Chapter XIII.Coblentz.On Saturday afternoon, August 14th, I prepared a programme of my contemplated trip through South Germany, Switzerland, Italy and the East, which, together with several hundred cards, I got printed in the afternoon. By means of these programmes I informed my correspondents in America, in which cities I would look for mail matter and at what times I expected to reach them.Mr. Elmer, of theCoblentzer Volkszeitung, told me that the dialects of the German language are so different, that the people of Coblentz and those of Cologne can scarcely understand each other when they speak their peculiar dialects.The principle, that whenever a stream of water makes a curve, the outside bank (that which turns the water from its strait course) is always more precipitous than the other in proportion to the amount of curvature of the stream, is well illustrated at the confluence of the Mosel and the Rhine at Coblentz, by the course of the latter. The waters of the Mosel flow almost perpendicularly against the right bank of the Rhine, and have helped it in forming the precipitous rock of Ehrenbreitstein rising to the height of 387 feet above the river, upon which stand the famous fortifications of that name. The Rhine curves toward the left for about six or eight miles, and its right bank is in consequence high and steep, while the left bank is in the form of a gradual slope, bearing a striking resemblance to the valley of the Jordan for a mile around Siegersville, Lehigh Co., Pa. Another principle, that the width of a valley and the hardness of its bed is always in proportion to the fall of the stream of water flowing through it, does also find as ample illustrations in the sweeping Rhine as in any of the humbler streams whose courses I had watched and studied at home. These two principles afford perhaps the strongest and most conclusive of all proofs, that the hills and valleys of our planet are all the result of erosion.The streets of Coblentz are mostly narrow, as are also its pavements, many of the latter being only from one to two feet wide. There are several remarkable churches, one, the Church of St. Castor dating from 1208, being an example of the early "Lombard style."In order to enjoy the Rhine scenery to the greatest advantage, I took passage on a steamer to Bingen, and started out on Sunday morning at 10 o'clock. One of the steamers had been delayed about three hours that morning on account of the fog, but the day turned out to be a most beautiful one. I took a seat near the prow of the steamer, where I could conveniently watch the views of both banks without interruption from any source. I was now about to ascend the most romantic part of the Rhine--the Rhine of history and of poetry, upon whose precipitous banks the Germans erected their castles in the early and middle ages and defended their "Fatherland" against the attacks of their warlike neighbors. Only after one has seen the castled steam with its numerous watch-towers crowning every towering peak, and the indescribable beauties of this noble river, will the national air, "Die Wacht Am Rhein," (Watch At The Rhine), seem so beautiful to him, as it does to the sons of Germany, whose souls are stirred by its boundless historic associations.I cannot stop to describe the scores of Schlösser, (castles), the charming prospects, the beautiful valleys with their verdant hillsides peeping into the Rhine, and the rich vineyards upon its sloping banks in some places, or the romantic scenery of the bare rocky mountains that rise almost perpendicularly at its sides to the height of 300 to 500 feet, in other places. Several objects claim particular attention, however.Some 35 or 40 miles up the river from Coblentz, on the left bank, rise the imposing rocks of the Lurlei to the height of 433 feet above the Rhine. The river is very narrow in this place, has much fall and makes a decided turn, so that it is with considerable difficulty and some danger that steamers make their ascent. The river is here 76 feet deep and its waters form a whirlpool, (Gewirre). This place and every other one of interest along the Rhine, as well as all its castles, have their legends. It is said that a siren who had her abode on the rock, was wont by means of charming music to entice sailors and fishermen to their destruction in the rapids at the foot of the precipice.As it is dangerous for steamers to meet on these rapids, they have a rule that every steamer coming up the stream must fire a few small cannons as soon as it approaches the Lurlei, so that steamers that are descending may hear it and wait to let the ascending steamer pass before they enter upon the rapids.Near Bingen is the Mouse Tower, so called because the cruel Archbishop Hatto, of Mayence? had once compared some poor famishing people to mice bent on devouring corn, and caused them to be burned in his barn after having invited them to come there and receive provisions which it had been his duty to give them. After this outrage he was immediately attacked by mice, which tormented him day and night. He sought refuge in this tower, but was followed by his persecutors and soon devoured alive. Thus runs the legend.We reached Bingen at 3:30 p.m., and started by rail for Frankfort on the Main an hour later. At 7:15 we crossed the Rhine by the magnificent iron bridge at Mayence, from which we had a good view of the extensive fortifications of that city, also the rich decorations of the entire city with banners, for, though it was Sunday, the Republicans (Internationals or Communists as they call themselves) had a great political meeting. I formed the acquaintance of one of their number who traveled with me to Frankfort and gave me an invitation to accompany him to one of their meetings the next evening. The Communists which fled from Paris after the storm of 1871, are now busy in different countries assisting those opposed to royalty to form organizations for the purpose of instituting other revolutionary movements some future day.Frankfort.Frankfort, the home of the Rothschilds, down to 1866 a free city of the German Confederation and the seat of the Diet, has a population of 90,000 inhabitants. It has 20,000 Catholics and 8,000 Jews.The Römer is historically the most interesting building in Frankfort. It became the town-hall in 1405. In the second story is the Kaisersaal (Imperial Hall) containing the portraits of 47 emperors reigning from A.D. 912 to 1806. In front of it is the Römerberg, (a large square), or market-place, which was the scene of public rejoicings on the occasion of the election of an emperor. After dining in the Kaisersaal he would show himself from the balcony to the assembled multitudes upon it. Down to the end of the last century no Jew was permitted to enter it.The Judengasse (or Jew's street) was founded in 1462 and until the beginning of the present century all the Jews of the city lived there in an isolated community. Every evening and on Sundays and holidays, this street was closed with gates, and a Jew who would venture into any part of the town was subject to a heavy penalty.The Church of St. Paul is immediately behind the Römer. It is a circular building having seating capacity for 3,000 adults, and was used in 1848-9 for the meetings of the "German National Assembly for remodeling the Constitution."Frankfort is the birthplace of Goethe, and has embellished one of its squares with a fine monument to his memory. It has also a fine monument to Schiller and a magnificent one to Gutenberg.In some of the old streets of this city the upper stories of the houses are built out over the streets, making a break in the wall at every story, so that some of the narrow streets are thus almost arched over.I left Frankfort by rail on the 17th of August, at 2:00 o'clock, and reached Darmstadt at 2:40 p.m.Before leaving home, I had been presented by different persons with the addresses of a number of their friends and acquaintances in different countries of Europe, and also with letters of introduction to them. On account of my unbounded success in forming congenial friendships with foreigners, I never departed from my programme in order to meet persons for whom I carried letters, and consequently met none of them except a young American lady who had been abroad for several years with the object of studying the German language, and who was now connected with an educational institution at Darmstadt. Though I had been almost continually surrounded by tourists whose society and friendship I enjoyed and appreciated, still this meeting with a friend of one of my friends at home, seemed to me just like meeting an old acquaintance. We seated ourselves under a tree in the beautiful garden belonging to the Boarding School, and had a long talk about what each had seen in Europe, and how the social, political and literary institution of the Old World differ from those of America. The next day my new friend kindly accompanied me through the large museum contained in the Schloss, comprising a valuable collection of about 700 paintings, among them some fine specimens of the Dutch school. The Library in the Schloss consists of 450,000 volumes. On our way to the Schloss Garden we saw a little hut nestled in the garrets of other large buildings and surrounded by them on every side, except one of its gable-ends. The old peasant (so says tradition) would not part with it for any price, therefore his neighbors built their housesaround,beneathandoverhis, leaving butoneside clear through which he could admit the light of heaven into his humble apartment! Darmstadt has about 40,000 inhabitants, and is one of the cleanest and most modern in appearance of all the cities that I met in the Old World. Its broad and shaded streets intersecting each other at right angles, give it much of the appearance of an American city. The view from the Ludwigsäule commands a fine prospect of the level country around, with its large woods of "tall trees" so rare in Europe, and the Rhein Strasse (Rhine Street) loosing itself only in the distance, is the straitest and longest street that I have yet seen.Worms.Worms is one of the oldest towns in Germany. "The war against the Saxons was planned here in, 772, and here the great contest concerning the investure of the bishops with ring and staff was adjusted by the Concordat between, the Emp. Henry V. and Pope Calixtus II." It had once 70,000 inhabitants, but it contains now only 15,000, (2/3 Prodestant).TheCathedralis a remarkably fine Romanesque edifice with four elegant towers, and two domes. The towers are adorned with odd figures of animals and gurgoyles. Most of this church dates from the 12th century. In the pediment is "the figure of a woman with a mural crown, mounted on an animal, whose four heads (angel, lion, ox, eagle,) are symbols of the four Evangelists, the whole being emblematic of the victorious church.""In the Bishofshof was held the diet of April 1521, in which Luther defended his doctrines in the presence of Charles V., six electors, and a numerous assembly, concluding with the words: 'Here I stand, I cannot act otherwise, God help me! Amen.'"The Baptistry contains some curious sculptures. Upon the roof of the building (stable) represented in connection with the Nativity, there lies a wheel, the signification of which no one could tell me. Among other musical instruments represented in relief in this church, there are the harp, the bugle and rows of violins or fiddles!In the Luther-Platz stands the great Luther Monument, an imposing memorial of the Great Reformer. Its execution occupied nine years and cost $85,000.
On Saturday afternoon, August 14th, I prepared a programme of my contemplated trip through South Germany, Switzerland, Italy and the East, which, together with several hundred cards, I got printed in the afternoon. By means of these programmes I informed my correspondents in America, in which cities I would look for mail matter and at what times I expected to reach them.
Mr. Elmer, of theCoblentzer Volkszeitung, told me that the dialects of the German language are so different, that the people of Coblentz and those of Cologne can scarcely understand each other when they speak their peculiar dialects.
The principle, that whenever a stream of water makes a curve, the outside bank (that which turns the water from its strait course) is always more precipitous than the other in proportion to the amount of curvature of the stream, is well illustrated at the confluence of the Mosel and the Rhine at Coblentz, by the course of the latter. The waters of the Mosel flow almost perpendicularly against the right bank of the Rhine, and have helped it in forming the precipitous rock of Ehrenbreitstein rising to the height of 387 feet above the river, upon which stand the famous fortifications of that name. The Rhine curves toward the left for about six or eight miles, and its right bank is in consequence high and steep, while the left bank is in the form of a gradual slope, bearing a striking resemblance to the valley of the Jordan for a mile around Siegersville, Lehigh Co., Pa. Another principle, that the width of a valley and the hardness of its bed is always in proportion to the fall of the stream of water flowing through it, does also find as ample illustrations in the sweeping Rhine as in any of the humbler streams whose courses I had watched and studied at home. These two principles afford perhaps the strongest and most conclusive of all proofs, that the hills and valleys of our planet are all the result of erosion.
