TW11 PUBLIC LE
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FOUNDATIONS
118 GERMAN COURTS.
many may laugh-from Brodie Bagster's second ballad on the same subject, written to a melody which he is said to have patiently coaxed out of his own fiddle : -
And so, with that, this lady proud, Plucked up her damask gown,
And sailed out of Court, like an evening cloud, When the sun has just gone down And when she died-which soon befel!-Sir Ralph of Scroby Hall-
He married the lass he'd not used well, And made amends for all. "
ANECDOTES OF GERMAN COURTS.
THE various tongued denizens of earth who had crowded Frankfort during the great fair were fast returning to their distant homes, the well filled table d'hote at the Romischer Kaiser was now reduced to a few members of the corps diplomatique. “See that my passport is en regle for Vienna, “said I to the Kellner, “for Frankfort has now become intolerably dull. "
As the traveller journies towards Saxony, the face of the country undergoes a marked change; the vine clad heights of the Mein gave place to the dark ridges of the Thuringian forest, between which and the foot of the Ezegibirge, extend the dominions of a crowd of petty princes, who by their family influence or political services, have saved their insignificant independencies from the mediatising ban of the German confederation.
My travelling companion was an old Dutch colonel, the Baron Van SHe had made thirty campaigns, and the wild uncertainty of a camp life had given to him that happy constitutional indifference which philosophy in vain aspires to. A vein of military pedantry ran through his conversation, but this was enlivened by such shrewd and profound observations on men and things, such a fund of anecdote, as taught me that the Baron had moved no inattentive observer on the great theatre of events on which he had played his part. “In whose dominions are we at present; “said I to the post-master at Lebenstein, for in the course of our morning's ride, we had passed through half-a-dozen states. “In those of his Serene Highness of Saxe Meinengen, “was the reply. I confess I felt a little curious to visit the state that was likely to have the honour of one day giving a Queen ' to England. We therefore proceeded straight to the capital, and little time it took us to get there.
The town of Saxe Meinengen is situated on the right bank of the Warre, beautifully embosomed in hills; it is rather handsomely built, and is poetically called the City of the Harp. The population of the whole state is about 40,000 souls, its revenue 30,000l., and as a member of the German confederation it has one fifth of a vote. I gathered this important statistical knowledge from the Court Almanack. What a ridiculous “spectacle politique ” do these little petty German states present, with their standing armies and all the attirail of a court. Here is the duchy of Saxe Meinengen-its whole population is inferior to that of a moderately sized
English town, and its entire revenue considerably less than the pin money of our Queen. Such is the fact; an English town, considered unworthy of being represented in parliament, has double the population, and centuple the wealth and intelligence of the duchy of Saxe Meinengen, that has given to us a Queen who has shewn so much elevated contempt for our Manchesters and Birminghams. An English hunter would gallop round its territory in an hour; an English nobleman must be a skilful financier to subsist on its paltry revenue without running in debt.
“You are right, “said the Baron, “but it was still worse in the time of the old German confederation. In fact the state we are now in is a mighty empire compared to the Lilliputian dominions of many of these princes, whose military contingent to the confederation was fixed at half a man each! The whole extent of their territory might have been ranged by an eighteen pounder. On the formation of the confederation of the Rhine, eighty de ces Messieurs were mediatised at one coup de plume, an arrangement which was confirmed by the congress of Vienna in 1815, who I believe would fain have extended to a few more this mediatising principle; an act that would have gained for that assembly the eternal gratitude of the subjects of these petty sovereigns, who are borne to the carth by the weight of taxes to support their beggarly pride and ridiculous pretensions. To give you an idea, “continued the Baron, “shortly after Holland was overrun by the French, I was in garrison at Breda. “Now at the words “Fetais et garnison, ” I filled out a bumper of Rhudesheimer, for I expected the relation of a whole campaign at least, and I foresaw it would be far past midnight ere we got into winter quarters; but for once I was mistaken.
“Tired of the monotony of a garrison life, I resolved to make an excursion into some of the little states of the right bank of the Rhine; they were crowded at the time with French emigrants, and I need not tell you there was no lack of amusement. I directed my steps to the nearest of these, the dominions of the Hereditary Prince of Bentheim Steinfurth, and took up my quarters at the Hotel de la Cour, -immediately opposite the parade. This was fortunate, for it afforded me an opportunity of reviewing the standing army of the state, which consisted of six hussars and twenty grenadiers.
