A journey made in the summer of 1794, through Holland and the western frontier of Germany: with a return down the Rhine: to which are added Observations during a tour to the lakes of Lancashire, Westmoreland, and Cumberland. By Ann Radcliffe.

After a few miles, this road leaves the territories of the United Pro|vinces, and enters the Prussian duchy of Cleves, at a spot where a mill is in one country, and the miller's house in the other. An instance of difference between the conditions of the people in the two countries was observable even at this passage of their boundary. Our postillion bought, at the miller's, a loaf of black bread, such as is not made in the Dutch provinces, and carried it away for the food of his horses, which were thus initiated into some of the blessings of the German peasantry. After another quarter of a mile you have more proofs that you have entered the country of the King of Prussia. From almost every cluster of huts barefooted children run out to beg, and ten or a dozen stand at every gate, nearly throwing themselves under the wheels to catch your money, which, every now and then, the bigger seize from the less.

Yet the land is not ill-cultivated. The distinction between the culture of land in free and arbitrary countries, was, indeed, never very apparent to us, who should have been ready enough to perceive it. The great landholders know what should be done, and the pea|santry are directed to do it. The latter are, perhaps, supplied with stock, and the grounds produce as much as elsewhere, though you

may read, in the looks and manners of the people, that very little of its productions is for them.

Approaching nearer to Cleves, we travelled on a ridge of heights, and were once more cheared with the

"pomp of groves."

Between the branches were delightful catches of extensive landscapes, varied with hills clothed to their summits with wood, where frequently the distant spires of a town peeped out most picturesquely. The open vales between were chiefly spread with corn; and such a prospect of undulating ground, and of hills tufted with the grandeur of forests, was inexpressibly chearing to eyes fatigued by the long view of level countries.

At a few miles from Cleves the road enters the Park and a close avenue of noble plane-trees, when these prospects are, for a while, excluded. The first opening is where, on one hand, a second avenue commences, and, on the other, a sort of broad bay in the woods, which were planted by Prince Maurice, includes an handsome house, now converted into an inn, which, owing to the pleasantness of the situation, and its vicinity to a mineral spring, is much frequented in summer. A statue of General Martin Schenck, of dark bronze, in complete armour, and with the beaver down, is raised upon a lofty Ionic column, in the centre of the avenue, before the house. Rest|ing upon a lance, the figure seems to look down upon the passenger, and to watch over the scene, with the sternness of an ancient knight. It appears to be formed with remarkable skill, and has an air more striking and grand than can be readily described.

The orangerie of the palace is still preserved, together with a semi|circular pavilion, in a recess of the woods, through which an avenue of two miles leads you to

CLEVES.

THIS place, which, being the capital of a duchy, is entitled a City, consists of some irregular streets, built upon the brow of a steep hill. It is walled, but cannot be mentioned as fortified, having no solid works. The houses are chiefly built of stone, and there is a little of Dutch cleanliness; but the marks of decay are strongly impressed upon them, and on the ancient walls. What little trade there is, exists in retailing goods sent from Holland. The Dutch language and coins are in circulation here, almost as much as the German.

The established religion of the town is Protestant; but here is an almost universal toleration, and the Catholics have several churches and monasteries. Cleves has suffered a various fate in the sport of war during many centuries, but has now little to distinguish it except the beauty of its prospects, which extend into Guelderland and the province of Holland, over a country enriched with woody hills and vallies of corn and pasturage.

Being convinced, in two or three hours, that there was nothing to require a longer stay, we set out for Xanten, a town in the same duchy, distant about eighteen miles. For nearly the whole of this length the road lay through a broad avenue, which frequently entered a forest of oak, fir, elm, and majestic plane-trees, and emer|ged from it only to wind along its skirts. The views then opened over a country, diversified with gentle hills, and ornamented by numberless spires upon the heights, every small town having several convents. The castle of Eltenberg, on the summit of a wooded mountain, was visible during the whole of this stage and part of the next day's journey. Yet the fewness, or the poverty, of the inha|bitants appeared from our meeting only one chaise, and two or three small carts, for eighteen miles of the only high-road in the country.

It was a fine evening in June, and the rich lights, thrown among the forest glades, with the solitary calmness of the scene, and the sereneness of the air, filled with scents from the woods, were circum|stances which persuaded to such tranquil rapture as Collins must have felt when he had the happiness to address to Evening—

For when thy folding star, arising, shews His paly circlet, at his warning lamp, The fragrant hours and elves Who slept in buds the day:

And many a nymph, who wreaths her brows with sedge, And sheds the fresh'ning dew, and, lovelier still, The pensive pleasures sweet Prepare thy shadowy car.

A small half-way village, a stately convent, with its gardens, called Marienbaum, founded in the 15th century by Maria, Duchess of Cleves, and a few mud cottages of the woodcutters, were the only buildings on the road: the foot passengers were two Prussian soldiers. It was moon-light, and we became impatient to reach Xanten, long before our driver could say, in a mixture of German and Dutch, that we were near it. At length from the woods, that had concealed the town, a few lights appeared over the walls, and dissipated some gloomy fancies about a night to be passed in a forest.

XANTEN.

THIS is a small town, near the Rhine, without much appearance of prosperity, but neater than most of the others around it. Several narrow streets open into a wide and pleasant market|place, in the centre of which an old but flourishing elm has its branches carefully extended by a circular railing, to form an arbour over benches. A cathedral, that proves the town to have been once more considerable, is on the north side of this place; a fine building, which, shewn by the moon of a summer midnight, when only the bell of the adjoining convent calling the monks to prayers, and the waving of the aged tree, were to be heard, presented a scene before the windows of our inn, that fully recompensed for its want of accommodation.

There were also humbler reasons towards contentment; for the people of the house were extremely desirous to afford it; and the landlord was an orator in French, of which and his address he was pleasantly vain. He received us with an air of humour, mingled with his complaisance, and hoped, that,

"as Monsieur was Anglois, he should surprise him with his vin extraordinaire, all the Rhenish wine being adulterated by the Dutch, before they sent it to England.

His house could not be fine, because he had little money; but he had an excellent cook, otherwise it could not be expected that the pre|bendaries of the cathedral would dine at it, every day, and become, as they were, vraiment, Monsieur, gros comme vous me voyez!"

There are in this small town several monasteries and one convent of noble canonesses, of which last the members are few and the revenues very great. The interior of the cathedral is nearly as grand as the outside; and mass is performed in it with more solemnity than in many, which have larger institutions.

We left Xanten, the next morning, in high spirits, expecting to reach Cologne, which was little more than fifty miles distant, before night, though the landlord and the postmaster hinted, that we should go no further than Neuss. This was our first use of the German post, the slowness of which, though it has been so often described, we had not estimated. The day was intensely hot, and the road, unsheltered by trees, lay over deep sands, that reflected the rays. The refreshing forests of yesterday we now severely regretted, and watched impatiently to catch a freer air from the summit of every hill on the way. The postillion would permit his horses to do little more than walk, and every step threw up heaps of dust into the chaise. It had been so often said by travellers, that money has as little effect in such cases as intreaties, or threats, that we supposed this slowness irremediable, which was really intended only to produce an offer of what we would willingly have given.

RHEINBERG.

IN something more than three hours, we reached Rhein|berg, distant about nine miles; a place often mentioned in the mili|tary history of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and which we had supposed would at least gratify us by the shew of magnificent ruins, together with some remains of its former importance. It is a wretched place of one dirty street, and three or four hundred mean houses, surrounded by a decayed wall that never was grand, and half filled by inhabitants, whose indolence, while it is probably more to be pitied than blamed, accounts for the sullenness and wretchedness of their appearance. Not one symptom of labour, or comfort, was to be perceived in the whole town. The men seemed, for the most part, to be standing at their doors, in unbuckled shoes and woollen caps. What few women we saw were brown, without the appearance of health, which their leanness and dirtiness prevented. Some small shops of hucksters' wares were the only signs of trade.

The inn, that seemed to be the best, was such as might be ex|pected in a remote village, in a cross road in England. The land|lord was standing before the door in his cap, and remained there some time after we had found the way into a sitting room, and from thence,

for want of attendance, into a kitchen; where two women, without stockings, were watching over some sort of cookery in earthen jugs. We were supplied, at length, with bread, butter and sour wine, and did not suffer ourselves to consider this as any specimen of German towns, because Rheinberg was not a station of the post; a delusion, the spirit of which continued through several weeks, for we were always finding reasons to believe, that the wretchedness of present places and persons was produced by some circumstances, which would not operate in other districts.

This is the condition of a town, which, in the sixteenth and seven|teenth centuries, was thought important enough to be five times at|tacked by large armies. FARNESE, the Spanish commander, was di|verted from his attempt upon it, by the necessity of relieving Zutphen, then besieged by the Earl of Leceister: in 1589, the Marquis of Varambon invested it, for the Spaniards, by order of the Prince of Parma; but it was relieved by our Colonel Vere, who, after a long battle, completely defeated the Spanish army. In 1599, when it was attacked by Mendoza, a magazine caught fire. The governor, his family, and a part of the garrison were buried in the ruins of a tower, and the explosion sunk several vessels in the Rhine; after which, the remainder of the garrison surrendered the place. The Prince of Orange retook it in 1633. Four years afterwards, the Spaniards at|tempted to surprise it in the night; but the Deputy Governor and others, who perceived that the garrison could not be immediately collected, passed the walls, and, pretending to be deserters, mingled

with the enemy, whom they persuaded to delay the attack for a few minutes. The troops within were in the mean time prepared for their defence, and succeeded in it; but the Governor, with two officers and fifteen soldiers who had accompanied him, being discovered, were killed. All these contests were for a place not belonging to either party, being in the electorate of Cologne, but which was va|luable to both, for its neighbourhood to their frontiers.

Beyond Rheinberg, our prospects were extensive, but not so woody, or so rich as those of the day before, and few villages enlivened the landscape. Open corn lands, intermixed with fields of turnips, spread to a considerable distance, on both sides; on the east, the high ridges of the Westphalian mountains shut up the scene. The Rhine, which frequently swept near the road, shewed a broad surface, though shrunk within its sandy shores by the dryness of the season. Not a single vessel animated its current, which was here tame and smooth, though often interrupted by sands, that rose above its level.

HOOGSTRASS.

THE next town was Hoogstrass, a post station, fifteen miles from Xanten, of which we saw little more than the inn, the other part of this small place being out of the road. A large house, which might have been easily made convenient, and was really not without plenty, confirmed our notion, that, at the post stages, there would always be some accommodation. We dined here, and were well at|tended. The landlord, a young man who had served in the army of the country, and appeared by his dress to have gained some promo|tion, was very industrious in the house, during this interval of his other employments.

The next stage was of eighteen miles, which make a German post and an half; and, during this space, we passed by only one town, Ordingen, or Urdingen, the greatest part of which spread between the road and the Rhine.

Towards evening, the country became more woody, and the slen|der spires of convents frequently appeared, sheltered in their groves and surrounded by corn lands of their own domain. One of these, nearer to the road, was a noble mansion, and, with its courts, offices and gardens, spread over a considerable space. A summer-house,

built over the garden wall, had no windows towards the road, but there were several small apertures, which looked upon it and beyond to a large tract of inclosed wood, the property of the convent.

NEUSS.

SOON after sun-set, we came to Neuss, which, as it is a post town, and was mentioned as far off as Xanten, we had been sure would afford a comfortable lodging, whether there were any vestiges, or not, of its ancient and modern history. The view of it, at some little distance, did not altogether contradict this notion, for it stands upon a gentle ascent, and the spires of several convents might justly give ideas of a considerable town to those, who had not learned how slightly such symptoms are to be attended to in Germany.

On each side of the gate, cannon balls of various sizes remain in the walls. Within, you enter immediately into a close street of high, but dirty stone houses, from which you expect to escape presently, supposing it to be only some wretched quarter, appropriated to disease and misfortune. You see no passengers, but, at the door of every house, an haggard group of men and women stare upon you with looks of hungry rage, rather than curiosity, and their gaunt figures

excite, at first, more fear than pity. Continuing to look for the bet|ter quarter, and to pass between houses, that seem to have been left after a siege and never entered since, the other gate of the town at length appears, which you would rather pass at midnight than stop at any place yet perceived. Within a small distance of the gate, there is, however, a house with a wider front, and windows of unshattered glass and walls not quite as black as the others, which is known to be the inn only because the driver stops there, for, according to the etiquette of sullenness in Germany, the people of the house make no shew of receiving you.

If it had not already appeared, that there was no other inn, you might learn it from the manners of the two hostesses and their servants. Some sort of accommodation is, however, to be had; and those, who have been longer from the civilities and assiduities of similar places in England, may, by more submission and more patience, obtain it sooner than we did. By these means they may reduce all their difficulties into one, that of determining whether the windows shall be open or shut; whether they will endure the close|ness of the rooms, or will admit air, loaded with the feculence of putrid kennels, that stagnate along the whole town.

This is the Novesium of Tacitus, the entrance of the thirteenth legion into which he relates, at a time when the Rhine, incognita illi coelo siccitate, became vix navium patiens, and which VOCULA was soon after compelled to surrender by the treachery of other leaders and the corruption of his army, whom he addressed, just before his

murder, in the fine speech, beginning,

"Nunquam apud vos verba feci, aut pro vobis solicitior, aut pro me securior;

a passage so near to the cunctisque timentem, securumque sui, by which LUCAN describes CATO, that it must be supposed to have been inspired by it.

This place stood a siege, for twelve months, against 60,000 men, commanded by CHARLES the BOLD, Duke of Burgundy, and succeeded in its resistance. But, in 1586, when it held out for GEBHERT DE TRUSCHES, an Elector of Cologne, expelled by his Chapter, for having married, it was the scene of a dreadful calamity. FARNESE, the Spanish General, who had just taken Venlo, marched against it with an army, enraged at having lost the plunder of that place by a capitulation. When the inhabitants of Neuss were upon the point of surrendering it, upon similar terms, the army, resolving not to lose another prey of blood and gold, rushed to the assault, set fire to the place, and murdered all the inhabitants, except a few women and children, who took refuge in two churches, which alone were saved from the flames.

When the first shock of the surprise, indignation and pity, excited by the mention of such events, is overcome, we are, of course, anxious to ascertain whether the perpetrators of them were previously distinguished by a voluntary entrance into situations, that could be supposed to mark their characters. This was the army of Philip the Second. The soldiers were probably, for the most part, forced into the service. The officers, of whom only two are related to have opposed the massacre, could not have been so.

What was then the previous distinction of the officers of Philip the Second? But it is not proper to enter into a discussion here of the nature of their employment.

Neuss was rebuilt, on the same spot; the situation being conve|nient for an intercourse with the eastern shore of the Rhine, espe|cially with Dusseldorff, to which it is nearly opposite. The ancient walls were partly restored by the French, in 1602. One of the churches, spared by the Spaniards, was founded by a daughter of CHARLEMAGNE, in the ninth century, and is now attached to the Chapter of Noble Ladies of St. Quirin; besides which there are a Chapter of Canons, and five or six convents in the place.

COLOGNE.

FROM Neuss hither we passed through a deep, sandy road, that sometimes wound near the Rhine, the shores of which were yet low and the water tame and shallow. There were no vessels upon it, to give one ideas either of the commerce, or the population of its banks.

The country, for the greater part of twenty miles, was a flat of corn lands; but, within a short distance of Cologne, a gentle rise affords a view of the whole city, whose numerous towers and

steeples had before appeared, and of the extensive plains, that spread round it. In the southern perspective of these, at the distance of about eight leagues, rise the fantastic forms of what are called the Seven Mountains; westward, are the cultivated hills, that extend towards Flanders; and, eastward, over the Rhine, the distant moun|tains, that run through several countries of interior Germany. Over the wild and gigantic features of the Seven Mountains dark thun|der mists soon spread an awful obscurity, and heightened the ex|pectation, which this glimpse of them had awakened, concerning the scenery we were approaching.

The appearance of Cologne, at the distance of one, or two miles, is not inferior to the conception, which a traveller may have already formed of one of the capitals of Germany, should his mind have obeyed that almost universal illusion of fancy, which dresses up the images of places unseen, as soon as much expectation, or attention is directed towards them. The air above is crowded with the towers and spires of churches and convents, among which the cathedral, with its huge, unfinished mass, has a striking appearance. The walls are also high enough to be observed, and their whole inclosure seems, at a distance, to be thickly filled with buildings.

We should have known ourselves to be in the neighbourhood of some place larger than usual, from the sight of two, or three car|riages, at once, on the road; nearly the first we had seen in Germany. There is besides some shew of labour in the adjoining villages; but the sallow countenances and miserable air of the people prove, that

it is not a labour beneficial to them. The houses are only the desolated homes of these villagers; for there is not one that can be supposed to belong to any prosperous inhabitant of the city, or to afford the coveted stillness, in which the active find an occasional reward, and the idle a perpetual misery.

A bridge over a dry fossé leads to the northern gate, on each side of which a small modern battery defends the ancient walls. The city is not fortified, according to any present sense of the term, but is surrounded by these walls and by a ditch, of which the latter, near the northern gate, serves as a sort of kitchen garden to the inhabitants.

Before passing the inner gate, a soldier demanded our names, and we shewed our passport, for the first time; but, as the inquisitor did not understand French, in which language passports from England are written, it was handed to his comrades, who formed a circle about our chaise, and began, with leaden looks, to spell over the paper. Some talked, in the mean time, of examining the bag|gage; and the money, which we gave to prevent this, being in various pieces and in Prussian coin, which is not perfectly understood here, the whole party turned from the passport, counting and estimating the money in the hand of their collector, as openly as if it had been a legal tribute. When this was done and they had heard, with sur|prise, that we had not determined where to lodge, being inclined to take the pleasantest inn, we wrote our names in the corporal's dirty book, and were allowed to drive, under a dark tower, into the city.

Instantly, the narrow street, gloomy houses, stagnant kennels and wretchedly looking people reminded us of the horrors of Neuss. The lower windows of these prison-like houses are so strongly barricadoed, that we had supposed the first two, or three, to be really parts of a gaol; but it soon appeared, that this profusion of heavy iron work was intended to exclude, not to confine, robbers. A succession of nar|row streets, in which the largest houses were not less disgusting than the others for the filthiness of their windows, doorways and massy walls, continued through half the city. In one of these streets, or lanes, the postillion stopped at the door of an inn, which he said was the best; but the suffocating air of the street rendered it unnecessary to enquire, whether, contrary to appearances, there could be any accom|modation within, and, as we had read of many squares, or market|places, he was desired to stop at an inn, situated in one of these. Thus we came to the Hotel de Prague, a large straggling building, said to be not worse than the others, for wanting half its furniture, and probably superior to them, by having a landlord of better than German civility.

Having counted from our windows the spires of ten, or twelve churches, or convents, we were at leisure to walk farther into the city, and to look for the spacious squares, neat streets, noble public buildings and handsome houses, which there could be no doubt must be found in an Imperial and Electoral city, seated on the Rhine, at a point where the chief roads from Holland and Flanders join those of Germany, treated by all writers as a considerable place, and evidently

by its situation capable of becoming a sort of emporium for the three countries. The spot, into which our inn opened, though a parallelo|gram of considerable extent, bordered by lime trees, we passed quick|ly through, perceiving, that the houses on all its sides were mean buildings, and therefore such as could not deserve the attention in the Imperial and Electoral city of Cologne. There are streets from each angle of this place, and we pursued them all in their turn, narrow, winding and dirty as they are, pestilent with kennels, gloomy from the height and blackness of the houses, unadorned by any public buildings, except the churches, that were grand, or by one private dwelling, that appeared to be clean, with little shew of traffic and less of passengers, either busy, or gay, till we saw them ending in other streets still worse, or concluded by the gates of the city. One of them, indeed, led through a market-place, in which the air is free from the feculence of the streets, but which is inferior to the other opening in space, and not better surrounded by buildings.

"These diminutive observations seem to take away something from the dignity of writing, and therefore are never communicated, but with hesitation, and a little fear of abasement and contempt* 1.1."

And it is not only because they take away something from the dig|nity of writing, that such observations are withheld. To be thought capable of commanding more pleasures and preventing more inconve|niences than others is a too general passport to respect; and, in the ordinary affairs of life, for one, that will shew somewhat less pro|sperity than he has, in order to try who will really respect him,

thousands exert themselves to assume an appearance of more, which they might know can procure only the mockery of esteem for them|selves, and the reality of it for their supposed conditions. Authors are not always free from a willingness to receive the fallacious sort of respect, that attaches to accidental circumstances, for the real sort, of which it would be more reasonable to be proud. A man, relating part of the history of his life, which is always necessarily done by a writer of travels, does not choose to shew that his course could lie through any scenes deficient of delights; or that, if it did, he was not enough elevated by his friends, importance, fortune, fame, or busi|ness, to be incapable of observing them minutely. The curiosities of cabinets and of courts are, therefore, exactly described, and as much of every occurrence as does not shew the relater moving in any of the plainer walks of life; but the difference between the stock of physical comforts in different countries, the character of conditions, if the phrase may be used, such as it appears in the ordinary circum|stances of residence, dress, food, cleanliness, opportunities of relaxa|tion; in short, the information, which all may gain, is sometimes left to be gained by all, not from the book, but from travel. A writer, issuing into the world, makes up what he mistakes for his best appearance, and is continually telling his happiness, or shewing his good-humour, as people in a promenade always smile, and always look round to observe whether they are seen smiling. The politest salutation of the Chinese, when they meet, is,

"Sir, prosperity is painted on your countenance;"

or,

"your whole air announces

your felicity;"

and the writers of travels, especially since the censure thrown upon SMOLLET, seem to provide, that their prosperity shall be painted on their volumes, and all their observations announce their felicity.

Cologne, though it bears the name of the Electorate, by which it is surrounded, is an imperial city; and the Elector, as to temporal affairs, has very little jurisdiction within it. The government has an affecta|tion of being formed upon the model of Republican Rome; a form certainly not worthy of imitation, but which is as much disgraced by this burlesque of it, as ancient statues are by the gilding and the wigs, with which they are said to be sometimes arrayed by modern hands. There is a senate of forty-nine persons, who, being returned at dif|ferent times of the year, are partly nominated by the remaining members, and partly chosen by twenty-two tribes of burgesses, or rather by so many companies of traders. Of six burgomasters, two are in office every third year, and, when these appear in public, they are preceded by LICTORS, bearing fasces, surmounted by their own arms! Each of the tribes, or companies, has a President, and the twenty-two Presidents form a Council, which is authorised to enquire into the conduct of the Senate: but the humbleness of the burgesses in their individual condition has virtually abolished all this scheme of a political constitution. Without some of the intelligence and per|sonal independence, which are but little consistent with the general poverty and indolence of German traders, nothing but the forms of any constitution can be preserved, long after the virtual destruction of

it has been meditated by those in a better condition. The greater part of these companies of traders having, in fact, no trade which can place them much above the rank of menial servants to their rich customers, the design, that their Council shall check the Senate, and the Senate direct the Burgomasters, has now, of course, little effect. And this, or a still humbler condition, is that of several cities in Ger|many, called free and independent, in which the neighbouring sove|reigns have scarcely less authority, though with something more of circumstance, than in their own dominions.

The constitution of Cologne permits, indeed, some direct interfer|ence of the Elector; for the Tribunal of Appeal, which is the supreme court of law, is nominated by him: he has otherwise no direct power within the city; and, being forbidden to reside there more than three days successively, he does not even retain a palace, but is contented with a suite of apartments, reserved for his use at an inn. That this exclusion is no punishment, those, who have ever passed two days at Cologne, will admit; and it can tend very little to lessen his influence, for the greatest part of his personal expenditure must reach the mer|chants of the place; and the officers of several of his territorial juris|dictions make part of the inhabitants. His residences, with which he is remarkably well provided, are at Bonn; at Bruhl, a palace between Cologne and that place; at Poppelsdorff, which is beyond it; at Her|zogs Freud, an hunting seat; and in Munster, of which he is the Bishop.

The duties of customs and excise are imposed by the magistrates of

the city, and these enable them to pay their contributions to the Ger|manic fund; for, though such cities are formally independent of the neighbouring princes and nobility, they are not so of the general laws or expences of the empire, in the Diet of which they have some small share, forty-nine cities being allowed to send two representatives, and thus to have two votes out of an hundred and thirty-six. These duties, of both sorts, are very high at Cologne; and the first form a consider|able part of the interruptions, which all the States upon the Rhine give to the commerce of that river. Here also commodities, in|tended to be carried beyond the city by water, must be re-shipped; for, in order to provide cargoes for the boatmen of the place, vessels from the lower parts of the Rhine are not allowed to ascend beyond Cologne, and those from the higher parts cannot descend it farther. They may, indeed, reload with other cargoes for their return; and, as they constantly do so, the Cologne boatmen are not much benefited by the regulation; but the transfer of the goods employs some hands, subjects them better to the inspection of the customhouse officers, and makes it necessary for the merchants of places, on both sides, trading with each other, to have intermediate correspondents here. Yet, notwithstanding all this aggression upon the freedom of trade, Cologne is less considerable as a port, than some Dutch towns, never mentioned in a book, and is inferior, perhaps, to half the minor sea|ports in England. We could not find more than thirty vessels of burthen against the quay, all mean and ill-built, except the Dutch, which are very large, and, being constructed purposely for a tedious navigation, contain apartments upon the deck for the family of the

skipper, well furnished, and so commodious as to have four or five sashed windows on each side, generally gay with flower-pots. Little flower-gardens, too, sometimes formed upon the roof of the cabin, increase the domestic comforts of the skipper; and the neatness of his vessel can, perhaps, be equalled only by that of a Dutch house. In a time of perfect peace, there is no doubt more traffic; but, from what we saw of the general means and occasions of commerce in Germany, we cannot suppose it to be much reduced by war. Wealthy and commercial countries may be injured immensely by making war either for Germany or against it; by too much friendship or too much enmity; but Germany itself cannot be proportionately injured with them, except when it is the scene of actual violence. Englishmen, who feel, as they always must, the love of their own country much increased by the view of others, should be induced, at every step, to wish, that there may be as little political intercourse as possible, either of friendship or enmity, between the blessings of their Island and the wretchedness of the Continent.

Our inn had formerly been a convent, and was in a part of the town where such societies are more numerous than elsewhere. At five o'clock, on the Sunday after our arrival, the bells of churches and convents began to sound on all sides, and there was scarcely any entire intermission of them till evening. The places of public amuse|ment, chiefly a sort of tea-gardens, were then set open, and, in many streets, the sound of music and dancing was heard almost as plainly as that of the bells had been before; a disgusting excess of licentious|ness,

which appeared in other instances, for we heard, at the same time, the voices of a choir on one side of the street, and the noise of a billiard table on the other. Near the inn, this contrast was more observable. While the strains of revelry arose from an adjoining garden, into which our windows opened, a pause in the music allowed us to catch some notes of the vesper service, performing in a convent of the order of Clarisse, only three or four doors beyond. Of the severe rules of this society we had been told in the morning. The members take a vow, not only to renounce the world, but their dearest friends, and are never after permitted to see even their fathers or mothers, though they may sometimes converse with the latter from behind a curtain. And, lest some lingering remains of filial affection should tempt an unhappy nun to lift the veil of separation between herself and her mother, she is not allowed to speak even with her, but in the presence of the abbess. Accounts of such hor|rible perversions of human reason make the blood thrill and the teeth chatter. Their fathers they can never speak to, for no man is suf|fered to be in any part of the convent used by the sisterhood, nor, indeed, is admitted beyond the gate, except when there is a necessity for repairs, when all the votaries of the order are previously secluded. It is not easily, that a cautious mind becomes convinced of the exist|ence of such severe orders; when it does, astonishment at the artificial miseries, which the ingenuity of human beings forms for themselves by seclusion, is as boundless as at the other miseries, with which the most trivial vanity and envy so frequently pollute the intercourses of social life. The poor nuns, thus nearly entombed during their lives,

are, after death, tied upon a board, in the clothes they die in, and, with only their veils thrown over the face, are buried in the garden of the convent.

During this day, Trinity Sunday, processions were passing on all sides, most of them attended by some sort of martial music. Many of the parishes, of which there are nineteen, paraded with their officers; and the burgesses, who are distributed into eight corps, under a supposition that they could and would defend the city, if it was attacked, presented their captains at the churches. The host accompanied all these processions. A party of the city guards fol|lowed, and forty or fifty persons out of uniform, the representatives probably of the burgesses, who are about six thousand, succeeded. Besides the guards, there was only one man in uniform, who, in the burlesque dress of a drum-major, entertained the populace by a kind of extravagant marching dance, in the middle of the procession. Our companion would not tell us that this was the captain.

The cathedral, though unfinished, is conspicuous, amongst a great number of churches, for the dignity of some detached features, that shew part of the vast design formed for the whole. It was begun, in 1248, by the Elector Conrad, who is related, in an hexameter inscrip|tion over a gate, to have laid the first stone himself. In 1320, the choir was finished, and the workmen continued to be employed upon the other parts in 1499, when of two towers, destined to be 580 feet above the roof, one had risen 21 feet, and the other 150 feet, accord|ing to the measurement mentioned in a printed description. We did not learn at what period the design of completing the edifice was

abandoned; but the original founder lived to see all the treasures expended, which he had collected for the purpose. In its present state, the inequality of its vast towers renders it a striking object at a considerable distance; and, from the large unfilled area around it, the magnificence of its Gothic architecture, especially of some parts, which have not been joined to the rest, and appear to be the ruined remains, rather than the commencement of a work, is viewed with awful delight.

In the interior of the cathedral, a fine choir leads to an altar of black marble, raised above several steps, which, being free from the incongruous ornaments usual in Romish churches, is left to impress the mind by its majestic plainness The tall painted windows above, of which there are six, are superior in richness of colouring and design to any we ever saw; beyond even those in the Chapter-house at York, and most resembling the very fine ones in the cathedral of Can|terbury. The nave is deformed by a low wooden roof, which appears to have been intended only as a temporary covering, and should certainly be succeeded by one of equal dignity to the vast columns placed for its support, whether the other parts of the original design can ever be completed or not.

By some accident we did not see the tomb of the three kings of Jerusalem, whose bodies are affirmed to have been brought here from Milan in 1162, when the latter city was destroyed by the Emperor Frederic Barbarossa. Their boasted treasures of golden crowns and diamonds pass, of course, without our estimation.

A description of the churches in Cologne, set out with good antiquarian minuteness, would fill volumes. The whole number of churches, chapters and chapels, which last are by far the most nu|merous, is not less than eighty, and none are without an history of two or three centuries. They are all opened on Sundays; and we can believe, that the city may contain, as is asserted, 40,000 souls, for nearly all that we saw were well attended. In one, indeed, the congregation consisted only of two or three females, kneeling at a great distance from the altar, with an appearance of the utmost intentness upon the service, and abstraction from the noise of the processions, that could be easily heard within. They were entirely covered with a loose black drapery; whether for penance, or not, we did not hear. In the cathedral, a figure in the same attitude was rendered more interesting by her situation beneath the broken arches and shattered fret-work of a painted window, through which the rays of the sun scarcely penetrated to break the shade she had chosen.

Several of the chapels are not much larger than an ordinary apart|ment, but they are higher, that the nuns of some adjoining convent may have a gallery, where, veiled from observation by a lawn curtain, their voices often mingle sweetly with the choir. There are thirty-nine convents of women and nineteen of men, which are sup|posed to contain about fifteen hundred persons. The chapters, of which some are noble and extremely opulent, support nearly four hundred more; and there are said to be, upon the whole, between two and three thousand persons, under religious denominations, in

Cologne. Walls of convents and their gardens appear in every street, but do not attract notice, unless, as frequently happens, their bell sounds while you are passing. Some of their female inhabitants may be seen in various parts of the city, for there is an order, the members of which are employed, by rotation, in teaching children and attending the sick. Those of the noble chapters are little more confined than if they were with their own families, being permitted to visit their friends, to appear at balls and promenades, to wear what dresses they please, except when they chaunt in the choir, and to quit the chapter, if the offer of an acceptable marriage induces their families to authorise it; but their own admission into the chapter proves them to be noble by sixteen quarterings, or four generations, and the offer must be from a person of equal rank, or their descend|ants could not be received into similar chapters; an important cir|cumstance in the affairs of the German noblesse.

Some of these ladies we saw in the church of their convent. Their habits were remarkably graceful; robes of lawn and black silk flowed from the shoulder, whence a quilled ruff, somewhat resembling that of Queen Elizabeth's time, spread round the neck. The hair was in curls, without powder, and in the English fashion. Their voices were peculiarly sweet, and they sung the responses with a kind of plaintive tenderness, that was extremely interesting.

The Jesuits' church is one of the grandest in Cologne, and has the greatest display of paintings over its numerous altars, as well as of marble pillars. The churches of the chapters are, for the most part, very large, and endowed with the richest ornaments, which are, how|ever,

not shewn to the public, except upon days of fête. We do not remember to have seen that of the chapter of St. Ursula, where heads and other relics are said to be handed to you from shelves, like books in a library; nor that of the convent of Jacobins, where some MSS. and other effects of Albert the Great, bishop of Ratisbon, are among the treasures of the monks.

Opposite to the Jesuits' church was an hospital for wounded sol|diers, several of whom were walking in the court yard before it, half|cloathed in dirty woollen, through which the bare arms of many appeared. Sickness and neglect had subdued all the symptoms of a soldier; and it was impossible to distinguish the wounded French from the others, though we were assured that several of that nation were in the crowd. The windows of the hospital were filled with figures still more wretched. There was a large assemblage of specta|tors, who looked as if they were astonished to see, that war is com|pounded of something else, besides the glories, of which it is so easy to be informed.

The soldiery of Cologne are under the command of the magistrates, and are employed only within the gates of the city. The whole body does not exceed an hundred and fifty, whom we saw reviewed by their colonel, in the place before the Hotel de Prague. The uni|form is red, faced with white. The men wear whiskers, and affect an air of ferocity, but appear to be mostly invalids, who have grown old in their guard-houses.

Protestants, though protected in their persons, are not allowed the exercise of their religion within the walls of the city, but have a cha|pel

in a village on the other side of the Rhine. As some of the chief merchants, and those who are most useful to the inhabitants, are of the reformed church, they ventured lately to request that they might have a place of worship within the city; but they received the common answer, which opposes all sort of improvement, religious or civil, that, though the privilege in itself might be justly required, it could not be granted, because they would then think of asking some|thing more.

The government of Cologne in ecclesiastical affairs is with the Elector, as archbishop, and the Chapter as his council. In civil mat|ters, though the city constitution is of little effect, the real power is not so constantly with him as might be supposed; those, who have influence, being sometimes out of his interest. Conversation, as we were told, was scarcely less free than in Holland, where there is justly no opposition to any opinion, however improper, or absurd, except from the reason of those, who hear it. On that account, and because of its easy intercourse with Brussels and Spa, this city is somewhat the resort of strangers, by whom such conversation is, perhaps, chiefly carried on; but those must come from very wretched countries, who can find pleasure in a residence at Cologne.

