Cheltenham, July 12, 1828.

My Dear Julia,

I left London at two o’clock in the morning, very ill and out of spirits; in harmony with the weather, which was perfectly ‘À l’Anglaise.’ It blew a hurricane, and rained water-spouts. About eight o’clock, however, the sky cleared. I had been lulled into a gentle slumber by the rapid and easy roll of the carriage; all nature shone with an emerald brightness, and a delicious fragrance poured in at the open windows from every field and flower; and your care-worn, melancholy friend was again, in a few moments, the light-hearted child rejoicing in the beautiful world, and in its mighty and merciful Creator. Travelling in England is, indeed, most delightful. Could I but witness your pleasure in it! Could I but feel my own doubled by your participation! It rained occasionally through the day, but I was little incommoded by this in a close carriage, and found the air mild and balmy. The former part of the country through which our road lay, teemed with all the luxuriant vegetation of the most beautiful park; the next presented boundless corn fields without hedges, which is a rarity in England; and the last nearly resembled the rich plains of Lombardy. I passed many large parks, which, however, weather being uncertain, and time limited, I left unvisited. It is not easy, after my long park and garden chase through half England, to find any thing new of this kind. In Cirencester I visited a beautiful Gothic church of great antiquity, with windows of coloured glass in pretty good preservation, and curious grotesque carvings. It is a grievous pity that the Gothic churches in England, without exception, are defaced by tasteless modern grave-stones and monuments.

Late in the evening I reached Cheltenham, an extremely pretty watering-place, of an elegance nowhere to be found on the continent. Even the splendid gas-lights and the new villa-looking houses, each surrounded by its little flower-garden, put the mind into a cheerful and agreeable tone. I arrived, too, just in the hour when the contest between the light of day and the artificial illumination produces a peculiar and, to me, pleasing effect. As I entered the inn, which, I might almost call magnificent, and ascended the snow-white stone staircase, ornamented with a gilt bronze railing, and trod on fresh and brilliant carpets, lighted by two servants to my room, I gave myself up, ‘con amore,’ to the feeling of ‘comfort’ which can be found in perfection nowhere but in England. In this point of view, it is a country completely made for a misanthrope like myself;—since all that is unconnected with social life, all that a man can procure with money, is excellent and perfect in its kind; and he may enjoy it isolated, without any other human being troubling himself about him.

A larger mass of varied and manifold enjoyments may certainly be found in England than it is possible to procure with us. Not in vain have wise institutions long prevailed here. What especially soothes and gladdens the philanthropist is the spectacle of the superior comfort and more elevated condition in the scale of existence, universally prevailing. What with us are called luxuries, are here looked upon as necessaries, and are diffused over all classes. Hence arise, even in the smallest and most ordinary details, an endeavour after elegance, an elaborate finish and neatness; in a word, a successful combination of the beautiful with the useful, which is entirely unknown to our lower classes.

The distress, in truth, consisted in this; that the people, instead of having three or four meals a day, with tea, cold meat, bread and butter, beef-steaks or roast meat, were now obliged to content themselves with two, consisting only of meat and potatoes. It was, however, just harvesttime, and the want of labourers in the field so great, that the farmers gave almost any wages. Nevertheless, I was assured that the mechanics would rather destroy all the machinery and actually starve, than bring themselves to take a sickle in their hands, or bind a sheaf: so intractable and obstinate are the English common people rendered by their universal comfort, and the certainty of obtaining employment if they vigorously seek it. From what I have now told you, you may imagine what deductions you ought to make from newspaper articles.

July 13th.

This morning I visited some of the public walks, which fell short of my expectations; and drank the waters, which have some resemblance to those of Carlsbad. I found them very heating. The doctors here say, as ours do, that they must be drunk early in the morning, or they lose a great part of their efficacy. The joke is, however, that here, early begins exactly where it ends with us, namely, at ten o’clock.

The weather is unfortunately not favourable: cold and stormy, after a continuance of heat pretty long for England. For travelling, however, it is not bad; at least I find myself in far better spirits than in London, and am in great delight at the anticipation of the beautiful scenery of Wales, towards which I am now bending my course.

I entreat you to be with me, at least in thought, and let our spirits journey together over sea and land, look down from the summits of mountains and enjoy the sweet repose of valleys; for I doubt not that spirits, in forms as infinitely various as infinity itself is boundless, rejoice, throughout all worlds, in the beauty of God’s magnificent creation.

I will first lead you to the seven sources of the Thames, which arises two or three miles from Cheltenham. I set out on this excursion in ‘a Fly’ (a kind of small landau, drawn by one horse), on the top of which I sat, that I might enjoy the beautiful prospect from the highest station.

After a long ascent, you come to some solitary grassy hills; on the top of these, under the shade of two or three alders, is a little group of plashy springs, which trickle away, forming, as far as the eye can follow them, an insignificant brook. Such is the modest infancy of the proud Thames. I felt a tide of poetry come over my mind, as I thought, how, but a few hours ago, and but a few miles hence, I had seen these same waters covered with a thousand vessels; how this glorious stream, in its short course, bears on its bosom more ships, more treasures, and more human beings, than any of its colossal brethren; how the capital of the world lies on its banks, and by her omnipotent commerce may be almost said to rule the four quarters of the globe. With reverential admiration I looked down on the gushing drops, and compared them, one while with Napoleon, who, obscurely born in Ajaccio, in a few years made all the thrones of the earth tremble;—then with the avalanche, which, loosened from its bed under the foot of a sparrow, in five minutes buries a village;—then with Rothschild, whose father sold ribands, and without whose assistance no power in Europe is now able to carry on war.

My driver, who was at the same time an accredited Cheltenham cicerone, took me from this spot to a high hill called Lackington Hill, from which there is a celebrated view, with the appendage of a pleasant inn for the accommodation of visitors. Hidden under a bower of roses[93] my eye commanded an extent of seventy English miles;—a rich plain studded with towns and villages, among which the cathedral of Gloucester is the most striking and stately object. Behind it rose two ridges, the Malvern Hills and above them the Welsh mountains. Beautiful as was all around me, the distant blue mountains, bathed in air, awoke in me only an intense longing after home. How gladly should I have flown to your side with the aid of Fortunatus’s cap!

Up to this time black clouds had chased each other across the heavens; just as I turned away from the prospect the sun provokingly broke forth: it lighted me through a beautiful beech-wood to the charming seat of Mr. Todd, who has built a smiling village in the midst of the leafy shade, consisting of straw-roofed cottages and pretty moss houses. In the centre of a green level turf stands a noble lime-tree, surrounded by three tiers of benches for as many generations. Not far distant, on the withered trunk of a tree, is a sun-dial, and on the edge of the hill overlooking the valley, a rural seat, sheltered by a little arched roof covered with heather, and its sides tastefully interwoven with roots. On holidays it is often covered with evergreens and flowers, and lighted at evening with gay lamps. In the neighbouring park, which has many distinguishing beauties, are the ruins of a Roman villa: they were accidentally discovered about eight years ago by the sudden sinking-in of a tree. Some baths are still in good preservation, as are also two tessellated floors; they are however of rather coarse workmanship, and bear no comparison with those discovered at Pompeii. The walls are in part covered with red and blue stucco, two inches thick, and the brick pipes for conveying heat are of a quality and durability now unequalled. About three quarters of a mile further on, the Roman road is distinctly to be traced, and a portion of it is indeed in actual use: it is to be distinguished from the English road chiefly by its running, like a north-German ‘ChaussÉe,’ in a perfectly straight line. It is to be hoped, however, that the taste of the Romans was too good to allow them to enclose their roads between two endless rows of Lombardy poplars, and thus inflict a twofold torture of monotony on the unfortunate traveller. How different from an English road, which winds around the hills in soft and graceful sweeps, avoiding deep valleys or reverend trees, instead of following the one inveterate idea of a straight line, at a sixfold cost, through thick and thin, over hill and valley.