The streets of Coblentz are mostly narrow, as are also its pavements, many of the latter being only from one to two feet wide. There are several remarkable churches, one, the Church of St. Castor dating from 1208, being an example of the early "Lombard style."
In order to enjoy the Rhine scenery to the greatest advantage, I took passage on a steamer to Bingen, and started out on Sunday morning at 10 o'clock. One of the steamers had been delayed about three hours that morning on account of the fog, but the day turned out to be a most beautiful one. I took a seat near the prow of the steamer, where I could conveniently watch the views of both banks without interruption from any source. I was now about to ascend the most romantic part of the Rhine--the Rhine of history and of poetry, upon whose precipitous banks the Germans erected their castles in the early and middle ages and defended their "Fatherland" against the attacks of their warlike neighbors. Only after one has seen the castled steam with its numerous watch-towers crowning every towering peak, and the indescribable beauties of this noble river, will the national air, "Die Wacht Am Rhein," (Watch At The Rhine), seem so beautiful to him, as it does to the sons of Germany, whose souls are stirred by its boundless historic associations.
I cannot stop to describe the scores of Schlösser, (castles), the charming prospects, the beautiful valleys with their verdant hillsides peeping into the Rhine, and the rich vineyards upon its sloping banks in some places, or the romantic scenery of the bare rocky mountains that rise almost perpendicularly at its sides to the height of 300 to 500 feet, in other places. Several objects claim particular attention, however.
Some 35 or 40 miles up the river from Coblentz, on the left bank, rise the imposing rocks of the Lurlei to the height of 433 feet above the Rhine. The river is very narrow in this place, has much fall and makes a decided turn, so that it is with considerable difficulty and some danger that steamers make their ascent. The river is here 76 feet deep and its waters form a whirlpool, (Gewirre). This place and every other one of interest along the Rhine, as well as all its castles, have their legends. It is said that a siren who had her abode on the rock, was wont by means of charming music to entice sailors and fishermen to their destruction in the rapids at the foot of the precipice.
As it is dangerous for steamers to meet on these rapids, they have a rule that every steamer coming up the stream must fire a few small cannons as soon as it approaches the Lurlei, so that steamers that are descending may hear it and wait to let the ascending steamer pass before they enter upon the rapids.
Near Bingen is the Mouse Tower, so called because the cruel Archbishop Hatto, of Mayence? had once compared some poor famishing people to mice bent on devouring corn, and caused them to be burned in his barn after having invited them to come there and receive provisions which it had been his duty to give them. After this outrage he was immediately attacked by mice, which tormented him day and night. He sought refuge in this tower, but was followed by his persecutors and soon devoured alive. Thus runs the legend.
We reached Bingen at 3:30 p.m., and started by rail for Frankfort on the Main an hour later. At 7:15 we crossed the Rhine by the magnificent iron bridge at Mayence, from which we had a good view of the extensive fortifications of that city, also the rich decorations of the entire city with banners, for, though it was Sunday, the Republicans (Internationals or Communists as they call themselves) had a great political meeting. I formed the acquaintance of one of their number who traveled with me to Frankfort and gave me an invitation to accompany him to one of their meetings the next evening. The Communists which fled from Paris after the storm of 1871, are now busy in different countries assisting those opposed to royalty to form organizations for the purpose of instituting other revolutionary movements some future day.
Frankfort, the home of the Rothschilds, down to 1866 a free city of the German Confederation and the seat of the Diet, has a population of 90,000 inhabitants. It has 20,000 Catholics and 8,000 Jews.
The Römer is historically the most interesting building in Frankfort. It became the town-hall in 1405. In the second story is the Kaisersaal (Imperial Hall) containing the portraits of 47 emperors reigning from A.D. 912 to 1806. In front of it is the Römerberg, (a large square), or market-place, which was the scene of public rejoicings on the occasion of the election of an emperor. After dining in the Kaisersaal he would show himself from the balcony to the assembled multitudes upon it. Down to the end of the last century no Jew was permitted to enter it.
The Judengasse (or Jew's street) was founded in 1462 and until the beginning of the present century all the Jews of the city lived there in an isolated community. Every evening and on Sundays and holidays, this street was closed with gates, and a Jew who would venture into any part of the town was subject to a heavy penalty.
The Church of St. Paul is immediately behind the Römer. It is a circular building having seating capacity for 3,000 adults, and was used in 1848-9 for the meetings of the "German National Assembly for remodeling the Constitution."
Frankfort is the birthplace of Goethe, and has embellished one of its squares with a fine monument to his memory. It has also a fine monument to Schiller and a magnificent one to Gutenberg.
In some of the old streets of this city the upper stories of the houses are built out over the streets, making a break in the wall at every story, so that some of the narrow streets are thus almost arched over.
I left Frankfort by rail on the 17th of August, at 2:00 o'clock, and reached Darmstadt at 2:40 p.m.
Before leaving home, I had been presented by different persons with the addresses of a number of their friends and acquaintances in different countries of Europe, and also with letters of introduction to them. On account of my unbounded success in forming congenial friendships with foreigners, I never departed from my programme in order to meet persons for whom I carried letters, and consequently met none of them except a young American lady who had been abroad for several years with the object of studying the German language, and who was now connected with an educational institution at Darmstadt. Though I had been almost continually surrounded by tourists whose society and friendship I enjoyed and appreciated, still this meeting with a friend of one of my friends at home, seemed to me just like meeting an old acquaintance. We seated ourselves under a tree in the beautiful garden belonging to the Boarding School, and had a long talk about what each had seen in Europe, and how the social, political and literary institution of the Old World differ from those of America. The next day my new friend kindly accompanied me through the large museum contained in the Schloss, comprising a valuable collection of about 700 paintings, among them some fine specimens of the Dutch school. The Library in the Schloss consists of 450,000 volumes. On our way to the Schloss Garden we saw a little hut nestled in the garrets of other large buildings and surrounded by them on every side, except one of its gable-ends. The old peasant (so says tradition) would not part with it for any price, therefore his neighbors built their housesaround,beneathandoverhis, leaving butoneside clear through which he could admit the light of heaven into his humble apartment! Darmstadt has about 40,000 inhabitants, and is one of the cleanest and most modern in appearance of all the cities that I met in the Old World. Its broad and shaded streets intersecting each other at right angles, give it much of the appearance of an American city. The view from the Ludwigsäule commands a fine prospect of the level country around, with its large woods of "tall trees" so rare in Europe, and the Rhein Strasse (Rhine Street) loosing itself only in the distance, is the straitest and longest street that I have yet seen.
Worms is one of the oldest towns in Germany. "The war against the Saxons was planned here in, 772, and here the great contest concerning the investure of the bishops with ring and staff was adjusted by the Concordat between, the Emp. Henry V. and Pope Calixtus II." It had once 70,000 inhabitants, but it contains now only 15,000, (2/3 Prodestant).
TheCathedralis a remarkably fine Romanesque edifice with four elegant towers, and two domes. The towers are adorned with odd figures of animals and gurgoyles. Most of this church dates from the 12th century. In the pediment is "the figure of a woman with a mural crown, mounted on an animal, whose four heads (angel, lion, ox, eagle,) are symbols of the four Evangelists, the whole being emblematic of the victorious church."
"In the Bishofshof was held the diet of April 1521, in which Luther defended his doctrines in the presence of Charles V., six electors, and a numerous assembly, concluding with the words: 'Here I stand, I cannot act otherwise, God help me! Amen.'"
The Baptistry contains some curious sculptures. Upon the roof of the building (stable) represented in connection with the Nativity, there lies a wheel, the signification of which no one could tell me. Among other musical instruments represented in relief in this church, there are the harp, the bugle and rows of violins or fiddles!
In the Luther-Platz stands the great Luther Monument, an imposing memorial of the Great Reformer. Its execution occupied nine years and cost $85,000.