Amongst the public buildings must be reckoned the Theatre, of which we did not see the inside, there being no performance, during our stay, except on Sunday. This, it seems, may be opened, with|out offence to the Magistrates, though a protestant church may not. It stands in a row of small houses, from which it is distinguished only by a painted front, once tawdry and now dirty, with the inscrip|tion,

"Musis Gratiisque decentibus."

The Town-house is an awk|ward and irregular stone building. The arsenal, which is in one of the narrowest streets, we should have passed, without notice, if it had not been pointed out to us. As a building, it is nothing more than such as might be formed out of four or five of the plainest houses laid into one. Its contents are said to be chiefly antient arms, of various fashions and sizes, not very proper for modern use.

BONN.

AFTER a stay of nearly three tedious days, we left Cologne for Bonn, passing through an avenue of limes, which extends from one place to the other, without interruption, except where there is a small half way village. The distance is not less than eighteen miles, and the diversified culture of the plains, through which it passes, is unusually grateful to the eye, after the dirty buildings of Cologne and the long uniformity of corn lands in the approach to it. Vines cover a great part of these plains, and are here first seen in Germany, except, indeed, within the walls of Cologne itself, which contain many large inclosures, converted from gardens and orchards into well sheltered vineyards. The vines reminded us of English hop plants, being set, like them, in rows, and led round poles to various heights, though all less than that of hops. Corn, fruit or herbs were frequently growing between the rows, whose light green foliage mingled beautifully with yellow wheat and larger patches of garden plantations, that spread, without any

inclosures, to the sweeping Rhine, on the left. Beyond, appeared the blue ridges of Westphalian mountains. On the right, the plains extend to a chain of lower and less distant hills, whose skirts are covered with vines and summits darkened with thick woods.

The Elector's palace of Bruhl is on the right hand of the road, at no great distance, but we were not told, till afterwards, of the mag|nificent architecture and furniture, which ought to have attracted our curiosity.

On a green and circular hill, near the Rhine, stands the Bene|dictine abbey of Siegbourg, one of the first picturesque objects of the rich approach to Bonn; and, further on, the castle-like towers of a convent of noble ladies; both societies celebrated for their wealth and the pleasantness of their situations, which command extensive prospects over the country, on each side of the river. As we drew near Bonn, we frequently caught, between the trees of the avenue, imperfect, but awakening glimpses of the pointed mountains beyond; contrasted with the solemn grandeur of which was the beauty of a round woody hill, apparently separated from them only by the Rhine and crowned with the spire of a comely convent. Bonn, with tall slender steeples and the trees of its ramparts, thus backed by sublime mountains, looks well, as you approach it from Cologne, though neither its noble palace, nor the Rhine, which washes its walls, are seen from hence.

We were asked our names at the gate, but had no trouble about passports, or baggage. A long and narrow street leads from thence to the market place, not disgusting you either with the gloom, or the

dirt of Cologne, though mean houses are abundantly intermixed with the others, and the best are far from admirable. The phy|siognomy of the place, if one may use the expression, is wholesome, though humble. By the recommendation of a Dutch merchant, we went to an inn in another street, branching from the market place, and found it the cleanest, since we had left Holland.

Bonn may be called the political capital of the country, the Elector's Court being held only there; and, what would not be expected, this has importance enough to command the residence of an agent from almost every Power in Europe. The present Elector being the uncle of the Emperor, this attention is, perhaps, partly paid, with the view, that it may be felt at the Court of Vienna. Even Russia is not unrepresented in this miniature State.

The Elector's palace is, in point of grandeur, much better fitted to be the scene of diplomatic ceremonies, than those of many greater Sovereigns; and it is fitted also for better than diplomatic purposes, being placed before some of the most striking of nature's features, of which it is nearly as worthy an ornament as art can make. It is seated on the western bank of the Rhine, the general course of which it fronts, though it forms a considerable angle with the part imme|diately nearest. The first emotion, on perceiving it, being that of admiration, at its vastness, the wonder is, of course, equal, with which you discover, that it is only part of a greater design. It con|sists of a centre and an eastern wing, which are completed, and of a western wing, of which not half is yet raised. The extent from east to west is so great, that, if we had enquired the measurement,

we should have been but little assisted in giving an idea of the spec|tacle, exhibited by so immense a building.

It is of stone, of an architecture, perhaps, not adequate to the grandeur of its extent, but which fills no part with unsuitable, or inelegant ornaments. Along the whole garden front, which is the chief, a broad terrace supports a promenade and an orangery of noble trees, occasionally refreshed by fountains, that, ornamented with statues, rise from marble bafons. An arcade through the centre of the palace leads to this terrace, from whence the prospect is strik|ingly beautiful and sublime. The eye passes over the green lawn of the garden and a tract of level country to the groupe, called the Seven Mountains, broken, rocky and abrupt towards their sum|mits, yet sweeping finely near their bases, and uniting with the plains by long and gradual descents, that spread round many miles. The nearest is about a league and a half off. We saw them under the cloudless sky of June, invested with the mistiness of heat, which, softening their rocky points, and half veiling their recesses, left much for the imagination to supply, and gave them an aërial appearance, a faint tint of silvery grey, that was inexpressibly interesting. The Rhine, that winds at their feet, was concealed from us by the garden groves, but from the upper windows of the palace it is seen in all its majesty.

On the right from this terrace, the smaller palace of Poppelsdorff terminates a long avenue of limes and chesnut trees, that commu|nicates with both buildings, and above are the hill and the convent Sanctae Crucis, the latter looking out from among sirs and shrubby

steeps. From thence the western horizon is bounded by a range of hills, cloathed to their summits with wood. The plain, that extends between these and the Rhine, is cultivated with vines and corn, and the middle distance is marked by a pyramidal mountain, darkened by wood and crowned with the tower and walls of a ruined castle.

The gardens of the palace are formally laid out in straight walks and alleys of cut trees; but the spacious lawn between these gives fine effect to the perspective of the distant mountains; and the bowery walks, while they afford refreshing shelter from a summer sun, allow partial views of the palace and the romantic landscape.

It was the Elector Joseph Clement, the same who repaired the city, left in a ruinous state by the siege of 1703, under the Duke of Marlborough, that built this magnificent residence. There are in it many suites of state rooms and every sort of apartment usual in the mansions of Sovereigns; saloons of audience and ceremony, a library, a cabinet of natural history and a theatre. Though these are readily opened to strangers, we are to confess, that we did not see them, being prevented by the attentions of those, whose civi|lities gave them a right to command us, while their situations enabled them to point out the best occupation of our time. The hall of the grand master of the Teutonic order, ornamented with portraits of all the grand masters, we are, however, sorry to have neglected even for the delights of Poppelsdorff, which we were pre|sently shewn.

Leaving the palace, we passed through the garden, on the right, to a fine avenue of turf, nearly a mile long, bordered by alleys of

tall trees, and so wide, that the late Elector had designed to form a canal in the middle of it, for an opportunity of passing between his palaces, by land, or water, as he might wish. The palace of Poppelsdorff terminates the perspective of this avenue. It is a small building, surrounded by its gardens, in a taste not very good, and remarkable chiefly for the pleasantness of its situation. An arcade, encompassing a court in the interior, communicates with all the apartments on the ground floor, which is the principal, and with the gardens, on the eastern side of the chateau. The entrance is through a small hall, decorated with the ensigns of hunting, and round nearly the whole arcade stags' heads are placed, at equal distances. These have remained here, since the reign of Clement Augustus, the founder of the palace, who died in 1761; and they exhibit some part of the history of his life; for, under each, is an inscription, relating the events and date of the hunt, by which he killed it. There are twenty-three such ornaments.

The greatest part of the furniture had been removed, during the approach of the French, in 1792; and the Archduchess Maria Christina, to whom the Elector, her brother, had lent the chateau, was now very far from sumptuously accommodated. On this account, she passed much of her time, at Goodesberg, a small watering place in the neighbourhood. After her retreat from Brussels, in conse|quence of the advances of the French in the same year, she had accompanied her husband, the Duke of Saxe Teschen, into Saxony; but, since his appointment to the command of the Emperor's army

of the Upper Rhine, her residence had been established in the domi|nions of her brother.

We were shewn through her apartments, which she had left for Goodesberg, a few hours before. On the table of her sitting room lay the fragments of a painted cross, composed of small pieces, like our dissected maps, the putting of which together exercises inge|nuity and passes, perhaps, for a sort of piety. The attendant said, that it served to pass the time; but it cannot be supposed, that rank and fortune have so little power to bestow happiness, as that their possessors should have recourse to such means of lightening the hours of life.

On another table, was spread a map of all the countries, then included in the Theatre of War, and on it a box, filled with small pieces of various coloured wax, intended to mark the positions of the different armies. These were of many shades, for the Arch|duchess, who is said to be conversant with military affairs and to have descended to the firing of bombs at the siege of Lisle, was able to distinguish the several corps of the allied armies, that were acting separately from each other. The positions were marked up to the latest accounts then public. The course of her thoughts was visible from this chart, and they were interesting to curiosity, being those of the sister of the late unfortunate Queen of France.

The walls of an adjoining cabinet were ornamented with draw|ings from the antique by the Archduchess, disposed upon a light ground and serving instead of tapestry.

The chapel is a rotunda, rising into a dome, and, though small, is splendid with painting and gilding. In the centre are four altars, formed on the four sides of a square pedestal, that supports a figure of our Saviour; but the beauty of this design is marred by the vanity of placing near each altar the statue of a founder of the Teutonic order. The furniture of the Elector's gallery is of crimson velvet and gold.

On another side of the chateau, we were shewn an apartment entirely covered with grotto work, and called the hall of shells; a curious instance of patient industry, having been completed by one man, during a labour of many years. Its situation in the middle of an inhabited mansion is unsuitable to the character of a grotto; but its coolness must render it a very convenient retreat, and the like|nesses of animals, as well as the other forms, into which the shells are thrown, though not very elegant, are fanciful enough, especially as the ornaments of fountains, which play into several parts of the room.

Leaving the palace by the bridge of a moat, that nearly surrounds it, we passed through the pleasant village of Poppelsdorff, and ascended the hill SANCTAE CRUCIS, called so from the convent of the same name, which occupies its summit. The road wound between thick woods, but we soon left it for a path, that led more immediately to the summit, among shrubs and plantations of larch and fir, and which opened into easy avenues of turf, that sometimes allowed momentary views of other woody points and of the plains

around. The turf was uncommonly fragrant and fine, abounding with plants, which made us regret the want of a Botanist's know|ledge and pleasures. During the ascent, the peaked tops of the mountains of the Rhine, so often admired below, began to appear above a ridge of dark woods, very near us, in a contrast of hues, which was exquisitely fine. It was now near evening; the mistiness of heat was gone from the surface of these mountains, and they had assumed a blue tint so peculiar and clear, that they appeared upon the sky, like supernatural transparencies.

We had heard, at Bonn, of the Capuchins' courtesy, and had no hesitation to knock at their gate, after taking some rest in the portico of the church, from whence we looked down another side of the mountain, over the long plains between Bonn and Cologne. Having waited some time at the gate, during which many steps fled along the passage and the head of a monk appeared peeping through a window above, a servant admitted us into a parlour, adjoining the refectory, which appeared to have been just left. This was the first convent we had entered, and we could not help expecting to see more than others had described; an involuntary habit, from which few are free, and which need not be imputed to vanity, so long as the love of surprise shall be so visible in human pursuits. When the lay-brother had quitted us, to inform the superior of our re|quest, not a footstep, or a voice approached, for near a quarter of an hour, and the place seemed as if uninhabited. Our curiosity had no indulgence within the room, which was of the utmost plainness,

and that plainness free from any thing, that the most tractable ima|gination could suppose peculiar to a convent. At length, a monk appeared, who received us with infinite good humour, and with the ease which must have been acquired in more general society. His shaven head and black garments formed a whimsical contrast to the character of his person and countenance, which bore no symptoms of sorrow, or penance, and were, indeed, animated by an air of cheer|fulness and intelligence, that would have become the happiest inha|bitant of the gayest city.

Through some silent passages, in which he did not shew us a cell and we did not perceive another monk, we passed to the church, where the favour of several Electors has assisted the display of paintings, marble, sculpture, gold and silver, mingled and arranged with magni|ficent effect. Among these was the marble statue, brought from England, at a great expence, and here called a representation of St. Anne, who is said to have found the Cross. Our conductor seemed to be a man of good understanding and desirous of being thought so; a disposition, which gave an awkwardness to his manner, when, in noticing a relic, he was obliged to touch upon some unproved and unimportant tradition, peculiar to his church and not essential to the least article of our faith. His sense of decorum as a member of the convent seemed then to be struggling with his vanity, as a man.

But there are relics here, pretending to a connection with some parts of christian history, which it is shocking to see introduced to

consideration by any means so trivial and so liable to ridicule. It is, indeed, wonderful, that the absurd exhibitions, made in Romish churches, should so often be minutely described, and dwelt upon in terms of ludicrous exultation by those, who do not intend that most malignant of offences against human nature, the endeavour to excite a wretched vanity by sarcasm and jest, and to employ it in eradi|cating the comforts of religion. To such writers, the probable mischief of uniting with the mention of the most important divine doctrines the most ridiculous of human impositions ought to be apparent; and, as the risk is unnecessary in a Protestant country, why is it encountered? That persons otherwise inclined should adopt these topics is not surprising; the easiest pretences to wit are found to be made by means of familiar allusions to sacred subjects, because their necessary incongruity accomplishes the greatest part of what, in other cases, must be done by wit itself; there will, therefore, never be an end of such allusions, till it is generally seen, that they are the resources and symptoms of mean understandings, urged by the feverish desire of an eminence, to which they feel themselves inadequate.

From the chapel we ascended to a tower of the convent, whence all the scattered scenes, of whose beauty, or sublimity, we had caught partial glimpses between the woods below, were collected into one vast landscape, and exhibited almost to a single glance. The point, on which the convent stands, commands the whole horizon. To the north, spread the wide plains, before seen, covered with corn,

then just embrowned, and with vines and gardens, whose alternate colours formed a gay checker work with villages, convents and castles. The grandeur of this level was unbroken by any inclosures, that could seem to diminish its vastness. The range of woody heights, that bound it on the west, extend to the southward, many leagues beyond the hill Sanctae Cruois; but the uniform and unbroken ridges of distant mountains, on the east, cease before the Seven Mountains rise above the Rhine in all their awful majesty. The bases of the latter were yet concealed by the woody ridge near the convent, which gives such enchanting effect to their aerial points. The sky above them was clear and glowing, unstained by the lightest vapour; and these mountains still appeared upon it, like unsubstantial visions. On the two highest pinnacles we could just distinguish the ruins of castles, and, on a lower precipice, a building, which our reverend guide pointed out as a convent, dedicated to St. Bernard, giving us new occasion to admire the fine taste of the monks in their choice of situations.

Opposite to the Seven Mountains, the plains of Goodesberg are screened by the chain of hills already mentioned, which begin in the neighbourhood of Cologne, and whose woods, spreading into France, there assume the name of the Forest of Ardennes. Within the recesses of these woods the Elector has a hunting-seat, almost every window of which opens upon a different alley, and not a stag can cross these without being seen from the chateau. It is melancholy to consider, that the most frequent motives of man's retirement among the beauti|ful

recesses of nature, are only those of destroying the innocent ani|mals that inhabit her shades. Strange! that her lovely scenes can|not soften his heart to milder pleasures, or elevate his fancy to nobler pursuits, and that he must still seek his amusement in scattering death among the harmless and the happy.

As we afterwards walked in the garden of the convent, the greater part of which was planted with vines, the monk further exhibited his good humour and liberality. He enquired concerning the events of the war, of which he appeared to know the latest; spoke of his friends in Cologne and other places; drew a ludicrous picture of the effect which would be produced by the appearance of a capuchin in Lon|don, and laughed immoderately at it.

"There,"

said he,

"it would be supposed, that some harlequin was walking in a capuchin's dress to attract spectators for a pantomime; here nobody will follow him, left he should lead them to church. Every nation has its way, and laughs at the ways of others. Considering the effects, which differ|ences sometimes have, there are few things more innocent than that sort of laughter."

The garden was stored with fruits and the vegetable luxuries of the table, but was laid out with no attention to beauty, its inimitable prospects having, as the good monk said, rendered the society care|less of less advantages. After exchanging our thanks for his civilities against his thanks for the visit, we descended to Poppelsdorff by a steep road, bordered with firs and fragrant shrubs, which frequently opened to corn lands and vineyards, where peasants were busied in dressing the vines.

About a mile from Bonn is a garden, or rather nursery, to which they have given the name of Va•…•…xhall. It is much more rural than that of London, being planted with thick and lofty groves, which, in this climate, are gratefully refreshing, during the summer-day, but are very pernicious in the evening, when the vapour, arising from the ground, cannot escape through the thick foliage. The garden is lighted up only on great festivals, or when the Elector or his courtiers give a ball in a large room built for the purpose. On some days, half the inhabitants of Bonn are to be seen in this garden, mingling in the promenade with the Elector and his nobility; but there were few visitors when we saw it. Count GIMNICH, the com|mander, who had surrendered Mentz to the French, was the only person pointed out to us.

The road from hence to Bonn was laid out and planted with pop|lars at the expence of the Elector, who has a taste for works of pub|lic advantage and ornament. His Grand-mastership of the Teutonic Order renders his Court more frequented than those of the other eccle|siastical Princes, the possessions of that Order being still considerable enough to support many younger brothers of noble families. Having passed his youth in the army, or at the courts of Vienna or Brussels, he is also environed by friends, made before the vacancy of an ecclesiastical electorate induced him to change his profession, and the union of his three incomes, as Bishop of Munster, Grand Master and Elector, enables him to spend something more than two hundred thousand pounds annually. His experience and revenues are, in many

respects, very usefully employed. To the nobility he affords an example of so much personal dignity, as to be able to reject many ostentatious customs, and to remove some of the ceremonial barriers, which men do not constantly place between themselves and their fel|low-beings, except from some consciousness of personal weakness. All sovereigns, who have had any sense of their individual liberty and power, have shewn a readiness to remove such barriers; but not many have been able to effect so much as the Elector of Cologne against the chamberlains, pages, and other footmanry of their courts, who are always upon the alerte to defend the false magnificence that makes their offices seem necessary. He now enjoys many of the blessings, usual only in private stations; among others, that of con|versing with great numbers of persons, not forced into his society by their rank, and of dispensing with much of that attendance, which would render his menial servants part of his company.

His secretary, Mr. Floret, whom we had the pleasure to see, gave us some accounts of the industry and carefulness of his private life, which he judiciously thought were better than any other panegyrics upon his master. His attention to the relief, em|ployment and education of the poor, to the state of manufactures and the encouragement of talents, appears to be continual; and his country would soon have elapsed from the general wretchedness of Germany, if the exertions of three campaigns had not destroyed what thirty years of care and improvement cannot restore.

His residence at Bonn occasions expenditure enough to keep the

people busy, but he has not been able to divert to it any part of the commerce, which, though it is of so little use at Cologne, is here spoken of with some envy, and seems to be estimated above its amount. The town, which is much neater than the others in the electorate, and so pleasantly situated, that its name has been supposed to be formed from the Latin synonym for good, is ornamented by few public buildings, except the palace. What is called the Univer|sity is a small brick building, used more as a school than a college, except that the masters are called professors. The principal church of four, which are within the walls, is a large building, distinguished by several spires, but not remarkable for its antiquity or beauty.

Many of the German powers retain some shew of a representative government, as to affairs of finance, and have States, by which taxes are voted. Those of the electorate of Cologne consist of four colleges, representing the clergy, nobility, knights and cities; the votes are given by colleges, so that the inhabitants of the cities, if they elect their repre|sentatives fairly, have one vote in four. These States assemble at Bonn.

One of the privileges, which it is surprising that the present Elector should retain, is that of grinding corn for the consumption of the whole town. His mill, like those of all the towns on the Rhine, is a floating one, moored in the river, which turns its wheel. Bread is bad at Bonn; but this oppressive privilege is not entirely answerable for it, there being little better throughout the whole country. It generally appears in rolls, with glazed crusts, half hollow; the crumb not brown, but a sort of dirty white.

There are few cities in Germany without walls, which, when the dreadful science of war was less advanced than at present, frequently protected them against large armies. These are now so useless, that such cannon as are employed against batteries could probably not be fired from them without shaking their foundations. The fortifica|tions of Bonn are of this sort; and, though they were doubtless bet|ter, when the Duke of Marlborough arrived before them, it is won|derful that they should have sustained a regular siege, during which great part of the town was demolished. The electorate of Cologne is, indeed, so ill prepared for war, that it has not one town, which could resist ten thousand men for three days.

The inhabitants of Bonn, whenever they regret the loss of their fortifications, should be reminded of the three sieges, which, in the course of thirty years, nearly destroyed their city. Of these the first was in 1673, when the Elector had received a French garrison into it; but the resistance did not then continue many days. It was in this siege that the Prince of Orange, afterwards our honoured William the Third, had one of his few military successes. In 1689, the French, who had lately defended it, returned to attack it; and, before they could subdue the strong garrison left in it by the Elector of Brandenburg, the palace and several public buildings were de|stroyed. The third siege was commanded by the Duke of Marlbo|rough, and continued from the 24th of April to the 16th of May, the French being then the defenders, and the celebrated Cohorn one of the assailants. It was not till fifteen years afterwards, that all the

houses, demolished in this siege, could be restored by the efforts of the Elector Joseph.

The present Elector maintains, in time of peace, about eight hun|dred soldiers, which is the number of his contingent to the army of the Empire: in the present war he has supplied somewhat more than this allotment; and, when we were at Bonn, two thousand recruits were in training. His troops wear the general uniform of the Empire, blue faced with red, which many of the Germanic sovereigns give only to their contingent troops, while those of their separate establish|ments are distinguished by other colours. The Austrian regiments are chiefly in white, faced with light blue, grey, or red; but the artillery are dressed, with very little shew, in a cloak speckled with light brown.

Bonn was one of the very few places in Germany, which we left with regret. It is endeared to the votaries of landscape by its situa|tion in the midst of fruitful plains, in the presence of stupendous mountains, and on the bank of a river, that, in summer, is impelled by the dissolved snows of Switzerland, and, in winter, rolls with the accumulation of a thousand torrents from the rocks on its shores. It contained many inhabitants, who had the independence to aim at a just taste in morals and letters, in spite of the ill examples with which such countries supply them; and, having the vices of the form of government, established in it, corrected by the moderation and imme|diate attention of the governor, it might be considered as a happy region in the midst of ignorance, injustice and misery, and remem|bered

like the green spot, that, in an Arabian desert, cheers the senses and sustains the hopes of the weary traveller.

GOODESBERG.

THE ride from Bonn to this delightful village is only one league over a narrow plain, covered with corn and vineyards. On our right was the range of hills, before seen from the mountain SANCTAE CRUCIS, sweeping into frequent recesses, and starting for|ward into promontories, with inequalities, which gave exquisite rich|ness to the forest, that mantled from their bases to their utmost sum|mits. Many a lurking village, with its slender grey steeple, peeped from among the woody skirts of these hills. On our left, the tremen|dous mountains, that bind the eastern shore of the Rhine, gradually lost their aërial complexion, as we approached them, and displayed new features and new enchantments; an ever-varying illusion, to which the transient circumstance of thunder clouds contributed. The sun-beams, streaming among these clouds, threw partial gleams upon the precipices, and, followed by dark shadows, gave surprising and inimitable effect to the natural colouring of the mountains, whose pointed tops we now discerned to be covered with dark heath, extended down their rocky sides, and mingled with the reddish and light yellow tints of other vegetation and the soil. It was delightful to watch the shadows sweeping over these steeps, now involving them

in deep obscurity, and then leaving them to the sun's rays, which brought out all their hues into vivid contrast.

Near Goodesberg, a small mountain, insulated, abrupt and pyra|midal, rises from the plain, which it seems to terminate, and conceals the village, that lies along its southern skirt. This mountain, covered with vineyards and thick dwarf wood to its summit, where one high tower and some shattered walls appear, is a very interesting object.

At the entrance of the village, the road was obstructed by a great number of small carts, filled with soldiers apparently wounded. The line of their procession had been broken by some carriages, hastening with company to the ridotto at Goodesberg, and was not easily restored. Misery and festivity could scarcely be brought into closer contrast. We thought of Johnson's

"many-coloured life,"

and of his picture, in the preface to Shakespeare, of cotemporary wretchedness and joy, when

"the reveller is hastening to his wine, and the mourner is burying his friend."

This was a procession of wounded French prisoners, chiefly boys, whose appearance had, indeed, led us to suspect their nation, before we saw the stamp of the fasces, and the words

"Republique Françoise"

upon the buttons of some, whom our driver had nearly overset. The few, that could raise themselves above the floor of their carts, shewed countenances yellow, or livid with sickness. They did not talk to their guards, nor did the latter shew any signs of exultation over them.

In a plain, beyond the village, a row of large houses, built upon one plan, and almost resembling a palace, form the little watering

place of Goodesberg, which has been founded partly at the expence of the Elector, and partly by individuals under his patronage. One of the houses was occupied by the Archduchess, his sister, and is often used by the Elector, who is extremely solicitous for the prosperity of the place. A large building at the end contains the public rooms, and is fitted up as an hotel.

The situation of this house is beautiful beyond any hope or power of description; for description, though it may tell that there are mountains and rocks, cannot paint the grandeur, or the elegance of outline, cannot give the effect of precipices, or draw the minute fea|tures, that reward the actual observer by continual changes of colour, and by varying their forms at every new choice of his position. Delightful Goodesberg! the sublime and beautiful of landscape, the charms of music, and the pleasures of gay and elegant society, were thine! The immediate unhappiness of war has now fallen upon thee; but, though the graces may have fled thee, thy terrible majesty remains, beyond the sphere of human contention.

The plain, that contains the village and the Spa, is about five miles in length and of half that breadth. It is covered by unin|closed corn and nearly surrounded by a vast amphitheatre of moun|tains. In front of the inn, at the distance of half a league, extend, along the opposite shore of the Rhine, the Seven Mountains, so long seen and admired, which here assume a new attitude. The three tallest points are now nearest to the eye, and the lower mountains are seen either in the perspective between them, or sinking, with

less abrupt declivities, into the plains, on the north. The whole mass exhibits a grandeur of outline, such as the pencil only can describe; but fancy may paint the stupendous precipices of rock, that rise over the Rhine, the rich tuftings of wood, that emboss the cliffs or lurk within the recesses, the spiry summits and the ruined castles, faintly discerned, that crown them. Yet the appearance of these mountains, though more grand, from Goodesberg, is less sublime than from Bonn; for the nearness, which increases their grandeur, diminishes their sublimity by removing the obscurity that had veiled them. To the south of this plain, the long perspective is crossed by further ranges of mountains, which open to glimpses of others still beyond; an endless succession of summits, that lead on the imagination to unknown vallies and regions of solitary obscurity.

Amidst so many attractions of nature, art cannot do much. The little, which it attempts, at Goodesberg, is the disposition of some walks from the houses to a spring, which is said to resemble that at Spa, and through the woods above it. Twice a week there are some musical performances and a ball given by the Elector, who frequently appears, and with the ease and plainness of a private gen|tleman. At these entertainments the company, visiting the spring, are joined by neighbouring families, so as to be in number sixty, or a hundred. The balls, agreeably to the earliness of German hours, begin at six; and that, which we meant to see, was nearly concluded before our arrival. The company then retired to a public

game, at which large sums of gold were risked, and a severe anxiety defied the influence of Mozart's music, that continued to be played by an excellent orchestra. The dresses of the company were in the English taste, and, as we were glad to believe, chiefly of English manufacture; the wearing of countenances by play appears to be also according to our manners, and the German ladies, with features scarcely less elegant, have complexions, perhaps, finer than are gene|ral in England.

Meditating censures against the Elector's policy, or carelessness, in this respect, we took advantage of the last gleams of evening, to ascend the slender and spiry mountain, which bears the name of the village, and appears ready to precipitate the ruins of its antient castle upon it. A steep road, winding among vineyards and dwarf wood, enters, at the summit of the mountain, the broken walls, which surround the ancient citadel of the castle; an almost solid building, that has existed for more than five centuries. From the area of these ruins we saw the sun set over the whole line of plains, that extend to the westward of Cologne, whose spires were distinctly visible. Bonn, and the hill SANCTAE CRUCIS, appeared at a league's distance, and the windings of the Rhine gleamed here and there amidst the rich scene, like distant lakes. It was a still and beautiful evening, in which no shade remained of the thunder clouds, that passed in the day. To the west, under the glow of sun-set, the landscape melted into the horizon in tints so soft, so clear, so deli|cately roseate as Claude only could have painted. Viewed, as we then

saw it, beyond a deep and dark arch of the ruin, its effect was en|chanting; it was to the eye, what the finest strains of Paisiello are to the heart, or the poetry of Collins is to the fancy—all tender, sweet, elegant and glowing.

From the other side of the hill the character of the view is entirely different, and, instead of a long prospect over an open and level country, the little plain of Goodesberg appears reposing amidst wild and awful mountains. These were now melancholy and silent; the last rays were fading from their many points, and the obscurity of twilight began to spread over them. We seemed to have found the spot, for which Collins wished:

"Now let me rove some wild and heathy scene, Or find some ruin 'midst its dreary dells, Whose walls more awful nod By thy religious gleams." ODE TO EVENING.

And this is a place almost as renowned in the history of the country, as it is worthy to exercise the powers of poetry and paint|ing. The same Ernest, in the cause of whose sovereignty the massa|cre of Neuss was perpetrated, besieged here the same Gerard de Trusches, the Elector, who had embraced the Protestant religion, and for whom Neuss held out. The castle of Goodesberg was impreg|nable, except by famine, but was very liable to that from its insu|lated situation, and the ease, with which the whole base of the

mountain could be surrounded. Gerard's defence was rendered the more obstinate by his belief, that nothing less than his life, and that of a beautiful woman, the marrying of whom had constituted one of the offences against his Chapter, would appease his ferocious ene|mies. He was personally beloved by his garrison, and they adhered to him with the affection of friends, as well as with the enthusiasm of soldiers. When, therefore, they perceived, that their surrender could not be much longer protracted, they resolved to employ their remaining time and strength in enabling him to separate his for|tunes from theirs. They laboured incessantly in forming a subter|raneous passage, which should open beyond the besiegers' lines; and, though their distress became extreme before this was completed, they made no overtures for a surrender, till Gerard and his wife had escaped by it. The fugitives arrived safely in Holland, and the vengeance of their adversaries was never gratified further than by hearing, many years after, that they died poor.

The fortress, rendered interesting by these traits of fidelity and misfortune, is not so far decayed, but that its remains exhibit much of its original form. It covered the whole summit of the hill, and was valuable as a residence, as well as a fortification. What seem to have been the walls of the great hall, in which probably the horn of two quarts was often emptied to welcome the guest, or reward the soldier, are still perfect enough to preserve the arches of its capacious win|dows, and the door-ways, that admitted its festive trains. The vast strength of the citadel has been unsubdued by war, or time. Though

the battlements, that crown it, are broken, and of a gallery, that once encircled it half way from the ground, the corbells alone remain, the solid walls of the building itself are unimpaired. At the narrow door-way, by which only it could be entered, we measured their thickness, and found it to be more than ten feet, nearly half the diameter of its area. There has never been a fixed staircase, though these walls would so well have contained one; and the hole is still perfect in the floor above, through which the garrison ascended and drew up their ladder after them. Behind the loop-holes, the wall has been hollowed, and would permit a soldier, half bent, to stand within them and use his bow. It was twilight without and night within the edifice; which fancy might have easily filled with the stern and silent forms of warriors, waiting for their prey, with the patience of safety and sure superiority.

We wandered long among these vestiges of ancient story, rendered still more interesting by the shadowy hour and the vesper bell of a chapel on a cliff below. The village, to which this belongs, straggles half way up the mountain, and there are several little shrines above it, which the cottagers, on festivals, decorate with flowers. The Priest is the schoolmaster of the parish, and almost all the children, within several miles of the hill, walk to it, every day, to prayers and lessons. Whether it is from this care of their minds, or that they are under the authority of milder landlords than elsewhere, the manners of the inhabitants in this plain differ much from those, usual in Germany. Instead of an inveterate sullenness, approaching frequently to malig|nity,

they shew a civility and gentleness in their intercourse with strangers, which leave the enjoyments derived from inanimate nature, unalloyed by the remembrances of human deformity, that mingle with them in other districts. Even the children's begging is in a manner, which shews a different character. They here kiss their little hands, and silently hold them out to you, almost as much in salute, as in entreaty; in many parts of Germany their manner is so offensive, not only for its intrusion, but as a symptom of their dispo|sition, that nothing but the remembrance of the oppression, that pro|duces it, can prevent you from denying the little they are compelled to require.

The music had not ceased, when we returned to the inn; and the mellowness of French horns, mingled with the tenderness of haut|boys, gave a kind of enchantment to the scenery, which we con|tinued to watch from our windows. The opposite mountains of the Rhine were gradually vanishing in twilight and then as gradually re-appearing, as the rising moon threw her light upon their broken surfaces. The perspective in the east received a silvery softness, which made its heights appear like shadowy illusions, while the nearer mountains were distinguished by their colouring, as much as by their forms. The broad Rhine, at their feet, rolled a stream of light for their boundary, on this side. But the first exquisite tint of beauty soon began to fade; the mountains became misty underneath the moon, and, as she ascended, these mists thickened, till they veiled the landscape from our view.

The spring, which is supposed to have some medicinal qualities, is about a quarter of a mile from the rooms, in a woody valley, in which the Elector has laid out several roads and walks. It rises in a stone bason, to which the company, if they wish to drink it on the spot, descend by an handsome flight of steps. We were not told its qualities, but there is a ferrugineous tint upon all the stones, which it touches. The taste is slightly unpleasant.

The three superior points of the Seven Mountains, which contri|bute so much to the distinction of Goodesberg, are called Draken|fels, Wolkenbourg and Lowenbourg, and have each been crowned by its castle, of which two are still visible in ruins. There is a story faintly recorded, concerning them. Three brothers, resolving to found three distinguished families, took the method, which was anciently in use for such a purpose, that of establishing themselves in fortresses, from whence they could issue out, and take what they wanted from their industrious neighbours. The pinnacles of Dra|kenfels, Wolkenbourg and Lowenbourg, which, with all assistance, cannot be ascended now, without the utmost fatigue, were inacces|sible, when guarded by the castles, built by the three brothers. Their depredations, which they called successes in war, enriched their families, and placed them amongst the most distinguished in the empire.

They had a sister, named Adelaide, famed to have been very beau|tiful; and, their parents being dead, the care of her had descended to them. Roland, a young knight, whose castle was on the opposite

bank of the Rhine, became her suitor, and gained her affections. Whether the brothers had expected, by her means, to form a more splendid alliance, or that they remembered the ancient enmity be|tween their family and that of Roland, they secretly resolved to deny the hand of Adelaide, but did not choose to provoke him by a direct refusal. They stipulated, that he should serve, a certain num|ber of years, in the war of Palestine, and, on his return, should be permitted to renew his suit.