On my return to Cheltenham, I passed through a large village, where I visited for the first time what is here called a tea-garden. The ingenuity with which a small space is made to contain a hundred little niches, benches, and picturesque, nay, often romantic seats, is quite extraordinary, and forms a curious contrast with the phlegm of the gaily dressed multitude who rather garnish than animate the scene.

As it was rather early when I reached the town, I took advantage of the beautiful evening to visit more of the mineral waters, and I found that in the morning I had stumbled on the least important. These establishments are extremely splendid, ornamented with marble decorations, and still more with flowers, green-houses and pretty plantations. As soon as a thing is the fashion in England it becomes the subject of enormous speculation. This is to such a degree the case here, that the value of an acre of land in the neighbourhood of the town has risen within fifteen years from forty to a thousand guineas. The gardens and grounds which are destined to be places of public resort and amusement, are here, and I think rightly, laid out in a totally different style from the gardens and parks of private gentlemen. Broad and shady walks, and distinct open spaces, are rather to be aimed at, than picturesque views, or a large and landscape-like whole. Their manner of planting shady walks pleases me. A strip of ground about five feet wide, on each side of the way, is dug and thickly planted with a mixture of various trees and shrubs. The most flourishing trees are afterwards left to grow, and the others are kept down by the shears as irregular underwood. Between this and the top of the high trees the prospect is as it were set in a beautiful frame; the whole is fuller and more luxuriant; and wherever the country is uninteresting, it may be shut out by merely suffering the underwood to grow.

Worcester, July 14th.

Yesterday, ‘entre la poire et le fromage,’ I received the twice-declined visit of the master of the ceremonies,—the gentleman who does the honour of the baths, and exercises a considerable authority over the company of an English watering-place, in virtue of which he welcomes strangers with most anti-English officiousness and pomposity, and manifests great care and zeal for their entertainment. An Englishman invested with such a character has mauvais jeu, and vividly recalls the ass in the fable, who tried to imitate the caresses of the lapdog. I could not get rid of my visitor till he had swallowed some bottles of claret with me, and devoured all the dessert the house afforded. At length he took his leave, first extorting from me a promise that I would honour the ball of the following evening with my presence. However, I had so little inclination for company and new acquaintances, that I made ‘faux bond,’ and left Cheltenham early in the morning.

The country continued most lovely, the near ground full of soft meadows and deep green clumps of trees; the horizon bounded by the mountains, which at every mile grew in magnitude and distinctness of outline. At almost every stage I passed a considerable town, which was never without its towering Gothic church. The situation of Tewksbury struck me as peculiarly delightful. Nothing can be more tranquil, more pastoral; and yet all these blooming plains were bloody battle-fields in the times of the countless civil wars of England, whence they retain the names, now so inappropriate, of Bloody Field, Field of Bones, &c.

Worcester, where I am now writing, the chief city of the county, has nothing remarkable except its magnificent cathedral; the windows contain but small remains of ancient painted glass: to these, new has been added, which is very little inferior either in softness or brilliancy to the old. In the middle of the nave King John is buried: his effigy in stone reposes on the tomb; the oldest monument of an English king which Great Britain contains. The tomb was opened some years ago, when the skeleton was found in good preservation, and in precisely the same dress as that represented in the statue: as soon as it came in contact with the air, the materials of which it was composed crumbled into dust; the sword was entirely consumed by rust, and only its handle remained.

Another very interesting monument is that of a Templar, of the year 1220, with this Norman inscription: “Ici gist syr guilleaume de harcourt fys robert de harcourt, et de Isabel de camvile.” The figure of the knight (whose costume, by-the-by, is totally different from that of Count BrÜhl’s Templar at Berlin[94]) is an admirable piece of sculpture, and reposes with an ease and ‘abandon’ which would do no discredit to antique art: his dress consists of boots or stockings (whichever you choose to call them) of mail, and golden spurs; the knee is naked; above the knee is again covered with mail, which so completely encloses the whole body, and even the head, that only the face is visible. Over this shirt of mail is a long red mantle, falling in folds below the calf; and over this a black baldrick, from which hangs a sword in a red scabbard: the left arm supports a narrow pointed shield bearing the family arms, and not the cross of the Temple. This is found only on the tomb. The whole figure is, as you perceive, painted; and the colours are from time to time renewed.

As the greatest of all curiosities, strangers are shown Prince Arthur’s tomb, the intricate stone tracery of which is really like the most exquisite carvings in wood or ivory. On one side of the chapel are fine rows of small figures, one above another. The order is as follows: on the lowest row the abbesses; above them bishops; above them kings; then saints; and at the top of all, angels. ‘Quant À moi, qui ne suis encore ni saint, ni ange, souffrez que je vous quitte pour mon diner.’

Llangollen, July 15th.

If I had the honour to be the wandering Jew (who of course must have money ad libitum), I should most certainly spend the greatest part of my immortality on the high road, and specially in England. ‘’Tis so delightful’ for a man of my opinions and character. In the first place, no human being troubles or constrains me. Wherever I pay well, I am the first person (always an agreeable feeling for the lordly sons of men), and meet with none but smiling faces and obliging people, full of zeal to serve me. Continued motion, without fatigue, keeps the body in health; and the rapidly succeeding changes in beautiful, free nature have the same strengthening influence on the mind. I must confess that I am partly of Dr. Johnson’s opinion:—he maintained that the greatest human felicity was to drive rapidly over an English road in a good postchaise, with a pretty woman by one’s side.

It is one of the most agreeable sensations in the world to me to roll along in a comfortable carriage, and to stretch myself out at my ease while my eye feasts on the ever-changing pictures, like those of a magic lantern. As they pass, they awaken fancies serious and gay, tragic and comic; and I find an intense pleasure in filling up the sketches thus presented to my eye. What strange fantastic shapes often start up with the rapidity of lightning, and flit before my mind like figures in the clouds! Then if my fancy droops her wings, I read and sleep in my carriage. I am little troubled with my baggage, which from long practice is so well arranged that I can get at every thing I want in a moment, without tormenting my servants. Sometimes, when the weather is fine and the country beautiful, I walk for miles together: in short, I can desire no more perfect freedom than I enjoy here. Lastly, it is no slight pleasure that I can close the day by devoting a tranquil hour to conversing with the friend of my heart on all that has passed before me.

But to return to my narrative.—I travelled all night, after witnessing an extraordinary sport of nature in the clouds. From the top of a hill I saw what appeared to me a gigantic range of black mountains, and at its foot a boundless lake: it was long before I could persuade myself that it was only an illusion, created by mist and cloud. The sky above was of an uniform light grey; upon it lay a coal-black mass of clouds thrown together in the form of the wildest mountains, the upper edge of which shaped itself into a bold and abrupt outline, while the lower was trans-sected by a horizontal line of mist. This wore the appearance of a boundless extent of silvery water; and, as the green foreground of sunny wooded plains which lay beneath my feet was immediately bounded by it, the illusion was indeed complete. As I descended the hill, step by step, the magic picture faded from before my eyes.