Chapter XIV.Die Pfalz (Palatinate).From Worms I went to Frankenthal, where I spent the night (of August 18th) at the Pfalzhof. It was now nearly two months since I had left America, and since that time, in all my wanderings, I had met no people that resembled the Americans. Even in Germany had I not yet seen any one whose physiognomy spoke of near kinship to any that I knew on the other side of the Atlantic. But atFrankenthalI was introduced to a new class of experiences which were as unexpected as they were pleasant. If I had not here experienced it, I could never have anticipated the feelings of a lonely wanderer who, when thousands of miles away from home, was addressed in tones so like unto the voices of those he loved to hear at home, that he felt as if he was all the time hearing familiar voices in every direction.At Worms my attention had already been arrested by social phases that reminded me of America, but at Frankenthal I met an officer at the station, who, upon being asked where the peculiar Palatinate dialect was spoken, not only mentioned to me the places, but also gave me a list of Pfälzish words that are peculiar to them, most of which are purely Pennsylvania German both in their pronunciation and their meanings. A young girl at the hotel and her brother not only used language similar to ours, but betrayed their kinship in various other ways. I spent about a week in Mannheim, Neustadt, Speyer and the surrounding country, during which time I devoted all my attention to the question of our common ancestry. That those people are cousins to many of our Pennsylvania Germans can easily be proved in a variety of ways, even when we throw aside the traditional and historic evidences which we have that many Pennsylvanians have emigrated from the Pfalz in times past. The most convincing proof to those who can not go there and see the people themselves, likely consists in the fact that many of the family names of the Pfälzer and of our Pennsylvania Germans are the same. I attended the large annual Sängerfest at Neustadt, in which 973 singers from all parts of the Pfalz participated. I procured a catalogue of their names and found that a very large proportion are the same as those of the majority of our people. When we contrast with this the fact that the proportion of names common between our people and that of any other section, is much smaller, we see the force of the argument. But this is by no means the first thing that strikes the visitor. Consanguinity or relationship by blood betrays itself in a hundred ways. Particular words and expressions, peculiar pitches of the voice, styles of address, forms of salutations, and special ways of performing certain kinds of work, tell their tale with an emphasis that makes itself understood even to the unscientific observer. The expression of the face and the very ring of the laugh often impressed me with the truth that it was that of a cousin's brother or sister. I often expressed my surprise at these things to those around me, and by a free indulgence in the peculiarities of their idiom enlisted the attention and gained the friendship of those people with magical effect. From Frankenthal I went toMannheim,which is the most regularly built town in Germany. It is divided into 100 squares like a chess-board, and has about 40,000 inhabitants. It consists of 20 sections lettered from A to U (the J being excluded from the nomenclature) and the squares of each sections numbered from 1 to 5. As the city enlarges in territory the numbers of the squares run from 5 upwards. The streets are named as in other cities, but the houses are numberedaroundthe squares. Thus theMannheimer Familienblatter(a newspaper published in the Pfälzisch dialect, which is like the Pennsylvania German) is printed at E 1. 8.--Section E, Square 1, No. 8.Neustadt.At Neustadt I made my home for half a week whence I took excursions into the country. One day I went to Drachenfels, walking about 16 miles in the woods, where I had nothing but paths and guide-boards to lead me; but the latter are found wherever two paths meet, so that I could easily find my way back again. In order to meet these people in every sphere of life, I used to go out to see the poor men and women work in the fields. One Saturday afternoon I struck out from Landau toward the Haardt Mountains with a view to put up for the night in a certain town that I saw on a distant hill. When I had come a short distance, I overtook a little maiden whom I asked the name of that town, so that I might ask the way thither if I should come into a valley where I could not have pointed it out any longer. I pleased the young girl very much by presenting her with my card, and induced her to use her glib tongue volubly in telling me about their schools--what they studied, how long the terms last, &c. She would get along very well in our Pennsylvania German dialect. When we parted, she skipped away and proudly showed the card which she had received from an "American," to one of her schoolmates (?). Here one may see women hauling hay and grain with cows, though I also saw some men use horses. Toward evening I met a peasant of Böchingen, who had finished his work and was about to return home. On learning that I was an American, he asked me to accompany him to his village, saying thatKirmeshad come, the great jubilee season of the year when all the churches were being re-dedicated, after which ceremony the people would go to the public houses and keep up dancing and drinking wine and beer from Sunday noon till Monday night, and that I could therefore see a great many Palatinates together in his town I asked him what hotel accommodations their town had; to which he replied that there were several hotels and he would conduct me to a good one. On reaching the place I accompanied him first to his home and was introduced to his family. I had here one of those opportunities, so rare to the traveler, of seeing the kitchen arrangements of the middle and lower classes. When we came to the hotel he asked the landlord for a room for me, who immediately came to me and explained that on account of the great "Fest" (anniversary) he had turned all the spare rooms of the house into coffee-rooms, "but," said he, "though I know that Americans are used to good accommodations, I can only offer you theFruchtkammer(granery) to-night, where I have a good nice bed for you, however, if that will suit you." The homelike cheerful tone and conversation of the landlord at once captivated me, and when I looked at the large house and saw all his rooms already filled with guests enjoying their wine and beer together, after the German fashion, I soon decided to stay with them. The room which he gave me was a very large one in the second story of the house, and, though there were large heaps of grain and different kinds of farming implements there, the end where the bed stood was clean and inviting, considering the circumstances. There was no lock at the door, but the landlord's honest face and assurances soon put me at ease about that matter. He told me that I might place some barrels against it, however, if I felt so inclined, which of course I did. There was a lady in that town who had been spending her time in Philadelphia for several years, but who had on this occasion come home to Böchingen on a visit. An invitation was sent to her in the evening already, asking her to come to the hotel where an American was waiting to meet her, and early on Sunday morning she met me in the coffee-room where we spent the morning. One's partiality to the English language seldom displeased me in Europe, but as this lady was a native of that part of the Pfalz whose people spoke a dialect more like the Pennsylvania German than I heard anywhere else, I insisted upon conversing with her in "the dialect." The landlord who did not understand any English was with us most of the time, so that out of respect for him she also felt constrained to speak German when he was present, but whenever he left us she would speak English, the language of her new American home. She had visited Allentown, Pa., and was well acquainted with the resemblance of the Pfälzish and the Pennsylvania German dialects. I went home to Neustadt that forenoon and attended the great Pfälzer Sängerfest (the annual Concert of the Palatinate Choirs). The city was splendidly decorated with flags, and the "Fest" was a grand success in every respect. From Neustadt I went to Speyer, and a day later toHeidelberg.Heidelberg was the only place where I found lady ticket agents at the railway station. The station is a very large and important one, and the positions held by those ladies are of great responsibility. In Continental Europe, it is the ladies that transact most of the business in almost every city. Hotels, stores, shops, cafes, drinking stands, &c., are generally managed by ladies.Heidelberg was the last city in which I felt that I was hourly seeing the cousins of the Pennsylvania Germans. Here still, I did occasionally see one who not only favored some of our people in form and features, but whose voice and accent also spoke of kinship. I had heard persons speak in some parts of the Pfalz and particularly around Böchingen (about 10 miles S.S.W. from Neustadt and 25 miles W.S.W. from Speyer) from 50 to 70 per cent of whose words corresponded to the Pennsylvania German. Dürkheim, Landau, (and some say, Kaiserslautern too), are good examples.The old renowned university of Heidelberg has 800 students, and a library of 200,000 volumes and 1,800 MSS.The castle is the most magnificent ruin in Germany. The towers, turrets, buttresses, balconies, and fine statues still stand there, proud and bold, even in its ruins. And the portcullis of iron in one of its lofty gateways gave me the first idea how the balance of the enemy could be shut off, after a portion had been admitted into the yard of the fortifications with a view of slaughtering them. The iron bars of this portcullis or sliding gate are very thick and heavy, and have sharp points below. A tower stands over the gate, into which the portcullis is drawn up. The defenders of castles would sometimes conceal themselves and keep perfectly silent on the approach of an enemy, as if the castle had been abandoned, but as soon as as large a portion of them as they thought they could dispose of, had entered, the portcullis was dropped, which, on account of its immense weight, of course made its way to the ground even, if it had to pierce the bodies of a dozen that stood under it! Hereupon the alarm was sounded and all that were inside were barbarously slaughtered. In some castles there were large pit-falls full of pointed spears standing upwards. As soon as a large part of the enemy were upon this pit, they would be precipitated into the spears below! At other places there were immense rollers, and only one approach to the castle, which lead directly up the hill. When the assaulting enemy made its approach by this, the hillside was filled with the enemy's soldiers, these rollers would be loosened upon them, and thus the bodies of many thousands would be mangled in a minute! Such was the barbarity of the ancients.I will not forget the long walk I had all alone through one of the underground passages of the Heidelberg Castle. I saw a pale light at the other end, when I entered; but it was dark in the middle, and turned out to be much longer than I had anticipated. These passages are about 7 feet high and 10 feet wide, and are arched by a brick vault. The illumination of this ruined castle on the evening of August 23rd, constituted one of my grandest sights in all Europe. It seemed to be enveloped with flames of such an intense heat, that its walls, towers, &c., appeared to be about to melt down! As the colors of the illuminating light changed suddenly from yellowish white to blue, green and red, the scene was so indescribably beautiful, that numbers of the ten thousand spectators actually went into raptures.The Tun,in the castle of Heidelberg, the largest of all the tuns in the world, is 32 feet long, 22 feet in diameter at both ends and 23 feet in the center. Its eighteen wooden hoops are 8 inches thick and 15 inches broad, and its 127 staves are 91 inches thick. The bung-hole is 3 to 4 inches in diameter. To built it cost the enormous sum of $32,000, and its capacity is equal to about 2,200 common barrels! On top of it is a dancing-floor having the bung-hole in the center! What a joy it must be for the dancers to reflect that there is such a flood of wine still beneath them! This giant tun erected as an altar to the jovial God "Bacchus," has been filled completely three times, (1753, 1760, 1766)."In Heidelberg beim grossen FassDa liess sich's fröhlich sein,Bei einem vollgefülten GlasVon edlem Pfälzer Wein;Den als dies Fass kam einst zum standDo war ein Jubel in dem Land,Da freut' sich Alles, Gross und Klein,Denn voll war es mit Pfälzer Wein.""In Heidelberg, the 'Grosse Fass,'Caused merry days to shine,When all enjoyed the well filled glassOf noble Pfälzer wine;For when this Tun first came to light,All did in joy combine,To see the 'Fass,' oh wondrous sight!Fill'd up with Pfälzer wine."The Philosophenweg, (Philosopher's way), two miles in length, commands some of the finest prospect on the Rhine. It winds through charming vineyards, and from it may be enjoyed splendid views of the town, castle, valley, and of the beautiful outlines of the Haardt Mountains and the cathedral of Speyer in the distance.From Heidelberg I went to Stuttgart, remarkable for the vast collection of books (300,000 vols.) in the Royal Library. Among these are about 9,000 Bibles, in some 80 languages!The Railway Station in Stuttgart is remarkable both for magnificence and the beauty of its interior. Its wide and lofty passages and splendid waiting-rooms, are among the grandest in the world.From Stuttgart I went to Carlsruhe, famous for the manner in which the streets meet at the Castle, from every point of the compass. Some thirty streets meet here like so many sticks of a circular fan. Near the Botanic Garden, is a large Hall of Art rich in paintings and relics.Strassburg.Strassburg, the capital of Alsace and Lorraine, is situated on the River Ill, 2 miles from the Rhine, and comprises a population of 80,000 inhabitants. Its Cathedral, covering more than an acre of ground and 216 feet in height, is deservedly famous. Its elegant spire, the highest in Europe, is 465 feet in height. To procure a permit from the city authorities to ascend to the "lantern," which is immediately below the extreme summit, I walked about the city nearly an hour to find the proper official. The view from the platform or roof of the building (216 feet high) affords a fine view of the beautiful plains of Alsace, but many ascend to the "lantern" simply for the satisfaction of saying that they have done it. No one is allowed to go higher than the platform, except by special permission from the city authorities, and accompanied by a guide and protector, for which an extra ticket is required. The ascent is quite easy for some distance, but by and by the spire becomes too narrow to have stairs on the inside, so that we had to climb up on the outside along ladder-like steps. If one would become giddy in this place, he might fall from a hight of over four hundred feet into the street below! I cannot stop to speak of the world-renowned astronomical clock which is contained in this cathedral.The railroad through the Black Forest is one of the great victories of civil engineering which characterize this age of great undertakings. We passed in exactly one hour through 38 tunnels, during which time, in our ascent of the mountains, we passed through one valley three times! When we had reached the highest point, we saw the two other tracks at different elevations on the mountain side below us! Here we passed for many hours through pine forests, all the trees of which were raised from seed, (some sown, and others planted). Many square miles of this mountainous section is covered with pines planted as regularly as our orchards; and the scenery of these mountain-sides green with dense forests in which the comical tree-tops stand with mathematical exactness in the square or quincunx order, is among the most beautiful imaginable.