Roland took a reluctant farewell of Adelaide, and went to the war, where he was soon distinguished for an impetuous career. Adelaide remained in the castle of Drakenfels, waiting, in solitary fidelity, for his return. But the brothers had determined, that he should not return for her. They clothed one of their dependents in the disguise of a pilgrim, and introduced him into the castle, where he related, that he was arrived from the holy wars, and had been desired by Roland in his latest moments to assure Adelaide of his having loved her till death.

The unhappy Adelaide believed the tale, and, from that time, devoted herself to the memory of Roland and to the nourishment of her sorrow. She rejected all the suitors, introduced by her brothers, and accepted no society, but that of some neighbouring nuns. At length, the gloom of a cloister became so necessary to the melancholy of her imagination, that she resolved to found a con|vent and take the veil; a design, which her brothers assisted, with the view of placing her effectually beyond the reach of her lover.

She chose an island in the Rhine between her brother's castle and the seat of Roland, both of which she could see from the windows of her convent; and here she passed some years in the placid per|formance of her new duties.

At length, Roland returned, and they both discovered the cruel device, by which they had been separated for ever. Adelaide remained in her convent, and soon after died; but Roland, emu|lating the fidelity of her retirement, built, at the extreme point of his domains towards the Rhine, a small castle, that over|looked the island, where he wasted his days in melancholy regret, and in watching over the walls, that shrouded his Adelaide.

This is the story, on which the wild and vivid imagination of Ariosto is said to have founded his Orlando.

THE VALLEY OF ANDERNACH.

AFTER spending part of two days at Goodesberg, we set out, in a sultry afternoon, for the town of Andernach, distant about five-and-twenty English miles. The road wound among corn|lands towards the Rhine, and approached almost as near to the Seven Mountains, as the river would permit. Opposite to the last, and nearly the tallest of these, called Drakenfels, the open plain termi|nates, and the narrower valley begins.

This mountain towers, the majestic sentinel of the river over which it aspires, in vast masses of rock, varied with rich tuftings of dwarf|wood, and bearing on its narrow peak the remains of a castle, whose walls seem to rise in a line with the perpendicular precipice, on which they stand, and, when viewed from the opposite bank, appear little more than a rugged cabin. The eye aches in attempting to scale this rock; but the sublimity of its height and the grandeur of its inter|mingled cliffs and woods gratify the warmest wish of fancy.

The road led us along the western bank of the Rhine among vine|yards, and corn, and thick trees, that allowed only transient catches of the water between their branches; but the gigantic form of Draken|fels was always seen, its superior features, perhaps, appearing more wild, from the partial concealment of its base, and assuming new atti|tudes as we passed away from it. Lowenberg, whose upper region only had been seen from Goodesberg, soon unfolded itself from be|hind Drakenfels, and displayed all its pomp of wood, sweeping from the spreading base in one uninterrupted line of grandeur to the spiry top, on which one high tower of the castle appears enthroned among the forests. This is the loftiest of the Seven Mountains; and its dark sides, where no rock is visible, form a fine contrast with the broken cliffs of Drakenfels. A multitude of spiry summits appeared beyond Lowenberg, seen and lost again, as the nearer rocks of the shore opened to the distance, or re-united. About a mile further, lies the pleasant island, on which Adelaide raised her convent. As it was well endowed, it has been rebuilt, and is now a large and hand|some

quadrangle of white stone, surrounded with trees, and corn, and vineyards, and still allotted to the society, which she established. An abrupt, but not lofty rock, on the western shore of the Rhine, called Rolands Eck, or Roland's Corner, is the site of her lover's castle, of which one arch, picturesquely shadowed with wood, is all that remains of this monument to faithful love. The road winds beneath it, and nearly overhangs the narrow channel, that separates Adelaide's island from the shore. Concerning this rock there is an ancient rhyme in the country, amounting to something like the following:

Was not Roland, the knight, a strange silly wight, For the love of a nun, to live on this height?

After passing the island, the valley contracts, and the river is soon shut up between fruitful and abrupt hills, which rise immediately over it, on one side, and a series of rocky heights on the other. In the small space, left between these heights and the Rhine, the road is formed. For the greater part of the way, it has been hollowed in the solid rock, which ascends almost perpendicularly above it, on one hand, and sinks as abruptly below it, to the river, on the other; a work worthy of Roman perseverance and design, and well known to be a monument of both. It was made during the reign of Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus; and as the inscription, whose antiquity has not been doubted, dates its completion in the year 162, it must have been finished in one year, or little more, Marcus Aurelius having

been raised to the purple in 161. The Elector Palatine having re|paired this road, which the Electors of Cologne had neglected, in 1768, has caused his name to be joined with those of the Roman Emperors, in the following inscription upon an oblisk:

VIAM
SUB M.
AURELIO
ET L. VERO
I. M. P. P.
ANNO CHR.
CLXII
MUNITAM
CAROLUS
THEODORUS
ELECTOR PAL.
DUX BAV. JUL. CL. M.
REFECIT
ET AMPLIAVIT
AN. M. DCCLXVIII
CURANTE JO. LUD. COMITE
DE GOLDSTEIN
PRO PRINCIPE.

We did not sufficiently observe the commencement and conclu|sion of this road, to be certain of its exact length; but it is probably about twelve miles. The rock above is, for the most part, naked to the summit, where it is thinly covered with earth; but sometimes it slopes so much as to permit patches of soil on its side, and these are

carefully planted with vines. This shore of the Rhine may be said to be bounded, for many miles, by an immense wall of rock, through which the openings into the country behind are few; and these breaks shew only deep glens, seen and lost again so quickly, that a woody mountain, or a castle, or a convent, were the only objects we could ascertain.

This rock lies in oblique strata, and resembles marble in its brown and reddish tints, marked with veins of deeper red; but we are unable to mention it under its proper and scientific denomination. The colouring of the cliffs is beautiful, when mingled with the verdure of shrubs, that sometimes hang in rich drapery from their points, and with the mosses, and creeping vegetables of bright crimson, yellow, and purple, that emboss their fractured sides.

The road, which the Elector mentions himself to have widened, is now and then very narrow, and approaches near enough to the river, over which it has no parapet, to make a traveller anxious for the sobriety and skill of his postillion. It is sometimes elevated forty feet above the level of the Rhine, and seldom less than thirty; an ele|vation from whence the water and its scenery are viewed to great advantage; but to the variety and grandeur of these shores, and the ever changing form of the river, description cannot do justice.

Sometimes, as we approached a rocky point, we seemed going to plunge into the expanse of water beyond; when, turning the sharp angle of the promontory, the road swept along an ample bay, where the rocks, receding, formed an amphitheatre, covered with ilex and

dwarf-wood, round a narrow, but cultivated level stripe: then, wind|ing the furthest angle of this crescent, under huge cliffs, we saw the river beyond, shut in by the folding bases of more distant promonto|ries, assume the form of a lake, amidst wild and romantic landscapes. Having doubled one of these capes, the prospect opened in long per|spective, and the green waters of the Rhine appeared in all their majesty, flowing rapidly between ranges of marbled rocks, and a suc|cession of woody steeps, and overlooked by a multitude of spiry sum|mits, which distance had sweetly coloured with the blue and purple tints of air.

The retrospect of the river, too, was often enchanting, and the Seven Mountains long maintained their dignity in the scene, superior to many intervening heights; the dark summit of Lowenburg, in particular, appeared, for several leagues, overlooking the whole valley of the Rhine.

The eastern margin of the river sometimes exhibited as extensive a range of steep rocks as the western, and frequently the fitness of the salient angles on one side, to the recipient ones on the other, seemed to justify the speculation, that they had been divided by an earth|quake, which let the river in between them. The general state of the eastern bank, though steep, is that of the thickest cultivation. The rock frequently peeps, in rugged projections, through the thin soil, which is scattered over its declivity, and every where appears at top; but the sides are covered with vines so abundantly, that the labour of cultivating them, and of expressing the wine, supports a

village at least at every half mile. The green rows are led up the steeps to an height, which cannot be ascended without the help of steps cut in the rock: the soil itself is there supported by walls of loose stones, or it would fall either by its own weight, or with the first pressure of rain; and sometimes even this scanty mould appears to have been placed there by art, being in such small patches, that, perhaps, only twenty vines can be planted in each. But such exces|sive labour has been necessary only towards the summits, for, lower down, the soil is sufficiently deep to support the most luxuriant vege|tation.

It might be supposed from so much produce and exertion, that this bank of the Rhine is the residence of an opulent, or, at least, a well|conditioned peasantry, and that the villages, of which seven or eight are frequently in sight at once, are as superior to the neighbouring towns by the state of their inhabitants, as they are by their pictu|resque situation. On the contrary, the inhabitants of the wine country are said to be amongst the poorest in Germany. The value of every hill is exactly watched by the landlords, so that the tenants are very seldom benefited by any improvement of its produce. If the rent is paid in money, it leaves only so much in the hands of the farmer as will enable him to live, and pay his workmen; while the attention of a great number of stewards is supposed to supply what might be expected from his attention, had he a common interest with his landlord in the welfare of the estate. But the rent is fre|quently paid in kind, amounting to a settled proportion of the pro|duce;

and this proportion is so fixed, that, though the farmer is immoderately distressed by a bad vintage, the best will not afford him any means of approaching to independence. In other countries it might be asked,

"But, though we can suppose the ingenuity of the landlord to be greater than that of the tenant, at the commencement of a bargain, how happens it, that, since the result must be felt, the tenant will remain under his burthens, or can be succeeded by any other, on such terms?"

Here, however, these questions are not appli|cable; they presume a choice of situations, which the country does not afford. The severity of the agricultural system continues itself by continuing the poverty, upon which it acts; and those, who would escape from it find few manufactures and little trade to em|ploy them, had they the capital and the education necessary for either. The choice of such persons is between the being a master of day-labourers for their landlord, or a labourer under other masters.

Many of these estates belong immediately to Princes, or Chapters, whose stewards superintend the cultivation, and are themselves instead of the farmers, so that all other persons employed in such vineyards are ordinary servants. By one or other of these means it happens, that the bounteousness of nature to the country is very little felt by the body of the inhabitants. The payment of rents in kind is usual, wherever the vineyards are most celebrated; and, at such places, there is this sure proof of the wretchedness of the inhabitants, that, in a month after the wine is made, you cannot obtain one bottle of the true produce, except by favour of the proprietors, or their stewards.

How much is the delight of looking upon plenteousness lessened by the belief, that it supplies the means of excess to a few, but denies those of competence to many!

Between this pass of cultivated steeps on one side of the river, and of romantic rocks on the other, the road continues for several miles. Being thus commanded on both sides, it must be one of the most dif|ficult passages in Europe to an enemy, if resolutely defended. The Rhine, pent between these impenetrable boundaries, is considerably narrower here than in other parts of the valley, and so rapid, that a loaded vessel can seldom be drawn faster than at the rate of six English miles a day, against the stream. The passage down the river from Mentz to Cologne may be easily performed in two days; that from Cologne to Mentz requires a fortnight.

The view along this pass, though bounded, is various and change|ful. Villages, vineyards and rocks alternately ornament the borders of the river, and every fifty yards enable the eye to double some massy projection that concealed the fruitful bay behind. An object at the end of the pass is presented singly to the sight as through an inverted telescope. The surface of the water, or the whole stillness of the scene, was very seldom interrupted by the passing of a boat; carriages were still fewer; and, indeed, throughout Germany, you will not meet more than one in twenty miles. Travelling is consi|dered by the natives, who know the fatigue of going in carriages nearly without springs, and stopping at inns where there is little of either accommodation or civility, as productive of no pleasure; and

they have seldom curiosity or business enough to recompense for its inconveniencies.

We passed through two or three small towns, whose ruined gates and walls told of their antiquity, and that they had once been held of some consequence in the defence of the valley. Their present deso|lation formed a melancholy contrast with the cheerful cultivation around them. These, however, with every village in our way, were decorated with green boughs, planted before the door of each cot|tage, for it was a day of festival. The little chapels at the road-side, and the image, which, every now and then, appeared under a spread|ing tree, were adorned with wreaths of fresh flowers; and though one might smile at the emblems of superstition, it was impossible not to reverence the sentiment of pious affection, which had adjusted these simple ornaments.

About half-way to Andernach, the western rocks suddenly recede from the river, and, rising to greater height, form a grand sweep round a plain cultivated with orchards, garden-fields, corn and vine|yards. The valley here spreads to a breadth of nearly a mile and an half, and exhibits grandeur, beauty and barren sublimity, united in a singular manner. The abrupt steeps, that rise over this plain, are entirely covered with wood, except that here and there the ravage of a winter torrent appeared, which could sometimes be traced from the very summit of the acclivity to the base. Near the centre, this noble amphitheatre opens to a glen, that shews only wooded moun|tains, point above point, in long perspective; such sylvan pomp we

had seldom seen! But though the tuftings of the nearer woods were beautifully luxuriant, there seemed to be few timber trees amongst them. The opposite shore exhibited only a range of rocks, varie|gated like marble, of which purple was the predominating tint, and uniformly disposed in vast, oblique strata. But even here, little green patches of vines peeped among the cliffs, and were led up crevices where it seemed as if no human foot could rest. Along the base of this tremendous wall, and on the points above, villages, with each its tall, grey steeple, were thickly strewn, thus mingling in striking con|trast the cheerfulness of populous inhabitation with the horrors of untamed nature. A few monasteries, resembling castles in their extent, and known from such only by their spires, were distinguish|able; and, in the widening perspective of the Rhine, an old castle itself, now and then, appeared on the summit of a mountain some|what remote from the shore; an object rendered sweetly picturesque, as the sun's rays lighted up its towers and fortified terraees, while the shrubby steeps below were in shade.

We saw this landscape under the happiest circumstances of season and weather; the woods and plants were in their midsummer bloom, and the mellow light of evening heightened the richness of their hues, and gave exquisite effect to one half of the amphitheatre we were passing, while the other half was in shadow. The air was scented by bean-blossoms, and by lime-trees then in flower, that bordered the road. If this plain had mingled pasture with its groves, it would have been truly Arcadian; but neither here, nor through the whole

of this delightful valley, did we see a single pasture or meadow, except now and then in an island on the Rhine; deficiencies which are here supplied, to the lover of landscape, by the verdure of the woods and vines. In other parts of Germany they are more to be regretted, where, frequently, only corn and rock colour the land.

Fatigued at length by such prodigality of beauty, we were glad to be shrouded awhile from the view of it, among close boughs, and to see only the wide rivulets, with their rustic bridges of faggots and earth, that, descending from among the mountains, frequently crossed our way; or the simple peasant-girl, leading her cows to feed on the narrow stripe of grass that margined the road. The little bells, that jingled at their necks, would not suffer them to stray beyond her hearing. If we had not long since dismissed our surprise at the scarcity and bad quality of cheese and butter in Germany, we should have done so now, on perceiving this scanty method of pasturing the cattle, which future observation convinced us was the frequent practice.

About sun-set we reached the little village of Namedy, seated near the foot of a rock, round which the Rhine makes a sudden sweep, and, contracted by the bold precipices of Hammerstein on the oppo|site shore, its green current passes with astonishing rapidity and sounding strength. These circumstances of scenery, with the tall masts of vessels lying below the shrubby bank, on which the village stands, and seeming to heighten by comparison the stupendous rocks, that rose around them; the moving figures of boatmen and horses

employed in towing a barge against the stream, in the bay beyond; and a group of peasants on the high quay, in the fore ground, watching their progress; the ancient castle of Hammerstein over|looking the whole—these were a combination of images, that formed one of the most interesting pictures we had seen.

The valley again expanding, the walls and turrets of Andernach, with its Roman tower rising independently at the foot of a moun|tain, and the ruins of its castle above, appeared athwart the perspec|tive of the river, terminating the pass; for there the rocky boun|dary opened to plains and remote mountains. The light vapour, that rose from the water, and was tinged by the setting rays, spread a purple haze over the town and the cliffs, which, at this distance appeared to impend over it; colouring extremely beautiful, contrasted as it was by the clearer and deeper tints of rocks, wood and water nearer to the eye.

As we approached Andernach, its situation seemed to be perpe|tually changing, with the winding bank. Now it appeared seated on a low peninsula, that nearly crossed the Rhine, overhung by roman|tic rocks; but this vision vanished as we advanced, and we per|ceived the town lying along a curving shore, near the foot of the cliffs, which were finely fringed with wood, and at the entrance of extensive plains. Its towers seen afar, would be signs of a con|siderable place, to those who had not before been wearied of such symptoms by the towers of Neuss, and other German towns. From a wooded precipice over the river we had soon after a fine retrospec|tive

glimpse of the valley, its fantastic shores, and long mountainous distance, over which evening had drawn her sweetest colouring. As we pursued the pass, the heights on either hand gradually softened; the country beyond shewed remote mountains less wild and aspiring than those we had left, and the blooming tint, which had invested the distance, deepened to a dusky purple, and then vanished in the gloom of twilight. The progressive influence of the hour upon the landscape was interesting; and the shade of evening, under which we entered Andernach, harmonized with the desolation and silence of its old walls and the broken ground around them. We passed a drawbridge and a ruinous gateway, and were sufficiently fatigued to be somewhat anxious as to our accommodation. The English habit of considering, towards the end of the day's journey, that you are not far from the cheerful reception, the ready attendance, and the conveniences of a substantial inn, will soon be lost in Germany. There, instead of being in good spirits, during the last stage, from such a prospect, you have to consider, whether you shall find a room, not absolutely disgusting, or a house with any eatable provision, or a landlady, who will give it you, before the delay and the fatigue of an hundred requests have rendered you almost incapable of receiv|ing it. When your carriage stops at the inn, you will perhaps per|ceive, instead of the alacrity of an English waiter, or the civility of an English landlord, a huge figure, wrapt in a great coat, with a red worsted cap on his head, and a pipe in his mouth, stalking before the door. This is the landlord. He makes no alteration in his pace

on perceiving you, or, if he stops, it is to eye you with curiosity; he seldom speaks, never bows, or assists you to alight; and perhaps stands surrounded by a troop of slovenly girls, his daughters, whom the sound of wheels has brought to the door, and who, as they lean indolently against it, gaze at you with rude curiosity and sur|prise.

The drivers in Germany are all bribed by the innkeepers, and, either by affecting to misunderstand you, or otherwise, will constantly stop at the door, where they are best paid. That this money comes out of your pocket the next morning is not the grievance; the evil is, that the worst inns give them the most, and a traveller, unless he exactly remembers his directions, is liable to be lodged in all the vilest rooms of a country, where the best hotels have no lodging so clean and no larder so wholesomely filled as those of every half-way house between London and Canterbury. When you are within the inn, the landlord, who is eager to keep, though not to accommodate you, will affirm, that his is the inn you ask for, or that the other sign is not in the place; and, as you soon learn to believe any thing of the wretchedness of the country, you are unwilling to give up one lodging, lest you should not find another.

Our driver, after passing a desolate, half filled place, into which the gate of Andernach opened, entered a narrow passage, which after|wards appeared to be one of the chief streets of the place. Here he found a miserable inn, and declared that there was no other; but, as we had seen one of a much better appearance, we were at length

brought to that, and, though with some delay, were not ill accommodated, for the night.

Andernach is an ancient town, and it is believed, that a tower, which stands alone, at one end of the walls, was built by Drusus, of whom there are many traces in walls and castles, intended to defend the colonies, on this side of the Rhine, against the Germans, on the other. The fortifications can now be of little other use than to authorise the toll, which travellers pay, for entering a walled town; a tax, on account of which many of the walls are supported, though it is pretended, that the tax is to support the walls. By their means also, the Elector of Cologne collects here the last of four pay|ments, which he demands for the privilege of passing the Rhine from Urdingen to Andernach; and this is the most Southern frontier town of his dominions on the western side of the Rhine, which soon after join those of the Elector of Treves. Their length from hence to Rheinberg is not less than ninety miles; the breadth pro|bably never more than twenty.

There is some trade, at Andernach, in tiles, timber, and mill-stones, but the heaps of these commodities upon the beach are the only visible symptoms of the traffick; for you will not see one person in the place moving as if he had business to attract him, or one shop of a better appearance, than an English huckster's, or one man in the dress of a creditable trader, or one house, which can be supposed to belong to persons in easy circumstances. The port contains, perhaps, half a dozen vessels, clinker built, in shape between a barge and a

sloop; on the quay, you may see two or three fellows, harnessing half a dozen horses to a tow line, while twenty more watch their lingering manoeuvres, and this may probably be the morning's busi|ness of the town. Those, who are concerned in it, say that they are engaged in commerce.

This, or something like it, is the condition, as to trade, of all the towns we saw in Germany, one or two excepted. They are so far from having well filled, or spacious repositories, that you can scarcely tell at what houses there are any, till you are led within the door; you may then wait long after you are heard, or seen, before the owner, if he has any other engagement, thinks it necessary to ap|proach you: if he has what you ask for, which he probably has not, unless it is something very ordinary, he tells the price and takes it, with as much sullenness, as if you were forcing the goods from him: if he has not, and can shew you only something very different, he then considers your enquiry as an intrusion, and appears to think himself injured by having had the trouble to answer you. What seems unaccountable in the manners of a German trader, is, that, though he is so careless in attending you, he looks as much distressed, as vexed, if you do not leave some money with him; but he probably knows, that you can be supplied no where else in the town, and, therefore, will not deny himself the indulgence of his temper. Even when you are satisfied, his manner is so ill, that he appears to consi|der you his dependent, by wanting something which he can refuse. After perceiving, that this is nearly general, the pain of making con|tinual

discoveries of idleness and malignity becomes so much greater than the inconvenience of wanting any thing short of necessaries, that you decline going into shops, and wait for some easier oppor|tunities of supplying whatever you may lose upon the road.

COBLENTZ.

IT is one post from Andernach hither, over a road, as good as any in England. Beyond the dominions of the Elector of Cologne, the face of the country, on this side of the Rhine, entirely changes its character. The rocks cease, at Andernach, and a rich plain commences, along which the road is led, at a greater distance from the Rhine, through corn lands and uninclosed orchards. About a mile from Andernach, on the other side of the river, the white town of Neuwiedt, the capital of a small Protestant principality, is seen; and the general report, that it is one of the most commercial places, on the Rhine, appeared to be true from the chearful neatness of the principal street, which faces towards the water. There were also about twenty small vessels, lying before it, and the quay seemed to be wide enough to serve as a spacious terrace to the houses. The Prince's palace, an extensive stone building, with a lofty orangery along the shore, is at the end of this street, which, as well as the greatest part of the town, was built, or improved under the auspices of his father; a wise prince, distinguished by having negotiated, in

1735, a peace between the Empire and France, when the continu|ance of the war had seemed to be inevitable. The same benevo|lence led him to a voluntary surrender of many oppressive privileges over his subjects, as well as to the most careful protection of com|merce and manufactures. Accordingly, the town of Neuwiedt has been continually increasing in prosperity and size, for the last fifty years, and the inhabitants of the whole principality are said to be as much more qualified in their characters as they are happier in their conditions than those of the neighbouring states. But then there is the wretchedness of a deficiency of game in the country, for the late Prince was guilty of such an innovation as to mitigate the seve|rity of the laws respecting it.

The forest hills, that rise behind Neuwiedt and over the rocky margin of the river, extend themselves towards the more rugged mountains of Wetteravia, which are seen, a shapeless multitude, in the east.

The river is soon after lost to the view between high, sedgy banks; but, near Coblentz, the broad bay, which it makes in conjunction with the Moselle, is seen expanding between the walls of the city and the huge pyramidal precipice, on which stands the fortress of Ehrenbreit|stein, or rather which is itself formed into that fortress. The Moselle is here a noble river, by which the streams of a thousand hills, cover|ed with vines, pour themselves into the Rhine. The antient stone bridge over it leads to the northern gate of Coblentz, and the en|trance into the city is ornamented by several large chateau-like man|sions,

erected to command a view of the two rivers. A narrow street of high, but antient houses then commences, and runs through the place. Those, which branch from it extend, on each side, to|wards the walls, immediately within which there are others, that nearly follow their course and encompass the city. Being built be|tween two rivers, its form is triangular, and only one side is entirely open to the land; a situation so convenient both for the purposes of commerce and war, that it could not be overlooked by the Romans, and was not much neglected by the moderns, till the industry of maritime countries and the complicated constitution of the Empire reduced Germany in the scale of nations. This was accordingly the station of the first legion, and the union of the two rivers gave it a name; Confluentia. At the commencement of the modern division of nations, the successors of Charlemagne frequently resided here, for the convenience of an intercourse between the other parts of the Empire and France; but, in the eleventh century, the whole territory of Treves regained the distinction, as a separate country, which the Romans had given it, by calling the inhabitants Treveri.

Coblentz is a city of many spires, and has establishments of chap|ters and monasteries, which make the great pride of German capitals, and are sometimes the chief objects, that could distinguish them from the neglected villages of other countries. The streets are not all nar|row, but few of them are straight; and the same pavement serves for the horses of the Elector and the feet of his subjects. The port, or beach, has the appearance of something more business than that of

Andernach, being the resort of passage-vessels between Mentz and Cologne; but the broad quay, which has been raised above it, is chiefly useful as a promenade to the visitors of a close and gloomy town. Beyond the terrace stands the Elector's palace, an elegant and spacious stone edifice, built to the height of three stories, and inclosing a court, which is large enough to be light as well as mag|nificent. The front towards the Rhine is simple, yet grand, the few ornaments being so well proportioned to its size, as neither to debase it by minuteness, nor encumber it by vastness. An entablature, dis|playing some allegorical figures in bas relief, is supported by six Doric columns, which contribute much to the majestic simplicity of the edifice. The palace was built, about ten years since, by the reigning Elector, who mentions, in an inscription, his attention to the architectural art; and a fountain, between the building and the town, is inscribed with a few words, which seem to acknowledge his sub|jects as beings of the same species with himself; CLEMENS WIN|CESLAUS VICINIS SUIS.

But the most striking parts of the view from this quay are the rock and fortress of Ehrenbreitstein, that present themselves immediately before it, on the other side of the river; notwithstanding the breadth of which they appear to rise almost perpendicularly over Coblentz. At the base of the rock stands a large building, formerly the palace of the Electors, who chose to reside under the immediate protection of the fortress, rather than in the midst of their capital. Adjoining it is the village of Ehrenbreitstein, between which and Coblentz a

flying bridge is continually passing, and, with its train of subordinate boats, forms a very picturesque object from the quay. The fortress itself consists of several tier of low walls, built wherever there was a projection in the rock capable of supporting them, or wherever the rock could be hewn so as to afford room for cannon and soldiers. The stone, taken out of the mass, served for the formation of the walls, which, in some places, can scarcely be distinguished from the living rock. Above these tier, which are divided into several small parts, according to the conveniences afforded by the cliff, is built the castle, or citadel, covering its summit, and surrounded by walls more regularly continued, as well as higher. Small towers, somewhat in the antient form, defend the castle, which would be of little value, except for its height, and for the gradations of batteries between it and the river. Thus protected, it seems impregnable on that side, and is said to be not much weaker on the other; so that the garrison, if they should be willing to fire upon Coblentz, might make it impossible for an enemy to remain within it, except under the cover of very high entrenchments. This is the real defence of the city, for its walls would presently fall before heavy artillery; and this, it is believed, might be preserved as long as the garrison could be supplied with stores.

We crossed the river from the quay to the fortress, by means of the very simple invention, a flying bridge. That, by which part of the passage of the Waal is made at Nimeguen, has been already men|tioned; this is upon the same principle, but on a much larger scale.

After the barges, upon which the platform is laid, are clear of the bank, the whole passage is effected with no other labour than that of the rudder. A strong cable, which is fastened to an anchor at each side of the river, is supported across it by a series of small boats; the bridge has two low masts, one on each barge, and these are connected at the top by a beam, over which the cable is passed, being confined so as that it cannot slip beyond them. When the bridge is launched, the rapidity of the current forces it down the Rhine as far as the cable will permit: having reached that point, the force, received from the current, gives it the only direction of which it is capable, that across the river, with the cable which holds it. The steersman manages two rudders, by which he assists in giving it this direction. The voyage requires nine or ten minutes, and the bridge is conti|nually passing. The toll, which, for a foot passenger, is something less than a penny, is paid, for the benefit of the Elector, at an office, on the bank, and a sentinel always accompanies the bridge, to support his government, during the voyage.

The old palace of Ehrenbreitstein, deserted because of its damp|ness, and from the fear of its being overwhelmed by the rock, that sometimes scatters its fragments upon it, is now used as a barrack and hospital for soldiers. It is a large building, even more pleasantly situ|ated than the new one, being opposite to the entrance of the Moselle into the Rhine; and its structure, which has been once magnificent, denotes scarcely any other decay, than all buildings will shew, after a few years' neglect. The rock has allowed little room for a garden,

but there are some ridiculous ornaments upon a very narrow strip of ground, which was probably intended for one.

The only entrance into the fortress, on this side, is by a road, cut in the solid rock, under four gateways. It is so steep, that we were compelled to decline the honour of admission, but ascended it far enough to judge of the view, commanded from the summit, and to be behind the batteries, of which some were mounted with large brass cannon. Coblentz lies beneath it, as open to inspection as a model upon a table. The sweeps of the Rhine and the meanders of the Moselle, the one binding the plain, the other intersecting it, lead the eye towards distant hills, that encircle the capacious level. The quay of the city, with the palace and the moving bridge, form an interest|ing picture immediately below, and we were unwilling to leave the rock for the dull and close streets of Coblentz. On our return, the extreme nakedness of the new palace, which is not sheltered by trees, on any side, withdrew our attention from the motley group of passengers, mingled with hay carts and other carriages, on the flying bridge.

The long residence of the emigrant princes and noblesse of France in this city is to be accounted for not by its general accommodations, or gaieties, of which it is nearly as deficient as the others of Germany; but first by the great hospitality of the Elector towards them, and then by the convenience of its situation for receiving intelligence from France, and for communicating with other countries. The Elector held frequent levies for the French nobility, and continued for them

part of the splendour which they had enjoyed in their own country. The readiness for lending money upon property, or employments in France, was also so great, that those, who had not brought cash with them, were immediately supplied, and those, who had, were encou|raged to continue their usual expences. We know it from some of the best possible authority, that, at the commencement of the march towards Longwy, money, at four per cent. was even pressed upon many, and that large sums were refused.

Here, and in the neighbourhood, between sixty and seventy squa|drons of cavalry, consisting chiefly of those who had formerly enjoyed military, or other rank, were formed; each person being mounted and equipped chiefly at his own expence. We heard several anec|dotes of the confidence, entertained in this army, of a speedy arrival in Paris; but, as the persons, to whom they relate, are now under the pressure of misfortune, there would be as little pleasure, as propriety in repeating them.

At Coblentz, we quitted, for a time, the left bank of the Rhine, in order to take the watering place of Selters, in our way to Mentz. Having crossed the river and ascended a steep road, near the fortress, we had fine glimpses of its walls, bastions and out-towers, and the heathy knolls, around them, with catches of distant country. The way continued to lie through the dominions of the Elector of Treves, which are here so distinguished for their wretchedness as to be named the Siberia of Germany! It is paved and called a chaussée; but those, who have not experienced its ruggedness, can have no idea of it,

except by supposing the pavement of a street torn up by a plough, and then suffered to fix itself, as it had fallen. Always steep, either in ascent, or descent, it is not only the roughness, that prevents your exceeding the usual post-pace of three English miles an hour. Some|times it runs along edges of mountains, that might almost be called precipices, and commands short views of other mountains and of vallies entirely covered with thick, but not lofty forests; sometimes it buries itself in the depths of such forests and glens; sometimes the turrets of an old chateau peep above these, but rather confirm than contradict the notion of their desolateness, having been evidently built for the purposes of the chace; and sometimes a mud village surprises you with a few inhabitants, emblems of the misery and savageness of the country.

These are the mountains of Wetteravia, the boundaries of many a former and far-seen prospect, then picturesque, sublime, or graceful, but now desolate, shaggy, and almost hideous; as in life, that, which is so grand as to charm at a distance, is often found to be forlorn, dis|gustful and comfortless by those, who approach it.

MONTABAUR.

SIX hours after leaving Coblentz, we reached Montabaur, the first post-town on the road, and distant about eighteen miles. An ancient chateau, not strong enough to be a castle, nor light enough to be a good house, commands the town, and is probably the residence of the lord. The walls and gates shew the antiquity of Montabaur, but the ruggedness of its site should seem to prove, that there was no other place in the neighbourhood, on which a town could be built. Though it is situated in a valley, as to the nearer mountains, it is constructed chiefly on two sides of a narrow rock, the abrupt summit of which is in the centre of this very little place.

The appearance of Montabaur is adequate in gloominess to that of several before seen; but it would be endless to repeat, as often as they should be true, the descriptions of the squalidness and decay, that cha|racterise German towns; nor should we have noticed these so often, if the negligence of others, in this respect, had not left us to form deceitful expectations, suitable to the supposed importance of several very conspicuous, but really very wretched cities.

LIMBOURG.

OVER a succession of forest mountains, similar to those just passed, we came, in the afternoon, to Limbourg, another post town, or, perhaps, city, and another collection of houses, like tombs, or forsaken hospitals. At an inn, called the Three Kings, we saw first the sullenness and then the ferocious malignity of a German landlord and his wife, exemplified much more fully than had before occurred. When we afterwards expressed our surprise, that the magis|trates should permit persons of such conduct to keep an inn, especially where there was only one, we learned, that this fellow was himself the chief magistrate, or burgomaster of the place; and his authority appeared in the fearfulness of his neighbours to afford any sort of refreshment to those, who had left his inn. One of the Elector's mini|sters, with whom we had the pleasure to be acquainted, informed us, that he knew this man, and that he must have been intoxicated, for that, though civil when sober, he was madly turbulent and abusive, if otherwise. It appeared, therefore, that a person was permitted to be a magistrate, who, to the knowledge of government, was exposed by his situation to be intoxicated, and was outrageous, whenever he was so. So little is the order of society estimated here, when it is not con|nected with the order of politics.

Near Limbourg, the forest scenery, which had shut up the view,

during the day, disappeared, and the country lost, at least, an unifor|mity of savageness. The hills continue, but they are partly culti|vated. At a small distance from the town, a steep ascent leads to a plain, on which a battle was fought, during the short stay of the French in this district, in the campaign of 1792.

Four thousand French were advancing towards Limbourg; a small Prussian corps drew up to oppose them, and the engagement, though short, was vivid, for the Prussians did not perceive the superiority of the French in numbers, till the latter began to spread upon the plain, for the purpose of surrounding them. Being then compelled to retreat, they left several of the Elector's towns open to contribution, from which five-and-twenty thousand florins were demanded, but the remonstrances of the magistrates reduced this sum to 8000 florins, or about 700 l. The French then entered Limbourg, and extended themselves over the neighbouring country. At Weilbourg, the resi|dence of a Prince of the House of Nassau, they required 300,000 flo|rins, or 25,000 l. which the Prince neither had, nor could collect, in two days, through his whole country. All his plate, horses, coaches, arms and six pieces of cannon, were brought together, for the pur|pose of removal; but afterwards two individuals were accepted as hostages, instead of the Prince himself, who had been at first demanded. The action near Limbourg took place on the 9th of November, and, before the conclusion of the month, the French had fallen back to Franckfort, upon the re-approach of the Prussian and Austrian troops.