The most beautiful reality, however, awaited me this morning in Wales. The vision of clouds seemed to have been the harbinger of the magnificence of the vale of Llangollen,—a spot which, in my opinion, far surpasses all the beauties of the Rhine-land, and has, moreover, a character quite its own, from the unusual form of the peaked tops and rugged declivities of its mountains. The Dee, a rapid stream, winds through the green valley in a thousand fantastic bendings overhung with thick underwood. On each side, high mountains rise abruptly from the plain, and are crowned with antique ruins, modern country-houses, manufactories, whose towering chimneys send out columns of thick smoke, or with grotesque groups of upright rocks. The vegetation is every where rich, and hill and vale are filled with lofty trees, whose varied hues add so infinitely to the beauty and picturesque effect of a landscape. In the midst of this luxuriant nature, arises, with a grandeur heightened by contrast, a single long, black, bare range of mountains, clothed only with thick, dark heather, and from time to time skirting the high road. This magnificent road, which from London to Holyhead, a distance of two hundred miles,[95] is as even as a ‘parquet,’ here runs along the side of the left range of mountains, at about their middle elevation and following all their windings; so that in riding along at a brisk trot or gallop, the traveller is presented at every minute with a completely new prospect; and without changing his position, overlooks the valley now before him, now behind, now at his side. On one side is an aqueduct of twenty-five slender arches, a work which would have done honour to Rome. Through this a second river is led over the valley and across the Dee, at an elevation of a hundred and twenty feet above the bed of the natural stream. A few miles further on, the little town of Llangollen offers a delightful resting-place, and is deservedly much resorted to.

There is a beautiful view from the churchyard near the inn: here I climbed upon a tomb, and stood for half an hour enjoying with deep and grateful delight the beauties so richly spread before me. Immediately below me bloomed a terraced garden, filled with vine, honey-suckle, rose, and a hundred gay flowers, which descended to the very edge of the foaming stream. On the right hand, my eye followed the crisped waves in their restless murmuring course through the overhanging thicket; before me rose two lines of wood, divided by a strip of meadow-land filled with grazing cattle; and high above all, rose the bare conical peak of a mountain crowned by the ruins of the old Welsh castle Dinas Bran, or the Crow’s Fortress. On the left, the stone houses of the town lie scattered along the valley; the river forms a considerable waterfall near the picturesque bridge, while three colossal rocks rise immediately behind it like giant guards, and shut out all the more distant wonders of this enchanting region.

Permit me now to turn to some less refined and romantic, but not less real, enjoyments of sense—to my own room; where my appetite, enormously sharpened by the mountain air, was most agreeably invited by the aspect of the smoking coffee, fresh guinea-fowls’ eggs, deep yellow mountain butter, thick cream, ‘toasted muffins’ (a delicate sort of cake eaten hot with butter), and lastly, two red spotted trout just caught; all placed on a snow-white table-cloth of Irish damask;—a breakfast which Walter Scott’s heroes in ‘the highlands’ might have been thankful to receive at the hands of that great painter of human necessities. ‘Je dÉvore dÉjÀ un oeuf.’—Adieu.

Bangor.—Evening.

The rain, which with short intervals accompanied me from London, remained constant to me to-day; but the weather seems now inclined to change for the better. I have all sorts of things to tell you, and a very interesting day to recount. Before I left Llangollen I recollected the two celebrated ladies who have inhabited this valley for more than half a century, and of whom I had heard once as a child, and again recently in London. You have doubtless heard your father talk of them,—‘si non voilÀ leur historie.’ Fifty-six years ago, two young, pretty and fashionable ladies, Lady Eleanor Butler, and the daughter of the late Lord Ponsonby, took it in their heads to hate men, to love only each other, and to live from that hour in some remote hermitage. The resolution was immediately executed; and from that time neither lady has ever passed a night out of their cottage. On the other hand, no one who is presentable travels in Wales unprovided with an introduction to them. It is affirmed that the ‘scandal’ of the great world interests them as much as when they lived in it; and that their curiosity to know what passes has preserved all its freshness. I had compliments to deliver to them from several ladies, but I had neglected to furnish myself with a letter. I therefore sent my card, determined if they declined my visit, as I was led to fear, to storm the cottage. Here, as elsewhere, however, in England, a title easily opened the door, and I immediately received a gracious invitation to a second breakfast. Passing along a charming road, through a trim and pretty pleasure-ground, in a quarter of an hour I reached a small but tasteful Gothic cottage, situated directly opposite to Dinas Bran, various glimpses of which were visible through openings cut in the trees. I alighted, and was received at the door by the two ladies. Fortunately I was already prepared by hearsay for their peculiarities; I might otherwise have found it difficult to repress some expression of astonishment. Imagine two ladies, the eldest of whom, Lady Eleanor, a short robust woman, begins to feel her years a little, being now eighty-three; the other, a tall and imposing person, esteems herself still youthful, being only seventy-four. Both wore their still abundant hair combed straight back and powdered, a man’s round hat, a man’s cravat and waistcoat, but in the place of ‘inexpressibles,’[96] a short petticoat and boots: the whole covered by a coat of blue cloth, of a cut quite peculiar,—a sort of middle term between a man’s coat and a lady’s riding-habit. Over this, Lady Eleanor wore, first, the grand cordon of the order of St. Louis across her shoulder; secondly, the same order around her neck; thirdly, the small cross of the same in her button-hole, and, ‘pour comble de gloire,’ a golden lily of nearly the natural size, as a star,—all, as she said, presents of the Bourbon family. So far the whole effect was somewhat ludicrous. But now, you must imagine both ladies with that agreeable ‘aisance,’ that air of the world of the ‘ancien regime,’ courteous and entertaining, without the slightest affectation; speaking French as well as any Englishwoman of my acquaintance; and, above all, with that essentially polite, unconstrained, and simply cheerful manner of the good society of that day, which, in our serious hard-working age of business, appears to be going to utter decay. I was really affected with a melancholy sort of pleasure in contemplating it in the persons of the amiable old ladies, who are among the last of its living representatives; nor could I witness without lively sympathy the uninterrupted, natural and affectionate attention with which the younger treated her somewhat infirmer friend, and anticipated all her wants. The charm of such actions lies chiefly in the manner in which they are performed,—in things which appear small and insignificant, but which are never lost upon a susceptible heart.

I began by saying that I esteemed myself fortunate in being permitted to deliver to the fair recluses the compliments with which I was charged by my grandfather, who had had the honour of visiting them fifty years ago. Their beauty indeed they had lost, but not their memory: they remembered the C—— C—— very well, immediately produced an old memorial of him, and only expressed their wonder that so young a man was dead already. Not only the venerable ladies, but their house, was full of interest; indeed it contained some real treasures. There is scarcely a remarkable person of the last half century who has not sent them a portrait or some curiosity or antique as a token of remembrance. The collection of these, a well furnished library, a delightful situation, an equable, tranquil life, and perfect friendship and union,—these have been their possessions; and if we may judge by their robust old age and their cheerful temper, they have not chosen amiss.

