his clasped hands for a pillow. 
 The stone is exceedingly worn by ages 
 of exposure, yet the altitude and size of 
 the figure are full of grandeur, and it aids 
 the imagination more than all the other 
 remains in conceiving what must have 
 been the original beauty of the edifice. 
 
 In the range of buildings that over- 
 looked the city-wall the fifth and last 
 goes by the name of the temple of Cas- 
 tor and Pollux. A statue of Leda found 
 
 on the spot makes it probable that it was 
 built in honor of her, rather than of her 
 sons. It is a picturesque ruin, standing 
 near the western angle of the wall, close 
 to the brink of the precipice, which here 
 is high enough to give grandeur to the 
 site. Of the thirty -four columns that 
 surrounded the peristyle, only a pretty 
 group of four remains, surmounted by 
 the cornice and one angle of the pedi- 
 ment. Though this was one of the 
 smallest of the sacred buildings, its posi- 
 tion was one of the loveliest of the town. 
 A large artificial lake filled the ravine on 
 the western side of the city, and washed 
 the base of the cliff on which this temple 
 stands, so that a picture of the white 
 colonnade was reflected from the water 
 far below. 
 
198 
 
 A MOUTH IN SICILY. 
 
 The less important ruins about Gir- 
 genti are very numerous. Four days 
 were overcrowded with interesting work 
 m exploring the other temples, aque- 
 ducts and tombs, and in revisiting the 
 great ruins. 
 
 The fifth day found us hurried reluct- 
 antly away, over a most tempestuous 
 sea, toward Syracuse : longer delay was 
 impossible, for Girgenti has but weekly 
 steam communication with the outer 
 world. 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 CONCLUDING PART. 
 
 THE OLYMPIEUM. 
 
 THE steamer which carried us to- 
 ward Syracuse was small, the sea 
 was rough, our fellow-travellers were of- 
 ficers of the Italian army; therefore, as 
 we rounded the south-eastern cape, the 
 
 stormy Pachinum, and a drenching rain 
 forced me to leave the deck, the ship's 
 cabin presented a doleful spectacle to 
 my eyes. "How were the mighty fall- 
 en !'" The stalwart officers, to a man. 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 199 
 
 lay pallid and motionless as if some 
 conquering foe had cut off the flower 
 of the Italian army. On every lounge 
 and berth was seen a pale and woe- 
 begone face, made the more ghastly 
 by the contrast with a beard of intense 
 blackness. 
 
 Their hair drooped round their pallid cheeks 
 Like sea- weed round a clam. 
 
 The sight strengthened my opinion that 
 the dark-haired people of Southern Eu- 
 rope are more invariably and more se- 
 verely affected by sea-sickness than fair- 
 haired men of the Anglo-Saxon race. 
 
 There are few positions which give to 
 the human soul such a feeling of calm 
 superiority, of deep self-satisfaction, as 
 that which is experienced by a man sit- 
 ting with a clear head and smiling coun- 
 tenance in the midst of a sea -sick com- 
 pany. Nevertheless, even the dignity of 
 that position became irksome with time, 
 and I could sympathize with the sighs 
 of relief which burst in chorus from the 
 military gentlemen when, sooner than 
 seemed possible, the rolling ceased, we 
 heard the anchor drop, and knew that 
 our voyage was at an end. 
 
 The view which greeted our eyes on 
 returning to the deck was of a different 
 character from any which we had met be- 
 fore in Sicily. The steamer was at anchor 
 in the beautiful great harbor of Syracuse. 
 The country on the north, south and west 
 of the bay is prettily varied by low, rolling 
 hills, but would seem tame if compared 
 with the rugged scenery of all other parts 
 of the island except for one grand fea- 
 ture, the superb snow-covered pyramid 
 of Etna, which, though forty miles away 
 from Syracuse, is the most striking ob- 
 ject in sight. 
 
 Across the eastern side of the bay, 
 dividing it from the open sea, lies the 
 island of Ortygia, covered by the houses 
 of Syracuse. The buildings rise from 
 the edge of the water, and the symmet- 
 rical shape of the island gives a singular 
 grace to the city viewed as a whole. 
 Seen fron. a distance across the water, 
 it is like a great white waterfowl resting 
 on the surface of the sea. 
 
 The city was founded twenty -six cen- 
 turies ago on Ortygia, but in the course 
 
 of ages it covered many square miles of 
 the adjacent coast : now, in its old age, 
 it has shrunk again within the narrow 
 limits of the island. 
 
 A man who in his school -boy days 
 has toiled over the ^neid and the Bu- 
 colics, changing the lovely Latin verses 
 into bad English prose, and has felt 
 even a little appreciation of the poetry, 
 cannot rest long in Syracuse without 
 looking about him for the famous Are- 
 thusa, the sacred fountain whose praises 
 are sounded by Virgil, and which was 
 the subject of so much poetry and le- 
 gend through the classical ages. After 
 we had landed upon the quay before the 
 sea-gate of the city, and had passed up 
 through the gate to one of the adjacent 
 hotels overlooking the bay, enough of 
 daylight remained to us for a little sight- 
 seeing. Our thoughts naturally turned 
 first to Arethusa. The fountain is most 
 pleasantly approached by going back 
 through the sea-gate on to the Marina, 
 a beautiful seashore drive which runs 
 for half the length of the island between 
 the town-wall and the shore of the har- 
 bor, and is laid out in imitation of the 
 grand Marina of Palermo. 
 
 At the southern end of this avenue 
 we descended a stairway of stone to the 
 shore of the harbor. The custodian of 
 Arethusa threw open an iron gateway 
 on our left, and we stepped down to the 
 edge of the fountain. A large semicir- 
 cular space, which is bounded on its 
 curve by a wall of massive masonry and 
 faces toward the bay, is quite filled by 
 the pool of Arethusa, except that a nar- 
 row flagged walk runs by the water's edge. 
 The clear water bursts in a torrent from 
 many openings in the rock underlying 
 the wall, and, rushing across the pool and 
 through a short channel, falls into the 
 bay with almost the volume of a river. 
 The pool is so close to the surface of the 
 harbor that if it were by any sea but the 
 tideless Mediterranean it would be daily 
 overflowed even by a rise of a few inches. 
 
 The fountain is adorned with the pa- 
 pyrus brought from the marshes beyond 
 the harbor. As we paced the flagging 
 along the edge of the water the plumes 
 of the papyrus nodded in the wind high 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 over our heads. It seemed the most 
 stately and graceful of plants, even in 
 the midst of the luxuriant vegetable life 
 of Sicily. 
 
 The fable of Arethusa and Alpheus is 
 
 well known : Virgil has expressed it in a 
 few words : 
 
 Alpheum fama est hue Elidis amnem 
 Occultas egisse vias subter mare ; qui nunc 
 Ore, Arethusa, tuo Siculis confunditur undis. 
 
 LATOMIA DEI CAPPUCCINI. 
 
 The story goes that the nymph Are- 
 thusa, pursued by the river - god Alphe- 
 us in Greece, implored the aid of Diana, 
 and was changed by her into a fountain 
 which sank into the earth, and, flowing 
 together with the waters of the river a 
 hundred leagues under the sea, rose to 
 the light again in this Ortygian pool. 
 
 The story has this foundation in truth, 
 that the waters of Arethusa really flow 
 
 under the sea. The fountain is the last 
 outlet of one of the ancient aqueducts, 
 which has its origin far away in the hills 
 of Sicily, north-west of the city. The 
 conduit is carried for several miles un- 
 der the plateau occupied by that district 
 of Syracuse called Epipolae : thence it 
 descends under the small harbor, and 
 at last emerges in the island. 
 
 It is a charming excursion for half a 
 
A MONTH TN SICIL V. 
 
 day to cross the harbor and visit the re- 
 mains which lie outside the ancient walls 
 upon its western shore. On a morning 
 when the harbor lay calm and brilliant 
 among its encircling hills, looking like 
 a magnified blue flower among green 
 leaves, we descended to the quay and 
 engaged boatmen for the trip across the 
 bay and up the river Anapus. We were 
 rowed due west across the harbor to the 
 mouth of the little river, but we had hard- 
 ly entered the stream when the boatmen 
 began to insinuate that the gentlemen 
 would find walking more agreeable : the 
 dryness of the winter had rendered the 
 Anapus too low for comfortable naviga- 
 tion. A rough walk through salt marshes 
 and over rocky fields brought us in ten 
 minutes to the top of the low but com- 
 manding knoll on which the scanty 
 ruins of the Olympieum stand in per- 
 fect solitude. 
 
 This temple was one of the richest, 
 oldest and most revered of all Greek 
 fanes. The statue of Olympian Jove 
 which was adored here was ranked by 
 Cicero among three statues of the god 
 which he esteemed the most perfect in 
 the world. Gelon, returning from the 
 spoliation of the Carthaginians at Hi- 
 mera, commemorated the greatest vic- 
 tory of the Sicilian Greeks by clothing 
 this statue in a robe of solid gold ; but 
 a century afterward Dionysius the Ty- 
 rant appropriated the gold to his own 
 use, apologizing for his greed only with 
 the grim joke that "gold was too heavy 
 a mantle for summer and too cold for 
 winter, but wool was well adapted to 
 both seasons." 
 
 The site is interesting rather for its old 
 celebrity than for existing remains. Only 
 two tall Doric columns stand, showing 
 by their wide separation the length of 
 the building. They have a circumfer- 
 ence of about eighteen feet, and yet each 
 column was hewn from a single stone. 
 
 Near the Olympieum, at a point where 
 the Anapus receives the tributary waters 
 of the famous Cyane — ' ' celeberissitna inter 
 Sicilias nymphas" — begins a great thicket 
 of papyrus bordering the stream on both 
 sides. The gigantic reeds, bending under 
 the weight of their bushy heads and ris- 
 
 ing in some cases to a height of nearly 
 twenty feet, are mirrored from the slug- 
 gish stream below. Amid such vegeta- 
 tion it is as easy to imagine one's self 
 sailing along the head-waters of the Nile 
 as on a river of temperate Europe ; for 
 I believe there is no country nearer than 
 Abyssinia where this famous plant now 
 grows. It long ago disappeared from 
 Egypt, nor is it found elsewhere in Eu- 
 rope than here. It is hard to account 
 for its isolated growth in this marsh, but 
 probably its introduction into Europe was 
 due to the Arab conquerors of Sicily. 
 
 Ancient Syracuse had great beauty, 
 both natural and architectural, yet its 
 position cannot compare with the moun- 
 tainous height of Acragas, conspicuous 
 far away over land and sea ; nor had 
 it any such natural beauty as the sea- 
 washed cliffs of Selinus, serving as ped- 
 estals for sublime buildings. Neverthe- 
 less, the situation had a peculiar loveli- 
 ness. The buildings of the island, the 
 oldest portion of the town, rose. Venice- 
 like, from the very waves of the sea. The 
 four other districts — Acradina, Tyche, 
 Epipolee and Neapolis, sometimes call- 
 ed distinct cities — occupied a low table- 
 land which overlooks from the north the 
 two fine harbors of Syracuse, and spread 
 to the adjoining plain. 
 
 Fine as was the site of Syracuse, its 
 reputation for extraordinary beauty in 
 old times rested chiefly on its architec- 
 tural grandeur; so that even at a time 
 when the greatness of Syracuse had de- 
 clined and Rome was in her prime, a 
 Roman, addressing Romans, said, "You 
 have often heard that Syracuse is the 
 largest of Greek cities, and the most 
 beautiful of all cities." 
 
 By far the greater portion of the exist- 
 ing remains of Syracuse is found in those 
 districts which lie north of the harbor. 
 Early in the morning we rode through 
 the powerful fortress which defends the 
 island upon the north, and crossed the 
 bridge connecting Ortygia with the Sicil- 
 ian shore, to pass a delightful day among 
 the ruins. 
 
 All along under the brow of the Syra- 
 cusan plateau the rock is deeply pene- 
 trated by old quarries called latomie. It 
 
A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 LATOMIA DEL PARADISO, NEAR SYRACUSE. 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
 203 
 
 was from these quarries that ancient 
 Syracuse was built, and their size and 
 number indicate how great the city was. 
 The first of them which is approached 
 on the east is called Latomia dei Cap- 
 puccini, from its proximity to the Capu- 
 chin convent. It is a vast pit sunk in 
 the earth between scarped cliffs which 
 rise perpendicularly around it to a height 
 of eighty or a hundred feet. In the midst 
 of it two monstrous masses of stone like 
 fortified towers have been left standing. 
 The floor of the quarry, many acres in 
 extent, is partly covered with a garden 
 of oranges and pomegranates, and a wild 
 growth of roses and acanthus runs be- 
 tween the trees : over the fallen masses 
 of rock and from the cliffs above hang 
 ivy and wild vines matted into graceful 
 curtains which soften the rough aspect 
 of the crags. 
 
 Looking from above upon this luxu- 
 riant garden, which lies below so peace- 
 ful and solitary and silent that the flight 
 or chirp of every bird is noticed, it is 
 hard to revive in imagination the trag- 
 edy of which it was the scene. In this 
 quarry, amid unutterable horrors, toiled 
 and perished seven thousand Athenians, 
 all that remained of the forces sent forth 
 from Athens under Nicias and Demos- 
 thenes in an armada greater and more 
 splendid than any Greek state before had 
 equipped. 
 
 A number of the most important re- 
 mains of the city lie in a group not far 
 from the main northern highway, a mile 
 to the west of the Capuchin monastery. 
 The first great ruin which we meet is the 
 Roman amphitheatre. The dimensions 
 of this amphitheatre, as compared with 
 the neighboring Greek theatre, indicate 
 a great decline in the population of Sy- 
 racuse during the earlier ages of the Ro- 
 man empire, for it is hardly larger than 
 the amphitheatre of Verona. The seats 
 are partly excavated from the natural 
 rock, but as the hillside slopes rapidly 
 toward the south, the lower part of the 
 building is constructed of solid masonry. 
 A traveller who has studied the great 
 amphitheatres of the Peninsula will find 
 little of fresh interest in this ; neverthe- 
 less, it was to me a half hour full of in- 
 
 terest which I spent in exploring the 
 labyrinth of vaulted corridors for en- 
 trance and exit, the innumerable stair- 
 ways of stone, and the passages and 
 gateways through which wild beasts and 
 gladiators were introduced upon the are- 
 na ; in noticing the curious arrangements 
 for supplying the place with water; in 
 searching for inscriptions on the marble 
 trimmings, which show to what families 
 the best sittings in the theatre belonged. 
 
 A Greek historian has mentioned that 
 Hieron II., tyrant of Syracuse, built an 
 altar a stadium (one-eighth of a mile) in 
 length. It has been suggested that its 
 incredible dimensions would long ago 
 have been found incorrect by those acute 
 German critics whose mission it is to set 
 the classical authors right in their figures 
 and dimensions, except for the trouble- 
 some fact that the altar was dug up in 
 1 839. We came to this altar next among 
 the ruins. It is a vast platform hewn 
 from the natural rock, but supplement- 
 ed at its southern end with masonry, 
 like the amphitheatre. It is approached 
 on each side by a flight of three steps. 
 There could hardly have been much use 
 for this altar except once in the year, 
 when the Syracusans offered to Jupiter 
 their annual sacrifice of four hundred 
 and fifty oxen — a remarkable example 
 of the lavish scale on which public af- 
 fairs were conducted at Syracuse both 
 in peace and war. 
 
 Above this altar the ground rises first 
 in a gradual slope, then perpendicularly, 
 to the level of the plateau at that part 
 occupied by the district called Neapolis. 
 In the vertical face of this cliff" are the 
 entrances of two latomie worthy of spe- 
 cial notice. The first is a cavern ap- 
 proached through the vast open quarry 
 called Latomia del Paradise. Beside 
 its entrance stands a pinnacle of rocks 
 crowned with mediaeval ruins. The 
 grotto was anciently used as a prison, 
 but has no special historic interest : it is 
 attractive only for its beauty. The walls 
 of rock about the opening, and even for 
 some distance within the cave, are half 
 concealed under a quivei ing tapestry of 
 the maiden-hair fern, which clings to ev- 
 ery crevice of the rock. The roof rests 
 
204 
 
 A MONTH IN SICIL Y. 
 
A MONTH IN SICIL V. 
 
 205 
 
 upon innumerable piers roughly hewn 
 from the natural rock, and between them 
 are seen, far back in the twilight of the 
 cavern, the forms of men and women 
 moving back and forth as if in the state- 
 ly figures of a minuet. They are work- 
 ing at the very ordinary business of mak- 
 ing ropes, but the surroundings make it 
 an exceedingly picturesque occupation. 
 
 The second latomia is called the Ear 
 of Dionysius — a name not flattering to 
 the tyrant, for the shape of the ear is far 
 more asinine than human. The acoustic 
 properties of .this cave are very remark- 
 able. It is one room, as long and high 
 as the nave of a large mediaeval church. 
 Every sound made near the opening of 
 the cavern is echoed from the farther 
 end, and astonishingly magnified. The 
 noise from a bit of paper crumpled in the 
 hand, after running a distance of five 
 hundred feet, returns to the ear increased 
 in volume ; and the crack of a tiny pis- 
 tol is so multiplied that it seems like the 
 simultaneous roar of a hundred distant 
 cannon. 
 
 The last and the most remarkable in 
 this group of remains is the Greek theatre. 
 We descended from the quarries under 
 the arches of an aqueduct to the high- 
 way. A few minutes' walk brought us 
 to the theatre. A most impressive first 
 sight of the building is obtained by turn- 
 ing from the road into a vaulted passage 
 on the right, which emerges upon the 
 orchestra j ust in front of the stage. On 
 three sides the seats in the vast curve of 
 the auditorium rise in receding ranges. 
 To the eye, confused by emerging from 
 the dim light of the vault, they seem like 
 the countless ripples from a stone falling 
 in calm water. No traces of the stage re- 
 main except the foundation of the sceiia 
 at the back, and a trough of masonry at 
 the front to contain the curtain ; for, 
 contrary to the custom of the m.odern 
 stage, the curtain rolled down at the 
 opening of the play. 
 
 This theatre is one of the largest ever 
 built. Among the Greek theatres of 
 which traces remain probably only two 
 equalled it in seating capacity. The en- 
 tire population of the modern city would 
 find room on the seats which remain, yet 
 
 many of the upper tiers are gone. The 
 theatre used to accommodate twenty-four 
 thousand persons : the new Grand Opera- 
 house at Paris will seat less than four 
 thousand. Standing in the orchestra and 
 considering the great distance of the re- 
 moter seats, it is easy to understand why 
 the ugly and unnatural masks were al- 
 ways retained in the Greek plays, for 
 without the reinforcement of the voice 
 given by the mouthpiece it would have 
 been impossible on the higher tiers to 
 distinguish the words of the actor. 
 
 The cavia, or excavation, extends from 
 the top to the bottom of the hill. Above 
 the fifteenth row of seats a broad cor- 
 ridor divides the lower seats of the aris- 
 tocracy from those above occupied by 
 the common people. On the wall of 
 the corridor are inscribed, in large Greek 
 capitals, the names of Zeus, of Hieron 
 the Tyrant, and of Philistis and Nereis, 
 queens of Syracuse, giving titles to the 
 great divisions of the theatre. 
 
 A visit to this group of remains usually 
 completes the sightseeing of a traveller 
 to Syracuse, but three miles to the west 
 there stands another ruin, the fortress of 
 Euryalus, which was to me the most in- 
 teresting building of Syracuse, for it is 
 the finest existing specimen of the mil- 
 itary engineering of the Greeks, or per- 
 haps of any other ancient people. 
 
 Ascending one of the long stairways 
 of the theatre, and entering the rock- 
 hewn street of tombs, the fortress may 
 be reached by following the course of 
 the old aqueduct westward for a league 
 across the table - land occupied by the 
 Epipolffi. 
 
 The lines of cliff which bound the pla- 
 teau on the north and south converge to 
 a sharp angle at the western end of the 
 town. At this extreme point of the city 
 stood the fortress, powerfully defending 
 the western gate in the town-wall. In 
 looking at the ruin from its western side 
 only the gray bases of four stone towers 
 are seen. All that remains of the fortress 
 above ground is in a state of extreme 
 ruin, but below the surface of the ground 
 the immense fosses, the magazines hewn 
 in the rock, and especially the labyrinth 
 of subterranean passages running in all 
 
2o6 
 
 A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
A MONTH IN SICILY. 
 
 207 
 
 directions from the fort, are of the high- 
 est interest, as throwing hght on ancient 
 modes of warfare. From these under- 
 ground corridors many stairways of 
 stone ascend to concealed openings in 
 the country about. They were to be 
 used for surprising the enemy by salUes 
 from the fortress at unexpected points. 
 There is good reason to beheve that we 
 see in Euryalus the work of Archimedes, 
 or at least that the fortification, if older, 
 was greatly improved by him. 
 
 Syracuse is connected with the other 
 cities of the eastern coast by the only 
 completed railroad in Sicily : for that 
 reason this part of the island is becom- 
 ing more familiarly known to foreigners 
 than other regions, and I need not dwell 
 upon the charms of a country so often 
 described by others. The remaining 
 towns of special interest are Catania, 
 Taormina and Messina. 
 
 At Catania we paused long enough 
 for a vain attempt to scale the almost 
 impenetrable winter-snows of Etna. At 
 a height of six thousand feet a wind was 
 encountered against which neither man 
 nor beast could stand, and the attempt 
 was abandoned. 
 
 I cannot here describe at length the 
 extraordinary grandeur of the view from 
 the ruined Greek theatre of Taormina ; 
 but after a year of European travel, 
 when a gentleman acknowledged as a 
 judge in sesthetic matters said to me 
 among the Alps, " There is no other 
 view in Europe so beautiful as that 
 from the theatre of Taormina," I could 
 respond with an unhesitating amen. 
 
 After a few days spent in Messina we 
 bade good-bye to Sicily. Messina is a 
 handsome, busy, commercial place, well 
 built and surrounded by wild mountain- 
 scenery. Its cathedral is one of the 
 finest churches of Sicily, but, consider- 
 ing the ancient importance of the place, 
 it is remarkable how few remains of an- 
 tiquity are to be found. 
 
 On a brilliant afternoon, when long 
 shadows from the Sicilian mountains 
 were already beginning to fall across 
 the sea, we took the returning steamer 
 for Naples, and sailed northward slow- 
 
 ly against the powerful current which 
 sweeps between Scylla and Charybdis. 
 A month before we had been charmed 
 with the scenery on first approaching 
 the island, but now, as it faded from 
 our eyes, the impression which remain- 
 ed upon the mind was of a view more 
 beautiful. 
 
 The Strait of Messina is here no wider 
 than a broad river. On either side the 
 Italian and Sicilian mountains rise so 
 near at hand that the waters of the strait 
 seem to wash their bases. Out of the viv- 
 id blue of the sea they tower up through 
 zones of soft green vegetation, lifting to a 
 height of many thousand feet bare shoul- 
 ders of rock, while here and there the 
 highest mountain -Jieads are snow-cap- 
 ped, glittering against a blue so deep 
 and so undimmed by any cloud or haze 
 that the reflected light from the sum- 
 mits is almost too dazzling for the eye 
 to bear. 
 
 I believe that there cannot be found 
 elsewhere, even on the Mediterranean, 
 a more sublime harmony of sea and 
 mountain -scenery than these views on 
 the Strait of Messina, whether looked at 
 from the water or the adjacent heights. 
 It is a kind of beauty especially fresh 
 and charming to American eyes, from 
 the fact that along our Atlantic coast the 
 mountain -ranges nowhere approach the 
 sea. 
 
 A little white town nestling under the 
 mountains on the Italian shore still bears 
 the name of Scylla. After the steamer 
 passed it we were beyond the strongest 
 current, and progress was more rapid. 
 In less than two hours the Sicilian moun- 
 tains were growing very dim in the south, 
 and on our left the volcanoes of the Lipa- 
 ri Islands were outlined in black against 
 the yellow of the western sky. The sun 
 set into the smoke-cloud from Vulcano, 
 and in the deepening twilight we watch- 
 ed the rugged mass of Stromboli rising 
 higher out of the sea, but with many 
 lingering backward looks at the island 
 whose matchless beauty had in a jour- 
 ney of one month kindled a sort of loy- 
 al attachment akin to a feeling of patriot- 
 ism. Alfred T. Bacon. 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 ■'^jSi^^Mv.!^: 
 
 w%^l^^}^d: "Si^l^f : 
 
 GOTEKORG. 
 
 THERE is hardly any spectacle in 
 the European world more animated 
 than the field of glorious water that runs 
 like a vein of green malachite between 
 Copenhagen and the Swedish coast. It 
 is filled with innumerable sea-craft of 
 every description, going and coming, 
 tacking and tugging, in every direction, 
 while the water so beautifully ripples and 
 rolls and covers itself with an infinite 
 water-lily of foam that the artist's eye is 
 delighted and the poet's imagination fe- 
 vered with the spangled and tumultuous 
 motion. The strait is like a mighty trum- 
 pet through which immeasurable wind 
 blows — a huge pneumatic tube drawing 
 in draughts from the Atlantic and pour- 
 ing them up the Baltic, sometimes with 
 resistless force. There is continual agi- 
 tation in the Cattegat and Skager-Rack, 
 The water seems to take on a human 
 208 
 
 joyousness, and leaps and laughs with 
 living light. It is exquisitely sensitive 
 water to impinging sunlight or to wan 
 and wasting cloud. It is sometimes so 
 black in gloomy weather that the ships 
 that sail on it seem sailing on a thun- 
 derstorm ; but in a moment a marvel- 
 lous transformation takes place, and the 
 thunderstorm is smiled away into the 
 loveliest sunlight. I have noticed the 
 same volatilization of thunderstorms — 
 so to speak — in Scotland, where a few 
 rays of shattering sunlight will scattei" 
 themselves like luminous quicklime over 
 half an horizon of cloud, and eat it almost 
 instantaneously away. 
 
 Although the Sound is thus replete 
 with sea -vessels of every sort traffick- 
 ing and travelling to the ends of the 
 world, the Danes, like the English in 
 their Channel navigation, have no pas- 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 209 
 
 senger- ships of any great size to take 
 tourists across to the Swedish coast. 
 Many of such passenger -boats as they 
 have are mere coasting steamers, small, 
 dirty, uncomfortable, seesawing like a 
 political newspaper first to one side and 
 
 TYSKA KYRKAN, GOTEBORG 
 
 then to the other — a sort of oscillating 
 dungeon rocking you into unutterable 
 nausea. The results of such oscilla- 
 tions are not to be described. The 
 weak, weary and tremulous pilgrim is 
 only too glad to catch sight of huge 
 looming shores that in the lens of the 
 evening light look strangely spectral. 
 Our plan was to cross to the south-west 
 14 
 
 of Sweden and land at Goteborg, go 
 from there by rail to Stockholm, and 
 then return — arterial blood-like — through 
 the heart of Sweden, visiting the lakes and 
 making pilgrimages along the canals to 
 various places of interest. As we steam- 
 ed on in the dim 
 dilating evening 
 light we could 
 catch glimpses of 
 the mountains 
 veiled in tremu- 
 lous gauzes of mist 
 that occasionally 
 melted into weak 
 rain, and then 
 opened and re- 
 vealed the most 
 beautifully vivid 
 green. Some 
 time in the night 
 we dropped in at 
 some remote port 
 on a fjord, an- 
 chored for a few 
 moments in a 
 sluggish canal, 
 and then put to 
 sea again in our 
 steam-churn. The 
 same evening we 
 ran into a delight- 
 ful breezy little 
 Swedish watering- 
 place and took on 
 a Swedish bridal- 
 party. They had 
 a band of musi- 
 c i a n s , and the 
 tremulous sweet- 
 ness of the soft 
 and pathetic mu- 
 sic has remained 
 with me as a sou- 
 venir of the trip. 
 There is something peculiarly sad, joy- 
 ous and strange in this Swedish music. 
 Perhaps there are reminiscences of the 
 vikings and the old heroic life and the 
 vanished sagas, mingled with a throb 
 or two of that passionate pagan clinging 
 of theirs, that come to melodious resur- 
 rection in these bright harmonic sound- 
 pictures, and touch the listener with 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 mirth and mournfulness. If, however, 
 I remember aright, our oscillating dun- 
 geon soon proved fatal to the newly- 
 initiated pair, and sounds not of "revel- 
 ry by night" came from their state-room. 
 
 What an ogre is the sea, that turns the 
 honeymoon into a moon of gall, and 
 blows all the sweet breath out of life ! 
 As we steamed up the Cattegat we 
 caught sight of seals lying among the 
 
 NORRA HAMNGATAN, GOTEBORG. 
 
 rocks, but on our approach they dis- 
 appeared. Early in the morning we ran 
 up a long gray tongue of fog -hidden 
 water, and braced ourselves to the Gote- 
 borg dock while the rain and the sea- 
 spray scattered plentifully in our faces. 
 It is not a particularly delectable sight 
 to see a new and strange land for the 
 first time through a mist. Not even a 
 London fog can idealize away all the 
 immense oppression that a stranger feels 
 on slipping like a drop into the sea of 
 unimagined existence that awaits him. 
 Had my first glimpse of Sweden been 
 a sunlit glimpse — as it was afterward 
 when I visited Goteborg again — how 
 different would have been the first im- 
 pressions ! As it was, we saw people 
 groping about in a sort of mud twilight, 
 waterproofed and umbrella-ed from head 
 to foot, dripping in the chill air of Arctic 
 summer and submerged in the oozy in- 
 undation of the mist. It seemed to us 
 like a lacustrine, amphibious world, with 
 
 seal - like men and women energetically 
 moving about on what looked like land, 
 but proved on nearer acquaintance to 
 be unfathomable mud. To increase our 
 perplexities, we could not find a hotel, or 
 the hotel that we did find — with its sad 
 little rows of Siberian firs firmly planted 
 in green boxes set in rows in front like 
 a sort of make - believe forest — was full. 
 We were told we might dine there if we 
 pleased, but we didn't please, and had 
 to trot off to some outlandish part of 
 the town in search of other lodgings. 
 And here began a series of grimaces, 
 gesticulations, broken Swedish, wild de- 
 spair, unutterable misunderstandings, but 
 final triumph. They stared and we stared, 
 and then we were carried up flights of 
 stone stairs and along brick-paved pas- 
 sages into a room like a parish prison. 
 There was no water, no towel, no basin ; 
 and as for the bed, I think it was still 
 warm with somebody that had just left 
 it. We looked through dingy windows 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 into a stable-yard, but did not dare lift 
 the windows. We could not get a drop 
 of coffee or anything else in the house. 
 Strange men and stranger women came 
 mincing and mouthing in, admiring our 
 outlandish ways and perhaps taking us 
 for a brace of convicts. I felt forlorn. 
 A feeling of utter disappointment crept 
 through my numbed senses. Outside it 
 was hideous — inside it was diabolical. I 
 
 GUSTAF ADOLF S STATUE, GOTEBORG. 
 
 summoned all I had of Swedish up from 
 the vasty deep, but I found they had no 
 more idea of what I was saying than if I 
 had been a Samojede. We were grate- 
 ful, however, that they did not drive us 
 out of the house into the street. After a 
 while, when we had parted with certain 
 reminiscences of the steamer, we sallied 
 forth to see what was to be seen, or rather 
 to eat what was to be eaten, for a mighty 
 hunger had come upon us meantime since 
 we had stormed the Swedish citadel and 
 found it swept and garnished. 
 
 All Goteborg, I found — or all the un- 
 claimed, un-familied, old-bachelor part — 
 
 led a sort of Bohemian life, and while they 
 slept at what they called "home," seem- 
 ed to breakfast, dine, and sup at the va- 
 rious restaurants. This seems to be a 
 peculiarity of Swedish life. What the 
 women live on I cannot imagine. The 
 restaurants are of every class and fashion. 
 Our eyes opened at the enormous eating 
 and drinking. The Eskimo are said to 
 consume daily two gallons of blubber 
 and to have a pelvic capacity equal to 
 forty pounds of veal at one meal. The 
 Swedes almost startled us into believing 
 this ; or were we bewitched ? When we 
 were at dessert our companions would still 
 be wrestling with soup. No nation grap- 
 ples with dinner like the Swedish. The 
 delicate birdlike appetite of an Italian, 
 satisfied as he is with a string of mac- 
 aroni and a glass of sunlight, must be 
 absolutely phenomenal to these people. 
 Pounds of food seemed to disappear undei 
 their magical mastication — food, too, well 
 mellowed with wine. The Swedes are 
 famous drinkers, and one of the na- 
 tional traits is an abounding conviviality. 
 From this perhaps it comes that they are 
 a somewhat loose people. 
 
 I found Goteborg extremely modern 
 and extremely commercial, but I was 
 surprised when the mist lifted to find 
 what an environment of charming sce- 
 nery it is set in. It is only a place of 
 sixty thousand inhabitants, but it is in 
 some respects superior to Stockholm. It 
 is very rich in manufactures of all kinds. 
 The town lies in a luxuriant valley be- 
 tween bare rocks that lift themselves in 
 fantastic ruggedness about its outskirts. 
 It is a place of ancient memories, with a 
 history — burnt, besieged and rebuilt as 
 the town has been several times — ex- 
 tending into a misty antiquity. The place 
 is not healthy, in spite of the beauty of 
 its situation. Charles IX. in 1607 con- 
 structed the new city of Goteborg after 
 the model of the Dutch cities, and peo- 
 pled it with strangers. There are numer- 
 ous canals bordered by trees and palatial 
 residences. Looking down the Sodra 
 Hamngatan, which is the finest street 
 in the city, there is a striking perspec- 
 tive toward the east. The canal with 
 its migratory population of boats lies be- 
 
212 
 
 GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 fore you, with the broad street bordered 
 on both sides by a fringe of palaces; then 
 the bridges, the quays and the avenues ; 
 on the right the Great 
 Square (called nearly 
 always target, or market- 
 place), with the elegant 
 bourse, the residence of 
 the commandant, and the -J 
 
 German church (Tyska ^ 
 
 Kyrkan), where the great 
 Rutger von Ascheberg 
 reposes. In the distance 
 is the Gote-Elf (River 
 Elbe). There are many 
 bright and busy streets, 
 prominent among which 
 is the Norra Hamngatan 
 with its canal, quays and 
 handsome houses. Fo- 
 gelberg's great bronze 
 statue of Gustaf Adolf, 
 erected in 1854, adorns 
 the principal square. 
 The graceful Engelska 
 Kyrkan (English 
 church), constructed un- 
 der the superintendence 
 of Major Edelsvard, is 
 a pretty object in the Goteborg land- 
 scape. 
 
 There are lovely gardens in the sub- 
 urbs, and the same long delightful roads 
 and lanes bordered by limes and elms that 
 I had noticed in Denmark. The Swedes 
 are a simple - hearted, laughter - loving 
 people, and they make as much as pos- 
 sible of their short summer. The town 
 abounds in commercial enterprises of ev- 
 ery sort, full of ships, canals and factories 
 — a busy, unpoetic life, relieved on Sun- 
 days by theatres and operas, to which 
 everybody goes as a matter of course. 
 I remember a delightful evening passed 
 in one of the pleasant gardens, while a 
 band played soothingly and the long 
 light fell out over luxuriant green shrub- 
 beries and bewildering flowers — a garden 
 full of happy people, full of a sort of old 
 Greek Anacreontic spirit, sweet and sun- 
 ny as any picnic party in Italy. It is in 
 these brilliant bits of summer that the 
 Swedes lay up stores of sunshine for 
 the long and relentless winter — a winter 
 
 which is a sort of hyperborean twilight 
 illumined by the dazzling shadow-dance 
 of the aurora borealis. 
 
 ENGELSKA KYRKAN, GOTEBORO. 
 
 The Swedes are constitutionally sun- 
 ny-tempered. There is lurking in their 
 constitution that drop of golden light 
 which transforms a dew-drop into a lens 
 — a highly imaginative, sociable, sensu- 
 ous people, supplementing their bleak 
 climate by every resource of art and 
 culture. Swedish poetry abounds in rich 
 pictorial ei?'ects, and yet it has the sil- 
 very spirituality of the most unsensuous 
 German ballad. We may look almost 
 in vain through the Greek and Latin 
 poets for any recognition of the superb 
 Mediterranean landscapes that must con- 
 tinually have impinged on their physical 
 consciousness, and yet did not result in 
 the multiplicity of imagery and image- 
 making that we are rainbowed with in the 
 modern school of poets. Their words do 
 not give off that oblique iridescence which 
 is as much a matter of the spirit as any 
 other occult delight, but which the hard 
 texture of their words and thoughts is 
 unfamiliar with. In Theocritus there are 
 delicious hints and buds of landscape 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 painting always about to blossom into 
 pictures — a warm, sensuous, silken gla- 
 mour of sea and sky — an occasional but 
 entirely incidental intrusion of the mag- 
 ical Sicilian scenery by which his life 
 was enatmosphered. But there is none 
 of the elaborate consciousness of the 
 manifold brightness and beauty of the 
 outside world that we gather from any 
 poet of the nineteenth century. 
 
 Swedish literature is penetrated with 
 this love of scenery. It is the same with 
 the Norwegian writer Bjornson and the 
 Norwegian writers in general. We see 
 the same feeling morbidly intensified 
 when Danes or Swedes journey from 
 
 their own pale climate to the lands of 
 the South — Hans Andersen, for exam- 
 ple, who in his Improvisatore shows that 
 he was so bewitched by Italy, and throws 
 off his impressions in pages of impas- 
 sioned description. The hnprovisatore, 
 in fact, is a divine Dionysiac sort of book, 
 full of spiritual brilliance and frenzy, full 
 of the supreme effervescence of deified 
 youth. Montaigne said that the simple 
 gazing on a healthy person communi- 
 cates health. So it seems to me the 
 mere opening of their eyes on Italy en- 
 dows Swedes and Danes with rare im- 
 agination. 
 
 The part of Sweden in which Goteborg 
 
 ON THE GOTEBORG AND STOCKHOLM RAILROAD. 
 
 lies is full of grain and green fields, and 
 a cultjre so soft and luxurious that it re- 
 minds one of parts of France. The coun- 
 try is mountainous, but everywhere up 
 the mountains there run curving valleys 
 full of rye and wheat that leave behind 
 their lines of sinuous and suggestive 
 green. There are a South and a North 
 to Sweden as different as the South and 
 the North with us. The Lapps and Finns 
 in the extreme North dream of this, to 
 them, delicious Arcadia of the South of 
 Sweden as of something fairylike and 
 unattainable. In the North life is so 
 hard, so bitter, so hopeless : it is a life 
 
 shared with wolves, bears and reindeer 
 — a life that reduces people to live or 
 the ground bark of trees, grovel in huts 
 two-thirds of the year, and become stunt- 
 ed, abject and miserable. For centuries 
 — and centuries strangely near cars — 
 these northern provinces were strong- 
 holds of paganism. The vivid hered- 
 itary prejudices of the Finns and Lapps 
 crop out in sharp controversies with the 
 Swedes and Norwegians. A Swedish or 
 Norwegian woman who marries one of 
 these people has to learn his language, 
 there being sounds in the Scandinavian, 
 simple as these sounds are, unpronounce- 
 
214 
 
 GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 
 SODERTELGE. 
 
 able to the mountaineers. They possess 
 a plaintive ballad literature and a lan- 
 guage that has fifteen cases. Our words 
 fiend and fiendish are said to be con- 
 nected with Mnn and Finnish — a desig- 
 nation derived from the homeliness of 
 the nation. Their swart skins, blue-black 
 eyes and squat figures make a tout en- 
 semble that richly justifies the etymology.' 
 It is said to be difficult to get into their 
 confidence, so suspicious and sinister are 
 they in many cases — a race upon whom 
 the radiations of Christianity have play- 
 ed but faintly. Their country is a coun- 
 try of vast voluminous mountains, fro- 
 zen and inaccessible except to them — 
 a strange scene of elemental glory and 
 grimness, where the most vivid mag- 
 netic storms light up the horizon and 
 startle even the drowsy Lapp with their 
 ghostly magnificence. These displays 
 of electric phenomena resemble a huge 
 seolian harp turned into light, so infin- 
 itely still and fitful are they as they flash 
 out into sudden seas of light. 
 