SELTERS.

WE had a curiosity to see this place, which, under the name of Seltzer, is so celebrated throughout Europe, for its medi|cinal water. Though it is rather in the high road to Franckfort than to Mentz, there seemed no probability of inconvenience in making this short departure from our route, when it was to be joined again from a place of such public access as Selters appeared likely to be found.

About seven miles from Limbourg, a descent commences, at the bottom of which stands this village. What a reproof to the expec|tations of comfort, or convenience in Germany! Selters, a spot, to which a valetudinarian might be directed, with the prospect of his finding not only abundant accommodation, but many luxuries, Selters is literally and positively nothing more than an assemblage of miser|able cottages, with one inn and two houses for officers of the Elector, stuck in a dirty pass, which more resembles a ditch than a road. The village may be said to be near half a mile long, because the huts, being mostly separated from each other, continue as far; and this length would increase its inconvenience to invalids, if such should ever stay there longer than to see it, for there is nothing like a swept path-way, and the road, in which they must walk, is pro|bably always deeply covered with mud, being so when we were there in the beginning of July. There was then, however, not one

stranger, besides ourselves, in the place, and we found, that very rarely any aggravate the miseries of sickness by a stay at Selters.

The only lodgings to be had are at the inn, and fortunately for travellers this is not such as might be expected from the appearance of the village. Finding there the novelty of an obliging host and hostess, we were very well contented to have reached it, at night, though we were to stay there also the next day, being Sunday. The rooms are as good as those in the inns of German cities, and three, which are called Court Chambers, having been used by the Elector and lately by the King of Prussia, are better. These are as open as the others to strangers.

The spring is at the foot of one of several hills, which imme|diately surround the village, and is separated from the road by a small court yard. An oaken covering, at the height of ten or twelve feet, prevents rain from falling into the wooden bason, in which the stream rises; and two or three of the Elector's guards watch over it, that no considerable quantity may be taken, without pay|ment of the duty, which forms a large part of his income. Many thousands of stone bottles are piled round this court, and, for the reputation of the spring, care is taken to fill them as immediately as possible, before their removal for exportation.

The policy of keeping this income intire is said to be a motive for neglecting the condition of the village. A duty could not well be demanded of those, who should drink at the spring, but is easily col|lected before the water is bottled for removal; it is, therefore, not

wished, that there should be many visitors, at Selters. We did not hear this reason upon the spot, but it is difficult otherwise to account for a negligence, which prevents the inhabitants of the neighbouring country from being enriched at the expence of wanderers from others.

Nor is it only a duty, but the whole profit of the traffick, till the water leaves the place, which rewards the care of the Elector. His office for the sale of it is established here, and his agents alone trans|mit it into foreign countries. The business is sufficient to employ several clerks, and the number of bottles annually filled is so im|mense, that, having omitted to write it down, we will not venture to mention it from memory. The water is brought to table constantly and at an easy price in all the towns near the Rhine. Mixed with Rhenish wine and sugar it forms a delightful, but not always a safe beverage, in hot weather. The acid of the wine, expelling the fixed air of other ingredients, occasions an effervescence, like that of Champagne, but the liquor has not a fourth part of the obnoxious strength of the latter. The danger of drinking it is, that the acid may be too powerful for some constitutions.

After being surprised by the desolateness of the village, we were not less so to find amongst its few inhabitants one, whose manners and information, so far from bearing the character of the dreariness around him, were worthy of the best society in the most intelligent cities. This was the Commissary and Privy Counsellor of the Elec|tor for the district, who, having heard, that there were some English

visitors at the well, very frankly introduced himself to us by his civilities, and favoured us with his company in the afternoon. He had been in England, with many valuable introductions, and had formed from the talents and accomplishments of a distinguished Marquis an high opinion of the national character; a circumstance, which probably united with his natural disposition, in inducing him to emulate towards us the general politeness of that truly honourable person.

When we enquired how the journey of the next day was to be performed, it appeared, that no other carriage could be hired in the place than a sort of one-horse chair, which would take us to the next post town, from whence we might proceed with the usual chaises. The driver walked at the side of this uncouth carriage, which had shafts and wheels strong enough for a waggon; and, either by the mistake or intention of his master in directing him, we were led, not to the post town, for a chaise, if it could be had, but entirely through a forest country to Mentz, by roads made only for the woodcutters, and, as it afterwards proved, known to few others, except to our inge|nious voiturier. We did not pass a town, or village, at which it was possible to change the carriage, and had, therefore, no other alterna|tive, when the mistake was discovered, than to return to Selters, or to proceed to Mentz, in this inconvenient and ludicrous vehicle. We chose to proceed, and had some reward for fatigue, by passing nearly an whole day under the shade of deep and delightful forests, little tamed by the hand of man, and appearing to acknowledge only

"the season's difference."

Between Selters and these forests, the country is well cultivated, and frequently laid out in garden fields, in which there was the first appearance ofcheerful labour we had seen in Germany. After passing a small town, on the summit of a hill to the left, still sur|rounded by its antient fortifications, we entered a large plain, skirted, on one side, by villages; another town, at the end of which, was almost the last sign of an inhabited country, that appeared for several hours. The forest then commenced, and, with the exception of one hamlet, enveloped near the middle, we saw nothing but lofty oaks, elms and chesnuts, till we emerged from it in the afternoon, and came to a town of the Landgrave of Hesse Darmstadt. Roebucks are said to be numerous, and wild boars not very scarce, in this forest; but we saw none either here, or in those near Limbourg, which are much inferior to this in beauty. Upon the whole, it was a scene of per|fect novelty; without which it now seems that we should have wanted many ideas of sylvan life and much of the delight, excited by Shakespeare's exquisite description of it.

The country afterwards opens towards

MENTZ,

WHICH stands in a spacious plain, on the opposite edge of the Rhine, and is visible, at a considerable distance, with its massy towers and numerous spires. Within two or three miles of the city, the symptoms of ruin, occasioned by the siege in 1793, began to appear. A village, on the left, had scarcely one house entire; and the tower of the church was a mere wreck, blackened by flames, and with large chasms, that admitted the light. The road did not pass nearer to it than two miles, but the broken walls and roofs were distinguishable even at that distance, and sometimes a part, which had been repaired, contrasted its colour with the black and smoky hues of the remainder. This was the village of Kostheim, so often contended for in the course of the siege, being on the opposite bank of the Rhine to the city, and capable of obstructing the intercourse with it by water.

The country on the eastern side of the river was otherwise but little damaged, if we except the destruction of numerous orchards; for the allies were not strong enough to besiege the city on all sides at once, and contented themselves with occupying some posts in this quarter, capable of holding the garrison of Cassel in awe.

This Cassel is a small village exactly opposite to Mentz, and com|municating with it by a bridge of boats. It was unfortified before

the invasion of the French; but these had no sooner entered the city, than they perceived the importance of such a place, and prepared themselves to render it a regular fortress. In about two months they completely surrounded it with earthen works and outworks, ditched and pallisadoed. Some of the nearest orchards were cut down to be used in these fortifications. The fruit trees still remain with their branches upwards from the ditch, and serve instead of chevaux de frise.

The village of Hockheim, which is also on this side of the Rhine, is further to the left than Kostheim, and remains uninjured, at the top of the round and easy hill, the vines of which are so much cele|brated for their flavour, as to give a name to great quantities of wine, produced in other districts. After the siege, the merchants of the neighbourhood enhanced the price of their stocks by reporting, that all the vineyards had been destroyed; but the truth is, that Hock|heim was not much contended for, and that little damage was done even to the crops then in bloom. The village is advantageously situated about the confluence of the Rhine and the Maine, and, if it had been nearer the city, would probably have been so important, as to have been contested, till it was destroyed.

This is the home ground of the scene, which spreads before the traveller, who approaches Mentz from the eastern shore of the Rhine. Furthest to the left is Hockheim, then the devastated village of Kostheim, then the fortifications of Cassel, which, with the river, are between him and the city. Beyond, the horizon is bounded on

all sides by gradual hills, distant and apparently fruitful; but those to the north are pre-eminent, with gentle slopes at their feet, co|loured sweetly by corn, dark wood and gleams of reddish earth.

The works of Cassel render the approach to the city very tedious, for they have been so contrived as that the road nearly follows them, in all their angles, for the purpose of being commanded by many points at once. The village was now garrisoned by Prussians, of whom, some were lying under the sheds of their guard-house near the bridge, and others were riding over it, with just speed enough to give one an idea of military earnestness. Their horses shook the floor of the bridge of boats, which here crosses the Rhine, at its breadth of nearly eight hundred feet, and disturbed the promenade, for which it is usually frequented in an evening. We followed them, admiring the expanse, and rapidity of the river more than the appearance of the city, where gloominess is too much mingled with grandeur; till, at the end of the bridge, we were stopped at another guard-house, to answer the usual enquiries. A soldier ac|companied us thence to a large square filled with cannon and mor|tars, where the captain of the guard examined our passport. We were then very glad to pass the evening at an inn without further researches; but there were some symptoms of the late condition of the city to attract attention in the way.

The Elector's palace, which forms one side of this square, having been converted into an hospital by the French, is still used as such, or as a barrack, by the Prussians; and the windows were crowded with

the figures of half-dressed soldiers. Many of the cannon in the square remained with the fractures, made by the balls of the be|siegers. This place communicates with a broad street, in which were many buildings, filled with soldiers, and an handsome house, that, having belonged to one of the Clubbists, was destroyed immediately after the expulsion of the French. The walls still remain bare and open. Some greater ruins, occasioned by fire, during the siege, were visible at a distance, and, upon the whole, we had interest enough excited, as to the immediate history of the place, to take little notice of the narrow and difficult passages, through which we wound for half an hour, after leaving the principal street.

The next morning, the friends, to whom we had letters, began to conduct us through the melancholy curiosities, left in the city by the siege. These are chiefly in the southern quarter, against which the direct attack of the allies was made, and their approaches most advanced. Some entire streets have been destroyed here, and were still in ruins. A magnificent church, attached to a convent of Fran|ciscan monks, is among the most lamentable spectacles; what was the roof now lies in heaps over the pavement; not a vestige of furniture, or decoration, has escaped the flames, and there are chasms in the walls larger than the noble windows, that once illuminated them. This church and convent were set on fire by a bomb; and of the sick soldiers, who were lodged in the latter, it is feared that but few were removed before the destruction of the building. We next saw the remains of a palace, built by the present Provost of the Chapter of

Nobles; an institution, which is so rich, that their Superior had a more elegant residence than the Elector. It was of stone, and the principal front was in the Corinthian order, six columns of which supported a spacious open gallery, ornamented with statues, for its whole length. The wings formed two sides of a square, which sepa|rated the palace from the street. A profusion of the richest furniture and a valuable collection of paintings filled the interior. Of the whole edifice little now remains but the shattered walls of the centre, which have been so scorched as to lose all appearance of having belonged to a splendid structure. It was burnt the night before the fire of the Franciscan church, and two nights after the French had removed their head quarters and their municipality from it. On the day before the removal, a bomb had fallen upon the French General Blou, destroying him on the spot, and mortally wounding an officer, with whom he was conversing. The ruins are now so accumulated over the court-yard, that we could not discern it to have ever had that appendage of a distinguished residence.

But the church of Notre Dame was the most conspicuous of many ruined objects. The steeple of this had been one of the grandest ornaments of the city; a shower of bombs set fire to it; and, while it was thus rendered an easy mark for the besiegers, their cannon played upon and beat a great part of it to the ground. By its fall the roof of the church was shattered, but the body did not otherwise suf|fer any material injury. Wooden galleries have been raised round the remainder of the steeple, not for the purpose of repairing, but for

that of entirely removing it; and, to save the trouble of letting down the stones on the outside, a wooden pipe, or channel has been made, through which they are lowered into the church. The appearance of this steeple, which was once very large and lofty, is rendered striking by these preparations for its total destruction.

The whole church is built of a stone, dug from the neighbouring hills, the colour of which is so delicate a pink, that it might be sup|posed to be given by art. The Elector's palace and several other public buildings in the city are formed of this stone.

Passing through the gates on this side of Mentz, we came to a slope near the river, and beyond the glacis of the place, which was then partly covered with huge masses of stone scattered among the roots of broken trees and shrubs, that had begun again to shoot their ver|dure over the amputated trunks. This was the site of a palace of the Elector, called, both from the beauty of its situation, and the splen|dour of its structure, La Favorita. The apartments of the palace and the terraces of the garden commanded extensive views of the Rhine and the surrounding country ascending from its banks; and the gar|dens themselves were so beautifully disposed as to be thought worthy of the name of English. They were ornamented with pavilions, which had each its distinct prospect, and with one music room in the thickest part of the shrubbery. Of the building nothing is now visible but some disjointed stones; and of the garden, only the broken trunks of trees. The palace was burned and the gardens levelled by the French, that they might not afford shelter to the Prussians, during the siege.

From this spot we were shewn the positions of the allied forces, the course of their approaches and the chief outworks of the city. Hock|heim, Kostheim and Cassel lay before us, on the other side of the river; a gentle rise, on this side, at the distance of nearly a mile, was the first station of the allies, part of whose force was covered behind it; their last batteries were within two hundred and fifty paces of the city. The ground had been since levelled, and was now covered with standing corn, but the track of the trenches was, in some places, visible. On the other hand, the forts, in which the strength of the whole so much consists, were completely repaired, and had no appearance of having been so lately attacked. They are five in num|ber, and, being raised at a considerable distance from the walls of the city, no near approaches can be made, till some of them are either taken, or destroyed; for they are said to be regular and strong forti|fications, capable of containing numerous garrisons, and communi|cating with the city itself by passages, cut in the ground, through which they may be constantly reinforced.

Only one of these five forts, that nearest to the river, was destroyed in the late siege, which would have been much more tedious, but for the want of provisions and medicines, that began to be felt in the garrison. The walls of the city were almost uninjured, so that it has not been thought necessary to repair them in the few places, where balls may be perceived to have struck. The bombardment was the chief annoyance of the garrison, who were not sheltered in caserns, and whose magazines, both of ammunition and provision, were fre|quently

destroyed by it. Their numbers were also greatly reduced by sallies and by engagements, on the other side of the Rhine, in defence of Cassel, or in attack of part of an island, called the Bleiau.

We walked round the city upon what is termed the glacis, that is upon the slope, which ascends from the plain towards the top of the ditch, and which is the furthest of the defensive works, being very gradually raised, that those, who are upon it, may be exposed, at every step, to the fire from the walls. The forts, which are formed of solid earthen works, covered with turf, would scarcely attract the notice of an unmilitary eye, if the channelled passages to them did not issue from this slope, and if the sentinels, stalking upon the parapets, did not seem of a gigantic size, by having their whole figures raised against the light.

Mentz was at this time the depôt of stores for the Prussian army on the Rhine, and there were persons employed upon the glacis, in counting heaps of cannon balls, which had been delivered from some neighbouring foundery. On the bank of the river, others were throwing waggon-loads of hay into large barges, on which it was piled to such an height, that small passages were cut through it for the rowers to work in. There were nine or ten barges so filled; and in these labours more activity was apparent than in any other transactions we saw at Mentz.

Having passed round the city, between the walls and the forts, which protect them, to the north, west and south, we came, at this latter side, to some other signals of a theatre of war. Here had been

a noble alley of at least a mile and a half long, formed of poplars as large and high as elms, and surrounded, on each side, by plantations, intersected by small and irregular walks. Being led along the banks of the Rhine, this alley, with its adjoining groves, afforded a most delightful promenade, and was classed amongst the best ornaments, given to the river, in its whole course. This also was destroyed upon the approach of the besiegers, that it might not afford them shelter. The trunks of the sturdy trees, cut at the height of one or two feet from the ground, shew, by their solidity and the abundance of their vigorous shoots, how long they might have flourished, but for this disaster.

An Englishman, walking amidst the ensigns of such artificial and premature desolation, cannot help considering the natural security of his country, and rejoicing, that, even if the strong and plain policy of neglecting all foreign consequence, and avoiding all foreign interests, except the commercial ones, which may be maintained by a navy, should for ever be rejected, still his home cannot be invaded; and, though the expence of wars should make poverty general, the imme|diate horrors of them cannot enter the cities, or the cottages of an island.

Great part of our time at Mentz was occupied by enquiries con|cerning the siege, which was not so much a topic as we had expected to find it. We probably heard, however, all that was to be told, and had a German pamphlet recommended, containing the history of the place from the first invasion of the French to their departure.

The authenticity of this was assured to us; and it is partly from it, partly from the accounts given by our friends, that the following short narrative has been extracted.

OF MENTZ IN 1792 AND 1793.

THE entrance of a French army into Worms, in the beginning of October 1792, had excited a considerable alarm in Mentz, before the inhabitants of the latter city received the accounts, which were not long wanting, of express and avowed preparations for a march towards them. Great numbers of French emigrants had been drawn to the city by the meeting of the Emperor and the King of Prussia there, a few months before; many had arrived since the dissolution of their army in Champagne; and, during the approach of the Republican troops to Spires and Worms, families were continually passing through the city, joining those, who began to take their flight from it. The narrow streets were filled with carriages, and the distressful haste of the travellers served to depress the spirits of the inhabitants, who saw how little their city was thought capable of defence. On the 15th of October, Baron d'Albini, a counsellor of the Court, called the Burgesses together, and admonished them to make preparations for their security; he also enquired, whether they thought it prudent, that the Elector should remain in the city with them? and, it being readily answered, that they did not, the Elector

set out for Wurtzburg, a town about 100 miles distant, and was fol|lowed by the members of the government. At the same time, a con|siderable emigration of the other inhabitants took place.

The approach of the French had been so little foreseen, till within the few last weeks, that the garrison did not amount to a tenth part of the war complement. The inhabitants, however, having happily had little experience of sieges, did not know what this complement should be, and, after the first alarm, began to think the deficiency might be easily remedied. The Electoral troops, having sent some useless detachments to Spires, amounted to only 968 men, to whom an hundred were added, obtained from Nassau, Oranien, Weilburg, Bieberich and Fuld by the Elector's demands of assistance from his neighbours. Two hundred and seven Austrian hussars of Esterhazy had also arrived, on the 13th, and all the inhabitants of the Rhein|gau, a populous district, bordering upon the Rhine, were summoned to the assistance of the capital. The antient society of Archers of the city laid down their bows for musquets; the Academicians formed themselves into a corps, and were placed, together with the Archers, at several outposts. The traders, though exempt from per|sonal service, and unwilling to surrender that privilege, resolved to pay double watch-money for substitutes. It began to be thought, that the threatened progress of the French had been untruly report|ed; that the siege could not be commenced at that late season of the year; and lastly, that some promised reinforcements of Austrian troops could not be far off.

But, on the 19th of October, the French, in four columns, began to surround the place. They wore, at first, white cockades, expect|ing to be mistaken for the army of M. de Condé; they were, how|ever, known, and fired upon. Though some days had been passed in preparation, it was now found, that there was little readiness for de|fence. The best artillerymen had been lost at Spires; there were, at first, no horses to draw the cannon, so that oxen were used for that purpose; the nearest balls to the batteries of twenty-four pound can|non were cast for twelve-pounders; and many of the musquet car|tridges could not be fired. In a few hours, however, several of the artisans applied themselves to the making of cartridges; horses were supplied by the servants of the Court and the Nobility, and all hands were, in some way or other, employed. It was then reported, that a corps of Austrian troops was in the neighbourhood, and, on the 19th, 1800 men entered the city. These were recruits without ammuni|tion, and, for the most part, without arms, being on their march to join the army of the Emperor. They were then under the command of two, or three subalterns; but some other Imperial officers came in from the neighbourhood, and arms were obtained from the Elector's arsenal. After this reinforcement there were probably about four thousand men in arms in the city.

With this force, it is allowed, that a much longer defence than was made might have been expected; and, unless there was some failure of the commander's attention, the treachery of an engineer, to whom the surrender is imputed, could certainly not have been so effectual.

EIKENMAYER, this engineer, had, it seems, made known to the French the commander's preparations for defence; intelligence, which, if the preparations had been greater, could have been but little serviceable to the assailants. His chief assistance was afforded to them by much more conspicuous means; for, as the inhabitants went frequently to a building called St. Stephen's Tower, to observe the progress of the be|siegers, he assured them, that the army, which really amounted only to eleven thousand men, consisted of forty thousand; that they had with them two-and-twenty waggons, laden with scaling ladders, and that the city would presently be taken by storm. The same representa|tions of the besiegers' force were also made by him to the Council of War; and these, it is said, determined them to the surrender, before the French had raised a battery against the works.

Many of the citizens, however, were surprised and enraged at this resolution; and the captain of the Austrian reinforcements expressed his displeasure, at the Council House, where he declared, that he would continue to defend the place, even without permission. In the mean time, the capitulation was signed, and he was induced to submit to it by the solicitations even of the citizens, by whom it was blamed, and by their representations, that, in the present agitated temper of the inhabitants, all attempts at defence must be useless.

Baron d'ALBINI carried news of the surrender to the Elector, at Wurtzburg, and, about five o'clock, on the 21st of October, two French officers came to the Council House, followed by two companies of grenadiers. On the 22d, eight thousand French entered the city, the

other three thousand having marched, the preceding day, to Franck|fort; the inhabitants, astonished to find themselves taken by so small a force, now saw, to their still greater surprise, that their conquerors had scarcely any heavy cannon. This day was passed in assigning quarters to the troops, and, on the next, Custine, the commander of the French, called the members of the City Council together, to whom, in a short speech, he promised the protection of persons and properties, inviting them, at the same time, to promote the fraterni|zation of the inhabitants with the French nation. Professor BOH|MER, who had accepted the office of his Secretary, translated this address into German, and it was circulated through the city.

It is remarkable, that the French had no sooner taken possession of this sudden prize, than they began to foresee the probability of being reduced to defensive measures and to prepare for them. They imme|diately collected contributions of forage and corn from the neigh|bouring villages; the streets were rendered almost impassable by the loads brought in; and, as the magazines were soon filled, great quan|tities were wasted by being exposed to the rain in gardens, and trod|den under the feet of horses in the streets. The garrison was soon increased to 20,000 men, of whom sometimes three hundred some|times five hundred were lodged in each convent. The French soldiery having committed some excesses, Custine reproved their licentious|ness, and began to habituate them to discipline by ordering a retire|ment to their quarters, at certain hours, by beat of drum.

The inhabitants soon began to suspect the contrivance and the per|sons,

that had produced the surrender; for Eikenmayer lived in inti|macy with Custine; Professor Metternich, of the Academy of Mentz, mounted the French cockade; and the Elector's physician, having left the city, upon a promise of assisting some peasants, whom he asserted to be seized with an infectious fever, had carried on a corre|spondence with the French, as had PATOKI, a merchant, born at Col|mar, who had lately received the right of citizenship.

The palaces of the Elector and the Provost were now ransacked; and, though it had been published as a rule, that the property of pri|vate individuals should not be touched, the houses of the nobility were treated, as if they had belonged to the Prince. The profligacy and pride of Custine became every day more conspicuous, and were oppressive upon the garrison, as well as the inhabitants, though in a less degree. Johannesberg, a village upon the Rhine, at the distance of a few miles, is celebrated for its wines, which fell for three times the price of those of Hockheim. Custine sent a part of the garrison solely to bring him the wines from the cellars of the Prince of Fuld, who has a palace there; but, a compromise being proposed, the negotiation was protracted so long, that a Prussian corps, for which the Prince had sent, carried Johannesberg, before the terms were con|cluded. The Prince saved his money, and lost only eighteen barrels of wine, of which part was sent to Paris, and the rest supplied the entertainments given by Custine.

Those of the Germans, who attached themselves to Custine, sup|plied him with information of the state of the whole country. His

Secretary, Professor Bohmer, had begun the institution of a Club so early as the 22d of October; but this society is thought to have become inconvenient, and they soon after began to prepare for a National Convention in Mentz.

In the mean time, Cassel was surveyed, and the fortifications, for which Eikenmayer is said to have furnished the design, were com|menced. The neighbouring peasants were summoned to work at these, at the price of fifteen French sous, or about seven pence halfpenny a day; and intrenchments were thrown round Kostheim.

On the 17th of December, Custine published a proclamation, in which he stated, that, whereas some persons had supposed the King of Prussia to have so little respect for his character as to have invited him to a surrender, none should presume, on pain of death, to speak of such a measure, in future. This proclamation gave the inhabitants of Mentz information, that the Prussians were approaching. Some German troops had, indeed, begun by degrees to occupy the ground about Coblentz, but in a condition, which did not promise active measures, being weakened by a long march and by sickness; the Hessians posted themselves between Hanau and Franckfort; and the Prussians advanced so near to the latter city, that the scattered parties of the French retired to, and at length lost it.

About this time, an Electoral Professor of Philosophy and a Canon of Mentz, named Dorsel, who had left his posts, in the preceding year, to be naturalized, at Strasbourg, returned with a design for an union of Spires, Worms and Mentz into one territory, under the protection

of the French. He procured the substitution of a Municipality for the City Council. He obtained considerable influence in the city; and, on the 1st of January 1793, when the three commissioners of the Convention, Reubell, Merlin and Haussman entered Mentz, and were received by Custine with military honours, they shewed more attention to the Professor than to the General.

The Prussian head quarters had been established within a short dis|tance of Mentz; but, during all December, there had been only affairs of advanced posts, so that some tranquillity prevailed in the city. On the 6th of January, Hockheim was assailed by six thousand Prus|sians; the French, however, had been informed of the preparations for attack, and had time to retire to Kostheim and Cassel, leaving 112 prisoners and twelve pieces of cannon. Some French, who had con|cealed themselves in the church tower, were thrown headlong from it, for having shouted, or thrown stones at the King of Prussia, as he passed.

After this, another month passed, without hostile attempts on either side. The Prussian troops were refreshed by rest; the French passed the same time, partly in balls, to which all the ladies of Mentz were invited, and partly in preparations for defence. On the 17th of January, a small tree of liberty, which had been planted in Novem|ber, was removed, and a fir, seventy feet high, placed in its stead, with much ceremony. All the inhabitants were pressingly invited, upon this occasion; Messrs. Reubell, Merlin, Haussman and Custine attended; the Mayor, Municipality, and the Members of the Clubs followed;

the ensigns of the former government were burned; Custine called upon the music of the garrison for French airs, which occupied the rest of the day; and the evening concluded with entertainments and dancing. Soon after, the Commissioners left the city, and proceeded on a journey to the Moselle.

On the 16th of February, Custine published a proclamation, and two new Commissioners, who had just arrived, issued ano|ther, founded upon a decree of the French Convention, relative to the union of other countries with France. The Council House was full from morning till night; the assembled traders declared their adherence to the Germanic system; and the new Commis|sioners seemed inclined to listen to their remonstrances. But, when the three former Commissioners returned, they treated the Deputies of the trades with great haughtiness, and refused them permission to send agents to Paris. A second deputation, on the 22d of Febru|ary, was no better received, and they were informed, that the 24th was the day for the commencement of the new form. The traders are described to have been much affected, at the return of their Depu|ties. On the 23d of February, early in the morning, the author of a remonstrance, which had been presented, was arrested and carried into banishment, being accompanied by guards to the advanced posts of the Prussians, at Hockheim.

The inhabitants now began to leave the city by passports, which were, however, not easily procured, or used. A proclamation by the Municipality divided Mentz into sections, and directed the manner,

in which each section should elect a representative, on the 24th. On that day, the streets were unusually silent, all the former bur|gesses having resolved to remain in their houses, except one, and only 266 persons met to take the new oath and to make the new elections. On the 25th, another proclamation came out, and several banish|ments succeeded; but the burgesses still adhered to their resolution. The Municipality, on the 1st of March, again invited them to take the new oaths, and gave notice of an order of the Commissioners to the Mayor, to publish a list of the sworn and unsworn, on the Mon|day or Tuesday following. Notwithstanding this, the number of sworn did not equal 350.

Some of the neighbouring villages, which were visited by the French Commissioners, accepted their terms; the greater part refused them.

At Worms, where clubs, similar to those at Mentz, had been formed, 1051 persons took the oaths. The inhabitants of Bingen refused them.

In the mean time, some expeditions were made into the Palatinate, and corn, to the amount of sixty thousand florins, was taken away, before the reiterated remonstrances of the Palatine Resident at Mentz, upon the subject of his master's neutrality, could restrain them. In the first days of February, the French had also entered Deux Ponts, where the Duke relied so much upon his having supplied only his contingent to the treasure of the Empire, that he had not left his palace, though he knew of their approaches to his country. On the

9th, at eleven at night, the Duke and Duchess fled, with the utmost pre|cipitation, to Manheim, having left the palace only one hour before the French entered it. Great quantities of forage were swept away from this country, and brought to Mentz, which the allies now ap|proached so nearly, that the garrison hastily completed the fortifica|tions of Cassel, and filled the magazines with stores, left the commu|nication should be cut off by the destruction of the bridge.

On the 15th of February, they had begun to destroy the palace of La Favorita, and to erect a battery upon its ruins. Though the car|riage of provisions now occupied so much of their attention, a great number of large and small cannon were brought from Landau; fresh troops arrived, and General Wimpfen, who had defended Thion|ville against the King of Prussia, was declared the first in command. By banishments and emigration, the number of persons in the city was reduced fifteen thousand.

The new National Assembly met in Mentz, on the 10th of March, that city having chosen six deputies, Spires two, Worms two, and some other places one each. On the 17th, they had their first sit|ting, and, on the 18th, declared all the country between Landau and Bingen, which places were then the limits of the French posts near the Rhine, united in one independent state. On the 19th, was agi|tated the great question relative to the connections of this state, and it was not till the 21st, that they declared their incorporation with the French. Three deputies, FORSTER, PATOKI and LUCKS were appointed, the next day, to carry this resolution to Paris; and several

decrees, relative to the interior administration of this state, were passed, in consequence of which many persons were conducted over the bridge into banishment, on the 30th.

Accounts now arrived, that the siege would shortly commence, and orders were issued, relative to the prevention of fires, to the collection of stores of provisions by each family, and to several other domestic particulars. All the inhabitants, those especially in the neighbourhood of the granaries, were directed to preserve large quantities of water; and the proprietors of gardens within the city were ordered to plant them with herbs. Officers were sent round to examine these gardens. Already each family had been admonished to provide subsistence for seven months; and the richer class were now directed to furnish a loan to the burgesses, that the latter might be enabled to provide for the poor. In consequence of this order, 38,646 florins 10 creitzers, or about 3200 l. were collected, and expended for provisions. The gardens and walks round the city were now dismantled of their trees, of which those in the Rheinallee, before mentioned, were an hundred years old. All the summer-houses and villas, within cannon-shot of the city, were destroyed.

On the 8th of March, the French garrison in the fortress of Ko|nigstein, which the Prussians had blockaded for some months, surren|dered. In this month also other advances were made towards Mentz. The Prussian General Schonfield brought 12,000 men into the neigh|bourhood of Hockheim, near which the Saxons were posted; the

King of Prussia, his son and the Duke of Brunswick, who had passed part of the winter at Franckfort, left it, on the 23d of March; a bridge was laid, at St. Goar, over which numerous bodies of Prussian troops passed the Rhine; the French fell back towards Bingen, and the Prussians occupied a hill, not far from it. On the 28th, they were closer pressed, and left all the villages in the neighbourhood of Bingen, from which place they were driven, the next day, by a bombardment.

At the same time, a similar retreat towards Mentz also took place from the southward. At Worms, during the abandonment, great quan|tities of hay and straw were burned, and the burgesses kept watch, all night, dreading the conflagration of the whole city by the flames, rising from the magazines. Immense masses of hay and straw were also burned at Frankenthal, where there had been a garrison, during the whole winter; but the corn was carried away. At Spires, early on the 31st of March, the burgesses and troops were employed in throwing the hay and straw from the magazines into the ditch; but it appeared that even this mode would not be expeditious enough, and fire was at length set to the whole store at once.

In the retreat from Oppenheim, though the French were under considerable difficulties, they were upon the point of obtaining what they would have thought an abundant reward for them. It was on the 30th of March, that their cavalry and flying artillery took the road by Alsheim. As this was a place capable of making some de|fence,

and there were Prussian troops visible at the gates, they began the attack by planting cannon, and directing a vigorous fire upon it. The King of Prussia, who was at dinner in the town, and had not an hundred men with him, received his first intelligence of their ap|proach from this fire. He immediately rode out, on the opposite side, and, sending some hussars to the spot, the French did not con|tinue the contest, but made their retreat by another road. If they had known how few troops were in the town, they would, of course, have entered it without commencing this fire; and the Prussian offi|cers agree, that, if they had done so, there would have been little chance of saving their monarch. Had they been aware also, that his Prussian Majesty was there, they might have reduced this slight chance to an impossibility; for they were sufficiently numerous to have surrounded the town, and had approached so quietly, that they were not known to be near it. The Prussians had no cannon, and the French were otherwise greatly superior; though, having no other purpose for entering the town, than to continue their retreat, they did not wait to contest it, but retired by another road. That a cir|cumstance, which would have had such an effect upon the affairs of Europe, should have depended upon so slight a chance as this, we could not have believed, if the story had not been confirmed to us by ample authority.

The garrison of Mentz was increased by these retreats to 23,000 men; General Kalkreuth, who commanded the blockade from Lau|benheim

to Budenheim, a distance of twelve miles, had only 16,000 men. General Schonfield, with his corps of observation, was at Hockheim. The besiegers, however, presently amounted to 30,000 men. It is remarkable, that, though the French retreated from seve|ral quarters, at once, and in many small columns, not one of these was effectually interrupted by the Prussian commander.

Upon intelligence of these advances, the Elector of Mentz paid a visit to the King of Prussia, at his head quarters, and left his minister, the Baron d'ALBINI, to attend to the affairs of the re|covered places.

In the beginning of April, the blockade was more closely pressed, and the preparations for the siege seriously commenced. General d'OYRE was made commander in the city, with a Council of sixteen persons, to assist him in restoring the means of its defence. A person was placed at the top of an high building, called Stephen's Tower, with glasses, which enabled him to overlook the country for nine miles round. He had a secretary with him, that his view might never be unnecessarily diverted, and was obliged to make a daily report of his observations. The beating of drums and ringing of bells were forbidden throughout the whole city, that the besiegers might not know in what quarters the corps de garde were placed, or what churches were left without the military. All prospect houses and trees within the walls, which could serve as marks to the fire without, were ordered to be demolished. Many days were passed in

bringing further stores of provisions into the city; after which an account of the stock was taken, and there were found to be

• 24,090 sacks of wheat.
• 1,465 of other corn.
• 996 of mixed grain.