I had made my visit to them in a tremendous rain, which continued undiminished as I proceeded on my journey past the ruins of an abbey, and then by the palace of Owen Glendower, a personage whom you must remember from my Shaksperian readings at M——. The variety of the scenery is extraordinary; sometimes you are hemmed in by a chaotic heap of mountains, of every form; in a few minutes you have so extensive a view before you that you could almost believe yourself in a level country; the scene shifts again, and you are in a road enclosed and overshadowed by wood. Further on, the stream turns a peaceful mill, and immediately after rushes foaming over masses of rock, and forms a magnificent waterfall.

But the vale of Llangollen is only the proem to the true epopea, the high mountain district. After quitting the waterfall and riding for about half an hour through a nearly level country, all at once, a little beyond the inn at Cernioge Maur, you enter the holy of holies. Huge black rocks form a sublime amphitheatre, and their jagged and rent peaks seem to float in the clouds. Below, at a depth of eight hundred feet of perpendicular rock, the mountain torrent forces its difficult way, leaping headlong from chasm to chasm. Before me lay mountains rising one above another in endless perspective. I was so enchanted that I exclaimed aloud with delight. And in the midst of such scenery, it is impossible to say enough in praise of the road, which, avoiding every great inequality of surface, allows the traveller to enjoy at his ease all the ‘belles horreurs’ of this mountain region. Wherever it is not protected by the rocks, it is fenced by low walls; at equal distances are niches neatly walled in, in which are deposited the stones for mending the roads: this has a much better effect than the open heaps by the sides of our roads.

The mountain region of Wales has a very peculiar character, which it is difficult to compare with any other. Its height is about that of the Riesengebirg, but it is infinitely grander in form, richer in striking and picturesque grouped peaks. The vegetation is more varied in plants, though there is less wood, and it contains rivers and lakes, in which the Riesengebirg is quite deficient. On the other hand, it wants the majestic impervious forests of the abode of RÜbezahl;[97] and in some places cultivation has already occupied the middle ground in a manner which would harmonize better with the beautiful than with the sublime. The road from Capel Cerig to within a few miles of Bangor is, however, wild and rugged as can be desired; and broad masses of red and yellow heath flowers, ferns and other plants which do not bloom in our severe climate, clothe the rocks and replace the trees which do not flourish at such an elevation. But the most striking variety of the picture is produced by the strange, wild and colossal forms of the mountains themselves; some of them are much more like clouds than solid masses. The peak of Trivaen is surmounted by such extraordinary basaltic pillars, that travellers can hardly be persuaded they are not men: they are only mountain spirits, keeping the everlasting station to which Merlin condemned them.

I was struck with the good taste which had rendered all the houses along the high-road so perfectly in keeping with the scenery: they are built of rough stone of a reddish colour, roofed with slate, in a heavy, simple style of architecture, and enclosed by iron gates, the gratings of which are so disposed as to represent the intersecting rays of two suns. The post-boy pointed out to me the remains of a Druidical castle, into which, as my guide-book informed me, Caractacus retired after his defeat at Caer Caredoc. The Welsh language sounds like the cawing of rooks. Almost all their names begin with C, pronounced with a guttural explosion which no foreign organs can imitate. The ruin is converted into two or three inhabited huts, nor are the boundaries of the original building even distinguishable.

A more remarkable object is a rock a little further on, in the form of a bishop with crozier and mitre, as if he had just started from the caverns of the mountain to preach Christianity to the heathen. Whence comes it that when Nature plays these sportive tricks, the effect is almost always sublime; when Art seeks to imitate them, it is invariably ludicrous?

A minor ‘tormento’ in this region is the multitude of children, who start up and vanish like gnomes: they pursue the carriage, begging with inconceivable pertinacity. Wearied by their importunity, I had made a positive determination not to give anything to any-body; a single deviation from which rule insures your never being rid of them for a moment. However, one little girl vanquished all my resolutions by her perseverance: she ran at least a German mile, up hill and down dale, at a brisk trot, sometimes gaining upon me a little by a foot-path, but never losing sight of me for a minute. She ran by the side of the carriage, uttering the same incessant tone of plaintive lamentation, like the cry of a sea-mew, which at length became so intolerable to me that I surrendered, and purchased my deliverance from my untireable pursuer at the price of a shilling. The ill-boding tone had however taken such possession of my ear, that I could not get rid of it for the whole day.

August 16th.

I have slept admirably, and am now sitting at the window of an inn on the sea-shore, and enjoying the sight of the ships cutting the transparent waters in every direction. On the landward rises a castle built of black marble, surrounded by ancient oaks.

As I am very comfortably housed, I shall make this inn my head-quarters, and begin my excursions by this castle. I found here, very unexpectedly, an amusing countryman. You know the clever A——, who is so thin, and yet exhibits such magnificent calves, so elegantly dressed, and yet so frugal, so good-natured, and yet so sarcastic, so English, and yet so German. Well, this same A—— ate a second breakfast with me, without any visible diminution of appetite from the former one; and in return, regaled me with the most diverting conversation. He came from S——, concerning which he told me as follows.

JEST AND EARNEST.

You know, my dear friend, that in Vienna, every man who can eat a roast fowl, and (N.B.) pay for it, receives the title of Euer Gnaden (Your Grace.) In S——,[98] on the other hand, every man who has a whole coat is called, in dubio, Herr Rath (Counsellor;) or still better, Herr Geheimer Rath (Privy Counsellor.) They do not trouble themselves with the distinctions between an actual and a nominal Rath, a half, (that is a pensioned,) or a whole, (that is a full-payed,) and a payless Rath, a titular nullity. The attributes and functions of this mysterious Counsellorship are wonderfully various. In the first place comes the invalid statesman in the Residenz, who, from respect for his declining years, and as a reward for living over half a century, has been invested with the yellow griffin; or a provincial chief president, more remarkable for his prepossessions in his own behalf, than for his public labours, whom his services on occasion of the visit of some foreign sovereign have raised to honours and to orders. Here we find the vigorous prop of the finances, or that ‘rara avis,’ a man of influence near the throne, yet as full of modesty as of merit: there a vegetating Excellenz, who knows no other occupation than that of going from house to house dishing up antiquated jokes and jeux de mots, which for half a century have enjoyed the uninterrupted privilege of delighting ‘la crÊme de la bonnie sociÉtÉ’ in the capital. Next we see it in the person of one who is equally delightful as man and as poet, and who has never trodden any but the straight forward path. A little further we recognize it in the form of a less brilliant but more comprehensive genius, which, although consecrated to Themis, has an acute eye for the glories of the theatrical, as well as the celestial stars. This Proteus then transforms itself into a Cameralist, celebrated for his breed of sheep and his political economy, who manures his fields;—then into a physician, who performs a similar good office on the churchyard. It is also to be found in the invincible Landwehr; nay even the post,[99] the lottery, &c., cannot exist without it. The court-philosopher, and court-theologian, all shake hands as Geheime RÄthe; for so they are, have been, or shall be hereafter: in short, no nation under the sun is more richly provided with counsel, and truly of the most privy kind; for such is the modesty of these countless counsellors, that many of them keep their talents buried in the most profound secrecy.

It is, however, a real pleasure to see with what unconstrained and touching ‘bonhommie’ they bandy titles and compliments, every one exalting the other, and awaiting in return a grateful reciprocity of good offices.

