Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843/Part 2/Letter 5
LETTER V.
At length we have left Kissingen; and though, while there, we made the best of it, we find, on looking back, that it was very intolerable, and that it is a great blessing to escape from the saddening spectacle of a crowd of invalids assembled en masse. Enormously fat men trying to thin down—delicate women hoping to grow into better case—no children. This is another decree of the physicians: children are prohibited, because the mind must enjoy perfect repose, and children are apt to create disturbance in the hearts of tender parents. It is surprising that, to forward the cure, all letters are not opened first by the doctors, and not delivered if they contain any disagreeable news. As yet, they only exhort the friends of the sick to spare them every painful emotion in their correspondence; but Kissingen will not be perfect, until the post is put under medical surveillance. Do not misunderstand me. I believe the waters of Kissingen to be highly medicinal, and the hours and walks and everything, but the dinners, exceedingly conducive to the restoration of health; but during this season it has not offered any attraction to those who come to a watering-place in search of amusement.
By the help of our German master, Mr. Wertheim, of Munich, who showed himself most zealous and kind, we engaged a voiture to take us to Leipsig in six days. The only error we have found in Murray is, that the price he mentions for the hire of carriages and horses is less than we find it. He may retort, and say we are cheated: but we apply to natives, and, if it be possible, I am sure it would be difficult, to make a better bargain than we have done.
The town of Brukenau lay in our route; the Baths, two miles beyond, were out of it: however, we bargained to visit them. The road lay along the level close under the hills, and we wound for twenty miles through the wooded ravine. The characteristic of Franconia, on the edges of which we still were, appears to be gentle valleys, thridded by small clear streams; the immediate banks either meadow or arable, and closed in by hills, covered with forests of beech, interspersed by the weeping birch. Brukenau itself is beyond this circle, and entered into the territories of the Bishops of Falda: but in the new distribution of kingdoms, Brukenau fell to the share of Bavaria, and the town of Fulda to the Duke of Hesse-Cassel. At Brukenau, leaving the high road, we entered the valley of the Sinn, and penetrated into the very sheltered bosom of the hills towards the Baths. There is a sense of extreme tranquillity in these secluded spots in Bavaria, where you seem cast on an unknown, unvisited region, and yet, on reaching the watering-place itself, find all the comforts of life “rise like an exhalation” around.
The hills round Brukenau are much higher and more romantic than at Kissingen. They are covered with fine beech forests, and traversed in every part by paths, interspersed with seats, constructed for the convenience of the visitors; and so extensive, that you may wander for ten or twenty miles in their depths. The public gardens, instead of being a melancholy strip of ground, planted with dry and dusty-looking trees, are extensive, and resemble an English pleasure-ground; a brawling stream, the Sinn, adorns them; everything invites the wanderer to stroll on, and to enjoy in fine weather Nature’s dearest gifts, shady woods, open lawns, and views of beautiful country; loitering beside a murmuring stream, or toiling on awhile, and then resting as you gaze on a wider prospect. The waters here are chalybeate and tonic; they taste of ink, but sparkle in the glass, and I found them pleasant. We arrived at the dinner hour, and sat down in the large and well-built Kursaal, where the tables were spread, to a dinner somewhat better than that allowed us at Kissingen, and we enjoyed the novelty of salad, fruits, and ice. We found several familiar faces from Kissingen come here to strengthen themselves with steel waters. Altogether the place looked at once more sociable and more retired; and, above all, the country around was, without being striking from crag and precipice, far more picturesque than at Kissingen. The whole establishment is in the hands of government, and the houses where the visitors lodge are placed in the midst of the garden. Things are managed both more cheaply and more agreeably than at Kissingen. The visitors, however, are never so numerous, and the style of the place is more quiet. The king has a palace, where he spends the season, and is very courteous to the English. We wished to sleep at the Baths, but unfortunately no beds were to be had, though great exertion was made by several good-natured visitors to procure them for us. Oddly enough, persons we had been accustomed to meet, without speaking, day after day at Kissingen, here had the air of familiar acquaintance. We were sorry to go away, and loitered several hours in the gardens, and visited the old kursaal, a rather dilapidated room. The walls were hung with portraits of the ancient Prince-Bishops of Fulda—the discoverers, and erst the possessors, of these medicinal springs. I should have been glad to stay at least a week in this agreeable retirement, and drink the waters; but we could not now alter our arrangements.