Of which 26,551 sacks, it was stated, that 23,070 sacks of meal could be made. To this was to be added in sifted meal of wheat 109 sacks, of other corn 45 sacks, of mixed grain 10,076 sacks; making in all 33,300 sacks of meal. There were besides

• 43,960 rations of biscuit.
• 7,275 pounds of rice.
• 13,045 of dried herbs.

Of forage there were 10,820 quintals of hay.

• 54,270 of straw.
• 1,518 sacks of oats.
• 2,503 of barley.

The Council estimated, that the garrison had corn enough for nine months, rice for seven, and herbs for six. There were fifteen hundred horses, and it was reckoned, that the straw was enough for ten months, the oats for four-and-twenty days, and the barley for eighty days. The garrison was numbered, and found to con|sist of 22,653 persons; of whom to each soldier was allotted, for the future, 24 ounces of bread, per day, in lieu of 28, and 4 ounces

of fresh meat, or 3 ounces of salt, in lieu of 8 ounces of fresh. The allowance of the sick in the hospitals was changed from twelve to eight ounces.

During these preparations for a long siege, the diminution of the number of inhabitants, by means of the clubs, was pursued. On the 8th of April, all persons, not useful to the army, were ordered to leave the city, unless they would take the new oath; at the same time, it was said, that, on account of the foreseen want of money, the soldiers, employed on the works, would be no longer paid, but the other workmen would continue to receive their salaries.

The garrison made their first sortie, on the night of the 10th and 11th, proceeding towards the Rhine. Kostheim was imme|diately taken, and the attack upon the Hessians succeeded, at first, but a reinforcement compelled the French to retire. About this time, the Commissioner Reubell went to Oppenheim, where he de|livered a proposal for peace to the King of Prussia.

The village of Weissenau was contended for, on the 15th, 16th and 17th, and finally destroyed, the French soldiers, who remained upon the spot, subscribing 460 livres for the inhabitants.

On the 18th, nearly the whole of a French convoy of 90 waggons was taken by the Prussians. On the 20th the Imperialists erected a small fort on a point of land, near the Main, and the French, on the other hand, perfected a battery, at Kostheim, with which they set on fire some stables.

The price of provisions was already so much increased in the city, that salt butter cost 48 creitzers, or 16d. pence per pound.

In the night of the 28th and 29th, the French landed in three vessels, and destroyed a battery, erected near the Main. On the 1st of May, at one in the morning, they attacked the Prussians, at Hockheim, and set the village of Kostheim on fire. The Prussians repulsed them with loss, but they remained in Kostheim, notwith|standing the fire, which continued for three days; they were then expelled by the Prussians, but soon returned with reinforcements, and a sanguinary contest commenced, at the end of which they con|tinued to be masters of the village. A numerous garrison was placed in it, which, on the 8th, was again attacked by the Prussians, but without effect. Thus the greatest part of May was spent in contests for villages and posts, in which the French were generally the assailants. In the night of the 30th, they beat up, in three columns, the Prussian head quarters, at Marienborn. Having marched barefooted and with such exact information, that they passed all the batteries unperceived, they entered the village itself, without resistance, and, it is supposed, would have surprised the com|mander, if they had not fired at his windows, beat their drums, and begun to shout Vive la nation! Three balls, which entered the apartment of General KALKREUTH, admonished him to quit it, and a sentinel stepped up just in time to shoot a French soldier, who had seized him. Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia immediately arrived with some troops, and the French began to retire, leaving

thirty prisoners and twenty killed of 6000, engaged in the enter|prise. The loss of the Prussians was considerable; amongst the rest Captain Voss, a relative of Mademoiselle Voss, well known in the Court of Prussia.

On the 4th of June, the allowance to the garrison was ordered to be two pounds of bread and one bottle of wine for each soldier, per day.

In the night of the 6th and 7th, the cannonade was very fierce, on both sides; in Mentz a powder magazine was fired by a bomb, and blew up with a dreadful explosion.

The scarceness of provisions increased, so that a pound of fresh butter cost six shillings. Horseflesh began to be consumed in many families.

On the night of the 9th and 10th of June, the garrison made four sorties, which ended in considerable loss, on both sides, and in the retirement of the French into the city. On the 10th, they attacked, at eight in the morning, a post near Gonsenheim, retreating with|out loss, after killing an officer and several men. This was their first sally in open day-light.

General Meusnier, who had been wounded near Cassel, on the 7th, died on the 13th, and was buried the next day, within the new fortifications, all the officers of the garrison, with the members of the convention and clubs, attending.

Some fire ships were now completed, which a Dutch engineer had conducted from Holland, to be employed by the besiegers in burn|ing

the bridge of boats over the Rhine. It was thought, however, that their explosion would damage the city unnecessarily, and they were rejected. In the night of the 15th, one of these floated down the river, whether by accident, or by the connivance of the inven|tor, is not known; the inhabitants were in the utmost terror, but it struck against the quay, and, being immediately boarded, did no damage.

The trenches were opened, in the night of the 16th and 17th, but, the workmen having been ill conducted, were not covered in, at day-light, and were compelled to retire, leaving their implements be|hind them. Two nights afterwards, the work was renewed in good order and without loss, the King of Prussia, his sons and the Duke of Brunswick surveying them from a neighbouring height. The first balls fell in a street near one of the gates, and all that part of the town was presently deserted.

The 24th was a distressful day for the inhabitants. Four days before, the King of Prussia had sent a general passport for such as chose to come out, and 1500 persons, chiefly women and children, had accepted his offer. A short time after the gate had been opened, dismay was spread through the whole city by an account, that the Prussians would suffer no more to pass and the French none to return. The bridge was covered with these unhappy fugitives, who had no food, or shelter, and who thought themselves within reach of the Hock|heim batteries, that played furiously upon the city. Two children lost their senses through fright. At length, the French soldiers took

compassion upon them; they carried several persons into the city under their cloaks, and, the next day, their remonstrances against the inhumanity of the German clubbists, who had shut the gates against this defenceless crowd, obliged them to permit the return of the whole number.

For several succeeding nights, the garrison made sorties, with various effect, interrupting, but not preventing the completion of the parallel.

At sunset, on the 27th, the besiegers began a dreadful cannonade and bombardment. On this night, the steeple of the church of Notre Dame caught fire; and during the alarm, excited by an im|mense volume of flame, arising in the midst of the city, the Aus|trians completely carried the French posts, near Weissenau. The next night was equally terrible to the inhabitants; the flames caught several parts of the city, amongst others the cathedral; some of the maga|zines took fire, and eleven hundred sacks of corn were burned. The church, formerly belonging to the Jesuits, was much injured. The French, intending to retaliate their last surprise upon the Aus|trians, made a fruitless attack upon the Weissenau redoubt.

On the 29th of June, at mid-day, the French were driven from a point of land, near the Main, called the Bleiau. In this affair, a vessel, with 78 Prussians on board, drove from her anchor, owing to the unskilfulness of the crew, and, during a fire, by which eight men were killed, made towards the city. The Prussians were taken prisoners, and exchanged the next day. At night, the bombard|ment

was renewed; the Domprobstei, or palace of the Provost, was burned and several of the neighbouring residences; in other parts of the city, some houses were reduced to ashes.

The next night, the church of the Franciscans and several other public buildings were destroyed. A dreadful fire, on the night of the 2d and 4th of June, consumed the chapel of St. Alban. Families in the southern part of the city now constantly passed the night in their cellars; in the day-time, they ventured into their usual apart|ments; for the batteries of the besiegers were by far the most ter|rible, at night, when the whole city was a sufficient mark for them, though their works could scarcely be discerned by the garrison. In the day-time, the exactness of the French gunners frequently did great injury to the batteries, which, at night, were repaired and used with equal effect against the city.

St. Alban's fort was now demolished, so that the besieged with|drew their cannon from it. Elizabeth fort was also much damaged. A strong work, which the French had raised, in prolongation of the glacis, divided the opinions of the Prussian engineers. Some thought it should be preserved, when taken, because it would command part of the town; others, that it should be demolished. The latter opi|nion prevailed, and, in the night of the 5th and 6th, General MANSTEIN was ordered to make the attack with three battalions. He perfectly succeeded, as to the nearest part of the work, but the other, on account of its solid foundation, could not be entirely de|stroyed. In the mean time, two battalions were sent, under cover

of the darkness, to attack the Zahlbach fort, a part of which they carried by storm; but the reinforcements, immediately supplied by the garrison, obliged them to retire. Two Prussian officers were killed; one wounded, and another, with one-and-thirty men, taken. The Prussians lost in all ••83 men; the French had twelve killed and forty-seven wounded.

On the 6th of July, the French repaired the damaged fort, the distance of it from the Prussians preventing the latter from hinder|ing them.

At night, General Kleist carried the fort, at Zahlbach, by a second attack, and demolished it; at the same time, some batteries of the second parallel were perfected. The French could not support the loss of this fort; on the 7th, they attacked the scite; carried it, after a severe contest; and rebuilt it. At night, they were driven back again and the fort entirely destroyed. In the same night they were driven from Kostheim, after a furious battle, by the Prussian Gene|ral Schonfield. During this engagement, the rapid succession of flashes and explosion of bombs seemed to fill the air with flame. A Prussian detachment having been posted on the road to Cassel, in or|der to prevent the garrison of that place from sending succour to Kost|heim, this road was so strongly bombarded by the French, that seven bombs were frequently seen in the air at once. The loss was great, on both sides, in this engagement, after which the Council in the city resolved, to make no more attempts upon Kostheim, on account of the distance.

The following night, the fire was less than usual, but a few bombs and grenades fell in the city, where the inhabitants had now learned to extinguish such as grounded, before their fusees were consumed. They also formed themselves into parties for the ready suppres|sion of fires. The next morning, the garrison saw the works of the besiegers brought to within two hundred and fifty paces of the walls.

About this time, the sickliness of the garrison became apparent, and General d'Oyré informed the Council, that, on account of this and of the fatiguing service of the works, he feared the defence could not be much longer continued. He lamented, that the troops of the line were so few, and the others so inexperienced.

For several nights, the works of the besiegers were eagerly push|ed, but still they were not so forward, as had been expected. Some of the besieging corps began to be sickly; the King of Prussia having resolved to employ no more labourers, it was reckoned, that the soldiers, for eight-and-forty hours of work, had only eighteen of rest. On the other hand, they were assured, that the garrison must be equally fatigued, since, in such an extensive fortification, none could be left long unemployed.

The French had been, for some time, busied in forming what is called a Fleche at the head of one of their forts, and this was thought necessary to be destroyed. It was attacked in the night of the 12th and 13th by the Austrians; but so much time was passed in their operations, that the French fell upon them, in great force, about two in the morning, and beat them away, with loss. The Austrians were as little employed as possible in services of this sort.

On the 13th of July, another battery was stormed by the Prussians; but, as the officer, unlike the Austrians, advanced with too little caution, his party was much hurt by some pieces of concealed can|non, and the enterprise failed.

The night of the 13th and 14th was passed in much agitation by the garrison and inhabitants. Several of the public buildings were set fire to and burned by grenades. The works of the besiegers were now greatly advanced. The garrison made five sorties in this night, and were repulsed in all, losing an hundred men, while the besiegers lost eight killed and one-and-thirty wounded.

On the 14th of July, a cessation of arms took place from seven o'clock in the morning till one. In the city, the French celebrated their annual fête; General d'OYRE and the troops took the oath, and MERLIN delivered an address to them. In the Austrian camp, the Prince de CONDE was received with a feu de joye. During this ces|sation, the soldiers upon the different outposts entered into conversa|tion with each other, and the French boasted of the difficulties they laboured under from the length of the siege.

At night, an affair at the Fleche cost the allies, who succeeded in part, ninety men; the French confessed, that this work cost them in all three hundred. The inhabitants of the city were again greatly alarmed, their streets being covered with a shower of grenades. The laboratory and a part of the Benedictine abbey were burned, and two explosions took place at the former. The whole city shook with each report, and, in the nearer parts, all the windows were broken and

the doors burst open. The remainder of the hay and straw was consumed in this fire; the whole stock of other forage was reduced to a sufficiency for four days; and the surgeon's stores were much damaged.

Still the Fleche prevented the besiegers from completing their second parallel. It was, therefore, again attacked, on the night of the 16th and 17th, Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia commanding at the assault, in which he was one of twelve officers wounded. The Fleche was then completely carried.

The next night was very industriously spent by the besiegers in forming new batteries, and those of the second parallel were raised, before there were cannon enough at hand to place upon them. The French took advantage of this, and brought a part of theirs to bear, so as to enfilade the parallel, with great effect; the Prussians almost immediately losing an officer and forty men.

In the city, the sick had now increased so much, that six hundred men were brought from Cassel, on the 17th, to reinforce the garrison. On the 18th, the commandant informed the Council, that there was a want of fodder and such a loss of horses, by desertion, that there were not cavalry enough left for service. The soldiers, who knew the deficiency of medicines and other means of relief for the wounded, were unwilling to be led to sorties. Though corn had not failed, flour, it appeared, soon would, for some of the mills had been ren|dered unserviceable, for the present, by shot, and others were desert|ed by the millers.

At night, after an unsuccessful attempt upon the Fleche, it was resolved, that the garrison, which had hitherto scarcely suffered a night to pass, without making some sorties, should, for the future, adhere solely to defensive measures. Some engineers proposed to abandon the whole line of forts, and others, that two of the largest should be blown up. The General and Council, at length, confessed, that they could not continue the defence, and assured the inhabitants, who had declared themselves in their favour, that a longer delay of the surrender would produce a more severe disposition of the be|siegers towards them, without increasing the chance of escaping it.

A negotiation, relative to the surrender, was now begun by D'OYRE, in a letter, which partly replied to one from the Prussian commander KALKREUTH, upon the subject of the departure of aged persons and children from the city. Their correspondence continued till the 20th, and several letters were exchanged, chiefly upon the question of the removal, or detention of the inhabitants, who had attached themselves to the French; it was then broken off, upon a disagreement, as to this and some other points. The firing, on both sides, had in the mean time continued, and the besiegers carried on the trenches, though these were now such an easy mark for the garri|son, that they lost an officer and five-and-twenty men, in the night of the 19th and 20th. The next night, the Dominicans' church in the city took fire, and six French soldiers were buried under its ruins.

Upon a renewal of the intercourse, the fire slackened, on the 21st; but, on some delays in the negotiation, was threatened to be recom|menced.

At length, the conditions of the surrender were settled, and the negotiation signed, on the 22d of July, by the two Generals Kalkreut hand D'Oyré; the former having rendered the capitulation somewhat easier than was expected for the garrison, because the Duke of Brunswick had only nineteen thousand men to cover the siege, and Custine had forty thousand, which were near enough to attack him. General KALKREUTH'S orders are supposed to have been to obtain possession of the place, upon any terms, that would give it him quickly.

At this time, the garrison, which, at the commencement of the siege, had consisted of 22,653 men, was reduced to 17,038, having had 1959 killed, 3334 wounded, or rendered unserviceable by sick|ness, and having lost 322 by desertion.

The loss of the besiegers is stated at about 3000 men.

The consumption of ammunition, on the part of the French, was found to have been

• 681,850 pounds of powder,
• 106,152 cannon balls,
• 10,278 bombs,
• 6592 grenades,
• 44,500 pounds of iron,
• 300,340 musquet cartridges;

and, during the siege, 107 cannon either burst, or were rendered un|serviceable by the besiegers' shot. Towards the conclusion, sixty can|non also became useless by the failure of balls of the proper calibre.

On the 24th and 25th, the garrison marched out, MERLIN leading the first column of 7500 men. The members of the Clubs, who would have gone out with the troops, were pointed out by the other inhabitants and detained; but the Elector had the magnanimity to think of no other retaliation, than their imprisonment in a tower, near the Rhine, where they have since remained.

There was now leisure to examine the city, and it was found, that six churches were in ruins; that seven mansions of the nobility had been burned, and that very few houses had escaped, without some damage. The surrounding grounds were torn up by balls and bat|teries. The works of Cassel were surrendered entire to the con|querors, and are an important addition to the strength of Mentz, already reckoned one of the strongest and largest fortifications in Europe. Between Cassel and the ruins of Kostheim not a tree was to be seen. All the neighbouring villages were more, or less, injured, being contended for, as posts, at the commencement of the siege; and the country was so much disfigured, that the proprietors of lands had some difficulty to ascertain their boundaries.

MENTZ.

SOMETHING has been already said of the present condi|tion of this city: upon a review it appears, that from the mention of churches, palaces, burgesses, quays and streets, we might be supposed to represent it as a considerable place, either for splendour, or com|merce, or for having its middle classes numerously filled. Any such opinion of Mentz will be very incorrect. After two broad and some|what handsome streets, all the other passages in the city are narrow lanes, and into these many of the best houses open, having, for the most part, their lower windows barricadoed, like those of Cologne. The disadvantage, with which any buildings must appear in such situations, is increased by the neglected condition of these; for a German has no notion, that the outside of his house should be clean, even if the inside is so. An Englishman, who spends a few hun|dred pounds in a year, has his house in better condition, as to neat|ness, than any German nobleman's we saw; a Dutchman, with fifty pounds a year, exceeds both.

The Elector's palace is a large turretted building of reddish stone, with one front towards the Rhine, which it commands in a delightful point of view; but we did not hear, that it was so much altered, by being now used as a barrack, as that its appearance can formerly have been much less suitable than at present to such a purpose.

On the quay there is some appearance of traffic, but not much in the city; so that the transfer of commodities from vessels of other districts to those of the Electorate may be supposed to contribute great part of the show near the river. The commerce is not sufficient to encourage the building of warehouses over the quay. The vessels are ill rigged, and the hulls are entirely covered with pitch, without paint. About thirty of these, apparently from forty to seventy tons burthen, were lying near the quay; and the war could scarcely have diminished their usual number, so many being employed in carrying stores for the armies.

The burgesses are numerous, and have some privileges, which ren|der their political condition enviable to the other inhabitants of the Electorate. But, though these have invited manufacturers, and some|what encouraged commerce, there is not wealth enough in the neigh|bouring country, to make such a consumption, as shall render many traders prosperous. In point of wealth, activity and address, the bur|gesses of Mentz are much below the opinion, which must be formed, while German cities are described and estimated by their importance in their own country, rather than by a comparison of their condition with that of others. A trader, it will be allowed, is at least as likely to appear to advantage in his business as in any other state. His intelligence may surely be, in some degree, judged of by those, who deal with him; and that we might know something of those of Mentz, we passed some of the little time we were left to ourselves in endeavouring to buy trifles at their shops.

The idleness and inadvertence we generally saw are difficult to be conceived; perhaps, the trouble, experienced in purchasing a book, may give an idea of them. We wanted the German pamphlet, from which most of the above-mentioned particulars of the siege are ex|tracted; and, as it related to a topic so general within the place, we smiled, when our friends said they would assist us to procure it, during a walk. Two booksellers, to whom we applied, knew nothing of it; and one supposed, that an engraved view of the works would do quite as well. Passing another shop, a young German gentleman enquired for it of the master, who was at the door, and heard, that we might have it, upon our return, in half an hour. The door, when we came back, was shut, and no knocking could procure it to be opened; so that we were obliged to send into the dwelling-house. When the shopman came, he knew nothing of the book; but, being assured that his master had promised it, went away, and returned with a copy in sheets. We paid for this, and left it to be sewed, which was agreed to be done, in three hours. At that time, it was not finished, but might be had in another hour; and, after that hour, it was again promised, within two. Finally, it could not be had, that night, but would be ready in the morning, and, in the morning, it was still unfinished; we then went to Franckfort without it, and it was sent after us by a friend. This was the most aggravated instance we saw of a German trader's manners; but something like it may be almost every where met with.

From such symptoms and from the infrequency of wealth among

the middle classes it is apparent, that Mentz could not have been im|portant, as to commerce, even if there had been no siege, which is here mentioned as the cause of all deficiencies, and certainly is so of many. The destruction of property, occasioned by it, will not be soon remedied. The nobility have almost forsaken a place, where their palaces have been either destroyed, or ransacked; the Prince has no residence there; some of the Germans, who emigrated on account of the last siege, fled into France; the war-taxes, as well as the partial maintenance of the garrison, diminish what property re|mains; and all expenditure is upon a reduced footing.

The contribution of the inhabitants towards a support of the garri|son is made by the very irksome means of affording them lodging. At the best houses, the doors are chalked over with the names of officers, lodged in them; which the servants dare not efface, for the soldiers must know where to find their officers. In a family, whom we visited, four officers and their servants were quartered; but it must be acknowledged, that the former, so far from adding to this incon|venience by any negligent conduct, were constantly and carefully polite. We, indeed, never saw Prussian officers otherwise; and can testify, that they are as much superior to those Austrians in manners and intelligence, as they are usually said to be in military qualities.

Another obstruction, which the siege has given to the prosperity of Mentz, consists in the absence of many members of the Noble Chapter; an institution, which, however useless, or injurious to the country occasions the expenditure of considerable sums in the capi|tal.

That of Mentz is said to be one of the richest of many similar Chapters in Germany. From such foundations the younger sons of noble families derive sometimes very ample incomes, and are but little restricted by their regulations from any enjoyment of temporal splen|dour. Their carriages and liveries vie with those of the other attend|ants at Court; they are not prohibited from wearing the ornaments of orders of knighthood; are very little enjoined to residence; are received in the environs of the Court with military honours, and allowed to reside in their separate houses. They may wear embroi|dery of gold, and cloths of any colours, except scarlet, or green, which, as well as silver lace, are thought too gay. Being thus per|mitted and enabled to become examples of luxury, their residence in any city diffuses some appearance of prosperity over it.

One of the largest buildings in Mentz is the arsenal, which fronts towards the river, and attracts the attention of those, who walk upon the quay, by having armed heads placed at the windows of the first floor, which seem to frown, with Roman sternness, upon the passen|ger. In one of the principal rooms within, a party of figures in similar armour are placed at a council-board. We did not hear who contrived them; but the heads in the windows may be mistaken for real ones, at the distance of fifty yards.

The Elector of Mentz, who is chosen by a Chapter of twenty-four Canons, and is usually one of their number, is the first ecclesiastical Prince in the empire, of which he is also the Arch-chancellor and Di|rector of the Electoral College. In the Diet, he sits on the right hand

of the Emperor, affixes the seal of the Empire to its decrees, and has afterwards the custody of them among the archives. His revenues, in a time of peace, are nearly 200,000 l. annually; but, during a war, they are much less, a third part of them arising from tolls, imposed upon the navigation of the Rhine. The vineyards supply another large part; and his subjects, not interested in them, are but little taxed, except when military preparations are to be made; the taxes are then as direct as possible, that money may be immediately col|lected.

The fortifications of his chief city are as much a misfortune to his country as they are an advantage to the rest of the Empire. Being always one of the first objects, on this side of the Rhine, since an enemy cannot cross the river, while so considerable a fortress and so large a garrison as it may contain, might, perhaps, check their return, the Electorate has been often the scene of a tedious warfare. From the first raising of the works by Louis the Fourteenth, their strength has never been fully tried. The surrender in 1792 was partly for the want of a proper garrison, and partly by contrivance; even in 1793, when the defence was so furious and long, the garrison, it is thought, might have held out further, if their stores had been secured in bomb|proof buildings. A German garrison, supported by an army, which should occupy the opposite bank of the Rhine, might be continually reinforced and supplied, so as to be conquered by nothing but the absolute demolition of the walls.

The bridge of boats over the Rhine, which, both in peace and war,

is so important to the city, is now in a much better state than the French found it, being guarded, at the eastern end, by the fortifica|tions of Cassel. Notwithstanding its great length and the rapidity of the river, it is so well constructed, as to be much less liable to injury, than might be supposed, and would probably sustain batteries, which might defeat every attempt at destroying it by fireships. It is 766 feet long, and wide enough for the passage of two carriages at once. Various repairs, and the care of a daily survey, have continued it, since 1661, when it was thrown over the river.

The practice of modifying the names of towns so as to incorporate them separately with every language, is no where more remarkable than with respect to those of Germany, where a stranger, unless he is aware of them, might find the variations very inconvenient. The German name for what we call Mentz, is Maynz; the French, which is most used, Mayence; and the Italian Magontio, by descent from the Roman Magontiacum. The German synonym for Liege is Luttich; for Aix la Chapelle, Achen; for Bois le Duc, Herzogen|busch; and for Cologne, Cöln, which is pronounced Keln. The name, borne by every town in the nation to which it belongs, should surely be its name, wherever it is mentioned; for the same reason, that words, derived into one language from another, are pronounced ac|cording to the authority of their roots, because the use of the primary term is already established, and there can never be a decision between subsequent varieties, which are cotemporary among themselves, and are each produced by the same arrogance of invention.

FRANCKFORT.

WE came hither by means of a passage boat, which we were told would shew something of the German populace, but which displayed nothing so much as the unskilfulness of the German sailors. Though they make this voyage, every day, they went aground in the even stream of the Maine, and during the calmest weather; fixing the vessel so fast by their ill-directed struggle to get off, that they were compelled to bring the towing horses to the side and tug backward with the stream. There were an hundred people in the boat; but the expedient of desiring them to remove from the part, which was aground, was never used. We heard, that they seldom make the voyage, without a similar stoppage, not against any shifting sand, but upon the permanent shelves of the river.

The distance is about four-and-twenty miles, but we were nine hours in reaching Franckfort, the environs of which afford some symptoms of a commercial and opulent city, the banks of the Maine being covered for nearly the last mile with country seats, separated from each other by small pleasure grounds.

There are gates and walls to Franckfort, but the magistrates do not oppress travellers by a military examination at their entrance. Having seen the worthlessness of many places, which bear ostentatious cha|racters either for splendour or trade, we were surprised to find in this

as much of both as had been reported. The quays were well covered with goods and labourers; the streets nearest to the water are lined with shops, and those in the middle of the city with the houses of merchants, of which nearly all are spacious, and many magnificent. Some, indeed, might be called palaces, if they had nobility for their tenants; but, though the independence, which commerce spreads among the middle classes, does not entirely deter the German nobility from a residence here, the finest houses are the property of merchants.

In our way to the Cigne Blanc, which is one of the best inns, we passed many of so good an appearance, that it was difficult to believe there could be better in a German city. But Franckfort, which is the pride of Germany, in this respect, has probably a greater number of large inns than any other place of equal extent in Europe. The fairs fill these, twice in a year, for three weeks, at each time; and the order, which is indispensible then, continues at other periods, to the surprise and comfort of strangers.

This city has been justly described by many travellers; and Doctor MOORE has treated of its inhabitants with the ease and elegant ani|mation of his peculiar manner. We shall not assume the disadvan|tage of entering upon the same subject after him. The inhabitants of Franckfort are very distinct, as to manners and information, from the other Germans; but they are so far like to those of our own com|mercial cities, that one able account leaves scarcely any thing new to be seen, or told, concerning them.

All their blessings of liberty, intelligence, and wealth are observed

with the more attention, because they cannot be approached, except through countries afflicted by arbitrary power, ignorance and poverty. The existence of such a city, in such a situation, is little less than a phenomenon; the causes of which are so various and minute as to make the effect, at first sight, appear almost accidental. The jea|lousy of the neighbouring Princes towards each other, is the known, and, certainly, the chief cause of its exterior protection against each; the continuance of its interior liberties is probably owing to the cir|cumstance, which, but for that jealousy, would expose it to subjection from without,—the smallness of its territory. Where the departments of government must be very few, very difficult to be rendered ex|pensive to the public, and very near to their inspection, the ambition of individuals can be but little tempted to contrive encroachments upon the community. So complexly are the chief causes of its exterior and interior independence connected with each other.

As to the first of these, it may, perhaps, be replied, that a similar jealousy has not always been sufficient to protect similar cities; and Dantzick is the recent instance of its insufficiency. But the jealousy, ••s to Dantzick, though similar, was not equal to this, and the tempta|tion to oppose it was considerably greater. What would the most capable of the neighbouring Princes gain by the seizure of Franck|fort? A place of strength? No. A place capable of paying taxes? Yes; but taxes, which would be re-imposed upon commodities, consumed partly by his own subjects, whose property is his own already, and partly by those of his neighbours, to whose jealousy they would afford

an additional and an unappeasable provocation. Dantzick, on the contrary, being a seaport, was, if not strong, capable of supplying strength, and might pay taxes, which should not fall entirely upon its neighbours, but upon the distant countries, that traffick with it. And even to these considerations it is unnecessary to resort, unless we can suppose, that despotism would have no effect upon commerce; a sup|position which does not require to be refuted. If a severe taxation was introduced here, and, in so small a district, taxation must be severe to be productive; if such a taxation was to be introduced, and if the other advantage of conquest, that of a forcible levy of soldiers, was attempted, commerce would vanish in silence before the oppressor, and the Prince, that should seize the liberties of Franckfort, would find nothing but those liberties in his grasp.

On the other hand, what are the advantages of permitting the independence of such a city to the sovereigns, who have the power of violating it? Those of a neutral barrier are well known, but apply only to military, or political circumstances. The others are the mar|ket, which Franckfort affords, for the produce and manufactures of all the neighbouring states; its value as a banking depôt and empo|rium, in which Princes may place their money, without rendering it liable to the orders of each other, or from which they may derive loans, by negotiating solely and directly with the lenders; its inca|pacity for offensive measures; and its usefulness as a place of meeting to themselves, or their ministers, when political connections are to be discussed.

That the inhabitants do enjoy this independence without and free|dom within, we believe, not because they are asserted by treaties, or political forms; of which the former might not have survived the temporary interests, that concluded them, and the latter might be sub|dued by corruption, if there were the means of it; but because they were acknowledged to us by many temperate and discerning persons, as much aloof from faction, as they were from the affectation, or ser|vility, that sometimes makes men boast themselves free, only because they have, or would be thought to have, a little share in oppressing others. Many such persons declared to us, that they had a substan|tial, practical freedom; and we thought a testimony to their actual enjoyments more valuable than any formal acknowledgments of their rights. As to these latter securities, indeed, Franckfort is no better provided than other imperial cities, which have proved their inuti|lity. It stands in the same list with Cologne, but is as superior to it in government as in wealth.

The inhabitants having had the good sense to foresee, that fortifi|cations might render them a more desirable prize to their neighbours, at the same time that their real protection must depend upon other means, have done little more than sustain their antient walls, which are sufficient to defend them against a surprise by small parties. They maintain no troops, except a few companies of city-guards, and make their contributions to the army of the Empire in specie. These companies are filled chiefly with middle-aged men, whose appearance bespeaks the plenty and peacefulness of the city. Their uniforms,

blue and white, are of the cut of those in the prints of MARLBO|ROUGH'S days; and their grenadiers' caps are of the same peaked sort, with tin facings, impressed with the city arms.

In wars with France, the fate of Franckfort has usually depended upon that of Mentz, which is properly called the key of Germany, on the western frontier. In the campaign of 1792, Custine detached 3000 troops of the 11,000, with which he had besieged Mentz, and these reached Franckfort, early in the morning of the 22d of October. NEUWINGER, their commander, sent a letter to the magistrates from Custine, demanding a contribution of two millions of florins, which, by a negotiation at Mentz, was reduced to a million and a half, for the present. Notice was accordingly given in the city, that the magistrates would receive money at four per cent. interest, and, on the 23d, at break of day, it began to flow in to the Council-house from all quarters. Part was immediately given to NEUWINGER, but payment of the rest was delayed; so that Custine came himself on the 27th, and, by throwing the hostages into prison, obtained, on the 31st of October, the remainder of the first million. For the second, the magistrates gave security to NEUWINGER, but it was never paid; the Convention disavowed great part of the proceedings of Custine, and the money was not again demanded.

The French, during the whole of their stay, were very eager to spread exaggerated accounts of their numbers. Troops were accord|ingly marched out at one gate of the city, with very little parade, that they might enter with much pomp and in a longer column, at

the other. The inhabitants, who were not expert at military nume|ration, easily believed, that the first party had joined other troops, and that the whole amounted to treble their real number. After the entry of the Prussians, this contrivance was related by prisoners.

The number of troops, left in the city by Custine, on his retire|ment from the neighbouring posts, in the latter end of November, was 1800 men, with two pieces of cannon. On the 28th, when the Prussian Lieutenant Pellet brought a summons to surrender, Helden, the commander, having sent to Custine for reinforcements and can|non, was answered, that no men could be spared; and that, as to cannon, he might use the city artillery. Helden endeavoured to re|move this from the arsenal; but the populace, encouraged by the neighbourhood of the Prussians, rose to prevent him; and there might have been a considerable tumult, if Custine had not arrived, on the 29th, and assured the magistrates, that the garrison should retire, rather than expose the place to a siege. The city then became tran|quil, and remained so till the 2d of December, when the inhabitants, being in church, first knew by the noise of cannon, that the place was attacked.

General Helden would then have taken his two cannon to the gate, which was contended for, but the inhabitants, remembering Custine's promise, would permit no resistance; they cut the harness of the horses, broke the cannon wheels, and themselves opened the gates to the Prussians, or rather to the Hessians, for the advanced corps of the assailants was chiefly formed of them. About 100 fell

in this attack. Of the French 41 were killed; 139 wounded; and 800 taken prisoners. The remainder of the 1800 reached Custine's army. A monument, erected without the northern gate of the city, commemorates the loss of the 100 assailants, on the spot, on which they fell.

Thus Franckfort, having happily but few fortifications, was lost and regained, without a siege; while Mentz, in a period of six more months, had nearly all its best buildings destroyed, by a similar change of masters.

We stayed here almost a week, which was well occupied by visits, but shewed nothing in addition to what is already known of the society of the place. Manners, customs, the topics of conversation and even dress, differ very slightly from those of London, in similar ranks; the merchants of Franckfort have more generally the advan|tages of travel, than those of England, but they have not that minute knowledge of modern events and characters, which an attention to public transactions renders common in our island. Those, who have been in England, or who speak English, seem desirous to discuss the state of parliamentary transactions and interests, and to remedy the thinness of their own public topics, by introducing ours. In such discussions one error is very general from their want of experience. The faculty of making a speech is taken for the standard of intellec|tual power in every sort of exertion; though there is nothing better known in countries, where public speakers are numerous enough to be often observed, than that persons may be educated to oratory, so as to

have a facility, elegance and force in it, distinct from the endow|ments of deliberative wisdom; may be taught to speak in terms remote from common use, to combine them with an unfailing dexterity of ar|rangement, and to invest every thought with its portion of artificial dignity, who, through the chaos of benefits and evils, which the agita|tion of difficult times throws up before the eye of the politician, shall be able to see no gleam of light, to describe no direct path, to discern no difference between greater and lesser evils, nor to think one whole|some truth for a confiding and an honest country. To estimate the general intellectual powers of men, tutored to oratory, from their suc|cess in the practice of it, is as absurd as to judge of corporeal strength from that of one arm, which may have been rendered unusually strong by exercise and art.

Of the society at Franckfort, Messrs. Bethman, the chief bankers, seem able to collect a valuable part; and their politeness to strangers induces them to do it often. A traveller, who misses their table, loses, both as to conversation and elegant hospitality, a welcome proof of what freedom and commerce can do against the mental and physi|cal desolation otherwise spread over the country.