The various adjuncts and applications of the poor word geboren (born) must doubtless for ever remain a mystical enigma to all foreigners who endeavour to acquire the German language. Without plunging deeper into this labyrinth, I will only mention for their information, that with us the meanest beggar will no longer condescend to be merely geboren; that Edelgeboren[100] (nobly born) begins to be a sensible affront to the lower order of official persons; and Wohlgeboren (well born) no less so to the higher, but not noble functionaries. For my part, I am very careful to write to my tailor, “Hochwohlgeborner Herr” (High-well-born Sir.) He was moreover a very distinguished man, a descendant of our old friend Robinson Crusoe, who has attained to historic importance by the daring and inimitable cut of uniforms: he was therefore deserving, at the least, of an order of merit.[101]

That no restraint may be imposed on this arbitrary distribution and assumption of titles, matters are so favourably arranged, that with all this avidity for rank, there exists no real and fixed order of rank, either determined by the court, or by birth, or grounded on opinion and custom, so general and rooted in the nation as to have nearly the force of law. Sometimes it is birth, oftener place; sometimes merit, sometimes favour, sometimes irresistible impudence which seizes precedence wherever accident or circumstances offer it. This gives occasion to many strange anomalies, which an old nobleman like myself, a Baron von Tunderdendronk, “qui ne sauroit compter le nombre de ses Ânes,” as general P—— said, cannot understand. Complaints, affronts, and anxieties are therefore endless in society. There is only a certain lively and excellent old lady, who has the sole and proper art of maintaining the first place almost everywhere, and under all circumstances. She unites great talents with remarkable bodily strength and bravery; and by means of these mingled advantages, sometimes by wit, sometimes by unimaginable rudeness; sometimes, when nothing else will do, by a hearty push, she takes and maintains precedency at court and on all gala occasions. I know from good authority that Countess Kackelack, at one of our courts (for you know we have many,) felt herself slighted and aggrieved by a certain court party, and by the advice of her friend the Starost von PÜckling addressed a petition directly to our upright and equitable ruler, praying that her place might be officially determined. It was allotted immediately after that of the Princess Bona, who (for once, on account of the services of her late husband,) is in possession of the first. The Grand-Marshal (GrosswÜrdentrÄger, Grand-dignity-bearer) Prince Weise, brought her the order, and added, “But, my dear Countess, you must yield precedence to Baroness Stolz, for with your slender person what can you do against her? A single blow from her elbow lames you for ever. Do therefore let her go first; for you know even the police is afraid of her since the famous challenge she put forth some years ago.”

Everything must yield to force; and this shows how difficult it is to secure precedence to mere merit without universal and declared rules:—merit is so relative. If a minister or a general is a great man,—who can deny that the best of cooks, the loveliest of opera-dancers, has great merit? merit which, as history teaches us, monarchs and states have recognized and honoured.

In England, where antiquity of title gives precedence (be it remarked, by-the-bye, the safest and best adapted to a monarchy,[102]) the great Field Marshal and Prime Minister Wellington must yield precedence to the little Duke of St. Albans, (who is known, indeed, but not very illustrious,) because the latter is an older Duke; that is to say, the services of his progenitress Nell Gwynn, an actress and mistress of Charles II., are of more ancient date than those of the Duke of Wellington, and consequently entitle her descendants to all the rights of precedence over the great general.

In our capital it is otherwise. We are generally too well accustomed to bad eating to estimate very highly the merits of a good cook, and are of late universally become so virtuous that nobody has a mistress. As to rewarding merit, that is a thing which does not often come under contemplation.[103]

What really and mainly gives rank and consideration here, is to be a servant of the state or of the court, ‘n’importe lequel et comment.’ “Beati possidentes.” The good old German proverb applies here, “When God gives a place, he gives brains to fill it.” The Bureaucracy has taken the place of the Aristocracy, and will perhaps soon become equally hereditary. Even now the Government itself cannot dismiss any of its ‘employÉes’ without regular trial and judgment: every man regards his place as his most stable property, and it is not to be wondered at that place-holders laud this state of things to the skies. Strange, that nevertheless all states which have a free constitution,—all in which it is a recognized principle that the nation, and not any privileged class—not even that of its official servants—is the main object,—follow a totally opposite system.[104]

The middle classes are, in another way, happy in their disregarded state: they enjoy their competence ‘con amore,’ and, as the salt of life, they indulge themselves now and then with a lawsuit, for which the ministers of justice afford them every possible facility. The merchant, whether Christian or prÆ-Christian, finds his account in this, and, if he knows how to come at it, useful patronage. Indeed to have a great deal of money is almost as good as to be a wirklicher Geheimerath (actual privy counsellor):[105] and rich bankers, who keep a good house, are reckoned among the privileged classes, and not unfrequently for these high deserts elevated to nobility.

In this manner, all manage to get something; the unfortunate nobles, especially those of ancient date, are the only people with whom it goes hard. Without money, without any land of which he has the free disposal, his titles affording an example of infinite multiplication, and his hereditary estates of infinite division, without any share in the legislation, long stripped of his ancient endowments and benefices,[106] unnecessarily and unfairly annoyed by the authorities, his ill-supported claims often bringing upon him not only ridicule and contempt, but hostility and persecution, the nobleman has, as member of a Corporation, lost all dignity and importance in the eyes of the people, and he retains scarcely any other distinction than that of serving as the only stuff out of which to make chamberlains and lords in waiting, in the respective courts of the capital;—doubtless always a most enviable lot.

This last truth is duly known to many; and a great deal of talent has been displayed thereupon by a celebrated authoress, who was some time ago engaged in a sort of amicable rivalry with her husband on the field of romance,—a contest which used to produce two or three works of that nature, consisting of as many volumes each, every Leipsig fair, to the great joy of the public. The most extraordinary part of the story is, that the works of the husband were characterized by the overflowing tenderness of a female pen; those of the wife, on the contrary, by a somewhat unwieldy quantity of masculine knowledge, a lead which even the alchemical hand of an amiable and accomplished prince could not turn to gold. The works of both, especially the former, have outlived their vogue; and the graceful and child-like simplicity of the Northern heroes, who tilted at each other with tenderness, looked on their slain friend with clear blue eyes, and imprinted upon his lips the kiss of peace; nay, even their wondrous steeds, who galloped over precipitous crags and swam after their lords through seas, have been forced, spite of all their marvellous gifts, to give way to Walter Scott’s unbreeched Highlanders.