We were obliged to return to the town of Brukenau to sleep; as the golden hues of evening increased at once the beauty and the stillness of the happy valley, with regret we tore ourselves away. Murray bids us go to the Hotel of the Post at Brukenau, and we learned afterwards that this is really a good and comfortable inn. I fancy the master has had some quarrel with the authorities at the Baths, for we were bidden go to another inn; in an evil hour we obeyed. It was very dirty and comfortless.
Leaving Brukenau the following morning early, we by degrees quitted the wooded hills and grassy valleys of Franconia, and entered the domains of the Prince of Hesse Cassel.
It was in these territories that a scene was enacted during the last century, so overlooked by history, that I believe by-and-bye it will only be remembered (how is it even now?) by the commentators on Schiller. When we read of the Hessians in the American war, we have a vague idea that our government called in the aid of foreign mercenaries to subdue the revolted colonies; an act which roused Lord Chatham to exclaim in the House of Peers, “If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country I never would lay down my arms, never—never—never!” We censure the policy of government, we lament the obstinacy of George III., who, exhausting the English levies, had recourse to “the mercenary sons of rapine and plunder;” and “devoted the Americans and their possessions to the rapacity of hireling cruelty.” But our imagination does not transport itself to the homes of the unfortunate Germans; nor is our abhorrence of the tyranny that sent them to die in another hemisphere awakened. Lord Chatham does indeed in the same speech, from which the above quotations are made, cast a half-pitying glance on the victims of their native sovereign, when he talks of “traffic and barter with every little pitiful German prince that sells and sends his subjects to the shambles of a foreign sovereign.” Schiller, in his tragedy of “Cabal and Love,” describes the misery brought on his own countrymen more graphically. “A petty German prince,” namely, the Duke of Hesse Cassel, or perhaps the Margrave of Anspach, who also dealt in this unholy traffic, sends a present of jewels to his mistress—she is astonished at their magnificence, and asks the bringer of them, how the Duke could pay for such immeasurably costly jewels? The servant replies—“They cost him nothing. Seven thousand children of the soil started yesterday for America; they pay for all.” “But not compelled?” the lady demands; the poor man, who has two sons among the recruits, replies—“O God, no! perfect volunteers. True, some forward lads stepped out of the ranks and asked the colonel, how dear the prince sold his yoke of men? But our gracious lord caused all the regiments to be marched to the parade ground, to shoot down the jackanapes. We heard the report of the firelocks, saw their brains scattered on the ground, and the whole army shouted ‘Hurrah for America!’ Then the loud drums told us it was time. On one side shrieking orphans followed their living father; on the other a distracted mother ran to cast her sucking child on the bayonets; here a pair of betrothed lovers were parted by sabre blows; and there grey beards stood struck by despair, and at last flung their crutches after the young fellows who were off to the New World. Oh! and with all that the deafening roll of the drum mingled, for fear the Almighty should hear us praying!” We were told that the facts were worse even than this picture; since when first the order was given out for the enlisting of the soldiers, hundreds deserted their homes and betook themselves to the neighbouring mountains of Franconia, and were hunted down like wild animals, and starved into surrender.
History fails fearfully in its duty when it makes over to the poet the record and memory of such an event. One, it is to be hoped, that can never be renewed. And yet what act of cruelty and tyranny may not be reacted on the stage of the world, which we boast of as civilised, if one man has uncontrolled power over the lives of many, the unwritten story of Russian may hereafter tell.