The assistance, which the mutual use of languages gives to a con|nection between distant places, we were happy to see existing and increasing, to the advantage of England, at Franckfort. At the Messrs. Bethmans', one day, French was nearly excluded, the majo|rity being able to converse with nine or ten English, who were there, in their own language. Of the merchants, who have not been in

England, several speak English, without difficulty, and the rising generation, it is said, will be generally accomplished in it.

One of the luxuries of Franckfort is a Cabinet Literaire, which is open to strangers by the introduction of members. There the best periodical publications of the Continent are received, and their titles immediately entered in a book, so that the reading is not disturbed by conversation with the librarian. It excited our shame to hear, that some contrivance had, for several months, prevented the society from receiving a very valuable English publication.

After this, the Theatre may seem to require some notice. It is a modern, but not an elegant building, standing in an area, that renders it convenient of access, and nearly in the middle of the city. The interior, which has been gaudily decorated, contains a pit, three rows of boxes, that surround the audience part, and a gallery over them in the centre. It is larger than the Little Theatre in the Haymarket, and, in form, resembles that of Covent Garden, except that six or seven of the central boxes, in each tier, encroach upon the oval figure by a projection over the pit. The boxes are let by the year; the price of admission for non-subscribers, is a florin, for which they may find places in the boxes, engaged by their friends, or in the pit, which is in the same proportion of esteem as that at an Opera-house.

The performances are plays and operas alternately; both in Ger|man; and the music of the latter chiefly by German composers. The players are very far beneath mediocrity; but the orchestra, when we heard it, accorded with the fame of German musicians, for spirit and

precision. In these qualities even the wandering parties, that play at inns, are very seldom deficient.

The stage was well lighted, but the other parts of the theatre were left in duskiness, which scarcely permitted us to see the diamonds, profusely worn by several ladies. Six o'clock is the hour of begin|ning, and the performances conclude soon after nine.

The Cabinet Literaire and the Theatre are the only permanent places of public amusement at Franckfort, which is, however, in want of no more, the inhabitants being accustomed to pass much of their time in friendly parties, at their houses. Though wealth is, of course, earnestly and universally sought for in a place purely mercantile, we were assured, that the richest persons, and there are some, who have above half a million sterling, find no more attention in these parties than others. This was acknowledged and separately boasted of by some of the very rich, and by those who were comparatively poor. We are so far able to report it for true, as that we could never discern the least traces of the officiousness, or subserviency that, in a corrupt and debased state of society, frequently point to the wealthiest individuals in every private party.

These and many other circumstances would probably render Franckfort a place of residence for foreigners, if the magistrates, either dreading the increase of luxury, or the interference of strangers with their commerce, did not prevent this by prohibiting them from being lodged otherwise than at inns. It was with difficulty, that an English officer, acting as Commissary to some of the German regi|ments,

lately raised upon our pay, could obtain an exemption from this rule, at the request of the Hanoverian Minister.

Round the city, are several well-disposed walks, as pleasant as the flatness of the nearer country will permit; and, at intervals, along these, are the country houses of the merchants, who do not choose to go beyond the city territories, for a residence. Saxenhausen, a small town, on the other side of the Maine, though incorporated with Franckfort, as to jurisdiction, and connected with it by a bridge, is chiefly inhabited by watermen and other labourers.

We left Franckfort, after a stay of six days, fortified by a German passport from M. de Swartzhoff, the Hanoverian Minister, who obli|gingly advised us to be prepared with one in the native language of the Austrian officers. At Mentz, the ceremonies of examination were rendered much more troublesome than before, the Governor, General Kalkreuth, happening to be in the great square, who chose to make several travellers wait as if for a sort of review before him, though, after all, nothing was to be said but

"Go to the Comman|dant, who will look at your passports."

This Commandant was M. de Lucadou, a gentleman of considerate and polite manners, who, knowing our friends in Mentz, added to his confirmation of M. de Swartzhoff's passport an address to M. de Wilde, the Intendant of some salt mines in Switzerland, which he recommended to us to see. These circumstances are necessary to be mentioned here, because they soon led to a disagreeable and very contradictory event in our journey.

The next morning, we set out from Mentz, and were conducted by our voiturier over a summer road, on the left bank of the Rhine, then flowing with the melted snows of Switzerland.

OPPENHEIM.

THIS is the first town of the Palatinate, on arriving from the north; and it bears marks of the devastation, inflicted upon that country, in the last century, more flagrant than could be expected, when the length of the intervening time, and the complete recovery of other cities from similar disasters, are considered. Louis the Four|teenth's fury has converted it from a populous city into little more than a picturesque ruin. It was burned in 1668; and the walls, which remain in double, or sometimes in treble circles, are more visible, at a distance, than the streets, which have been thinly erected within them. Above all, is the Landscroon, or crown of the coun|try, a castle erected on an eminence, which commands the Rhine, and dignisies the view from it, for several miles. The whole city, or rather ruin, stands on a brow, over this majestic river.

The gates do not now open directly into streets, but into lanes of stone walls between vineyards and gardens, formed on the site of houses, never restored, since the fire. The town itself has shrunk from its antient limits into a few streets in the centre. In some of the interstices, corn grows up to the walls of the present houses. In

others, the ruins of former buildings remain, which the owners have not been tempted to remove, for the sake of cultivating their sites. Of the cathedral, said to have been once the finest on the Rhine, nearly all the walls and the tower still exist; but these are the only remains of grandeur in a city, which seems entirely incapable of overcoming in this century the wretchedness it inherits from the last.

Had the walls been as strong as they are extensive, this place might not improbably have endured a siege in the present age, having been several times lost and regained. It was surrendered to the French, without a contest, in the campaign of 1792. After their retreat from Worms, and during the siege of Mentz, it was occupied by the Prussians; and, in December 1793, when the allies retired from Alsace, the Duke of Brunswick established his head-quarters in it, for the purpose of covering the fortress. His army ovens remained near the northern gate, in July 1794, when we passed through it. In October of the fame year it fell again into the hands of the French.

No city on the banks of the Rhine is so well seated for affording a view of it as this, which, to the north, overlooks all its windings as far as Mentz, and, southward, commands them towards Worms. The river is also here of a noble breadth and force, beating so vehe|mently against the water-mills, moored near the side, that they seem likely to be borne away with the current. A city might be built on the site of Oppenheim, which should faintly rival the castle of Goodes|berg, in the richness, though not in the sublimity of its prospect.

From hence the road leads through a fertile country of corn and

vines, but at a greater distance from the river, to Worms, five or six miles from which it becomes broad, straight, and bordered with regu|larly-planted trees, that form an avenue to the city. Soon after leav|ing Oppenheim, we had the first symptom of an approach to the immediate theatre of the war, meeting a waggon, loaded with wounded soldiers. On this road, there was a long train of carriages, taking stores to some military depôt. The defacement of the Elec|tor's arms, on posts near the road, shewed also, that the country had been lately occupied by the French; as the delay in cutting the ripe corn did, that there was little expectation of their return.

WORMS.

THE condition of Worms is an aggravated repetition of the wretchedness of Oppenheim. It suffered something in the war, which the unfortunate Elector, son-in-law of our James the First, provoked by accepting the kingdom of Bohemia. Louis the Four|teenth came upon it next, and, in 1669, burned every thing that could be consumed. Nothing was restored, but on that part, which was the centre of the antient city; and the walls include, as at Oppenheim, corn and vineyards upon the ground, which was once covered with houses, and which plainly appears to have been so, from the lanes that pass between, and doors that open into the inclosures. A much larger space is so covered, than at Oppen|heim,

for you are some time in driving from the northern gate of the old city to the first street of the present one.

On the right of the road stands the skeleton of the Electoral palace, which the French burned in one of the late campaigns; and it is as curious as melancholy to observe how the signs of antient and modern desolation mingle with each other. On one hand is a palace, burned by the present French; on the other, the walls of a church, laid open by Louis the Fourteenth.

The first and principal street of theplace leads through these min|gled ruins, and through rows of dirty houses, miserably tenanted, to the other end of the city. A few others branch from it, chiefly towards the Rhine, including sometimes the ruins, and sometimes the repaired parts of churches; of which streets, narrow, ill-paved and gloomy, consists the city of Worms. The French General, that lately wrote to Paris,

"We entered the fair episcopal city of Worms,"

may be supposed to have derived his terms from a geographical dictionary, rather than from a view of his conquest.

We were now in a place, occupied by part of the acting army of the allies, which, if not immediately liable to be attacked, was to be defended by the maintenance of posts, at a very short distance. Troops passed through it daily, for the service of these posts. The noise of every cannonade was audible, and the result of every engagement was immediately known, for it might make an advance, or a retreat necessary from Worms. The wounded men arrived, soon after the intelligence, to the military hospitals of the Prussians. A city, so cir|cumstanced,

seemed to differ but little from a camp; and we were aware, for a few hours, of a departure from the security and order of civil life.

The inn, which was not otherwise a mean building, was nearly destitute of furniture; so that the owner was prepared to receive any sort of guests, or masters. The only provision, which we could ob|tain was bread, the commonest sort of wine, and one piece of cold veal; for the city was under military jurisdiction, and no guests were allowed to have more than one dish at their table.

In the afternoon, we saw, for the first time, a crowd in a German city. A narrow waggon, of which nearly all but the wheels was basket-work, had arrived from the army, with a wounded officer, who lay upon the floor, supported by his servant, but occasionally rose to return the salutes of passengers. This was the Prince of An|halt Plessis, who had been wounded, in the morning, when the French attacked all the neighbouring lines of the allies, and an inde|cisive engagement ensued, the noise of which had been distinctly heard, at Worms. He was hurt in the leg, and descended, with much difficulty, from the waggon; but did not, for an instant, lose the elegance of his address, and continued bowing through the passage to his apartment. No doubt was entertained of his recovery, but there seemed to be a considerable degree of sympathy, attending this young man.

We had not time to look into the churches, or numerous monas|teries, that yet remain, at Worms; the war appeared to have depo|pulated

the latter, for not a monk was to be seen. The cathedral, or church of St. Mary and St. Peter, is one of the most antient sacred buildings in Germany, having been founded at least as early as the commencement of the seventh century. One of the prebends was established in 1033, another in 1058. The Dominicans, Carmelites, Capuchins and Augustines have each a monastery, at Worms; as have the Cistercians and the Augustines a nunnery. A Protestant church was also consecrated, on the 9th of June 1744; something more than two hundred years, after the ineffectual conference held here of Protestant and Catholic divines, which Charles the Fifth inter|rupted, when Melancthon, on one side, and Echius, on the other, had engaged in it, ordering them to resume their arguments, in his pre|sence, at Ratisbon. This meeting was five years previous to the celebrated diet of Worms, at which Charles, having then estimated the temporal strength of the two parties, openly shewed his animosity to the Protestants, as Maurice of Saxony did his intriguing ambition, by referring the question to the Council of Trent.

The Jews, at Worms, inhabit a separate street, and have a syna|gogue, of great antiquity, their numbers having been once such as to endanger the peace of the city; but, in 1689, when the French turned their synagogue into a stable, they fled with the rest of the opu|lent inhabitants to Holland. Those of the present day can have very few articles of traffic, except money, the changing of which may have been frequent, on account of the neighbourhood of France.

Worms is somewhat connected with English history, having been

occupied by the troops, which James the First uselessly sent to the assistance of the proscribed Elector Palatine, when his just abhorrence of continental wars was once, though tardily, overcome by the en|treaties of his daughter. Here too George the Second held his head|quarters, from the 7th to the 20th of September 1743; on the 14th of which month, Lord Carteret concluded, in his name, an offensive and defensive treaty with the Ministers of Hungary and Sardinia.

This city, like Cologne, retains some affectation of the Roman form of government, to which it was rendered subject by Caesar, with the title of Augusta Vangionum. The STADTMEISTER is sometimes called the CONSUL, and the SCHULTHEIS, or Mayor, the PRAETOR. But, in 1703, some trivial tumult afforded a pretence for abolishing its little remains of liberty, and the Elector Palatine was declared its protector. This blow completed the desolation, which the disasters of the preceding century had commenced; and a city, that was once called the market of the Palatinate, as the Palatinate was reputed the market of Germany, continues to exhibit nothing more than the ruins of its antient prosperity.

Few of the present inhabitants can be the descendants of those, who witnessed its destruction in 1689; for we could not find, that the particulars of that event were much known, or commemorated by them, dreadful and impressive as they must have been. A column of Louis the Fourteenth's army had entered the city, in September of the preceding year, under the command of the Marquis de Bon|fleur, who soon distressed the inhabitants by preparations for blow|ing

up the walls with gunpowder. The mines were so numerous and large, as to threaten nothing less than the entire overwhelming of the city; but, being fired at different times, the walls of the houses were left standing, though they shook with almost every explosion. The artillery and balls had been previously carried away to Landau, or Mentz, then possessed by Louis. At length, on the 12th of May 1689, the Intendant sent the melancholy news to the magistracy, that he had received orders from his monarch to burn the whole city. Six days were allowed for the departure of the inhabitants and the removal of their property; which period was prolonged by their entreaties to nineteen. At the expiration of these, on Ascension Day, the 31st of May, the French grenadiers were employed from twelve o'clock, till four, in placing combustibles about the houses and public buildings, against several of which large heaps of hay and straw were raised. The word being then given, fire was set to almost every house at once, and, in a few hours, the city was reduced to ashes; the conflagration being so general and strong as to be visible in day|light at the distance of more than thirty English miles. Such was one of the calamities of a city, so unfortunately situated, that the chapter of the cathedral alone proved a loss by wars, previous to the year 1743, amounting to 1,262,749 florins.

The attention, due to so memorable a place, detained us at Worms, till the voiturier talked of being unable to reach Manheim, before the gates would be shut, and we let him drive vehemently towards

FRANCKENTHAL,

ANOTHER place, destroyed by Louis the Fourteenth, but restored upon a plan so uniform and convenient, that nothing but a fuller population is necessary to confirm its title of a flourishing city. The streets, which intersect each other at right angles, are wide and exactly straight; the houses are handsomely built, but the poverty, or indolence of the owners suffers them to partake of the air of neglect, which is general in German habitations; and the streets, though spacious and not ill-paved, had so few passengers, that the depopulation of the place seemed to be rendered the more observable by its grandeur.

Yet it would be unfair to estimate the general prosperity of Franck|enthal by its present circumstances, even had we stayed long enough to know them more accurately. This place had been occupied but a few weeks before by the French army, who had plundered it, as well as several other towns of the Palatinate, after the retreat of the allies from Alsace, at the latter end of 1793. The inhabitants had, for the most part, returned to their houses; but their commerce, which is said to have been not contemptible, could not be so easily restored. The manufactures of porcelain, cloths, silks, spangles, vinegar and soap, of which some were established and all are protected by the wise libera|lity of the Elector, though far from being answerable, either in their

capitals, or produce, to the English idea of similar enterprises, com|mand some share with England and France in supplying the rest of Germany. One method of facilitating the operations of trade the Elector has advantageously adopted here; that of instituting a court upon the spot for the decision of all causes, in which the traders are interested; and at his expence a navigable canal has been formed from the town to the Rhine. Artists and merchants have also some privileges, at Franckenthal, of which that of being exempt from the military press is not the least.

This press, or levy, is the method, by which all the German Princes return their contingents to the army of the Empire. The population of every town and district in their dominions is known with sufficient accuracy, and a settled number of recruits is supplied by each. When these are wanted, notice is given, that the men of a certain age must assemble and cast lots for the service. Those, who are drawn, may find substitutes, but with this condition, that the de|puty must be at least as tall as his principal; a regulation, which makes the price of substitutes depend upon their height, and fre|quently renders it impossible for the principals to avail themselves of the permission. A farmer in this neighbourhood, who was consider|ably above six feet in height, could not obtain a substitute for less than a hundred louis d'ors.

Another unpleasant condition is attached to this exchange: if the substitute is disabled, or deserts, another must be supplied; and, if he

carries his arms, or accoutrements, away, these must be paid for by the person, who sent him.

After a ride of a few miles, we reached

OGGERSHEIM,

A SMALL town, on the west bank of the Rhine, rebuilt in uniform streets, like Franckenthal, having been destroyed by the same exertion of Louis the Fourteenth's cruelty. Here also the modern French had very lately been, and some of the ruins, left near the road by Louis, appeared to have served them for kitchens in their excursion.

At the east end of the town, towards the Rhine, stands a chateau of the Elector, built with modern, but not very admirable taste, and commanding the distant river in several fine points of view. We could not be admitted to see the inside, which is said to have been splendid|ly decorated; for the French had just dismantled it of the furniture.

The road from hence to Manheim was bordered for its whole length, of at least two miles, by rows of poplars, of which some still remain near Oggersheim; but those within a mile and a half of Man|heim, have been felled at one or two feet from the ground. This was done in December 1793, when the French began to advance from Landau, and were expected to besiege Manheim, their opera|tions

against which might have been covered, in some measure, by this noble alley.

Near the Rhine, the road is now commanded by two forts, of which one was thrown up during the approach of the French, and completed in the middle of the summer, with great care. These con|tribute much to the present security of the city, which might other|wise be bombarded from the opposite bank of the river, even by an enemy, who should not be able and should not propose to attempt the conquest of the place. They are ditched and pallisadoed, but, being divided from the body of the city, by the Rhine, are, of course, without the communication, which renders such works capable of a long defence. Round one of these forts, the road now winds, entering a part of the works, near the bridge, where there is a guardhouse for the troops of the Elector.

MANHEIM.

IT was twilight, when we approached Manheim; and the palace, the numerous turrets and the fortisications had their gran|deur probably increased by the obscurity. The bridge of boats is not so long as that at Mentz; but we had time enough in passing it to observe the extent of the city, on the left of which the Neckar pours itself into the Rhine, so that two sides are entirely washed by their streams. At the next guard-house, where we were detained by the

usual enquiries, the troops were more numerous; and surely no mili|tary figures ever accorded so well with the gloomy gates, and walls they guarded. The uniform of the Palatine light troops is a close jacket of motley brown, and pantaloons of the same that reach to their half-boots. They have black helmets, with crests and fronts of brass, large whiskers, and their faces, by constant exposure to the sun, are of the deepest brown that can be, without approaching to black. As they stood singly on the ramparts, or in groups at the gates, their bronze faces and Roman helmets seemed of a deeper hue, than the gloom, that partly concealed their figures.

The entrance into Manheim, from the Rhine, is by a spacious street, which leads directly into the centre of the city, and to a large square, planted with limes, consisting, on one side, of public build|ings, and, on the other, of several noble houses, one of which is the chief inn, called the Cour Palatine. This is the first city in Ger|many, that can answer, by its appearance, the expectations of a foreigner, who has formed them from books. Its aspect is truly that of a capital and of the residence of a Court; except that in the day|time a traveller may be somewhat surprised at the fewness of passen|gers and the small shew of traffic, amidst such public buildings, and in streets of such convenience and extent. The fairness, the grandeur and the stateliness, which he may have seen attributed to other Ger|man cities, till he is as much disgusted as deceived by every idea de|rived from description, may be perceived in several parts of Man|heim, and the justness of disposition in all.

Nor is the beauty of the present city solely owing to the destruction of the antient one by Louis the Fourteenth, in 1689, the year of gene|ral devastation in the Palatinate. It was laid out in right lines, though to a less extent, in the beginning of the seventeenth century, when Frederic the Fifth laid the foundation of the fortifications, behind which a town was built, that adopted the antient name of Manheim, from a neighbouring one then in decay. These were the fortifica|tions and the town destroyed by the French in 1689. The plan of both was but extended, when the present works were formed upon the system of Cohorn, and the city by degrees restored, with streets, which, intersecting each other at right angles, divide it into an hun|dred and seven square portions. The number of the inhabitants, exclusive of the garrison, was, in 1784, 21,858.

Some of the streets are planted with rows of trees, and there are five or six open places, suitable for promenades, or markets. The customhouse, which forms a side to one of these, is a noble stone building, rather appearing to be a palace, than an office, except that under the colonnades, which surround it, are shops for jewellery and other commodities.

The Electoral palace, which opens, on one side, to the city, and, on the other, to the ramparts, was built by the Elector Charles-Phi|lippe, who, in the year 1721, removed his residence hither from Heidelberg, on account of some difference with the magistrates, or, as is said, of the prevalence of religious disputes in that city. He began to erect it in 1720; but the edisice was not completed, till the

right wing was added by the present Elector, not to be used as a resi|dence, but to contain a gallery of paintings, cabinets of antiquities and natural history, a library, treasury and manege. We passed a morning in viewing the apartments in the other wing, all the paint|ings and books having been removed from this, as well as great part of the furniture from the whole palace, in the dread of an approach|ing bombardment. The person, who shewed them, took care to keep the credit of each room safe, by assuring us at the door, that it was not in its usual condition. The Elector had been, for some months, at Munich, but the Duke and Duchess of Deux Ponts and their family have resided in this palace, since their retirement from Deux Ponts, in the latter end of the campaign of 1792.

The rooms are all lofty, and floored with inlaid work of oak and chesnut; the ceilings, for the most part, painted; and the walls covered with tapestry, finely wrought, both as to colour and design. Some of this came from a manufactory, established by the Elector, at Franckenthal.

The furniture, left in several of the rooms, was grand and antient, but could never have been so costly as those, who have seen the man|sions of wealthy individuals in England, would expect to find in a palace. The Elector's state-bed was inclosed not only by a railing, but by a glass case to the height of the ceiling, with windows, that could be opened at pleasure, to permit a conversation with his cour|tiers, when compliments were paid literally at a levee. In the court of France, this practice continued even to very late years, and there

were three distinct privileges of entrée, denoting the time, at which persons of different classes were permitted to enter the chamber. In the Earl of Portland's embassy for King William to Louis the Four|teenth, it was thought a signal mark of honour, that he was admitted to his audience, not only in the chamber, but within the rails; and there the French Monarch stood with the three young Princes, his grandsons, the Count de Tholouse, the Duke d'Aumont and the Ma|reschal de Noailles. The Duke made his speech covered, after which the King entered into conversation with him, for several minutes.

One room, at Manheim, was called the Silver Chamber, from the quantity of solid silver, used about the furniture. Such articles as could be carried away entire, had been removed, but the walls were disfigured by the loss of the ornaments torn from them, on account of their value. In several rooms, the furniture, that remained, was partly packed, to be carried away upon the next alarm. The con|tents of the wardrobe were in this state, and the interior of these now desolated apartments seemed like the skeleton of grandeur. The beauty of the painted ceilings, however, the richness of the va|rious prospects, commanded by the windows, and the great extent of the building sufficiently accounted for the reputation, which this palace has, of being the finest in Germany.

It is built of stone, which has somewhat the reddish hue of that used at Mentz, and, though several parts are positively disapproved by persons of skill in architecture, the whole is certainly a grand and sumptuous building.

The situation of Manheim and the scenery around it are viewed to great advantage from the tower of the Observatory, in which strangers are politely received by the Professor of Astronomy, whose residence is established in it. From this are seen the fruitful plains of the Palatinate, spreading, on all sides, to bold mountains, of which those of Lorrain, that extend on the west, lose in distance the variety of their colouring, and, assuming a blue tint, retain only the dignity of their form. Among these, the vast and round headland, called the Tonnesberg, which is in sight, during the greatest part of the journey from Mentz to Manheim, is pre-eminent.

But the chain, that binds the horizon on the east, and is known by the name of the Bergstrasse, or road of mountains, is near enough to display all their wild irregularity of shape, the forest glens, to which they open, and the various tints of rock and soil, of red and purple, that mingle with the corn and wood on their lower steeps. These mountains are seen in the north from their commencement near Franckfort, and this line is never interrupted from thence south|ward into Switzerland. The rivals to them, on the south west, are the mountains of Alsace, which extend in long perspective, and at a distance appear to unite with those of the Bergstrasse. Among the numerous towns and villages that throng the Palatinate, the spires of Oppenheim and Worms are distinctly visible to the north; almost beneath the eye are those of Franckenthal, and Oggersheim, and to the southward Spires shews its many towers.

In the nearer scene the Neckar, after tumbling from among the

forests of the Bergstrasse, falls into the Rhine, a little below the walls of Manheim; and the gardens of a summer chateau belonging to the Elector occupy the angle between the two rivers.

These gardens were now surrendered by the Prince to be the camp of three thousand of his troops, detached from the garrison of the city, which, at this time, consisted of nearly ten thousand men. In several places, on the banks of the two rivers, batteries were thrown up, and, near the camp, a regular fort, for the purpose of commanding both; so that Manheim, by its natural and artificial means of defence, was supposed to be rendered nearly unassailable, on two sides. On that of Heidelberg, it was not so secure; nor could the others be defended by a garrison of less than 15,000 men. It was on this account, that the Elector detained ten thousand of his troops from actual service, contrary, as is said, to the remon|strances of the Emperor, who offered, but without success, to garri|son his capital with Austrians. From the observatory, the camp and the works were easily seen, and, by the help of a Dollond tele|scope, the only optical instrument remaining, the order of both was so exactly pointed out by our guide, that it was not difficult to com|prehend the uses of them. Military preparations, indeed, occurred very frequently in Manheim. In the gardens of the chief Electoral palace, extending to the ramparts over the Rhine, cannon were planted, which were as regularly guarded by sentinels as in the other parts of the fortifications.

All the gates of Manheim appear to be defended by fortifications

of unusual strength. Besides two broad ditches, there are batteries, which play directly upon the bridges, and might destroy them in a few minutes. The gates are guarded, with the utmost strictness, and no person is suffered to enter them, after ten at night, without the express permission of the governor. When a courier arrives, who wishes to use his privilege of passing, at all hours, he puts some token of his office into a small tin box, which is kept on the outside of the ditch, to be drawn across it by a cord, that runs upon a roller on each bank. The officer of the guard carries this to the governor, and obtains the keys; but so much time is passed in this sort of appli|cation, that couriers, when the nights are short, usually wait the opening of the gates, which is soon after day-light, in summer, and at six, or seven, in winter.

The absence of the Elector, we were assured, had much altered the appearance of Manheim, where scarcely a carriage was now to be seen, though there were traces enough of the gaiety and general splendour of this little Court. Here are an Opera House, a German Comedy, an Amateur Concert, an Electoral Lottery, an Academy of Sculpture and Design, and an Academy of Sciences. The Opera performances are held in a wing of the palace, and were established in 1742, but have not attained much celebrity, being supported chiefly by performers from the other Theatre. This last is called a national establishment, the players being Germans, and the Thea|tre founded in 1779 at the expence of the Elector. The Baron de Dahlberg, one of his Ministers, has the superintendance of it.

The Amateur Concert is held, every Friday, during the winter, and is much frequented.

The Electoral Lotteries, for there are two, are drawn in the pre|sence of the Minister of Finances, and one of them is less disadvan|tageous for the gamesters than is usual with such undertakings. That, which consists of chances determined in the customary way, gives the Elector an advantage of only five to four over the subscribers. The other, which is formed upon the more intricate model of that of Ge|noa, entitles the subscribers to prizes, proportioned to the number of times a certain ticket issues from the wheel, five numbers being drawn out of ninety, or rather five drawings of one number each being suc|cessively made out of ninety tickets. A ticket, which issues once in these five drawings, wins fifteen times the value of the stake; one, that should be drawn each of the five times, would entitle the owner to have his original stake multiplied by sixty thousand, and the product would be his prize. The undertaker of this latter Lottery has the chances immensely in his favour.

From the very large income, to which these Lotteries contribute a part, the present Elector has certainly made considerable disburse|ments, with useful purposes, if not to useful effects. Of his founda|tion are the Academy of Sciences, which was opened in 1763, for weekly sittings, and has proceeded to some correspondence with other Academies; the German Society, established for the easy pur|pose of purifying and the difficult one of fixing language; the Ca|binet of Physics, or rather of experimental philosophy, celebrated

for the variety and magnitude of its instruments, among which are two burning glasses of three feet diameter, said to be capable of lique|fying bodies, even bottles filled with water, at 10 feet distance; the Observatory, of 108 feet high, in which all the chief instruments were English; a Botanical Garden and Directorship; an Academy of Sculpture, and a Cabinet of Engravings and Drawings, formed un|der the direction of M. Krahe of Dusseldorff, in 400 folio volumes.

Of all these establishments, none of the ornaments, or materials, that were portable, now remain at Manheim. The astronomical in|struments, the celebrated collection of statues, the paintings and the prints have been removed, together with the Electoral treasure of diamonds and jewels, some to Munich and some to other places of security. But, though we missed a sight, which even its rarity would have rendered welcome, it seems proper, after such frequent notice of the barrenness of Germany, to mention what has been collected in one of its chief cities.

The expectation of an attack had dismantled other houses, besides the Elector's, of their furniture; for, in the Cour Palatine, a very spacious, and really a good inn, not a curtain and scarcely a spoon was left. A cause de la guerre was, indeed, the general excuse for every deficiency, used by those, who had civility enough to offer one; but, in truth, the war had not often incroached upon the ordi|nary stock of conveniencies in Germany, which was previously too low to be capable of much reduction. The places, which the French had actually entered, are, of course, to be excepted; but

it may otherwise be believed, that Germany can lose little by a war, more than the unfortunate labourers, whom it forces to become soldiers. The loss of wealth must come chiefly from other countries. A rich nation may give present treasure; a commercial nation may give both present treasure and the means of future competence.

The land near Manheim is chiefly planted with tobacco and mad|der, and the landscape is enlivened with small, but neat country|houses, scattered along the margin of the Neckar. The neighbour|hood abounds in pleasant rides, and, whether you wind the high banks of the majestic Rhine, or the borders of the more tranquil Neckar, the mountains of the Bergstrasse, tumbled upon each other in wild confusion, generally form the magnificent back ground of the scene.

On returning from an excursion of this kind at the close of even|ing, the soldiers at the gates are frequently heard chanting martial songs in parts and chorus; a fonorous music in severe unison with the solemnity of the hour and the imperfect forms, that meet the eye, of sentinels keeping watch beneath the dusky gateways, while their brethren, reposing on the benches without, mingle their voices in the deep chorus. Rude and simple as are these strains, they are often singularly impressive, and touch the imagination with some|thing approaching to horror, when the circumstances of the place are remembered, and it is considered how soon these men, sent to in|flict death on others, may themselves be thrown into the unnum|bered heap of the military slain.

SCHWEZINGEN.

AN excellent road, sheltered for nine English miles by rows of high poplars, conducted us through richly cultivated plains from Manheim to Schwezingen, a small village, distinguished by an Electoral chateau and gardens. This was one of the pleasantest rides we had found in Germany, for the road, though it exhibited little of either the wild or picturesque, frequently opened towards the mountains, bright with a variety of colouring, and then again was shrouded among woods and plantations, that bordered the neigh|bouring fields, and brought faintly to remembrance the style and mingled verdure of our native landscape.

Schwezingen had been very lately the Austrian head-quarters, for the army of the Upper Rhine, and some soldiers were still stationed near the road to guard an immense magazine of wood; but there were otherwise no military symptoms about the place.

The chateau is an old and inelegant building, not large enough to have been ever used as a formal residence. The present Elector has added to it two wings, each of six hundred feet long, but so low, that the apartments are all on the ground floor. Somewhat of that air of neglect, which can sadden even the most delightful scenes, is visible here; several of the windows are broken, and the theatre,

music-room, and ball-room, which have been laid out in one of the wings, are abandoned to dust and lumber.

The gardens, however, are preserved in better order. Before the palace, a long vista of lawn and wood, with numerous and spacious fountains, guarded by statues, display something of the old French manner; other parts shew charming scenery, and deep sylvan reces|ses, where nature is again at liberty; in a bay formed by the woods is an amphitheatre of fragrant orange trees, placed in front of a light semicircular green-house, and crowned with lofty groves. Near this delicious spot, extends a bending arcade of lattice-work, interwoven with vines and many beautifully flowering plants; a sort of structure, the filagree lightness of which it is impossible not to admire, against precept, and perhaps, when general effect is considered, against ne|cessary taste. In another part, sheltered by the woods, is an edifice in the style of a Turkish mosque, with its light cloistered courts, slender minarets, and painted entrances, inscribed with Arabic mot|tos, which by the German translations appear to express the pleasure of friendly conversation and of indolence in summer. The gardens have this result of a judicious arrangement, that they seem to extend much beyond their real limits, which we discovered only by ascend|ing one of the minarets. They are open to the public, during great part of every day, under certain rules for their preservation, of which copies are pasted up in several places.

CARLSRUHE.

AT Schwezingen the fine Electoral road concludes, and we began to wind along the skirts of a forest on the left, having on the right an open corn country, beyond which appeared the towers of Spires and Philipsburg, of which the former was then the head|quarters of the Austrian army, and the latter is memorable for having given birth to Melancthon in 1491. Waghausel and Bruch|sal are small posting places in this route, at a village between which we had another instance of the little attention paid to travellers in Germany. At a small inn, noxious with some fumigation used against bugs, we were detained a quarter of an hour, because the landlord, who had gone out after our arrival, had not left word how much we should pay, and the poor old woman, who, without shoes or stockings, attended us, was terrified when we talked of leaving what was proper, and proceeding before his return.

About a mile beyond Bruchsal our postillion quitted the chaussée, and entered a summer road, through the deep and extensive forest of Carlsruhe, preserved by the Margrave of Baden for the shelter of game. Avenues cut through this forest for nine or ten miles in every direction, converge at his palace and city of Carlsruhe, as at a point. Other cruelties than those of the chase sometimes take place in these delightful scenes, for an amphitheatre has been formed in

the woods, where imitations of a Spanish bull feast have been exhi|bited; to such horrid means of preventing vacuity of mind has a prince had recourse, who is otherwise distinguished for the elegance of his taste, and the suavity of his manners!

The scenery of this forest is very various. Sometimes we found our way through groves of ancient pine and fir, so thickly planted that their lower branches were withered for want of air, and it seemed as if the carriage could not proceed between them; at others we passed under the spreading shade of chesnuts, oak and walnut, and crossed many a cool stream, green with the impending foliage, on whose sequestered bank one almost expected to see the moralizing Jacques; so exactly did the scene accord with Shakespeare's descrip|tion. The woods again opening, we found ourselves in a noble avenue, and saw the stag gracefully bounding across it

"to more profound repose;"

while now and then a hut, formed of rude green planks under some old oak, seemed, by its smoked sides, to have often afforded a sheltered repast to hunting parties.

Near Carlsruhe the gardens of the Prince and then the palace be|come visible, the road winding along them, on the edge of the fo|rest, till it enters the northern gate of the city, the uniformity of which has the same date as its completion, the ground plot having been entirely laid out between January and June 1715, on the 17th of which month the Margrave Charles William laid the foundation stone.

The streets are accordingly spacious, light, and exactly straight;

but not so magnificent as those of Manheim, and still less enlivened with passengers. Since the commencement of the war, the gaieties of the Court, which afforded some occupation to the inhabitants, have ceased; the nobility have left their houses; and the Margrave is contented with the amusements of his library, in which English literature is said to fill a considerable space.