From Worms I went to Frankenthal, where I spent the night (of August 18th) at the Pfalzhof. It was now nearly two months since I had left America, and since that time, in all my wanderings, I had met no people that resembled the Americans. Even in Germany had I not yet seen any one whose physiognomy spoke of near kinship to any that I knew on the other side of the Atlantic. But at
I was introduced to a new class of experiences which were as unexpected as they were pleasant. If I had not here experienced it, I could never have anticipated the feelings of a lonely wanderer who, when thousands of miles away from home, was addressed in tones so like unto the voices of those he loved to hear at home, that he felt as if he was all the time hearing familiar voices in every direction.
At Worms my attention had already been arrested by social phases that reminded me of America, but at Frankenthal I met an officer at the station, who, upon being asked where the peculiar Palatinate dialect was spoken, not only mentioned to me the places, but also gave me a list of Pfälzish words that are peculiar to them, most of which are purely Pennsylvania German both in their pronunciation and their meanings. A young girl at the hotel and her brother not only used language similar to ours, but betrayed their kinship in various other ways. I spent about a week in Mannheim, Neustadt, Speyer and the surrounding country, during which time I devoted all my attention to the question of our common ancestry. That those people are cousins to many of our Pennsylvania Germans can easily be proved in a variety of ways, even when we throw aside the traditional and historic evidences which we have that many Pennsylvanians have emigrated from the Pfalz in times past. The most convincing proof to those who can not go there and see the people themselves, likely consists in the fact that many of the family names of the Pfälzer and of our Pennsylvania Germans are the same. I attended the large annual Sängerfest at Neustadt, in which 973 singers from all parts of the Pfalz participated. I procured a catalogue of their names and found that a very large proportion are the same as those of the majority of our people. When we contrast with this the fact that the proportion of names common between our people and that of any other section, is much smaller, we see the force of the argument. But this is by no means the first thing that strikes the visitor. Consanguinity or relationship by blood betrays itself in a hundred ways. Particular words and expressions, peculiar pitches of the voice, styles of address, forms of salutations, and special ways of performing certain kinds of work, tell their tale with an emphasis that makes itself understood even to the unscientific observer. The expression of the face and the very ring of the laugh often impressed me with the truth that it was that of a cousin's brother or sister. I often expressed my surprise at these things to those around me, and by a free indulgence in the peculiarities of their idiom enlisted the attention and gained the friendship of those people with magical effect. From Frankenthal I went to
which is the most regularly built town in Germany. It is divided into 100 squares like a chess-board, and has about 40,000 inhabitants. It consists of 20 sections lettered from A to U (the J being excluded from the nomenclature) and the squares of each sections numbered from 1 to 5. As the city enlarges in territory the numbers of the squares run from 5 upwards. The streets are named as in other cities, but the houses are numberedaroundthe squares. Thus theMannheimer Familienblatter(a newspaper published in the Pfälzisch dialect, which is like the Pennsylvania German) is printed at E 1. 8.--Section E, Square 1, No. 8.
At Neustadt I made my home for half a week whence I took excursions into the country. One day I went to Drachenfels, walking about 16 miles in the woods, where I had nothing but paths and guide-boards to lead me; but the latter are found wherever two paths meet, so that I could easily find my way back again. In order to meet these people in every sphere of life, I used to go out to see the poor men and women work in the fields. One Saturday afternoon I struck out from Landau toward the Haardt Mountains with a view to put up for the night in a certain town that I saw on a distant hill. When I had come a short distance, I overtook a little maiden whom I asked the name of that town, so that I might ask the way thither if I should come into a valley where I could not have pointed it out any longer. I pleased the young girl very much by presenting her with my card, and induced her to use her glib tongue volubly in telling me about their schools--what they studied, how long the terms last, &c. She would get along very well in our Pennsylvania German dialect. When we parted, she skipped away and proudly showed the card which she had received from an "American," to one of her schoolmates (?). Here one may see women hauling hay and grain with cows, though I also saw some men use horses. Toward evening I met a peasant of Böchingen, who had finished his work and was about to return home. On learning that I was an American, he asked me to accompany him to his village, saying thatKirmeshad come, the great jubilee season of the year when all the churches were being re-dedicated, after which ceremony the people would go to the public houses and keep up dancing and drinking wine and beer from Sunday noon till Monday night, and that I could therefore see a great many Palatinates together in his town I asked him what hotel accommodations their town had; to which he replied that there were several hotels and he would conduct me to a good one. On reaching the place I accompanied him first to his home and was introduced to his family. I had here one of those opportunities, so rare to the traveler, of seeing the kitchen arrangements of the middle and lower classes. When we came to the hotel he asked the landlord for a room for me, who immediately came to me and explained that on account of the great "Fest" (anniversary) he had turned all the spare rooms of the house into coffee-rooms, "but," said he, "though I know that Americans are used to good accommodations, I can only offer you theFruchtkammer(granery) to-night, where I have a good nice bed for you, however, if that will suit you." The homelike cheerful tone and conversation of the landlord at once captivated me, and when I looked at the large house and saw all his rooms already filled with guests enjoying their wine and beer together, after the German fashion, I soon decided to stay with them. The room which he gave me was a very large one in the second story of the house, and, though there were large heaps of grain and different kinds of farming implements there, the end where the bed stood was clean and inviting, considering the circumstances. There was no lock at the door, but the landlord's honest face and assurances soon put me at ease about that matter. He told me that I might place some barrels against it, however, if I felt so inclined, which of course I did. There was a lady in that town who had been spending her time in Philadelphia for several years, but who had on this occasion come home to Böchingen on a visit. An invitation was sent to her in the evening already, asking her to come to the hotel where an American was waiting to meet her, and early on Sunday morning she met me in the coffee-room where we spent the morning. One's partiality to the English language seldom displeased me in Europe, but as this lady was a native of that part of the Pfalz whose people spoke a dialect more like the Pennsylvania German than I heard anywhere else, I insisted upon conversing with her in "the dialect." The landlord who did not understand any English was with us most of the time, so that out of respect for him she also felt constrained to speak German when he was present, but whenever he left us she would speak English, the language of her new American home. She had visited Allentown, Pa., and was well acquainted with the resemblance of the Pfälzish and the Pennsylvania German dialects. I went home to Neustadt that forenoon and attended the great Pfälzer Sängerfest (the annual Concert of the Palatinate Choirs). The city was splendidly decorated with flags, and the "Fest" was a grand success in every respect. From Neustadt I went to Speyer, and a day later to
Heidelberg was the only place where I found lady ticket agents at the railway station. The station is a very large and important one, and the positions held by those ladies are of great responsibility. In Continental Europe, it is the ladies that transact most of the business in almost every city. Hotels, stores, shops, cafes, drinking stands, &c., are generally managed by ladies.
Heidelberg was the last city in which I felt that I was hourly seeing the cousins of the Pennsylvania Germans. Here still, I did occasionally see one who not only favored some of our people in form and features, but whose voice and accent also spoke of kinship. I had heard persons speak in some parts of the Pfalz and particularly around Böchingen (about 10 miles S.S.W. from Neustadt and 25 miles W.S.W. from Speyer) from 50 to 70 per cent of whose words corresponded to the Pennsylvania German. Dürkheim, Landau, (and some say, Kaiserslautern too), are good examples.
The old renowned university of Heidelberg has 800 students, and a library of 200,000 volumes and 1,800 MSS.
The castle is the most magnificent ruin in Germany. The towers, turrets, buttresses, balconies, and fine statues still stand there, proud and bold, even in its ruins. And the portcullis of iron in one of its lofty gateways gave me the first idea how the balance of the enemy could be shut off, after a portion had been admitted into the yard of the fortifications with a view of slaughtering them. The iron bars of this portcullis or sliding gate are very thick and heavy, and have sharp points below. A tower stands over the gate, into which the portcullis is drawn up. The defenders of castles would sometimes conceal themselves and keep perfectly silent on the approach of an enemy, as if the castle had been abandoned, but as soon as as large a portion of them as they thought they could dispose of, had entered, the portcullis was dropped, which, on account of its immense weight, of course made its way to the ground even, if it had to pierce the bodies of a dozen that stood under it! Hereupon the alarm was sounded and all that were inside were barbarously slaughtered. In some castles there were large pit-falls full of pointed spears standing upwards. As soon as a large part of the enemy were upon this pit, they would be precipitated into the spears below! At other places there were immense rollers, and only one approach to the castle, which lead directly up the hill. When the assaulting enemy made its approach by this, the hillside was filled with the enemy's soldiers, these rollers would be loosened upon them, and thus the bodies of many thousands would be mangled in a minute! Such was the barbarity of the ancients.
I will not forget the long walk I had all alone through one of the underground passages of the Heidelberg Castle. I saw a pale light at the other end, when I entered; but it was dark in the middle, and turned out to be much longer than I had anticipated. These passages are about 7 feet high and 10 feet wide, and are arched by a brick vault. The illumination of this ruined castle on the evening of August 23rd, constituted one of my grandest sights in all Europe. It seemed to be enveloped with flames of such an intense heat, that its walls, towers, &c., appeared to be about to melt down! As the colors of the illuminating light changed suddenly from yellowish white to blue, green and red, the scene was so indescribably beautiful, that numbers of the ten thousand spectators actually went into raptures.
in the castle of Heidelberg, the largest of all the tuns in the world, is 32 feet long, 22 feet in diameter at both ends and 23 feet in the center. Its eighteen wooden hoops are 8 inches thick and 15 inches broad, and its 127 staves are 91 inches thick. The bung-hole is 3 to 4 inches in diameter. To built it cost the enormous sum of $32,000, and its capacity is equal to about 2,200 common barrels! On top of it is a dancing-floor having the bung-hole in the center! What a joy it must be for the dancers to reflect that there is such a flood of wine still beneath them! This giant tun erected as an altar to the jovial God "Bacchus," has been filled completely three times, (1753, 1760, 1766).
"In Heidelberg beim grossen FassDa liess sich's fröhlich sein,Bei einem vollgefülten GlasVon edlem Pfälzer Wein;Den als dies Fass kam einst zum standDo war ein Jubel in dem Land,Da freut' sich Alles, Gross und Klein,Denn voll war es mit Pfälzer Wein.""In Heidelberg, the 'Grosse Fass,'Caused merry days to shine,When all enjoyed the well filled glassOf noble Pfälzer wine;For when this Tun first came to light,All did in joy combine,To see the 'Fass,' oh wondrous sight!Fill'd up with Pfälzer wine."