The poetical young lords of the chamber, and the learned tea-parties of the noble lady, had long before been deserted as somewhat insipid. In such a tea-party did Ahasuerus, (as we read in the memoirs of the Devil,) after his long and restless wanderings, first find repose, and sink into a refreshing sleep. Since that time, the thick volumes of the distinguished authoress have dwindled to small tales,—pretty ephemera,—which live but a day indeed, but are well requited by the honour of circulating exclusively in courts and antechambers, among princes, ladies in waiting, and maids of honour, lords of the chamber, equerries and grooms of the chambers (for nothing within the precinct of a court is to be treated lightly). Haunted rooms were lately introduced, but the ghosts were so dull and fades, so like white-washed boards, ‘avec un bel air de famille,’ that the utmost they could do was to make one think of a cold shudder, never to excite one. The most piquant of all these stories was unquestionably that which ‘persiffloit’ the society of the capital, in which poor Viola played a very suspicious part, and a fashionable lady was introduced, who sold her for a large sum to an illustrious person. This story was justly called moral: for it excited in every person of good feeling, who read it, detestation of calumny and of hasty condemnations. The ill-natured, however, were delighted with it for other reasons; and so in one way or other it was not without value. It might fairly be called a master-piece when compared with the “Tales of the middle ages,” full of virtue and distress, of Christianity and indecency, of Italianism and Germanism, which the necessities of journal and almanack literature call into existence by myriads, and of which we may say with Schiller, “When people are gorged with vice, set virtue on the table.”[107] These do not reach either the one or the other; but, from the beginning to the end, one suffers the moral ‘pendant’ of a so-called medical cure by nausea. After enduring all sorts of allusions, the whole thing burns in the pan, and so far from being fit to bring to table, the unfortunate reader is for a long time disgusted with all food whatsoever.[108]

But to return to the learned and amiable lady, of whom we were just speaking. At the time I was in those regions, a strange swarm of insects sported in the wintry sun of her courtly and literary celebrity, ycelped in the great world a coterie, which, I believe, establishes it as a principle (who has not principles now-a-days?), that nobles have really and truly a different sort of blood in their veins from that of other men; and that if a common tree can be ennobled at all, it can be only by the process of grafting; for instance, by the insertion of some illegitimate scion of a noble stock. They teach that this nobility should remain, before all things, pure and distinct; it must dishonour itself neither by trade nor by any speculations of public utility, which latter offence has lately been denounced as the cause of the decay of the nobility of the land by a certain Frau von Tonne in a very voluminous work. To dabble a little in authorship and artistship is lawful (even for money, nay for burghers’ money,) seeing that artists[109] occupy a sort of middle region between the noble and the bourgeois. A constitutional high nobility and a representative government are by no means to the taste of this party; from the very natural reason that under any such terrible system, men, the date of whose nobility is known to nobody but themselves, and whose encumbered estates are split up into portions of microscopic invisibility, would be condemned to the horror of being compelled to take their seat in the Chamber of Commons (where else?). Who can blame them, therefore, under circumstances, for preferring the chambers of princes, especially if they can lord it there? Which Heaven forfend! It is to be hoped they will remain merely titular, and not actual privy counsellors and lords of the bedchamber.

Evening.

I could bear no longer to sit still in my room, while the castle opposite to my windows tempted me forth. As soon therefore as A—— had taken his departure, I procured a mountain pony and rode out in high spirits. This remarkable edifice was built by the proprietor of the slate quarries, situated about three miles distant, which bring him a yearly income of 40,000l. He has laid out a part in the most delightful situation on the sea-shore; and has pursued the strange but admirably executed idea of erecting every building within its enclosure in the old Saxon style of architecture. The English falsely ascribe the introduction of this style to the Anglo-Saxons: it arose in the time of the emperors of Saxon line; and it is quite certain that none of the numerous Saxon remains are to be traced to an earlier date. The high wall, which surrounds the park in a circuit of at least a German mile, has a very singular appearance; pointed masses of slate three or four feet high, and of irregular shape, are built upright into the top of the wall. At every entrance a fortress-like gate with a portcullis frowns on the intruder,—no inapt symbol, by-the-bye, of the illiberality of the present race of Englishmen, who shut their parks and gardens more closely than we do our sitting-rooms. The favoured visitor must then cross a drawbridge before he passes the gate-way of the imposing castle. The black marble of the island of Anglesea, rudely hewn, harmonizes admirably with the majestic character of the surrounding scenery. The pure Saxon style is preserved in the minutest details, even in the servants’ rooms and meanest parts of the building. In the eating-hall I found an imitation of the castle of William the Conqueror, at Rochester, which I formerly described to you. What could then be accomplished only by a mighty monarch, is now executed, as a plaything,—only with increased size, magnificence and expense,—by a simple country-gentleman, whose father very likely sold cheeses. So do times change!

The ground-plan of the building, which the architect had the politeness to show me, gave occasion to certain domestic details, which I am glad to be able to communicate to you; because nearly all large English country-houses are constructed on the same plan; and because in this, as in many other things, the nice perception of the useful and commodious, the exquisite adaptation of means to ends, which distinguish the English, are conspicuous. The servants never wait in the ante-room,—here called the hall,—which, like the overture of an opera, is designed to express the character of the whole: it is generally decorated with statues or pictures, and, like the elegant staircase and the various apartments, is appropriated to the use of the family and guests, who have the good taste rather to wait on themselves than to have an attendant spirit always at their heels. The servants live in a large room in a remote part of the house, generally on the ground-floor, where all, male and female, eat together, and where the bells of the whole house are placed. They are suspended in a row on the wall, numbered so that it is immediately seen in what room any one has rung: a sort of pendulum[110] is attached to each, which continues to vibrate for ten minutes after the sound has ceased to remind the sluggish of their duty. The females of the establishment have also a large common room, in which, when they have nothing else to do, they sew, knit, and spin: close to this is a closet for washing the glass and china which comes within their province. Each of them, as well as of the men-servants, has her separate bed-chamber in the highest story. Only the ‘housekeeper’ and the ‘butler’ have distinct apartments below. Immediately adjoining that of the housekeeper, is a room where coffee is made, and the store-room containing every thing requisite for breakfast, which important meal, in England, belongs especially to her department. On the other side of the building is the washing establishment, with a small court-yard attached; it consists of three rooms, the first for washing, the second for ironing, the third, which is considerably loftier, and heated by steam, for drying the linen in bad weather. Near the butler’s room is his pantry, a spacious fire-proof room, with closets on every side for the reception of the plate which he cleans here, and the glass and china used at dinner, which must be delivered back into his custody as soon as it is washed by the women. All these arrangements are executed with the greatest punctuality. A locked staircase leads from the pantry into the beer and wine cellar, which is likewise under the butler’s jurisdiction.

I followed a very romantic road, which led me through the park, and then along the bank of a beautifully wooded mountain stream, and in about an hour arrived at the slate quarry, which lies in the midst of the mountains, six miles from the castle. From what I have already told you, you may imagine what a vast work this is. Five or six high terraces of great extent rise one above another on the side of the mountain; along these swarm men, machines, trains of a hundred wagons attached together and rolling rapidly along the iron railways, cranes drawing up heavy loads, water courses, &c. It took me a considerable time to give even a hasty glance at this busy and complicated scene. In order to reach a remote part of the works, where they were then blasting rocks with gunpowder,—a process which I had a great desire to see,—I was obliged to lie down in one of the little iron wagons which serve for the conveyance of the slate, and are drawn by means of a windlass through a gallery hewn in the solid rock, only four feet in height, four hundred paces in length, and pitch dark. It is a most disagreeable sensation to be dragged through this narrow passage at full speed, and in Egyptian darkness, after having had ample opportunity of seeing at the entrance the thousand abrupt jagged projections by which one is surrounded. Few strangers make the experiment, spite of the tranquillizing assurances of the guide who rides before. It is impossible to get rid of the idea that if one came in contact with any of these salient points, one would, in all probability, make one’s egress without a head. After passing through this gallery, I had to walk along a path at the edge of the precipice, only two feet wide, and without any railing or defence; then to pass through a second low cavern, when I reached the fearfully magnificent scene of operations.

