Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 9/Up the Moselle - Part 6
UP THE MOSELLE.
Part VI.
It is a short walk from Bremm to Cochem across the crest of the hill. By following a stream before we arrive at Eller, up a glen, the way may be made still shorter, as it is unnecessary to follow the zigzags of the carriage-road, which resemble those over a Swiss pass. The road leads down to a little village on the river, about half-a-mile from Cochem, shortly after leaving which a view of remarkable beauty discloses itself. The town and castle of Cochem are seen in the foreground, dark against the dazzling evening sun; beyond them in misty distance the glen, where stands on a more lofty height the Castle of Winneberg, and height behind height beyond. On the right bank of the river is a bright-green level, covered with trees, through which peer the church-tower and houses of Cond. The writer in “Murray’s Guide Book,” whose displeasure was excited by the Valley of Elz, has again fallen foul of Cochem as being one of those places which look very well at a distance, but are very dirty on close acquaintance. Here he is scarcely just. Cochem is decidedly cleaner than most picturesque places; and picturesque places are hardly ever clean except in Holland. But it is to be feared he is an insatiably fastidious gentleman, who would even wash Murillo’s beggar-boys. Places full of quaint gables, and tumble-down turrets, and old arches, and bits of embattled walls, and wondrously lofty narrow streets, must be what is commonly called dirty, as every painter knows who attempts to sketch them in the midst of a swarm of urchins. It would be impossible to have the rich Prout browns consistently with baths and wash-houses. And yet I saw a scene which brought to mind the Odyssean Nausicaa and her maids of honour engaged in washing the linen of the royal household of Alcinous; for early in the morning the whole female population of Cochem seemed to have turned out to get up their linen at the mouth of the brook which runs into the Moselle, unconsciously composing an excellent picture. Cochem is a place which well rewards a stay of three or four days, as it may be made the centre of many interesting excursions, besides being in itself full of antiquities, as well as the liveliest port on the Moselle. It is, perhaps, not generally known that it owns a little steamer, which leaves early in the morning for Coblentz, and returns in the afternoon, at lower fares than those charged on the steamers which are usually advertised.
Near the place where the Enderbach (Rivus Andrida) flows into the Moselle, there is a fine old gateway and tower, with a house built on to it, forming a most grotesque object on both sides; behind this a winding way leads up to the former Capuchin convent, now used as a school. Here lived the famous literary character, Father Martin, of Cochem, who usually signed his name “P. Martinus, a useless Capuchin.” He died near Bruchsal, in 1712, leaving several works, which are still read in the Eifel country—amongst others his “Great Life of Christ,” containing a description of Hell, which for detail may vie with Dante’s. Higher up we come to the ruins of the castle, of which some towers of enormous strength still remain. In the fosse is seen a grand old walnut-tree. The town is mentioned as early as A.D. 876, in a record of the Abbot of Prüm Ansbald. In the tenth century the Counts Palatine of Aix held Cochem in fee to the Empire. The abbeys and cloisters here and in the neighbourhood were richly endowed by the exiled Polish Queen Richezza, or Richenza, daughter of the Count Palatine Ehrenfried, and Matilda, niece of Otto III. She died in 1060, and was buried in the Church of St. Maria-ad-Gradus, at Cologne, bequeathing the goods she possessed at Cochem to the Convent Brauweiler, founded by her father. The town she gave to the Count Palatine Henry, surnamed the Madman, a son of her uncle Hezilo. This Henry, in a fit of frenzy, murdered his wife Matilda, A.D. 1161, in the Castle of Cochem, which was afterwards believed to be haunted by her ghost. His son, Henry II., was the founder of the Abbey of Laach, and the last male heir. The terrible circumstances of his mother’s death may have conduced with his own childlessness to turn his mind to a pious work. He was succeeded by his stepson Siegfried—probably that Siegfried of whose wife, Genoveva, a miraculous legend is related. This Count Palatine, suspecting his beautiful wife of infidelity from a false accusation, drove her from his home to perish in the woods; but afterwards, discovering his error, went out to seek her and bring her home. In the meantime, in order to diminish the guilt attaching to her husband in case she should perish, she had thrown her ring into a stream. When her husband was dining in the woods, a fine trout was brought him, which he ordered to be cooked immediately. On opening it, the ring which he had given to his wife was found in its inside. He at once recognised the interposition of Heaven in full vindication of his wife’s innocence, and lived ever afterwards with her in undisturbed happiness; and when she died, she was accounted a saint. When their son William died childless, in 1140, the Emperor Conrad III. took possession of Cochem as a lapsed imperial fief.
Castle of Winneberg.