Carlsruhe has the advantage of not being fortified; so that the inhabitants are not oppressed by a numerous garrison, and strangers pass through it, though so near the seat of war, without interrup|tion. It is less than Manheim by at least half, and has no consider|able public building, except the palace, from the spacious area before which, all the streets proceed as radii, till their furthest ends fill up the figure of a semicircle. The houses in the area, which immediately front the palace, are built over a piazza interrupted only by the commencement of the streets. The palace has, of course, an unexampled advantage in the mixture of town and rural scenery in its prospects, looking on one side through all the streets of the city, and on the other through thirty-two forest alleys, cut to various lengths of from ten to fifteen English miles each; few, however, of the latter prospects are now commanded except from the upper win|dows, the present Elector having entirely changed the style of the intervening gardens, and permitted them to be laid out in the English taste, without respect to the thirty-two intersections, that rendered them conformable with the forest.

We passed part of two days at Carlsruhe, and were chiefly in these

gardens, which are of the most enchanting beauty and richness. The warmth of the climate draws up colours for the shrubs and plants, which we thought could not be equalled in more northern latitudes; two thousand and seven hundred orange and lemon trees, loaded with fruit and blossoms, perfumed the air; and choice shrubs, marked with the Linnean distinctions, composed the thickets. The gardens, being limited only by the forests, appear to unite with them; and the deep verdure and luxuriance of the latter are contrasted sweetly with the tender green of the lawns and plants, and with the variety of scarce and majestic trees, mingled with the garden groves.

The palace is a large and sumptuous, though not an elegant edi|sice, built of stone like all the rest of the city, and at the same period. The Margrave generally resides in it, and has rendered it a valuable home, by adding greatly to the library, filling an observatory with excellent instruments, and preserving the whole structure in a condition not usual in Germany. The spot, compared with the surrounding country, appeared like Milton's Eden—like Paradise opened in the wild.

Beyond Carlsruhe the road begins to approach the Rhine, which we had lost sight of near Manheim; and, though the river is never within view, the country is considered as a military frontier, being constantly patrolled by troops. Some of these were of the Prince of Condé's army of emigrants, who have no uniform, and are distin|guished only by the white cockade, and by a bandage of white linen,

impressed with black fleurs de lis, upon the right arm. They were chiefly on foot, and then wore only their swords, without fire|arms.

Near the road, a small party of Austrians were guarding a maga|zine, before a tent, marked, like their regimentals, with green upon white. Soon afterwards, our postillion drew up on one side, to permit a train of carriages to pass, and immediately announced the Prinz von Condé, who was in an open landau, followed by two covered waggons for his kitchen and laundry, and by a coach with attendants.

He appeared to be between fifty and sixty; tall, not corpulent, and of an air, which might have announced the French courtier, if his rank had been unknown. A star was embroidered upon his military surtout, but he had no guards, though travelling within the jurisdiction allotted to him as a general officer. So little was the road frequented at this period, that his was the second or third car|riage we had met, except military waggons, since leaving Mentz; a distance of more than eighty English miles.

The road for the whole stage between Carlsruhe and Rastadt, about fifteen miles, is planted, as seems customary in Germany between the palaces of sovereigns, with lofty trees, of which the shade was extremely refreshing at this season; the clouds of sand, that rose from the road, would otherwise have made the heat intole|rable.

The first house in Rastadt is the palace of the Margrave of Baden

Baden, brother of the Margrave of Baden Durlach, whose residence is at Carlsruhe, a small and heavy building, that fronts the avenue, and is surrounded with stone walls. The interior is said to be splen|didly decorated, and a chamber is preserved in the state, in which Prince Eugene and Marshal Villars left it in 1714, after concluding the peace between the Emperor and Louis the Fourteenth. The Prince of Baden, being then a general in the service of the Emperor, had not been able to escape the vengeance of Louis, whose troops in 1688 first plundered, and then burnt, the palace and city, and in the war of the Succession they had a camp on the adjoining plain. The Prince is therefore supposed to have lent the palace, which he had rebuilt, with the more readiness, that the Marshal might see how perfectly he could overcome his loss. The plunder of the city in 1688 had continued for five days, and it is mentioned in its history that the French carried away fifteen waggon loads of wine of the vintage of 1572.

Rastadt, like Carlsruhe, is built upon one plan, but is as inferior to it in beauty, as in size. The chief street is, however, uncom|monly broad, so much so, that the upper end is used as a market|place, and the statue of the founder, Prince Louis, in the centre, is seen with all the advantages of space and perspective. There is, not|withstanding, little appearance of traffic, and the inhabitants seemed to be much less numerous than the emigrant corps, which was then stationed there, the head quarters of the Prince of Condé being esta|blished in the city. We passed an hour at an inn, which was nearly

filled by part of this corps, and were compelled to witness the dis|tress and disappointment, excited by intelligence just then received of the state of affairs in the Low Countries.

A small park of artillery was kept on the southern side of Rastadt, where there is a handsome stone bridge over the river Murg, that falls into the Rhine, at the distance of a league from the city. Soon after, the road passes by the groves of the Favorita, a summer palace built by a dowager Margravine. We now drew nearer to the mountains of the Bergstrasse, which had disappeared near Schwezingen, and had risen again partially through the morn|ing mists, soon after our quitting Carlsruhe. They are here of more awful height, and abrupt steepness than in the neighbourhood of Manheim, and, on their pointed brows, are frequently the ruins of castles, placed sometimes where it seems as if no human foot could climb. The nearer we approached these mountains the more we had occasion to admire the various tints of their granites. Sometimes the precipices were of a faint pink, then of a deep red, a dull purple, or a blush approaching to lilac, and sometimes gleams of a pale yel|low mingled with the low shrubs, that grew upon their sides. The day was cloudless and bright, and we were too near these heights to be deceived by the illusions of aerial colouring; the real hues of their features were as beautiful, as their magnitude was sublime. The plains, that extend along their feet to the Rhine, are richly cultivated with corn, and, beyond the river, others, which appear to be equally fruitful, spread towards the mountains of Alsace,

a corresponding chain with the Bergstrasse, vast and now blue with distance.

The manners of the people from Manheim downwards, are more civilized than in the upper parts of Germany; an improvement, which may with great probability be imputed to the superior fruitfulness of the country, that amends their condition, and with it the social qualities. The farms are more numerous, the labourers less dejected, and the women, who still work barefooted in the fields, have some|what of a ruddy brown in their complexion, instead of the sallow|ness, that renders the ferocious, or sullen air of the others more strik|ing. They are also better dressed; for, though they retain the slouched woollen hat, they have caps; and towards the borders of Switzerland their appearance becomes picturesque. Here they frequently wear a blue petticoat with a cherry-coloured boddice, full white sleeves fastened above the elbow, and a muslin handkerchief thrown grace|fully round the neck in a sort of roll; the hair sometimes platted round the head, and held on the crown with a large bodkin. On holidays, the girls have often a flat straw hat, with bows of ribband hanging behind. Higher up, the women wear their long black hair platted, but falling in a queue down the back.

The cottages are also somewhat better, and the sides entirely covered with vines, on which, in the beginning of July, were grapes bigger than capers, and in immense quantities. Sometimes Turkey corn is put to dry under the projections of the first floor, and the gardens are ornamented with a short alley of hops. Meat is

however bad and scarce; the appearance so disgusting before it is dressed, that those, who can accommodate their palates to the cook|ing, must endeavour to forget what they have seen. Butter is still more scarce, and the little cheese that appears, is only a new white curd, made up in rolls, scarcely bigger than an egg. A sort of beer is here made for servants, the taste of which affords no symptom of either malt or hops; it is often nearly white, and appears to have been brewed but a few hours; what is somewhat browner is bottled, and sold at about three-pence a quart.

Our road, this day, was feldom more than two leagues distant from the Rhine, and we expected to have heard the fire, which the Austrian and French posts, who have their batteries on the two banks of the river, frequently exchange with each other. The tran|quillity was, however, as sound as in any other country, and nothing but the continuance of patroles and convoys reminded us of our nearness to the war. The peasants were as leisurely cutting their harvest, and all the other business of rural life was proceeding as uninterruptedly, as if there was no possibility of an attack. Yet we afterwards learned, that the French had, very early on the morning of this day, ineffectually attempted the passage of the Rhine, about fifteen miles higher up; and the firing had been distinctly heard at a little village where we dined.

One road, as short as this, lies immediately upon the margin of the river; and, as we were assured that none but military parties were fired at, we wished to pass it, for the purpose of observing the inge|nious

methods, by which a country so circumstanced is defended; but our postillion, who dreaded, that he might be pressed by the Austrians, for the intrusion, refused to venture upon it, and, instead of proceeding to Kehl, which is directly opposite to Strasbourg, we took the road for Offenburg, about three leagues from the Rhine.

The country through which our route now lay, better as it is than more northern parts, has suffered some positive injuries by the war. Before this, all the little towns, from Carlsruhe downwards, main|tained some commerce with France, on their own account, and sup|plied carriage for that of others. In return for provisions and coarse commodities for manufacture, carried to Strasbourg, they received the silks and woollens of France, to be dispersed at Franckfort, or Manheim. The intercourse between the two countries was so fre|quent, that nearly all the tradesmen, and many of the labouring per|sons in this part of Germany speak a little French. The landlord of the house, where we dined, assured us that, though his village was so small, he had sufficient business before the war; now he was upon the point of removing to Offenburg, being unable to pay his rent, during the interruption of travelling.

A little before sun-set, we came to Appenweyer, one of these towns, from the entrance of which the spires of Strasbourg were so plainly visible that we could see the fanes glittering against the light, and even the forms of the fortifications near the water could be traced. In the midst of the straggling town of Appenweyer the loud sounds of martial music and then the appearance of troops, entering

at the opposite end, surprised us. This was the advanced guard of several Austrian regiments, on their march to re-inforce the allied army in the Low Countries. Our postillion had drawn up, to sur|render as much of the road as possible to them, but their march was so irregular, that they frequently thronged round the carriage; affording us sufficient opportunity to observe how far their air corresponded with what has been so often said of the Austrian soldiery.

Except as to their dress and arms, their appearance is not military, according to any notion, which an Englishman is likely to have formed; that is, there is nothing of activity, nothing of spirit, of cheerfulness, of the correctness of discipline, or of the eagerness of the youthful in it. There is much of ferocity, much of timid cruelty, of sullenness, indolence and awkwardness. They dress up their faces with mustachios, and seem extremely desirous to impress terror. How far this may be effectual against other troops we cannot know; but they certainly are, by their ferocious manners, and by the traits, which a nearer view of them discloses, very terrible to the peaceful traveller. Though now immediately under the eyes of their officers they could scarcely refrain from petty insults, and from wishfully laying their hands upon our baggage.

About a thousand men passed in two divisions, which had com|menced their march a few hours before, for the purpose of avoid|ing the heat of the day. As we proceeded, the trodden corn in the sields shewed where they had rested.

It was night before we reached Offenburg, where we were com|pelled

to lodge at a wretched inn called the Post-house, the master of the other having that day removed to admit a new tenant; but the condition of the lodging was of little importance, for, all night, the heavy trampling of feet along the road below prevented sleep, and with the first dawn the sound of martial music drew us to the win|dows. It seemed like a dream, when the Austrian bands played ça ira, with double drums, and cymbals thrown almost up to our casements, louder than any we had ever heard before. This was the main body of the army, of which we had met the advanced party. Each regiment was followed by a long train of baggage carriages, of various and curious descriptions, some of the cabriolets having a woman nearly in man's apparel in the front, and behind, a large basket higher than the carriage, filled with hay. This

"tide of human existence"

continued to pass for several hours. But the whole army did not consist of more than three regiments of infantry, among which were those of D'Arcy, and Pellegrini, and one of horse; for each of the Austrian regiments of foot contains, when complete, two thousand three hundred men. They had with them a small train of artillery, and were to proceed to the Low Countries as quick as they could march; but, so uniform are the expedients of the councils of Vienna, that the opportunity of carrying these troops down the Rhine in barges from Phillipsburg, where it was prac|ticable, was not adopted, though this method would have saved two weeks out of three, and have landed the army unfatigued at its post.

All their regimentals were white, faced either with light blue, or pompadour, and seemed unsuitably delicate for figures so large and heavy. The cavalry were loaded with many articles of baggage, but their horses appeared to be of the strongest and most serviceable kind. This was a grand military show, which it was impossible to see without many reflections on human nature and human misery.

Offenburg is a small town, in the Margraviate of Baden Baden, pleasantly seated at the feet of the Bergstrasse, which the road again approaches so near as to be somewhat obstructed by its acclivities. Our way lay along the base of these steeps, during the whole day; and as we drew nearer to Switzerland, their height became still more stupendous, and the mountains of Alsace seemed advancing to meet them in the long perspective; the plains between, through which the Rhine gleamed in long sweeps, appeared to be entirely covered with corn, and in the nearer scene joyous groups were loading the waggons with the harvest. An harvest of another kind was ripen|ing among the lower rocks of the Bergstrasse, where the light green of the vines enlivened every cliff, and sometimes overspread the ruinous walls of what had once been fortresses.

We passed many villages, shaded with noble trees, which had more appearance of comfort than any we had seen, and which were enviable for the pleasantness of their situation; their spacious street generally opening to the grandeur of the mountain vista, that extend|ed to the south. In these landscapes the peasant girl, in the simple

dress of the country, and balancing on her large straw hat an har|vest keg, was a very picturesque figure.

It was evening when we came within view of Friburg, the last city of Germany on the borders of Switzerland, and found ourselves among mountains, which partook of the immensity and sublimity of those of that enchanting country. But what was our emotion, when, from an eminence, we discovered the pointed summits of what we believed to be the Swiss mountains themselves, a multitudi|nous assemblage rolled in the far-distant prospect! This glimpse of a country of all others in Europe the most astonishing and grand, awakened a thousand interesting recollections and delightful expecta|tions; while we watched with regret even this partial vision vanish|ing from our eyes as we descended towards Friburg. The moun|tains, that encompass this city, have so much the character of the great, that we immediately recollect the line of separation between Germany and Switzerland to be merely artificial, not marked even by a river. Yet while we yield to the awful pleasure which this eternal vastness inspires, we feel the insignificance of our temporary nature, and, seeming more than ever conscious by what a slender sys|tem our existence is upheld, somewhat of dejection and anxiety min|gle with our admiration.

FRIBURG

IS an ancient Imperial city and the capital of the Brisgau. Its name alludes to the privileges granted to such cities; but its pre|sent condition, like that of many others, is a proof of the virtual discontinuance of the rights, by which the Sovereign intended to in|vite to one part of his dominions the advantages of commerce. Its appearance is that, which we have so often described; better than Cologne, and worse than Mentz; its size is about a third part of the latter city. On descending to it, the first distinct object is the spire of the great church, a remarkable structure, the stones of which are laid with open interstices, so that the light appears through its taper|ing sides. Of this sort of stone fillagree work there are said to be other specimens in Germany. The city was once strongly fortified, and has endured some celebrated sieges. In 1677, 1713, and 1745 is was taken by the French, who, in the latter year, destroyed all the fortifications, which had rendered it formidable, and left nothing but the present walls.

Being, however, a frontier place towards Switzerland, it is pro|vided with a small Austrian garrison; and the business of permitting, or preventing the passage of travellers into that country is entrusted to its officers. The malignity, or ignorance of one of these, called the Lieutenant de Place, prevented us from reaching it, after a jour|ney

of more than six hundred miles; a disappointment, which no person could bear without severe regret, but which was alloyed to us by the reports we daily heard of some approaching change in Switzerland unfavourable to England, and by a consciousness of the deduction which, in spite of all endeavours at abstraction, encroach|ments upon physical comfort and upon the assurance of peacefulness make from the disposition to enquiry, or fancy.

We had delivered at the gate the German passport, recommended to us by M. de Schwartzkoff, and which had been signed by the Commandant at Mentz; the man, who took it, promising to bring it properly attested to our inn. He returned without the passport, and, as we afterwards found, carried our voiturier to be examined by an officer. We endeavoured in vain to obtain an explanation, as to this delay and appearance of suspicion, till, at supper, the Lieutenant de Place announced himself, and presently shewed, that he was not come to offer apologies. This man, an illiterate Piedmontese in the Austrian service, either believed, or affected to do so, that our name was not Radcliffe, but something like it, with a German termina|tion, and that we were not English, but Germans. Neither my Lord Grenville's, or M. de Schwartzkoff's passports, our letters from London to families in Switzerland, nor one of credit from the Messrs. Hopes of Amsterdam to the Banking-house of Porta at Lausanne, all of which he pretended to examine, could remove this discerning suspicion as to our country. While we were considering, as much as vexation would permit, what circumstance could have afforded a pretext for any part of this intrusion, it came out inci|dentally,

that the confirmation given to our passport at Mentz, which we had never examined, expressed

"returning to England,"

though the pass itself was for Basil, to which place we were upon our route.

Such a contradiction might certainly have justified some delay, if we had not been enabled to prove it accidental to the satisfaction of any person desirous of being right. The passport had been produced at Mentz, together with those of two English artists, then on their return from Rome, whom we had the pleasure to see at Franckfort. The Secretary inscribed all the passports alike for England, and M. de Lucadou, the Commandant, hastily signed ours, without observing the mistake, though he so well knew us to be upon the road to Switzer|land, that he politely endeavoured to render us some service there. Our friends in Mentz being known to him, he desired us to accept an address from himself to M. de Wilde, Intendant of salt mines near Bec. We produced to Mr. Lieutenant this address, as a proof, that the Commandant both knew us, and where we were going; but it soon appeared, that, though the former might have honestly fallen into his suspicions at first, he had a malignant obstinacy in refusing to abandon them. He left us, with notice that we could not quit the town without receiving the Commandant's permission by his means; and it was with some terror, that we perceived ourselves to be so much in his power, in a place where there was a pretext for military authority, and where the least expression of just indignation seemed to provoke a disposition for further injustice.

The only relief, which could be hinted to us, was to write to the Commandant at Mentz, who might re-testify his knowledge of our

destination; yet, as an answer could not be received in less than eight days, and, as imagination suggested not only all the possible horrors of oppression, during that period, but all the contrivances, by which the malignant disposition we had already experienced, might even then be prevented from disappointment, we looked upon this resource as little better than the worst, and resolved in the morning to demand leave for an immediate return to Mentz.

There being then some witnesses to the application, the Lieutenant conducted himself with more propriety, and even proposed an intro|duction to the Commandant, to whom we could not before hear of any direct means of access; there being a possibility, he said, that a passage into Switzerland might be permitted. But the disgust of Austrian authority was now so complete, that we were not disposed to risk the mockery of an appeal. The Lieutenant expressed his readiness to allow our passage, if we should choose to return from Mentz with another passport; but we had no intention to be ever again in his power, and, assuring him that we should not return, left Friburg without the hope of penetrating through the experienced, and present difficulties of Germany, into the far-seen delights of Switzerland.

As those, who leave one home for another, think, in the first part of their journey, of the friends they have left, and, in the last, of those, to whom they are going; so we, in quitting the borders of Switzerland, thought only of that country; and, when we regained the eminence from whence the tops of its mountains had been so lately viewed with enthusiastic hope, all this delightful expectation

occurred again to the mind, only to torture it with the certainty of our loss; but, as the distance from Switzerland increased, the attrac|tions of home gathered strength, and the inconveniences of Ger|many, which had been so readily felt before, could scarcely be no|ticed when we knew them to lie in the road to England.

We passed Offenburg, on the first day of our return, and, travel|ling till midnight, as is customary in Germany during the summer, traversed the unusual space of fifty miles in fourteen hours. Soon after passing Appenweyer we overtook the rear-guard of the army, the advanced party of which we had met at that place three nights before. The troops were then quartered in the villages near the road, and their narrow waggons were sometimes drawn up on both sides of it. They had probably but lately separated, for there were parties of French ladies and gentlemen, who seemed to have taken the benefit of moonlight to be spectators, and some of the glow-worms, that had been numerous on the banks, now glittered very prettily in the hair of the former.

At Biel, a small town, which we reached about midnight, the street was rendered nearly impassable by military carriages, and we were surprised to find, that every room in the inn was not occupied by troops; but one must have been very fastidious to have complained of any part of our reception here. As to lodging, though the apart|ment was as bare as is usual in Germany, there was the inscription of

"Chambre de Monsieur"

over the door, and on another near it

"Chambre de Condé le Grand;"

personages, who, it appeared, had once been accommodated there, for the honour of which the land|lord

chose to retain their inscriptions. Their meeting here was pro|bably in 1791, soon after the departure of the former from France.

The second day's journey brought us again to Schwetzingen, from whence we hoped to have reached Manheim, that night; but the post horses were all out, and none others could be hired, the village being obliged to furnish a certain number for the carriage of stores to the Austrian army. Eighteen of these we had met, an hour be|fore, drawing slowly in one waggon, laden with cannon balls. We stayed the following day at Manheim, and, on the next, reached Mentz, where our statement of the obstruction at Friburg excited less surprise than indignation, the want of agreement between the Austrian and Prussian officers being such, that the former, who are frequently persons of the lowest education, are said to neglect no opportunity of preying upon accidental mistakes in passports, or other business, committed by the Prussians. Before our departure we were, however, assured, that a proper representation of the affair had been sent by the first estaffette to the Commandant at Friburg.

Further intelligence of the course of affairs in Flanders was now made known in Germany; and our regrets, relative to Switzerland, were lessened by the apparent probability, that a return homeward might in a few months be rendered difficult by some still more un|fortunate events to the allies. Several effects of the late reverses and symptoms of the general alarm were indeed already apparent at Mentz. Our inn was filled with refugees not only from Flanders, but from Liege, which the French had not then threatened. Some of the emigrants of the latter nation, in quitting the places where they

had temporarily settled, abandoned their only means of livelihood, and several parties arrived in a state almost too distressful to be repeated. Ladies and children, who had passed the night in fields, came with so little property, and so little appearance of any, that they were refused admittance at many inns; for some others, it seemed, after resting a day or two, could offer only tears and lamentations, instead of payment. Our good landlord, Philip Bolz, relieved several, and others had a little charity from individuals; but, as far as we saw and heard, the Germans very seldom afforded them even the con|solations of compassion and tender manners.

Mentz is the usual place of embarkment for a voyage down the Rhine, the celebrated scenery of whose banks we determined to view, as some compensation for the loss of Switzerland. We were also glad to escape a repetition of the fatigues of travel by land, now that these were to be attended with the uncertainties occasioned by any unusual influx of travellers upon the roads.

The business of supplying post-horses is here not the private undertaking of the innkeepers; so that the emulation and civility, which might be excited by their views of profit, are entirely wanting. The Prince de la Tour Taxis is the Hereditary Grand Post-master of the Empire, an office, which has raised his family from the station of private Counts, to a seat in the College of Princes. He has a mono|poly of the profits arising from this concern, for which he is obliged to forward all the Imperial packets gratis. A settled number of horses and a post-master are kept at every stage; where the arms of the Prince, and some line entreating a blessing upon the post, distin|guish

the door of his office. The postmaster determines, according to the number of travellers and the quantity of baggage, how many horses must be hired; three persons cannot be allowed to proceed with less than three horses, and he will generally endeavour to send out as many horses as there are persons.

The price for each horse was established at one florin, or twenty pence per post, but, on account of the war, a florin and an half is now paid; half a florin is also due for the carriage; and the postil|lion is entitled to a trinkgeld, or drink-money, of another half flo|rin; but, unless he is promised more than this at the beginning of the stage, he will proceed only at the regulated pace of four hours for each post, which may be reckoned at ten or twelve English miles. We soon learned the way of quickening him, and, in the Palatinate and the Brisgau, where the roads are good, could proceed nearly as fast as we wished, amounting to about five miles an hour.

If the postmaster supplies a carriage, he demands half a florin per stage for it; but the whole expence of a chaise and two horses, includ|ing the tolls and the trinkgeld, which word the postillions accommo|date to English ears by pronouncing it drinkhealth, does not exceed eight pence per mile. We are, however, to caution all persons against supposing, as we did, that the chaises of the post must be pro|per ones, and that the necessity of buying a carriage, which may be urged to them, is merely that of shew; these chaises are more incon|venient and filthy, than any travelling carriage, seen in England, can give an idea of, and a stranger should not enter Germany, before he

has purchased a carriage, which will probably cost twenty pounds in Holland and sell for fifteen, at his return. Having neglected this, we escaped from the chaises de poste as often as possible, by hiring those of voituriers, whose price is about half as much again as that of the post.

The regular drivers wear a sort of uniform, consisting of a yellow coat, with black cuffs and cape, a small bugle horn, slung over the shoulders, and a yellow sash. At the entrance of towns and narrow passes, they sometimes sound the horn, playing upon it a perfect and not unpleasant tune, the music of their order. All other carriages give way to theirs, and persons travelling with them are considered to be under the protection of the Empire; so that, if they were rob|bed, information would be forwarded from one post-house to another throughout all Germany, and it would become a common cause to detect the aggressors. On this account, and because there can be no concealment in a country so little populous, highway robberies are almost unknown in it, and the fear of them is never men|tioned. The Germans, who, in summer, travel chiefly by night, are seldom armed, and are so far from thinking even watchfulness neces|sary, that most of their carriages, though open in front, during the day-time, are contrived with curtains and benches, in order to pro|mote rest. The post-masters also assure you, that, if there were rob|bers, they would content themselves with attacking private voituriers, without violating the sacredness of the post; and the security of the postillions is so strictly attended to, that no man dare strike them,

while they have the yellow coat on. In disputes with their passen|gers they have, therefore, sometimes been known to put off this coat, in order to shew, that they do not claim the extraordinary protection of the laws.

These postillions acknowledge no obligation to travellers, who usual|ly give double what can be demanded, and seem to consider them only as so many bales of goods, which they are under a contract with the postmaster to deliver at a certain place and within a certain time. Knowing, that their slowness, if there is no addition to their trinkgeld, is of itself sufficient to compel some gratuity, they do not depart from the German luxury of incivility, and frequently return no answer, when they are questioned, as to distance, or desired to call the servant of an inn, or to quit the worst part of a road. When you tell them, that they shall have a good drinkhealth for speed, they reply,

"Yaw, yaw;"

and, after that, think it unnecessary to reply to any enquiry till they ask you for the money at the end of a stage. They are all pro|vided with tobacco boxes and combustible bark, on which they stop to strike with a slint and steel, immediately after leaving their town; in the hottest day and on the most dusty road, they will begin to smoke, though every whiff flies into the faces of the passengers behind; and it must be some very positive interference, that prevents them from continuing it.

As long as there are horses not engaged at any post-house, the people are bound to supply travellers, within half an hour after their arrival; but all the German Princes and many of their Ministers are

permitted to engage the whole stock on the road they intend to pass; and it frequently happens, that individuals may be detained a day, or even two, by such an order, if there should be no voiturier to furnish them with others. At Cologne and Bonn, when we were first there, all the horses were ordered for the Emperor, who passed through, however, with only one carriage, accompanied by an Aide-de-camp and followed by two servants, on horseback. It happens also fre|quently, that a sudden throng of private travellers has employed the whole stock of the post-masters; and the present emigrations from Liege and Juliers, we were assured, had filled the roads so much, that we might be frequently detained in small towns, and should find even the best overwhelmed with crowds of fugitives.

During a stay of five days at Mentz, we often wandered amidst the ruins of the late siege, especially on the site of the Favorita, from whence the majestic Rhine is seen rolling from one chain of mountains to another. Near this spot, and not less fortunately situ|ated, stood a Carthusian convent, known in English history for having been the head-quarters of George the Second, in the year 1743, soon after the battle of Dettingen. The apartments, used by this monarch, were preserved in the state, in which he left them, till a short time before the late siege, when the whole building was demolished, so that scarcely a trace of it now remains.

By our enquiries for a passage vessel we discovered the unpleasant truth, that the dread of another invasion began now to be felt at Mentz, where, a fortnight before, not a symptom of it was dis|cernible.

Several of the inhabitants had hired boats to be in readi|ness for transporting their effects to Franckfort, if the French should approach much nearer to the Rhine; and our friends, when we mentioned the circumstance, confessed, that they were preparing for a removal to Saxony. The state of the arsenal had been lately enquired into, and a deficiency, which was whispered to have been discovered in the gunpowder, was imputed to the want of cordiality between the Austrians and Prussians, of whom the latter, being uncertain that they should stay in the place, had refused to replenish the stores, at their own expence, and the former would not spare their ammunition, till the departure of the Prussians should leave it to be guarded by themselves. The communication with the other shore of the Rhine, by the bridge and the fortifications of Cassel, secured, however, to a German garrison the opportunity of receiving supplies, even if the French should occupy all the western bank of the river.

VOYAGE DOWN THE RHINE.

THE boats, to be hired at Mentz, are awkward imita|tions of the Dutch trechtschuyts, or what, upon the Thames, would be called House-boats; but, for the sake of being allowed to dis|pose of one as the varieties of the voyage should seem to tempt, we gave four louis for the use of a cabin, between Mentz and Cologne; the boatmen being permitted to take passengers in the other part of the vessel. In this we embarked at six o'clock, on a delightful morning in the latter end of July, and, as we left the shore, had leisure to observe the city in a new point of view, the most picturesque we had seen. Its principal features were the high quays called the Rheinstrasse, the castellated palace, with its gothic turrets, of pale red stone, the arsenal, the lofty ramparts, far extended along the river, and the northern gate; the long bridge of boats completed the fore-ground, and some forest hills the picture.

We soon passed the wooded island, called Peters-au, of so much consequence, during the siege, for its command of the bridge; and, approaching the mountains of the Rheingau to the north, the most sublime in this horizon, saw their summits veiled in clouds, while the sun soon melted the mists, that dimmed their lower sides, and brought out their various colouring of wood, corn and soils. It was, how|ever, nearly two hours before the windings of the Rhine per|mitted

us to reach any of their bases. Meanwhile the river flowed through highly cultivated plains, chiefly of corn, with villages thickly scattered on its banks, in which are the country houses of the richer inhabitants of Mentz, among pleasant orchards and vineyards. Those on the right bank are in the dominions of the Prince of Nassau Usingen, who has a large chateau in the midst of them, once tenanted, for a night, by George the Second, and the Duke of Cumberland.

The Rhine is here, and for several leagues downward, of a very noble breadth, perhaps wider than in any other part of its Ger|man course; and its surface is animated by many islands covered with poplars and low wood. The western shore, often fringed with pine and elms, is flat; but the eastern begins to swell into hillocks near Wallauf, the last village of Nassau Usingen, and once somewhat fortified.

Here the Rheingau, or the country of the vines, commences, and we approached the northern mountains, which rise on the right in sine sweeping undulations. These increased in dignity as we ad|vanced, and their summits then appeared to be darkened with heath and woods, which form part of the extensive forest of Landeswald, or Woodland. Hitherto the scenery had been open and pleasant only, but now the eastern shore began to be romantic, starting into heights, so abrupt, that the vineyards almost overhung the river, and opening to forest glens, among the mountains. Still, however, towns and villages perpetually occurred, and the banks of the river were populous, though not a vessel besides our own appeared upon it.

On the eastern margin are two small towns, Oder and Niederingel|heim, which, in the midst of the dominions of Mentz, belong to the Elector Palatine. On this shore also is made one of the celebrated wines of the Rhine, called Markerbrunner, which ranks next to those of Johannesberg and Hockheim. At no great distance on the same shore, but beneath a bank somewhat more abrupt, is the former of these places, alienated in the sixteenth century from the dominions of Mentz, to those of the Abbot, now Prince Bishop of Fulde.

The wine of the neighbouring steeps is the highest priced of all the numerous sorts of Rhenish; a bottle selling upon the spot, where it is least likely to be pure, for three, four, or five shillings, according to the vintages, the merits and distinctions of which are in the memory of almost every German. That of 1786 was the most celebrated since 1779; but we continually heard that the heat of 1794 would render this year equal in fame to any of the others.

Behind the village is the large and well-built abbey of Johannes|berg, rich with all this produce, for the security of which there are immense cellars, cut in the rock below, said to be capable of contain|ing several thousand tons of wine. The abbey was founded in 1105; and there is a long history of changes pertaining to it, till it came into the possession of the Abbot of Fulde, who rebuilt it in its present state. This part of the Rheingau is, indeed, thickly set with similar edisices, having, in a short space, the nunnery of Marienthal, and the mona|steries of Nothgottes, Aulenhausen, and Eibingen.

Further on is the large modern chateau of Count Ostein, a

nobleman of great wealth, and, as it appears, of not less taste. Hav|ing disposed all his nearer grounds in a style for the most part English, he has had recourse to the ridge of precipices, that rise over the river, for sublimity and grandeur of prospect. On the brink of these woody heights, several pavilions have been erected, from the most conspicuous of which Coblentz, it is said, may be distinguished, at the distance of forty miles. The view must be astonishingly grand, for to the south-east the eye overlooks all the fine country of the Rheingau to Mentz; to the west, the course of the Moselle towards. France; and, to the north, the chaos of wild mountains, that screen the Rhine in its progress to Coblentz.

So general was the alarm of invasion, that Count Ostein had already withdrawn into the interior of Germany, and was endea|vouring to dispose of this charming residence, partly protected as it is by the river, at the very disadvantageous price now paid for estates on the western frontier of the Empire.

The vineyards, that succeed, are proofs of the industry and skill to which the Germans are accustomed in this part of their labours, the seanty soil being prevented from falling down the almost perpendicu|lar rocks, by walls that frequently require some new toil from the careful farmer. Every addition, made to the mould, must be carried in baskets up the steep paths, or rather staircases, cut in the solid rock. At the time of the vintage, when these precipices are thronged with people, and the sounds of merriment are echoed along them, the spectacle must here be as striking and gay as can be painted by fancy.

BINGEN.

ABOUT eleven o'clock, we reached Bingen, a town of which the antiquity is so clear, that one of its gates is still called Dru|sithor, or, the gate of Drusus. Its appearance, however, is neither rendered venerable by age, or neat by novelty. The present build|ings were all raised in the distress and confusion produced in 1689, after Louis the Fourteenth had blown up the fortifications, that endured a tedious siege in the beginning of the century, and had de|stroyed the city, in which Drusus is said to have died.

It has now the appearance, which we have often mentioned is characteristic of most German towns, nearly every house being covered with symptoms of decay and neglect, and the streets aban|doned to a few idle passengers. Yet Bingen has the advantage of standing at the conflux of two rivers, the Nahe making there its junction with the Rhine; and an antient German book mentions it as the central place of an hundred villages, or chateaux, the inhabi|tants of which might come to its market and return between sun-rise and sun-set.

Since the revolution in France, it has occasionally been much the residence of emigrants; and, in a plain behind the town, which was pointed out to us, the King of Prussia reviewed their army before the entrance into France in 1792. A part of his speech was re|peated

to us by a gentleman who bore a high commission in it;

"Gentlemen, be tranquil and happy; in a little time I shall conduct you to your homes and your property."