The country, as we went on, became uninteresting—a sandy soil, and few trees. We dined at Fulda, an agreeable, quiet-looking, old German town, once the capital of the prince-bishops of that diocese. We visited the Cathedral, a fine old building, containing some holy relics, which are preserved in little painted wooden boxes kept behind the altar. They had not the air of sanctity about them, and the man who shewed the chancel handled them with great indifference. Afterwards, we went to the Church of St. Michael, where we were taken to some subterranean vaults, in which Aniaschiadus, a saint and confessor, lived, I think, they said, for seven years, hid from the persecution of the Arians. Do not wonder that I speak in doubt, for our guide was German, and we could only guess at his meaning. Enough to learn that one persecuted for his religious faith did pass a number of years in this dark vault, in fear, want, and suffering; and came out, probably, to persecute in his turn—such is the usual result of this sort of controversy. Ministers of religion have been in all ages too easily led to destroy the bodies of those whose souls they believe to be lost. There is a palace here, standing on the highest part of the town; and a show of military. The city has, indeed, an individual appearance, that stamps it on the memory, without being sufficiently striking for description.
This evening we slept at Buttlar, at a quiet, comfortable, country inn. Buttlar is a small village; this the only good house; but it had all the charm of an English way-side inn in a retired spot, where they are accustomed to receive visitors in search of the picturesque. The charges in this part of the journey were very moderate. We paid highest, of course, at the bad inn, at Brukenau; and the charges at all appear quite arbitrary. Fancy prices put on by the landlord, according to the appearance of his guests. As we pass also, without knowing it, from one State to another, the coins vary. The money is easy enough when not confounded: a Bavarian florin is reckoned as two francs; a thaler as three shillings. Sometimes we pay in one money; sometimes in another. On the whole, the Prussian thaler, divided into three coins of ten groschen each, equivalent to a shilling, is the most intelligible; but the Bavarian florin denotes greater cheapness in price.
We now entered the depths of the Thuringerwald; and, stopping at Eisenach for dinner, hired a carriage—the distance was not much more than a mile, but the day was wet—to take us to the Castle of Wartburg. Luther, on his return from the Diet of Worms, was waylaid by his friend, the Elector of Saxony, and carried thither as to a place of safety. He remained ten months, passing for a young nobleman; and busily employed in translating the Bible, and composing other works. The Castle of Wartburg is situated on a steep wooded eminence, ascended by a winding road, thickly shaded by trees. The chamber that Luther inhabited has one large window, overlooking a wide extent of hill and dale, stretching far away over the Thuringian Forest—a noble prospect; and the very site, high-raised and commanding, was well suited to the lofty and unbending soul of the recluse. This chamber is preserved in the same state as when it harboured its illustrious guest; and, except his bed, his furniture remains: his table, his stool, his chair, and ink-stand, are there; and if not the stain on the wall, marking his exploit of throwing his ink-stand at the Arch Tempter’s head, there is at least the place where the ink was—some tourist has carried off the memorable plaster. We saw, also, several suits of armour belonging to various heroes of olden time here preserved. Hearing the names of prince, heroine, or even of illustrious robber (names honoured in history), who once endued these iron vestments—looking round on the armoury, or out of the window on the Thuringerwald—I felt happy in the sense of satisfied curiosity; or rather, of another sentiment to which I cannot give a precise name, but which swells the heart and makes the bosom glow, as one views, and touches, and feels surrounded by the remains of illustrious antiquity. The honoured name of Luther had more than any other right and power to awaken this: those of warrior or king only influence the imagination, as associated with poetry and romance; his is rendered sacred by his struggle, the most fearful human life presents, with antique mis-beliefs and errors upheld by authority.