"In Heidelberg beim grossen FassDa liess sich's fröhlich sein,Bei einem vollgefülten GlasVon edlem Pfälzer Wein;Den als dies Fass kam einst zum standDo war ein Jubel in dem Land,Da freut' sich Alles, Gross und Klein,Denn voll war es mit Pfälzer Wein."
"In Heidelberg, the 'Grosse Fass,'Caused merry days to shine,When all enjoyed the well filled glassOf noble Pfälzer wine;For when this Tun first came to light,All did in joy combine,To see the 'Fass,' oh wondrous sight!Fill'd up with Pfälzer wine."
The Philosophenweg, (Philosopher's way), two miles in length, commands some of the finest prospect on the Rhine. It winds through charming vineyards, and from it may be enjoyed splendid views of the town, castle, valley, and of the beautiful outlines of the Haardt Mountains and the cathedral of Speyer in the distance.
From Heidelberg I went to Stuttgart, remarkable for the vast collection of books (300,000 vols.) in the Royal Library. Among these are about 9,000 Bibles, in some 80 languages!
The Railway Station in Stuttgart is remarkable both for magnificence and the beauty of its interior. Its wide and lofty passages and splendid waiting-rooms, are among the grandest in the world.
From Stuttgart I went to Carlsruhe, famous for the manner in which the streets meet at the Castle, from every point of the compass. Some thirty streets meet here like so many sticks of a circular fan. Near the Botanic Garden, is a large Hall of Art rich in paintings and relics.
Strassburg, the capital of Alsace and Lorraine, is situated on the River Ill, 2 miles from the Rhine, and comprises a population of 80,000 inhabitants. Its Cathedral, covering more than an acre of ground and 216 feet in height, is deservedly famous. Its elegant spire, the highest in Europe, is 465 feet in height. To procure a permit from the city authorities to ascend to the "lantern," which is immediately below the extreme summit, I walked about the city nearly an hour to find the proper official. The view from the platform or roof of the building (216 feet high) affords a fine view of the beautiful plains of Alsace, but many ascend to the "lantern" simply for the satisfaction of saying that they have done it. No one is allowed to go higher than the platform, except by special permission from the city authorities, and accompanied by a guide and protector, for which an extra ticket is required. The ascent is quite easy for some distance, but by and by the spire becomes too narrow to have stairs on the inside, so that we had to climb up on the outside along ladder-like steps. If one would become giddy in this place, he might fall from a hight of over four hundred feet into the street below! I cannot stop to speak of the world-renowned astronomical clock which is contained in this cathedral.
The railroad through the Black Forest is one of the great victories of civil engineering which characterize this age of great undertakings. We passed in exactly one hour through 38 tunnels, during which time, in our ascent of the mountains, we passed through one valley three times! When we had reached the highest point, we saw the two other tracks at different elevations on the mountain side below us! Here we passed for many hours through pine forests, all the trees of which were raised from seed, (some sown, and others planted). Many square miles of this mountainous section is covered with pines planted as regularly as our orchards; and the scenery of these mountain-sides green with dense forests in which the comical tree-tops stand with mathematical exactness in the square or quincunx order, is among the most beautiful imaginable.
Chapter XV.Switzerland.It is almost impossible to describe the scenery of the Alps to one who had never yet ascended mountains above the region of the clouds, without so bewildering his imagination that his fancy will call forth and accept more fictitious notions than true ones. The best description that I had ever heard of the Alps, was the occasion of my most incorrect conceptions about them. I think the speaker did not misstate or exaggerate anything in a single word, but as he could in an hour's talk tell only one tenth of what one ought to know, in order to form a correct notion of what the Alps look like, my fanciful imagination promptly supplied the coloring of the other nine tenths of the picture which he left untouched; and consequently when I came to see the Alps, I found them entirely different from what I had anticipated.The ordinary school maps represent the Alps as extending along the borders of Switzerland, as if they consisted of a single range, or possibly of several parallel ranges, and Mount Blanc as its towering peak. With what surprise a scholar who only saw these maps, will look about him, when he reaches the summit of any high peak in Switzerland! On the Rigi, for example, one sees an extent of territory almost 300 miles in circuit, every part of which is studded with ice-capped peaks. These range not in any one particular direction, nor do they number only several dozen, but many hundreds of them stand around the beholder toward every point of the compass and at variable distances, from the Pilatus near by to the most distant part of the horizon--more than 50 miles away. The snow-clad crowns of many of these rise high above the clouds, so that"Through the parting clouds onlyThe earth can be seen,Far down 'neath the vapourThe meadows of green."Those forms of clouds called cumuli, (P.G. Gewitter Wolken), presenting themselves the appearance of mountains covered with ice, often creep around these peaks at less than half their height! At Zurich I first beheld the strange sight of mountains and clouds piled upon each other so that I could not well distinguish them. It was on a sunny afternoon that I stood on the banks of theZuricher See(Lake Zurich) and, looking over its calm waters, I beheld in the distant southeast a strange phenomenon. There stood the high glittering banks of clouds, and over them I saw the black sides of a towering peak whose top was covered with ice and snow. I then visited the Rigi and looked at Alpine Switzerland from its giddy heights. This, since the railroad has been completed to its top, is one of the most famous mountains in Switzerland. Though it stands beneath the line of perpectual snow, its top being covered with grass in summer, still it commands a panoramic view of indescribable grandeur. Numerous hotels stand around the top where thousands of tourists find shelter during the summer nights, and among them is one of the finest hotels in the world. When fall comes, all the landlords must take their families and move down from the mountain, as it would be impossible to keep the track of the railroad clear during the winter to bring up the necessary provisions for them. The snow is often from 10 to 20 feet deep on these Alps.All Swiss scenery, whether one is on the lakes, upon the mountains, or in the valleys and ravines, is singularly charming, and bears no resemblance to the scenery which one sees elsewhere; so that for this lack of having something with which to compare it, no one can do it justice in any description short of a volume. The reader will therefore pardon our haste in this country. One who sees the rest of Europe and not Switzerland, will not miss any particular links in the historic chain of social, religious and political development of the human race, but he will not have seen the sublime in nature. The Alps are the poetry of inorganic creation, and a week or two spent on their lakes, in their valleys and gorges, amid the high waterfalls or upon their snowfields and glaciers, teaches one to associate new meanings to the words, grand, sublime, lofty, inspiring, overawing, romantic, wild, precipitous and bewildering, &c. It took me two days to ascend as high as the Rhone glacier, during which time I walked over 30 miles up hill along old military roads which the Romans constructed through Switzerland. I saw the snow and ice on the first day already, and it seemed as if I was but a little below it, but in place of reaching the snow line in the afternoon as I judged I might, I did not reach it until the next afternoon at 5:00 o'clock. The valleys are narrow and the mountains rise in some places almost perpendicularly at the sides, so that the snow and ice which melts near the tops of the mountains, falls down thousands of feet into the streams below. Water-falls that are from several hundred to a thousand feet in height are numerous among the Alps.The Giessbach Falls which I ascended on the 6th of September, descends in a series of seven cascades 1,148 feet, and the Handeck Falls, which I passed on the 5th, precipitates in an unbroken sheet from the height of 250 feet! Rainbows stand over all the falls of the Alps, whenever the sun shines.On the second day (Sept. 4th) of my ascend of the Alps, I could look upwards and see the eternal snows, or look down into the valleys, and see the people in the meadows and fields making hay or cutting grain! Haymakers may drink the water that was an hour before part of the mass of ice and snow which they see hanging near the top of the mountains several thousand feet above their heads! Avalanches slide down into the valleys every month of the year, and I passed through tunnels and bridges that are purposely constructed that the snow may thus slide over the roads without doing harm to any one. Where the mountains rise too precipitously, it is in some places impossible to construct a road along the edge; in these cases they pierce through the mountains for considerable distances. The Axenstrasse, along Lake Luzerne, has many such tunnels, one of which is about one eighth of a mile in length. In the Grimsel, the road avoids a water-fall by passing through a tunnel under it.The Rhone Glacier, the only ice-field that I crossed, is upwards of nine miles in length and rises from 5,751 feet to 10,450 feet in height. About the time of sunset on the 4th of September, I entered the cavern of ice from which issues the stream that constitutes the source of the Rhone River. "This is the Rhodanus of the ancients, which was said to issue 'from the gates of eternal night at the foot of the pillar of the sun.'"I descended through the Grimsel pass (7,103 feet) and Haslithal along the upper waters of the Aare down to Meiringen, in one day. Though there is only a bridle-path through the almost unparalled wildnesses of this valley, still there is a telegraphic wire running up to the hotel at the upper end, near the Rhone Glacier! No language can describe the picturesqueness of the bare rocky sides of this valley. I heard persons who thought they were alone, utter a dozen exclamations of surprise while making a single turn where a new view opened! The solitary tourist will ejaculate his exclamations without number; and it is under such circumstances that the unpoetical soul seeks some personification to whom it may do homage. It would not require a worshipper of images to kneel down, in the Grimsel or Ober Haslithal, before any emblem that embodied any adequate representation of the crushingly sublime scenery that one beholds there!I met a lake whose depths seemed as boundless as the blue heavens above me. The water of many of the Swiss lakes is as clear as crystal, so that white objects at their bottoms may be discerned at great depths.While sailing along the Lake of Geneva one day, I could as little see substance in the water below me, when I looked upon it at a certain distance from the steamer, as in the clear sky; both seemed alike blue and boundless!The weather and the temperature changes very suddenly among the high Alps. The climate in the valleys of Switzerland is as warm as ours, in summer, while some thousand feet higher lie the everlasting glaciers. From these, avalanches of cold air precipitate into the valleys, so that the mercury often falls from 20 to 30 degrees in ten minutes! One is in danger of taking "a cold" every day in Switzerland.Besides "The Alps" and thelovely lakesamong them, the tourist may also see castles, museums, art galleries, pleasure gardens, &c., in Switzerland, but I will only enumerate a few of the most striking objects that I met and saw in this curious country, and then pass on to Italy.One of the bridges of Lucerne is adorned with very curious paintings representing the "Dance of Death." Scores of skeletons, some blowing the bugle or playing with the triangles, others equipped with hoes and spades, are jubilant over their work!One of the finest organs in Europe is the far-famed one at Freiburg, having 67 stops and 7,800 pipes, some of them 33 feet long. This instrument has such a range of volume that it can simulate the roaring thunder as well as the faintest echo. The portal of the same cathedral which contains the famous organ is also adorned (?) with a curious representation of the last judgment. St. Peter leads the blessed to the door of Heaven, but half a dozen evil ones busy themselves in disposing of the wicked. One of them that has a head like a hog, carries them from the scales into a large caldron where they are boiled. Others with forks in their hands pitch them into the mouth of the large dragon-devil who is represented as glutting them, and whose capacious mouth admits of several of them at a time! The time has almost arrived when one may no longer describe what he sees in the churches of Europe! This reminds me of a monster that stands upon a fountain in Bern, called the Kindlifresser, (the Ogre), who is in the act of eating a child, while others doomed to the same fate protrude from his girdle and pockets!Berne is a great place for bears. Besides those connected with the curious machinery of the clock on one of its clock-towers, among the dead bears, they also keep a large den of living bears at the expense of the government. The bear is the heraldic emblem of Switzerland, as is our eagle of American freedom.Of the fictitous hero, William Tell, and the nature and character of the Swiss Republic, I can not say more in the compass of this book, than that the former is a myth and that the latter was in a great measure the outgrowth of poverty.The reader may form an idea of the miserable dwellings of the peasantry on the mountains, when he is told that many are hardly distinguishable from the stables in which the cattle are sheltered.When I came into view of Guttannen, the first village of any considerable extent that I passed after seeing the Rhone Glacier and the wildnesses of the Grimsel and Haslithal, where no houses except hotels, and in some places not even trees or grass abound, I felt glad once more to see a group of human habitations, and determined to count them, so that I might record their number. I passed along the edge of the mountains where I could easily overlook the village, but it was in many instances impossible to determine by a survey of their external appearances, which were the stables and which the houses or huts, so I counted them all, large and small, and found their number between 60 and 90. I once intended to count these buildings only with windows, as houses; but I soon discovered that some huts had windows only on one or several sides, and looked like stables on the other sides!A question to dairy men: Do thunder and lightning affect fresh milk? A lady keeping a cafe in Brienz, told me that if a thunder storm overtook those which were bringing the fresh milk from the mountains, the milk would suddenly turn sour, so that it could no longer be boiled for drinking it sweet. She said, "Es thut sie verbolera, so das sie gerinnt wen man sie kochen will!"