 The Swedes are blissfully unconscious 
 of American luxuriousness in railway 
 
 travelling. They at least seem to remem- 
 ber that travel and travail are one and 
 the same word. I remember with fever- 
 ish vividness the night we spent in going 
 from Goteborg to Stockholm — the strange 
 cries, the frequent stoppings, the uniform- 
 ed conductor with a tiny oil-lamp fixed 
 on his breast like a boutonniere, the dim 
 lines of vanishing mountains, the fan- 
 tastic - looking people and villages we 
 passed, the melodious accents of the 
 Swedish 'tongue with its intonations vo- 
 luptuous almost as the Tuscan, the swift, 
 silent rivers the train sped over, and the 
 great number of lakes we passed, — all 
 blending as in the febrile phantasmagory 
 of an opium-dream. It was a bouquet of 
 confused impressions. When we mean- 
 dered out into daylight, after a while we 
 saw a country almost perfectly bald of 
 trees — a peculiarity which Sweden shares 
 with Italy — thinly populated, with vast 
 stretches of weary, watery horizon and 
 a scantiness of evidences of life that sur- 
 prised me. The houses were principally 
 one - storied, thatched and low : there 
 seemed to be few or no fences — which 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 215 
 
 is the case also in Germany — and the 
 culture was rude and primitive. The 
 Italian peasant still drags about the 
 plough we read of in the Georgics of 
 Virgil, and combs the ground with his 
 
 superficial harrow precisely as when he 
 sunned himself in the aurea regna of 
 Augustus. So the Swedish peasant, mix- 
 ing his meal with ground beech-bark and 
 eating five or six times a dav, clings to 
 
 the barbarous implements of the Vasas 
 as he does to their memories, and finds 
 it hard to give up the ancestral mode of 
 agriculture. The wonderful advances the 
 Swedes have recently made in civiliza- 
 
 tion were amply illustrated last year at 
 Philadelphia. We have all heard of their 
 astonishing success in mining, their vast 
 iron- and copper-mines, their silver and 
 lumber, their model school -houses and 
 
2l6 
 
 GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 their pauperism. A specialist would no 
 doubt find much in their foundries and 
 manufactories that would show the ut- 
 most scientific spirit. The biting air has 
 kindled science in them, and forced it to 
 a thousand ingenious 
 applications. But in 
 travelling over the face 
 of the country ' there is 
 an apparent and op- 
 pressive absence of all 
 this. The interior of 
 Sweden looks like a 
 country just harvested. 
 Great richness, except 
 mineral richness, is not 
 in the soil, and cannot 
 be brought out of it ex- 
 cept by the most thor- 
 ough fertilization. 
 
 The lakes are im- 
 mense : one of them is J 
 ninety, another fifty, ^ 
 miles in length. Yet c 
 Switzerland can throw 5 
 more beauty into a few ^ 
 furlongs of magical i 
 water than we find in \ 
 all these desolate miles. "^ 
 The water is that shal- \ 
 low, sandy -haired sort \ 
 without depth enough \ 
 to make it luminously -• 
 blue, and with that in- 
 terminable gray in hor- 
 izon and sky that fa- 
 tigues the eye. I was 
 disappointed in the 
 great lakes of Sweden. 
 In the far North there 
 are bits of exquisite 
 water full of eerie and 
 savage beauty — moun- 
 tain-locked Undines 
 that have gathered their 
 shining spiritualities 
 under the curves of 
 enormous cliffs, and are 
 hidden away from the 
 blowing; sunlight. There is laughter of 
 fern and gleam of sea-bird about them, 
 while the wild shock of the rain impinges 
 on the. septentrional sunlight and suffuses 
 the heavens with orange mist. These 
 
 atoms of beauty tucked away among the 
 fjelds and fjords are remote from sum- 
 mer pilgrims, unless like true knights 
 they brave the heroic mountains and 
 snatch them from their isolation. As 
 
 we journeyed on to Stockholm, one after 
 another of the larger lakes came in sight, 
 as gray and gaunt as a Scottish moor, 
 and not even with that silver side- 
 look that most water has when seer* 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 217 
 
 aslant. There appeared to be few water- 
 fowl, though in the mountain - lakes of 
 the North they are countless — just a flat, 
 dull prairie of water. How the Swedes 
 can be so poetic with all this load of 
 fog - producing water is a psychological 
 problem. Of course the exhalations from 
 these waters are full of malaria. They 
 haul up an endless fog, and spread it 
 
 thick as butter over the whole land. To 
 have one's life thus overlaid with fog 
 would certainly create discontent with us. 
 A constitutional monarchy like the 
 Swedish, however, can exist as well in 
 fog as in sunshine — perhaps better. 
 There are no nervous revolutionary 
 tendencies, no spasms of sudden self- 
 consciousness, no flaming and fulminat- 
 
 ing. The Swedes quietly convoke their 
 Diet, or their "Big Thing" [Siorthing), 
 as they call it — the other provincial ones 
 suggesting by contrast the title "Little 
 Things" — in the winter of every year, 
 and dream of no revolution except to 
 keep down gynocracy. Their expe- 
 rience of Queen Christina appears to 
 have made a profound impression, for 
 by their new constitution of 1807 they 
 relentlessly established the Salic law. 
 The succession is hereditary, though 
 they can elect a foreigner in case of 
 extinction of the reigning race. The 
 king is put under solemn oath to be 
 a Lutheran ; which Church no sooner 
 found itself enjoying pre-eminence than 
 it began to persecute, turning Catholics 
 out of doors, elevating its own arch- 
 bishop into a sort of pope, excluding 
 Protestant dissenters from many im- 
 portant offices, and going about with 
 
 bell, book and candle to fumigate (so 
 to speak) other pestiferous churches. 
 For centuries the bishops have been 
 true spiritual sovereigns, genuine te- 
 trarchs mayhap, not at all averse, when 
 circumstances permitted, to order a mur- 
 der of the innocents. The Catholics were 
 emancipated five years ago — a little later 
 than our slaves — and may now be elect- 
 ed if anybody would vote for them. The 
 Jews are, I think, still knocking at the 
 social and political door. Since Norway 
 and Sweden were united in 18 14 the 
 Norwegians have rid themselves of a 
 titled class, and their constitution is now 
 the most republican in Europe. The 
 king made a vain attempt to inflict a 
 noble order on the people when their 
 own nobility became extinct ; but this 
 stalwart people in a fit of splenetic ex- 
 altation rebelled, and there is now not 
 a sprig of titled pedigree in the land. 
 
2l8 
 
 GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 When the king goes to visit his Norwe- 
 gian subjects he is often received and 
 entertained by the grand peasants who 
 date their Hneage from the vikings and 
 receive their king on terms of equahty. 
 It is a beautiful patriarchal relation — a 
 relation full of the hoariness and the 
 homeliness of antique times, full also 
 of a grand but unconscious recognition 
 of human dignity. It is a fine illustra- 
 tion, too, of the etymology of the word 
 king — z. e. "one who is the kinsman of 
 all his people." 
 
 In Sweden education is compulsory 
 from the age of nine, and in case of 
 persistent neglect the children are taken 
 from their parents and sent to boarding- 
 schools, while the parents are made to 
 pay their board. The Swedish govern- 
 ment is determined — and very properly 
 determined — to extinguish ignorance. It 
 has established a complete hierarchy of 
 schools, at all of which tuition is free, 
 from the lowest elementary schools up 
 to the two great universities of Upsala 
 and Lund. The school-houses are quite 
 famous for neatness and completeness. 
 It has been hard, however, to keep down 
 a certain French flippancy that has per- 
 vaded and perverted the literature for 
 more than a hundred years. The mod- 
 ern Swedish literature, indeed, may al- 
 most be said to have quickened and 
 germinated from the French, just as 
 the great school of modern Germans 
 received in the eighteenth century its 
 chief stimulus from Shakespeare, Mil- 
 ton and Goldsmith. Every Swede has a 
 crumb or two of French which he is par- 
 ticularly proud of, but through this veneer- 
 ing looms the wild, fresh Scandinavian 
 imagination, as sharply individualized as 
 the infinite breath of their heather-bloom. 
 
 The bills one gets at the Swedish ho- 
 tels are truly polyglot, as much French 
 and English and as little Swedish as 
 possible. One always has an uneasy 
 feeling that one is being cheated, and 
 cheated, too, in two or three different 
 languages in one and the same bill. It 
 is really necessary to carry a variety of 
 small pocket dictionaries to work one's 
 way successfully through a Swedish bill 
 of fare. On the right hand there is al- 
 
 ways a formidable array of what look 
 like dollars and cents, but this is always 
 ingeniously couched in Swedish, in or- 
 der perhaps that the foreigner may un- 
 derstand as little of it as possible. Al- 
 though when you arrive you may look 
 
 KARL XII. 'S BILDSTOD. 
 
 like a millionaire, you are, unless you 
 make voluminous objections, relentless- 
 ly consigned to a garret up five flights 
 of stairs, the servant comforting you on 
 the way up by describing the charming 
 view. The view from the Kung Carl, 
 after we had passed the pretty station 
 of Sbdertelge on the lake and arrived 
 at Stockholm, was charming. Europe 
 from an attic is not at first blush so al- 
 luring, but when the preliminary indig- 
 nation and humiliation at being taken 
 up so high have evaporated, then comes 
 in the most enjoyable part of the trip — 
 inspection of the quaint furniture, read- 
 ing the quaint regulations, linguistic com- 
 bats with the unintelligible waiter, and 
 gazing down into the delightful streets. 
 Stockholm lacks the magnificent sun- 
 ny sweep of the Bay of Naples : it lacks, 
 too, the voluptuous light of Italy that so 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 219 
 
 wonderfully gilds and soothes an Italian 
 landscape into a scene of silken beauty. 
 But with the exception of Naples and 
 Edinburgh it is the most nobly-situated 
 capital of Europe. The Malar Lake, on 
 whose pregnant emerald slopes it lies — 
 or rather in and about which Stockholm 
 runs like an incrustation of rare repousse- 
 work — is, on a limited scale, a miniature 
 St. Lawrence, full of islands, turreted and 
 twisted into a thousand insular eccen- 
 
 tricities, fantastic with foam and firs, cov- 
 ered with the richest umbrage, bright 
 with castles and chateaux, and made 
 alive by a singularly vivacious popula- 
 tion. Stockholm itself is a string of isl- 
 ands linked together by bridges. The 
 crowning architectural feature of the 
 town is the Slottet, or royal residence, 
 built upon a lofty islet and commanding 
 the whole scene with its massive square 
 walls. A beautiful causeway, the Norr- 
 
 ^^3^.s^3-V^ 
 
 THE RIDDARHOLMS liRlDGE, STUCKIIULM. 
 
 bro, lined by low shops and leading down 
 by a stairway to the famous Strbmpar- 
 terre, connects it with the great square 
 and royal theatre. It is one of the finest 
 sights imaginable to stand on this cause- 
 way and watch the tide of people drift- 
 ing over, the thronging ships and steam- 
 ers in the winding lake beneath, and the 
 brilliant and buoyant life all around. 
 
 The royal castle is a many-sided mon- 
 ster : a vast library, a museum, splendid 
 state apartments and a sumptuous hall 
 are contained within its huge quadrangle. 
 European palaces are not prepossessing 
 in general : they look like immense jails 
 — penitentiaries for princes — with no end 
 of cobwebbed window-glass, and habit- 
 able only here and there in certain suites 
 of rooms, like oases in a desert. The 
 quays around and beneath the Slottet 
 are lined with Russian, Danish, Dutch 
 and English ships. Statues of Gustavus 
 Adolphus, Gustavus Vasa and Charles 
 XII. — a remarkable one of the latter by 
 
 Molin, surrounded by four mortars cap- 
 tured in his wars, stands in the Place 
 Charles XII. — are as numerous as the 
 bronze dukes of Wellington in London, 
 prancing to battle in eveiy square and 
 charging unimaginable enemies on bra- 
 zen steeds. This apotheosis of brass is 
 really becoming intolerable. One can 
 hardly take a step in continental towns 
 but heroes and martyrs are grimacing 
 and pirouetting from pyramids of granite. 
 The statue of Charles XII., though strik- 
 ing enough in itself, is on a singularly low 
 pedestal. A fine fountain, also by Molin, 
 and a statue of Charles XIII. adorn the 
 same sunny and sylvan square. A lit- 
 tle alley leads to the square commemo- 
 rative of the great chemist Berzelius. 
 
 The beauty of Stockholm is its blend- 
 ing of rushing melodic water, towering 
 islands and rich umbrageous suburbs. 
 Its island-clusters are girded by a per- 
 petual sinuous sunlight of changeful 
 water. 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 CONCLUDING PART. 
 
 HASSELBACKEN. 
 
 THERE are delicious gardens all 
 about Stockholm — gardens full of 
 summer and summer theatres and Ar- 
 cadian walks everywhere bordering on 
 bright rushing water and filled with 
 mighty beech trees and Norwegian firs. 
 One of the most famous of these resorts 
 is Hasselbacken, a bit of the celebrated 
 Djurgarden, which commands an un- 
 rivalled view of panoramic Stockholm. 
 Near by is the magnificent old oak call- 
 ed Bellman's Oak, from Bellman, the 
 national Swedish poet, who used to sit 
 here in the gray hours of the last cen- 
 tury and play his inimitable guitar. 
 220 
 
 There is a statue of him in the grounds 
 of the DjurgS.rden, and the whole place 
 is garrulous with his bacchic spirit. The 
 air is gay with music. Omnibuses and 
 vapeurs-omnibus carry you everywhere 
 for a mere trifle. There is a hectic flush 
 in the summer of Sweden. The flowers 
 are feverishly bright, and one may well 
 believe there is no lack of them in the 
 land of Linnseus. 
 
 The DjurgSrd which I have mentioned 
 is a town of restaurants, concert-houses, 
 puppet-plays and pavilions, full all the 
 summer long of pedestrians and prom- 
 enaders. After the long chrysalis slum- 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 ber of winter the Swedes emerge bril- 
 liant as butterflies, smitten with a sort 
 of fury of pleasure brief and vivid as a 
 flower whose whole autobiography is its 
 perfume. This yearning for color, pas- 
 sion and pleasure is what strikes the 
 traveller particularly in them. It may 
 
 bellman's oak at hasselbacken. 
 
 be turned into the Attis-like spiritual in- 
 ebriation of Swedenborg, whose catalep- 
 sy, like Mohammed's, has become a re- 
 ligion ; or into the purely scientific pas- 
 sion of Berzelius; or into the exquisite 
 outlining of Tegner's poetry — a poetry 
 pale and pregnant and perfect as the 
 silver thread of the new moon. It is al- 
 ways distinctly and recognizably there. 
 I felt it as I walked through the ancient 
 
 house in Upsala where the great Lin- 
 naeus had dwelt thirty-five years delv- 
 ing among the herbs and flowers, and 
 receiving the paltry title of knight of the 
 Polar Star in recognition of his System 
 of Nature. The same enthusiasm leaps 
 up into flamelike exaltation in the won- 
 derful achievements 
 of the Swedish gen- 
 erals. 
 
 I have never seen 
 a place that had so 
 many striking situ- 
 ations for churches 
 and public buildings 
 as Stockholm, while 
 the island altitudes 
 and isolated heights, 
 the perpetual shim- 
 mer of sunny water 
 everywhere, the long 
 railway bridges leap- 
 ing the Malar, and 
 the incessant steam- 
 ing to and fro of 
 miniature propellers 
 conveying passen- 
 gers from one part 
 of the town and from 
 one island to anoth- 
 er, give motion and 
 variety to every 
 view. The streets 
 are narrow, and fre- 
 quently interrupted 
 by windings of the 
 Malar Lake. Much 
 of the architecture 
 has a Cinque-cento 
 look. There is no 
 lack of handsome 
 modern buildings, 
 however, such as the 
 Technological Insti- 
 tute and Blanch's cafe, where the Stock- 
 holmers go for the excellent after-dinner 
 music. There is an air of the Middle 
 Ages in the famous Riddarholmskyrkan 
 (the Westminster Abbey of Sweden), the 
 Svea Hofrattet and the strange - looking 
 inns and wharves. Charles Lamb would 
 have been delighted with their rubbish, 
 their antiquities, their embalmed memo- 
 rials of a great past and their odd incon- 
 
222 
 
 GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 gruities of the present. We could feel 
 that we were in the land of Jenny Lind 
 and Christine Nilsson, for the August air 
 seemed full of nightingales, and 
 there was a suavity and a sweet- 
 ness in the manners of the people 
 that sprang from an unseen depth 
 of rhythmic sensibilities. 
 
 There float about in my mem- 
 ory many pleasant days spent in 
 rambling about the old town ; 
 gazing in at the bookstalls and 
 print-shop windows; wondering 
 at the marvellously artistic way in 
 which the butchers dress up their 
 meats ; strolling into dim seven- 
 teenth-century churches ; stopping 
 at old-fashioned inns to get a cup 
 of coffee, and peeping and poking 
 about after the fashion of a weasel. 
 The fine new National Museum, 
 with its elegant vestibule and rich 
 treasures, came in for its share of 
 attention, andaglamour of delight- 
 ful pictures, statuary and engrav- 
 ings hovers before my mind's eye 
 still. I have never seen a more 
 beautifully arranged museum, a 
 museum more full of cheerfulness 
 and luminousness, with the bright 
 sun streaming in on the antique armor 
 and kindling all the relics of the dusky 
 
 past into vivid and silent life. The por- 
 tico is of green Swedish marble, with or- 
 naments in bas-rehef, statues of Tessin 
 
 ..i^^ 
 
 BELLMAN S STATUE. 
 
 and Sergei and busts of Fogelberg, Ehr- 
 enstahl, Linnaeus, Tegner, Berzelius and 
 
 TECHNOLOGICAL INSTITUTE. 
 
 Wallin. There are elegant columns of 
 Italian marble in the great vestibule and 
 salles within. The cost of the structure 
 
 was two million two hundred thousand 
 rixdalers. Collections of engravings and 
 original drawings, majolica and antique 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 223 
 
 vases, galleries of sculpture ancient and 
 modern, collections of models and plaster 
 casts, galleries of paintings and historical 
 costumes, colossal statues of Odin, Thor 
 and Balder, valuable antiquities from the 
 
 Stone, Iron and Bronze Ages, mediaeval 
 objects of art, coins, armor, ^re some of 
 the things gathered into this fine build- 
 ing. There are some beautiful modern 
 sculptures, chiefly of the Swedish school 
 
 —among them the Wrestlers of Mohn. 
 There are also many vivid glimpses of 
 old Swedish life and legend dramatically 
 thrown on canvas. The Swedish school 
 seems particularly rich in landscapes, 
 
 most of which are a rich reflex of that 
 Southern tropic life that has built its nest 
 among the lilies of Florence or found its 
 types in the bazaars of Constantinople. 
 There are also many scientific and tech 
 
224 
 
 GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 nological schools. The old theatre where 
 Jenny Lind made her first appearance 
 stands in the great Gustave Adolphe 
 Place, opposite the crown-prince's resi- 
 dence, with the 
 Hotel Rydberg on 
 one side and the 
 Castle beyond the 
 Norrbro on' the 
 other. 
 
 Miss Bremer 
 lived at Stock- 
 holm, and with 
 her sister Agathe 
 dispensed a liberal 
 hospitality, after 
 they had both fos- 
 silized into some- 
 thing like heroic 
 old-maidhood. 
 Swedish literar)- 
 annals are full of 
 such remarkable 
 women, working 
 wondrously to re- 
 form their people. In fact, the general 
 public know the Swedes chiefly by their 
 celebrated women, by their singers and 
 novel-writers. Many dehghtful bits have 
 
 himself. The old Icelandic sagas, writ- 
 ten in a language common at the time 
 of their composition to Danes, Swedes 
 and Norwegians, have been finely trans- 
 
 NATIONAL MUSEUM. 
 
 been translated by Longfellow, Mary 
 Howitt and others, but the language is 
 so easy of acquisition that any ordinary 
 linguist can easily learn it and judge for 
 
 BLANCH'S CAFfe. 
 
 lated into German by Simrock, and have 
 given to Carlyle much of his most bizarre 
 imagery. It is a weird, wild, half-demonic 
 poetry, the infinite babble of talking and 
 toiling jotuns — the 
 rhythm of the sea 
 and the sharpness 
 of death. The 
 Sibylline books 
 must have been 
 such Edda- utter- 
 ances. I know of 
 nothing in the glit- 
 ^^ tering mythologies 
 of the South so 
 fine as the grand 
 allegory of Ygg- 
 drasil, the Tree 
 of Life. 
 
 Th i r ty-five 
 years ago there 
 were few hotels in 
 Sweden. Before 
 one's day was 
 done one had to 
 visit three or four places for one's meals. 
 The hotels, such as they were, were call- 
 ed "cellars" [kallare). You seldom dined 
 where you slept. One had to go to a con- 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 225 
 
 fectioner's for one's coffee and chocolate, 
 to a wine-merchant for one's drinks, and 
 to a restaurant for the midday meal 
 This trotting about resulted in a fine 
 appetite. Wherever you went were the 
 fumes of the national drink, a sweet, 
 potent punch, put up in dainty little 
 iDottles and thick and clear. "Swenska 
 punsch" soon makes the head swim. It 
 
 LOWER VESTIBULE OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. 
 
 and macadamized roads run in all di- 
 rections. There are all the modern and 
 improved ways of losing your life — burst- 
 ing resei'voirs, collisions, explosions and 
 capsizings. A universal suffrage of death 
 has been established here as elsewhere. 
 Rotten boilers, snags in rivers, boats 
 brilliant with kerosene light, headlong 
 speed and careless pilots are not un- 
 known in Sweden. 
 
 The habit of 
 lunching in the very 
 presence of dinner, 
 of going to a side 
 table and eating 
 your fill of ancho- 
 vies, raw herrings, 
 smoked beef and 
 cold eel - pie while 
 dinner is on the 
 very table, still pre- 
 vails, and is hardly 
 conducive to health. 
 It is said that the 
 habit of taking "a 
 sup," as the Swedes 
 call it, arose from 
 the scarcity of deli- 
 cacies. It was hard 
 to get enough of any 
 one nice thing to 
 make a meal of; so 
 you were first deli- 
 cately innuendoed 
 off to the brandy-ta- 
 ble (as it is called), 
 and then allowed to 
 sit down to dinner. 
 The practice is uni- 
 versal in Sweden. 
 Private houses, ho- 
 tels and boarding- 
 houses, all feed you 
 
 is sweet as squills, odorous as rum. Be- 
 fore railroads were built passengers were 
 forwarded by post-horses and carrioles, 
 the animals for which had to be furnished 
 in seed-time and harvest by the peasantry 
 under pain of fines. Provisions had to 
 be carried by the traveller, and still have 
 to be in some parts of the peninsula. 
 Generally, however, things are now very 
 different. Canals, railroads, steamboats 
 15 
 
 on preliminary 
 scraps, and woe be to you if you innocent- 
 ly turn away from the proffered luncheon ! 
 You fare like an ascetic and feed yourself 
 on odors. The ordinary routine of dining 
 seems in Sweden to be in wild confusion. 
 Soup sometimes ends instead of begin- 
 ning the dinner. Iced soups and cold 
 fish are dainties to the Scandinavian 
 palate. Much of the soup is nauseously 
 sweet, flavored with cherries, raspberries 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 and gooseberries, often with macaroon 
 cakes and spikes of cinnamon floating 
 wildly about in it. This is eaten as a 
 sort of dessert, and is cold and often 
 beautifully clear. If Heine bitterly re- 
 viled the English for bringing vegetables 
 on the table au natu- 
 rel, there is no such 
 complaint to be made 
 here. Heaven, earth 
 and hell are eaten with 
 sauce — sauces red, 
 white and blue, green, 
 yellow and black — 
 sauces celestial and 
 sauces infernal. 
 Strange combinations 
 of ice - cream heaped 
 over delicious apple- 
 tarts, or strange dishes 
 of berry -juice boiled 
 down and mixed with 
 farina, sugar and al- 
 monds, then cooled, 
 moulded and turned 
 out into basins of 
 cream, to be eaten with 
 crushed sugar and 
 wine, appear at the end 
 of dinner. The Swedes 
 share with the Danes 
 and Arabs a passionate 
 fondness for sweet- 
 meats. Everything is 
 slightly sweet: even 
 green peas are sugar- 
 ed, as well as the in- 
 numerable tea- and 
 coffee - cakes, so that 
 long before the unhap- 
 py tourist has finished 
 his tour he is a hopeless dyspeptic or a 
 raging Swedophobe. 
 
 The manners of the people are excep- 
 tionally affectionate. The Danes object 
 to the Swedes because they are so gush- 
 ing. The language is full of pet names, 
 terms of endearment, titillating diminu- 
 tives and tender. synonyms. In no lan- 
 guage, not even in Greek, can a man be 
 so covered with a sweet icing of flattery, 
 and the Swedish women are adepts in 
 this art. The language is very musical. 
 There is an undulation of intonation, a 
 
 rising and falling of silvery inflections, 
 a predominance of soft, silken - footed 
 vowels, which give a peculiar suavity to 
 intercourse and stand in bold contrast 
 with the heroic cast of the Swedish his- 
 toric achievements. The love of music 
 
 'THE wrestlers" OF MOLIN (NATIONAL MUSEUM). 
 
 has taken deep root among the people. 
 Everybody sings, fiddles, dances and 
 belongs to a musical club. 
 
 Travellers have noticed the clumsy 
 household arrangements of the Swedes 
 — the loose and careless building, the 
 rough woodwork and primitive imple- 
 ments — all pointing to indifference en- 
 gendered by long habit and inaccessible 
 to artistic influences. This, however, is 
 gradually disappearing, and the Swedish 
 houses are no longer, as they used to be, 
 heaps of miscellaneous lumber crazily 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 227 
 
 put together. French taste under Ber- 
 nadotte and his successors has softened 
 the barbarism of the Vasas, and one 
 finds one's self in apartments as luxu- 
 riously and tastefully furnished as any- 
 where else in the world. Improvements 
 are going on in hotel -life. Stockholm 
 contains half a dozen fine hotels, and 
 one of great elegance, the Grand Hotel, 
 rivalling in beauty and extent the mag- 
 
 nificent mass of the royal castle. Water- 
 ing-places, baths, spas and seaside re- 
 sorts are numerous. A visit to the baths 
 is not only an essential element in the 
 life of Miss Carlen's and Miss Bremer's 
 heroines, but a general annual habit 
 with the better-conditioned classes. Of 
 course there is nothing to compare with 
 the gorgeous chateaux on the Mediter- 
 ranean, the lovely half-moon of the Bay 
 
 ROYAL THEATRE. 
 
 of Naples or the Arcadian snugness of 
 a Swiss water-cure; but neither are the 
 Swedes so critical. They content them- 
 selves with unpretentious accommoda- 
 tions, a bit of cultivated Eden to prom- 
 enade in, a band of music and quantities 
 of gossip. With these a month is agree- 
 ably passed, and then the return-journey 
 takes place. 
 
 If England is the most aristocratic of 
 European nations, Sweden is the coun- 
 try most exuberantly devoted to titles, 
 to minute exactions of etiquette and to 
 all their attendant absurdities. It is said 
 that the title "Your Ladyship" is given 
 even to the wives of second lieutenants 
 and clerks. Your Excellency ,Your Grace, 
 Your Serenity, Your Transparency, suc- 
 ceed one another in bewildering profu- 
 sion at a metropolitan ball. There will 
 be bitter disputes as to whether an Amer- 
 ican minister, for example, has the right 
 
 to the title Excellency. Amusement for 
 an entire evening will be culled from the 
 controversy whether Mrs. Chose is Frti 
 or Froken or Madame or Mademoiselle 
 or Grace. And the poor wo-man may be 
 left dangling in the seventh heaven of 
 beatific expectation for months before 
 her place in society is finally settled. 
 
 Among the nobility pride and pedigree 
 exist in all their rigor, but the traveller 
 notices a singular lack of those ancestral 
 chateaux which so picturesquely over- 
 hang the rivers of France and every- 
 where embellish the delightful rural 
 scenery of England. The red, turf- 
 covered cabins of the peasants, with 
 their one story and small garden, are 
 unrelieved by quaint Gothic villas or 
 towering Elizabethan mansions. The 
 fanciful and picture-like costumes of the 
 Middle Ages have almost disappeared. 
 
 The condition of the lower orders in 
 
228 
 
 GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 Sweden has long excited the notice of 
 pohtical economists. Drunkenness and 
 debauchery and criminahty have long 
 prevailed among them, wedded to an 
 external decency that renders these vices 
 still worse. Few countries are more opu- 
 lent in figures that tell against itself. The 
 
 archives are stored with statistics that 
 present a singular self-revelation. The 
 Delphic injunction is carried out with a 
 vengeance, but the self-knowledge seems 
 of little avail. Still, great improvements 
 have taken place since the classification 
 of crimes a few years ago and the estab- 
 
 GRAND HOTEL. 
 
 lishment of penitentiaries bythe late king, 
 Charles XV. Lunatic asylums, asylums 
 for blind and deaf and hospitals for sick 
 and indigent abound. In 1870 there were 
 over two hundred thousand paupers in 
 a population of little over four millions. 
 The peasants make their own household 
 implements, clothes and tools. Special 
 provinces are renowned for special things 
 — furniture, watches, cotton and woollen 
 tissues, cut stone and marble, and min- 
 ing industries. As soon as you set foot 
 in Sweden you are saluted with the odor 
 of fish. Salted salmon — the famous Ha- 
 lensta-lax — is a universal tidbit, and her- 
 ring, cod and other fish impregnate the 
 air. Of course game abounds in the 
 northern provinces : bears, foxes, rein- 
 deer, hares, partridges, woodcock and 
 wild duck contribute to the animation 
 
 of the vast forests. Six or seven canals, 
 of great length sometimes, meander 
 through the heart of Sweden, and, as 
 in Holland, the eye is seldom without the 
 pleasing sight of bright or fantastic sails 
 threading their way through the land- 
 scape. Telegraph-wires stretch every- 
 where, and internal improvements are 
 progressing rapidly. 
 
 From Stockholm we took a small 
 steamer and went to the ancient Uni- 
 versity of Upsala, passing on the way 
 the lovely chateau of Drottningholm. 
 Upsala was the old pagan capital of Swe- 
 den, and in the vicinity are still shown 
 three immense mounds where tradition 
 says Odin, Thor and Balder are buried. 
 A strange old ruinous church of great 
 age stands near the spot, looking as if 
 it might have been built by Odin him- 
 
GLIMPSES OF SWEDEN. 
 
 229 
 
 self. There was a pleasant little thatched 
 inn near by, with a garden full of gilly- 
 flowers, where we stopped and drank 
 some genuine Scandinavian mead out 
 of huge drinking-horns presented by 
 Bernadotte. There was a legend on 
 them telling how many illustrious folk 
 had drunk from their mammoth sinu- 
 osities—dukes, princes and what not. 
 We soon satisfied our curiosity with the 
 
 CHATEAU KARNAN. 
 
 mead, and went to visit the house of 
 Linnaeus, the large, two-towered cathe- 
 dral and the famous library of the uni- 
 versity. The chief treasure — and a ver- 
 itable chef d'ceuvre it is — is the Codex 
 argentetcs of Ulfilas, a translation of the 
 New Testament into Gothic on purple 
 parchment in letters of silver. The uni- 
 versity maintains fifteen hundred stu- 
 dents, and has a famous glee-club which 
 won the prize at Vienna. 
 
 Upsala is reached from Stockholm by 
 rail or by canal, the latter of which passes 
 part of the time through charming sce- 
 nery. The summer twilight of this high 
 
 northern region seems almost endless, 
 ending at midnight, with daybreak at 
 two. Our experience on the steam canal- 
 boats was delightful. We took one at 
 Stockholm, and went down through the 
 heart of the country in and out of what 
 appeared innumerable lakes and islands 
 to our original starting-point, Goteborg. 
 The canal -boats are "Tiny Tims" of 
 water-craft, with three decks, handsome 
 state-rooms, dining-room and hurri- 
 cane-deck, and move swiftly, without 
 much washing of the banks. These 
 banks are lined with mountain-birch, 
 just then crimson - spotted every- 
 where with bright warm bunches of 
 berries. This canal is, in fact, a 
 series of canals which connect the 
 Malar, Wener and Wetter lakes. 
 The greatest height attained is one 
 hundred and thirty - four feet, and 
 there are numerous admirably ar- 
 ranged locks. 
 
 The interior of Sweden is unpic- 
 turesque. The great central railroad 
 traverses a region replete with mines 
 and mining industries, and ends final- 
 ly at Helsingfors, in whose vicinity lie 
 the lovely ruins of the Chateau Kar- 
 nan, and over the Sound the low- 
 looming flats of Copenhagen and Elsi- 
 nore. Not until the canal debouches 
 into the Gota - Elf does the canal- 
 scape wake up. Then there is a glo- 
 rious bit of parenthetic scenery. The 
 canal is constructed round the falls 
 of the Gota -Elf (TroUhatta), the glim- 
 mer of whose beautiful white tumbling 
 water is a radiant vision in these gloomy 
 woods. It is a scene of exquisite savage- 
 ness, gloom and beauty. The fall is one 
 hundred and twelve feet, extending in 
 four breaks over thirty -six hundred feet 
 in length. At the bottom it subsides into 
 the glasslike Gota River, which we fol- 
 low down to Goteborg. On the way the 
 steamer passes Kongelf, formerly the 
 capital of Norway, and the ruins of the 
 chateau of Balmo, the most romantic and 
 the most colossal in Sweden. 
 
 James A. Harrison. 
 
TRY NORWAY 
 
 ^}^A. J)/ 
 
 PEASANT-WOMEN. 
 
 HAYMAKER OF ELFDAL. 
 
 A JOLLY party of Americans stepped 
 off the deck of a steamer at Liver- 
 pool the other day, so to speak, full of 
 warm enthusiasm and high glee at the 
 pleasant prospect of a three months' 
 holiday life abroad. They were to "do" 
 London and Paris, of course ; Switzer- 
 land and Italy, maybe ; Scotland, sure. 
 To some of them all these localities were 
 quite familiar : others of the party were 
 230 
 
 novices in foreign travel, and knew nci 
 ther the half-moon slope of Regent street 
 quadrant nor the gaslit arcades of the Rue 
 de Rivoli. There was novelty enough be- 
 fore these persons, of course, and they 
 would not have been willing to spare the 
 sight of one shop on the Boulevards for 
 the promise of a view of Schliemann's 
 site of ancient Troy. Paris, London, 
 Lucerne and Florence were places of 
 
TRY NORWAY! 
 
 231 
 
 enough interest for them, said these sau- 
 cy young folks, with each a self-sufficient 
 toss of his or her good-looking head. 
 But while the elders certainly looked 
 forward with great pleasure to visiting 
 these delightful places again, they nev- 
 ertheless yearned after fresh fields to 
 follow. 
 
 We were talking about it as we rode 
 to London in a railway - carriage which 
 we had occupants enough to fill, and 
 which therefore we were privileged in 
 ticketing "Private" — the word written 
 
 A GIRL-ROWER. 
 
 in blue pencil on the back of one of 
 our Chicago friend's business-cards, and 
 stuck up defiantly in one of the plate- 
 glass windows. "I wonder where we 
 could ^o" said one of my friends, "that 
 would furnish us with a new sensation ?" 
 
 ''Try Norway r' said a great, big-let- 
 tered poster stuck up at the station which 
 we were that moment passing. 
 
 The result was a trial of Norway. But 
 what is here written is only partly de- 
 rived from that experience.* 
 
 * See A. Vaudal's En Karriole a. travers la Suide 
 ei la Norwcge. 
 
 The tourist -mania has lately driven 
 so many summer travellers from Great 
 Britain into Sweden and Norway that 
 these once secluded regions are becom- 
 ing like nothing more than an extension 
 of Scotland, and are quite the proper 
 thing to "do " after a rapid run through 
 the storied but well-trodden ground of 
 Marmion and the Lady of the Lake. 
 The first sounds which greet the travel- 
 ler's ear when he strikes Scandinavian 
 soil are not those of the language of the 
 skalds and vikings : they are the crisp 
 syllables of the Strand and Fleet street. 
 Every summer steamers from Hull and 
 Leith bring over to the port of Trond- 
 hjem parties of British sportsmen and 
 lady travellers. Your English are a 
 race of born sportsmen, and the rivers 
 of Norway are crammed with salmon, 
 thousands upon thousands of trout play 
 in the leaping torrents, while in the al- 
 most unbroken woods abide red -deer, 
 reindeer, grouse, woodcocks, elks. The 
 Norwegian fjords, which cut so deeply 
 into the coast, offer to pleasure-yachts a 
 safe harbor and easy navigation. The 
 Englishman who is neither a hunter nor 
 a fisherman nor a sailor becomes a tour- 
 ist, at least for a few months each year. 
 He conscientiously climbs every moun- 
 tain-peak in the vicinity of the route he 
 is travelling, drives his karriole with the 
 ardor of performing an expected duty 
 in a thorough manner, and persistently 
 talks English to the natives without the 
 slightest regard to the fact of their not 
 understanding it. And his laudable ef- 
 forts are having their effect. "Yes," has 
 almost dethroned "Ja" in Norway, even 
 among natives talking together. A prov- 
 erb has it that when founding a colony 
 Spaniards begin by building a church, 
 the Yankees a factory, the British an ho- 
 tel. In the gorge of the Romsdal, the 
 journey toward which is one of great 
 difficulty, there is to be found an Eng- 
 lish hotel which is quite in the London 
 style, even as regards its prices, and 
 where the smiling proprietor spreads 
 before you the latest numbers oi Punch 
 and the London Titnes. Sailing around 
 the Northern Cape to Bergen, the sum- 
 mer traveller sees on one of the islands 
 
232 
 
 TRY NORWAY! 
 
 of the lonely Qord a British flag flying 
 from the top of an elegant cottage, whose 
 dainty construction recalls the coquettish 
 villas of the Isle of Wight. The steamer 
 touches the shore, and the English col- 
 ony is found to consist of a single house 
 which was brought here direct from Lon- 
 don, with its pretty pointed roof, its green 
 shutters, its tiny tower 
 and its graceful bow- 
 window. Every sum- 
 mer it is erected on the 
 banks of some Scandi- 
 navian fjord, and in the 
 autumn it is taken down, 
 board by board, and re- 
 turns to London to pass 
 the winter in a store- 
 house. The proprietor 
 is a jolly gentleman, a 
 passionate lover of the 
 forest and the stream, 
 who receives his visitors 
 in a room hung with 
 . emblems of his prowess 
 as a fisher and a hunter, 
 with tents easy to pitch, 
 and the last new thing in 
 fowling-pieces and fish- 
 ing-rods. Outside, a flour- 
 ishing kitchen-garden is 
 the result of the planting 
 of the seeds he brought 
 from England. His lit- 
 tle house is an exact 
 model of the one he 
 lives in in the suburbs of London — a 
 jointed toy easily fitted together. In the 
 spring this eccentric gentleman boards 
 his yacht, embarks his house upon it, 
 takes with his baggage a collection of 
 seeds, a cellar of wines, tinned provis- 
 ions, tea, coffee and sugar, and turns 
 prow toward the east. When he arrives 
 on the Norway coast he takes possession 
 of a deserted islet in a fish-haunted fjord, 
 puts up his house and plants his salads. 
 By day he hunts the deer and fishes for 
 salmon : in the evening he eats the fish 
 he has caught, the deer he has killed, 
 the vegetables he has sown. The rare 
 steamers which pass before his windows 
 bring him his only news of the world. 
 As soon as the first cold weather comes 
 
 he folds his baggage, takes to sail again, 
 returns to London and plays the other 
 half of his life — fashionable gentleman 
 during the winter, Robinson Crusoe dur- 
 ing the summer. 
 
 At the railway-station of Malmo an 
 ambulatory merchant runs along by the 
 car-windows and offers travellers a tov. 
 
 costumes: parish of mora. 
 
 a diminutive representation of the kar- 
 riole. It is a little arm-chair mounted 
 on large wheels and hung between long 
 shafts. You put the karriole in your 
 pocket and take the express -train for 
 Stockholm. In the train the aspect of 
 your fellow-travellers differs in no re- 
 spect from that cosmopolitan character 
 which you would expect in any express- 
 train near large cities in Europe. All 
 countries seem represented in the dress 
 of these tourists, which varies sufficient- 
 ly to include the plaid of the Highlander 
 and the Castilian sombrero. As yet you 
 see nothing unmistakably Swedish ex- 
 cept perhaps a few tall and extremely 
 blond army officers, wearing the severe- 
 ly-plain uniform of the Royal Guards oi 
 
TRY NORWAY! 
 
 233 
 
 the black and gold dolman of the Charles 
 XV. Hussars. 
 
