Antwerp.

Dear Charley:—

In company still with our friends from Bristol on a wedding tour, we took the rail for Antwerp. The arrangements of the railroad in Belgium seem to me as perfect as they can be made. All is order, civility, and comfort. On starting for this place, we had the curiosity to inquire as to the number of passengers, and found thirteen first class, seventy-one second class, and one hundred and three third class. The road we took lay through a level country, but cultivated to a great degree; and the produce was chiefly clover, beans, potatoes, grain, and turnips. On leaving Brussels, we noticed the fine botanical gardens on our right, and the AllÉe Verte, a noble avenue of trees which reaches to Laeken, a pretty village, dating as far back as the seventh century, and containing a fine palace, where Leopold frequently resides. Napoleon once occupied this palace, and here it is said that he planned his Russian campaign. The park is spacious, and the village has a celebrated cemetery; and here Madame Malibran reposes. The first stopping-place is at about six miles from Brussels, at Vilvorde—a very ancient town, having a population of not quite three thousand. It is known in history as Filfurdum, and was a place of some consequence in 760. It was here that Tindal, who was the first translator of the New Testament into English, suffered martyrdom, in 1536, being burnt as a heretic. The Testament was a 12mo. edition. It was published in 1526, and probably was printed at Antwerp, where he then resided. Fifteen hundred copies were printed, and they were mostly bought up by Bishop Tonstall, and destroyed. The only copy known to exist is in the library of the Baptist College at Bristol. This copy belonged to Lord Oxford, and he valued the acquisition so highly that he settled twenty pounds a year upon the person who obtained it for him. Both Tindal's assistants in this great work—Fryth and Roye—suffered martyrdom before his death. I am sorry to find, by history, that Sir Thomas More employed one Phillips to go over to Antwerp and decoy Tindal into the hands of the emperor. The last words of the martyr were, "Lord! open the King of England's eyes." Sir Thomas More was a bitter persecutor, and he was "recompensed in his own ways." Not far from Vilvorde are the remains of the chateau of Rubens; and in the same vicinity is the house where Teniers is said to have lived. Mechlin, or Malines, is a fine-looking town, with twenty-five thousand inhabitants, and it is spelt by early writers ways without number. The railroad just touches on its skirts, and, of course, we could only look at it. Its cathedral church loomed up; and we longed to see its interior, where Vandyke's greatest picture—the Crucifixion—is found in the altar. The tower shows well at a distance. The other churches have some pictures of great merit, by Rubens. After passing Mechlin, we saw at our right a large town, lying, perhaps, two miles off, and then a still smaller one to the left, and a fine old castle, which looked in good preservation. The road led us through some fine country residences; and, just before entering Antwerp, we passed Berchem, a sweet little village. And I would not omit to say that the small place called Vieux Dieu, before we came to Berchem, is famous for being one of the last places where heathenism retained its hold in this port of Europe, and here was formerly an idol.

Antwerp—or, as the French write it, Anvers—is a noble city on the River Scheldt, and is about twenty-seven miles from Brussels. The population is rather more than eighty thousand. The city is laid out in the shape of a bow, and the river forms the string. The river here is one hundred and ninety yards wide. The tide rises about fifteen feet. This place is of very ancient origin, and its legends are mixed up with the fabulous. Early in the sixteenth century it was an important town. It was fortified, and became one of the chief places of trade for the north of Europe. In 1520, the population was over two hundred thousand. Five hundred vessels daily came into and left the port, and two thousand others were always lying in the river and basins of the port. The death blow to this place was the treaty of Munster, which stipulated that every vessel entering the Scheldt should discharge her cargo in Holland, so that it had to be conveyed to Antwerp by land. The abolition of the Spanish power was severely felt at Antwerp. You know, I suppose, that this is regarded as one of the strongest fortifications in Europe, and has been the scene of repeated sieges. The last and most celebrated one was in 1832, when it was captured by the French, after a brave defence of two months.