It is almost impossible to describe the scenery of the Alps to one who had never yet ascended mountains above the region of the clouds, without so bewildering his imagination that his fancy will call forth and accept more fictitious notions than true ones. The best description that I had ever heard of the Alps, was the occasion of my most incorrect conceptions about them. I think the speaker did not misstate or exaggerate anything in a single word, but as he could in an hour's talk tell only one tenth of what one ought to know, in order to form a correct notion of what the Alps look like, my fanciful imagination promptly supplied the coloring of the other nine tenths of the picture which he left untouched; and consequently when I came to see the Alps, I found them entirely different from what I had anticipated.
The ordinary school maps represent the Alps as extending along the borders of Switzerland, as if they consisted of a single range, or possibly of several parallel ranges, and Mount Blanc as its towering peak. With what surprise a scholar who only saw these maps, will look about him, when he reaches the summit of any high peak in Switzerland! On the Rigi, for example, one sees an extent of territory almost 300 miles in circuit, every part of which is studded with ice-capped peaks. These range not in any one particular direction, nor do they number only several dozen, but many hundreds of them stand around the beholder toward every point of the compass and at variable distances, from the Pilatus near by to the most distant part of the horizon--more than 50 miles away. The snow-clad crowns of many of these rise high above the clouds, so that
"Through the parting clouds onlyThe earth can be seen,Far down 'neath the vapourThe meadows of green."
"Through the parting clouds onlyThe earth can be seen,Far down 'neath the vapourThe meadows of green."
Those forms of clouds called cumuli, (P.G. Gewitter Wolken), presenting themselves the appearance of mountains covered with ice, often creep around these peaks at less than half their height! At Zurich I first beheld the strange sight of mountains and clouds piled upon each other so that I could not well distinguish them. It was on a sunny afternoon that I stood on the banks of theZuricher See(Lake Zurich) and, looking over its calm waters, I beheld in the distant southeast a strange phenomenon. There stood the high glittering banks of clouds, and over them I saw the black sides of a towering peak whose top was covered with ice and snow. I then visited the Rigi and looked at Alpine Switzerland from its giddy heights. This, since the railroad has been completed to its top, is one of the most famous mountains in Switzerland. Though it stands beneath the line of perpectual snow, its top being covered with grass in summer, still it commands a panoramic view of indescribable grandeur. Numerous hotels stand around the top where thousands of tourists find shelter during the summer nights, and among them is one of the finest hotels in the world. When fall comes, all the landlords must take their families and move down from the mountain, as it would be impossible to keep the track of the railroad clear during the winter to bring up the necessary provisions for them. The snow is often from 10 to 20 feet deep on these Alps.
All Swiss scenery, whether one is on the lakes, upon the mountains, or in the valleys and ravines, is singularly charming, and bears no resemblance to the scenery which one sees elsewhere; so that for this lack of having something with which to compare it, no one can do it justice in any description short of a volume. The reader will therefore pardon our haste in this country. One who sees the rest of Europe and not Switzerland, will not miss any particular links in the historic chain of social, religious and political development of the human race, but he will not have seen the sublime in nature. The Alps are the poetry of inorganic creation, and a week or two spent on their lakes, in their valleys and gorges, amid the high waterfalls or upon their snowfields and glaciers, teaches one to associate new meanings to the words, grand, sublime, lofty, inspiring, overawing, romantic, wild, precipitous and bewildering, &c. It took me two days to ascend as high as the Rhone glacier, during which time I walked over 30 miles up hill along old military roads which the Romans constructed through Switzerland. I saw the snow and ice on the first day already, and it seemed as if I was but a little below it, but in place of reaching the snow line in the afternoon as I judged I might, I did not reach it until the next afternoon at 5:00 o'clock. The valleys are narrow and the mountains rise in some places almost perpendicularly at the sides, so that the snow and ice which melts near the tops of the mountains, falls down thousands of feet into the streams below. Water-falls that are from several hundred to a thousand feet in height are numerous among the Alps.
The Giessbach Falls which I ascended on the 6th of September, descends in a series of seven cascades 1,148 feet, and the Handeck Falls, which I passed on the 5th, precipitates in an unbroken sheet from the height of 250 feet! Rainbows stand over all the falls of the Alps, whenever the sun shines.
On the second day (Sept. 4th) of my ascend of the Alps, I could look upwards and see the eternal snows, or look down into the valleys, and see the people in the meadows and fields making hay or cutting grain! Haymakers may drink the water that was an hour before part of the mass of ice and snow which they see hanging near the top of the mountains several thousand feet above their heads! Avalanches slide down into the valleys every month of the year, and I passed through tunnels and bridges that are purposely constructed that the snow may thus slide over the roads without doing harm to any one. Where the mountains rise too precipitously, it is in some places impossible to construct a road along the edge; in these cases they pierce through the mountains for considerable distances. The Axenstrasse, along Lake Luzerne, has many such tunnels, one of which is about one eighth of a mile in length. In the Grimsel, the road avoids a water-fall by passing through a tunnel under it.
The Rhone Glacier, the only ice-field that I crossed, is upwards of nine miles in length and rises from 5,751 feet to 10,450 feet in height. About the time of sunset on the 4th of September, I entered the cavern of ice from which issues the stream that constitutes the source of the Rhone River. "This is the Rhodanus of the ancients, which was said to issue 'from the gates of eternal night at the foot of the pillar of the sun.'"
I descended through the Grimsel pass (7,103 feet) and Haslithal along the upper waters of the Aare down to Meiringen, in one day. Though there is only a bridle-path through the almost unparalled wildnesses of this valley, still there is a telegraphic wire running up to the hotel at the upper end, near the Rhone Glacier! No language can describe the picturesqueness of the bare rocky sides of this valley. I heard persons who thought they were alone, utter a dozen exclamations of surprise while making a single turn where a new view opened! The solitary tourist will ejaculate his exclamations without number; and it is under such circumstances that the unpoetical soul seeks some personification to whom it may do homage. It would not require a worshipper of images to kneel down, in the Grimsel or Ober Haslithal, before any emblem that embodied any adequate representation of the crushingly sublime scenery that one beholds there!
I met a lake whose depths seemed as boundless as the blue heavens above me. The water of many of the Swiss lakes is as clear as crystal, so that white objects at their bottoms may be discerned at great depths.
While sailing along the Lake of Geneva one day, I could as little see substance in the water below me, when I looked upon it at a certain distance from the steamer, as in the clear sky; both seemed alike blue and boundless!
The weather and the temperature changes very suddenly among the high Alps. The climate in the valleys of Switzerland is as warm as ours, in summer, while some thousand feet higher lie the everlasting glaciers. From these, avalanches of cold air precipitate into the valleys, so that the mercury often falls from 20 to 30 degrees in ten minutes! One is in danger of taking "a cold" every day in Switzerland.
Besides "The Alps" and thelovely lakesamong them, the tourist may also see castles, museums, art galleries, pleasure gardens, &c., in Switzerland, but I will only enumerate a few of the most striking objects that I met and saw in this curious country, and then pass on to Italy.
One of the bridges of Lucerne is adorned with very curious paintings representing the "Dance of Death." Scores of skeletons, some blowing the bugle or playing with the triangles, others equipped with hoes and spades, are jubilant over their work!
One of the finest organs in Europe is the far-famed one at Freiburg, having 67 stops and 7,800 pipes, some of them 33 feet long. This instrument has such a range of volume that it can simulate the roaring thunder as well as the faintest echo. The portal of the same cathedral which contains the famous organ is also adorned (?) with a curious representation of the last judgment. St. Peter leads the blessed to the door of Heaven, but half a dozen evil ones busy themselves in disposing of the wicked. One of them that has a head like a hog, carries them from the scales into a large caldron where they are boiled. Others with forks in their hands pitch them into the mouth of the large dragon-devil who is represented as glutting them, and whose capacious mouth admits of several of them at a time! The time has almost arrived when one may no longer describe what he sees in the churches of Europe! This reminds me of a monster that stands upon a fountain in Bern, called the Kindlifresser, (the Ogre), who is in the act of eating a child, while others doomed to the same fate protrude from his girdle and pockets!
Berne is a great place for bears. Besides those connected with the curious machinery of the clock on one of its clock-towers, among the dead bears, they also keep a large den of living bears at the expense of the government. The bear is the heraldic emblem of Switzerland, as is our eagle of American freedom.
Of the fictitous hero, William Tell, and the nature and character of the Swiss Republic, I can not say more in the compass of this book, than that the former is a myth and that the latter was in a great measure the outgrowth of poverty.