 Ten years ago Stockholm was only 
 accessible by sea. Even now it is called 
 the Venice of the North. The streets are 
 arms of the sea. A fleet of war-ships 
 could defile in battle array under the 
 palace - windows of the Swedish king. 
 The sole vehicle of Stockholm is a light 
 steamer, a microscopic affair propelled 
 by a miniature steam-engine. It pulls 
 up at the curb frequently, disembarks 
 the passengers and rings its bell for an- 
 
 COSTUMES: PARISH OF LEKSAND. 
 
 Other load. Captain, engineer, helms- 
 man and fireman are all embodied sat- 
 isfactorily in the person of one small 
 boy. He collects the fare from the pas- 
 sengers, gives the signal for leaving, and 
 obeys it — slows up or crowds on steam. 
 On these boats you may study at your 
 leisure the peasant girls and women wear- 
 ing their picturesque provincial costume. 
 Their short skirts disclose stockings of a 
 brilliant red ; a brown or green bodice 
 imprisons their waists ; quaint, stiffly - 
 starched caps cover their heads. The 
 
 physical aspect of the Swedish popula- 
 tion is blond, large, tall : in repose the 
 face denotes great placidity, but in speak- 
 ing the blue eyes lighten up with intelli- 
 gence and the language becomes rapid 
 and full of color. There is much in 
 them which recalls the German charac- 
 ter, and yet they are more like the Ger- 
 mans as depicted by Tacitus than the 
 Prussians of our day. The Germans of 
 antiquity built neither towns nor villages. 
 Every family lived isolated, with its servi- 
 tors, under the absolute authority of the 
 chief. This is the case in Scan- 
 dinavia to - day. Every family 
 owns and inhabits its own guard, 
 a little miniature state, where the 
 father of the family is the king. 
 
 The Scandinavian gaard or 
 gord is not a farm, neither is it 
 a hamlet ; for, though it some- 
 times consists of many buildings, 
 one man only is their proprietor. 
 It is a collection of eight or ten 
 wooden houses, generally paint- 
 ed in the most brilliant colors, and 
 still further adorned with contrast- 
 ing bands of color around the 
 doors and windows. These build- 
 ings are erected around a square, 
 so as to form a more or less ir- 
 regular courtyard : one is used as 
 a storehouse, another as a dairy, 
 another as a work-room where the 
 women spin and sew, for the col- 
 ony must clothe itself. The chief 
 of the family often keeps several 
 buildings for his own private 
 use : one is his dining - room, 
 another his bedroom, another 
 his kitchen. The other cottages 
 are used by his serving-men, whose posi- 
 tion is more that of vassals than the or- 
 dinary domestics of our day. A second 
 line of buildings encircles the first : it is 
 composed of stables, barns, etc. ; and 
 beyond these lies a broad zone of culti- 
 vated fields, where the grain grows yel- 
 low under the warm sun of summer, and 
 farther on beautiful green prairies dotted 
 with flocks. The lord and master of this 
 little empire, though a peasant, is often 
 a member of the Diet and helps to rule 
 the land. " There is only one state in 
 
234 
 
 TRY NORWAY! 
 
 Europe which from the poHtical point of 
 view can be compared to Sweden," said 
 a young Scandinavian officer: "it is the 
 canton of Uri in Switzerland. Like our 
 
 country, it is governed by peasants.' ' The 
 peasant influence has been powerful in 
 Sweden for centuries. This laborious 
 and independent class of men has never 
 
 known what it is to perform servile work 
 for any master : on the contrary, during 
 the Middle Ages the Swedish peasants 
 themselves held serfs, but to Sweden be- 
 longs the honor of being the first country 
 
 in Europe to abolish serfdom, and to 
 another Scandinavian state, Denmark, 
 belongs the glory of first freeing negro 
 slaves in our times. 
 
 The love of brig^ht color is universal 
 
TRY NORWAY! 
 
 235 
 
 in Scandinavia. The houses are paint- 
 ed every hue of the rainbow ; the cos- 
 tumes of the people are as high-colored 
 as those worn by the figurantes of the 
 opera ; and even the most ordinary tools 
 and instruments are as flaming in color 
 as a barber's pole. At Leksand the boats 
 which ply on the lakes and rivers are 
 painted red, blue and yellow, and are 
 guided by girl -rowers as gayly dressed 
 as possible. These variegated boats 
 bring down almost the entire popula- 
 tion of the four parishes nearabout Lek- 
 sand to the rendezvous which God gives 
 each Sunday to the faithful. Every 
 gaard possesses a bark of its own dedi- 
 cated to this special usage, and the fam- 
 ily relic is transmitted from generation 
 to generation. The company of peas- 
 ants attired in their Sunday costumes is 
 a brilliant sight — curious too, for the cut 
 of the garments is several centuries old. 
 It is a real delight to the eyes to con- 
 template these strange costumes, where 
 red, blue, green and yellow are married 
 so happily and without a jar, for taste and 
 harmony dominate the whole. What more 
 graceful, more elegant, than these white 
 skirts trimmed with red which seem to 
 be the uniform of the girl-rowers ? The 
 white jacket opening over a scarlet vest 
 seems the thing of all others to set off 
 the beauty of a handsome young man. 
 This father of a family, with his square- 
 cut coat with enormous skirts, his buckled 
 shoes and his long jabot of lace, looks 
 like a bailiff of the good old times. And 
 these peasant -girls, with striped skirts, 
 bodices adorned with jewels, and odd 
 head - dresses, look for all the world as 
 if they had just stepped out from be- 
 tween the illustrated pages of a medi- 
 aeval missal. The worship of color is 
 universal. The oars of the boats are 
 sculptured and colored, and in the fields 
 you see harvesters wearing embroidered 
 breeches and scarlet stockings, and whole 
 battalions of haymakers their long rakes 
 painted half red and half yellow. Ev- 
 ery parish, every family, has its favorite 
 colors. 
 
 The karriole is a Norwegian institu- 
 tion, but some provinces of Sweden 
 have borrowed it. It resembles a cart. 
 
 a drosky, a tilbury, a sulky, yet differs 
 from all. It is composed of a circular 
 wooden seat for one person, ornamented 
 with a hard flat cushion like a pancake, 
 and perched on a pair of large wheels. 
 Between the seat and the axletree two 
 half hoops of wood serve as springs and 
 make a base pretence of modifying the 
 violence of the jolting. Between the 
 long shafts stands a rusty little horse 
 with unkempt mane, quick eye, prom- 
 inent ribs and a nervous and steely 
 ankle. The harness is as strange as 
 the vehicle, as wild as the horse. One 
 of the reins is a rope, the other a leather 
 strap rusty with age and weather. But 
 even here the Scandinavian love of color 
 comes in. The horse's collar is orna- 
 mented with carved wood painted in 
 brilliant hues, and to it hang a half 
 dozen or more sleigh-bells. You swing 
 up into your rolling chair, your valise 
 fixed between your feet : your young 
 conductor hands you the reins and 
 jumps up behind, and kneels on a nar- 
 row board there, his hands holding on 
 to your back. When you are ready he 
 utters a sibilant sound something like 
 this : pr-pr-pr ; and to the horse this is 
 a magic utterance. He shakes his mane, 
 starts off at a gallop, plunges down hill 
 with his belly to the ground, and takes 
 the ascents by storm. The karriole fol- 
 lows him, jumping, bounding, dancing, 
 describing unheard-of zigzags over the 
 bosom of Mother Earth. Relays are 
 made at certain stages. The traveller 
 leaves not only horse, but karriole, and 
 enters another, bag and baggage. The 
 boy who accompanied the preceding re- 
 lay receives the stipulated price of the 
 conveyance, shakes hands cordially with 
 the traveller and returns home with his 
 horse and karriole. One of his youth- 
 ful compatriots succeeds him on the 
 fresh karriole, and thus the traveller 
 passes in review the coming generation 
 of Scandinavia. Though the karrioles 
 vary little in appearance, no one of your 
 young companions resembles the other. 
 One, timid and fearful, crouches behind 
 on the board, hangs tightly by your 
 shoulders and never utters a word ; an- 
 other, wide awake to an astonishing de- 
 
236 
 
 TRY NORWAY! 
 
 gree, carries on a ceaseless discourse in 
 his own language, and seems quite 
 indignant that you do not understand 
 Swedish like a native. Often the boy 
 
 jumps to the ground, ti'ots beside the 
 vehicle, springs up again with a bound 
 on to the shafts, stands there astride like 
 a circus -rider, jumps, dances and turns 
 
 summersaults, without the pony relaxing 
 his headlong pace for an instant. Some- 
 times your young postilion, anxious to 
 show the superiority of Swedish horse- 
 flesh over all other in the world, stim- 
 
 ulates the courser of the karriole. You 
 hold the reins, it is true, but the animal 
 pays no attention to any one but his fel- 
 low-countryman. It is he who urges him 
 on by a gesture or stops him by a word. 
 
TRY NORWAY! 
 
 237 
 
 For the most part, however, the best 
 energies of the gamin are devoted to 
 sparing the horse, which is perhaps the 
 only treasure, and certainly the friend 
 
 A TOFTE PRINCE. 
 
 and companion, of the family. The whip 
 is an instrument almost unknown in Swe- 
 den, and if you venture to caress the back- 
 bone of your horse with a switch, the poor 
 boy behind will groan at every stroke as 
 if he were being switched himself. 
 
 The diligence of France and the stage- 
 coach of England are replaced in Scan- 
 dinavia not by one but a whole proces- 
 sion of karrioles, the column headed by 
 the post-carrier. It is great fun to meet 
 a joyous, noisy caravan like this, with 
 bells ringing, laughter and chat resound- 
 ing, in the stillness of these great soli- 
 tudes. Conversation is carried on by the 
 tr -vellers jumping down and running 
 alongside of one another's karriole. All 
 karrioles upset once or twice a day — this 
 is the expected average — in which case 
 the horse, trained by long custom, stops : 
 all the other karrioles in the procession 
 
 do the same ; the gamin in charge of 
 the conveyance examines his harness 
 and vehicle to see if anything is bro- 
 ken ; the traveller picks himself up ; and 
 away goes the caravan again at a lively 
 gallop. 
 
 Although their religious faith does not 
 encourage belief in the heathen gods 
 their ancestors worshipped, good Luther- 
 ans as they are, the common people are 
 superstitious. In the pale dusk which is 
 their night strange figures are seen to 
 float on the surface of their steel-blue 
 lakes: enchanted palaces rise slowly 
 before their eyes. Mirage is a common 
 sight to the sailor, but your Scandinavian 
 explains not such fairy visions by prosaic 
 reasoning. The airy palace seen to rise 
 from the lake is the home of the Scandi- 
 navian siren with the glassy eyes and the 
 seductive and perfidious voice. Rising 
 
 A NORWEGIAN BRIDE. 
 
 upon the narrow plank behind, the kar- 
 riole-boy in a frightened voice cries out, 
 "Elf! elf!" and points eagerly toward 
 the blue vapor which lifts from the waters 
 
238 
 
 TRY NORWAY! 
 
 on a summer night. In it the Scandina- 
 vians think they behold sweet faces and 
 transparent forms. The fairies dance 
 upon the water without ruffling it, and 
 
 whosoever approaches too near to them 
 will surely be inflamed with love for them. 
 But when an elf timidly approaches the 
 bank and allows the mortal to press her 
 
 to his breast, she casts a pitiful look into 
 his eyes and expires in his embrace. 
 Then slowly she vanishes in the wave, 
 and unknown disturbances are in store 
 for that wretched lover in the future. 
 
 The guide of the karriole is not always 
 a boy. Girls not infrequently perform 
 the office. When it is remembered that 
 necessity obliges them to hang on to the 
 gentlemen's shoulders with their hands. 
 
TRY NORWAY! 
 
 239 
 
 and even sometimes to lay their heads 
 on the gentlemen's backs to get a little 
 rest, it can easily be conceived that the 
 spectacle is an amusing one. 
 
 One of the most thrilling sights in Scan- 
 dinavia is the cataract of the Skeggedal- 
 foss, beside which the favorite Swiss falls 
 of Staubach and Giesbach are but trifling 
 cascades. From the neighboring heights 
 the tourist beholds a panorama composed 
 of sixty leagues of mountains, glaciers 
 and eternal snows. On these heights 
 blooms a special vegetation, brilliant and 
 poisonous. Here aconite exhibits its pale 
 bunches, belladonna reddens the bushes 
 with its scarlet berries, and the tourist 
 brings back as a souvenir of his visit a 
 monster bouquet of poisons. The ascent 
 of the heights near the gorge is very try- 
 ing : difficult from the base, as the apex 
 is approached it becomes almost impos- 
 sible. But the climb is well repaid. A 
 fairy spectacle is spread out below, above 
 and around. Three or four torrents as 
 large as rivers fall together from the 
 height of a thousand feet into a lake, 
 where they mingle their waters in foam, 
 roar and fury. 
 
 The descendants of Harold with the 
 Fine Hair, the first king who ever reigned 
 over Norway, still exist. They have in- 
 habited an estate called the Tofte for 
 many centuries, and they are known as 
 the Toftes. They still preserve their an- 
 cient parchments and their genealogical 
 tree. They are rich too, owning three 
 hundred cows, and to visit all their es- 
 tates takes a week's time, and to receive 
 their farmers' accounts the entire space 
 of a day. They intermarry among them- 
 selves, and have little intercourse with 
 those whom they consider beneath them. 
 Proposals of marriage have frequently 
 come from outsiders, and it has been 
 urged upon them that their race will soon 
 be extinguished unless it is replenished 
 with new blood. They answer that they 
 know this, but prefer to have no sons at 
 all rather than sons less noble than them- 
 selves. The chief or king of the Toftes 
 is a vigorous old man, but his only son 
 is a pale and feeble youth who plainly 
 shows the poverty of a blood which is 
 never rejuvenated by new currents. This 
 
 prince wears the square-cut coat, knee- 
 breeches and buckled shoes used in 
 France in IVIadame de Pompadour's 
 time, but his cap is a revolutionary bit 
 of headgear such as would hardly have 
 been tolerated at the elegant court of 
 Versailles. The Toftes show the genea- 
 logical tree. Near its roots appear the 
 names of those kings to whom affection- 
 ate surnames have been given — Harold 
 of the Fine Hair, Hardrath with the 
 Bare Feet, Harold the Red, Bjorn with 
 the Sparkling Eyes. The topmost branch 
 bears the name of the two Toftes w^io 
 exhibit the precious document. One 
 branch is broken off rudely, and the 
 Toftes explain that this is a scion of the 
 race who no longer belongs to the fam- 
 ily, having disgraced himself by an alli- 
 ance with a woman not of the blood- 
 royal. Among the curious relics exhib- 
 ited to the visitor is a tall, heavy crown 
 rising into points, upon which silver bells 
 are hung which ring at every touch. 
 This crown has nothing especially royal 
 in it, although it has been for many cen- 
 turies the property of this princely fam- 
 ily. Every family in good circumstances 
 in this locality owns a similar one, and 
 places it on the heads of its daughters 
 the day they marry. The precious relic 
 is transmitted from generation to genera- 
 tion. The bride is hung with ornaments 
 when she walks to the altar. She marches 
 slowly to the ceremony, as pretentiously 
 tricked out as a Spanish Madonna. 
 
 A dashing vessel is lying at anchor in 
 one port, getting ready for an expedition 
 to the Lofoden Isles, there to fish for her- 
 ring and cod. One of its masts is broken 
 short off, and many indications show its 
 recent fierce battle with the tempests. 
 The shape of the ship is truly Norwegian, 
 and announces plainly its descent from 
 the pirate vessels, those dragens of the 
 sea. The prow rises above the wave 
 and twists about like the neck of a ser- 
 pent : behind is a sort of tower which 
 serves as a shelter for the sailors during 
 a tempest. Formerly, this was a sort of 
 block-house, where the defenders of the 
 ship received the enemy when they at- 
 tempted to board her. Now her only 
 sea-fights are with cod and herring, which 
 
240 
 
 TR Y NOR IVA Y! 
 
 every spring invade the waters about the 
 Lofodeu Isles in myriads. The master 
 of the bark wears cowskin boots, a fur- 
 lined jacket, a leathern apron and thick 
 
 woollen mittens. He looks like a bear 
 back from its hunt and satisfied with its 
 booty. His wife lives with him in his 
 damp home ; and if she had not on a 
 
 OLD CHURCH IN TJiE THELEMARKEN. 
 
 thick green skirt bordered with red over 
 her boots and her pantaloons, it \^ould 
 be difficult to assign the proper sex to 
 the two spouses. Two or three sailors 
 
 accoutred in the same guise make up 
 the crew. The boss has navigated the 
 North Sea many years, and has made 
 the ocean -journey on the Atlantic. He 
 
TR Y NOR WA Y! 
 
 241 
 
 has seen England and the United States, 
 and speaks the Enghsh language quite 
 fluently. He was doing well "off there," 
 but he got homesick for his Norwegian 
 fjords, and returned to them. These 
 Norwegian fishers prepare for sea as sol- 
 diers make ready for the battle-field : no 
 man knows whether he will ever return. 
 In the month of March word reaches 
 them that cod have arrived in the West 
 Fjord, near the Lofodens, and they set 
 out. From the North Cape to Bergen 
 the whole coast is alive : barks of every 
 size and shape, schooners, brigs, luggers, 
 yachts, all set sail. When they arrive 
 at the isles the fishing -area is divided. 
 Four or five hundred boats cast their 
 nets at once, and draw them in full of 
 the squirming prisoners. The remain- 
 der of the crew have landed in a shel- 
 tered place, and await the arrival of the 
 fish to cure them. As soon as a net casts 
 its living cargo on the rocks the execu- 
 tioners advance : each seizes his victim, 
 hits it, despatches it with a stroke of his 
 knife, cuts off its head, which he slings 
 into a tunnel of oil, drags out its entrails, 
 and then bites greedily into the yet warm 
 liver of the creature as if it were a ripe 
 fruit. This is the battle of the fishers. 
 They have on their side skill and au- 
 dacity, but the fish have on theirs the 
 tempest, the Maelstrom which draws 
 in ships and sucks them down, the icy 
 currents of the North Sea. So reason- 
 ed the boss when the subject of cruelty 
 to cod was broached to him. The Nor- 
 wegian sailors are reputed the best in 
 the world. A British admiral once said, 
 ■"To rule the seas I should like a fleet 
 of English ships manned by Norwegian 
 sailors." 
 
 Bergen is the principal port where all 
 this wealth of fishing industry goes. Ev- 
 ery year Bergen receives six hundred 
 thousand cod from the Lofoden Isles, 
 and sends to the European markets two 
 hundred thousand barrels of salted fish 
 and oil. The little town is perched in 
 a most uncomfortable situation on a 
 rocky steep incessantly beaten by ter- 
 rific rains and at the mercy of all the 
 storms which gather and break on the 
 North Sea. Why the tov/n is not wash- 
 16 
 
 ed away seems a marvel. But, such as 
 it is, it has been perched there for six 
 hundred years. 
 
 The Norwegians claim the discovery 
 of America of course. In the year 1000 
 the navigator Leif with thirty-five com- 
 panions sighted the Isle of Newfound- 
 land, and pushing on to the westward he 
 found a vast country covered with vines, 
 to which, like our temperance neighbors 
 in their New Jersey town, he gave the 
 name of Vineland. This was North 
 America, near the mouth of the St. Law- 
 rence River. A Scandinavian colony es- 
 tablished itself on the banks of the river, 
 and soon pushed onward to the New 
 England coasts : it is claimed that a com- 
 pany even ventured as far as the bay 
 whereon Boston now sits so proudly. 
 Regular communication was established 
 between Norway and the New World. 
 The pope appointed bishops in America 
 four centuries before Las Casas. About 
 1350 the civil wars which raged among 
 the Scandinavian peoples and the ter- 
 rible black pest — a scourge not yet for- 
 gotten in Norway — seein to have caused 
 an interruption of communication be- 
 tween the two continents. It was near- 
 ly a century and a half later before the 
 New World was definitely discovered. 
 The spirit of Norwegian adventure show- 
 ed Europeans the route to America ; 
 chance lost it ; genius brought it to light 
 again. Such is their tale. 
 
 The Thelemarken province is a cor- 
 ner of Norway almost unknown to tour- 
 ists. The English go to the North Cape, 
 to the Lofoden Isles, but have not yet 
 quite discovered the Thelemarken, prob- 
 ably because it is nearer home than Lap- 
 land and Norrland. The manners and 
 customs of past ages seem to have taken 
 refuge in this valley imprisoned on all 
 sides by lofty mountains. It presents a 
 curious sample of Norway as it was two 
 centuries ago : costumes, manners, cha- 
 racters, all have a primitive savor. The 
 chairs are but trunks of trees coarsely 
 hewed out, with a part of the trunk left 
 to form a back. The table is another 
 tree-trunk, and on it are plates, cups and 
 spoons made of sculptured wood paint- 
 ed in brisfht colors. Both furniture and 
 
242 
 
 TR Y NOR WA Y! 
 
 walls are ornamented with proverbs, 
 moral sentences, quotations from the Bi- 
 ble — sometimes in Scandinavian, some- 
 times in Latin. Around a wooden milk- 
 
 bowl you read, "Drink, and thank God;" 
 at the bottom of a wooden platter these 
 words of the Psalmist : " Eat with thy 
 friend: let thine enemy eat;" over the 
 
 door : " If the Lord does not guard the 
 house, he who guards it will guard in 
 vain;" and on the bed-tester: "Man 
 sows: God prospers the seed." In the 
 bed sleep sometimes mother, father and 
 
 half a dozen children. Your karriole 
 guide, though an urchin but four or five 
 years of age, has his waist encircled by 
 a stout leather belt in which hangs an 
 unsheathed dagger. All the inhabitants 
 
TRY NORWAY! 
 
 243 
 
 of the Thelemarken wear this arm, and 
 use it with dexterity. 
 
 After a long twilight the night falls. 
 It is the first time for six weeks that 
 you have known what darkness is. You 
 greet the stars as old acquaintances who 
 have been long absent. By this roman- 
 tic light you discern in the distance a 
 strange black mass whose size and un- 
 usual form almost frighten you. It looks 
 like an immense monster with shining 
 scales, humpbacked, stretching out long 
 weird arms which terminate in grima- 
 cing heads. At sight of it the karriole- 
 boy extends his tiny hand, and indicat- 
 ing a point beyond it, says, "Priester- 
 gaard " — the gaard or farm of the priest. 
 This explains the monster. The curious 
 old mass is simply one of those ancient 
 Norwegian churches which are imitated 
 to some extent in all parts of Norway, 
 but in the Thelemarken are undoubted 
 originals. Imagine a squat wooden ed- 
 ifice nearly rectangular, surrounded by 
 galleries open to the air and daylight, 
 and surmounted by a tangled mass of 
 slate roofs which pile themselves one 
 above the other, run up into spires or 
 round out in cupolas, and from every 
 angle of which and on every frontage 
 jut out dragon-faced gargoyles. These 
 churches, essentially Scandinavian, are 
 three or four centuries old. The cold of 
 the North, which disagrees with stone, 
 respects their wooden walls. There is 
 scarcely anything stranger in building 
 than this disordered architecture, which 
 defies symmetry and is strikingly effec- 
 tive in spite of all rul6s to the contrary, 
 and especially in the steel blue of the 
 northern moonlight makes a fantastic 
 and impressive silhouette against the 
 azure background of the atmosphere. 
 
 At the door of the pastor's house a 
 knock brings a venerable patriarch to 
 open. The priest knows neither French, 
 English nor German, but being asked 
 for a few minutes' rest and shelter in 
 Latin, replies fluently in that language, 
 and presses the traveller to stop all 
 night. 
 
 Sometimes your karriole will bring you 
 to the gate of a sort of rustic castle, the 
 mistress of which comes out herself to 
 
 meet you, surrounded by a whole popu- 
 lation of children and servants. The 
 hostess wears a pair of trousers of black 
 woollen stuff which reach quite over the 
 feet and are tucked into her sculptured 
 wooden shoes, and around the ankle are 
 beautified with embroidery in brilliant 
 colors ; a short skirt, not reaching to the 
 knees, something like the Greek petti- 
 coat ; the bodice open in front and orna- 
 mented with a double row of jewels ; a 
 multi-colored scarf twisted several times 
 about her waist ; and on her head a sort 
 of cape, falling on the shoulders and em- 
 broidered to match the trousers. On a 
 sign from this lady the traveller is con- 
 ducted into "the house of the stranger " 
 — a house specially reserved for hospital- 
 ity. In it are antique beds overhung with 
 embroidered phrases in illuminated let- 
 ters, arm-chairs with more sculpture than 
 stuffing about them, and walls adorned 
 with consoling maxims from the Bible 
 painted in Gothic characters. Servants 
 busy themselves silently to provide for 
 your wants without waiting for a request 
 or asking a question, in obedience to the 
 motto inscribed over the door of the stran- 
 ger's house : "One must not fatigue the 
 guest one receives. He needs repose, 
 dry clothing, and not to be questioned." 
 The southern part of Sweden is pierced 
 with canals, grand works which have im- 
 mortalized the name of Ericsson, the civil 
 engineer. These canals link the lakes, 
 and, putting these great floods into com- 
 munication, offer to commerce as well as 
 to tourists a means of transport which 
 facilitates the journeys and shortens dis- 
 tances. In twenty-two hours the Dais- 
 land Canal takes the traveller from the 
 Norwegian frontier to Lake Wener. It 
 opens a passage through solid rocks, 
 climbs mountains by means of sluices 
 cut in granite, glides among wooded 
 heights, crosses lakes and boldly passes 
 over a cataract, the Hafverud falls. The 
 boat, floating in an iron aqueduct, a sort 
 of gigantic gutter suspended in air, sees 
 below it torrents of water and foam pre- 
 cipitating themselves into an abyss. Near 
 the Hafverud Cataract is Lake Wener, 
 an immense interior basin whose waters 
 are often as tumultuous as those of the 
 
2 44 
 
 77? y NOR IVA Y! 
 
 ocean. It is the largest lake in Europe 
 after Ladoga in Russia. A quaint little 
 town called Wenersborg is situated on 
 the southern extremity of the lake. It 
 
 is merely a group of houses without streets 
 or squares. Sheep nibble unconcernedly 
 before the very door of the hotel, where 
 the smiling proprietor complacently 
 
 stands awaiting the customers whom 
 every steamer brings him in the sum- 
 mer-time. He is a man who understands 
 his business and means to make himself 
 agreeable. Addressing the French trav- 
 
 ellers, whose Parisian air and speech an 
 nounce their nationality, he bows to tht 
 ground and says with an accent which 
 would do no discredit to a Boulevard 
 lounger, "Messieurs, it is with a real 
 
TRY NORWAY! 
 
 245 
 
 pleasure that I place my services at your 
 disposition." Without waiting for an an- 
 swer, he turns to a group of English peo- 
 ple and repeats the same phrase in Eng- 
 lish. A Viennese family complete the 
 list, and to them Boniface proffers the 
 same remark, word for word, in German. 
 But when an effort is made to pursue 
 this happy opening to more extended 
 converse, relating to something to eat 
 and drink, bath, soap and towels and a 
 bed, English, French and German being 
 in turn tried, all is found to be in vain. 
 Boniface speaks no language but Swe- 
 dish, and has only learned a single phrase 
 in the other tongues, which he uses out 
 of compliment to his patrons. 
 
 Near Wenersborg are the celebrated 
 falls of Trolhatta. For many miles the 
 Gota-Elf River, held in by two steep 
 banks, rushes from cascade to cascade, 
 
 throws itself from cliff to cliff; now pours 
 down an abyss, now beats against a men- 
 acing rock ; boils, bounds, launches in 
 the air great volumes of foam, and final- 
 ly finds a calm and green limpidity in a 
 basin two hundred feet below which lies 
 in everlasting repose. The boat — which 
 cannot very well navigate a body of wa- 
 ter so restless as this — finds a pleasant 
 journey in a neighboring canal ; and the 
 travellers, who have gone ashore to see 
 the falls, are surprised to suddenly be- 
 hold their boat at a distance of three 
 hundred feet above their heads, at the 
 top of a giant staircase cut out in a 
 mountain's flank. Each step is an im- 
 mense trough which alternately empties 
 and fills in order to raise or lower the 
 water for the boat's descent — the locks 
 of our own Niagaran Lockport on a 
 wilder scale. ' Olive Logan. 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 VIEW OF WAITZEN. 
 
 AN old gentleman whom I had known 
 in other climes, and when he was see- 
 ing better days, accompanied me through 
 the darkened streets of Pe'sth to a garden 
 in the suburbs, and, seating me before a 
 green table under a mass of vines, he 
 knocked loudly and cried out, "Now I 
 am going to show you something very 
 curious." 
 
 A sleepy - looking waiter shuffled in 
 and took the venerable gentleman's or- 
 der for a flask of the very best red wine. 
 At that moment a little curtain amid the 
 246 
 
 foliage rolled up, and a dashing young 
 fellow, with a sinister look about the 
 eyes, came forward to the smoking foot- 
 lights of a tiny stage and began to sing a 
 song. 
 
 "That's it!" cried my friend. "He 
 always sings the brigand ballad at this 
 hour. You shall be delighted. Listen!" 
 
 I did. It was the most remarkable 
 song that I ever heard. In it the brigand 
 of the steppes related the savage joys 
 of his adventvu-ous life — the peril, the 
 assault, the battles with herdsmen and 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 2^7 
 
 travellers, as well as his rustic love. The 
 Hungarian language sounded extremely 
 poetic as this stage-brigand sang it. In 
 the music there was the wild wail, the 
 intense passionate earnestness, the rude 
 poetry which you can understand when 
 you have heard Remenyi play upon his 
 violin or Liszt upon his piano. What is 
 this wonderful, this fascinating echo in 
 a minor key which is heard in the mu- 
 sic throughout South - eastern Europe ? 
 Whence comes it ? 
 
 Brigands still flourish in some parts 
 of Hungary, but when caught they are 
 so severely dealt with that many are 
 abandoning the career for the safer ones 
 of shepherds or nomadic fortune-tellers 
 and tinkers. The peasantry have a dan- 
 gerous tendency to make popular heroes 
 of them. Among these brigands have 
 now and then appeared adorable types 
 of beauty, of exquisite manly grace, 
 which made many fair ladies' hearts 
 ache. In a few years the last brigand 
 will have vanished, in company with 
 the remaining bits of costume to which 
 certain people in Hungary still fondly 
 cling. Let the artist who would catch 
 the picturesque aspects of peasant -life 
 in this country hasten, for the young 
 generation is getting into the hideous 
 black clothes, slouch hats and sombre 
 petticoats that offend the eye in North- 
 ern Germany. Munkacsy has painted 
 a few bits from sketches made among 
 the lower classes of his fellow-country- 
 men : how fresh, original and sympa- 
 thetic they are ! And what a noble head 
 the artist himself has ! It is a real Hun- 
 garian type, symmetrica], strong, framed 
 in handsome beard and crowned with 
 finely - colored hair. When Munkacsy 
 walks on the Paris boulevards passers 
 who do not know him turn to stare at 
 him. " If he is not something exceptional, 
 he ought to be," they say to themselves. 
 One sees dozens of striking faces in the 
 course of a day's walk in Pesth. Some- 
 times they are deceptive, and the lad 
 whom one takes for an incipient poet is 
 only a vulgar schoolboy, with few ideas 
 above his dinner and his geography, or 
 the man of noble and stately port is a 
 waiter in a restaurant. Beauty has been 
 
 lavished on many people without respect 
 to class or fortune. Yet the ugly types 
 are so hideous that I doubt if they can be 
 equalled elsewhere. The gypsies at the 
 Kaiserbad and around the other "oven "- 
 like heated grounds from which Ofen 
 takes its name are as fantastic as the 
 beggars in Dore's illustrations to Bal- 
 zac's Contes Drolatiques. The old peas- 
 ant-women who beg on the fine bridge 
 over the Danube are such wrecks of hu- 
 manity that one vainly endeavors to dis- 
 cover in them any remnants of past grace 
 or beauty. 
 
 The Esterhazy Gallery is so well known 
 that I will only mention the extreme pride 
 which the Hungarians take in it — a pride 
 heightened, perhaps, by the fact that the 
 beautiful collection was ceded by Vien- 
 na to Pesth. There are Hungarians who 
 would willingly take the Grand Opera- 
 house, the Belvidere, the Votive Church 
 and the Palace of Schonbrunn from Vien- 
 na if they could, although they have an 
 admirable opera of their own, and pal- 
 aces enough to house the memories of" 
 all their kings. The Hungarians are 
 good Wagnerites, and bestow much at- 
 tention upon the music of the erratic and 
 immortal Richard. 
 
 Up river, toward Vienna, the intelli- 
 gent traveller who will not be dictated 
 to by Murray or Baedeker, and who 
 scorns haste, can find dozens of inter- 
 esting excursions. He will not think the 
 Hungarian village very impressive, es- 
 pecially if he happens into it on a rainy 
 day. The streets have no sidewalks, and 
 are speedily transformed into mud-pud- 
 dles under the furious rains which now 
 and then beat across hill and plain. The 
 houses are low, blessed with but few win- 
 dows, and the doors are narrow. The 
 inn has some wooden benches in front 
 of its principal entrance, and there wag- 
 oners sit and drink, even in the rain. 
 Solemn processions of geese promenade 
 the muddy ways, now and then indulg- 
 ing in sinister cries rather more discord- 
 ant than any accents to be heard in the 
 human dialects thereabouts. Bare-limb- 
 ed peasant-girls stare at the strangers and 
 laugh at them. Even an Austrian excites 
 their attention and their critical remarks. 
 
248 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 The extensive fleet of Danube steam- I tance above the new^er and principal 
 ers is built at Old Ofen, but a short dis- I town of that name. Old Ofen is charm- 
 
 ingly situated among vineyards, and the 
 activity of the fresh-water dockyards and 
 the beauty of the vine -clad slopes are 
 
 only made more striking by contrast 
 with many ugly and tumbling hovels 
 in which a rabble of low Jews herd to- 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 249 
 
 gether. The Jews have been so ambi- 
 tious to build a fine synagogue that they 
 have quite forgotten decency in housing 
 themselves. Their church at Alt Ofen 
 exceeds any other of its religion in Aus- 
 tria-Hungary in grace of design and 
 beauty of decoration. Hundreds of work- 
 men are employed in the yards of the 
 Danube Steam Navigation Company, for 
 the number of barges, towboats, rafts and 
 express steamers required for the com- 
 merce of the great stream is legion. De- 
 struction of property is rare, but the com- 
 pany has found it necessary to increase 
 its stock steadily for many years, and in 
 the winter harbor at Pesth there is a ver- 
 itable flotilla when ice has formed on the 
 stream. 
 
 Waitzen, Gros-Maros, Wissegrad and 
 Gran are all so unlike any towns in Mid- 
 dle Europe that the traveller whose ass- 
 thetic sense has been dulled by too much 
 sameness in France and Belgium and 
 Northern Germany will feel his heart 
 leap up with a sense of gratitude when 
 he sees them. Waitzen is full of quaint 
 monuments left by the Romans or con- 
 structed in the Middle Ages ; and in the 
 episcopal palace especially — for it is the 
 seat of a see — there are great numbers 
 of curious relics. The cathedral is not 
 more than a hundred years old, but is a 
 noble monument, resembling its mighty 
 brother at Gran above. Perhaps the most 
 noticeable peculiarity of Waitzen is the 
 manner in which the town is divided into 
 quarters. In one lives a Roman Cath- 
 olic population, which has little or noth- 
 ing to do with the Protestants, who are 
 ensconced in a section by themselves ; 
 and both these peoples consider that 
 they have a right to look down upon 
 the Servians, who of course profess the 
 Greek Protestant rite. Waitzen is like 
 many other towns in Austria -Hungary 
 in the variety of its populations and the 
 diversity of their beliefs, but unlike most 
 of them in the manner in which its peo- 
 ples keep apart. 
 
 Wissegrad (the"high fortress"), where 
 Matthias Corvinus built many a pleasant 
 chateau and embellished numerous gar- 
 dens, is a monument to the stupid mania 
 for destruction which characterized the 
 
 Turks' entry into Europe. In the elev- 
 enth century Hungarian kings had al- 
 ready established themselves there, and 
 the peasants in the vineyards can tell 
 the lingering pedestrian any quantity of 
 legends, more or less authentic, but all, to 
 theirthinking, solidly founded on the eter- 
 nal rock. The old walls of the fortress, 
 twice dismantled — once by the Turks, 
 and once by the emperor Leopold — are 
 bathed by the smoothly-flowing Danube, 
 which here is exquisitely beautiful. A 
 lofty ruined tower, the most conspicuous 
 objectat Wissegrad, was once a state pris- 
 on, and many a victim of royal caprice 
 languished here for long years, hearing 
 no cheerful sound save the gurgling of 
 the Danube when a storm came, or an oc- 
 casional shout from a passing boatman. 
 The rocks rise in the wildest fashion on 
 every side, and the brilliant southern sun 
 beats fiercely upon their peaks of por- 
 phyry and limestone. 
 
 Raab is a town which merits attention, 
 and, turning aside from the high road of 
 travel, the visitor may speedily reach it 
 by a fascinating route. It was there that 
 Francis Joseph gave evidence of his thor- 
 ough pluck during the siege in 1849, when 
 he signified his determination to lead the 
 assault on the insurgents in Raab in per- 
 son. It was with difficulty that General 
 Schlick dissuaded the emperor from the 
 hazardous adventure. Raab has a hand- 
 some twelfth-century cathedral, and the 
 guides also show strangers some horrible 
 dungeons into which the Turks, when 
 they were there, used to throw their 
 prisoners. 
 
 Gran is one of the most ancient towns 
 in Hungary. The Hungarians call it 
 Esztergom, and a hundred ballads sing 
 its praises. Its cathedral has a huge 
 dome, which the pious folk of the lo- 
 cality are fond of likening to that of St. 
 Peter's at Rome ; and one can scarcely 
 summon up courage to undeceive them. 
 An altarpiece in the cathedral represents 
 the baptism of St. Stephen, the first Chris- 
 tian king of Hungary and founder of the 
 bishopric at Gran nearly nine centuries 
 ago. The Turks have left their marks 
 on the sacred edifices here. It provokes 
 a smile to wander through Hungary, not- 
 
250 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 ing this evidence of Turkish barbarism 
 and rage, and at the same time hearing 
 everywhere from Hungarian lips most 
 enthusiastic praise of the invading Mus- 
 sulman. 
 
 From Pesth to Presburg the journey 
 
 up the Danube by river or by the rail- 
 road, which keeps close to the stream's 
 bank, is charming. The mountains are 
 with you, grave, majestic : from Pres- 
 burg the view of the far-away chain of 
 hills is ravishing. You are in a land of 
 
 WOMEN GARDENING IN THE ENVIRONS OF PESTH. 
 
 sunshine and song, where blood runs 
 quickly, yet is so hot that it almost burns 
 the veins ; where faces are swart and 
 limbs are round and eyes sparkle ; where 
 the vines in the lusty autumn are load- 
 ed with millions of clusters of exquisite 
 
 grapes ; where the plains are rich in a 
 hundred colors ; where legend has con- 
 secrated every stone ; where men talk 
 in heroic terms, and every fellow, even 
 though he be but a sorry one, may boast 
 of the glorious deeds of his ancestors. 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 251 
 
 This is the land of Strauss's "Danube :" 
 this is the country whence comes the 
 bewitching, maddening music which has 
 affected us all. Here the venerable towns, 
 half hidden under moss and vines, seem 
 to protest against the tooting horn of the 
 railway-porter and the shriek of the loco- 
 motive : they appear to frown upon the 
 present, or to pray it to pass them by as 
 gently and with as little ostentation as 
 possible. Here and there, however, the 
 present has given an added interest to 
 the glories of the past, as at Komorn — 
 ancient Komorn — at the junction of the 
 Waag with the Danube. Under Matthias 
 Corvinus the fortifications of Komorn 
 sprang into existence, and they were, 
 even in his day, one of the glories of 
 Hungary. At the beginning of this 
 century they were immensely enlarged 
 and strengthened, and the Austrians lit- 
 tle dreamed that they would be used to 
 sustain an Hungarian army against Aus- 
 trians during the bloody and perturbed 
 hours of 1849. Komorn made a success- 
 ful defence at that time, and might per- 
 haps do so again. If the noble Magyars 
 should have no other means of defeating 
 an Austrian army in any future compli- 
 cations, they could send out to the be- 
 siegers a few wagon-loads of the potent 
 wine of Neszmely, which grows on the 
 hills near by, and that would have the 
 desired effect. Your Austrian cannot 
 drink wine moderately, as your delicate 
 Southern Hungarian does : he must guz- 
 zle it in large quantities, and the effect is 
 disastrous to his sobriety. 
 