You cannot easily fancy what a charming old city this is; but I shall try to give you some account of it and our employments here. We put up at the Hotel St. Antoine, in the Place Verte, nearly opposite the cathedral, and it certainly is one of the best houses we have seen any where. The court yard is spacious, and has fine orange-trees around it. Our rooms are very elegant, and on the first floor. The coffee-room is admirably attended, and the table d'hÔte is the best we have yet set down to. A large part of our anticipated pleasure arose from the fact that here are the great works of Rubens; and in the city of Rubens, Vandyke, Teniers, Jordaens, and Quentin Matsys, we felt that we could not be disappointed. In the Place Verte we find a colossal statue of Rubens by Geefs; and passing on a few steps, at the corner we come to the Cathedral of Notre Dame, which is so celebrated all over Europe as one of the grandest specimens of the Gothic order of architecture. There is much dispute as to the exact date of this church, but the evidence is in favor of 1422, and it is known to have been finished in 1518. This church is four hundred and sixty-six feet high, five hundred feet long, and two hundred and fifty wide. The nave is thought to be the most superb in Europe; and the side naves are double, forming two hundred and thirty arches, supported by one hundred and twenty-five magnificent pillars, and some of these are twenty-seven feet in circumference. Here Philip II., in 1555, held a chapter of the Golden Fleece, at which nineteen knights and nine sovereign princes were present. In 1559, Paul IV. made this church a cathedral; but, in 1812, Pius VII. issued a bull by which it was made dependent on the diocese of Malines. The effect of the evening sun upon the painted windows is the production of a glory which no pen can describe. Charles V. was once an actor here, for he stood godfather at the baptism of the great bell. The pulpit is carved work, and done by Verbruggen. It represents the four quarters of the world, and, though elaborate, is not as beautiful as the one in St. Gudule, at Brussels. The glory of the church is the "breathing scroll" of Rubens, so often seen upon the walls of its solemn aisles. Here is Rubens's great picture,—the Descent from the Cross. To this picture pilgrimages have been made by all the lovers of art from other lands, and all concede the grandeur of idea and the simplicity of the style. There is quite a story about this picture, in which Rubens and the crossbow-men of Antwerp both figure, but which I have no time to tell you at present. Nearly opposite is the Elevation of the Cross. The Savior's face and figure are not to be forgotten by any one who carefully gazes on this canvas. Both these pictures were carried off by the French, and also the Assumption of the Virgin, which is the high altar-piece, and were restored by the allied sovereigns in 1815. This last-named picture is said to have been executed in sixteen days, and his pay was one hundred florins a day. I like it exceedingly; and the figure of the picture is more spiritual than any other I have seen of the Virgin. Its date is 1642. I advise you to read Sir Joshua Reynolds's Lectures, where you will find a critical description of these immortal pictures.

The steeple or tower is regarded as unrivalled, and is one of the highest in the world. It is four hundred and sixty-six feet high; and from the top we could see Brussels, Ghent, Malines, Louvain, and Flushing, and the course of the Scheldt lies beautifully marked out. I hardly dare tell you how many bells there are. Our valet said ninety-nine; one local book of facts says eighty-eight; but I suppose there are eighty or ninety; and every fifteen minutes they do chime the sweetest music: Charles V. wished the exquisite tower could be kept from harm in a glass case. The tracery of this tower is like delicate lacework, and no one can imagine half its beauty. After we came down, we examined, at the base, the epitaph of Quentin Matsys, once a black-smith, and then, under the force of the tender passion, he became a painter. The iron work over the pump and well, outside the church, is his handiwork.

All round the cathedral are the finest old gabled houses I ever saw, Charley. I never tire in looking at them. They were the great houses of the time when the Duke of Alva made Antwerp the scene of his cruel despotism, and when the Inquisition carried death and misery into men's families. The oppressions of the Spaniards in this city sent many of the best manufacturers from the Low Countries to England; and Queen Elizabeth received them gladly.

Yours, &c.,

weld.