The reader may form an idea of the miserable dwellings of the peasantry on the mountains, when he is told that many are hardly distinguishable from the stables in which the cattle are sheltered.
When I came into view of Guttannen, the first village of any considerable extent that I passed after seeing the Rhone Glacier and the wildnesses of the Grimsel and Haslithal, where no houses except hotels, and in some places not even trees or grass abound, I felt glad once more to see a group of human habitations, and determined to count them, so that I might record their number. I passed along the edge of the mountains where I could easily overlook the village, but it was in many instances impossible to determine by a survey of their external appearances, which were the stables and which the houses or huts, so I counted them all, large and small, and found their number between 60 and 90. I once intended to count these buildings only with windows, as houses; but I soon discovered that some huts had windows only on one or several sides, and looked like stables on the other sides!
A question to dairy men: Do thunder and lightning affect fresh milk? A lady keeping a cafe in Brienz, told me that if a thunder storm overtook those which were bringing the fresh milk from the mountains, the milk would suddenly turn sour, so that it could no longer be boiled for drinking it sweet. She said, "Es thut sie verbolera, so das sie gerinnt wen man sie kochen will!"
Chapter XVI.Geneva to Turin.Switzerland has two national languages, the German and the French, both of which are recognized by the Government. Geneva is French, so I had some trouble in getting my information and procuring a ticket for Italy. I left Geneva at 6:40 a.m., September 10th; and after passing through a number of tunnels, one of which required 5-1/2 minutes of moderate railway speed, we arrived at Bellegarde, on the French border, and passed muster. From 9:00 to 10:00 o'clock we were detained at Culoz, and by noon we saw the snow-covered Alps again. At 3:30 p.m., we arrived at Modane and passed muster for Italy.Mont Cenis Tunnel.We entered the mouth of this great tunnel, over 8 miles in length, at 4:58-1/2 p.m., and were exactly 26 minutes in the very bowels of the earth, where absolute darkness reigns. Temperature in the middle, 59° Fahrenheit.Italy.We now come to a country which contrasts as strangely with the nations of western Europe, as those do with America, or as Alpine Switzerland does with the rest of the world. When I parted at Paris with my New York friend, he bound for Rome, I for the north, we still had our school-boy ideas of Germany, Switzerland and Italy; and I shall never forget the remark which he then made, and which embodied my notions and anticipations perhaps as well as his own. He said, "I suppose we have now seen the brightest side of the picture, the trouble is that scenes will now become tamer as we advance toward the cradle of humanity." I had been pleasantly disappointed almost every time that I entered a new country, but now, as I was entering Italy, I expected that I would surely not see much to interest me except her rich stores of art and the ancient ruins. But less than a day at Turin convinced me that I had by no means entered a country whose people were behind hand in civilization and refinement; and when on my way from Turin to Milan I saw how much clearer and brighter the blue heavens were, how much sweeter the air smelt than any I had ever breathed before, (not excepting that of Paris, even), and how much fairer the people were than any other that I had yet seen, I felt that I must surely be on the border of that charming paradise which the poets make of Italy, but for which I had never given them due credit.Italy's Fair Sons and Daughters.I now come to a dry subject, especially for old people; but numbers of my young friends, among them several editors and teachers, requested me very earnestly to take particular notice which country contained the fairest specimens of the human species. Why these literary characters are so deeply interested in this question, I cannot tell, but my duty is plain enough--they want "a true and impartial statement of the facts," which I will endeavor to render them. I observed everywhere thatcultureandpersonal beautyalways go together. When I came to a city that had clean and beautiful streets and houses, I invariably found good looking people there; but in the rural districts generally, and in suburbs and wretched towns, beauty and culture are at a lower ebb. I now refer to that form of beauty which is dependent upon personal accomplishments and intellectual endowments and culture--that beauty which beams from an intellectual countenance and sparkles from eyes that glisten with pleasure. That is the kind of beauty that renders 90 per cent. of the individuals in all cultivated society acceptable, and 20 per cent. charming and attractive, but which is wanting to nine tenths of those who cannot, or do not, pay attention to cultivation and refinement. There are a very few persons whose forms and features please and fascinate even without the aid of accomplishments. These may be said to be possessed ofnativebeauty, which is met with very seldom in all countries that have a climate unfavorable to health. If I had not gone to Italy, I should not have hesitated to give my preference to the mild climate of Paris, where health and beauty are the natural result of a warm temperature, almost semi-tropical in mildness, and where the highest art assists to make every grace shine. But when I saw how nature dotes upon Italy, I felt as if she was only acting the step-mother to the rest of the world. The loveliest portion of Italy is the valley of the Po. One sees fewer sickly or consumptive people in some parts of England, France and Germany, than in our section of America, but in Turin and Milan every person looks hale, healthy, happy and beautiful, from the tender days of infancy to a ripe old age.Nothing that I saw in Europe surprised me more than to come so suddenly into the midst of a people whose very countenance bear the bloom of youth, even until the gray locks of age appear.Old age even knows no wingles here! I know that it seems incredible to any one that has never been in warmer climes, but the word beauty has a new meaning here. The glow which is lambent upon the faces of the sons and daughters of this section of sunny Italy, is something that I never saw elsewhere, and that cannot be described. It is a solemn truth, that nine tenths of all the ladies of Turin and Milan are perfect beauties; and I need not say less for the full round forms of the gentlemen. Only after I had observed that several very fair persons, who happened, to pass near me, had gray hair, did I notice that the bloom of youth still glows upon the faces of those who are 35 to 40 years of age! When I first came into this paradise of fairy angels, (for a paradise is the valley of the Po), I mistook this bloom of youth and glow of health and vigor for the lambent flames which flash from the countenances of the intellectual--it seemed to me that I must be surrounded by a halo of literary sages and muses, all gifted alike with every grace and charm that nature can bestow or art improve; but when I observed the youths at work in the fields and the maidens at the garden gates, who turned for a moment from their respective tasks to see our train move along, look as happy, as gay and as beautiful as the belles of the cafes and the beaus of the cities, I concluded that it must be the healthy state of the body that makes every face look rosy and bright in this fair and sunny clime. At Milan I asked some of my companions how far thisparadise of beautiesextended southward in Italy. "To Florence," was the answer. But I did not find that to be quite correct, for though Florence may have more fair people than any northern city, the proportion of beauties to the whole population, which is perhaps ninety per cent, in Turin and Milan, cannot be more than 20 or 30 per cent, in Florence. In order to be able to correct any false impression that I might have imbibed in my first visit to the valley of the Po, I paid particular attention to the same subject on my return from Egypt. At Milan there was then an immense concourse of people assembled from all parts of Europe to see Emperor William of Germany and King Victor Emanuel of Italy parade the streets of that elegant city, with a retinue of over 20,000 soldiers; the consequence was, that the fair people of Milan were lost in the multitude. But on my return to Turin, I found that her beautiful sons and daughters, again presented the same dream-like and enchanting scene of a pleasure-garden full of fair and merry beings possessed of angelic beauty, and enjoying their blessed existance just as I had seen them a month before.I met travelers that say the same thing of Nature's children in other sunny lands--Spain for example. The truth seems to be, that in warm climates only, will man attain that perfect healthy and beautiful physical development which has constituted the model of the artist and the theme of the poet, in every age. I have heard some pronounce the statue of Venus de Medici, the ideal perfection of female form and beauty. It is probably as near as sculpture can reach it, but who would suppose that a white stone could do justice to the beauty of a pure child of nature? The marble may present a most perfectform; but what becomes of the glow of life and flush of beauty upon the maiden's cheek, the ruby lips and the grace and elegance of her movements and winning manners? We may speak of ideal beauty in countries where the physical development of the inhabitants is blasted by the severities of the extreme heat and cold of an inhospitable clime, where the blasts of winter make every form shiver for many months of the year; but the superior beauty of the daughters of Northern Italy, if they were placed side by side with Venus de Medici, would laugh that frigid form to scorn! As compared with these, I thought I had seen no others that could eithertalkorlaughorwalk!The Italians live upon a very simple diet. When I first saw numbers of them make meals of dry bread and fruit, I supposed poverty impelled them to partake of so scant a diet, but by the time I came back from Egypt, I too had learned to sit down and eat dry bread and grapes together, though I could procure meat as cheap in Italy as elsewhere in Europe. It is not advisable to partake of much meat in any warm country. Any one may form an idea of what kind of a consumer of food cold is, when he reflects how much more flesh we consume in winter than in summer. I did not partake of more than half the amount of food in southern Italy and Egypt that I needed in England, Germany or Switzerland, and there is little room for doubt that many Italians do with one third of the amount of food that we require in the severer climate of the Middle States. I was always reminded of the story of "Cornaro the Italian," related in Wilson's Fourth Reader, whenever I saw them eat their simple meals. It is very singular, too, that they should all look full, healthy and robust; and many of us, on the contrary, lean and sickly. Twelve ounces of solid food and thirteen ounces of drink, seems a very spare supply to an American, but I do not believe that it is accounted very extraordinary in Italy.Milan.The praises of the magnificence and splendor of the Cathedral of Milan are sung all over the world. It is nearly 500 feet long and 250 feet wide through the transepts, covering an area of almosttwo acres and three quarters!The height of the nave is 150 feet! Its entire walls, and its pinnacles, spire and roof are all constructed of fine marble. The spire is over 350 feet high. The marble slabs constituting the roof are about three inches thick; how enormous the weight of that roof must be! Each of the 135 pinnacles or smaller spires is crowned with a statue, and throngs of others (some 4,500) ornament the outside of this magnificent building. The interior of this edifice is one of the most imposing in the world. As I looked at the rich decorations and delicate traceries of its high ceiling, 150 feet above me, I felt as if no human being could be worthy of enjoying such a magnificent view. But, "unless a language be invented full of lance-headed characters, and Gothic vagaries of arch and finial, flower and fruit, bird and beast," the beauties and glories of the temples of Italy, and her unparalleled galleries of art, can never be described. From Milan I went to Vicenza, where I spent a sleepless night in skirmishes with the mosquitoes! The number and variety of obnoxious insects multiplies fearfully as one approaches the topical regions. Thence I went toVenice.As I was very much disappointed with Venice, I shall not occupy much time in describing thisdaughter of the sea. The railway bridge which leads to this city is about two miles long. I expected that a city whose streets are canals and whose carriages are all boats, would present a very unique appearance, but when I once saw them, they were so exactly what I had anticipated, that I felt disgusted and left the city without doing justice even to the vast collection of paintings in the Ducal Palace, which alone is worth going a great distance to see.San Marco.The church ofSan Marcois one of the grandest and most wonderful structures in Italy, and I can only refrain from copying Ruskin's very fine description of it, because his account, though true in every particular, would, to one who has never seen any of the architectural glories of Italy, seem more like the attempt of a poet to depict in glowing language the vagaries of a dream, than like the description of an edifice really in existance.On the Piazza above the portal of San Marco, stand the celebrated bronze horses "which Constantine carried from Rome to Constantinople, whence Marino Zeno brought them hither in 1205; they were taken to Paris by Napoleon in 1797, but restored by the Allies in 1815."