 On many a peak of mountain or slope 
 of hill one sees rich abbeys surrounded 
 by carefully-tilled lands, and also great 
 castles, reminding one that the feudal 
 epoch has not yet entirely passed away 
 in Hungary, The friar and the master 
 of the manor are still important figures 
 there. The servile peasant does not real- 
 ize his condition here, although in some 
 sections of the country he has begun to 
 think. But he is not oppressed. If it 
 were not for the spectre of military ser- 
 vice, he might with justice consider his 
 lot enviable by comparison with that of 
 the peasantry in certain lands less fa- 
 vored by Nature than his own. He 
 
 is devout, and would not like to see 
 the clergy or nobility deprived of their 
 privileges, no matter how they obtain- 
 ed them. I do not mean to have it 
 understood that landlords have legally 
 any of the old-fashioned feudal control 
 over their tenants. The legislation of 
 1848 abolished all droits du seignetir, 
 which had already lasted longer in Hun- 
 gary than in most European countries ; 
 and the "lords of the soil" were indem- 
 nified for any losses which they might 
 incur, by funds taken from the state rev- 
 enues. But there has never been any 
 such great and general redistribution of 
 land in Hungary as came in France after 
 the great Revolution, and as must some 
 day come in England. The lawmakers 
 of 1848 hoped for more radical results 
 than have been achieved. The peasant 
 has not made the best use of his oppor- 
 tunities. Small farmers are still the ex- 
 ception, and one sees the vast estates 
 tilled by a humble tenantry that seems" 
 curiously unconscious of its emancipa- 
 tion. The Slavs and the two miUions 
 of Roumanians in Hungary are jealous 
 of their rights, but the peasant born on 
 the soil does not share their jealousy. 
 He sows his summer and winter wheat, 
 his grass-seed and his tobacco, content- 
 edly ; cultivates the vine ; tends the hive 
 of the industrious bee ; raises cattle and 
 horses ; toils in the forest right manful- 
 ly, and accepts the wages dictated. His 
 policy is that of his employer and of his 
 village priest. 
 
 The train which brings one to Pres- 
 burg whirls along the edges of steep 
 banks which are crowded with fat vine- 
 yards. In autumn the spectacle is amaz- 
 ing. As far as the eye can reach in ev- 
 ery direction except the site of the town 
 a sea of vines salutes the view. Pres- 
 burg people are fond of their own wines, 
 as the traveller speedily discovers by a 
 short sojourn among them. They talk 
 as glibly of the virtues of some special 
 vintage as of the proud days when the 
 Hungarian monarchs came to be crown- 
 ed in the town. The ancient capital has 
 a somewhat neglected air: the citadel, 
 on an imposing hill, is partially ruined, 
 and the royal palace, which looked down 
 
252 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 on the Danube from a high plateau, was 
 burned about fifty years ago. This pal- 
 ace was in a beautiful spot. Climbing 
 up through the crooked and ill-smelling 
 Judengasse, and passing under a mas- 
 sive gateway, one gets from various van- 
 tage-grounds among the ruins a superb 
 outlook over, the fertile plains and the 
 old city lying calm and silent at one's 
 feet ; over the villages scattered along 
 the slopes of the Little Carpathians ; and 
 over many a rustic merrymaking in plea- 
 sant grove or inn-yard, for the Hunga- 
 rians have as many fete - days as the 
 French, and make quite as liberal use 
 of them. It is a trial to one's nerves to 
 wander through the Judengasse, for the 
 amiable Hebrew of the lower classes 
 seems determined in Presburg, as in 
 many other cities in the dual empire, 
 to pay as little attention as possible to 
 cleanliness in his dwelling. Sunshine 
 does not penetrate his haunts : it makes 
 one shudder to peer into the black holes 
 in which he lives, and then to gaze up 
 out of the vile lane at the luminous sky, 
 and to remember the vineyards, the riv- 
 er, the orchards, the perfumed thickets, 
 from which the children of Abraham 
 seem voluntarily to have shut them- 
 selves out. 
 
 Presburg is not far from Vienna, and 
 the cookery at one of its inns is so re- 
 nowned that hundreds of excursions 
 yearly go out from the Austrian cap- 
 ital to- dine on pheasants and to drink 
 the ruddy wine in the old town. Then 
 the lanes and the pleasant roads by the 
 riverside resound with the uproarious 
 merriment of the Austrian who has dined 
 well, and some of the graver of the in- 
 habitants sneer at his antics, for they do 
 not like him, even when he is sober. Two 
 American friends informed me that, hav- 
 ing once sent a telegraphic order from 
 Vienna for a dinner at the inn in Pres- 
 burg — kept by a landlord rejoicing in the 
 classic name of Paluygay — they found 
 such a gorgeous repast awaiting them 
 that they began to feel some misgivings 
 about the size of the bill. But when it 
 was brought they were agreeably sur- 
 prised to discover that it amounted to 
 but six guldens, or a dollar and a half 
 
 apiece I Pheasant and white wines would 
 have cost a trifle more than that in Amer- 
 ica, England or France. 
 
 The sights of Presburg are not nu- 
 merous. There is a beautiful Gothic 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 253 
 
 church over which various, architects 
 toiled for four hundred years. Therein 
 the kings were crowned ; and not far 
 from the river was the Kronungshugel, 
 like that now in Pesth — the mound of 
 earth whence the king brandished his 
 sword against the four quarters of the 
 globe, menacing all humankind with 
 destruction if it dared to scowl at Hun- 
 gary. The museums, the old seat of the 
 imperial diets, the lines of the bulwarks, 
 now converted into handsome prome- 
 nades, arrest the attention for a day or 
 two only. There is many a finely-wood- 
 ed hill in the neighborhood dotted with 
 monasteries, some of which are in ruins, 
 others still prosperous and tenanted ; 
 and he who understands Hungarian 
 may amuse himself well by wandering 
 among the rustics and the monks. The 
 peasantry is hospitable in the highest 
 degree, and extremely civil, and the lo- 
 cal authorities are the same, if they do 
 not take it into their heads to fancy that 
 you are a Russian spy. 
 
 Theben, on the left bank of the Dan- 
 ube, above Presburg, is very striking 
 in appearance. The Hungarians often 
 speak of it as the gateway to their king- 
 dom. It is at the point where the Mora- 
 va River, which forms a kind of natural 
 boundary between Austria and Hungary, 
 empties into the Danube, and there once 
 stood a fortified work near the junction 
 of the streams, but the French destroy- 
 ed it in 1809. The castle, of wild and 
 straggling architecture, still exists. Who 
 knows what sanguinary battles may not 
 yet be fought near Theben ? History, it 
 is said, repeats itself, but the present 
 Habsburg dynasty doubtless disbelieves 
 that it will do so in the case of Theben. 
 The journey to Vienna by boat is far 
 preferable to that by rail from Pres- 
 burg, for on the river one has a chance 
 to observe the famous "Hat Hill," near 
 the church of St. John, at Deutsch Alten- 
 berg. This hat hill is a mound sixty feet 
 high, constructed, it is said, with hatsful 
 of earth which the worthy burghers con- 
 tributed to celebrate their joy at the ex- 
 pulsion of the Turks. The boat also 
 passes near Lobau Island, and one can 
 see the villages of Aspern, Essling and 
 
 Wagram, after the last two of which the 
 French, when they were flushed with vic- 
 tory, named two of the elegant avenues 
 of new Paris, without even taking the 
 trouble to consult the Austrians' feelings 
 on the subject. Near Lobau the Danube 
 flows swiftly, and its current is rough and 
 boisterous. It seems hastening away from 
 the scene of national humiliation to more 
 smiling and peaceful scenes below. Na- 
 poleon I. once had his head-quarters on 
 the low, narrow wooded islet, and for 
 four days sent forth those terrible orders 
 which resulted in frightful carnage at the 
 battle of Wagram and in the signing of 
 peace by the Austrians shortly afterward. 
 There are still some traces of fortifica- 
 tions on the Lobau, and every year 
 thousands of curious visitors go to see 
 them and to trace the battle-ground ac- 
 cording to the legends of the oldest in- 
 habitants. It is needless to say that in 
 the immediate vicinity of Essling and 
 Wagram the French visitor is not looked 
 upon with friendly eyes, although through- 
 out Austria generally Frenchmen receive 
 plenty of that sympathy which springs 
 from the common hatred that two un- 
 fortunate nations feel for successful Prus- 
 sia and her victorious armies. 
 
 The largest Danube steamers — those 
 which descend as far as Galatz and the 
 Black Sea — do not go nearer Vienna 
 than a point just above Lobau Island. 
 Travellers are brought up in small and 
 swiftly - running steamboats under the 
 great bridges into the "Danube Canal," 
 and are allowed to disembark only a 
 few minutes' ride from the heart of the 
 " Kaiserstadt," as the Austrians fondly 
 like to call their beautiful capital. 
 
 Vienna is a city of delights, and one 
 never regrets a sojourn in it; but this 
 does not appear at first sight to the new- 
 comer. The older portions of the town 
 have a stern and almost forbidding as- 
 pect. There are great numbers of nar- 
 row streets, mysterious passage-ways, 
 which bring you face to face with low, 
 sombre buildings, black with age, and 
 so dreary that you fancy them prisons. 
 The iron bars or gratings at all the 
 windows of the lower stories do not aid 
 in dispelling this illusion. Just as you 
 
254 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 are beginning to fancy that you must 
 retire and seek out a new route, you see 
 a road leading under an arch or beneath 
 
 a house, and, boldly pushing forward, 
 find yourself perhaps in a main avenue, 
 perhaps in a public square, or possibly 
 
 in a new labyrinth. Surprises await you 
 on every hand. The Prater - Strasse, 
 wide, well paved, with horse -railroads 
 traversing it in all directions, and with 
 
 houses of brick or brovvnstone or im- 
 mense stuccoed mansions, reminds you 
 of the better portions of Fourth or Sixth 
 avenue in New York. A glimpse of the 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 255 
 
 magnificent " Ring," as the circular street 
 running around the whole of the old city is 
 called, is a forcible reminder of the Paris 
 boulevards. A peep into the Judengasse 
 recalls to you the slums of Frankfort-on- 
 the-Main, as well as those of Pesth. The 
 Graben, a smart promenade in a central 
 section, gives you a queer sensation of 
 being on the border-line of the Orient, 
 because of the odd statues which adorn 
 it — statues such as one sees in smaller 
 towns near the frontier of Turkey- in-Eu- 
 rope. The splendor of a goodly num- 
 ber of the principal edifices astonishes 
 you : here is new Europe springing into 
 life close beside the old and decaying 
 Europe. Vienna is so rich in exterior 
 sights, the out-of-door life is so abun- 
 dant and variegated, there is such a 
 never - ending procession of interesting 
 figures in every street and alley, that 
 you speedily become fascinated, although 
 your first walk of an hour or two disap- 
 pointed and, mayhap, vexed you. If you 
 arrive in autumn, you are almost certain 
 of finding a cold wind abroad to worry 
 you, and to explain why it is that so many 
 of the cafes and beer-houses have double 
 windows, and why such a small number 
 of people sit out of doors. It may be re- 
 marked here that the Austrians, and es- 
 pecially the Viennese, share the German 
 prejudice against fresh air, and exclude 
 it whenever and wherever they can. To 
 throw open a window in a horse-car or 
 in a public room, even oh a moderately 
 warm day, would be to encounter a cer- 
 tain torrent of reproaches. The Grand 
 Opera-house is the only properly venti- 
 lated building in Vienna. In summer 
 and in the early autumn thousands of 
 people dine and sup daily in. the open 
 air, but the moment that there is a sus- 
 picion of rawness in the breeze they fly 
 to close rooms. 
 
 I left the huge building which serves 
 as an office for the Danube Steamboat 
 Company one summer evening just as 
 the swarms of workers were beginning 
 to leave their shops and get home to 
 their suppers, and wandered carelessly 
 until I came to the venerable cathedral 
 known as St. Stephen's. In the infor- 
 mation-office of the steamboat company 
 
 I had had an excellent opportunity to 
 judge of the cosmopolitan nature of the 
 populations. Each notice was printed 
 in Polish, Slavic, German, Servian and 
 Italian. The dialects of the Slavic lan- 
 guage are so essentially different from 
 each other that several versions in this 
 lively tongue were printed and affixed 
 to the wall. Interpreters stood ready at 
 hand in the cabinet of the chief business- 
 man. I fancied that the odd mixture of 
 peoples which I saw there was observa- 
 ble only in the currents of travel, and 
 that I should find Vienna solidly Ger- 
 man in appearance. Nothing of the sort ; 
 and that which was still more striking was 
 that the Vienna speech did not seem at 
 all like the harsh and guttural language 
 of Northern Germany, where German 
 only was spoken. I strolled along the 
 bank of the Danube Canal, whose cur- 
 rent flowed impetuously past low and 
 ancient -looking houses, gray in color, 
 on one bank, and on the other past the 
 splendid edifices which ornament the 
 new " Ring." Fences separate the bank 
 of the canal from the streets, and on 
 the sloping green sward there was a 
 motley gathering. The humble folk from 
 the back streets had come out to repose 
 there and to watch the current, danger- 
 ously near which any number of small 
 bald-headed babies were playing. The 
 mothers, stretched at full length on the 
 grass, gossiped in loud, shrill voices, and 
 seemed to take no heed for their darlings. 
 Great hulking men sat here and there, 
 smoking pipes and eating bits of bread 
 and meat alternately. Your true Vien- 
 nese of the lower order cannot refrain 
 from smoking for a long time : he 
 grudges the moments of sleep, for they 
 deprive him of his favorite pipe. A few 
 of the loungers on the canal's shores 
 were evidently regular visitors there for 
 professional purposes. Among them was 
 a very old woman with purple face and 
 bulbous eyes, whose livelihood was la- 
 boriously gained by washing poodles and 
 shearing them. The spectacle of this 
 old creature plunging the cringing and 
 whining animals into the water, then 
 drawing them out and scrubbing them 
 with a coarse towel, was comical in the 
 
256 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 extreme. Another "professional" was 
 the toy-seller, a bushy-haired youth in a 
 leathern j erkin and very dilapidated hose, 
 with a frowzy fur cap placed on his locks 
 and a basket filled with cheap wooden 
 toys on one arm. A few commissionaires 
 in red caps were beating carpets in a lazy 
 " way under an arch of one of the bridges. 
 A little group of vagabonds, dirty and dis- 
 consolate, was crouched not far from this 
 
 bridge, and seemed to shrink into the 
 shade whenever the imperious police- 
 man, with his hand on his broad sabre, 
 stalked near them. 
 
 Crossing the Ring-Strasse — of which 
 more anon — I plunged into the side 
 streets, and speedily found myself con- 
 fronted by a huge flight of steps lead- 
 ing up among houses which appeared 
 to have been on a prolonged drinking 
 
 THE "GRABEN. 
 
 bout, and were tipsily endeavoring to 
 keep their equilibrium. Serving-maids, 
 with hats set upon the extreme verge 
 of topknots of straw-colored hair, and 
 wearing red gowns, dark gaiters and 
 yellow basques, tripped down by me, 
 impudently grinning as they passed. 
 Gretchen, Netti and Katti are fond of 
 a joke, especially if it be at the expense 
 of a stranger. I would I could speak 
 well of their taste in dress, but I can- 
 not. Candor compels me to state, how- 
 ever, that among these toiling women 
 of the people there are some wonderful 
 types of beauty. Are the most beauti- 
 
 ful German, Slavic or Hungarian ? I 
 know not. They are all witty, light- 
 headed, ignorant, and the real Vien- 
 na serving - girl thinks that the world 
 is bounded by the Kahlenberg, a high 
 mountain-peak which looks down upon 
 the lofty tower of St. Stephen's. Their 
 merry laughter is heard in every street, 
 and they always seem to be going some- 
 where in great haste, much to the delight 
 of soldiers and loungers in general. 
 
 Once at the top of the stairs, 1 found 
 my way without much difficulty to the 
 cathedral. I passed through many an 
 ill -smelling alley, and was not a little 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 257 
 
 amazed at the absence of the animation 
 usual in a large city. In some of the sun- 
 less and dreary avenues not a soul was 
 to be seen, unless, perchance, a fluffy 
 face emerged from a beer - cellar : in 
 others people sat silently — looking, as I 
 chose to fancy, rather morose — in their 
 shops. Had I gone back to the canal 
 or into any of the principal parks, as it 
 happened to be a very warm and sun- 
 shiny day, I should have found the peo- 
 ple whom I looked for in vain in their 
 homes. Presently I came to the dark 
 and gloomy avenue monopolized by the 
 sons of Abraham, who sell old and new 
 clothes and clocks, watches, bones and 
 rubbish. It had the appearance of a 
 miniature exchange. The Jews, nearly 
 all dressed in extravagantly long coats 
 which came down to their heels, and in 
 flat caps which only set off to great ad- 
 vantage the ugliness of their faces, and 
 their abundant hair combed in front of 
 their ears in uncouth fashion, were chaff- 
 ering with each other, and now and then 
 their voices rose into that pleading shriek 
 which signifies that the Hebrew has said 
 his last word in a bargain. As I came 
 in they all looked at me as if I were an 
 intruder, and one of them, laying a skin- 
 ny hand upon my arm, endeavored to 
 arrest my course as well as my atten- 
 tion. Anxious to see the interior of his 
 shop, I pretended to be persuaded, and 
 looked in among the extraordinary speci- 
 mens of cheap clothing which garnished 
 the doorway. The stench of stale sewage, 
 of beer and food, was revolting. I doubt 
 if a ray of health-giving sun or a breath 
 of anything like pure air had been known 
 in that infected avenue for fifty years. 
 All the men were frightfully dirty, but 
 seemed sweetly unconscious of their de- 
 graded appearance. It is in the morning 
 that the Jews congregate most numerous- 
 ly in front of their houses for the purposes 
 of traffic, and I came after the business of 
 the day was over. Still, I have a most 
 lively recollection of the manner in 
 which I was tormented to purchase ar- 
 ticles to which I would have given house- 
 room on no condition whatsoever. I sup- 
 pose that dozens of the wretched-looking 
 objects whom I passed were millionaires, 
 17 
 
 but they seemed fit for a chorus to the 
 Beggars' Opera. All is grist that comes 
 to their mill : it may be a brass watch, 
 or a servant's livery, or a silk dress, or 
 clothes stripped from a drowned per- 
 son : they buy for little and sell for a 
 great deal. They are harmless creatures, 
 but I defy any stranger to find himself 
 suddenly surrounded by them, to gaze 
 upon their haggard and unwashed and 
 unshaven faces, and to feel them ner- 
 vously pulling him this way and that, 
 without for a few moments experiencing 
 strange misgivings which he is afterward 
 at a loss to account for to himself. And 
 it is but a step from such forbidding 
 places as this to the brightness, the 
 cheerful elegance, of some principal 
 street, where never an unkempt Jew 
 shows his face ! Heaven bless the He- 
 brews ! They are, after all, the most 
 influential folk in Vienna, and it is no 
 discredit to them that a certain number 
 of their race will not wash their faces 
 and have a resistless passion for dealing 
 in rubbish. The Jews own the finest pal- 
 aces in Vienna ; they manage and dictate 
 the policy of the Vienna press ; they con- 
 trol the Viennese banking business ; and 
 they could crumple up in a day, if they 
 were not too kind and considerate to do 
 so, two-thirds of the members of the Aus- 
 trian, Hungarian and Galician nobility, 
 who in society pretend to be infinitely 
 their superiors. As for the Jews en- 
 gaged in high finance and in the lib- 
 eral professions, they are as dandyish 
 as their brethren of the lower classes 
 are negligent. Paris and London tai- 
 lors have nothing which is too good or 
 too costly for them. The Hebrew who 
 now and then confiscates the goods 
 and chattels of some wealthy Christian 
 must feel a grim satisfaction when he 
 remembers that up to 1856 his race had 
 almost no privileges in Vienna, and that 
 in 1849 no Jew could remain in the city 
 over night without a passport, which he 
 was obliged to have renewed every fif- 
 teen days. Four hundred and fifty years 
 ago five-score Jews were burned alive in 
 the Austrian capital because the rumor 
 ran that some son of Israel had pur- 
 chased a consecrated wafer, and had 
 
258 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 made use of it in parodying the forms 
 of the CathoHc high mass. 
 
 It was refreshing to get out of the Ju- 
 
 dengasse into decent air, and at last 
 to find myself before the old cathedral, 
 around which the busy life of commei- 
 
 I X 
 
 cial Vienna flowed and roared as a noisy 
 stream breaks at the base of a majestic 
 rock. St. Stephen's cathedral is entitled 
 to the traveller's keenest admiration. 
 
 Legend and history and poetry have 
 done their utmost to make it interest- 
 ing, and its beautiful proportions at once 
 enlist one's sympathies. The Viennese 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 259 
 
 have a positive affection for it, and stop 
 in the midst of their morning hurry to 
 look lovingly upon it. The old south- 
 ern tower of the noble limestone edifice 
 dates from 1359, ^'^'^ i*- ^^^ nearly a cen- 
 tury before it was completed. From that 
 tower the weary Austrians saw the glitter 
 of the spears and helmets of the Christian 
 army approaching to deliver them from 
 the besieging Turks in those dread days 
 when the Burg bastion was already in 
 the hands of the infidel, and when it 
 seemed certain that he would be able 
 to pillage the town ; and from the same 
 tower, with sinking hearts, Viennese high 
 in power watched the progress of the bat- 
 tle between French and Austrians at Ess- 
 ling when this century was young. The 
 thorough restoration which the church 
 has undergone in the last fifteen years 
 has detracted no whit from its pictur- 
 esqueness. The Giant's Door, opened 
 only Avhen some great religious festival 
 demands the use of every portion of the 
 cathedral, is extremely imposing. It is 
 not the custom of the Viennese to men- 
 tion that the tower has been entirely 
 restored ; but such is the fact, as the 
 ancient one had become so shaky that 
 it had twice undergone very extensive 
 repairs. The common people in Aus- 
 tria are exceedingly devout, and the 
 Protestant traveller feels almost as if 
 he were guilty of indelicacy in stalking 
 before the rows of worshippers who may 
 be found at nearly every hour of day- 
 light kneeling at the shrines or thumb- 
 ing their prayer-books or loudly respond- 
 ing to the intonations of the priests. The 
 lovely faces of the adoring women are 
 not raised as their shoulders are brush- 
 ed by the heretic who has come to spy 
 out the wonders of the church. Wheth- 
 er or not the religion be more than skin- 
 deep, it is certainly apparent to a consid- 
 erable degree on the surface. The rich- 
 ly-carved choir-stalls, the ornate stained 
 glasses of fifteenth-century workmanship, 
 the stone which closes the entrance to the 
 old vault in which the sovereigns of Aus- 
 tria were long buried (the present recep- 
 tacle of dead royalty is in the church of 
 the Capuchins), the altar representing the 
 stoning of Stephen, the Adlerthor and the 
 
 Bischofsthor, the groined vaulting sup- 
 ported by eighteen massivepillars, — are 
 all worth many hours of careful study. 
 So are the beggars, deputies from the 
 under-strata of all Austria's nationalities, 
 who lay in wait for me — and I dare say 
 will for you when you go to Vienna — 
 both within and without the sacred edi- 
 fice. Old women, importunate as witches, 
 heap imprecations in the Wiejier dialect 
 upon the luckless wight who does not 
 drop a kreutzer- piece into their trem- 
 bling hands. 
 
 High up in the tower swings a noble 
 and melodious bell called "Josephine," 
 cast in the reign of Joseph I., and rung 
 for the first time when Charles VI. fas- 
 tened the imperial crown upon his brows 
 at Frankfort. Black days have come to 
 Austria since that time : the house of the 
 Habsburgs — noteworthy because it has 
 been so full of almost blameless princes 
 — has seen bitter humiliation, and pro- 
 found discouragement has knocked at 
 the doors of the "Burg," as the Vien- 
 nese call the monarch's palace. But 
 steady toil at reconstruction has' done 
 good both to men's spirits and to their 
 prospects, and some day Josephine's 
 mighty tongue will clamorously an- 
 nounce a great victory. The peasants 
 in the far-away Styrian Mountains some- 
 times stop suddenly in their work, and, 
 calling to each other, say, " Do you hear 
 Josephine in Vienna ? What can have 
 happened ?" The bell is of immense 
 power. An ingenious fire-alarm is also 
 managed from the belfry in which Jo- 
 sephine is housed. St. Stephen's is so 
 central that the numbers of the streets 
 are reckoned from it. 
 
 From the venerable church it is but 
 a short walk through handsome streets 
 lined with fine business-blocks, the lower 
 stories of which are devoted to attractive 
 shops, to the Graben, the broad but not 
 long avenue which the eye hails grateful- 
 ly after resting on narrow lanes on many 
 sides of it. The most bewildering effect 
 is produced on the visitor by constantly 
 stepping from brilliant thoroughfares into 
 mean and unattractive ones. The ar- 
 cades which branch out from the Graben 
 are much finer than the "passages" of 
 
26o 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 Paris. It is astonishing that they have 
 not been adopted in our American cities, 
 where the extreme heat in summer and 
 the cold and snow in winter render them 
 very desirable. The Graben — which de- 
 rives its name from the fact that it is on 
 the site of the moat of the old fortifica- 
 tions existing in the twelfth century — is a 
 dangerous place for people with slender 
 purses, for in the windows are displayed 
 all the tempting specialties of Vienna, such 
 as delicious Russia leather goods, orna- 
 mental bindings for books and albums, 
 bronzes and bijouterie, photographs — for 
 which the Viennese artists seem to pos- 
 sess especial talent — and carvings from 
 the Tyrol and from the Styrian Alps. 
 There are no striking architectural fea- 
 tures in the famous avenue ; the red- 
 nosed hackmen group around a pecu- 
 liar-looking monument erected in 1693 
 to commemorate the cessation of the 
 plague ; and, in the season, hundreds 
 of tall, elegant ladies, equipped in the 
 latest Paris fashions, besiege the shops. 
 " The season " is an unfortunate moment 
 for the stranger who is not rich. In 
 
 autumn and winter every hotel, every 
 suitable apartment-house, every palace, 
 is occupied by the country nobility, who 
 flock in from their estates, where they 
 have been economizing for seven months', 
 to lead a merry life in the capital for 
 the other five. Princes, archdukes and 
 counts are as plenty as blackberries in 
 an American pasture. The respect for 
 title is carried to an exaggerated point in 
 Austria unknown even in Great Britain. 
 The porter at a grand hotel speaks with 
 bated breath of his titled guests. Hat- 
 raising, genuflexion and hand -kissing 
 salute the nobleman from the moment 
 he leaves his bedchamber until he re-. 
 turns to it at night. These courtesies 
 cost money : each noble lord is severely 
 fleeced by his retainers, by shopkeepers 
 and by hotel-men ; and before he leaves for 
 home he is frequently compelled to call 
 upon some Hebrew friend for a tremen- 
 dous loan. Vienna is a very expensive 
 capital : it is safe to say that fifty cents 
 there will not buy more than twenty in 
 Paris. 
 
 CONCLUDING PART. 
 
 TH E Ring - Strasse was a happy 
 thought. Vienna would have been 
 but a second-rate capital without it. But 
 it was a terribly expensive conception, 
 and Austrian finances could not stand 
 the strain which it placed upon them. 
 To-day the project is incomplete, but it 
 is splendid, even in its unfinished condi- 
 tion. When all the great edifices, which 
 now look melancholy and forlorn sur- 
 rounded with ugly palings and scaffold- 
 ings, are complete, Paris must look to 
 her laurels. The Viennese is proud of 
 his "Ring," and as soon as his business 
 is done he hastens from his dingy office 
 in an ancient and unsavory street to prom- 
 enade in the immensely broad avenues or 
 to view other promenaders from behind 
 the windows of a cafe or restauration. 
 
 Until the early years of this century 
 Vienna possessed a double line of for- 
 tifications. She did not propose to be 
 again caught napping by the Turks. In 
 1704 the exterior line was built to pro- 
 
 tect the city against Rakoczy's Hunga- 
 rians, who were exceedingly troublesome. 
 This still exists, but the city has gone be- 
 yond it, and the traveller is not a little sur- 
 prised to find himself confronted by the 
 guard whose task it is to levy duty upon 
 passengers and freight coming in to town 
 when he thinks that he is in the very 
 centre of the capital. After 1858 the in- 
 ner fortifications, which were gradually 
 crumbling into unsightly ruins, were 
 mainly removed, although some of the 
 massive walls may still be seen, and the 
 new Ring-Strasse was built on the site of 
 the old rampart and fosse. The builders 
 were mindful of coming generations, and 
 laid out the avenue on such an ample 
 scale that the present population cannot 
 fill it. Even on fete-days it has a sub- 
 urban air. But a century hence the wis- 
 dom of the plans will be apparent. 
 
 Starting from the new and magnificent 
 Exchange, in front of which crowds are al- 
 ways pressing as tumultuously as is pos- 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 261 
 
 sible for people who are not especially 
 excitable, a walk around the Ring is ex- 
 ceedingly impressive. The Exchange is 
 a rather sad-colored structure, with a su- 
 perb portico. The interior is finer than 
 * that of any other Exchange in Europe. 
 The public cannot view it from conve- 
 nient galleries, as it can those of Paris 
 and London : the speculators who fre- 
 quent it even pay an annual subscrip- 
 tion for their entries. Each business- 
 man of importance has a small room 
 opening on one of the three grand naves 
 of the central hall. There he receives his 
 visitors and makes his sales. Clouds of 
 smoke rise up to the stately ceiling, and 
 from the corridors below come odors of 
 invigorating beer. In the basement the 
 flour exchange is located, besides a co- 
 lossal restaurant, where much of the prin- 
 cipal business of Vienna is done between 
 the discussion of two bocks. After the ter- 
 rible crisis of 1873 there were some stormy 
 scenes outside this Exchange. Several 
 prominent financiers were brutally beat- 
 en, and the government was compelled 
 to send troops to restore order. Now the 
 men who were then doing business by 
 millions are contented with the safer 
 game of hundreds, and are every way 
 more rational than during the days of 
 inflation. 
 
 Not far from the Exchange, and on a 
 side street, is the new telegraph-office, 
 which is, as a recent writer has express- 
 ed it, " a finer palace than that of the em- 
 peror." The telegraph service in Austria 
 is admirable and cheap, and apparently 
 restricted by no more formalities since 
 the epoch of liberalism arrived than in 
 America. A porter, imposing in costly 
 uniform, meets you on the steps and di- 
 rects you to any office which you may 
 designate. Every palace, church and 
 establishment of importance, even the 
 bank and the wholesale dry-goods house, 
 boasts one of these porters, dressed far 
 better than a general and of most ex- 
 travagant manners. These gentry date 
 from the time when Charles VI. intro- 
 duced the most extraordinary luxury into 
 Vienna, and when it was not uncommon 
 for a single nobleman to have a hundred 
 servants in his household. 
 
 The Ring is dotted with beautiful struc- 
 tures from the Exchange to the Grand 
 Opera. The police head-quarters is in- 
 stalled in a mammoth hotel built just 
 before the crash — an hotel devoid, how- 
 ever, of any special architectural fea- 
 tures. The days have passed away when 
 the police was Austria's principal and 
 most formidable organization, and when 
 no man's secrets were safe ; but the fa- 
 mous body still has great authority. 
 The men, in their short jackets and 
 navy hats, and with their broad sabres 
 dangling at their sides, are prompt and 
 efficient, as now and then they need to 
 be, for Vienna has a canaille among its 
 lower classes as dangerous as that of 
 London. Not far from the police-office 
 are the Comic Opera, the Hotel de France 
 and the unfinished Parliament Palace, 
 City Hall and University. Heaven alone 
 knows when these latter will be finished. 
 The present Chamber of Deputies is a 
 temporary structure, insignificant in ap- 
 pearance and inconvenient. If these 
 great buildings are ever completed, the 
 government intends to build near them 
 a vast museum, in which the rich col- 
 lections of the Belvedere and of the Mu- 
 seum of Natural History will be united. 
 Near the site selected for this museum 
 are the stables of the emperor, in which 
 six hundred noble horses are housed ; 
 and among the treasures in these sta- 
 bles are saddles and rich housings taken 
 from the Ottomans whom John Sobieski 
 chased from under the walls of Vienna. 
 At this point of the Ring the splendors 
 of the Austrian capital will culminate, 
 unless new wars and financial embar- 
 rassments for ever swamp the designs. 
 The Votive Church, a memorial of Fran- 
 cis Joseph's gratitude to Heaven for his 
 escape from assassination in 1853, is, to 
 my thinking, the prettiest church in Aus- 
 tria. It is a triumph of Gothic art. The 
 delicious lightness of its lines, the ethe- 
 real colors of its windows, the quaint ef- 
 fect produced by its sharply-pitched roof 
 ornamented with variegated tilings, — all 
 give a pleasurable sensation to eyes long 
 offended by heavy and ungracious edi- 
 fices. I doubt if there is a single church 
 in the United States as beautiful as this 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 ATUE OF THE EMPEROR FRANCIS I. OF AUSTRIA. 
 
 "votive" shrine, which springs as dain- 
 tily and naturally from the ground as 
 does a slender and graceful elm. 
 
 There are many lovely gardens in Vi- 
 enna, but none more handsome than the 
 Hofgarten, which the promenader around 
 the Ring finds at his left as he goes on 
 
 toward the Grand Opera. This Hofgar- 
 ten, which has in it a statue of Francis 1., 
 is the resort of the court, and has for its 
 neighbor the humbler but even more 
 attractive Volksgarten, where stands 
 an imitation of the temple of Theseus at 
 Athens, with sculptures by Canova with- 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 263 
 
 in. A new court theatre is springing up 
 just north of the Volksgarten. In sum- 
 mer and autumn thousands of Vienna 
 burghers wander among the flowers here, 
 listening to the music furnished by or- 
 chestras and bands such as Johann and 
 Eduard Strauss know how to assemble, 
 (n winter the gardens look uninviting, 
 and not even occasional sunshine can 
 :empt the burgher and his family to risk 
 a promenade in them. In spring, when 
 the fountains are plashing, the great 
 ranks of flowers sending out their per- 
 fumes, the orchestras playing, hundreds 
 of children and nursemaids romping and 
 laughing, knots of brilliantly -uniformed 
 officers promenading arm-in-arm with 
 the exquisitely-pretty Viennese girls, the 
 Stadtpark and the Volksgarten present a 
 spectacle gayer than any to be found in 
 more northern capitals. There is more 
 spontaneous and natural ebullition of 
 merriment, more pleasure in the fact of 
 mere existence, than the North will per- 
 mit of. Life seems pleasant indeed to 
 these large lustrous - eyed Italian beau- 
 ties, to the slender and passionate-faced 
 Hungarian daughters, to the haughty 
 young Slavs, whose loveliness is power- 
 ful as a spell over the man of German 
 blood. It is on the Ring and in these 
 gardens that one discovers that Vienna 
 is not a German city in the strict sense 
 of the word. German is heard no often- 
 er than at least three other languages, 
 and Francis Joseph is beloved of all 
 classes because he has never endeavor- 
 ed to force the diverse national elements 
 in his empire into one groove or to make 
 one language flourish at the expense of 
 another. 
 
 The ladies of Vienna are in some re- 
 spects almost as independent as those of 
 New York or Philadelphia. They wan- 
 der about the streets unattended, on foot, 
 morning and afternoon, and feel none of 
 the influence of those absurd convention- 
 alities which cripple the French and the 
 Italians. 
 
 Not far from the Hofgarten, and at- 
 tached to the archduke Albert's palace, 
 is a matchless gallery of designs and en- 
 gravings, founded by that duke Albert 
 who was a son of Frederick Augustus, 
 
 king of Poland, elector of Saxony. Here 
 are grouped together one hundred and 
 forty-seven designs by Rembrandt alone, 
 and a vast number of studies by Rubens 
 and Van Dyck. Here also are nearly 
 four hundred original designs by Al- 
 brecht Dijrer, the legacy of the enthu- 
 siastic Rodolph II. The artistic riches 
 of Vienna may be guessed at from the 
 fact that important as is this Albertina 
 Collection — as it is called — it is nearly 
 equalled by five others, which give an 
 admirable idea of the old Dutch, Italian 
 and German schools. These five collec- 
 tions belong to Prince Liechtenstein and 
 to Counts Breunner, Schbnborn, Czer- 
 nin and Harrach ; and to these must be 
 added that of the Belvedere, renowned 
 throughout Europe. The Ambras collec- 
 tion in the Belvedere and the Museum of 
 Weapons are among the brightest mem- 
 ories of American tourists. The " Hall 
 of Fame " in the last-named museum is 
 a colossal plan badly carried out. The 
 scenes from the earlier history of Austria 
 in the dome are good, but many of the 
 other paintings are decidedly inferior. 
 The Academy of Art, founded in 1705, 
 likewise has some noteworthy pictures, 
 and the emperor has promised to add to 
 them, now that the new Academy is in 
 order. This institution is in the Schiller 
 Platz, and is ornamented with a bronze 
 statue of that poet, as well as of many 
 other demigods of literature and art. 
 The cynical German of the North likes 
 to say that there is no culture in Vien- 
 na, but this is very far from the truth. 
 Goethe, Schiller and Shakespeare are as 
 passionately adored in the Austrian cap- 
 ital as in Berlin, and the Bard of Avon 
 is especially cultivated. 
 
 The "Opern Ring " and points near it 
 are among the most interesting in Vi- 
 enna, and in summer they are very ani- 
 mated until a late hour. But Vienna has 
 no such night-life as Paris. By eleven 
 o'clock the majority of the streets are 
 almost deserted, and the porter who 
 opens the door of your house is entitled 
 to levy a small fine — ten kreutzers, I 
 think — because you disturb him after 
 his day's duties are supposed to be over. 
 Apartment-houses are the rule, and each 
 
264 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 house has a vast outer door opening into 
 a court, whence the various stairways di- 
 verge. There is also a variety of vast 
 edifices, each containing hundreds of 
 apartments and tenements, which are 
 the property of the great ecclesiastical 
 foundations and abbeys, and some of 
 these are so extensive as to be mistaken 
 by strangers for public institutions. The 
 Schottenhof, once the property of some 
 Scottish Benedictines, who were invited 
 
 to Austria by the first duke in 11 58, and 
 the Melkerhof, which belongs to a pic- 
 turesque old abbey not far from Vienna, 
 are good illustrations of this. Many of 
 these caravanseries have passage-ways 
 through them, and the ground -floors 
 within the courts are occupied by small 
 shops. The friendly beggar also en- 
 sconces himself in the shelter of a wall, 
 and begs of the hundreds of inmates as 
 they go out and in, without ever being 
 
 THE BELVEDERE. 
 
 troubled by the police, so far as I could 
 discover. 
 