We saw nothing of Gotha, where we slept; though, for Prince Albert’s sake, I would willingly have become better acquainted with his native place. There is something pleasing in the mere outward aspect of these Protestant German towns: they look clean, orderly, and well-built. Hail to the good fight, the heart says everywhere; hail to the soil whence intellectual liberty gained, with toil and suffering, the victory—not complete yet—but which, thanks to the men of those time, can never suffer entire defeat! In time, it will spread to those countries which are still subject to Papacy.
We breakfasted this morning at Erfurt, and made duteous pilgrimage to the Augustine convent which Luther inhabited as a monk. In the church, he said his first mass; and it remains in the same state, with a rude old pulpit, in which Luther preached, and carved wooden galleries. His cell is preserved as when he lived in it. It is, like conventual cells all over the world, a small, square, high chamber. Here is the Bible that he first found in the library of the Convent; studying which his powerful mind began to perceive the errors of the Church to which he belonged. The convent is now used as an Orphan-house. There is a gallery in it, with a strange series of pictures. Death is represented as coming upon men and women at all moments, during every occupation—the Beauty at her toilette—the Miser counting his money—the Hero in the hour of victory—the King on his throne—the Mother fostering her first-born—the Bride, proud in her husband. It is a strange idea: the pictures are badly executed enough, yet some are striking.
The country lost, as we proceeded, all its beauty—vast uninclosed tracts of arable land spread out round. From a height, we looked down on Weimar. The trees of its park were the only verdure visible; for the harvest being over, the land was all stubble: no hedge, no meadow, no shady covert. I pitied the poets who had been destined to live there; for however agreeable royal parks and gardens may be, they are a poor compensation for the free and noble beauty of nature.
Dining at Weimar, we spent two or three hours in running about to visit the lions. It is a pleasant looking town. I do not know exactly how to present to your imagination the appearance of these German towns. The streets are wide; and thus, though the houses are high, they look airy, and, though badly paved, clean: the houses are white, and have not the air of antiquity. As I have said once or twice before, an appearance of order and tranquillity is their characteristic. We visited the abodes of Wieland, Schiller, and Göthe, who are the great people here: that is, we saw the outside of the houses in which they had dwelt; for, being inhabited by a fresh generation, the insides are not show-places. The palace is a handsome building; and three apartments are being decorated in honour of those chosen poets. The larger one for Göthe; a smaller for Schiller; a sort of octagon closet for Wieland. The walls are adorned with frescoes of subjects taken from their works. I am not sure that I should give this superiority to Göthe: Schiller has always appeared to me the greater man: he is more complete. The startling quality of Göthe is his insight into the secret depths of the human mind; his power of dissecting motives—of holding up the mirror to our most inmost sensations; and also in dramatic scenes of touching pathos, and passages of overflowing eloquence: but he wants completeness, and never achieves a whole. “Faust” is a fragment—“Wilhelm Meister” is a fragment. It is true, this has a closer resemblance to life which seldom affords an artistic beginning, middle, and end to its strange enchainment of events. Still, the conception of a perfect whole has ever held the highest place in our standard of a poet’s power of imagination. But I will spare you further criticism from an ignorant person.
We saw the coffins of the poets in the dark tomb, placed not side by side, princely etiquette forbad, but in the same narrow chamber with those of the princes who honoured them. These coffins suggest a wonderful contempt for the material of life; Camoëns exclaimed, when dying in an hospital, “Lo! the vast scene of my fortunes is contracted to this narrow bed!” This tomb told us that princely protection and the aspirations of genius were shut up in those dust-containing coffers; yet not so, while the works of the one endure, and the memory of the acts of the others survive in the minds of posterity. This friendship after death, this desire to share even in the grave the poet’s renown, after having sheltered and honoured him during life, makes one love these good German sovereigns. Mr. Landor says the Germans possess nine-tenths of the thought that exists in the world. There is in even larger proportion honour for thought. The gardens of the palace are agreeably laid out; and except that turf is wanting, resemble an English park, with fine old trees and a river running through. This spot was a favourite resort, and there is a pretty shady summer-house overlooking the river, where the sovereigns held réunions, and entertained their poet friends; many a June evening was there spent in refined intercourse. There is also a pavilion in the garden which Göthe inhabited in the summer months.