Switzerland has two national languages, the German and the French, both of which are recognized by the Government. Geneva is French, so I had some trouble in getting my information and procuring a ticket for Italy. I left Geneva at 6:40 a.m., September 10th; and after passing through a number of tunnels, one of which required 5-1/2 minutes of moderate railway speed, we arrived at Bellegarde, on the French border, and passed muster. From 9:00 to 10:00 o'clock we were detained at Culoz, and by noon we saw the snow-covered Alps again. At 3:30 p.m., we arrived at Modane and passed muster for Italy.
We entered the mouth of this great tunnel, over 8 miles in length, at 4:58-1/2 p.m., and were exactly 26 minutes in the very bowels of the earth, where absolute darkness reigns. Temperature in the middle, 59° Fahrenheit.
We now come to a country which contrasts as strangely with the nations of western Europe, as those do with America, or as Alpine Switzerland does with the rest of the world. When I parted at Paris with my New York friend, he bound for Rome, I for the north, we still had our school-boy ideas of Germany, Switzerland and Italy; and I shall never forget the remark which he then made, and which embodied my notions and anticipations perhaps as well as his own. He said, "I suppose we have now seen the brightest side of the picture, the trouble is that scenes will now become tamer as we advance toward the cradle of humanity." I had been pleasantly disappointed almost every time that I entered a new country, but now, as I was entering Italy, I expected that I would surely not see much to interest me except her rich stores of art and the ancient ruins. But less than a day at Turin convinced me that I had by no means entered a country whose people were behind hand in civilization and refinement; and when on my way from Turin to Milan I saw how much clearer and brighter the blue heavens were, how much sweeter the air smelt than any I had ever breathed before, (not excepting that of Paris, even), and how much fairer the people were than any other that I had yet seen, I felt that I must surely be on the border of that charming paradise which the poets make of Italy, but for which I had never given them due credit.
I now come to a dry subject, especially for old people; but numbers of my young friends, among them several editors and teachers, requested me very earnestly to take particular notice which country contained the fairest specimens of the human species. Why these literary characters are so deeply interested in this question, I cannot tell, but my duty is plain enough--they want "a true and impartial statement of the facts," which I will endeavor to render them. I observed everywhere thatcultureandpersonal beautyalways go together. When I came to a city that had clean and beautiful streets and houses, I invariably found good looking people there; but in the rural districts generally, and in suburbs and wretched towns, beauty and culture are at a lower ebb. I now refer to that form of beauty which is dependent upon personal accomplishments and intellectual endowments and culture--that beauty which beams from an intellectual countenance and sparkles from eyes that glisten with pleasure. That is the kind of beauty that renders 90 per cent. of the individuals in all cultivated society acceptable, and 20 per cent. charming and attractive, but which is wanting to nine tenths of those who cannot, or do not, pay attention to cultivation and refinement. There are a very few persons whose forms and features please and fascinate even without the aid of accomplishments. These may be said to be possessed ofnativebeauty, which is met with very seldom in all countries that have a climate unfavorable to health. If I had not gone to Italy, I should not have hesitated to give my preference to the mild climate of Paris, where health and beauty are the natural result of a warm temperature, almost semi-tropical in mildness, and where the highest art assists to make every grace shine. But when I saw how nature dotes upon Italy, I felt as if she was only acting the step-mother to the rest of the world. The loveliest portion of Italy is the valley of the Po. One sees fewer sickly or consumptive people in some parts of England, France and Germany, than in our section of America, but in Turin and Milan every person looks hale, healthy, happy and beautiful, from the tender days of infancy to a ripe old age.
Nothing that I saw in Europe surprised me more than to come so suddenly into the midst of a people whose very countenance bear the bloom of youth, even until the gray locks of age appear.
Old age even knows no wingles here! I know that it seems incredible to any one that has never been in warmer climes, but the word beauty has a new meaning here. The glow which is lambent upon the faces of the sons and daughters of this section of sunny Italy, is something that I never saw elsewhere, and that cannot be described. It is a solemn truth, that nine tenths of all the ladies of Turin and Milan are perfect beauties; and I need not say less for the full round forms of the gentlemen. Only after I had observed that several very fair persons, who happened, to pass near me, had gray hair, did I notice that the bloom of youth still glows upon the faces of those who are 35 to 40 years of age! When I first came into this paradise of fairy angels, (for a paradise is the valley of the Po), I mistook this bloom of youth and glow of health and vigor for the lambent flames which flash from the countenances of the intellectual--it seemed to me that I must be surrounded by a halo of literary sages and muses, all gifted alike with every grace and charm that nature can bestow or art improve; but when I observed the youths at work in the fields and the maidens at the garden gates, who turned for a moment from their respective tasks to see our train move along, look as happy, as gay and as beautiful as the belles of the cafes and the beaus of the cities, I concluded that it must be the healthy state of the body that makes every face look rosy and bright in this fair and sunny clime. At Milan I asked some of my companions how far thisparadise of beautiesextended southward in Italy. "To Florence," was the answer. But I did not find that to be quite correct, for though Florence may have more fair people than any northern city, the proportion of beauties to the whole population, which is perhaps ninety per cent, in Turin and Milan, cannot be more than 20 or 30 per cent, in Florence. In order to be able to correct any false impression that I might have imbibed in my first visit to the valley of the Po, I paid particular attention to the same subject on my return from Egypt. At Milan there was then an immense concourse of people assembled from all parts of Europe to see Emperor William of Germany and King Victor Emanuel of Italy parade the streets of that elegant city, with a retinue of over 20,000 soldiers; the consequence was, that the fair people of Milan were lost in the multitude. But on my return to Turin, I found that her beautiful sons and daughters, again presented the same dream-like and enchanting scene of a pleasure-garden full of fair and merry beings possessed of angelic beauty, and enjoying their blessed existance just as I had seen them a month before.
I met travelers that say the same thing of Nature's children in other sunny lands--Spain for example. The truth seems to be, that in warm climates only, will man attain that perfect healthy and beautiful physical development which has constituted the model of the artist and the theme of the poet, in every age. I have heard some pronounce the statue of Venus de Medici, the ideal perfection of female form and beauty. It is probably as near as sculpture can reach it, but who would suppose that a white stone could do justice to the beauty of a pure child of nature? The marble may present a most perfectform; but what becomes of the glow of life and flush of beauty upon the maiden's cheek, the ruby lips and the grace and elegance of her movements and winning manners? We may speak of ideal beauty in countries where the physical development of the inhabitants is blasted by the severities of the extreme heat and cold of an inhospitable clime, where the blasts of winter make every form shiver for many months of the year; but the superior beauty of the daughters of Northern Italy, if they were placed side by side with Venus de Medici, would laugh that frigid form to scorn! As compared with these, I thought I had seen no others that could eithertalkorlaughorwalk!
The Italians live upon a very simple diet. When I first saw numbers of them make meals of dry bread and fruit, I supposed poverty impelled them to partake of so scant a diet, but by the time I came back from Egypt, I too had learned to sit down and eat dry bread and grapes together, though I could procure meat as cheap in Italy as elsewhere in Europe. It is not advisable to partake of much meat in any warm country. Any one may form an idea of what kind of a consumer of food cold is, when he reflects how much more flesh we consume in winter than in summer. I did not partake of more than half the amount of food in southern Italy and Egypt that I needed in England, Germany or Switzerland, and there is little room for doubt that many Italians do with one third of the amount of food that we require in the severer climate of the Middle States. I was always reminded of the story of "Cornaro the Italian," related in Wilson's Fourth Reader, whenever I saw them eat their simple meals. It is very singular, too, that they should all look full, healthy and robust; and many of us, on the contrary, lean and sickly. Twelve ounces of solid food and thirteen ounces of drink, seems a very spare supply to an American, but I do not believe that it is accounted very extraordinary in Italy.
The praises of the magnificence and splendor of the Cathedral of Milan are sung all over the world. It is nearly 500 feet long and 250 feet wide through the transepts, covering an area of almosttwo acres and three quarters!The height of the nave is 150 feet! Its entire walls, and its pinnacles, spire and roof are all constructed of fine marble. The spire is over 350 feet high. The marble slabs constituting the roof are about three inches thick; how enormous the weight of that roof must be! Each of the 135 pinnacles or smaller spires is crowned with a statue, and throngs of others (some 4,500) ornament the outside of this magnificent building. The interior of this edifice is one of the most imposing in the world. As I looked at the rich decorations and delicate traceries of its high ceiling, 150 feet above me, I felt as if no human being could be worthy of enjoying such a magnificent view. But, "unless a language be invented full of lance-headed characters, and Gothic vagaries of arch and finial, flower and fruit, bird and beast," the beauties and glories of the temples of Italy, and her unparalleled galleries of art, can never be described. From Milan I went to Vicenza, where I spent a sleepless night in skirmishes with the mosquitoes! The number and variety of obnoxious insects multiplies fearfully as one approaches the topical regions. Thence I went to
As I was very much disappointed with Venice, I shall not occupy much time in describing thisdaughter of the sea. The railway bridge which leads to this city is about two miles long. I expected that a city whose streets are canals and whose carriages are all boats, would present a very unique appearance, but when I once saw them, they were so exactly what I had anticipated, that I felt disgusted and left the city without doing justice even to the vast collection of paintings in the Ducal Palace, which alone is worth going a great distance to see.
The church ofSan Marcois one of the grandest and most wonderful structures in Italy, and I can only refrain from copying Ruskin's very fine description of it, because his account, though true in every particular, would, to one who has never seen any of the architectural glories of Italy, seem more like the attempt of a poet to depict in glowing language the vagaries of a dream, than like the description of an edifice really in existance.
On the Piazza above the portal of San Marco, stand the celebrated bronze horses "which Constantine carried from Rome to Constantinople, whence Marino Zeno brought them hither in 1205; they were taken to Paris by Napoleon in 1797, but restored by the Allies in 1815."