 But let us come back to the Opern Ring. 
 Naturally, the most conspicuous object 
 upon it is the Grand Opera, whence it 
 takes its name. This edifice is by no 
 means of 5o fine exterior as that of Pa- 
 ris, but as an opera-house is far supe- 
 rior. It is long and low, its arcades are 
 not very impressive, and the few statues 
 which it possesses are not works of ge- 
 nius. But in the theatre portion of the 
 house it is the ideal of a well-ordered 
 structure for musical spectacles. A Swiss 
 author, whose stories need to be taken 
 
 with a grain of salt, says that the prin- 
 cipal architect of the Opera died of cha- 
 grin because of the numerous unfavor- 
 able criticisms which his work excited. 
 The building was completed only in 1869. 
 and still has an atmosphere of newness 
 environing it. The fa9ade fronting on 
 the Ring-Strasse is so low that when one 
 views it from that point one can form no 
 adequate idea of the immense size of the 
 building. Everything within is arranged 
 with the most exquisite order and good 
 taste. Enteringthe marble corridor, which 
 is nearly level with the street, and from 
 which a superb marble staircase ascends 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 265 
 
 to the boxes, one finds that there are plen- 
 ty of ticket-offices, so that there need be 
 no crowding. A vast and brilhantly-uni- 
 formedbeadle, a stupendous creature, evi- 
 dently born expressly for the purpose of 
 creating mingled admiration and fear in 
 just such a place as he occupies, parades 
 to and fro, striking the marbles with his 
 brass-pointed staff. He is "one having 
 authority," and when there is any ne- 
 cessity for orders he gives them freely 
 to a staff of more soberly dressed offi- 
 cials. Cloak-rooms abound ; the ushers 
 are civil to a degree unknown elsewhere ; 
 and, ushered into an audience-room which 
 contains three thousand people, and from 
 each section of which every part of the 
 stage can be distinctly seen, one realizes 
 for the first time in his life the real so- 
 lemnity of theatre-going. To the orches- 
 tra-seats ladies and their cavaliers enter 
 in the same dignified way that they would 
 go into a fashionable church. They feel 
 that they have come to be moved and in- 
 spired by art : the opera is an institution 
 which they are proud to sustain, and at 
 which they are delighted to be seen twice 
 or thrice weekly. There are habitues who 
 never miss a night during the whole long 
 season. Among them I remember well 
 an aged officer who always arrives just 
 as the curtain is about to rise, settles slow- 
 ly and painfully into his seat, and then 
 devotes himself until the close to every 
 detail with the most painstaking atten- 
 tion. The beautiful hall is so thorough- 
 ly and perfectly ventilated that one nev- 
 er experiences the slightest discomfort. 
 Employes can at any moment, by touch- 
 ing electric bells, procure you a current 
 of warm or of cool air. The ventilating 
 machinery in the capacious cellars is so 
 complicated as to seem magical. The 
 whole building is lighted at once by an 
 electric apparatus, and all the colossal 
 scenes on the stage are moved up, down 
 or away by steam. So fine is the organi- 
 zation in this latter department that twelve 
 men manage the whole business of scene- 
 shifting and produce effects which are 
 marvellous. I have never seen anything 
 to surpass the metamorphosis in the first 
 act of Tannhdtiser. In the twinkling of 
 an eye the vast grotto in which the knight 
 
 has been spellbound by the lurid lady 
 and her attendants — a grotto filled with 
 cascades, with cool recesses crowded with 
 shells and translucent waves, with fan- 
 tastic retreats in which sea- monsters are 
 basking — fades away and leaves Tann- 
 hauser trembling at the foot of a rocky 
 hill, on which stands a lofty abbey. The 
 beams of dawn are faintly touching the 
 towers, and the leaves of the trees are 
 tremulous in the morning breeze. To 
 the left, on a moss-grown rock, one sees 
 a shepherd lad playing upon a rustic pipe 
 a bewitchingly pastoral air. A hunting- 
 horn is heard : a party of huntsmen ad- 
 vance, and Tannhauser awakes from his 
 dream. This is poetry sublimated, and 
 reconciles one with Wagner. Mean- 
 time, the grand orchestra of one hun- 
 dred and fifty musicians unrivalled in 
 Europe interprets the unspeakable and 
 especially unsingable things which Mas- 
 ter Wagner evolves from his soul. A'ida, 
 as given at this Opera, is a touching, ten- 
 der, inexpressibly lovely poem from first 
 to last. From the moment that it begins 
 until it ends the seer and hearer is trans- 
 ported into ancient Egypt, and his senses 
 are intoxicated by a wealth of artistic de- 
 tail which is unrivalled elsewhere. Frau 
 Materna, as Zelika in L 'Afncaine, court- 
 ing death beneath the poisonous man- 
 zanilla tree, while the orchestra inter- 
 prets the splendid symphony on which 
 Meyerbeer bestowed genius enough to 
 make half a dozen composers immortal, 
 can never be forgotten by those who 
 have seen her. She appears to less ad- 
 vantage in some of the roles in Wag- 
 ner's mythical operas, where the action 
 passes in the clouds, and where she is 
 condemned to wear an ill-looking hel- 
 met and to unloose her locks. Seven 
 hundred persons are employed by the 
 administration of the Opera, and the 
 institution has its own establishment for 
 making properties and costumes. Shams 
 are despised, and dresses are made of 
 rich materials. The arsenals and muse- 
 ums of the state are drawn upon when- 
 ever they can be of service in the pro- 
 duction of an opera. Herr Richter, who 
 conducted the orchestra which interpret- 
 ed Wagner's works at Bayreuth, holds 
 
266 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 the baton at the Vienna Opera, and de- 
 votes himself with the greatest earnest- 
 ness to popularizing the master in the 
 
 Austrian capital. I confess that not 
 even the luxurious appointments of the 
 stage nor the exalted character of the 
 
 orchestration succeeded in convincing 
 me that The Valkyrior was sufficiently- 
 dramatic to be interesting as an opera ; 
 but the manner in which mechanical 
 
 skill had overcome the difficulties which 
 I had supposed to prevent representation 
 of supernatural things was quite stupefy- 
 ing. The chorus and the ballet are as 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 267 
 
 admirable as. every other essential fea- 
 ture of the performances is. Ballets, as 
 given in Vienna, are worth travelling 
 hundreds of miles to see. They are fre- 
 quently in two or three acts and last for 
 an hour or two, and villages, forests, 
 armies and troops of beautiful women 
 pass before the vision like phantasms 
 in a dream. Cappelia is the name of 
 a ballet first produced in Paris. When 
 it was taken to Vienna it was so much 
 improved and amplified as to be scarce- 
 ly recognizable. The fact that ballets 
 are given as separate pieces at the 
 Grand Opera does not hinder the ad- 
 ministration from embodying them in 
 the musical works also. Nothing can 
 exceed in idyllic beauty the scene in the 
 temple where the priestesses of the Sun 
 are performing their sacred rites, while 
 Ai'da and her lover are dying suffocated 
 in the vault below. The Viennese have 
 made this the ne plus ultra of dramatic 
 contrast. 
 
 The director of the Opera is an am- 
 bitious man. He does everything thor- 
 oughly, and is so anxious to have it done 
 better than elsewhere that he rehearsed 
 Wagner's Valkyrior one hundred times 
 before he allowed it to be presented to 
 the public. Not very long ago one of 
 Mendelssohn's symphonies was "set to 
 scenery" and produced on this stage. 
 There is a yearly season of Italian opera 
 alternated with the regular German reper- 
 toire from March until May. It is then 
 that such stars as Nilsson, Patti and Luc- 
 ca appear. The Viennese are very faith- 
 ful in their affection for their own stock 
 •company, which is exceptionally rich in 
 good voices. Certainly, excellent sing- 
 ing may be expected in an opera which 
 receives a large subsidy from the state, and 
 which pays its first tenor twelve thousand 
 florins for nine months' service. The Vi- 
 enna people are, curiously enough, more 
 interested in Wagner than the Prussians 
 are. The court has, I fancy, contributed 
 somewhat toward the enthusiasm of the 
 Austrians for a composer who is the espe- 
 cial pet of Francis Joseph's son-in-law, 
 young Louis of Bavaria. 
 
 The imperial family has its " box at the 
 opera," a huge, richly -blazoned loge in 
 
 the middle of the dress-circle, and some- 
 times the emperor in uniform may be 
 seen there. He evidently comes to the 
 music for relaxation and rest, and not 
 merely to be seen and to lend glory to 
 the occasion. The opera and prome- 
 nades in the Prater are about the only 
 amusements in which he indulges dur- 
 ing "the season." He listens intently, 
 and applauds like a connoisseur, not os- 
 tentatiously, but discreetly and "in the 
 proper places." The emperor has a sad 
 face — not bitter nor cynical, but worn 
 and weary. It is not strange, for he has 
 had trouble enough to kill men of less 
 sturdy stock. He is an earnest man, 
 anxious for the consolidation of the emi- 
 pire-kingdom committed to his keeping. 
 It would be difficult to recognize in him 
 now the dainty "Prince Charming" who 
 danced with the Hungarian beauties 
 when he was first made emperor, and 
 whose elegance in fashionable life was 
 on every one's tongue. Now he is a 
 loving husband and father and a sober 
 man of hard work — out of bed, summer 
 and winter, at five o'clock in the morn- 
 ing, and busy in his library while his 
 functionaries — even the astute Andrassy 
 — are recovering from the fatigues of rout 
 and reception in the diplomatic world, 
 or ball. He takes coffee early, lights a 
 long cigar, and smokes it while reading 
 his despatches. About eleven o'clock 
 he drinks a glass of beer, and at one he 
 dines with his family. The rest of his 
 day is spent either in the saddle or in 
 the council -chamber. The Habsburg 
 family is very devout, and has a great 
 many religious duties to perform, which 
 consume a good deal of Francis Joseph's 
 time. To be emperor of Austria and king 
 of Hungary implies being an apostolic as 
 well as an imperial majesty. The empe- 
 ror and all the members of his family 
 are rigid Catholics. On Holy Friday 
 Francis Joseph follows, bareheaded and 
 humble, behind the archbishop who leads 
 the procession, surrounded by swarms of 
 priests, who revive the sacerdotal splen- 
 dor of the Middle Ages, to and from the 
 old cathedral. Austria still allows the 
 Catholic street -displays which are for- 
 bidden in so many other countries. The 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 State lends all that it possesses of daz- 
 zling to dignify the ceremonials of the 
 Church. Artillery thunders, trumpets 
 sound, heralds advance clad in fantas- 
 tic garments. After religious rites have 
 been celebrated in the interior of the 
 imperial palace, the cortege promenades 
 the principal streets. The archbishop 
 bears the holy sacrament, round which 
 rise clouds of in- 
 cense from censers 
 swung by the hands 
 of acolytes. The 
 emperor wears the 
 uniform of a gene- 
 ral, and is followed 
 at a respectful dis- 
 tance by his staff 
 of marshals and of- 
 ficers, the German 
 Guard resplendent 
 in scarlet and gold, 
 and the Hungarians 
 in brilliant tunics, 
 with leopard -skins 
 hanging from their 
 shoulders and their 
 breasts aglow with 
 precious stones. 
 The number of 
 lackeys, pages, 
 court chamber- 
 lains, gentlemen of 
 the household and 
 musicians is only 
 exceeded by the 
 friars, black, white, 
 red, gray, yellow 
 and green, who 
 spring up on this 
 day of days from 
 the hundreds of re- 
 ligious institutions 
 in the neighbor- 
 hood of the capital, 
 
 and who vanish as quickly as they came 
 when the ceremonies are ended. All 
 work is suspended : people who with- 
 out exaggeration may be counted by hun- 
 dreds of thousands flock from church to 
 church and render the streets impassable 
 for vehicles. Later in the day the em- 
 peror and empress enter the reception- 
 room of the palace, and there wash the 
 
 feet of twelve old men, who come clad 
 as pilgrims to receive this touching hom- 
 age and memorial of humility from the 
 hands of their sovereigns. Then the old 
 men are seated at table and the emperor 
 and empress serve them food and wine. 
 When the meal is finished Francis Jo- 
 seph hangs about the neck of each ven- 
 erable man a little purse filled with gold, 
 
 THE IMPERIAL ARSENAL. 
 
 and proceeds to inquire tenderly about 
 his wants and those of his family. This 
 scene never fails vividly to recall, as it 
 is intended to do, the acts and words of 
 Jesus at the Last Supper. There are no 
 signs that these processions and obser- 
 vances will ever fall into disuse. Hun- 
 garians, Slavs, Italians and Southern 
 Germans have a profound affection for 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 269 
 
 religious pomp, and the shopkeepers 
 would growl were they to be deprived 
 of the income which they draw from the 
 necessary preparations for these festivals. 
 But many of the customs which prevailed 
 during the last century are no longer ob- 
 served. Then the mystery of the "Pas- 
 sion " was represented in the churches; 
 Judas was burned in effigy at the door 
 of the cathedral ; and a "benediction of 
 the wolves " was given in memory of the 
 time when wolves used to venture even 
 into the streets of Vienna, and when 
 their bowlings troubled pious souls who 
 were engaged in their devotions. All 
 Saints' Day and "the Day of the Dead" 
 are observed with the same earnest fidel- 
 ity as in Paris and throughout France. 
 There is still a large fund of superstition 
 among the lower classes in Austria, and 
 religious fanaticism is sometimes carried 
 to a startling pitch, as in the case of a 
 stableman who crucified himself a year 
 or two since, and who was found bleed- 
 ing slowly to death with a rosary about 
 his neck. 
 
 The emperor is able to speak in their 
 own language to all his varied subjects, 
 and it is not unusual for him to receive 
 Slavs, Hungarians, Germans and Poles 
 in one morning. He never makes the 
 slightest pretensions to unapproachable 
 dignity in public, and is as democratic 
 as General Grant or President Hayes. 
 The entrance to that portion of the pal- 
 ace in which he resides is in a vast court- 
 yard, through which there is a public 
 passage-way, and the humblest cobbler 
 or corporal may stand close beside the 
 emperor as he comes in or out. He is 
 always affectionately saluted by baring 
 of the head on the part of men and pro- 
 found bows from women. 
 
 The old "Burg," or palace, is a mass of 
 buildings of different styles and epochs — 
 none of them especially striking — united 
 by courts. Once upon a time it was de- 
 fended by fortifications, but now the pop- 
 ulace could invade it in five minutes. 
 Within, there are splendid apartments, 
 libraries, collections of armor and hun- 
 dreds of costly portraits. In the imperial 
 treasury are the famous globe surmount- 
 ed by a cross, the sceptre crowned with 
 
 an eagle and the massive crown which 
 the Habsburgs have so long worn. The 
 crown which the archdukes of Austria 
 wore when they went to Frankfort to be 
 crowned is also in this treasury : it is in 
 fine gold, ornamented with diamonds, 
 pearls and rubies, and cost countless 
 thousands. The diamond crown worn 
 by the empress on state occasions cost 
 nearly eight hundred thousand dollars. 
 Neither the receptacles of the Vatican 
 nor the museums of Dresden contain 
 such a miraculous store of riches as is 
 shut within the treasury in this sombre 
 old Burg. Add to this unrivalled mu- 
 seum the imperial library, which con- 
 tains three hundred thousand volumes 
 and twenty thousand manuscripts, the 
 museums of natural history, the cabinets 
 of antiquities and precious stones, gal- 
 leries devoted to mineralogy, zoology 
 and botany, a vast riding-school for the 
 use of the ladies and gentlemen of the 
 court in winter, and you have some faint 
 idea of the diversity of the Burg's interior. 
 Passing througli the gallery leading to 
 the zoological museum during a visit to 
 Vienna some years ago in company with 
 an eccentric American friend, a curious 
 episode occurred. At a dark point in the 
 long corridor we came upon a white-coat- 
 ed sentine}, grim, silent, hugging his gun 
 as if he fancied that we desired to take 
 it from him. This sentinel, if he be still 
 alive, has probably never recovered from 
 the stupefaction into which he was thrown 
 by what then and there occurred. My 
 friend walked up to him, and with a 
 quick motion of his hand turned the sol- 
 dier round as if he had been a wooden 
 manikin swinging on a pivot. When 
 he had thus taken a good look at him 
 he apostrophized him as follows : "You 
 must get awful tired of this standing 
 about ; and it is a dreadful poor busi- 
 ness for a big, handsome fellow like 
 you. When you get through, you'd bet- 
 ter emigrate to Ameriky. Never heard 
 of Ameriky, mebbe. Well, never mind : 
 you jest take my advice and go to Amer- 
 iky." Then he turned the sentinel round 
 once more, gave him a playful dig in the 
 ribs with his fore finger, and moved on. 
 What the sentinel thought it is impos 
 
270 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 CHARLES CHURCH. 
 
 sible to imagine. Perhaps he was afraid 
 to resent it, for fear that it might be some 
 imperial joke. If my friend had ventured 
 thus cavaherly to treat a Prussian senti- 
 nel, he would infallibly have been skew- 
 ered with a bayonet. 
 
 Near by is the tomb — as here, in the 
 
 Burg is the cradle— of the Habsburgs. 
 A subterranean alley unites the imperial 
 palace to the church of the Augustines, 
 where the members of the family are in 
 these later times buried, or, rather, where 
 their hearts are preserved in funereal 
 urns. There is the magnificent tomb 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 271 
 
 which Maria Theresa's daughter erect- 
 ed to her husband, Duke Albert : Cano- 
 va's richest marbles are lavished on this 
 monument. The tombs of the emperor 
 Leopold II. and of the great marshal and 
 general Daum are also in this church. 
 But the powerful emperors of the elder 
 days sleep in the church of the Capu- 
 chins, in the centre of the city, and 
 among them lie Joseph II. and Maxi- 
 milian, the two unhappiest in the line 
 which rules over infelix Austria. Even 
 to this day the good people of Trieste 
 and Vienna cannot speak without emo- 
 tion in their voices of the gentle prince 
 whose life was sacrificed in Mexico to the 
 necessities of a cruel situation for which 
 he was in no measure responsible. 
 
 Sunday church-going is a prime fea- 
 ture of Viennese fashionable life, chiefly 
 because of the superb concerts given in 
 the principal religious edifices on that 
 day. On great festivals like those men- 
 tioned above the ladies of aristocratic cir- 
 cles frequently sing in the choirs. The 
 court chapel, the church of the Augus- 
 tines, and those of the Scotch and of 
 St. Anne of the Jesuits, are thronged 
 with elegant gentlemen and ladies, who 
 come to listen in the same enraptured 
 manner that they do at the opera, and 
 doubtless for the same reason — the grat- 
 ification of the aesthetic sense. In the 
 Carlskirche, built in the reign of Charles 
 VI. to commemorate the cessation of the 
 plague, remarkable concerts are also giv- 
 en. On each side of the portal of this 
 church rises a colossal column nearly 
 one hundred and fifty feet in height, the 
 effect of which is singularly imposing. 
 
 Opposite the Opera-house stands an 
 edifice which serves to illustrate the lux- 
 urious habits of modern business-men in 
 Vienna. It is a veritable palace, built by 
 a brickmaker in which to house himself 
 and his fortune. On the upper portion 
 of the front are numerous frescoes by 
 Rahl on a gold ground. Not far away 
 to the right one strays upon the banks 
 of the little Wien, the picturesque stream 
 which flows in a deep channel through 
 the Wieden quarter. There is a polytech- 
 nic school in this part of the town which 
 has a thousand students, and with it is 
 
 connected a technological museum which 
 contains more than sixty thousand spe- 
 cimens of manufactures in various stages 
 of production. In the Albrechtsgasse, 
 and not far from the Opera, is the ele- 
 gant new palace of the archduke Albert, 
 connected by a covered passage-way with 
 an older and less commodious house 
 which was the archduke's former resi- 
 dence. Of the Albertina Library I have 
 already spoken. The Albrechtsbrunnen, 
 a fountain adorned with marble statues 
 of the principal rivers of the empire, is 
 an attractive work, and relieves the eye, 
 which becomes a little fatigued by the 
 acres of yellowish stuccoed fronts on the 
 Ring. Beyond the Opera the broad cir- 
 cular thoroughfare is ornamented with 
 palatial dwellings, hotels large enough 
 for asylums, a commercial academy, the 
 elaborate building of the "Society of the 
 Friends of Music," the palaces of various 
 potentates, several clubs frequented by 
 the nobility, and a new academic gym- 
 nasium. Here in pleasant afternoons 
 Count Andrassy may be seen riding or 
 walking with his daughter, a stately Hun- 
 garian of the most bewitching type. An- 
 drassy is a remarkable figure, and wher- 
 ever he goes is well stared at. He has 
 come perilously near to the verge of de- 
 feat in his policy many times, but has 
 held his own with most consummate 
 ability, keeping decently in check the 
 Magyars, who are inclined to be over- 
 reaching, and at the same time content- 
 ing, in at least a reasonable degree, jeal- 
 ous Slavs and Germans. Andrassy's del- 
 icate, spirituel features are aglow with an 
 intelligence admirably fitted for diplo- 
 matic encounter with able adversaries. 
 His wit is like a rapier : it cuts severely 
 before one feels the sting. The number 
 of his mots on the complex Eastern Ques- 
 tion is legion. Bismarck affects to laugh 
 at Andrassy and his policy : the mighty 
 Prussian chancellor speaks of Austria as 
 the "sick woman," just as Turkey's sul- 
 tan has long been called the "sick man 
 of the East," but in his heart of hearts he 
 realizes that the wily Hungarian would be 
 a dangerous enemy. Andrassy is precise- 
 ly the man for the epoch of "dualism " 
 in Austria. 
 
272 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 This word dualism — so often used to 
 express the present period in the history 
 of the country — possibly needs a bit of 
 
 explanation. Victor Tissot says that when 
 he visited Vienna the situation was ex- 
 plained to him by an able Austrian as 
 
 follows: "From 1851 to 1859 'w^ were 
 ruled by absolutism ; from 1859 through 
 i860, by federalism; from 1861 to 1865, 
 by centralism ; and now, for some time 
 
 past, we have dualism. The empire is 
 divided into two great groups of states 
 — on the west, Cisleithania ; on the east, 
 Transleithania, separated by the little riv- 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 273 
 
 er Leytha a few leagues south of Vienna. 
 Cisleithania comprises Lower and Upper 
 Austria, the duchy of Salzburg, Styria, 
 the Tyrol and the Vorarlberg, Carinthia, 
 Carniola, the Littoral, Dalmatia, Bohe- 
 mia, Moravia, Galicia, and the Buko- 
 vina. The deputies of these provinces 
 meet in Vienna : the Germans are in 
 the majority, and the Tchechs, Slavs and 
 Poles complain that they are oppressed. 
 Transleithania is composed of three states 
 — Hungary, Transylvania, and Croatia 
 and Esclavonia. The deputies of these 
 provinces meet at Pesth, where the Cro- 
 atian deputies refuse to go, just as the 
 Tchechs refuse to sit in Vienna. The 
 two central chambers of Vienna and 
 Pesth each elect a superior delegation, 
 whose seat is in Vienna, and before 
 which the common ministers of Foreign 
 Affairs, War and Finance are responsi- 
 ble." It is easy to see that there must be 
 much trouble in satisfying all these dis- 
 cordant elements, and in shaping out 
 of them a real Austrian policy. Count 
 Andrassy has certainly endeavored, al- 
 though he has by no means been negli- 
 gent of his countrymen in Hungary, to 
 take a broad and national view of mat- 
 ters — national in the sense of being in 
 some measure representative of all the 
 peoples scattered up and down the broad 
 land over which the house of Habsburg 
 rules. That he has shown large-heart- 
 edness in dealing with the condition of 
 the unhappy populations that were late- 
 ly groaning under the Turkish yoke is 
 more astonishing when one considers 
 that he is an Hungarian than it would 
 be if he were of German blood. The 
 emperor has always had full confidence 
 in him, even in hours when the Germans 
 grumbled loudly against him. He ap- 
 pears to be for ever meditating some- 
 thing important, and when he rides in 
 the Prater people are more anxious to 
 see him than to gaze upon the emperor 
 or young Rodolph, the prince imperial. 
 The Stadt Park, the Kursaal and the 
 Blumensaal are resorts in which the beau 
 inonde of Vienna loves to show itself, and 
 where it comes to worship at the shrine 
 of the Strauss brothers winter and sum- 
 mer. The Stadt Park on a May morn- 
 18 
 
 ing, when hundreds of people are tak- 
 ing their coffee under the tfees or in the 
 pleasant arcades of the restaurants, is as 
 agreeable a spectacle as one could well 
 expect to find in a large city. What a 
 sharp contrast with the dull, sodden 
 streets of London, with their gloomy 
 house -walls reeking with smoke, and 
 the shops with their small windows and 
 inhospitable doors ! The birds are ev- 
 erywhere, and the sunshine riots on the 
 trellises, the bosquets of symmetrically- 
 trimmed trees, the yellow walls and the 
 noble fronts of palaces and halls near 
 by. Eduard Strauss gives concerts with 
 a perfect orchestra in the profusely-orna- 
 mented halls near this park when the mu- 
 sical season is at its height. Vienna will 
 never tire of the Strauss brethren, nor of 
 the delicious music which has sprung 
 from their brains. Johann — who is a 
 positive genius, and whom Americans 
 have judged for themselves, since they 
 have had an opportunity to hear him 
 and see him — appears rarely in public 
 as a leader now. He is the imperial 
 chapel-master, and court duties and the 
 composition of new operas absorb his at- 
 tention ; but Eduard is ubiquitous, some- 
 times appearing at as many as five pop- 
 ular concerts in an evening — here pre- 
 siding at a polka, there at a waltz, and 
 yet elsewhere beating time to a ravish- 
 ing mazurka. The Strauss music is in- 
 deed, as Meyerbeer said it was, the "echo 
 of the life of Vienna." There is in it an 
 immense fund of passion, a flood of tears, 
 gay and innocent laughter, the tender mi- 
 nor chords of despairing love, of death 
 and sorrow ; the wild and voluptuous 
 abandonment of the Orient, the nervous 
 vigor of the Hungarian song and dance, 
 the noble form and rhythm of Italian po- 
 etry ; and a certain German humor and 
 grotesqueness which belong to no other 
 national character. There is a certain 
 delicate and refined taste which coldly 
 rejects the Strauss compositions as un- 
 worthy attention, but no Viennese would 
 do so if he could, or could if he would. 
 Strauss the father had to run away from 
 home to become a musician. He began 
 by playing in public balls : by and by he 
 made a triumphal tour of Europe, and 
 
274 
 
 HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 died loaded with princely honors. Jo- 
 hann has become his principal succes- 
 sor, although some of the Viennese pre- 
 tend to prefer Eduard, who composes 
 fewer operas, but mingles more with the 
 people. 
 
 Supper is a joyous festival with a very 
 large class of the Viennese. The the- 
 atres are closed and the audiences are 
 on their way home by half-past nine or 
 ten o'clock, and father, mother, sons and 
 daughters stop to sup in one of the im- 
 
 mense underground restaurants which so 
 astonish the stranger. Stairways, broad, 
 beautifully decorated and illuminated, 
 lead down into the very bowels of the 
 earth, and there are spacious saloons 
 where thousands of people may be seen 
 supping together. The smoke - clouds 
 rise from innumerable cigars, but mys- 
 teriously disappear. The beer-boys, lit- 
 tle pale-faced fellows in black dress- 
 coats, shout and run until it seems t(i 
 the looker-on as if their legs would come 
 
 THE NORTHERN RAILWAY-STATION. 
 
 off. Laughter is universal, but never rude 
 or repulsive. All classes meet in these 
 basement restaurants, but never clash. 
 Prices are moderate and food is good. 
 The Viennese cuisine is as excellent as 
 that of Berlin is atrocious. The French- 
 man who accused the Prussians of put- 
 ting sugar on their beefsteaks and beat- 
 ing their wives could not repeat his crit- 
 icism in Vienna. The Austrian is much 
 more refined in his taste and manners 
 than his conquerors are. I regret that 
 he imitates them in one particular : he 
 persists in eating with his knife. How 
 he manages to do it so dexterously with- 
 
 out cutting his throat is a puzzle. The 
 quantities of beer consumed are start- 
 ling, but the climate seems to allow of 
 more drinking than would be possible 
 in America. Intoxication is almost un- 
 known, at least in public. 
 
 In some restaurants above ground a 
 variety performance is carried on upon 
 a vast stage from seven until eleven in 
 the evening. Officers and their wives, 
 family groups, strangers and children, go 
 to take their suppers at the Orpheum, the 
 most unique restaurant it was ever my for- 
 tune to enter. A favorite comic singer 
 makes his appearance at about ten eacl> 
 
HUNGARIAN TYPES AND AUSTRIAN PICTURES. 
 
 275 
 
 evening, and sings local ditties, in the 
 choruses of which the audience — if au- 
 dience it may be called — joins with a 
 gravity and an unction which are ex- 
 tremely amusing. The timeworn ballads 
 of Augustin, one of the ancient street- 
 singers of Vienna, are still repeated with 
 affection, and sturdy voices roll out in the 
 most natural and unaffected manner the 
 words, 
 
 O du lieber Augustin. 
 AUes ist hin, 
 
 while the comic artist on the stage beats 
 time and says, "All together." When 
 the chorus is over he adds, "Now you 
 can go on with your eating." 
 
 The Viennese workman enters a res- 
 taurant of the lower class, and orders one 
 of the savory dishes compounded of veal 
 or goose of which the Austrians are so 
 fond. As it is generally more than he 
 can eat at once, he asks for a bit of pa- 
 per, and picking out the available mor- 
 sels, makes a bundle of them and stows 
 them in his pocket. No false delicacy 
 interferes with his determined frugality. 
 An American workman would die be- 
 fore he would do such a thing. The 
 laboring classes in the capital, as a rule, 
 get enough to eat, but they have simple 
 fare, which our laborers of the humblest 
 kind would turn away from in disgust. 
 The street-merchants, hackmen, porters 
 and commissionaires, all manage to earn 
 decent livings. The Vienna coachman 
 is a furious driver, is enthusiastically de- 
 voted to beer — of which he can consume 
 enormous quantities without appearing 
 any the worse for it — and is very hon- 
 est if he thinks that you are familiar 
 with the prices, which are much higher 
 than they ought to be. The little one- 
 horse coupe is a favorite mode of convey- 
 ance for people in easy circumstances, 
 but the populace takes to the "tram- 
 way," as horse-cars are called through- 
 
 out Europe. These vehicles are divided 
 into compartments for smokers and non- 
 smokers, and in them every one talks to 
 his or her neighbor in the most cordial 
 and off-hand manner. The English and 
 French sit glaring and scowling at each 
 other, but the Austrians are much too 
 good-natured to do that. If one asks a 
 question a dozen voices are pretty sure 
 to be heard in answer, and I had almost 
 said that the response would be in as 
 many languages. There is a little of the 
 democratic crowding to which we are 
 accustomed in horse-cars in the United 
 States, and although the ladies do not 
 ask you for your seat nor expect you to 
 give it, a black-haired Jewess may very 
 possibly give you her baby to hold, and 
 a market-woman may set a heavy bas- 
 ket upon your toes. 
 
 One would scarcely think, in the United 
 States, of going to a railway - station res- 
 taurant in pursuit of an elegant dinner, 
 but the restaurants in the Vienna depots 
 are so good that it is quite fashionable to 
 do exactly that thing. At the Sudbahn 
 station game is cooked in the most ex- 
 quisite manner. The great depots of Vi- 
 enna are excelled by none in the world in 
 elegance and beauty. Order and com- 
 fort are found in them, combined with 
 spaciousness and grace. Swarms of at- 
 tentive employes accost the traveller, but 
 do not attempt to tear him to pieces. 
 They accept modest remuneration in a 
 polite manner, and do not ask you for 
 "another penny" for drink, as the Eng- 
 lish porters do. A good essay on the en- 
 viable management of the Austrian rail- 
 ways was recently furnished our govern- 
 ment by our efficient consul in Vienna, 
 General Philip Sidney Post, but I believe 
 that the facts have never found their wa)- 
 out of the obscurity of the State Depart- 
 ment's reports. Edward King. 
 
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 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 MONTENEGRIN POPE OF PEROI. 
 
 HE who fails to perceive that he is 
 approaching the East as he enters 
 Vienna, and who, as he wanders round 
 in the gay and briUiant capital, sees 
 no signs of Oriental manners and ar- 
 chitecture, jnust indeed be dull of appre- 
 hension. I remember the startling effect 
 which the sight of a certain church-tower 
 between Vienna andGratz once produced 
 on me. I was on the road to Trieste, 
 and, worn out with protracted journey- 
 ing, fell asleep in the comfortable coupe 
 276 
 
 as the train rolled out of Vienna in the 
 early morning. When I awoke the sun 
 was scorching my face ; the train was at 
 a standstill ; and directly in front of me, 
 surrounded by vineyards and fields where 
 a profusion of flowers bloomed and mul- 
 titudes of birds sang, I saw a — mosque ! 
 At least, it seemed to me exactly like the 
 pictures of Oriental mosques that I had so 
 often seen. There was the bulbous spire, 
 the slender point at the top : the resem- 
 blance was complete. I rubbed my eyes. 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 277 
 
 and could not believe that I was in Aus- 
 tria ; and the illusion was heightened by 
 the fact that, leaning from the carriage- 
 window, I heard the peasants in the road 
 below speaking the smoothly - flowing 
 Sclavic tongue : not one word of Ger- 
 
 man could I distinguish. As we 
 on to Gratz I looked in vain for other 
 churches with this curious outcropping 
 of Eastern architecture, but I did not 
 find it again until we had travelled more 
 than a hundred miles. 
 
 The impression of the immediate prox- 
 imity of the East is of course more stri- 
 king as one descends the Danube below 
 Vienna. The dark faces of the wander- 
 ing gypsies, the loose and flowing gar- 
 ments worn by the peasants who are 
 tending their floating 
 flour -mills, and the 
 imperturbable gravi- 
 ty of the masses have 
 very little that is Eu- 
 ropean in them. One 
 cannot help fancying 
 that Asia is about to 
 begin at some bound- 
 ary arbitrarily 
 stretched near at 
 hand. In contrast 
 with the heavy, 
 blonde, voluptuous 
 and voluminous types 
 of womanhood in Vi- 
 enna, one sees the 
 swart, lithe, dark- 
 eyed women from the 
 Sclavic provinces 
 held under the odious 
 dominion of Turkey. 
 There is something 
 nameless and inex- 
 pressible in the de- 
 meanor of these latter 
 which at once betrays 
 their origin. On the 
 Austrian shore of the 
 Danube, opposite 
 Belgrade, one sees 
 people who are so ut- 
 terly different from 
 the Germans of Vien- 
 na, or even the Bo- 
 hemians of Prague, 
 that he cannot imag- 
 ine them to be of the 
 same country or con- 
 tinent. Austria's 
 Sclavic folk are won- 
 derfully ' varied : it is 
 1 I 1 npossible to believe that they 
 can understand one another or have a 
 community of ideas and common na- 
 tional dreams and ambitions. 
 
 The variety of type in Austria is of 
 course far greater than in most other Eu- 
 
.78 
 
 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 ropean countries In the course of many met persons who I could have sworn 
 journeys up and down the land I have ! were Italians. Americans, Turks. Servi- 
 
 ans, Frenchmen, but they always proved I tion of Austria, in the little bark Jonio, I 
 to be Austrians. Going one day from I was vasdy entertained by a surcreon who 
 Trieste to Pola, the principal naval sta- 1 was about to join his ship, and whom I 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 279 
 
 should never have beUeved an Austrian 
 had he not given me his word that he 
 was a native-born subject of the House 
 of Hapsburg. He appeared like an Ital- 
 ian when he was conversing in the pret- 
 ty Venetian dialect so universally used 
 along the Adriatic coast ; like a French- 
 man when talking rapidly and well in 
 French ; he might readily have been 
 mistaken for a person born in a Sclavic 
 province when he talked with the mer- 
 chants from Fiume or Agram ; but when 
 he joked with the officers on the boat 
 and swore robust Teutonic "Donnerwet- 
 ters !" and " Potztausends !" he seemed 
 to me like a foreigner talking German. 
 Yet he was born in Vienna, and Ger- 
 man was his native tongue. 
 
 Nowhere does one get so remarkable 
 a panoramic view of these varied popu- 
 lations as during the journey from Vien- 
 na to Trieste. The good-natured and per- 
 haps a trifle boorish German peasant ; the 
 graceful, civil and gentle-spoken repre- 
 sentative of the German upper classes ; 
 the Styrian laborer in his quaint cos- 
 tume ; the stolid, plodding mountaineer, 
 with his green hat ornamented with the 
 feathers of the heathcock ; the peasant- 
 women in their curious headdresses of 
 long white cloths ; the rotund, placid 
 farmers ; the stiff and haughty retired 
 generals of Gratz, — all these are one by 
 one left behind, and in their stead one 
 passes in review the many and polite 
 Sclaves from the towns of Agram and 
 Sissek, or their ferocious-looking fellow- 
 citizens, the Croatish shepherds and wood- 
 cutters from the neighboring plains and 
 mountains ; coming at last to the Italian 
 types at Adelsberg, and finding them 
 everywhere until one arrives at lovely 
 Trieste on the shores and cliffs of the 
 Adriatic. The brown-eyed, oval-faced, 
 chestnut-haired maiden who brings wine 
 to the visitor at Prosecco, the little town 
 on the great hill which overhangs Trieste, 
 seems an alien. What does she in Aus- 
 tria ? Is not this Italy into which we 
 have suddenly, by some subtle magic, 
 been conveyed ? Surely, the architec- 
 ture of this roadside inn, with its curious 
 mediaeval courtyard, its wooden galleries 
 and its deep window - seats, is Italian ; 
 
 and so is yonder chapel, over whose door 
 sits a woe-begone saint whose battered 
 visage seems covered with lamentations 
 for his lost country. Italian is the lan- 
 guage spoken by the brown-eyed maid- 
 en ; by the old woman who sprawls at 
 the roadside, and seems to menace you 
 with the evil eye unless you accord alms ; 
 by the stealthy-looking rascals who spring 
 up a by-path among the rocks as you re- 
 turn to your carriage — fellows with rings 
 in their ears and long knives in their 
 belts ; by the very driver of the car- 
 riage — No, he is a German, and is 
 cursing you, perhaps, in his thick, un- 
 couth way, because you have not sent 
 him a draught of beer while he has been 
 waiting for you. 
 
 The beauty and quaintness of Trieste 
 are all the more surprising because the 
 traveller approaches them from the land- 
 ward side through such a broken and 
 desolate country. Who does not re- 
 member what a pang the desolate and 
 forbidding scenery of the Karst, that 
 rock - strewn country which stretches 
 from Adelsberg to Trieste, brought to 
 him, coming as it did so soon after the 
 luscious panorama of fertile fields at the 
 bases of the Carniolan and Julian Alps, 
 after the rich lands studded with fine barns 
 and comfortable dwellings, and inhabited 
 by the merry, frugal, sober, contented 
 Sclavonians ? I arrived at Adelsberg for 
 the first time just as a beautiful September 
 day was drawing to a close. The twilight 
 cast a weird mantle over the masses of 
 grayish rock which rose everywhere in 
 the treeless plains. It seemed a land of 
 ambush, of surprises : I could fancy that 
 the train might be attacked there. At 
 the station little Italian damsels, bare- 
 headed and bare-legged, ran to and fro, 
 melodiously crying "Fresh water !" which 
 cooling draught they carried in earthen 
 jars poised daintily on their shapely 
 heads. Up a rude road which climbed 
 a tiny hill among the piled rocks a group 
 of maidens was slowly climbing : each 
 girl held another by the hand, and to- 
 gether they were singing a tender Ve- 
 netian ballad. Again I rubbed my eyes, 
 yet I was not dreaming. Only two hours 
 before, however, I had left Steinbriick, 
 
28o 
 
 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA, 
 
 the comfortable restaurant-station at the 
 junction of the roaring Sann and the 
 noble Save, and there, among the lofty 
 
 mountains and the savage and gloomy 
 forests, I had found no trace whatever 
 of Italians or Italian manners. 
 
 TRIESTE: A CICI FAMILY. 
 
 From Adelsberg to Trieste one is ap- 
 parently in the midst of Italian civiliza- 
 tion, although great numbers of the in- 
 
 habitants in all the surrounding country 
 are Sclavonians. Nothing can be more 
 enchanting than this evening ride be- 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 yond Adelsberg, after the most barren 
 portion of the Karst is passed. The 
 vegetation in the gardens which are 
 bestowed among the stones is rich and 
 luxuriant : the vine shows its hthe form 
 everywhere. Sometimes the terrible bor- 
 ra, which works such mischief along the 
 Adriatic coast, descends on these plains, 
 and sweeps across them with such force 
 as to overthrow loaded wagons. When 
 a wandering peasant sees the cloud of 
 dust raised by the borra he throws him- 
 self flat on his face, pulls his cloak over 
 his head, makes the sign of the cross, 
 and waits for the unwelcome visitor to 
 go by. In the Karst there are numerous 
 caves and funnel-shaped cavities which 
 the old Romans, when they were there- 
 about, doubtless thought were the abodes 
 of the mischievous winds. 
 