It was like a subterranean world! Above the blasted walls of slate, smooth as a mirror, and several hundred feet high, scarcely enough of the blue heaven was visible to enable me to distinguish mid-day from twilight. The earth on which we stood was likewise blasted rock; just in the middle was a deep cleft six or eight feet wide. Some children of the workmen were amusing themselves in leaping across this chasm, for the sake of earning a few pence. The perpendicular sides were hung with men, who looked like dark birds, striking the rock with their long picks, and throwing down masses of slate which fell with a sharp and clattering sound. But on a sudden the whole mountain seemed to totter, loud cries of warning re-echoed from various points,—the mine was sprung. A large mass of rock loosened itself slowly and majestically from above, fell down with a mighty plunge, and while dust and splinters darkened the air like smoke, the thunder rang around in wild echoes. These operations, which are of almost daily necessity in one part or other of the quarry, are so dangerous, that, according to the statement of the overseer himself, they calculate on an average of one hundred and fifty men wounded, and seven or eight killed in a year. An hospital, exclusively devoted to the workmen on this property, receives the wounded; and on my way I had met, without being aware of it, the body of one who had fallen the day before yesterday; ‘car c’est comme un champ de bataille.’ The people who escorted it were so smartly dressed and so decorated with flowers, that I at first took the procession for a wedding, and was shocked when, in answer to my inquiry for the bridegroom, one of the attendants pointed in silence to the coffin which followed at some distance. The overseer assured me that half these accidents were owing to the indifference of the men, who are too careless to remove in time and to a sufficient distance, though at every explosion they have full warning given them. The slate invariably splits in sharp-edged flakes, so that an inconsiderable piece thrown to a great distance, is often sufficient to cut a man’s hand, leg, or even head, clean off. On one occasion, this last, as I was assured, actually happened.

As we ourselves were not far enough from the ‘foyer,’ I instantly obeyed the signal, and turned on the left through the infernal gallery, to inspect the more peaceful operations: these are extremely varied and interesting. Paper cannot be cut more neatly and rapidly than slates are here; and no deal board can split more easily and delicately than the blocks which the workmen with one single stroke of the mallet divide into slices, from three to four feet in breadth, as thin as the thinnest pasteboard. The rough blocks come from the region I have just described, down Parisian ‘montagnes russes’ to the stone-hewer; and, as in those, the downward impetus of the loaded wagons sends them up again when empty. The iron railways are not here, as they commonly are, concave, but convex, and the wagon wheels correspond.

July 17th.

The day has passed in rest, writing, and reading; so that it affords few materials. But before I go to bed I must indulge the delightful habit of chatting with you. I was just thinking of home, and our honoured friend L——, who is now travelling, and has sent me a whole volume of his former lucubrations. Shall I send you a specimen? Listen then.

“REFLECTIONS OF A PIOUS SOUL OF SANDOMIR, OR SANDOMICH.[111]

“1. On occasion of the quantity of Schnapps drunk at my expense by the Saxon postillions.

“How much better is our country in all respects than any other! Really one witnesses strange things! For instance, it is certainly an extraordinary circumstance,—and yet after repeated experience I cannot doubt it,—that when the horses here are tired and lazy, (which, alas! is too often the case,) the postilion has only to drink Schnapps, to render them brisk and active. The wisdom of Nature and her hidden powers are unfathomable! The above-mentioned phenomenon may perhaps be elucidated by the well-known fact, that wine begins to ferment in the cask when the vine blossoms.[112] At the last stage before Torgau, my companion Count S——, Lieutenant of the Guards, from Potsdam, upon whom the light of Grace hath not yet broken, and who consequently is unduly moved by worldly things, was so angry with the postilion that he shook his stick at him, and called him a Saxon dog. ‘O Lord! no, sir,’ answered the fellow stupidly; ‘there you’re mistaken—we have been Prussian dogs these ten years and more.’ This is a plain proof that the people here are entirely destitute of that high civilization which prevails among us.

“2. After my signal deliverance on the 6th of July, 1827.

“For four weeks I have not been able to write! With thankfulness and deep inward feeling I now take up my pen for the first time, to set forth the wonderful dispensation I have experienced. As I was travelling to M—— last month, I was overturned directly before the door of the tollhouse, and broke my right arm. My first exclamation—I confess it to my shame—was a shocking curse: but my second, thanks, fervent thanks to the Creator that I had broken my arm and not my neck. In such events we clearly perceive the ‘unfathomable ways’ and the protecting arm of Providence, which is ever at hand to help us at the moment of need. Did not my life hang upon a hair? and was it not the Lord’s pleasure herein to give me an impressive proof that it depends on him alone to close my eyes for ever, or still to preserve my young life, which perhaps (for what is impossible to him?) is reserved for great and weighty things? Yes, ye philosophers, with heartfelt joy and triumph do I feel it, Faith alone makes us happy.

“3. On occasion of my being nearly drowned in the Elbe, near Torgau.

“Certain it is that we ought not to venture into the water till we can swim, as a Grecian sage hath very justly remarked. I was so imprudent as to bathe yesterday without having acquired this art, for I ever kept myself far aloof from all revolutionary gymnastics and exercises of that sort, and being seized with a cramp in the calf of my leg, and consequently somewhat frightened, I should perhaps now be among the dead, had it not been for a man whom Heaven led in this direction, exactly at this time, for my preservation. Can I be blind at such repeated proofs of special interposition in my favour? The whole Elbe is, nevertheless, become rather disagreeable to me. I strive with this as a blameable feeling, since we ought to recollect how useful this river is to many of our fellow-creatures.[113] The remark has I believe been made before, but it nevertheless is not the less worthy of attention—that wherever we find a large city, we almost invariably find a great river by the side of it;—but so wisely, so graciously has a kind Providence arranged all things for our good, though we men acknowledge it but too seldom! Yes, Nature, like a good mother, has taken care for all. To the bee she gave her sting, to the beaver his tail, to the lion his strength, to the ass patience; but to man his lofty understanding, and—on subjects which this, with our deceitful reason, cannot reach—divine revelations. O how thankful do I always feel when I think rightly on this! I, who moreover have so much more cause than numbers of my brethren to be thankful for the manifold bodily and mental advantages I enjoy. May I never forget them!—Amen.

“4. On occasion of my being forced to pay Abraham the Jew my twice prolonged bill, with ‘alterum tantum.’

“I have been sorely disquieted by the doubt, whether the Jews are really to remain to the end of the world; and, in spite of the curse which lies upon them, scattered and oppressed as they are on earth, to continue for ever to cheat us so astonishingly as they do.