In the fourteenth century it came into the possession of the archiepiscopal see of Treves. It was mortgaged in the year 1328 to the Countess Loretta of Spontheim, on condition of her releasing Archbishop Baldwin, whom she had kidnapped by throwing a chain across the Moselle at Trarbach and arresting his barge. Cochem, like most other places, had to suffer in the Thirty Years’ War, and in 1673 was bombarded by the French; but it had to suffer worse treatment when they had established a permanent camp at Mont Royal by Traben. At the end of October, 1688, De Saxis, the commandant of Mont Royal bombarded the town from the site of the great linden-tree, which is still a conspicuous landmark on the mountain above, and took the castle, which was only defended by a few archiepiscopal soldiers, as well as the Castle of Winneberg, which, from its high position, must have been even more difficult to reduce.
The castle was blown up in 1689, when Marshal Boufflers burnt the town. Boufflers had 15,000 men and powerful artillery, to act against a garrison of 1600. He made three vain attempts to storm, but being determined to compliment his blood-thirsty master, Louis XIV., he carried the place on St. Louis’ Day, with a loss of 2500 men. The population, as well as the inhabitants of Cond on the opposite side, were mostly put to the sword, and only a few straggled back after the Peace of Ryswick. It is said that old people, who remembered the horrors of that time from their childhood, long years after used to spring from their beds in the middle of the night, crying out “The French are come!”
By following the bank of the Moselle to about a mile and a half above Cochem, we arrive at a large house, which was formerly a conventual building. Its chapel is a specimen of the purest style of Early Gothic, but is now entirely dilapidated, and used as a barn: a path through the woods, above this, leads to a point at the top of the plateau, whence Cochem is seen in the distance, with Winneberg behind it, and a superb panorama of hill-tops, which seen edgeways look like vast pyramids. Further on, we pass through a rare forest of vast virgin oaks to a descent which leads to Ernst, and so back by the river to Cochem. The river-side rocks are very grand, and one has obtained the dignity of being called the Lurley of the Moselle.
A still finer walk is up the walnut-shaded valley of the Enderbach to the top of the height crowned by the Castle of Winneberg, the ascent commanding a grand view of gabled hills with purple rocks, interspersed with foliage. A patriarchal walnut-tree, as at Cochem, keeps the gate of the mighty ruin. In the fourteenth century, Cuno II., Lord of Winneberg, married Lysa, only daughter of Gerlach of Beilstein, and thus received the possessions of his family. The male line became extinct in 1639, and the castle passed to the family of Metternich as an imperial fief; and the members of it were thenceforward called Counts of Metternich, Winneberg, and Beilstein. Amongst other privileges, they possessed an excise on all the eggs which were brought to Cochem market. Winneberg shared the subsequent fates of Cochem.
By following the river down for about two miles, we come to the little town of Clotten, crowned with its ruined castle. This was one of the principal possessions of Queen Richenza. It is celebrated for a deed of arms in 1580, when the townsmen, having erected entrenchments, beat off a powerful freebooting band, commanded by one Olivier Temple, whose right hand, being struck off in the action, was long kept in the civic chest as a trophy. On entering the little church here at a venture, we are agreeably surprised to light on a most perfect specimen of Early Pointed architecture in which the arborescent, or, more specifically speaking, banyan-tree character of this style is seen to great perfection. The roof is supported by two elegant shafts destitute of capitals. The bronze vessel for holy water is of extreme antiquity, as are also the carved oak seats—each representing, at its termination, a different human face.
The venerable parish priest arrives in his canonicals, and gives us a hearty welcome, with which his hospitable nature is not satisfied without cementing it by a bottle of his best home-grown wine, in the arbour outside of his ancient parsonage. He is justly proud of his magnifificent altar of stone carving, and pulpit decorated with apostolic and saintly figures, and supported by the effigy of St. Peter himself—in this case, a veritable Rock of the Church; and no less of a splendid Missal robe, which has descended to him from the fourteenth century, and is kept in the vestry with some rare relics of early saints.
Our visit to Cochem is concluded with a view of the total eclipse of the full moon, on the night of June 3rd, the diminishing image of the earth’s fading satellite being beautifully reflected in the Moselle. On the next morning we were off in the little steamer to Coblentz.
One of the most remarkable castles on this passage is that by Alken, where lives our hospitable clerical friend of last year. The country people call it by the unpleasant name of “Old Woman’s Mouth,” as suggesting broken teeth; but its right name is Thuron, or Thurn. In 1246, the Archbishops Arnold of Treves and Conrad of Cologne, finding its possessor, the Count Palatine Zorn, a public nuisance from his maraudings, besieged it for two years, during which time the besiegers consumed 300 puncheons of wine. It was finally ruined in the Thirty Years’ War.
As we approach Coblentz, we see that Turner’s beautiful view, with the Moselle bridge in it, has been spoiled by the railroad. Before the train starts up the Rhine, we have just time to see the gorgeous procession of Corpus Christi, being only able to carry away a confused impression of splendid banners, solemn music (which almost forces people to their knees), and pretty little maids, whom the nuns, by dint of white wreaths and frocks, tastefully arranged, manage to dress up into very creditable cherubim.