 At Nabresina, a pretty town, thorough- 
 ly Italian in aspect, the road begins to 
 descend the crags at the foot of which 
 Trieste lies. The twilight had deepened 
 into darkness ere we arrived there, and 
 from the car-windows there was little to 
 be seen except the edges of rocks and 
 occasional "section-houses " by the track 
 overgrown with vines. But presently a 
 "large low moon" stole out of a dull 
 horizon, and began to invest even the 
 most prosaic bits of scenery with her 
 proverbial witchery. I leaned out from 
 the window, regardless of the sharp ad- 
 monition of the guard, who was clam- 
 bering from carriage to carriage on the 
 narrow outer platform, and who espied 
 me. As the moon pierced the thin veil 
 of clouds which at first seemed anxious 
 to rob her of her glory, the train came 
 slowly and carefully round a great pin- 
 nacle and rolled along the edge of a high 
 precipice. Below, in the distance, were 
 the blue waves of the placid Adriatic, 
 now illuminated by the chaste moon- 
 beams, so that I could see a long path 
 of silver, over which merrily slipped 
 little barks bound inward to Trieste. 
 The effect was exhilarating, delightful: 
 in fancy I already saw those headlands 
 of the Istrian coast which in the words 
 of the old poet "brood o'er the sea;" 
 and I strained my eyes to catch a view 
 of the lights of Trieste. But the train 
 
 wound on and on under jagged masses 
 of rock which seemed certain to fall upon 
 and crush us ; beside yawning gulfs into 
 which had we been plunged there would 
 have been no earthly resurrection for any 
 one of us ; through sleepy villages which 
 appeared just on the point of committing 
 suicide by sliding into the Adriatic; over 
 bridges and through tunnels, all high in 
 air ; constantly descending — descending 
 slowly but surely. At last a line of dan- 
 cing lights seemed suddenly to spring 
 from the bosom of the waves : far below 
 us they beckoned, pirouetted, vanished, 
 reappeared. I looked at them steadfastly 
 for half an hour, yet we did not seem to 
 come nearer them. Just as I was be- 
 ginning to despair of ever reaching them 
 our engine shrieked, and we rolled into a 
 long tunnel. When we came out I could 
 find the lights no longer, but in ten min- 
 nutes we were in the huge railway-depot 
 at Trieste. 
 
 The night was lovely : each touter for 
 each hotel gave me such a bad opinion 
 of every other that I stored my baggage 
 in the station and set off alone for a walk, 
 while the rattling omnibuses, with their 
 polyglot conductors chattering in Ger- 
 man, Italian, French, English, Sclavic 
 and Greek, whirled away to the various 
 caravansaries. It was ten o'clock, and in 
 the harbor basin, along whose edge I took 
 my way, the air was melodious with the 
 ringing of ships' bells sounding the hour. 
 A solemn rich note from the tower of 
 some far-away church added harmony 
 and beauty to these chimes. I saw but 
 few people : here and there a belated 
 sailor was sidling toward his bark, keep- 
 ing his eyes warily fixed on the prome- 
 nading watchman, who seemed half in- 
 clined to make him halt and declare 
 his name and qualities. Now and then 
 I passed a little cafe, in front of which, 
 under broad awnings, showily -dressed 
 Montenegrins and Greeks were drinking 
 sugared water or coffee and playing sim- 
 ple games. At last I came to a hostelry 
 facing the quay, and, entering, ordered 
 the Italian porter to send for my baggage. 
 Then I sat down on a bench in the moon- 
 light, and watched the rows of fishing- 
 boats symmetrically ranged against the 
 
282 
 
 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 stone sides of the quay, their stained 
 sails showing out in bold relief in the 
 moonlight ; watched 
 the great fiery eyes 
 of the steamer just 
 coming in from Con- 
 stantinople, and an- 
 other departing for 
 Venice ; and watched 
 the blue water on 
 which all these craft 
 were so silently and 
 securely cradled. 
 Finally, I betook my- 
 self sleepily to an ex- 
 quisite and diminu- 
 tive room, from whose 
 windows I could look 
 out over the Adriatic, 
 and could hear the 
 musical resonance of 
 the bells from hour to 
 hour until, at mid- 
 night, the a i r was 
 verily burdened with 
 it ; and then — and 
 then I slept. 
 
 Nothing was stran- 
 ger to me next morn- 
 ing, as I wandered 
 through the narrow 
 and antique streets of 
 old Trieste, than that 
 I belonged to this 
 day and generation. 
 It seemed to m.e that 
 I had somehow gone 
 back three hundred 
 years — that perhaps 
 I was a Dalmatian 
 sailor returning from 
 some venturesome ex- 
 cursion in far Levant, 
 and had landed here 
 in Trieste to repose 
 my weary bones, or 
 that I was a Venetian 
 merchant or adventu- 
 rer strayed away from 
 my own proud city for 
 a little airing, and 
 amusing myself in fair 
 Trieste. There was nothing to suggest 
 the present century in the massive walls, 
 
 black with age, which reared themselves 
 on either side of the lanes, so near to- 
 
 gether that only the most infinitesimal 
 bit of blue sky was visible between them 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 283 
 
 at the top. There was no hint of the 
 nineteenth century in the tiny shops 
 stowed into the most miraculously pic- 
 tvesque corners, up the most sombre 
 blind alleys and in the most forlorn 
 basements. I found a shoemaker direct- 
 ly over my head, and a primitive-look- 
 ing barber's shop almost under my feet. 
 I peered into a cabaret, whose door was 
 pierced with a half window protected by 
 a thin curtain, and there, on wooden 
 benches, I could see sailors with long 
 knives in their belts talking uproarious- 
 ly and gambling furiously. Climbing a 
 
 PEASANT- WOMAN : NEIGHIJURHOOD OF POLA 
 
 dozen ancient, well-worn stone steps 
 to get into the next street, I came upon 
 half a dozen bald-headed little babies 
 squatted together, crooning and laugh- 
 ing in all the recklessness and impu- 
 dence of helpless babyhood in the path 
 of men and women passing with heavy 
 burdens on their broad backs ; yet no 
 baby was smashed to a jelly under the 
 splay feet of any of the porters, and no 
 infant rolled down the steep and danger- 
 ous flight of stairs. On a long wall over- 
 hanging a courtyard a hundred feet be- 
 low a bevy of round-armed, black-haired 
 girls were perched, swinging their feet. 
 
 munching fruit and making mock of 
 timid passers-by. An unlucky move- 
 ment would have precipitated these un- 
 trimmed beauties on to the cruel stones 
 below ; but they balanced themselves as 
 if they had been birds, while they re- 
 sponded gayly to the mockeries of two 
 young soldiers who, in the window of a 
 tall house forty feet above them, were 
 looking out on the world and making 
 free comments upon it after their own 
 fashion. Tired of seeing these towering 
 masses of grayish stone always above 
 me, I climbed persistently. At last I 
 blundered into a blind alley, 
 where a party of young maid 
 ens, not specially encumber 
 ed with clothing, were dan- 
 cing merrily to the music of 
 a hurdygurdy, whose owner 
 had just happened that way. 
 The hurdygurdy-man's mon- 
 key was of a sociable turn of 
 mind, and came up to chatter 
 in my ear and to examine the 
 texture of my silk umbrella. 
 As he betrayed an intense 
 anxiety to tear the umbrella 
 in pieces, I was compelled to 
 chastise him with it. He re- 
 treated, howling and chatter- 
 ing, to his master : the maid- 
 ens, looking up from their 
 sport, perceived a stranger 
 and hastily dispersed in all 
 directions, and the hurdy- 
 gurdy - man stood contem- 
 plating the hapless wanderer 
 who was the innocent cause 
 of the sport's interruption with an expres- 
 sion of mingled rage and disgust which 
 it would be quite impossible for me to 
 describe. I retreated precipitately, and 
 did not look round until I found myself 
 on a broad plateau near an ancient 
 church. From this plateau I could over- 
 look the port of Trieste and the adja- 
 cent mountains. Away across the bay, 
 and sheltered from the rude winds of 
 winter, as well as from the torrid sum- 
 mer suns, by projecting crags, I saw 
 the historic chateau of Miramar, world- 
 famous since one of the former occu- 
 pants died an usurper's death in Mex- 
 
284 
 
 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 ico, and the other met a more horrible 
 fate in losing her reason. Poor stately, 
 generous Maximilian ! Trieste 
 has a good statue of him now 
 in one of her squares fronting 
 on the bay ; and looking at it, 
 and remembering the princi- 
 pal points in his character, one 
 cannot help a thrill of pity for 
 him, for he was emphatically 
 a man. Perhaps the Italian 
 population here in Trieste 
 would not share in this sym- 
 pathy ; for, although they are 
 loyal and wear an outward 
 air of content, they are never 
 weary of criticising the Ger- 
 mans, whom they dislike. I 
 was not a little amused to 
 note that some of the most in- 
 telligent merchants in Trieste 
 share the absurd belief of the 
 . Italian lower classes, that the 
 central Austrian government 
 does all it can to prevent the 
 prosperity of Trieste. When 
 asked why such a peculiar 
 course of conduct should be 
 maintained, they shook their 
 heads gloomily, and were, I 
 fancy, really at a loss for a 
 reason. 
 
 Business habits in Trieste 
 are notably different from 
 those in other portions of the 
 Austrian empire, and the cli- 
 mate demands the difference. 
 In summer the bankers and 
 principal merchants enter the 
 cool darkened rooms in which 
 they transact their affairs at 
 an early hour in the morning, 
 and work until the sun grows 
 hot. The middle of the day 
 is given to breakfast and to 
 a visit to the corridors of the 
 Exchange, where a cosmopol- 
 itan throng is always gather- 
 ed. The Polish Jew, with his 
 incomparably filthy great-coat 
 and the slovenly locks of hair 
 pulled down in front of his ears, shuffles 
 by ; the Greek and the Montenegrin, in 
 their white and green petticoats, discuss 
 
 financial matters amicably ; the rotund 
 and spectacled German and the refined 
 
 Italian argue questions of trade -policy 
 with the Sclaves and Croats ; and the 
 shippers and skippers represent every 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 285 
 
 nation under the sun. After the visit to 
 the Exchange, and a cup of coffee or an 
 ice in one of the pleasant cafes which 
 abound in the vicinity, the merchants 
 disappear from pubUc view until three 
 o'clock. At that hour banks and whole- 
 sale establishments are reopened, and 
 work goes on uninterruptedly until six. 
 Then the streets are filled with people 
 taking the air before supper : they flock 
 to the principal promenades and gardens 
 to hear music, they stroll on the piers or 
 they loll in the shade of their own court- 
 yards until twilight or dark, when they 
 refresh themselves copiously after the 
 day's fatigue. 
 
 Looking seaward from the terrace, old 
 Trieste seems in some miraculous fash- 
 ion to disappear, and the new town, 
 with its handsome piers, its wide and 
 well -paved streets, its pleasant hotels, 
 and its main avenue, the " Corso," comes 
 into view. The German element is so 
 thoroughly subordinated here that one 
 sees almost nothing of it. The apothe- 
 cary, the bookseller, the photographer, 
 the silk-merchant, all advertise their ar- 
 ticles of merchandise in Italian ; the news- 
 papers, printed in black, heavy type on 
 thick, muddy paper, are in Italian ; the 
 " commissionnaire " who offers to show 
 you the sights of Trieste addresses you 
 in English with a strong Italian accent ; 
 the black-eyed ladies languidly prome- 
 nading wear lace veils thrown loosely 
 over their beautiful heads and talk in 
 high Italian key. The playbill, in Italian, 
 announces a most extraordinary season 
 of comedy : if you attend the theatre in 
 the evening, you will find that the au- 
 dience is almost entirely composed of 
 women, all of whom have the inevitable 
 black lace veils or at least coquettish 
 black bonnets ; the play will doubtless 
 be highly spiced with allusions to do- 
 mestic infelicity and to the failings of 
 the representatives of Mother Church ; 
 the ladies will manifest their enthusiasm 
 by tears, sometimes by tapping upon the 
 backs of the chairs in front of them with 
 their fans. At the opera — which is often 
 extremely good — the haut to7i of Trieste 
 is to be seen — the German officials and 
 their wives, the Italian merchants and 
 
 the upper crust of the Hebrew social 
 fabric. These same people also frequent 
 the huge and beautifully decorated halls 
 in which the best of classical music and 
 moderately good beer are served up to- 
 gether. Hundreds of elegantly-dressed 
 ladies and gentlemen are sometimes seen 
 in one of these halls at supper, while the 
 orchestra in the gallery plays the dreamy 
 music of Donizetti or startles the ear 
 with audacious refrains from Wagner's 
 Tetralogy. 
 
 On this terrace stands the cathedral 
 of San Giusto, a sombre edifice filled 
 with memorials of the Romans. It is 
 an odd collection of basilicas, baptist- 
 eries and Byzantine churches, represent- 
 ing all grades of architecture from the 
 fifth to the fourteenth century ; and Ro- 
 man columns aid in supporting the prin- 
 cipal tower. Underneath a stone in front 
 of this venerable edifice lies Fouche, 
 who played such a singular and import- 
 ant role under Napoleon I. as minister 
 of police, and who gave up the ghost at 
 Trieste in 1820. Winckelmann, the great 
 German archaeologist, is also buried near 
 by, not far from a museum of antiquities 
 which is appropriately located in a ven- 
 erable burying -ground. Winckelmann 
 was robbed and murdered in a tavern in 
 Trieste more than a hundred years ago. 
 To-day the traveller's life is as safe in 
 the well-ordered town as it is in Paris. 
 The Austrian police understand how to 
 enforce the law in a seaport ; and when 
 a Montenegrin comes to town he has to 
 lay aside the small arsenal of v/eapons 
 which he usually carries in his belt be- 
 fore he is permitted to land. 
 
 Landward, seaward, the view is en- 
 trancing. In winter the mountains now 
 and then take on a bleak aspect, for the 
 wind is sometimes unkind at Trieste ; but 
 in summer the exquisite effects of light 
 and shadow on the tall crags, the wide 
 expanse of the placid blue water, the 
 sleepy headlands that seem to hide such 
 mysteries behind them, and the rows of 
 colored sails gliding in and out among 
 the large ciaft, make a fascinating pic- 
 ture. There is wealth of curious costume 
 in the market-places, for the Istrian and 
 Dalmatian peasants still keep to their an- 
 
286 
 
 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 C^flsi^n 
 
 PARENZO : THE CATHEDRAL, A RELIC OF THE EARLIEST AGES OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 cient dress. The great square of the Pes- 
 cheria, the fish-market of Trieste, is filled 
 from early morning till noon with a crowd 
 of babbling girls and women dressed in 
 glaring colors, bare-headed, and some- 
 
 times bare-footed. The fruit-venders sit 
 lazily all day behind stands piled with 
 luscious grapes, figs, melons and pome- 
 granates, and do not even take the trouble 
 to cry their wares. Late in the afternoon 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 287 
 
 a little steamer comes bustling to a wharf 
 near the Pescheria, and the gossiping wo- 
 men flock to it with their baskets on their 
 heads. As soon as all are on board a 
 whistle blows, and the noisy freight is 
 whisked off to Capo d'Istria, where these 
 worthy fishmongers live, and whence they 
 draw their supplies. 
 
 Capo d' Istria. ! An odd corner indeed ! 
 Old Trieste is modern compared with this : 
 the past seems to have got a firm hold in 
 Istria ; there is no hint of modernism, 
 unless it be a huge state prison, which 
 stands on an eminence overlooking a 
 breezy estuary. No ! the prison accords 
 well with the ancient walls, the curious 
 Venetian gateways, the alleys so narrow 
 that one cannot help thinking that the 
 houses have just been jostling each 
 other, the forbidding passages where it 
 seems as if assassins, lying in wait with 
 long sharp daggers, must be the inevita- 
 ble and fitting accessories. The inhabit- 
 ants of all this region were once greatly 
 given to piracy and brigandage, but now 
 they are peaceful and law-abiding, as they 
 may well be under the shadow of the great 
 frowning prison. This was the Justinap- 
 olis of the Romans, and there are many 
 traces of the dominion of those hard- 
 headed old conquerors in all the terri- 
 tory. The Venetians came to Capo 
 d'Istria nine hundred years ago, and 
 stayed there long after other portions 
 of Istria had passed into the hands of 
 the Austrians. The central square of 
 the town is as Venetian as the great 
 plaza of St. Mark : into the dimly-light- 
 ed cathedral which stands in a recess at 
 one extremity the peasant men and wo- 
 men daily flock and fall on their knees in 
 prayer. They wander about under the 
 olive trees, and never seem to do any 
 work except at prayer -time. The ho- 
 tels in Capo d'Istria are repulsive-look- 
 ing stone structures, through whose lower 
 stories long and narrow passages lead 
 into pretty gardens where waiters serve 
 the foaming Asti, the delicious Prosecco, 
 and the dark-red traitorous Istrian wine, 
 which is pleasant to the palate, but dan- 
 gerous to the brain. The good German 
 burghers from the more Teutonic por- 
 tions of Austria greatly enjoy a journey 
 
 to Capo d'Istria and deep draughts of 
 its wine. 
 
 Outside the gates of the town — for 
 Capo d'Istria has gates and walls — the 
 country looks as wild and uncivilized as 
 it was a thousand years ago. A poorly- 
 graded road leads over some rolling 
 hills to the adjacent town of Pirano, a 
 picturesque place as seen from the sea, 
 but common and dirty when approached 
 by land. A few poorly -clad women, 
 driving donkeys laden with grain, fish 
 or vegetables, and one or two swine- 
 herds, followed by their snorting, bur- 
 rowing charges, are the only living ob- 
 jects which greet the eye, unless per- 
 chance a blind, halt or lame beggar 
 looms up before the visitor, insisting 
 with outstretched skinny hand upon im- 
 mediate alms. The Istrian peasantry in 
 the interior are not over fond of the stran- 
 ger : they laugh at his European clothes, 
 and find his modern refinements repul- 
 sive ; they understand him and his new 
 notions as little as they do the colossal 
 remains of the fortified towns of the peo- 
 ple of the Stone Age which are scattered 
 through Istria. But these good folk are 
 nevertheless far from wishing the wander- 
 er any harm : they will not throw a brick 
 at him, as an English farm-laborer might 
 do. And if they do not understand hos- 
 pitality very well, it is because they so 
 rarely have any occasion to practise it. 
 
 These little Istrian towns, Capo d'Istria, 
 Omago, Cittanova, Parenzo, Orsara, Ro- 
 vigno, scattered along the pretty coast 
 from Trieste to Pola, know nothing of 
 railroads, and many of them have no 
 regular steamer communication with the 
 outer world. The people who live in 
 the smaller towns by the water-side fur- 
 nish fine recruits for the Austrian navy : 
 the women rarely leave home. Many 
 of them have never been twenty miles 
 from their native towns in their lives, and 
 their only amusement is rambling among 
 the rocks or making pilgrimages to the 
 neighboring monastery. The pilgrimage 
 is a great feature of life in all these south- 
 ern Austrian provinces : on the wild Dal- 
 matian border, among the rugged rocks, 
 the traveller may any day come upon a 
 long procession of men and women car- 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 rying candles or branches of trees or 1 the road to a cross placed high on some 
 rudely -fashioned crucifixes, and all on | wooded hill or to a church on a pinnacle. 
 
 It is said that a quarter of a million per- 
 sons annually visit the pilgrimage church 
 of Marienzell in the Styrian Mountains ; 
 
 and in every mountain-region the num- 
 bers might be counted by thousands. 
 Some of the small Istrian towns are 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 289 
 
 scourged by malaria, which the inhab- 
 itants bow down before without the least 
 endeavor to escape from it. Much of the 
 ill-health is due to the wretched drainage 
 of the houses and to the poor food eaten 
 by these folk, but he who should attempt 
 to teach them new and better ways would 
 run the risk of being burned as a sorcerer. 
 
 Pola, with its grand Roman amphi- 
 theatre, with its fine hills and its excel- 
 lent basin, where the Austrian govern- 
 ment generally keeps a large fleet sta- 
 tioned, is well enough known to the 
 traveller who has made the journey to 
 Antivari or Corfu. The Austrians are 
 proud of their naval station, which they 
 have fortified, and are continually forti- 
 fying, with consummate care. The town 
 is a shrine filled with great memories. 
 Augustus built a fine resort there, en- 
 riched it with superb monuments and 
 called it Pietas Julia. Belisarius went 
 out from Pola with the fleet which was 
 destined to assemble before Ravenna. 
 A royal Roman road led from Pola to 
 Trieste. The Venetian republic took the 
 town in the twelfth century, and kept 
 possession of it until its fall. So rich was 
 Pola in Roman memorials that the Aus- 
 trians, when they wished to build a cit- 
 adel on an advantageous point of land, 
 were compelled to destroy the remains 
 of a beautiful ancient theatre. One of 
 the present gates of the town is the Por- 
 ta Aurea, which the magnificent Sergius 
 erected in honor of his victory. The 
 temple of Diana has been transformed 
 into a block of dwellings, as has the 
 superb palace of Diocletian at Spoleto. 
 Your landlord is liable to tell you that 
 you are lodged in the temple of Jupiter, 
 and he may possibly invite you to crack 
 a bottle of wine with him in the palace 
 of Justice. One treads upon dust of 
 antique monuments at every step, and 
 under the foundations of the breweries, 
 arsenals and shiphouses of the Pola of 
 to-day lie the ruined tombs and sarcoph- 
 agi of which Dante has sung in his In- 
 ferno. 
 
 He who voyages on the Adriatic in 
 
 autumn needs courage, especially if he 
 
 sails along the Istrian and Dalmatian 
 
 coast. The borra sweeps down without 
 
 19 
 
 warning, and straightway the sea is trans- 
 formed from a tranquil sheet of lovely 
 blue water into the veriest whirlpool and 
 mad vortex of waves imaginable. The 
 rugged coast which must be skirted be- 
 fore the entrance to Pola harbor can be* 
 reached becomes a constant danger : the 
 small steamers rock down to their rails, 
 and now and then seem just on the point 
 of sinking. Soldiers m transitu swear, 
 peasants howl, friars count their beads 
 and pray, travellers from other climes, 
 accustomed to the buffetings of a dozen 
 oceans, suffer and are silent. Although 
 this coasting seems but child's play to 
 the inexperienced observer, it is fraught 
 with great danger, and requires accurate 
 and immediate judgment on the part of 
 the captain, as any one journeying from 
 Trieste to Cattaro or Antivari will readi- 
 ly discover. 
 
 Southward from the southernmost point 
 of Istria stretches along the coast a gar- 
 land of small islands, many of which are 
 inhabited by only a few fishermen and 
 friars. For two hundred miles the steam- 
 ers can make their way tranquilly be- 
 tween these islands and the mainland, 
 feeling but little of the inconveniences 
 of storms which lash the sea just outside 
 the islets. In summer and in autumn a 
 journey through these long canals, past 
 these pretty islands, on whose reddish- 
 brown rocks the resplendent sunlight 
 of these latitudes produces the most en- 
 trancing and bewitching effects of color, 
 is an experience never to be forgotten. 
 Land is never lost sight of: on either side 
 there are houses, gardens, peaks capped 
 with monasteries, peaceful villages, fer- 
 tile fields, valleys rich with vines, gulfs 
 as tranquil as broad rivers. At night the 
 steamer cautiously picks its way into the 
 dozens of small ports, and chattering 
 throngs of boatmen, lighting up the dark 
 water with torches, row out their little 
 barks to receive the mails and the mer- 
 chandise. In every large port one comes 
 upon a variation in dialect, in dress and 
 in features. 
 
 One almost forgets that Austria is not 
 Italian as he wanders for days in these 
 towns and among these mountains, where 
 the signs on the shops and rustic inns and 
 
290 
 
 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 the manners of the 
 people are all Italian 
 in tone. The Scla- 
 vonic population, al- 
 though numerous in 
 all these regions, 
 does not give any 
 surface evidences of 
 its existence. But it 
 is easy to find within 
 a night's journey from 
 Trieste towns and 
 sections where the 
 Sclavic is spoken al- 
 most exclusively, and 
 where there is not an 
 Italian sign to be 
 found over a single 
 shop. I made an ex- 
 cursion in 1875 from 
 Steinbriick, which is 
 on the direct railway- 
 line from Vienna to 
 Trieste, down the 
 valley of the Save 
 River to Agram and 
 Sissek and the towns 
 beyond on the Turk- 
 ish border. The 
 Save — or Sau, as the 
 Germans call it — is a 
 capricious and 
 charming stream, 
 born of pure springs 
 far in the recesses of 
 the lofty Carniolan 
 Alps. It rushes down 
 through the forests, 
 now breaking, a ver- 
 itable torrent, through 
 some frightful chasm, 
 now flowing smooth- 
 ly through rich mead- 
 ows, and now — as at 
 Steinbriick, where it 
 receives the waters of 
 the Sann — becoming 
 broad and shallow as 
 it finds room in a val- 
 ley at the bases of the 
 great hills. Around 
 Steinbriick the sce- 
 nery is grand, impos- 
 ing, in some of the 
 
ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 29] 
 
 gorges awful. The precipices are ma- 
 jestic in their beauty. The road thence 
 
 to Agram leads high above the river, 
 along beetling crags, around corners 
 
 where an unskilful engineer would throw 
 his train hundreds of feet on to rocks be- 
 low, and through 
 villages lying un- 
 der the walls of 
 some vast chateau, 
 whose owner is 
 doubtless spending 
 his income in riot- 
 ous living in Vien- 
 na. Agram has no 
 specially remark- 
 able architectural 
 features: the au- 
 tumn climate there 
 reminds one of the 
 charms of Indian 
 summer in New 
 England and in 
 the Middle States; 
 and I found myself 
 imagining several 
 times during my 
 stay there that I 
 had been transport- 
 ed by magic into 
 some quiet New 
 England city of 
 twenty - five thou- 
 sand inhabitants. 
 Yet I was possess- 
 ed of this illusion 
 only when I look- 
 ed at some of the 
 comfortable man- 
 sions, in whose wide 
 yards children were 
 rollicking and spec- 
 tacled maidens sat 
 reading books hour 
 by hour. The white- 
 go w n e d peasant- 
 women, with their 
 flaming -red head- 
 dresses, who served 
 in the market ; the 
 men, with their 
 square- brimmed 
 Hungarian hats, 
 their amply-flowing 
 white trousers, 
 their girdles filled 
 with knives, and their clownish man- 
 ners, certainly furnished no reminders 
 
292 
 
 ODD CORNERS IN AUSTRIA. 
 
 of New England. Agram is a rich and 
 thriving town, and, like Belgrade in Ser- 
 via, one of the centres whence come the 
 great propelling forces now at work in 
 the interests of Pansclavism. Agram has 
 universities, fine schools of upper and 
 lower grade, and a hundred organiza- 
 tions for culture and refinement : it has 
 subtle and active politicians also, and 
 the central Austrian government keeps 
 a strong garrison there, ready to declare 
 it in a state of siege if at any time the 
 sympathies of the leaders should bid 
 fair to lead the country into war or dis- 
 agreeable diplomatic negotiations. These 
 Sclaves of Croatia hate the Hungarians 
 and the influence which they possess in 
 Austria to-day as bitterly as the Servians 
 do. The people of the aristocratic and 
 commercial classes are refined, polite 
 and hospitable. They live much in the 
 open air, and gather for supper in the 
 evening in the courtyards of the large 
 hotels to listen to music and to chat 
 together. 
 
 Round about Agram the plains stretch 
 out, seemingly limitless as the prairies of 
 Illinois, after a few fertile hills are passed. 
 Agram itself lies on a hill, the top of which 
 is occupied by a handsome square, sur- 
 rounded with cafes and pretty mansions. 
 In early autumn the waving grain and 
 the dark green of the trees along the 
 banks of the Save contrast prettily with 
 the gay colors of the garments worn by 
 the peasant-women trudging afield and 
 doing a large share of the heavy farm- 
 work. The road to Sissek leads through 
 a level land dotted with moss-grown vil- 
 lages. In the narrow streets of these an- 
 cient dorfs wild -looking children watch 
 flocks of screaming geese, and a few old 
 women sit spinning or knitting in the 
 sun. The young people make profound 
 obeisances, and the old ones repeat the 
 traditional formula, "I kiss your hand," 
 when addressed by a stranger. Sissek is 
 a rambling village, divided by the Save 
 into military and civil quarters : a strong 
 garrison is always maintained there, as 
 
 in most of the towns on the Austrian 
 side of the river. A little below the town 
 stands an old stone castle which has been 
 often besieged by the Turks when in their 
 wild wars they set their faces toward Vi- 
 enna. To-day this historical chateau is 
 — alas for the romance of association ! — 
 a cheese-factory ! 
 
 To Sissek and to many other towns 
 on the Save, which here begins to be 
 a broad and navigable stream, refugees 
 from Bosnia have been flocking in great 
 numbers for the last eighteen months. 
 Nothing has done more to excite to fiery 
 pitch of indignation the Sclavic popula- 
 tions of this interesting and influential sec^ 
 tion of Austria than the sight of these un- 
 happy thousands driven from their homes 
 by the cruelty of the rapacious and blood- 
 thirsty Turk. Centuries of enforced deg- 
 radation have done their work on these 
 unfortunate masses, these timorous and 
 dependent Christians, who are themselves 
 harmless, laborious and frugal when not 
 driven to desperation. The Austrian 
 government has not been hard-hearted 
 enough to send the cowering wretches 
 back across the boundary to a fate which 
 is worse than death, and hundreds of 
 them are settling in Croatia and Sclavo- 
 nia. Some day, when they have learn- 
 ed the difficult lesson of independence, 
 they will arise and turn their weapons 
 against those who have beaten them 
 down into the very dust; and then let 
 the oppressor tremble ! But up to the 
 present time they have not been allow- 
 ed to have any weapons : an ignorant 
 and malicious Mohammedan police has 
 watched them with the most untiring 
 care, and has succeeded, by terrible 
 punishments inflicted upon the few dar- 
 ing ones who have attempted to con- 
 spire, in frightening all the others into 
 passive endurance. It seems now as if 
 the hour of deliverance has sounded ; ■ 
 yet no man can venture to prophesy 
 what is to be the role of the Sclaves in 
 Austria in the settlement of the Sclavic 
 question. Edward King. 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. ^. k^ 
 
 7 
 
 SOMENDRIA. 
 
 AD A-K AL£ is a Turkish fortress which 
 seems to spring directly from the bo- 
 som of the Danube at a point where three 
 curious and quarrelsome races come into 
 contact, and where the Ottoman thought 
 it necessary to have a foothold even in 
 times of profound peace. To the trav- 
 eller from Western Europe no spectacle 
 on the way to Constantinople was so im- 
 pressive as this ancient and picturesque 
 fortification, suddenly affronting the vis- 
 ion with its odd walls, its minarets, its 
 red-capped sentries, and the yellow sin- 
 ister faces peering from balconies sus- 
 pended above the current. It was the 
 first glimpse of the Orient which one ob- 
 
 tained ; it appropriately introduced one 
 to a domain which is governed by sword 
 and gun ; and it was a pretty spot of color 
 in the midst of the severe and rather sol- 
 emn scenery of the Danubian stream. 
 Ada- Kale is to be razed to the water's 
 edge — so, at least, the treaty between 
 Russia and Turkey has ordained — and 
 the Servian mountaineers will no longer 
 see the Crescent flag flying within rifle- 
 shot of the crags from which, by their 
 heroic devotion in unequal battle, they 
 long ago banished it. 
 
 The Turks occupying this fortress dur- 
 ing the recent war evidently relied upon 
 Fate for their protection, for the walls of 
 
 293 
 
294 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 Ada-Kale are within a stone's throw of 
 the Roumanian shore, and every Mus- 
 sulman in the place could have been 
 captured in twenty minutes. I passed 
 by there one morning on the road from 
 Orsova, on the frontier of Hungary, to 
 Bucharest, and was somewhat amused 
 to see an elderly Turk seated in a small 
 boat near the Roumanian bank fishing. 
 Behind him were two soldiers, who serv- 
 ed as oarsmen, and rowed him gently 
 from point to point when he gave the 
 signal. Scarcely six hundred feet from 
 him stood a Wallachian sentry, watch- 
 ing his movements in lazy, indifferent 
 fashion. And this was at the moment 
 that the Turks were bombarding Kalafat 
 in Roumania from Widdin on the Bulga- 
 rian side of the Danube ! Such a spec- 
 tacle could be witnessed nowhere save 
 in this land, "where it is always after- 
 noon," where people at times seem to 
 suspend respiration because they are too 
 idle to breathe, and where even a dog 
 will protest if you ask him to move 
 quickly out of your path. The old Turk 
 doubtless fished in silence and calm un- 
 til the end of the war, for I never heard 
 of the removal of either himself or his 
 companions. 
 
 The journeys by river and by rail from 
 Lower Roumania to the romantic and 
 broken country surrounding Orsova are 
 extremely interesting. The Danube- 
 stretches of shimmering water among 
 the reedy lowlands — where the only 
 sign of life is a quaint craft painted with 
 gaudy colors becalmed in some nook, or 
 a guardhouse built on piles driven into 
 the mud — are perhaps a trifle monoto- 
 nous, but one has only to turn from them 
 to the people who come on board the 
 steamer to have a rich fund of enjoy- 
 ment. Nowhere are types so abundant 
 and various as on the routes of trav- 
 el between Bucharest and Rustchuk, or 
 Pesth and Belgrade. Every complexion, 
 an extraordinary piquancy and variety of 
 costume, and a bewildering array of lan- 
 guages and dialects, are set before the 
 careful observer. As for myself, I found 
 a special enchantment in the scenery of 
 the lower Danube — in the lonely inlets, 
 the wildernesses of young shoots in the 
 
 marshes, the flights of aquatic birds as 
 the sound of the steamer was heard, the 
 long tongues of land on which the water- 
 buffaloes lay huddled in stupid content, 
 the tiny hummocks where villages of 
 wattled hovels were assembled. The 
 Bulgarian shore stands out in bold re- 
 lief: Sistova, from the river, is positive- 
 ly beautiful, but the now historical Sim- 
 nitza seems only a mud-flat. At night 
 the boats touch upon the Roumanian 
 side for fuel — the Turks have always 
 been too lazy and vicious to develop the 
 splendid mineral resources of Bulgaria 
 — and the stout peasants and their wives 
 trundle thousands of barrows of coal 
 along the swinging planks. Here is raw 
 life, lusty, full of rude beauty, but utterly 
 incult. The men and women appear to 
 be merely animals gifted with speech. 
 The women wear almost no clothing: 
 their matted hair drops about their 
 shapely shoulders as they toil at their 
 burden, singing meanwhile some merry 
 chorus. Little tenderness is bestowed 
 on these creatures, and it was not with- 
 out a slight twinge of the nerves that I 
 saw the huge, burly master of the boat's 
 crew now and then bestow a ringing 
 slap with his open hand upon the neck 
 or cheek of one of the poor women who 
 stumbled with her load or who hesitated 
 for a moment to indulge in abuse of a 
 comrade. As the boat moved away these 
 people, dancing about the heaps of coal 
 in the torchlight, looked not unlike de- 
 mons disporting in some gruesome nook 
 of Enchanted Land. When they were 
 gypsies they did not need the aid of the 
 torches : they were sufficiently demoni- 
 acal without artificial aid. 
 
 Kalafat and Turnu-Severinu are small 
 towns which would never have been 
 much heard of had they not been in the 
 region visited by the war. Turnu-Seve- 
 rinu is noted, however, as the point where 
 Severinus once built a mighty tower; 
 and not far from the little hamlet may 
 still be seen the ruins of Trajan's im- 
 memorial bridge. Where the Danube 
 is twelve hundred yards wide and near- 
 ly twenty feet deep, ApoUodorus of Da- 
 mascus did not hesitate, at Trajan's com- 
 mand, to undertake the construction of 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 295 
 
 a bridge with 
 twenty stone and 
 wooden arches. 
 He builded well, 
 for one or two 
 of the stone 
 piers still remain 
 perfect a f t e r a 
 lapse of sixteen 
 centuries, and 
 eleven of them, 
 more or less ruin- 
 ed, are yet visible 
 at low water, 
 ApoUodorus was 
 a man of genius, 
 as his other work, 
 the Trajan Col- 
 umn, proudly 
 standing in 
 Rome, amply tes- 
 tifies. No doubt 
 he was richly re- 
 warded by Tra- 
 jan for construct- 
 ing a work which, 
 flanked as it was 
 by noble fortifi- 
 cations, bound 
 the newly - cap- 
 tured Dacian col- 
 ony to the Roman 
 empire. What 
 mighty men were 
 these Romans, 
 who carved their 
 way a 1 on g the 
 Danube banks, 
 hewing roads and 
 levelling moun- 
 tains at the same 
 time that they 
 engaged the sav- 
 ages of the local- 
 ity in daily bat- 
 tle ! There were 
 indeed giants in 
 those days. 
 
 When Ada-Kale is passed, and pretty 
 Orsova, lying in slumbrous quiet at the 
 foot of noble mountains, is reached, the 
 last trace of Turkish domination is left 
 behind. In future years, if the treaty 
 of San Stefano holds, there will b& little 
 
 evidence of Ottoman lack of civilization 
 an /where on the Danube, for the forts 
 of the Turks will gradually disappear, 
 and the Mussulman cannot for an in- 
 stant hold his own among Christians 
 where he has no military advantage. 
 
296 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 But at Orsova, although the red fez and 
 voluminous trousers are rarely seen, the 
 influence of Turkey is keenly felt. It is 
 in these remote regions of Hungary that 
 the real rage against Russia and the 
 burning enthusiasm and sympathy for 
 the Turks is most openly expressed. 
 Every cottage in the neighborhood is 
 filled with crude pictures representing 
 events of the Hungarian revolution; and 
 the peasants, as they look upon those re- 
 minders of perturbed times, reflect that 
 the Russians were instrumental in pre- 
 venting the accomplishment of their dear- 
 est wishes. Here the Hungarian is emi- 
 nently patriotic : he endeavors as much 
 as possible to forget that he and his are 
 bound to the empire of Austria, and he 
 speaks of the German and the Slav who 
 are his fellow-subjects with a sneer. The 
 people whom one encounters in that cor- 
 ner of Hungary profess a dense igno- 
 rance of the German language, but if 
 pressed can speak it glibly enough. I 
 won an angry frown and an unpleasant 
 lemark from an innkeeper because I did 
 not know that Austrian postage-stamps 
 are not good in Hungary. Such melan- 
 choly ignorance of the simplest details 
 of existence seemed to my host meet 
 subject for reproach. 
 
 Orsova became an important point as 
 soon as the Turks and Russians were at 
 war. The peasants of the Banat stared 
 as they saw long lines of travellers leav- 
 ing the steamers which had come from 
 Pesth and Bazros, and invading the two 
 small inns, which are usually more than 
 half empty. Englishmen, Russians, Aus- 
 trian officers sent down to keep careful 
 watch upon the land, French and Prus- 
 sian , Swiss and Belgian military attaches 
 and couriers, journalists, artists, amateur 
 army - followers, crowded the two long 
 streets and exhausted the market. Next 
 came a hungry and thirsty mob of refu- 
 gees from Widdin — Jews, Greeks and 
 gypsies — and these promenaded their 
 variegated misery on the river -banks 
 from sunrise until sunset. Then out from 
 Roumanian land poured thousands of 
 wretched peasants, bare -footed, bare- 
 headed, dying of starvation, fleeing from 
 Turkish invasion, which, happily, never 
 
 assumed large proportions. These poor 
 people slept on the ground, content with 
 the shelter of house-walls : they subsist- 
 ed on unripe fruits and that unfailing 
 fund of mild tobacco which every male 
 being in all those countries invariably 
 manages to secure. Walking abroad in 
 Orsova was no easy task, for one was 
 constantly compelled to step over these 
 poor fugitives, who packed themselves 
 into the sand at noonday, and managed 
 for a few hours before the cool evening 
 breezes came to forget their miseries. 
 The vast fleet of river-steamers belong- 
 ing to the Austrian company was laid 
 up at Orsova, and dozens of captains, 
 conversing in the liquid Slav or the 
 graceful Italian or guttural German, were 
 for ever seated about the doors of the lit- 
 tle cafes smoking long cigars and quaff- 
 ing beakers of the potent white wine pro- 
 duced in Austrian vineyards. 
 
 Opposite Orsova lie the Servian Moun- 
 tains, bold, majestic, inspiring. Their 
 noble forests and the deep ravines be- 
 tween them are exquisite in color when 
 the sun flashes along their sides. A few 
 miles below the point where the Hun- 
 garian and Roumanian territories meet 
 the mountainous region declines into 
 foot-hills, and then to an uninteresting 
 plain. The Orsovan dell is the cul- 
 minating point of all the beauty and 
 grandeur of the Danubian hills. From 
 one eminence richly laden with vine- 
 yards I looked out on a fresh April 
 morning across a delicious valley fill- 
 ed with pretty farms and white cottages 
 and ornamented by long rows of shape- 
 ly poplars. Turning to the right, I saw 
 Servia's barriers, shutting in from the 
 cold winds the fat lands of the interior ; 
 vast hillsides dotted from point to point 
 with peaceful villages, in the midst of 
 which white churches with slender spires 
 arose ; and to the left the irregular line 
 of the Roumanian peaks stood up, jag- 
 ged and broken, against the horizon. 
 Out from Orsova runs a rude highway 
 into the rocky and savage back-country. 
 The celebrated baths of Mehadia, the 
 "hot springs" of the Austro-Hungarian 
 empire, are yearly frequented by three 
 or four thousand sufferers, who come 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 297 
 
 from the European capitals to Tames- I gences to the water-cure. But the rail- 
 ''ar, and are thence trundled in dili- 1 way is penetrating even this far-off land, 
 
 where once brigands delighted to wan- 
 der, and Temesvar and Bucharest will 
 be bound together by a daily "through- 
 
 service " as regular as that between Pesth 
 and Vienna. 
 