The park of Weimar was an oasis in the desert. We found for many miles after leaving it, the same dreary landscape; flat and unmarked as the sea; not as barren, for the country is all corn-fields but as no hedge intersects them, nor any bush shows its tufted top, nor any trees appear except the ill-looking poplars mixed with cherry-trees that line the road, nothing can be more unvaried or uninteresting than these vast plains; uninteresting indeed, in outward aspect, yet claiming our attention and exciting our curiosity as the scene of a thousand battles, above all, of that last struggle, when yielding the ground inch by inch, mile by mile, Napoleon was driven from Dresden to the Rhine.
Some slight interruption occurs in the uniform aspect of these bare plains, when they are intersected by the course of the Saale, a common name for a river in Germany, which winds through a pleasing village. On the heights that surround, stand old castles renowned in story. We soon left this pleasant change behind, and came again on the naked country, sweeping over miles and miles; our guide-books speak of this as the scenes of battles and victories of Gustavus Adolphus, and Frederic the Great. The first name claims our admiration, and we looked with respect on the stone that marks the spot where he fell. Frederic was a very clever man, and except for the evils which, as a conqueror, he brought on his subjects, he did them good as far as his limited views permitted him. But there is no sovereign whose acts fill so many pages in history, for whom one cares so little as Frederic. Cold-hearted, if not false, the dogged determination and invincible purpose that form his best characteristic, yet centred so narrowly in self, that he excites no jot of interest. It was otherwise in his own day. He was a king, a man of talent, a warrior who encountered difficulties that had overwhelmed a weaker mind, and surmounted them. He had the charm of manners, which, though cruelly capricious to his dependents, were, when he chose, irresistibly fascinating; such qualities awoke, while he lived, the admiration of the world; but with the Prince de Ligne died the last of his enthusiastic admirers.
Another name, greater and newer than his, has thrust him from his place, and occupies our attention—in one respect his entire opposite; for Napoleon was great in success, Frederic in defeat. Perhaps the absence of heaven-born legitimacy took from the latest hero of the world who has joined the dead, the unflinching, stubborn will of Frederic in adversity; besides, it would seem that Napoleon disdained to fight, except when he could gain a world by victory. Here he lost one; and a struggle that lasted many days in the environs of Leipsig, drove him from Germany. When reduced to what he seemed to look upon as the paltry kingdom of France, he played double or quits with that and lost all.
We looked out for the Elster, where the bridge was blown up which cost Poniatowski his life, and lost to Napoleon twenty-five thousand French soldiers taken prisoners. I am told that I now look upon the very spot; that at the end of the garden of the Hôtel de Saxe this tragic scene was enacted: it seems as if a good hunter might leap the narrow stream which decided the fate of an empire.
Here ends a very fatiguing journey. The carriage we hired was to appearance roomy and comfortable; but being badly hung, it was inconceivably uneasy; and partly, I believe, the effect of the Kissingen waters still hanging about me, (I ought to have spent a week at least at Brukenau,) I never suffered more fatigue and even distress on a journey. Right glad I am to be here. To-morrow we commit ourselves to a rail-road—blessings on the man who invented them. Every traveller must especially bless him in these naked, monotonous plains.
The Hôtel de Saxe is very good, and not much dearer than any other. They are expecting the King of Prussia to-morrow, and the staircases are carpeted and decorated with evergreens. The Oberkellner, or upper waiter—a very important personage in these German hotels—is an intelligent little fellow, and speaks English perfectly.
Congratulate me that so far I am advanced in the heart of this mighty country. Though I skim its surface without having any communication with its inhabitants, still the eye is gratified, the imagination excited, and curiosity satisfied.