“Yet is not this very doubt a sin? since we are assured in many holy books that this will certainly be the case. Besides, the conversion of these misguided wretches is now proceeding from our country, whence the greatest light formerly went forth. But alas! here a new fearful doubt besets me: Will all the inhabitants of the earth ever be called Christians? It is indeed so declared: but in the course of my learned studies I lately met with a calculation which, to my horror, showed me that out of eight hundred millions of souls on the earth, only two hundred millions are called by the true name. Let us hope, however, that the worthy and admirable Bible Societies will do their part, and not weary. The English cannot be truly in earnest in this matter, seeing that as yet they have hardly made a convert in India. It is probable that they, as usual, have only political ends in view.[114] I read lately, that a Hindoo audaciously answered a missionary who was trying to convert him, ‘I shall not suffer myself to be converted to Christianity by you, till you consent to be converted to the religion of Brama by me. I believe in the truth of my religion, as you believe in the truth of yours; and what is right for one, is fair for the other. Some fables and abuses may perhaps have crept into both, but they are of the same family.’ What dreadful views! I myself, who,—I say it without vain-glory,—persuaded an old Jew, whose trade had fallen off, to be baptized, (for which I still allow him a pension,) sought also to contribute my mite by the spiritual change of a real Indian, who after many wonderful adventures had been driven into our hyperborean regions, where the Herrnhuters had long, though vainly, laboured at his conversion. He heard me very patiently; and, to say the truth, I was so carried away by the momentous nature of the circumstance, that I wondered at my own eloquence. But what was the result? he smiled at me, took my gift, shook his head like a Chinese idol, and left me without an answer.

“P. S. I have just heard, to my inexpressible horror, that the Jew I converted is dead: and being seized on his death-bed by pangs of conscience (would any body think it possible?) turned Jew again.

“5. On returning from Madame R——’s funeral.

“A most remarkable incident occurred here a few days ago. About ten years since a pretty and, what is far more important, a pious young woman served in a confectioner’s shop. Although exposed by her sweet occupation to many temptations, (for all young men who frequent confectioners’ shops have not my morals,) she would listen to no one, and found all her pleasure in godliness. She never missed a prayer-meeting at President S——’s, or at any other house where she could gain admittance; and above all, went to church at least once every Sunday. One Sunday, however, (it was St. Martin’s day if I mistake not,) she forgot her duty and staid at home, busied with worldly attire. Then did the Tempter draw near in the form of a young man, to whom she had long been secretly attached. It seems probable that on that fatal day he made great advances in her favour, since they were shortly after married. At first they lived very happily, and had several children. By degrees she exhibited a sensible falling off in piety, in consequence of the cares and distractions of married life. The unhappy woman appeared greatly attached to her duties as wife and mother, and henceforth preferred them to the comfort of prayer-meetings and pious readings. But the consequences of her carnal-mindedness soon appeared: her husband was assailed by numerous and, as I am assured, otherwise undeserved misfortunes; some of her children died; the whole family fell into poverty; and the husband, at length, into the deepest melancholy. Last Sunday, exactly on the tenth anniversary of that fatal Sunday on which the misguided girl did not go to church, her husband in a paroxysm of madness horribly murdered himself and his wife.—Here may be seen that the divine wrath if slow, is so much the more sure. I refrain from all severe animadversions:—but he who is not rendered serious by this warning, who does not see how sinful and dangerous it is to neglect, even for once, regular attendance at church, is truly an object of my pity. He can be made wise only by his own suffering; and well is it for him if he become so in time!

“6. On my last disappointment at D——.

“I am very unfortunate in love,—a circumstance which it is difficult to understand; but it is nevertheless true that another of my best laid plans has miscarried!

“For a long time I had loved Miss M—— with all the fire of my impetuous character. I did not venture to declare it; but my eyes, which I fixed upon her for hours with languishing tenderness, spoke too plainly not to be understood. Nevertheless, I had never been able to win aught but a scornful smile from my adored fair; when an important epoch, viz. her eighteenth birthday, arrived. I determined now to lay storm to her heart by some distinguished act of gallantry—which I could do with the greater propriety, and without any stings of conscience, since I never entertain any but the most virtuous designs. I now meditated long what to choose;—roses, and all sorts of botanical presents, as fruit and the like, are so common-place;—dress would not do, for that would have looked like an insinuation that I thought her vain;—still less could I offer her any thing costly, which would have appeared an indirect accusation of a mercenary spirit: I dared not choose a pious hymn-book, or other godly work, lest I should sinfully profane what is holy by using it with an earthly aim;—no, it must be something tender, and containing a delicate allusion to our situation. Suddenly, like a flash of lightning in a dark night, the thought occurred to me that the season of new herrings was at hand. The word electrified me, and, with the wonted rapidity of my conceptions, I instantly saw the meaning which lay hidden. I immediately sent an estafette to Berlin, where, as is well known, every thing new is to be had, in order, if possible, to get the above-mentioned creatures of the Lord before the annual advertisement of them appeared in the two blotting-paper journals of that city. Every thing succeeded according to my wishes:—ere many days had elapsed, a couple lay before me. I had them laid upon some leaves of artificial ‘forget-me-not,’ instead of parsley, and once more reflected upon all that their mute language (I mean the herrings’) could convey.

“It would perhaps appear too far-fetched were I to urge how herring resembles hymen; these words having clearly an etymological relation, since both begin with a great H,[115] and a little n occurs in both. But there was one circumstance which spoke plainer, viz. that they were a couple—the principal point of view from which they were to be regarded. The blue colour, which reminds us of heaven, signified our mutual gentleness and meekness; and the strong salt wherewith they were salted, the acuteness of our understandings, and our attic wit. The unfading leaves cried aloud, ‘Forget me not!’ and at the same time clearly alluded to that never-fading delight we should find in each other! But in my opinion the crown of the whole was the pretty play of words which is in the name itself—herring—here-ring. It was impossible for me to declare my love and my honourable intentions more plainly, and at the same time more delicately, (in every sense of the word, for new herrings are a great delicacy in Prussia and Saxony.) To make all doubly sure, however, I laid on them a beautiful rose, painted and cut out of Chinese rice-paper, in the leaves of which I concealed with a trembling hand the first effort of my youthful muse, in which I expressed all these tender and delicate ideas.

“Who could believe that all would be in vain! The mother answered me in plain prose, briefly and carelessly, that her daughter was very sorry that she had always had an idiosyncratical antipathy to herrings; so strong indeed, that she had not been able to sit out the last play of the celebrated Wilibald Alexis, having accidentally heard that his real name was Herring. She therefore sent me back my fish and the accompanying poetry, with many thanks for my good intentions.

“Happily, godliness consoles a spirit truly possessed by it for every thing; but I was obliged to read the Bible two hours before I recovered my accustomed patience and composure. I read for my edification the history of Jonas; and although the whale which swallowed him was so very large, it continually disappeared in my fancy before the luckless herrings.

“In my anger (which alas! I have not yet completely conquered) I must now censure some things in the two blotting-paper periodicals above mentioned. They ought not only to strive after a more correct orthography in their advertisements, but to pay some attention to the sense. In a collection of natural curiosities made by a Berlin friend of mine, I find two of the above-named newspapers, containing the two following notices of deaths inserted by the same unfortunate father; and an old advertisement of a concert.

1. ‘This day the Lord, on his journey through Tettow, took to himself my youngest son Fritz, with his teeth.’

2. (A month later). ‘This day the Lord again took to himself my daughter Agnes to eternal blessedness.’

3. ‘On Monday a concert will be given at the theatre. The receipts are to serve as the basis of a fund destined for the support of our countrymen who fell in defence of their country.’

“Now I ask anybody whether this is not making death ludicrous,—certainly a grievous sin, even when done unintentionally.”

So far friend L——.

But the night grows pale—already the morning dawns. I must say, therefore, like Moore, it is day—therefore good night. I send you this long letter, which an acquaintance takes to London to-morrow morning, through our embassy; and with it a hearty kiss, which I hope the P—— custom-house will suffer to pass undisputed.

Your faithful L——