 I sat one evening on the balcony of 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 the diminutive inn known as "The Hun- 
 garian Crown," watching the sunbeams 
 on the broad current of the Danube and 
 listening to the ripple, the plash and the 
 gurgle of the swollen stream as it rushed 
 impetuously against the banks. A group 
 of Servians, in canoes light and swift as 
 those of Indians, had made their way 
 across the river, and were struggling 
 vigorously to prevent the current from 
 carrying them below a favorable land- 
 ing-place. These tall, slender men, with 
 bronzed faces and gleaming eyes, with 
 their round skull-caps, their gaudy jack- 
 ets and ornamental leggings, bore no 
 small resemblance at a distance to cer- 
 tain of our North American red-skins. 
 Each man had a long knife in his belt, 
 and from experience I can say that a 
 Servian knife is in itself a complete tool- 
 chest. With its one tough and keen 
 blade one may skin a sheep, file a saw, 
 split wood, mend a wagon, defend one's 
 self vigorously if need be, make a but- 
 tonhole and eat one's breakfast. No 
 Servian who adheres to the ancient cos- 
 tume would consider himself dressed un- 
 less the crooked knife hung from his gir- 
 dle. Although the country-side along 
 the Danube is rough, and travellers are 
 said to need protection among the Ser- 
 vian hills, I could not discover that the 
 inhabitants wore other weapons than 
 these useful articles of cutlery. Yet they 
 are daring smugglers, and sometimes 
 openly, defy the Hungarian authorities 
 when discovered. "Ah!" said Master 
 Josef, the head-servant of the Hunga- 
 rian Crown, "many a good fight have I 
 seen in mid-stream, the boats grappled 
 together, knives flashing, and our fel- 
 lows drawing their pistols. All that, too, 
 for a few flasks of Negotin, which is a 
 musty red, thick wine that Heaven would 
 forbid me to recommend to your honor- 
 able self and companions so long as I 
 put in the cellar the pearl dew of yon- 
 der vineyards !" pointing to the vines of 
 Orsova. 
 
 While the Servians were anxiously 
 endeavoring to land, and seemed to be 
 in imminent danger of upsetting, the roll 
 of thunder was heard and a few drops 
 of rain fell with heavy plash. Master 
 
 Josef forthwith began making shutters 
 fast and tying the curtains; "For now 
 we shall have a wind !" quoth he. And 
 it came. As by magic the Servian shore 
 was blotted out, and before me I could 
 see little save the river, which seemed 
 transformed into a roaring and foam- 
 ing ocean. The refugees, the gypsies, 
 the Jews, the Greeks, scampered in all 
 directions. Then tremendous echoes 
 awoke among the hills. Peal after peal 
 echoed and re-echoed, until it seemed 
 as if the cliffs must crack and crumble. 
 Sheets of rain were blown by the mis- 
 chievous winds now full upon the un- 
 happy fugitives, or now descended with 
 seemingly crushing force on the Ser- 
 vians in their dancing canoes. Then 
 came vivid lightning, brilliant and in- 
 stant glances of electricity, disclosing 
 the forests and hills for a moment, then 
 seeming by their quick departure to ren- 
 der the obscurity more painful than be- 
 fore. The fiery darts were hurled by 
 dozens upon the devoted trees, and the 
 tall and graceful stems were bent like 
 reeds before the rushing of the blast. 
 Cold swept through the vale, and shad- 
 ows seemed to follow it. Such contrast 
 with the luminous, lovely semi-tropical 
 afternoon, in the dreamy restfulness of 
 which man and beast seemed settling 
 into lethargy, was crushing. It pained 
 and disturbed the spirit. Master Josef, 
 who never lost an occasion to cross him- 
 self and to do a few turns on a little ro- 
 sary of amber beads, came and went in 
 a kind of dazed mood while the storm 
 was at its height. Just as a blow was 
 struck among the hills which seemed to 
 make the earth quiver to its centre, the 
 varlet approached and modestly inquired 
 if the "honorable society" — myself and 
 chance companions — would visit that 
 very afternoon the famous chapel in 
 which the crown of Hungary lies buried. 
 I glanced curiously at him, thinking that 
 possibly the thunder had addled his brain. 
 " Oh, the honorable society may walk in 
 sunshine all the way to the chapel at five 
 o'clock," he said with an encouraging 
 grin. "These Danube storms come and 
 go as quickly as a Tsigane from a hen- 
 roost. See ! the thunder has stopped its 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 299 
 
 howling, and there 
 is not a wink of 
 lightning. Even 
 the raindrops are 
 so few that one 
 may almost walk 
 between them." 
 
 I returned to 
 the balcony from 
 which the storm 
 had driven me, 
 and was gratified 
 by the sight of the 
 mount a i n-side 
 studded with 
 pearls, which a 
 faint glow in the 
 sky was g e n tl y 
 touching. The 
 Danube roared 
 and foamed with 
 malicious glee as 
 the poor Servians 
 were still whirled 
 about on the wa- 
 ter. But present- 
 ly, through the 
 deep gorges and 
 along the sombre 
 stream and over 
 the vineyards, the 
 rocks and the 
 roofs of humble 
 cottages, stole a 
 warm breeze, fol- 
 lowed by dazzling 
 sunlight, which 
 returned in mad 
 haste to atone for 
 the displeasure of 
 the wind and rain. 
 In a few moments 
 the refugees were 
 again afield, 
 spreading their 
 drenched gar- 
 ments on the 
 wooden railings, 
 and stalking 
 about in a condi- 
 tion narrowly ap- 
 proaching naked- 
 ness. A gypsy 
 four feet high, 
 
300 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 clad in a linen shirt and trousers so wide 
 as to resemble petticoats, strolled thought- 
 lessly on the bank singing a plaintive 
 melody, and now and then turning his 
 brown face skyward as if to salute the 
 sun. This child of mysterious ancestry, 
 this wanderer from the East, this robber 
 of roosts and cunning worker in metals, 
 possessed nor hat nor shoes : his naked 
 breast and his unprotected arms must 
 suffer cold at night, yet he seemed won- 
 derfully happy. The Jews and Greeks 
 gave him scornful glances, which he re- 
 turned with quizzical, provoking smiles. 
 At last he threw himself down on a plank 
 from which the generous sun was rapidly 
 drying the rain, and, coiling up as a dog 
 might have done, he was soon asleep. 
 
 With a marine glass I could see dis- 
 tinctly every movement on the Servian 
 shore. Close to the water's edge nestled 
 a small village of neat white cottages. 
 Around a little wharf hovered fifty or 
 sixty stout farmers, mounted on sturdy 
 ponies, watching the arrival of the Mer- 
 cur, the Servian steamer from Belgrade 
 and the Sava River. The Mercur came 
 puffing valiantly forward, as unconcerned 
 as if no whirlwind had swept across her 
 path, although she must have been in 
 the narrow and dangerous canon of the 
 " Iron Gates " when the blast and the 
 shower were most furious. On the roads 
 leading down the mountain-sides I saw 
 long processions of squealing and grunt- 
 ing swine, black, white and gray, all at- 
 tive and self-willed, fighting each other 
 for the right of way. Before each pro- 
 cession marched a swineherd playing on 
 a rustic pipe, the sounds from which prim- 
 itive instrument seemed to exercise Cir- 
 cean enchantment upon the rude flocks. 
 It was inexpressibly comical to watch the 
 masses of swine after they had been en- 
 closed in the "folds" — huge tracts fenced 
 in and provided with shelters at the cor- 
 ners. Each- herd knew its master, and 
 as he passed to and fro would salute him 
 with a delighted squeal, which died away 
 into a series of disappointed and cynical 
 groans as soon as the porkers had dis- 
 covered that no evening repast was to be 
 offered them. Good fare do these Ser- 
 vian swine find in the abundant provision 
 
 of acorns in the vast forests. The men 
 who spend their lives in restraining the 
 vagabond instincts of these vulgar ani- 
 mals may perhaps be thought a collec- 
 tion of brutal hinds; but, on the con- 
 trary, they are fellows of shrewd com- 
 mon sense and much dignity of feeling. 
 Kara-George, the terror of the Turk at 
 the beginning of this century, the majes- 
 tic charactisr who won the admiration of 
 Europe, whose genius as a soldier was 
 praised by Napoleon the Great, and who 
 freed his countrymen from bondage, — 
 Kara -George was a swineherd in the 
 woods of the Schaumadia until the wind 
 of the spirit fanned his brow and called 
 him from his simple toil to immortalize 
 his homely name. 
 
 Master Josef and his fellows in Or- 
 sova did not hate the Servians with the 
 bitterness manifested toward the Rou- 
 manians, yet they considered them as 
 aliens and as dangerous conspirators 
 against the public weal. " Who knows 
 at what moment they may go over to 
 the Russians ?" was the constant cry. 
 And in process of time they went, but 
 although Master Josef had professed 
 the utmost willingness to take up arms 
 on such an occasion, it does not appear 
 that he did 'it, doubtless preferring, on 
 reflection, the quiet of his inn and his 
 flask of white wine in the courtyard ra- 
 ther than an excursion among the trans- 
 Danubian hills and the chances of an 
 untoward fate at the point of a Servian 
 knife. It is not astonishing that the two 
 peoples do not understand each other, 
 although only a strip of water separates 
 their frontiers for a long stretch ; for the 
 difference in language and in its written 
 form is a most effectual barrier to inter- 
 course. The Servians learn something of 
 the Hungarian dialects, since they come 
 to till the rich lands of the Banat in the 
 summer season. Bulgarians and Ser- 
 vians by thousands find employment in 
 Hungary in summer, and return home 
 when autumn sets in. But the dreams 
 and ambitions of the two peoples have 
 nothing in common. Servia looks long- 
 ingly to Slavic unification, and is anxious 
 to secure for herself a predominance in 
 the new nation to be moulded out of 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 the old scattered elements : Hungary be- 
 lieves that the consolidation of the Slavs 
 would place her in a dangerous 
 and humiliating position, and 
 conspires day and night to com- 
 pass exactly the reverse of Ser- 
 vian wishes. Thus the two coun- 
 tries are theoretically at peace 
 and practically at war. While 
 the conflict of 1877 was in prog- 
 ress collisions between Servian 
 and Hungarian were of almost 
 daily occurrence. 
 
 The Hungarian's intolerance 
 of the Slav does not proceed from 
 unworthy jealousy, but rather 
 from an exaggerated idea of the 
 importance of his own country, 
 and of the evils which might be- 
 fall it if the old Serb stock began 
 to renew its ancient glory. In ; 
 corners of Hungary, such as Or- '' 
 sova, the peasant imagines that ! 
 his native land is the main world, \ 
 andthattherestofEuropeisanun- I 
 necessary and troublesome fringe ; 
 around the edges of it. There is a 
 story of a gentleman in Pesth who 
 went to a dealer in maps and in- "i 
 quired for a globus of Hungary, 1 
 showing that he imagined it to be ■ 
 the whole round earth. ! 
 
 So fair were the land and the ; 
 stream after the storm that I lin- 
 gered until sunset gazing out over 
 river and on Servian hills, and 
 did not accept Josef's invitation 
 to visit the chapel of the Hunga- 
 rian crown that evening. But 
 next morning, before the sun was 
 high, I wandered alone in the di- 
 rection of the Roumanian fron- 
 tier, and by accident came upon 
 the chapel. It is a modest struc- 
 ture in a nook surrounded by tall 
 poplars, and within is a simple 
 chapel with Latin inscriptions. 
 Here the historic crown reposes, 
 now that there is no longer any 
 use for it at Presburg, the ancient 
 capital. Here it was brought by 
 pious hands after the troubles between 
 Austria and Hungary were settled. Dur- 
 ing the revolution the sacred bauble was 
 
 hidden by the command of noblemen to 
 whom it had been confided, and the ser- 
 
 vitors who concealed it at the behest of 
 their masters were slain, lest in an indis- 
 creet moment they might betray the se- 
 
302 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 cret. For thousands of enthusiasts this 
 tiny chapel is the hohest of shrines, and 
 should trouble come anew upon Hungary 
 in the present perturbed times, the crown 
 would perhaps journey once more. 
 
 It seems pitiful that the railway should 
 ever invade this out-of-the-way corner 
 of Europe. But it is already crawling 
 through the mountains : hundreds of 
 Italian laborers are putting down the 
 shining rails in woods and glens where 
 no sounds save the song of birds or the 
 carol of the infrequent passer-by have 
 heretofore been heard. For the present, 
 however, the old-fashioned, comfortless 
 diligence keeps the roads : the beribbon- 
 ed postilion winds his merry horn, and 
 as the afternoon sun is getting low the 
 dusty, antique vehicle rattles up to the 
 court of the inn, the guard gets down, 
 dusts the leather casing of the gun which 
 now-a-days he is never compelled to use : 
 then he touches his square hat, ornament- 
 ed with a feather, to the maids and men 
 of the hostelfy. When the mails are 
 claimed, the horses refreshed and the 
 stage is covered with its leathern hood, 
 postilion and guard sit down together in 
 a cool corner under the gallery in the 
 courtyard and crack various small flasks 
 of wine. They smoke their porcelain 
 pipes imported from Vienna with the 
 ai*- of men of the world who have trav- 
 elled and who could tell you a thing or 
 two if they liked. They are never tired 
 of talking of Mehadia, which is one ot 
 their principal stations. The sad-faced 
 nobleman, followed by the decorous old 
 man-servant in fantastic Magyar livery, 
 who arrived in the diligence, has been 
 to the baths. The master is vainly seek- 
 ing cure, comes eveiy year, and always 
 supplies postilion and guard with the 
 money to buy flasks of wine. This the 
 postilion tells me and my fellows, and 
 ^■uggests that the "honorable society" 
 should follow the worthy nobleman's ex- 
 ample. No sooner is it done than pos- 
 tilion and guard kiss our hands ; which 
 is likewise an evidence that they have 
 travelled, are well met with every stran- 
 ger and all customs, and know more than 
 they say. 
 
 The Romans had extensive establish- 
 
 ments at Mehadia, which they called the 
 "Baths of Hercules," and it is in mem- 
 ory of this that a statue of the good giant 
 stands in the square of the little town. 
 Scattered through the hills, many in- 
 scriptions to Hercules, to Mercury and 
 to Venus have been found during the 
 ages. The villages on the road thither 
 are few and far between, and are in- 
 habited by peasants decidedly Dacian 
 in type. It is estimated that a million 
 and a half of Roumanians are settled 
 in Hungary, and in this section they are 
 exceedingly numerous. Men and women 
 wear showy costumes, quite barbaric and 
 uncomfortable. The women seem deter- 
 mined to wear as few garments as pos- 
 sible, and to compensate for lack of num- 
 ber by brightness of coloring. In many 
 a pretty face traces of gypsy blood may 
 be seen. This vagabond taint gives an 
 inexpressible charm to a face for which 
 the Hungarian strain has already done 
 much. The coal-black hair and wild, 
 mutinous eyes set off to perfection the 
 pale face and exquisitely thin lips, the 
 delicate nostrils and beautifully moulded 
 chin. Angel or devil ? queries the be- 
 holder. Sometimes he is constrained to 
 think that the possessor of such a face 
 has the mingled souls of saint and si- 
 ren. The light undertone of melancholy 
 which pervades gypsy beauty, gypsy mu- 
 sic, gypsy manners, has an extremely 
 remarkable fascination for all who per- 
 ceive it. Even when it is almost buried 
 beneath ignorance and animal craft, it is 
 still to be found in the gypsy nature af- 
 ter dihgent search. This strange race 
 seems overshadowed by the sorrow of 
 some haunting memory. Each individ- 
 ual belonging to the Tsiganes whom I 
 saw impressed me as a fugitive from 
 Fate. To look back was impossible ; 
 of the present he was -careless ; the fu- 
 ture tempted him on. In their music 
 one now and then hears hints of a de- 
 sire to return to some far-off and half- 
 forgotten land. But this is rare. 
 
 There are a large number of "civil- 
 ized gypsies," so called, in the neigh- 
 borhood of Orsova. I never saw one of 
 them without a profound compassion foi 
 him, so utterly unhappy did he look in 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 303 
 
 ordinary attire. The musicians who came 
 nightly to play on the lawn in front of 
 the Hungarian Crown inn belonged to 
 these civilized Tsiganes. They had lost 
 all the freedom of gesture, the proud, 
 half-savage stateliness of those who re- 
 mained nomadic 
 and untrammel- 
 led by local law 
 and custom. The 
 old instinct was 
 in their music, but 
 sometimes there 
 drifted into it the 
 same mixture of 
 saint and devil 
 which I had seen 
 in the "compo- 
 site" faces. 
 
 As soon as sup- 
 per was set forth, 
 piping hot and 
 flanked by flagons 
 of beer and wine, 
 on the lawn, and 
 the guests had as- 
 sembled to par- 
 take of the good 
 cheer, while yet 
 the afterglow lin- 
 gered along the 
 Danube, these 
 dusky musicians 
 appeared and in- 
 stalled themselves 
 m a corner. The 
 old stream's mur- 
 mur could not 
 drown the pier- 
 cing and pathetic 
 notes of the vio- 
 lin, the gentle 
 wail of the guzla 
 or the soft thrum- 
 ming of the rude 
 tambourine. Lit- 
 tle poetry as a 
 spectacled and 
 frosty Austrian of- 
 ficer might have 
 in his soul, that 
 little must have 
 been awakened 
 by the songs and 
 
 the orchestral performances of the Tsi- 
 ganes as the sun sank low. The dusk 
 began to creep athwart the lawn, and a 
 cool breeze fanned the foreheads of the 
 listeners. When the light was all gone, 
 these men, as if inspired by the dark- 
 
 ','i,;ii)':i!r:! 
 
 'i!iilr','M"'| 
 
 ,',-1,1'"' ''i| 
 I",' ',:* i'':'!j 
 
 ■1 V'ii|i|(i!i| 
 
 "•"I'fJ'l 
 
 ■ '1 ■ I 
 II I I ' 
 
 ii'ii'i r 
 
 ,''i'iiifll|'i||i|i| 
 '''iiii'|i|f|l 
 
 ' I I 
 
 Ml 
 I 
 
304 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 ness, sometimes improvised most angelic 
 melody. There was never any loud or 
 boisterous note, never any direct appeal 
 to the attention. I invariably forgot the 
 singers and players, and the music seem- 
 ed a part of the harmony of Nature. 
 While the pleasant notes echoed in the 
 twilight, troops of jaunty young Hunga- 
 rian soldiers, dressed in red hose, dark- 
 green doublets and small caps sometimes 
 adorned with feathers, sauntered up and 
 down the principal street ; the refugees 
 huddled in corners and listened with de- 
 light ; the Austrian officials lumbered by, 
 pouring clouds of smoke from their long, 
 strong and inevitable cigars; and the 
 dogs forgot their perennial quarrel for 
 a few instants at a time. 
 
 The dogs of Orsova and of all the 
 neighboring country have many of the 
 characteristics of their fellow-creatures in 
 Turkey. Orsova is divided into ' ' beats, ' ' 
 which are thoroughly and garefuUy pa- 
 trolled night and day by bands of dogs 
 who recognize the limits of their domain 
 and severely resent intrusion. In front 
 of the Hungarian Crown a large dog, 
 aided by a small yellow cur and a black 
 spaniel mainly made up of ears and tail, 
 maintained order. The afternoon quiet 
 was generally distm-bed about four o'clock 
 by the advent of a strange canine, who, 
 with that expression of extreme inno- 
 cence which always characterizes the 
 animal that knows he is doing wrong, 
 would • venture on to the forbidden 
 ground. A low growl in chorus from 
 the three guardians was the inevitable 
 preliminary warning. The new-comer 
 usually seemed much surprised at this, 
 and gave an astonished glance : then, 
 wagging his tail merrily, as much as to 
 say, "Nonsense ! I must have been mis- 
 taken," he approached anew. One of 
 the trio of guardians thereupon sallied 
 forth to meet him, followed by the others 
 a little distance behind. If the strange 
 dog showed his teeth, assumed a defiant 
 attitude and seem.ed inclined to make 
 his way through any number of enemies, 
 the trio held a consultation, which, I am 
 bound to say, almost invariably result- 
 ed in a fight. The intruder would either 
 fly yelping, or would work his way across 
 
 the interdicted territory by means of a 
 series of encounters, accompanied by 
 the most terrific barking, snapping and 
 shrieking, and by a very considerable ef- 
 fusion of blood. The person who should 
 interfere to prevent a dog-fight in Orsova 
 would be regarded as a lunatic. Some- 
 times a large white dog, accompanied by 
 two shaggy animals resembling wolves so 
 closely that it was almost impossible to 
 believe them guardians of flocks of sheep, 
 passed by the Hungarian Crown unchal- 
 lenged, but these were probably tried 
 warriors whose valor was so well known 
 that they were no longer questioned any- 
 where. 
 
 The gypsies have in their wagons or 
 following in their train small black dogs 
 of temper unparalleled for ugliness. It 
 is impossible to approach a Tsigane tent 
 or wagon without encountering a swarm 
 of these diminutive creatures, whose rage 
 is not only amusing, but sometimes ra- 
 ther appalling to contemplate. Driving 
 rapidly by a camp one morning in a 
 farmer's cart drawn by two stout horses 
 adorned with jingling bells, I was fol- 
 lowed by a pack of these dark-skinned 
 animals. The bells awoke such rage 
 within them that they seemed insane 
 under its influence. As they leaped and 
 snapped around me, I felt like some trav- 
 eller in a Russian forest pursued by hun- 
 gry wolves. A dog scarcely six inches 
 high, and but twice as long, would spring 
 from the ground as if a pound of dy- 
 namite had exploded beneath him, and 
 would make a desperate effort to throw 
 himself into the wagon. Another, howl- 
 ing in impotent anger, would jump full 
 at a horse's throat, would roll beneath 
 the feet of the team, but in some mirac- 
 ulous fashion would escape unhurt, and 
 would scramble upon a bank to try again. 
 It was a real relief when the discouraged 
 pack fell away. Had I shot one of the 
 animals, the gypsies would have found 
 a way to avenge the death of their en- 
 terprising though somewhat too zealous 
 camp-follower. Animals everywhere on 
 these border-lines of the Orient are treat- 
 ed with much more tenderness than men 
 and women are. The grandee who would 
 scowl furiously in this wild region of the 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 305 
 
 Banat if the peasants did not stand by I of respect and submission as he whirled 
 the roadside and doff their hats in token | by in his carriage, would not kick a dog 
 
 out of his way, and would manifest the 
 utmost tenderness for his horses. 
 
 Much as the Hungarian inhabitants 
 20 
 
 of the Banat hate tlie Roumanians, they 
 do not fail to appreciate the commercial 
 advantages which will follow on the union 
 
3o6 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 of the two countries by rail. Pretty Or- 
 sova may in due time become a bustling 
 town filled with grain- and coal-depots 
 and with small manufactories. The rail- 
 way from Verciorova on the frontier runs 
 through the large towns Pitesti and Crai- 
 ova on its way to Bucharest. It is a mar- 
 vellous railroad : it climbs hills, descends 
 into deep gullies, and has as little of 
 the air -line about it as a great river 
 has, for the contractors built it on the 
 principle of "keeping near the surface," 
 and they much preferred climbing ten 
 high mountains to cutting one tunnel. 
 Craiova takes its name, according to a 
 somewhat misty legend, from John As- 
 san, who was one of the Romano-Bul- 
 garian kings, Craiova being a corruption 
 of Crai Ivan ("King John"). This John 
 was the same who drank his wine from a 
 cup made out of the skull of the unlucky 
 emperor Baldwin I. The old bans of 
 Craiova gave their title to the Rouma- 
 nian silver pieces now known as bant. 
 Slatina, farther down the line, on the 
 river Altu (the Aluta of the ancients), is 
 a pretty town, where a proud and brave 
 community love to recite to the stranger 
 the valorous deeds of their ancestors. It 
 is the centre from which have spread out 
 most of the modern revolutionary move- 
 ments in Roumania. " Little Wallachia," 
 in which Slatina stands, is rich in well- 
 tilled fields and uplands covered with 
 fat cattle : it is as fertile as Kansas, and 
 its people seemed to me more agreeable 
 and energetic than those in and around 
 Bucharest. 
 
 He who clings to the steamers plying 
 up and down the Danube sees much ro- 
 mantic scenery and many curious types, 
 but he loses all the real charm of travel 
 in these regions. The future tourist on 
 his way to or from Bulgaria and the bat- 
 tle-fields of the "new crusade" will be 
 wise if he journeys leisurely by farm- 
 wagon — he will not be likely to find a 
 carriage — along the Hungarian bank 
 of the stream. I made the journey in 
 April, when in that gentle southward 
 climate the wayside was already radiant 
 with flowers and the mellow sunshine 
 was unbroken by cloud or rain. There 
 were discomfort and dust, but there was 
 
 a rare pleasure in the arrival at a quaint 
 inn whose exterior front, boldly asserting 
 itself in the bolder row of house-fronts 
 in a long village street, was uninviting 
 enough, but the interior of which was 
 charming. In such a hostelry I always 
 found the wharfmaster, in green coat and 
 cap, asleep in an arm-chair, with the bur- 
 gomaster and one or two idle landed pro- 
 prietors sitting near him at a card-table, 
 enveloped in such a cloud of smoke that 
 One could scarcely see the long- necked 
 flasks of white wine which they were rap- 
 idly emptying. The host was a massive 
 man with bulbous nose and sleepy eyes : 
 he responded to all questions with a stare 
 and the statement that he did not know, 
 and seemed anxious to leave everything 
 in doubt until the latest moment possible. 
 His daughter, who was brighter and less 
 dubious in her responses than her father, 
 was a slight girl with lustrous black eyes, 
 wistful lips, a perfect form, and black 
 hair covered with a linen cloth that the 
 dust might not come near its glossy 
 threads. When she made her appear- 
 ance, flashing out of a huge dark room 
 which was stone paved and arched over- 
 head, and in which peasants sat drinking 
 sour beer, she seemed like a ray of sun- 
 shine in the middle of night. But there 
 was more dignity about her than is to be 
 found in most sunbeams : she was mod- 
 est and civil in answer, but understood 
 no compliments. There was something 
 of the princess-reduced-in-circumstances 
 in her demeanor. A royal supper could 
 she serve, and the linen which she spread 
 on the small wooden table in the back 
 courtyard smelled of lavender. I took 
 my dinners, after the long days' rides, in 
 inns which commanded delicious views 
 of the Danube — points where willows 
 overhung the rushing stream, or where 
 crags towered above it, or where it flow^ 
 ed in smooth yet resistless might through 
 plains in which hundreds of peasants were 
 toiling, their red-and-white costumes con- 
 trasting sharply with the brilliant blue of 
 the sky and the tender green of the foliage. 
 If the inns were uniformly cleanly 
 and agreeable, as much could not be 
 said for the villages, which were some- 
 times decidedly dirty. The cottages of 
 
ALONG THE bANUBE. 
 
 307 
 
 the peasants — that is, of the agri- 
 cultural laborers — were window- 
 less to a degree which led me to 
 look for a small- and dull-eyed 
 race, but the eloquent orbs of 
 youths and maidens in all this 
 Banat land are rarely equalled in 
 beauty. I found it in my heart 
 to object to the omnipresent 
 swine. These cheerful animals 
 were sometimes so domesticated 
 that they followed their masters 
 and mistresses afield in the morn- 
 ing. In this section of Hungary, 
 as indeed in most parts of Eu- 
 rope, the farm-houses are all hud- 
 dled together in compact villages, 
 and the lands tilled by the dwell- 
 ers in these communities extend 
 for miles around them. At dawn 
 the procession of laborers goes 
 forth, and at sunset it returns. 
 Nothing can give a better idea 
 of rural simplicity and peace than 
 the return of the peasants of a 
 hamlet at eventide from their 
 vineyards and meadows. Just as 
 the sun was deluging the broad 
 Danube with glory before relin- 
 quishing the current to the twi- 
 light's shades I came, in the soft 
 April evening, into the neighbor- 
 hood of Drenkova. A tranquil 
 afterglow was here and there vis- 
 ible near the hills, which warded 
 off the sun's passionate farewell 
 glances at the vines and flowers. 
 Beside the way, on the green 
 banks, sat groups of children, 
 clad with paradisiacal simplicity, 
 awaiting their fathers and moth- 
 ers. At a vineyard's hedge a 
 sweet girl, tall, stately and mel- 
 ancholy, was twining a garland 
 in the cap of a stout young fel- 
 low who rested one broad hand 
 lightly upon her shoulder. Old 
 women, bent and wrinkled, hob- 
 bled out from the fields, getting 
 help from their sons or grandsons. 
 Sometimes I met a shaggy white 
 horse drawing a cart in which 
 a dozen sonsie lasses, their faces 
 browned by wind and their tresses 
 
io8 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 blown back from their brows in most be- 
 witching manner by the hbertine breeze, 
 were jolting homeward, singing as they 
 went. The young men in their loose lin- 
 en garments, with their primitive hoes 
 and spades on their shoulders, were as 
 goodly specimens of manly strength and 
 beauty as one could wish to look upon. 
 It hurt me to see them stand humbly 
 ranged in rows as I passed. But it was 
 pleasant to note the fervor with which 
 they knelt around the cross rearing its , 
 sainted form amid the waving grasses. 
 They knew nothing of the outer world, 
 save that from time to time the emperor 
 claimed certain of their number for his 
 service, and that perhaps their lot might 
 lead them to the great city of Buda-Pesth. 
 Everywhere as far as the eye could reach 
 the land was cultivated with greatest care, 
 and plenty seemed the lot of all. The 
 peasant lived in an ugly and windowless 
 house because his father and grandfather 
 had done so before him, not because it 
 was necessary. It was odd to see girls 
 tall as Dian, and as fair, bending their 
 pretty bodies to come out of the con- 
 temptible little apertures in the peasant- 
 houses called "doors." 
 
 Drenkova is a long street of low cot- 
 tages, with here and there a two-story 
 mansion to denote that the proprietors 
 of the land reside there. As I approach- 
 ed the entrance to this street I saw a most 
 remarkable train coming to meet me. 
 One glance toid me that it was a large 
 company of gypsies who had come up 
 from Roumania, and were going north- 
 ward in search of work or plunder. My 
 driver drew rein, and we allowed the 
 swart Bohemians to pass on — a courtesy 
 which was gracefully acknowledged with 
 a singularly sweet smile from the driver 
 of the first cart. There were about two 
 hundred men and women in this wagon- 
 train, and I verily believe that there were 
 twice as many children. Each cart, drawn 
 by a small Roumanian pony, contained 
 two or three families huddled together, 
 and seemingly lost in contemplation of 
 the beautiful sunset, for your real gyp- 
 sy is a keen admirer of Nature and her 
 charms. Some of the women were in- 
 tensely hideous : age had ma'de them as 
 
 unattractive as in youth they had been 
 pretty ; others were graceful and well 
 formed. Many wore but a single gar 
 ment. The men were wilder than anj 
 that I had ever before seen : their mat 
 ted hair, their thick lips and their dark 
 eyes gave them almost the appearance 
 of negroes. One or two of them had 
 been foraging, and bore sheeps' heads 
 and hares which they had purchased or 
 "taken " in the village. They halted as 
 soon as they had passed me, and pre- 
 pared to go into camp ; so I waited a lit- 
 tle to observe them. During the process 
 of arranging the carts for the night one 
 of the women became enraged at the 
 father of her brood because he would 
 not aid her in the preparation of the 
 simple tent under which the family was 
 to repose. The woman ran to him, 
 clenching her fist and screaming forth 
 invective which, I am convinced, had I 
 understood it and had it been directed 
 at me, I should have found extremely 
 disagreeable. After thus lashing the cul- 
 prit with language for some time, she 
 broke forth into screams and danced 
 frantically around him. He arose, vis- 
 ibly disturbed, and I fancied that his 
 savage nature would come uppermost, 
 and that he might be impelled to give 
 her a brutal beating. But he, on the 
 contrary, advanced leisurely toward her 
 and spat upon the ground with an ex- 
 pression of extreme contempt. She seem- 
 ed to feel this much more than she would 
 have felt a blow, and her fury redoubled. 
 She likewise spat ; he again repeated the 
 contemptuous act ; and after both had 
 gratified the anger which was consum- 
 ing them, they walked off in different 
 directions. The battle was over, and I 
 was not sorry to notice a few minutes 
 later that paterfamilias had thought 
 better of his conduct, and was himself 
 spreading the tent and setting forth his 
 wandering Lares and Penates. 
 
 A few hundred yards from the point 
 where these wanderers had settled for 
 the night I found some rude huts in 
 which other gypsies were residing per- 
 manently. These huts were mere shel- 
 ters placed against steep banks or hedges, 
 and within there was no furniture save 
 
ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 309 
 
 one or two blankets, a camp-kettle and I or thirteen years of age cix)uched naked 
 some wicker baskets. Young girls twelve | about a smouldering fire. They did not 
 
 seem unhappy or hungry ; and none of 
 these strange people paid any attention 
 to me as I drove on to the inn, which. 
 
 oddly enough, was at some distance from 
 the main village, hard by the Danube 
 side, in a gully between the mountains. 
 
3IO 
 
 ALONG THE DANUBE. 
 
 where coal-barges lay moored. The Ser- 
 vian Mountains, covered from base to sum- 
 mit with dense forests, cast a deep gloom 
 over the vale. In a garden on a terrace 
 behind the inn, by the light of a flicker- 
 ing candle, I ate a frugal dinner, and went 
 to bed much impressed by the darkness, 
 in such striking contrast to the delightful 
 and picturesque scenes through which I 
 had wandered all day. 
 
 But I speedily forgot this next morn- 
 ing, when the landlord informed me that, 
 instead of toiling over the road along the 
 crags to Orsova, whither I was return- 
 ing, I could embark on a tug-boat bound 
 for that cheerful spot, and could thus in- 
 spect the grand scenery of the Iron Gates 
 from the river. The swift express-boats 
 which in time of peace run from Vienna 
 to Rustchuk whisk the traveller so rap- 
 idly through these famous defiles that 
 he sees little else than a panorama of 
 high rocky walls. But the slow-moving 
 and clumsy tug, with its train of barges 
 attached, offers better facilities to the 
 lover of natural beauty. We had drop- 
 ped down only a short distance below 
 Drenkova before we found the river- 
 path filled with eddies, miniature whirl- 
 pools, denoting the vicinity of the gorges 
 into which the great current is compress- 
 ed. These whirlpools all have names : 
 one is called the "Buffalo;" a second, 
 Kerdaps ; a third is known as the " De- 
 vourer.." The Turks have a healthy awe 
 of this passage, which in old times was 
 a terrible trial to these stupid and always 
 inefficient navigators. For three or four 
 hours we ran in the shade of mighty 
 walls of porphyry and granite, on whose 
 tops were forests of oaks and elms. High 
 up on cliffs around which the eagles cir- 
 cle, and low in glens where one some- 
 times sees a bear swimming, the sun 
 threw a flood of mellow glory. I could 
 fancy that the veins of red porphyry run- 
 ning along the face of the granite were 
 blood - stains, the tragic memorials of 
 ancient battles. For, wild and inacces- 
 sible as this region seems, it has been 
 fought over and through in sternest fash- 
 ion. Perched on a little promontory on 
 the Servian side is the tiny town of Po- 
 
 retch, where the brave shepherds and 
 swineherds fought the Turk, against 
 whose oppression they had risen, un- 
 til they were overwhelmed by numbers, 
 and their leader, Hadji Nikolos, lost his 
 head. The Austrians point out with pride 
 the cave on the tremendous flank of 
 Mount Choukourou where, two centu- 
 ries ago, an Austrian general at the 
 head of seven hundred men, all that was 
 left to him of a goodly army, sustained a 
 three months' siege against large Turk- 
 ish forces. This cave is perched high 
 above the road at a point where it abso- 
 lutely commands it, and the government 
 of to-day, realizing its importance, has 
 had it fortified and furnished with walls 
 pierced by loopholes. Trajan fought his 
 way through these defiles in the very in- 
 fancy of the Christian era ; and in mem- 
 ory of his first splendid campaign against 
 the Dacians he carved in the solid rock 
 the letters, some of which are still vis- 
 ible, and which, by their very grandilo- 
 quence, offer a mournful commentary on 
 the fleeting nature of human greatness. 
 Little did he think when his eyes rested 
 lovingly on this inscription, beginning — 
 
 IMP. CiES. D. NERViE FILIUS NERVA. 
 TRAJANUS. GERM. PONT. MAXIMUS. 
 
 — that Time with profane hand would 
 wipe out the memory of many of his 
 glories and would undo all the work 
 that he had done. 
 
 On we drifted, through huge landlock- 
 ed lakes, out of which there seemed no 
 issue until we chanced upon a miracu- 
 lous corner where there was an outlet 
 frowned upon by angry rocks ; on to the 
 "Caldron," as the Turks called the most 
 imposing portion of the gorge ; on through 
 an amphitheatre where densely-wooded 
 mountains on either side were reflected 
 in smooth water ; on beneath masses 
 that appeared about to topple, and over 
 shallows where it looked as if we must 
 be grounded ; on round a bluff which 
 had hidden the sudden opening of the 
 valley into a broad sweep, and which 
 had hindered us from seeing Orsova 
 the Fair nestling closely to her beloved 
 mountains. Edward King. 
 
DANUBIAN DAYS. 
 
 / 
 
 COSTUMES AT PESTH. 
 
 IF it were not for the people, the jour- 
 ney by steamer from Belgrade to Pesth 
 would be rather unromantic. When the 
 
 Servian capital is reached in ascending 
 the great stream from Galatz and Rust- 
 chuk, the picturesque cliffs, the mighty 
 
 311 
 
312 
 
 DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 forests, the moss-grown ruins overhang- 
 ing the rushing waters, are all left be- 
 hind. Belgrade is not very imposing. 
 It lies along a low line of hills border- 
 ing the Sava and the Danube, and con- 
 tains only a few edifices which are wor- 
 thy even of the epithet creditable. The 
 white pinnacle from which it takes its 
 n?,me — for the city grouped around the 
 fori was once called Beograd (" white 
 city") — now looks grimy and gloomy. 
 The Servians have placed the cannon 
 which they took from the Turks in the 
 recent war on the ramparts, and have 
 become so extravagantly vain in view of 
 their exploits that their conceit is quite 
 painful to contemplate. Yet it is impos- 
 sible to avoid sympathizing to some ex- 
 tent with this little people, whose lot has 
 been so hard and whose final emanci- 
 pation has been so long in arriving. The 
 intense affection which the Servian man- 
 ifests for his native land is doubtless the 
 result of the struggles and the sacrifices 
 which he has been compelled to make 
 in order to remain in possession of it. 
 One day he has been threatened by the 
 Austrian or the jealous and unreason- 
 able Hungarian : another he has re- 
 ceived news that the Turks were march- 
 ing across his borders, burning, plunder- 
 ing and devastating. There is something 
 peculiarly pathetic in the lot of these small 
 Danubian states. Nearly every one of 
 them has been the cause of combats in 
 which its inhabitants have shed rivers 
 of blood before they could obtain even 
 a fragment of such liberty and peace as 
 have long been the possessions of Switz- 
 erland and Belgium. It is not surprising 
 that the small countries which once form- 
 ed part of Turkey-in-Europe are anxious 
 to grow larger and stronger by annexa- 
 tion of territory and consolidation of pop- 
 ulations. They are tired of being feeble : 
 it is not amusing. Servia once expected 
 that she would be allowed to gain a con- 
 siderable portion of Bosnia, her neighbor 
 province, but the Austrians are there, 
 and would speedily send forces to Bel- 
 grade if it were for a moment imagined 
 that Prince Milan and his counsellors 
 were still greedy for Serajevo and oth- 
 er fat towns of the beautiful Bosnian 
 
 lands. Now and then, when a Servian 
 burgher has had an extra flask of Ne- 
 gotin, he vapors about meeting the Aus- 
 trians face to face and driving them into 
 the Sava ; but he never mentions it when 
 he is in a normal condition. 
 
 The country which Servia has won from 
 the Turks in the neighborhood of Nisch, 
 and the quaint old city of Nisch itself, 
 were no meagre prizes, and ought to 
 content the ambition of the young prince 
 for some time. It was righteous that the 
 Servians should possess Nisch, and that 
 the Turks should be driven out by vio- 
 lence. The cruel and vindictive barba- 
 rian had done everything that he could 
 to make himself feared and loathed by 
 the Servians. To this day, not far from 
 one of the principal gates of the city, on 
 the Pirot road, stands the " Skull Tower," 
 in the existence of which, I suppose, an 
 English Tory would refuse to believe, 
 just as he denied his credence to the 
 story of the atrocities at Batak. The 
 four sides of this tower are completely 
 covered, as with a barbarous mosaic, 
 with the skulls of Servians slain by their 
 oppressors in the great combat of 1809. 
 The Turks placed here but a few of their 
 trophies, for they slaughtered thousands, 
 while the tower's sides could accommo- 
 date only nine hundred and fifty -two 
 skulls. It is much to the credit of the 
 Servians that when they took Nisch in 
 1877 they wreaked no vengeance on the 
 Mussulman population, but simply com- 
 pelled them to give up their arms, and 
 informed them that they could return to 
 their labors. The presence of the Ser- 
 vians at Nisch has already been pro- 
 ductive of good : decent roads from that 
 point to Sophia are already in process 
 of construction, and the innumerable 
 brigands who swarmed along the coun- 
 try-side have been banished or killed. 
 Sophia still lies basking in the mellow 
 sunlight, lazily refusing to be cleansed 
 or improved. Nowhere else on the bor- 
 der-line of the Orient is there a town 
 which so admirably illustrates the reck- 
 less and stupid neghgence of the Turk. 
 Sophia looks enchanting . from a dis- 
 tance, but when one enters its narrow 
 streets, choked with rubbish and filled 
 
DANUBIAN DAYS. 
 
314 
 
 DA NUB IAN DA YS. 
 
 with fetid smells, one is only too glad 
 to retire hastily. It would take a quar- 
 
 ter of a century to make Sophia clean. 
 All round the city are scattered ancient 
 tumuli filled with the remains of the for- 
 
 mer lords of the soil, and they are al- 
 most as attractive as the hovels in which 
 live the people of to-day. What a des- 
 olate waste the Turk has been allowed 
 to make of one of the finest countries in 
 Europe ! He must be thrust out before 
 improvement can come in. Lamartine, 
 who was one of the keenest observers 
 that ever set foot in Turkey, truly said 
 "that civilization, which is so fine in its 
 proper place, would prove a mortal poi- 
 son to Islamism. Civilization cannot live 
 where the Turks are : it will wither away 
 and perish more quickly whenever it is 
 brought near them. With it, if you could 
 acclimate it in Turkey, you could not 
 make Europeans, you could not make 
 Christians : you would simply unmake 
 Turks." 
 
 The enemies of progress and of the 
 "Christian dogs " are receding, and rail- 
 ways and sanitary improvements will 
 come when they are gone. Belgrade 
 was a wretched town when the Turks 
 had it : now it is civilized. Its history 
 is romantic and picturesque, although 
 its buildings are not. Servia's legends 
 and the actual recitals of the adven- 
 turous wars which have occurred within 
 her limits would fill volumes. The White 
 City has been famous ever since the Ot- 
 toman conquest. Its dominant position 
 at the junction of two great rivers, at the 
 frontier of Christian Europe, at a time 
 when turbans were now and then seen 
 in front of the walls of Vienna, gave it 
 a supreme importance. The Turks ex- 
 ultingly named it "the Gate of the Holy 
 War." Thence it was that they sallied 
 forth on incursions through the fertile 
 plains where now the Hungarian shep- 
 herd leads his flock and plays upon his 
 wooden pipe, undisturbed by the beard- 
 ed infidel. The citadel was fought over 
 until its walls cracked beneath the suc- 
 cessive blows of Christian and Mussul- 
 man. Suleiman the Lawgiver, the elector 
 of Bavaria, Eugene of Savoy, have trod 
 the ramparts which frown on the Dan- 
 ube's broad current. The Austrians have 
 many memories of the old fortress : they 
 received it in 171 8 by the treaty of Pas- 
 sarowitz, but gave it up in 1749, to take 
 it back again in 1789. The treaty of 
 
DA NUB IAN DA YS. 
 
 315 
 
 
 * /^ 'j#^ 
 
 
 
 
 /%'->W,, 
 
 
 ' /' » 
 
 
 T'il^A' "'1-^'' 
 
 
 pip ' ^w" 
 
 ^''^" 
 
 M^ f\ 
 
 ^ , '^m^t 
 
 ?>.!, 
 
 "« ^ ■■ I •y-^ 
 
 
 i4*«* 
 
 ' ^K%\ 
 
 
 
 
 ;;. ^■-.'^•> uiPt 
 
 VILLAGE NEAR SEMLIN. 
 
 Sistova — an infamy which postponed 
 the hberation of the suffering peoples 
 in Turkey-in-Europe for nearly a hun- 
 dred years — compelled the Austrians 
 once more to yield it, this time to the 
 Turks. In this century how often has 
 it been fought over — from the time of 
 the heroic Kara George, the Servian 
 liberator, to the bloody riots in our days 
 which resulted in driving Mussulmans 
 definitely from the territory ! 
 
 Everywhere along the upper Servian 
 banks of the Danube traces of the old 
 epoch are disappearing. The national 
 costume, which was graceful, and often 
 very rich, is yielding before the prosaic 
 — the ugly garments imported from Jew- 
 ish tailoring establishments in Vienna and 
 Pesth. The horseman with his sack-coat, 
 baggy velvet trousers and slouch hat 
 looks not unlike a rough rider along 
 the shores of the Mississippi River. In 
 the interior patriarchal costumes and 
 customs are still preserved. On the 
 Sava river - steamers the people from 
 towns in the shadows of the primeval 
 forests which still cover a large portion 
 of the country are to be found, and they 
 are good studies for an artist. The wo- 
 
 men, with golden ducats braided in their 
 hair ; the priests, with tall brimless hats 
 and long yellow robes; the men, with 
 round skull-caps, leathern girdles with 
 knives in them, and waistcoats orna- 
 mented with hundreds of glittering but- 
 tons, — are all unconscious of the change 
 which is creeping in by the Danube, and 
 to which they will presently find them- 
 selves submitting. The railway will take 
 away the lingering bits of romance from 
 Servia ; the lovely and lonely monas- 
 teries high among the grand peaks in 
 the mountain-ranges will be visited by 
 tourists from Paris, who will scrawl their 
 names upon the very altars ; and Bel- 
 grade will be rich in second-class cara- 
 vanserais kept by Moses and Abraham. 
 After the Austrians who have gone over 
 into Bosnia will naturally follow a crowd 
 of adventurers from Croatia and from the 
 neighborhood of Pesth, and it would not 
 be surprising should many of them find 
 it for their interest to settle in Servia, al- 
 though the government would probably 
 endeavor to keep them out. Should the 
 movement which L®rd Beaconsfield is 
 pleased to call the "Panslavic conspir- 
 acy" assume alarming proportions with- 
 
3i6 
 
 DANUBTAN DA YS. 
 
 in a short time, the Servians would be in 
 great danger of losing, for years at least, 
 their autonomy. 
 
 The arrival by night at Belgrade, com- 
 ing from below, is interesting, and one has 
 a vivid recollection ever afterward of 
 swarms of barefooted coal-heavers, clad 
 in coarse sacking, rushing tumultuously 
 up and down a gang-plank, as negroes 
 do when wooding up on a Southern 
 river ; of shouting and swaggering Aus- 
 trian customs officials, clad in gorgeous 
 raiment, but smoking cheap cigars ; of 
 Servian gendarmes emulating the blus- 
 ter and surpassing the rudeness of the 
 Austrians ; of Turks in transit from the 
 Constantinople boat to the craft plying to 
 Bosnian river-ports; of Hungarian peas- 
 ants in white felt jackets embroidered 
 with scarlet thread, or mayhap even 
 with yellow ; and of various Bohemian 
 beggars, whose swart faces remind one 
 that he is still in the neighborhood of 
 the East. I had on one occasion, while 
 a steamer was lying at Belgrade, time to 
 observe the manners of the humbler sort 
 of folk in a species of cabaret near the 
 river-side and hard by the erratic struc- 
 ture known as the custom-house. There 
 was a serious air upon the faces of the 
 men which spoke well for their cha- 
 racters. Each one seemed independ- 
 ent, and to a certain extent careless, 
 of his neighbor's opinion. It would 
 have been impossible, without some 
 knowledge of the history of the coun- 
 try, to have supposed that these people, 
 or even their ancestors, had ever been 
 oppressed. Gayety did not prevail, nor 
 is there anywhere among the Danubian 
 Slavs a tendency to the innocent and 
 spontaneous jollity so common in some 
 sections of Europe. The Servian takes 
 life seriously. I was amused to see that 
 each one of this numerous company of 
 swineherds or farmers, who had evident- 
 ly come in to Belgrade to market, drank 
 his wine as if it were a duty, and on leav- 
 ing saluted as seriously as if he were 
 greeting a distinguished company gath- 
 ered to do him honor. That such men 
 are cowards, as the English would have 
 us believe, is impossible; and in 1877 
 they showed that the slander was desti- 
 
 tute of even the slightest foundation in 
 fact. 
 
 Morals in Belgrade among certain 
 classes perhaps leave something to de- 
 sire in the way of strictness ; but the 
 Danubian provinces are not supposed 
 to be the abodes of all the virtues and 
 graces. The Hungarians could not af- 
 ford to throw stones at the Servians on 
 the score of morality, and the Rouma- 
 nians certainly would not venture to try 
 the experiment. In the interior of Ser- 
 via the population is pure, and the patri- 
 archal manner in which the people live 
 tends to preserve them so. There is as 
 much difference between the sentiment 
 in Belgrade and that in the provinces as 
 would be found between Paris and a 
 French rural district. 
 
 But let us drop details concerning 
 Servia, for the brave little country de- 
 mands more serious attention than can 
 be given to it in one or two brief arti- 
 cles. The boat which bears me away 
 from the Servian capital has come hither 
 from Semlin, the Austrian town on the 
 other side of the Sava River. It is a 
 jaunty and comfortable craft, as befits 
 such vessels as afford Servians their only 
 means of communication with the outer 
 world. If any but Turks had been squat- 
 ted in Bosnia there would have been 
 many a smart little steamer running 
 down the Sava and around up the Dan- 
 ube ; but the baleful Mussulman has 
 checked all enterprise wherever he has 
 had any foothold. We go slowly, cleav- 
 ing the dull-colored tide, gazing, as we 
 sit enthroned in easy-chairs on the up- 
 per deck, out upon the few public insti- 
 tutions of Belgrade — the military college 
 and the handsome road leading to the 
 garden of Topschidere, where the lilipu- 
 tian court has its tiny summer residence. 
 Sombre memories overhang this " Can- 
 noneer's Valley," this Topschidere, where 
 Michael, the son and successor of good 
 Milosch as sovereign prince of the na- 
 tion, perished by assassination in [868. 
 In a few minutes we are whisked round 
 a corner, and a high wooded bluff con- 
 ceals the White City from our view. 
 
 The Servian women — and more espe- 
 cially those belonging to the lower classes 
 
DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 317 
 
 — have a majesty and dignity which are 
 very imposing. One is inclined at first 
 to believe these are partially due to as- 
 sumption, but he speedily discovers that 
 such is not the case. Blanqui, the French 
 revolutionist, who made a tour through 
 Servia in 1840, has given the world a 
 curious and interesting account of the 
 conversations which he held with Ser- 
 vian women on the subject of the op- 
 pression from which the nation was suf- 
 fering. Everywhere among the common 
 people he found virile sentiments express- 
 ed by the women, and the princess Lion- 
 bitza, he said, was "the prey of a kind 
 of holy fever." M. Blanqui described 
 her as a woman fifty years old, with a 
 martial, austere yet dreamy physiogno- 
 my, with strongly -marked features, a 
 proud and sombre gaze, and her head 
 crowned with superb gray hair braided 
 and tied with red ribbon. "Ah!" said 
 this woman to him, with an accent in 
 her voice which startled him, " if all 
 these men round about us here were 
 not women, or if they were women like 
 jne, we should soon be free from our 
 tormentors !" It was the fiery words of 
 such women as this which awoke the 
 Servian men from the. lethargy into 
 . which they were falling after Kara 
 George had exhausted himself in heroic 
 efforts, and which sent them forth anew 
 to fight for their liberties. 
 
 At night, when the moon is good enough 
 to shine, the voyage up the river has 
 charms, and tempts one to remain on 
 deck all night, in spite of the sharp 
 breezes which sweep across the stream. 
 The harmonious accents of the gentle 
 Servian tongue echo all round you : the 
 song of the peasants grouped together, 
 lying in a heap like cattle to keep warm, 
 comes occasionally to your ears ; and if 
 there be anything disagreeable, it is the 
 loud voices and brawling manners of 
 some Austrian troopers on transfer. From 
 time to time the boat slows her speed as 
 she passes through lines or streets of float- 
 ing mills anchored securely in the river. 
 Each mill — a small house with sloping 
 roof, and with so few windows that one 
 wonders how the millers ever manage 
 to see their grist — is built upon two boats. 
 
 The musical hum of its great wheel is 
 heard for a long distance, and warns 
 
 one of the approach toward these pacific 
 industries. The miller is usually on the 
 lookout, and sometimes, when a large 
 
3i8 
 
 DA NUB IAN DA YS. 
 
 steamer is coming up, and he antici- 
 pates trouble from the "swell" which 
 
 |lillllllllilllllillW'llli^i'^^^^^^ Mil 'iii'i'fl"[ll||||ljj III 
 
 -Ik 
 
 she may create, he may be seen madly 
 gesticulating and dancing upon hrs nar- 
 row platform in a frenzy of anxiety for 
 
 the fruits of his toil. A little village on 
 a neck of land or beneath a grove shows 
 where the wives and children of these 
 millers live. The mills are a source of 
 prosperity for thousands of humble folk, 
 and of provocation to hurricanes of pro- 
 fanity on the part of the Austrian, Ital- 
 ian and Dalmatian captains who are com- 
 pelled to pass them. Stealing through 
 an aquatic town of this kind at midnight, 
 with the millers all holding out their lan- 
 terns, with the steamer's bell ringing vio- 
 lently, and with rough voices crying out 
 words of caution in at least four lan- 
 guages, produces a curious if not a com- 
 ical effect on him who has the experience 
 for the first time. 
 
 Peaceable as the upper Danube shores 
 look, Arcadian as seems the simplicity 
 of their populations, the people are torn 
 by contending passions, and are watch- 
 ed by the lynx-eyed authorities of two or 
 three governments. The agents of the 
 Omladina, the mysterious society which 
 interests itself in the propagation of Pan- 
 slavism, have numerous powerful stations 
 in the Austrian towns, and do much to 
 discontent the Slavic subjects of Francis 
 Joseph with the rule of the Hapsburgs. 
 There have also been instances of con- 
 spiracy against the Obrenovich dynasty, 
 now in power in Servia, and these have 
 frequently resulted in armed incursions 
 from the Hungarian side of the stream 
 to the other bank, where a warm recep- 
 tion was not long awaited. In the hum- 
 blest hamlet there are brains hot with am- 
 bitious dreams daringly planning some 
 scheme which is too audacious to be 
 realized. 
 
 The traveller can scarcely believe this 
 when, as the boat stops at some little pier 
 which is half buried under vines and 
 blossoms, he sees the population indulg- 
 ing in an innocent festival with the aid 
 of red and white wine, a few glasses of 
 beer, and bread and cheese. Families 
 mounted in huge yellow chariots drawn 
 by horses ornamented with gayly- dec- 
 orated harnesses, come rattling into town 
 and get down before a weatherbeaten inn, 
 the signboard above which testifies to re- 
 spect and love for some emperor of long 
 ago. Youths and maidens wander arm 
 
DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 319 
 
 in arm by the foaming tide or sit in the 
 little arbors crooning songs and chnking 
 glasses. Officers strut about, calling each 
 other loudly by their titles or responding 
 to the sallies of those of their comrades 
 who fill the after -deck of the steamer. 
 The village mayor in a braided jacket, 
 the wharfmaster in semi - military uni- 
 form, and the agent of the steamboat 
 company, who appears to have a re- 
 markable penchant for gold lace and 
 buttons, render the throng still more 
 motley. There is also, in nine cases 
 out of ten, a band of tooting musicians, 
 and as the boat moves away national 
 Hungarian and Austrian airs are play- 
 ed. He would be indeed a surly fellow 
 who should not lift his cap on these oc- 
 casions, and he would be repaid for his 
 obstinacy by the very blackest of looks. 
 Carlowitz and Slankamen are two his- 
 toric spots which an Hungarian, if he 
 feels kindly disposed toward a stranger, 
 will point out to him. The former is 
 known to Americans by name only, as 
 a rule, and that because they have seen 
 it upon bottle-labels announcing excel- 
 lent wine ; but the town, with its ancient 
 cathedral, its convents, and its "chapel 
 of peace " built on the site of the struc- 
 ture in which was signed the noted peace 
 of 1699, deserves a visit. Rumor says that 
 the head -quarters of the Omladina are 
 very near this town, so that the foreign 
 visitor must not be astonished if the local 
 police seem uncommonly solicitous for 
 his welfare while he remains. At Slan- 
 kamen in 1 69 1 the illustrious margrave 
 of Baden administered such a thrashing 
 to the Turks that they fled in the great- 
 . est consternation, and it was long before 
 they rallied again. 
 
 Thus, threading in and out among 
 the floating mills, pushing through reedy 
 channels in the midst of which she nar- 
 rowly escapes crushing the boats of fish- 
 ers, and carefully avoiding the moving 
 banks of sand which render navigation 
 as difficult as on the Mississippi, the 
 boat reaches Peterwardein, high on a 
 mighty mass of rock, and Neusatz op- 
 posite, connected with its neighbor for- 
 tress-town by a bridge of boats. Al- 
 though within the limits of the Austria- 
 
 Hungarian empire, Neusatz is almost 
 entirely Servian in aspect .and popula- 
 tion, and Peterwardein, which marks 
 
 iliiii'lilliliiiiiiiiiiiiiiii 
 
 the military confines of Slavonia, has a 
 large number of Servian inhabitants. It 
 was the proximity and the earnestness in 
 
320 
 
 DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 their cause of these people which induced 
 the Hungarians to agree to the military- 
 occupation of Bosnia and the Herzego- 
 vina. At one time the obstinate Mag- 
 yars would have liked to refuse their 
 adhesion to the decisions of the Berlin 
 Congress, but they soon thought better 
 of that. Peterwardein is the last really 
 imposing object on the Danube before 
 reaching Pesth. It is majestic and sol- 
 emn, with its gloomy castle, its garrison 
 which contains several thousand soldiers, 
 and its prison of state. The remem- 
 brance that Peter the Hermit there put 
 himself at the head of the army with 
 which the Crusades were begun adds to 
 the mysterious and powerful fascination 
 of the place. I fancied that I could see 
 the lean and fanatical priest preaching 
 before the assembled thousands, hurling 
 his words down upon them from some 
 lofty pinnacle. No one can blame the 
 worthy Peter for undertaking his mission 
 if the infidels treated Christians in the 
 Orient as badly then as they do to-day. 
 Centuries after Peter slept in consecrated 
 dust the Turks sat down before Peter- 
 wardein to besiege it, but they had only 
 their labor for their pains, for Prince 
 Eugene drove them away. This was 
 in 1716. It seems hard to believe that 
 a hostile force of Turks was powerful 
 enough to wander about Christendom 
 a little more than a century and a half 
 ago. 
 
 After passing Peterwardein and Neu- 
 satz the boat's course lies through the 
 vast Hungarian plain, which reminds 
 the American of some of the rich lands 
 in the Mississippi bottom. Here is life, 
 lusty, crude, seemingly not of Europe, 
 but rather of the extreme West or East. 
 As far as the eye can reach on either 
 hand stretch the level acres, dotted with 
 her4s of inquisitive swine, with horses 
 wild and beautiful snorting and gam- 
 bolling as they hear the boat's whistle, 
 and peasants in white linen jackets and 
 trousers and immense black woollen hats. 
 Fishers by hundreds balance in their lit- 
 tle skiffs on the small whirlpool of waves 
 made by the steamer, and sing gajdy. 
 For a stretch of twenty miles the course 
 may lie near an immense forest, where 
 
 millions of stout trees stand in regular 
 rows, where thousands of oaks drop 
 acorns every year to fatten thousands 
 upon thousands of pigs. Cattle stray in 
 these woods, and sometimes the peas- 
 ant-farmer has a veritable hunt before 
 he can find his own. Afar in the wood- 
 ed recesses of Slavonia many convents 
 of the Greek religion are hidden. Their 
 inmates lead lives which have little or 
 no relation to anything in the nineteenth 
 century. For them wars and rumors of 
 wars, Russian aggression, Austrian an- 
 nexation, conspiracies by Kara George- 
 witch, Hungarian domination in the Cab- 
 inet at Vienna, and all such trivial mat- 
 ters, do not exist. The members of these 
 religious communities are not like the 
 more active members of the clergy of 
 their Church, who unquestionably have 
 much to do with promoting war and sup- 
 porting it when it is in aid of their na- 
 tionality and their religion. 
 
 One of the most remarkable sights in 
 this region is a herd of the noble "cat- 
 tle of the steppes," the beasts in which 
 every Hungarian takes so much pride. 
 These cattle are superb creatures, and 
 as they stand eying the passers-by one 
 regrets that he has not more time in 
 which to admire their exquisite white 
 skins, their long symmetrical horns and 
 their shapely limbs. They appear to be 
 good-tempered, but it would not be wise 
 to risk one's self on foot in their imme- 
 diate neighborhood. 
 
 As for the fishermen, some of them 
 seem to prefer living on the water rather 
 than on dry land. Indeed, the marshy 
 borders of the Danube are not very 
 healthy, and it is not astonishing that 
 men do not care to make their homes 
 on these low lands. There are several 
 aquatic towns between Pesth and the 
 point at which the Drava (or Drau), a 
 noble river, empties its waters into the 
 Danube. Apatin is an assemblage of 
 huts which appear to spring from the 
 bosom of the current, but as the steamer 
 approaches one sees that these huts are 
 built upon piles driven firmly into the 
 river-bed, and between these singular 
 habitations are other piles upon which 
 nets are stretched. So the fisherman, 
 
DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 32T 
 
 without going a hun- 
 dred yarrJs from his 
 own door, traps the 
 wily denizens of the 
 Danube, prepares 
 them for market, and 
 at night goes peace- 
 fully to sleep in his 
 rough bed, lulled by 
 the rushing of the 
 strong current be- 
 neath him. I am 
 bound to confess that 
 the fishermen of Apa- 
 tin impressed me as 
 being rather rheu- 
 matic, but perhaps 
 this was only a fancy. 
 Besdan, with its 
 low hills garnished 
 with windmills and 
 its shores lined with 
 silvery willows, is the 
 only other point of in- 
 terest, save Mohacz, 
 before reaching 
 Pesth. Hour after 
 hour the traveller 
 sees the same pano- 
 rama of steppes cov- 
 ered with swine, cattle 
 and horses, with occa- 
 sional farms — their 
 outbuildings protect- 
 ed against brigands 
 and future wars by 
 stout walls — and with 
 pools made by inun- 
 dations of the impet- 
 uous Danube. Mo- 
 hacz is celebrated for 
 two tremendous bat- 
 tles in the past, and 
 for a fine cathedral, 
 a railway and a coal- 
 ing-station at present. 
 Louis II., king of 
 Hungary, was there 
 undone by Suleiman 
 in 1526; and there, 
 a hundred and fifty 
 years later, did the 
 Turks come to sor- 
 row by the efforts of 
 21 
 
322 
 
 BA NUB IAN DA YS. 
 
 the forces under Charles IV. of Lor- 
 raine. 
 
 Just as I was beginning to beheve that 
 the slow-going steamer on which I had 
 embarked my fortunes was held back 
 by enchantment — for we were half a day 
 ascending the stream from Mohacz — we 
 came in sight of a huge clifif almost inac- 
 cessible from one side, and a few minutes 
 later could discern the towers of Buda 
 and the mansions of Pesth. While 
 nearing the landing-place and hasten- 
 ing hither and yon to look after various 
 small bundles and boxes, I had occasion 
 to address an Hungarian gentleman. In 
 the course of some conversation which 
 followed I remarked that Pesth seemed 
 a thriving place, and that one would 
 hardly haVe expected to find two such 
 flourishing towns as Vienna and Pesth 
 so near each other. 
 
 " Oh," said he with a little sneer which 
 his slight foreign accent (he was speak- 
 ing French) rendered almost ludicrous, 
 "Vienna is a smart town, but it is noth- 
 ing to this !" And he pointed with pride 
 to his native city. 
 
 Although I could not exactly agree 
 with this extravagant estimate of the 
 extent of Pesth, I could not deny that 
 it was vastly superior to my idea of it. 
 When one arrives there from the south- 
 east, after many wanderings among semi- 
 barbaric villages and little cities on the 
 outskirts of civilization, he finds Pesth 
 very impressive. The Hungarian shep- 
 herds and the boatmen who ply between 
 the capital and tiny forts below fancy that 
 it is the end of the world. They have 
 vaguely heard of Vienna, but their pa- 
 triotism is so intense and their round 
 of life so circumscribed that they never 
 succeed in forming a definite idea of its 
 proportions or its location. Communi- 
 cation between the two chief towns of 
 the Austria - Hungarian einpire is also 
 much less frequent than one would im- 
 agine. The Hungarians go but little to 
 Vienna, even the members of the no- 
 bility preferring to consecrate their re- 
 sources to the support of the splendors 
 of their own city rather than to con- 
 tribute them to the Austrian metropolis. 
 Seven hours' ride in what the Austri- 
 
 ans are bold enough to term an express- 
 train covers the distance between Vien- 
 na and Pesth, yet there seems to be an 
 abyss somewhere on the route which 
 the inhabitants are afraid of. Pride, a 
 haughty determination not to submit to 
 centralization, and content with their sur- 
 roundings make the Hungarians sparing 
 of intercourse with their Austrian neigh- 
 bors. "We send them prime ministers, 
 and now and then we allow them a 
 glimpse' of some of our beauties in one 
 of their palaces, but the latter does not 
 happen very often," once said an Hun- 
 garian friend to me. 
 
 An American who should arrive in 
 Pesth fancying that he was about to 
 see a specimen of the dilapidated towns 
 of "effete and decaying Europe" would 
 find himself vastly mistaken. The beau- 
 tiful and costly modern buildings on ev- 
 ery principal street, the noble bridges 
 across the vast river, the fine railway- 
 stations, the handsome theatres, the par 
 latial hotels, would explain to him why 
 it is that the citizens of Pesth speak of 
 their town as the "Chicago of the East." 
 There was a time when it really seemed 
 as if Pesth would rival, if not exceed, 
 Chicago in the extent of her commerce, 
 the vivacity and boldness of her enter- 
 prises and the rapid increase of her pop- 
 ulation. Austria and Hungary were alike 
 the prey of a feverish agitation which 
 pervaded all classes. In a single day at 
 Vienna as many as thirty gigantic stock 
 companies were formed ; hundreds of 
 superb structures sprang up monthly ; 
 people who had been beggars but a few 
 months before rode in carriages and 
 bestowed gold by handfuls on whoever 
 came first. The wind or some myste- 
 rious agency which no one could ex- 
 plain brought this financial pestilence to 
 Pesth, where it raged until the Krach — 
 the Crash, as the Germans very proper- 
 ly call it — came. After the extraordinary 
 activity which had prevailed there came 
 gloom and stagnation; but at last, as in 
 America, business in Pesth and in Hun- 
 gary generally is gradually assuming so- 
 lidity and contains itself within proper 
 bounds. The exciting period had one 
 beneficial feature : it made Pesth a hand- 
 
DANUBIAN DA VS. 
 
 323 
 
 some city. There are 
 no quays in Europe 
 more substantial and 
 elegant than those 
 along the Danube in 
 the Hungarian cap- 
 ital, and no hotels, 
 churches and man- 
 sions more splendid 
 than those fronting 
 on these same quays.. 
 At eventide, when 
 the whole population 
 comes out for an air- 
 ing and loiters by the 
 parapets which over- 
 look the broad rush- 
 ing river, when innu- 
 merable lights gleam 
 from the boats an- 
 chored on either 
 bank, and when the 
 sound of music and 
 song is heard from 
 half a hundred win- 
 dows, no city can 
 boast a spectacle 
 more animated. At 
 ten o'clock the streets 
 are deserted. Pesth 
 is exceedingly proper 
 and decorous as soon 
 as the darkness has 
 fallen, although I do 
 remember to have 
 seen a torchlight pro- 
 cession there during 
 the Russo-Turkish 
 war. The inhabitants 
 were so enthusiastic 
 over the arrival of a 
 delegation of Mussul- 
 man students f r o m 
 Constantinople that 
 they put ten thousand 
 torches in line and 
 marched until a late 
 hour, thinking, per- 
 haps, that the lurid 
 light on the horizon 
 might be seen as far 
 as Vienna, and might 
 serve as a warning 
 to the Austrian gfov- 
 
324 
 
 DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 ernment not to go too far in its sympa- 
 thy with Russia. 
 
 Buda-Pesth is the name by which the 
 Hungarians know their capital, and Bu- 
 da is by no means the least important 
 portion of the city. It occupies the ma- 
 jestic and rugged hill directly opposite 
 Pesth — a hill so steep that a tunnel con- 
 taining cars propelled upward and down- 
 ward by machinery has been arranged to 
 render Buda easy of access. Where the 
 hill slopes away southward there are 
 various large villages crowded with Ser- 
 vians, Croatians and Low Hungarians, 
 who huddle together in a rather unciv- 
 ilized manner. A fortress where there 
 were many famous fights and sieges in 
 the times of the Turks occupies a sum- 
 mit a little higher than Buda, so that in 
 case of insurrection a few hot shot could 
 be dropped among the inhabitants. Cu- 
 riously enough, however, there are thou- 
 sands of loyal Austrians, German by birth, 
 living in Buda — or Ofen, as the Teutons 
 call it — whereas in Pesth, out of the two 
 hundred thousand inhabitants, scarcely 
 three thousand are of Austrian birth. As 
 long as troops devoted to Francis Joseph 
 hold Buda there is little chance for the 
 citizens of Pesth to succeed in revolt. 
 Standing on the terrace of the rare old 
 palace on Buda's height, I looked down 
 on Pesth with the same range of vision 
 that I should have had in a balloon. 
 Every quarter of the city would be fully 
 exposed to an artillery fire from these 
 gigantic hills. 
 
 Buda is not rich in the modern im- 
 provements which render Pesth so no- 
 ticeable. I found no difficulty in some 
 of the nooks and corners of this quaint 
 town in imagining myself back in the 
 Middle Ages. Tottering churches, im- 
 mensely tall houses overhanging yawn- 
 ing and precipitous alleys, markets set 
 on little shelves in the mountain, hovels 
 protesting against sliding down into the 
 valley, whither they seemed inevitably 
 doomed to go, succeeded one another 
 in rapid panorama. Here were costume, 
 theatrical effect, artistic grouping : it was 
 like Ragusa, Spalatro and Sebenico. Old 
 and young women sat on the ground in 
 the markets, as our negroes do in Lynch- 
 
 burg in Virginia : they held up fruit and 
 vegetables and shrieked out the prices 
 in a dialect which seemed a compound 
 of Hungarian and German. Austrian 
 soldiers and Hungarian recruits, the for- 
 mer clad in brown jackets and blue hose, 
 the latter in buff doublets and red trou- 
 sers, and wearing feathers in their caps, 
 marched and countermarched, appar- 
 ently going nowhere in particular, but 
 merely keeping up discipline by means 
 of exercise. 
 
 The emperor comes often to the fine 
 palace on Buda hill, and sallies forth 
 from it to hunt with some of the nobles 
 on their immense estates. The empress 
 is passionately fond of Hungary, and 
 spends no small portion of her time 
 there. The Hungarians receive this con- 
 sideration from their sovereign lady as 
 very natural, and speak of her as a per- 
 son of great good sense. The German 
 and Slavic citizens of Austria say that 
 there are but two failings of which Her 
 Imperial Majesty can be accused — she 
 loves the Hungarians and she is too fond 
 of horses. Nothing dehghts the citizens 
 of Pesth so much as to find that the Slavs 
 are annoyed, for there is no love lost be- 
 tween Slav and Magyar. A natural an- 
 tipathy has been terribly increased by 
 the fear on the part of Hungary that she 
 may lose her influence in the composite 
 empire one day, owing to the Slavic re- 
 generation. 
 
 At Pesth they do not speak of the 
 "beautiful blue Danube," because there 
 the river ceases to be of that color, which 
 Johann Strauss has so enthusiastically 
 celebrated. But between Vienna and 
 Pesth the blue is clearly perceptible, and 
 the current is lovely even a few miles 
 from the islands in the stream near the 
 Hungarian capital. The Margarethen- 
 Insel, which is but a short distance above 
 Pesth, is a little paradise. It has been 
 transformed by private munificence into 
 a rich garden full of charming shaded 
 nooks and rare plants and flowers. In 
 the middle of this pleasure-ground are 
 extensive bath - houses and mineral 
 springs. Morning, noon and night gyp- 
 sy bands make seductive music, and the 
 notes of their melodies recall the strange 
 
DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 325 
 
 lands far away down the stream — I Banat and the savage Servian moun- 
 Roumania, the hills .and valleys of the | tains. Along the river -side there are 
 
 other resorts in which, in these days, 
 when business has not yet entirely re- 
 covered from the Krach, there are mul- 
 
 titudes of loungers. In midsummer no 
 Hungarian need go farther than these 
 baths of Pesth to secure rest and restore 
 
326 
 
 DA NUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 aealth. The Romans were so pleased 
 with the baths in the neighborhood that 
 chey founded a colony on the site of 
 Buda-Pesth, although they had no par- 
 dcular strategic reasons for doing so. 
 As you sit in the pleasant shade you will 
 probably hear the inspiring notes of the 
 Rakaczy, the march of which the Hun- 
 garians are so passionately fond, which 
 recalls the souvenirs of their revolutions 
 and awakens a kind of holy exaltation 
 in their hearts. The Rakoczy has been 
 often enough fantastically described : 
 some hear in it the gallop of horsemen, 
 the clashing of arms, the songs of wo- 
 men and the cries of wounded men. A 
 clever Frenchman has even written two 
 columns of analysis of the march, and 
 he found in it nearly as much as there 
 is in Goethe's Faust. These harmless 
 fancies are of little use in aiding to a 
 veritable understanding of the wonder- 
 ful march. It suffices to say that one 
 cannot hear it played, even by a stroll- 
 ing band of gypsies, without a strange 
 fluttering of the heart, an excitement 
 and an enthusiasm which are beyond 
 one's control. A nation with such a 
 Marseillaise as the Rakoczy certainly 
 ought to go far in time of war. 
 
 The Hungarians are a martial people, 
 and are fond of reciting their exploits. 
 Every old guide in Pesth will tell you, 
 in a variegated English which will pro- 
 voke your smiles, all the incidents of the 
 Hungarian revolution, the events of 1848 
 and 1849 — ^°^ ^^ Austrians were driv- 
 en across the great bridge over the Dan- 
 ube, etc. — with infinite gusto. The hum- 
 blest wharf- laborer takes a vital interest 
 in the welfare of his country, even if he 
 is not intelligent enough to know from 
 what quarter hostilities might be expect- 
 ed. There is a flash in an Hungarian's 
 eye when he speaks of the events of 
 1848 which is equalled only by the 
 lightnings evoked from his glance by 
 the magic echoes of the Rakoczy. 
 
 The peasantry round about Pesth, and 
 the poor wretches, Slavic and Hungarian, 
 who work on the streets, seem in sad 
 plight. A friend one day called my at- 
 tention to a number of old women, most 
 miserably clad, barefooted and bent with 
 
 age and infirmities, carrying stones and 
 bricks to a new building. The spectacle 
 was enough to make one's heart bleed, 
 but my friend assured me that the old 
 women were happy, and that they lived 
 on bread and an occasional onion, with 
 a little water for drink or sometimes a 
 glass of adulterated white wine. The 
 men working with them looked even 
 worse fed and more degraded than the 
 women. In the poor quarters of Pesth, 
 and more especially those inhabited by 
 the Jews, the tenements are exceedingly 
 filthy, and the aroma is so uninviting that 
 one hastens away from the streets where 
 these rookeries abound. The utmost 
 civility, not to say servility, may always 
 be expected of the lower classes : some 
 of them seize one's hand and kiss it 
 as the Austrian servants do. Toward 
 strangers Hungarians of all ranks are 
 unfailingly civil and courteous. A sim- 
 ple letter of introduction will procure one 
 a host of attentions which he would not 
 have the right to expect in England or 
 America. 
 
 The mound of earth on the bank of 
 the Danube near the quays of Pesth 
 represents the soil of every Hungarian 
 province ; and from that mound the 
 emperor of Austria, when he was crown- 
 ed king of Hungary, was forced to shake 
 his sword against the four quarters of 
 the globe, thus signifying his intention 
 of defending the country from any attack 
 whatsoever. Thus far he has succeeded 
 in doing it, and in keeping on good terms 
 with the legislative bodies of the country, 
 without whose co - operation he cannot 
 exercise his supreme authority. These 
 bodies are a chamber of peers, recruited 
 from the prelates, counts and such aristo- 
 crats as sit there by right of birth, and a 
 second chamber, which is composed of 
 four hundred and thirteen deputies elect- 
 ed from as many districts for the term 
 of three years, and thirty-four delegates 
 from the autonomous province of Croatia- 
 Slavonia. The entrance to the diet is 
 guarded by a frosty-looking servitor in an 
 extravagant Hungarian uniform, jacket 
 and hose profusely covered with bril- 
 liant braids^ and varnished jack-boots. 
 The deputies when in session are quiet, 
 
DANUBIAN DA YS. 
 
 327 
 
 orderly and dignified, save when the 
 word "Russian" is pronounced. It is 
 a word which arouses all their hatred. 
 
 Buda-Pesth is about to undergo a for- 
 midable series of improvements notwith- 
 standing the illusions which were dis- 
 persed by the Krach. One of the most 
 conspicuous and charm- 
 ing municipal displays 
 in the Paris Exposition 
 is the group of charts 
 and plans sent from 
 Pesth. The patriot 
 Deak is to have a co- 
 lossal monument ; the 
 quays are to be render- 
 ed more substantial 
 against inundations than 
 they are at present ; and 
 many massive public ed- 
 ifices are to be erected. 
 The Danube is often 
 unruly, and once near- 
 ly destroyed the city of 
 Pesth, also doing much 
 damage along the slopes 
 of Buda. If an inunda- 
 tion should come within 
 the next two or three 
 years millions of florins' 
 worth of property might 
 be swept away in a sin- 
 gle night. The opera, 
 the principal halls of 
 assembly and the ho- 
 tels of Pesth will chal- 
 lenge comparison with 
 those of any town of 
 two hundred thousand 
 population in the world ; and the Grand 
 Hotel Hungaria has few equals in cities 
 yf the largest size. 
 
 The Hungarians are a handsome race, 
 and the people of Pesth and vicinity have 
 especial claims to attention for their beau- 
 ty. The men of the middle and upper 
 classes are tall, slender, graceful, and 
 their features are exceedingly regular 
 and pleasing. The women are so re- 
 nowned that a description of their 
 charms is scarcely necessary. Beauti- 
 ful as are the Viennese ladies in their 
 early youth, they cannot rival their fel- 
 
 low-subjects of Hungary. The Austrian 
 woman grows fat, matronly and rather 
 coarse as she matures : the Hungarian 
 lady of forty is still as willowy, graceful 
 and capricious as she was at twenty. 
 The peasant -women, poor things ! are 
 ugly, because they work from morning 
 
 SLAV WOMAN IN PESTH. 
 
 till night in the vineyards, toiling until 
 their backs are broken. The wine which 
 the beauties drink costs their humbler 
 sisters their life-blood, their grace, their 
 happiness. The sunshine of a thousand 
 existences is imprisoned in the vintages 
 of Pressburg and Carlowitz. Poor, home- 
 ly toilers in the fields ! Poor human crea- 
 tures transformed into beasts of burden ! 
 The Hungarian nation owes it to itself to 
 emancipate these struggling women and 
 show them the way to better things. 
 Edward King. 
 

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 V. 
 
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 C-. *