Our companion, as he remembered the hopes excited by this speech, was deeply affected; an emigrant officer, of whom, as well as of an Ex-Nobleman of the same nation, with the latter of whom we parted here, we must pause to say, that had the old system in France, oppressive as it was, and injurious as Englishmen were once justly taught to believe it, been universally administered by men of their mildness, integrity and benevolence, it could not have been entirely overthrown by all the theories, or all the eloquence in the world.

Soon after this review, the march commenced; the general effect of which it is unnecessary to repeat. When the retreat was ordered, the emigrant army, comprising seventy squadrons of cavalry, was declared by the King of Prussia to be disbanded, and not any person was allowed to retain an horse, or arms. No other purchasers were present but the Prussians, and, in consequence of this order, the sinest horses, many of which had cost forty louis each, were now sold for four or five, some even for one! It resulted accidentally, no doubt, from this measure, that the Prussian army was thus reprovided with horses almost as cheaply as if they had seized them from Dumourier.

Bingen was taken by the French in the latter end of the cam|paign of 1792, and was then nearly the northernmost of their posts on the Rhine. It was regained by the Prussians in their advances

to Mentz, at the commencement of the next campaign, and has since occasionally served them as a depôt of stores.

This town, seated on the low western margin, surrounded with its old walls, and overtopped by its ruined castle, harmonizes well with the gloomy grandeur near it; and here the aspect of the country changes to a character awfully wild. The Rhine, after expanding to a great breadth, at its conflux with the Nahe, suddenly contracts itself, and winds with an abrupt and rapid sweep among the dark and tremendous rocks, that close the perspective. Then, disappearing beyond them, it leaves the imagination to paint the dangers of its course. Near the entrance of this close pass, stands the town of Bin|gen, immediately opposite to which appear the ruins of the castle of Ehrenfels, on a cliff highly elevated above the water, broken, craggy and impending, but with vines crawling in narrow crevices, and other rocks still aspiring above it. On an island between these shores, is a third ruined castle, very antient, and of which little more than one tower remains. This is called Mausthurm, or, The Tower of the Rats, from a marvellous tradition, that, in the tenth century, an Archbishop Statto was devoured there by these animals, after many cruelties to the poor, whom he called Rats, that eat the bread of the rich.

EHRENFELS.

EHRENFELS is synonymous to Majestic, or Noble Rock; and Fels, which is the present term for rock in all the northern coun|ties of England, as well as in Germany, is among several instances of exact similarity, as there are many of resemblance, between the pre|sent British and German languages. A German of the southern districts, meaning to enquire what you would have, says,

"Was woll zu haben?"

and in the north there is a sort of Patois, called Plat Deutsche, which brings the words much nearer to our own. In both parts the accent, or rather tone, is that, which prevails in Scotland and the adjoining counties of England. To express a temperate appro|bation of what they hear, the Germans say,

"So—so;"

pronoun|cing the words slowly and long; exactly as our brethren of Scot|land would. In a printed narrative of the siege of Mentz there is this passage,

"Funfzehn hundert menschen, meistens weiber und kin|der—wanderten mit dem bundel under dem arm uber die brucke;"

—Fifteen hundred persons, mostly wives and children, wan|dered, with their bundles under their arms, upon the bridge. So permanent has been the influence over our language, which the Saxons acquired by their establishment of more than five centuries amongst us; exiling the antient British tongue to the mountains of Scotland and Wales; and afterwards, when incorporated with this,

resisting the persecution of the Normans; rather improving than yielding under their endeavours to extirpate it. The injuries of the Bishop of Winchester, who, in Henry the Second's time, was de|prived of his see for being

"an English idcot, that could not speak French,"

one would fondly imagine had the effect due to all persecu|tions, that of strengthening, not subduing their objects.

After parting with some of the friends, who had accompanied us from Mentz, and taking in provision for the voyage, our oars were again plyed, and we approached Bingerloch, the commencement of that tremendous pass of rocky mountains, which enclose the Rhine nearly as far as Coblentz. Bingerloch is one of the most dangerous parts of the river; that, being here at once impelled by the waters of the Nahe, compressed by the projection of its boundaries, and irritated by hidden rocks in its current, makes an abrupt descent, frequently rendered further dangerous by whirlpools. Several Ger|man authors assert, that a part of the Rhine here takes a channel beneath its general bed, from which it does not issue, till it reaches St. Goar, a distance of probably twenty miles. The sorce and rapi|dity of the stream, the aspect of the dark disjointed cliffs, under which we passed, and the strength of the wind, opposing our en|trance among their chasms, and uniting with the sounding force of the waters to baffle the dexterity of the boatmen, who strug|gled hard to prevent the vessel from being whirled round, were circumstances of the true sublime, inspiring terror in some and admiration in a high degree.

Reviewing this now, in the leisure of recollection, these nervous lines of Thomson appear to describe much of the scene:

The rous'd up river pours along; Resistless, roaring, dreadful, down it comes From the rude mountain, and the mossy wild, Tumbling through rocks abrupt, and sounding far; — again constrain'd Between two meeting hills, it bursts away, Where rocks and woods o'erhang the turbid stream; There gathering triple force, rapid, and deep, It boils, and wheels, and foams, and thunders through.

Having doubled the sharp promontory, that alters the course of the river, we saw in perspective sometimes perpendicular rocks, and then mountains dark with dwarf-woods, shooting their precipices over the margin of the water; a boundary which, for many leagues, was not broken, on either margin, except where, by some slight receding, the rocks embosomed villages, lying on the edge of the river, and once guarded them by the antient castles on their points. A stormy day, with frequent showers, obscured the scenery, making it appear dreary, without increasing its gloomy grandeur; but we had leisure to observe every venerable ruin, that seemed to tell the religious, or military history of the country. The first of these beyond Bingen, is the old castle of Bauzberg, and, next, the church of St. Clement, built in a place once greatly infested by robbers. There are then the

modern castle of Konigstein, in which the French were besieged in 1793, and the remains of the old one, deserted for more than two hundred years. Opposite to these is the village of Assmans, or Hasemanshausen, celebrated for the flavour of its wines; and near them was formerly a warm bath, supplied by a spring, now lost from its source to the Rhine, notwithstanding many expensive searches to regain it. About a mile farther, is the antient castle of Falkenburg, and below it the village of Drechsen; then the ruins of an extensive chateau, called Sonneck, beneath which the Rhine expands, and encircles two small islands, that conclude the district of the Rheingau.

After passing the small town of Lorrich, on the eastern bank, the Rhine is again straightened by rocky precipices, and rolls hastily past the antient castle of Furstenberg, which gives its name to one of the dearest wines of the Rhine.

We now reached Bacharach, a town on the left bank of the river, sorming part of the widely scattered dominions of the Elector Pala|tine, who has attended to its prosperity by permitting the Calvinists and Lutherans to establish their forms of worship there, under equal privileges with the Roman Catholics.

It has a considerable commerce in Rhenish wine; and its toll|house, near which all vessels are compelled to stop, adds considerably to the revenues of the Palatinate. For the purpose of enforcing these, the antient castle called Stahleck, founded in 1190, was probably built; for Bacharach is the oldest town of the Palatinate, and has

scarcely any history between the period when it was annexed to that dominion and the departure of the Romans, who are supposed to have given it the name of Bacchi ara, and to have performed some ceremonies to that deity upon a stone, said to be still concealed in the Rhine. In the year 1654, 1695, 1719, and 1750, when the river was remarkably low, this stone is recorded to have been seen near the opposite island of Worth, and the country people have given it the name of the Aelterstein. As this extreme lowness of the waters never happens but in the hottest years, the sight of the Aelterstein is earnestly desired, as the symptom of a prosperous vintage. The river was unusually low when we passed the island, but we looked in vain for this stone, which is said to be so large, that five-and-twenty persons may stand upon its surface.

Bacharach is in the list of places, ruined by Louis the Fourteenth in 1689. The whole town was then so carefully and methodically plundered that the French commander, during the last night of his stay, had nothing to sleep on but straw; and, the next day, this bedding was employed in assisting to set fire to the town, which was presently reduced to ashes.

PFALTZ.

ABOUT a mile lower is the island of Pfaltz, or Pfalz|grafenstein, a place of such antient importance in the history of the Palatinate, that it has given its name to the whole territory in Ger|many called Pfaltz. It was probably the first residence of the Counts, the peaceable possession of which was one means of attesting the right to the Palatinate; for, as a sign of such possession, it was antiently necessary, that the heir apparent should be born in a castle, which still subsists in a repaired state upon it. This melancholy fortress is now provided with a garrison of invalids, who are chiefly employed in guarding state prisoners, and in giving notice to the neighbouring toll-house of Kaub, of the approach of vessels on the Rhine. Being much smaller than is suitable to the value placed upon it, it is secured from surprise by having no entrance, except by a ladder, which is drawn up at night.

KAUB.

KAUB, a Palatine town on the right bank of the river, is also fortified, and claims a toll upon the Rhine, notwithstanding its neighbourhood to Bacharach; an oppression, of which the expence is almost the least inconvenience, for the toll-gatherers do not come to the boats, but demand, that each should stop, while one at least of the crew goes on shore, and tells the num|ber of his passengers, who are also sometimes required to ap|pear. The officers do not even think it necessary to wait at home for this information, and our boatmen had frequently to search for them throughout the towns. So familiar, however, is this injustice, that it never appeared to excite surprise, or anger. The boatman dares not proceed till he has found and satisfied the officers; nor has he any means of compelling them to be punctual. Ours was astonished when we enquired, whether the merchants, to whom such delays might be important, could not have redress for them.

The stay we made at Kaub enabled us, however, to perceive that fine slate made a considerable part of its traffic.

The Rhine, at Bacharach and Kaub, is of great breadth; and the dark mountains, that ascend from its margin, form a grand vista, with antient chateaux still appearing on the heights, and frequent villages edging the stream, or studded among the cliffs.

Though the district of the Rheingau, the vines of which are the most celebrated, terminated some miles past, the vineyards are scarcely less abundant here, covering the lower rocks of the mountains, and creeping along the fractures of their upper crags. These, however, sometimes exhibit huge projecting masses and walls of granite, so entire and perpendicular, that not an handful of soil can lodge for the nourishment of any plant. They lie in vast oblique strata; and, as in the valley of Andernach, the angles of the promontories on one shore of the river frequently correspond with the recesses on the other.

OBERWESEL

IS another town, supported by the manufacture and trade of wines, which are, however, here shared by too many places to bestow much wealth singly upon any. Wine is also so important a production, that all the Germans have some degree of connoisseurship in it, and can distinguish its quantities and value so readily, that the advantage of dealing in it cannot be great, except to those, who sup|ply foreign countries. The merits of the different vineyards form a frequent topic of conversation, and almost every person has his own scale of their rank; running over with familiar fluency the uncouth names of Johannesberg, Ammanshausen, Hauptberg, Fuldische Schoss|berg,

Rudesheim, Hockheim, Rodtland, Hinterhauser, Marker|brunner, Grafenberg, Laubenheim, Bischeim, Nierstein, Hars|cheim and Kapellgarren; all celebrated vineyards in the Rheingau. The growth and manufacture of these wines are treated of in many books, from one of which we translate an account, that seems to be the most comprehensive and simple.

OF THE RHENISH VINEYARDS AND WINES.

THE strongest and, as they are termed, fullest-bodied wines, those, of course, which are best for keeping, are produced upon mountains of a cold and strong soil; the most brisk and spirited on a warm and gravelly situation. Those produced near the middle of an ascent are esteemed the most wholesome, the soil being there suf|ficiently watered, without becoming too moist; and, on this account, the vineyards of Hockheim are more esteemed than some, whose produce is better flavoured; on the contrary, those at the feet of hills are thought so unwholesome, on account of their extreme humidity, that the wine is directed to be kept for several years, before it is brought to table. The finest flavour is communicated by soils either argillaceous, or marly. Of this sort is a mountain near Bacharach, the wines of which are said to have a Muscadine flavour and to be so highly valued, that an Emperor, in the fourteenth cen|tury,

demanded four large barrels of them, instead of 10,000 florins, which the city of Nuremberg would have paid for its privileges.

A vineyard, newly manured, produces a strong, spirited and well|flavoured, but usually an unwholesome wine; because the manure contains a corrosive salt and a fat sulphur, which, being dissolved, passes with the juices of the earth into the vines. A manure, con|sisting of street mud, old earth, the ruins of houses well broken, and whatever has been much exposed to the elements, is, however, laid on, once in five or six years, between the vintage and winter.

The sorts of vines, cultivated in the Rheingau, are the low ones, called the Reistinge, which are the most common and ripen the first; those of Klebroth, or red Burgundy, the wine of which is nearly purple; of Orleans and of Lambert; and lastly the tall vine, raised against houses, or supported by bowers in gardens. The wines of the two first classes are wholesome; those of the latter are reputed dangerous, or, at least, unfit to be preserved.

The vintagers do not pluck the branches by hand, but carefully cut them, that the grapes may not fall off; in the Rheingau and about Worms the cultivators afterwards bruise them with clubs, but those of Franckfort with their feet; after which the grapes are car|ried to the press, and the wine flows from them by wooden pipes into barrels in the cellar. That, which flows upon the first pressure, is the most delicately flavoured, but the weakest; the next is strongest and most brisk; the third is four; but the mixture of all forms a good wine. The skins are sometimes pressed a fourth time, and a

bad brandy is obtained from the fermented juice; lastly, in the scar|city of pasturage in this part of Germany, they are given for food to oxen, but not to cows, their heat being destructive of milk.

To these particulars it may be useful to add, that one of the surest proofs of the purity of Rhenish is the quick rising and disappearance of the froth, on pouring it into a glass: when the beads are formed slowly and remain long, the wine is mixed and factitious.

OBERWESEL,

THE account of which has been interrupted by this digression, is the first town of the Electorate of Treves, on this side, to which it has belonged since 1312, when its freedom as an imperial city, granted by the Emperor, Frederic the Second, was per|sidiously seized by Henry the Seventh, and the town given to him by his brother Baldwin, the then Elector. The new Sovereign enriched it with a fine collegiate church, which still dignifies the shore of the river. If he used any other endeavours to make the prosperity of the place survive its liberties, they appear to have failed; for Ober|wesel now resembles the other towns of the Electorate, except that the great number of towers and steeples tell what it was before its declension into that territory. The Town-house, rendered unneces|sary by the power of Baldwin, does not exist to insult the inhabi|tants

with the memory of its former use; but is in ruins, and thus serves for an emblem of the effects, produced by the change.

Between Oberwesel and St. Goar, the river is of extraordinary breadth, and the majestic mountains are covered with forests, which leave space for little more than a road between their feet and the wa|ter. A group of peasants, with baskets on their heads, appeared now and then along the winding path, and their diminutive figures, as they passed under the cliffs, seemed to make the heights shew more tremendous. When they disappeared for a moment in the copses, their voices, echoing with several repetitions among the rocks, were heard at intervals, and with good effect, as our oars were suspended.

Soon after passing the island of Sand, we had a perspective view of St. Goar, of the strong fortress of Rhinfels, on the rocks beyond, and of the small fortified town of Goarhausen, on the opposite bank. The mountains now become still more stupendous, and many rivu|lets, or becks, which latter is a German, as well as an English term, descend from them into the river, on either hand, some of which, in a season less dry than the present, roar with angry torrents. But the extreme violence, with which the Rhine passes in this district, left us less leisure than in others to observe its scenery.

ST. GOAR.

WE soon reached St. Goar, lying at the feet of rocks on the western shore, with its ramparts and fortifications spreading far along the water, and mounting in several lines among the surround|ing cliffs, so as to have a very striking and romantic appearance. The Rhine no where, perhaps, presents grander objects either of nature, or of art, than in the northern perspective from St. Goar. There, expanding with a bold sweep, the river exhibits, at one coup d'oeil, on its mountainous shores, six fortresses or towns, many of them placed in the most wild and tremendous situations; their antient and gloomy structures giving ideas of the sullen tyranny of former times. The height and fantastic shapes of the rocks, upon which they are perched, or by which they are overhung, and the width and rapidity of the river, that, unchanged by the vicissitudes of ages and the contentions on its shores, has rolled at their feet, while generations, that made its mountains roar, have passed away into the silence of eternity,—these were objects, which, combined, formed one of the sublimest scenes we had viewed.

The chief of the fortresses is that of Rhinsels, impending over St. Goar, on the west shore, its high round tower rising above massy buildings, that crown two rocks, of such enormous bulk and threat|ening power, that, as we glided under them, it was necessary to re|member their fixed foundations, to soften the awe they inspired.

Other fortifications extend down the precipices, and margin the river, at their base. Further on in the perspective, and where the east bank of the Rhine makes its boldest sweep, is the very striking and singular castle of Platz, a cluster of towers, overtopped by one of immense height, that, perched upon the summit of a pyramidal rock, seems ready to precipitate itself into the water below. Wherever the cliffs beneath will admit of a footing, the sharp angles of fortifications appear.

On another rock, still further in the perspective, is the castle of Thumberg, and, at its foot, on the edge of the water, the walled tower of Welmick. Here the Rhine winds from the eye among heights, that close the scene.

Nearly opposite to St. Goar, is Goarshaussen, behind which the rocks rise so suddenly, as scarcely to leave space for the town to lie between them and the river. A flying bridge maintains a commu|nication between the two places, which, as well as the fortress of Rhinfels, are under the dominion of the Prince of Hesse Cassel.

The number of fortresses here, over which Rhinfels is in every respect paramount, seem to be the less necessary, because the river itself, suddenly swoln by many streams and vexed by hidden rocks, is a sort of natural fortification to both shores, a very little resist|ance from either of which must render it impassable. Whether the water has a subterraneous passage from Bingen hither or not, there are occasionally agitations in this part, which confound the skill of naturalists; and the river is universally allowed to have a fall. Near St. Goar, a sudden gust of wind, assisted by the current, ren|dered

our boat so unmanageable, that, in spite of its heaviness and of all the efforts of the watermen, it was whirled round, and nearly forced upon the opposite bank to that, on which they would have directed it.

St. Goar is a place of great antiquity. A dispute about the etymo|logy of its name is remarkable for the ludicrous contrariety of the two opinions. One author maintains, that it is derived from an hermit named Goar, who, in the sixth century, built a small chapel here. Another supposes that Gewerb, the name of a neighbouring fall in the Rhine, has been corrupted to Gewer, and thence to Goar; after which, considering that there is an island called Sand in the river, and that a great quantity of that material is hereabouts thrown up, he finds the two words combine very satisfactorily into a likeness of the present denomination. The former opinion is, however, pro|moted by this circumstance, which the advocates of the latter may complain of as a partiality, that a statue of St. Goar is actually to be seen in the great church, founded in 1440; and that, notwithstanding the robberies and violences committed in the church by a Spanish army, the following inscription is still entire:

S. GOAR
MONACHUS GALLUS
OBIIT 611.

St. Goar is one of the largest places we had yet passed, and has a considerable share of the commerce carried on by the Rhine. Hav|ing

in time of war a numerous garrison, and being a little resorted to on account of its romantic situation, it has an air of somewhat more animation than might be expected, mingling with the gloom of its walls, and the appearance of decay, which it has in common with other German towns. We were here required to pay the fifth toll from Mentz, and were visited by a Hessian serjeant, who demanded, that our names and condition should be written in his book. These being given, not in the Saxon, but the Roman character, he returned to require another edition of them in German; so that his officer was probably unable to read any other language, or characters. This being complied with, it seemed, that the noble garrison of St. Goar had no further fears concerning us, and we were not troubled by more of the precautions used,

"Lest foul invasion in disguise approach."

The fortress of Rhinfels, which commands St. Goar, is frequently mentioned in the histories of German wars. In the year 1255 it endured forty assaults of an army, combined from sixty towns on the Rhine. In 1692, the French General Tallard besieged it in vain, retreating with the loss of four thousand men, and nearly two hun|dred officers; but, in 1758, the Marquis de Castries surprised it with so much ingenuity and vigour, that not a life was lost, and it remained in possession of the French till 1763, when it was restored by the treaty of peace.

BOPPART.

WE next reached the dismal old town of Boppart, once an imperial city, still surrounded with venerable walls, and dignified by the fine Benedictine nunnery and abbey of Marienberg, perched upon a mountain above; an institution founded in the eleventh cen|tury, for the benefit of noble families only, and enriched by the dona|tions of several Emperors and Electors. Boppart, like many other towns, is built on the margin of the Rhine, whence it spreads up the rocks, that almost impend over the water, on which the clustered houses are scarcely distinguishable from the cliffs themselves. Besides the Benedictine abbey, here is a convent of Carmelites, and another of Franciscans; and the spot is such as suited well the superstition of former times, for

—"O'er the twilight groves, and dusky caves, Long-sounding aisles, and intermingled graves, Black Melancholy sits, and round her throws A death-like silence, and a dread repose; Her gloomy presence saddens all the scene, Shades every flower, and darkens every green, Deepens the murmur of the falling floods, And breathes a browner horror o'er the woods."

The river, expanding into a vast bay, seems nearly surrounded by mountains, that assume all shapes, as they aspire above each other; shooting into cliffs of naked rock, which impend over the water, or, covered with forests, retiring in multiplied steeps into regions whither fancy only can follow. At their base, a few miserable cabins, and half-famished vineyards, are all, that diversify the savageness of the scene. Here two Capuchins, belonging probably to the convent above, as they walked along the shore, beneath the dark cliffs of Boppart, wrapt in the long black drapery of their order, and their heads shrowded in cowls, that half concealed their faces, were inter|esting figures in a picture, always gloomily sublime.

PLACE OF ANTIENT ELECTIONS.

PASSING the town of Braubach and the majestic castle of Marksberg, which we had long observed, above the windings of the stream, on a steep mountain, we came to Rense, a small town, remarkable only for its neighbourhood to a spot, on which the elec|tions of kings of the Romans, or, at least, the meetings preliminary to them, are believed to have antiently taken place. This is distin|guished at present by the remains of a low octagonal building, open at top, and accessible beneath by eight arches, in one of which is a slight of steps. Within, is a stone bench, supposed to be formed for the Electors, who might ascend to it by these steps. In the centre

of the pavement below is a thick pillar, the use of which, whether as a tribune for the new king, or as a table for receiving the attestations of the electors, is not exactly known. That the building itself, now called Koningstuhl, or King's Throne, was used for some purposes of election, appears from several German historians, who mention meet|ings there in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and impute them to antient customs.

INTERMIXTURE OF GERMAN TERRITORIES.

NEARLY opposite to Rense is the small town of Ober|lahnstein, which belongs to the Elector of Mentz, though separated from his other dominions by those of several Princes. To such inter|sections of one territory with another the individual weakness of the German Princes is partly owing; while their collected body has not only necessarily the infirmities of each of its members, but is enfeebled by the counteraction arising from an arrangement, which brings per|sons together to decide a question, according to a common interest, who are always likely to have an individual one of more import|ance to each than his share in the general concern.

The banks of the Rhine afford many instances of this disjunction of territory. The Elector of Cologn has a town to the southward of nearly all the dominions of Treves; the Elector Palatine, whose pos|sessions on the east bank of the Rhine are intersected by those of five

or six other Princes, crosses the river to occupy some towns between the Electorates of Mentz and Treves; the Landgrave of Hesse Cassel does the same to his fortress of Rhinfels; and the Elector of Mentz, in return, has a strip of land and his chief country residence, between the dominions of the two houses of Hesse.

That this intermixture of territory exists, without producing do|mestic violences, is, however, obviously a proof, that the present state of the Germanic body, weak as it may be, with respect to foreign interests, is well formed for the preservation of interior peace. The aggrandizement of the Houses of Austria and Prussia, which has been supposed dangerous to the constitution of the Empire, tends considerably to secure its domestic tranquility, though it dimi|nishes the independence of the lesser Sovereigns; for the interests of the latter are known to be ranged on one, or the other side; and, as the House, to which each is attached, is likely to interfere, upon any aggression against them, the weaker Princes are with-held from con|tests among themselves, which would be accompanied by wars, so very extensive and so disproportionate to their causes.

Nor is the Chamber of Wetzlaar, or the Court for deciding the causes of Princes, as well as all questions relative to the constitution, to be considered as a nullity. The appointment of the judges by the free but secret votes of all Princes, subject to their decrees, is alone wanting to make its purity equal to its power. In minute questions, the chief Princes readily receive its decision, instead of that of arms, which, without it, might sometimes be adopted; and the other Sove|reigns

may be compelled to obey it, the Chamber being authorised to command any Prince to enforce its decrees by his army, and to take payment of the expences out of the dominions of his refractory neigh|bour. An instance of such a command, and of its being virtually effectual, notwithstanding the ridicule, with which it was treated, occurred, during the reign of the late Frederic of Prussia; the story is variously told, but the following account was confirmed to us by an Advocate of the Chamber of Wetzlaar.

The Landgrave of Hesse Cassel had disobeyed several injunctions of the Chamber, relative to a question, which had been constitution|ally submitted to them. At length, the Judges had recourse to their power of calling out what is called the Armée Exécutrice de l'Empire, consisting of so many troops of any Prince, not a party in the cause, as may be sufficient for enforcing submission. The Sovereign of Hesse Cassel was not to be conquered by any of his immediate neigh|bours, and they were induced to direct their order to the King of Prussia, notwithstanding the probability, that so unjust a monarch would shew some resentment of their controul.

Frederic consented to the propriety of supporting the Chamber, but did not choose to involve himself with the Landgrave, on their account. He, therefore, sent him a copy of their order, accompanied by a letter, which, in his own style of courteous pleasantry, yet with a sufficient shew of some further intentions, admonished him to obey them. The Landgrave assured him of his readiness to conform, and the two Princes had privately settled the matter, when the King of

Prussia resolved to obey and to ridicule the Chamber of Wetzlaar. He sent, by a public diligence, a serjeant of foot, who, at the first Hessian garrison, delivered a paper to the captain of the guard, declaring himself to be the commander of the Armée Exécutrice, set on foot by order of the Chamber; and the army consisted of two corporals, who waited at the door! The Judges of Wetzlaar did not shew, that they knew the disrespect, and were contented that the King of Prussia had reduced the Landgrave of Hesse Cassel to obedience.

To this Court subjects may make appeals from the orders of their immediate sovereigns, when the question can be shewn to have any general, or constitutional tendency. Such a cause we heard of in Germany, and it seemed likely to place the Chamber in somewhat a delicate situation. The Elector of Treves had banished a magistrate, for having addressed himself to Custine, during the invasion of the French, in 1792, and requested to know whether he might remain on a part of his property, near their posts, and perform the duties of his office, as usual. The magistrate appealed to Wetzlaar; admitted the facts charged; and set forth, that, in this part of his conduct, he had exactly followed the example of the Chamber itself, who, though at a greater distance, had made a similar application.

Soon after leaving Oberlahnstein, we passed the mouth of the Lahn, a small river, which descends from the mountains of Wette|ravia

on the right, and washes silver and lead mines in its course. It issues from one of those narrow and gloomy forest-glens, which had continually occurred on the eastern bank since we left Boppart, and which were once terrible for more than their aspect, having been the haunt of robbers, of whose crimes some testimonies still remain in the tombs of murdered travellers near the shore. In the ruins of castles and abandoned fortresses within the recesses of these wild mountains, such banditti took up their abode; and these are not fancied per|sonages, for, in the year 1273, an Elector of Mentz destroyed the deserted fortress of Rheinberg, because it had been a rendezvous for them.

Towards sun-set, the rain, which had fallen at intervals during the day, ceased; a fiery flush from the west was reflected on the water, and partially coloured the rocks. Sometimes, an oblique gleam glanced among these glens, touching their upper cliffs, but leaving their depths, with the rivulets, that roared there, in darkness. As the boat glided by, we could now and then discover on the heights a convent, or a chateau, lighted up by the rays, and which, like the pictures in a magic lanthorn, appeared and vanished in a moment, as we passed on the current.

But the shores soon begin to wear a milder aspect; the mountains of the western bank soften into gradual heights; and vineyards, which had disappeared near Boppart, again climb along them. The eastern shore is more abrupt, still bearing on its points some antient buildings, till, opposite to Coblentz, it shoots up into that enormous mass, which sustains the fortress of Ehrenbreitstein.

Having passed a Benedictine convent, seated on the island of Ober|worth, we reached Coblentz as the moon began to tint the rugged Ehrenbreitstein, whose towers and pointed angles caught the light. Part of the rock below, shaded by projecting cliffs, was dark and awful, but the Rhine, expanding at its feet, trembled with radiance. There the flying-bridge, and its sweeping line of boats, were just dis|cernible. On the left, the quay of Coblentz extended, high and broad, crowned with handsome buildings; with tall vessels lying along its base.

EHRENBREITSTEIN.

WE were now somewhat more pleasantly lodged than before, at an inn near the Rhine, almost opposite to the fortress, the importance of which had, in the mean time, greatly increased by the approach of the French armies. The strength of it was somewhat a popular topic. Being considered as one of the keys of Germany towards France, the Governor takes the oaths not only to the Elector of Treves, but to the Emperor and the Empire. As it can be attacked but on one side, and that is not towards the Rhine, a blockade is more expected than a siege; and there are storehouses in the rock for preserving a great quantity of provisions. The supply of water has been provided for so long since as the fifteenth century, when three years were passed in digging, with incredible labour, a well through the solid rock. An inscription on a part of the castle men|tions

this work, and that the rock was hewn to the depth of two hundred and eighty feet. The possession of the fortress was con|firmed to the Elector of Treves by the treaty of Westphalia in 1650.

In the morning, our boatmen crossed the river from Coblentz, to pass under the walls of Ehrenbreitstein, perhaps an established symp|tom of submission. The river is still of noble breadth, and, after the junction with the Moselle, which immediately fronts the old palace, flows with great, but even rapidity. Its shores are now less roman|tic, and more open; spreading on the left into the plains of Coblentz, and swelling on the right into retiring mountains.

CONVERSATION RELATIVE TO FRANCE.

BUT our attention was withdrawn from the view, and our party in the cabin this day increased, by a circumstance, that occurred to our emigrant friend. Having found a large sabre, which he thought was of French manufacture, he was enquiring for the owner, when it was claimed by a gentleman, whom he recognised to be an old friend, but with whose escape from France he was unacquainted; so that he had supposed, from his rank, he must have fallen there. The meeting, on both sides, was very affecting, and they shed some tears, and embraced again and again, with all the ardour of French|men, before the stranger was introduced to us, after which we had the pleasure of his company as far as Cologne.

This gentleman, a Lieutenant-Colonel before the Revolution, had made his escape from France so lately as May last, and his conversa|tion of course turned upon his late condition. There were in most towns many persons who, like himself, were obnoxious for their principles, yet, being unsuspected of active designs, and unreached by the private malice of Roberspierre's agents, were suffered to exist out of prison. They generally endeavoured to lodge in the houses of persons favourable to the Revolution; went to no public places; never visited each other; and, when they met in the street, passed with an hasty or concealed salutation. Their apartments were fre|quently searched; and those, who had houses, took care to have their cellars frequently dug for saltpetre.

With respect to the prospect of any political change, they had little hopes, and still less of being able, by remaining in France, to give assistance to the Combined Powers. They expected nothing but some chance of escape, which in general they would not attempt, without many probabilities in their favour, knowing the sure conse|quences of being discovered. It was impossible for them to pass by the common roads, being exposed to examination at every town, and by every patrol; but, in the day-time, they might venture upon tracts through forests, and, at night, upon cultivated ground; a sort of journey, to which they were tempted by the successes of others in it, but which could not be performed, without experienced guides. It will be heard with astonishment, that, notwithstanding the many difficulties and dangers of such an employment, there were persons,

who obtained a living by conducting others to the frontiers, without passing any town, village, or military post; who, having delivered one person, returned, with his recommendation, to another, and an offer to escort him for a certain sum. Our companion had waited several months for a guide, the person, whom he chose to trust, being under prior engagements, in all of which he was successful. They set out, each laden with his share of provisions, in the dress of peasants; and, without any other accident than that of being once so near the patrols as to hear their conversation, arrived in the Electorate of Treves, from whence this gentleman had been to Rastadt, for the purpose of presenting himself to M. de Condé.

It was remarkable that some of these guides did not share the principles of those, whom they conducted; yet they were faithful to their engagements, and seemed to gratify their humanity, as much as they served their interests. Considering the many contrivances, which are behind almost every political transaction, it seems not im|probable, that these men were secretly encouraged by some of the rulers, who wished to be disencumbered from their enemies, without the guilt of a massacre, or the unpopularity of appearing to assist them.

The attachment to the new principles seemed to be increased, when any circumstances either of signal disadvantage, or success, occurred in the course of a campaign. The disasters of an army, it was said, attracted sympathy; their victories aroused pride. Such a change of manners and of the course of education had taken place, that the

rising generation were all enragées in favour of the Revolution; of which the following was a remarkable instance: Two young ladies, the daughters of a baron, who had remained passively in the country, without promoting, or resisting the Revolution, were then engaged in a law-suit with their father, by which they demanded a mainte|nance, separate from him,

"he being either an Aristocrat, or a Neu|tralist, with whom they did not choose to reside."

They did not pretend to any other complaint, and, it was positively believed, had no other motive. Yet these ladies had been previously educated with the nicest care, by the most accomplished instructors, and, in fact, with more expence than was suitable to their father's income, hav|ing been intended for places at the Court. The children of the poorer classes were equally changed by education, and those of both sexes were proficients in all the Revolutionary songs and catechisms.

This conversation passed while we were floating through the vale of Ehrenbreitstein, where the river, bending round the plains of Co|blentz, flows through open and richly cultivated banks, till it enters the valley of Andernach, where it is again enclosed among romantic rocks. The places, washed by it in its passage thither, are the villages of Neuralf, Warschheim, Nerenberg, Malter, the old castle of Malter|berg, the village of Engus, the fine electoral palace of Schonbornust, the neat town and palace of Neuwied, and the chateau of Friedrichstein,

called by the country people the Devil's Castle, from that love of the wonderful, which has taught them to people it with apparitions.

NEUWIED

WAS now the head-quarters of a legion raised by the Prince of Salm, for the pay of Great Britain; and a scarlet uniform, somewhat resembling the English, was frequent on the quay. We heard of several such corps in Germany, and of the facility with which they are raised, the English pay being as eightpence to two|pence better than those of Austria and Prussia. Recruits receive from one to two crowns bounty: whether it is equally true, that the officers are, notwithstanding, allowed ten pounds for each, we can|not positively assert; but this was said within the hearing of several at Cologne, and was not contradicted. La solde d'Angleterre is extremely popular in Germany; and the great wealth of the English nation begins to be very familiarly known.

ANDERNACH

WAS occupied by Imperial troops; and, as we entered the gorge of its rocky pass, it was curious to observe the appearances of modern mixed with those of antient warfare; the soldiers of Fran|cis the Second lying at the foot of the tower of Drusus; their artil|lery and baggage waggons lining the shore along the whole extent of the walls.

In this neighbourhood are three celebrated mineral springs, of which one rises in the domain of the Carmelite monastery of Jonnies|stein; the second, called Ponterbrunnen, is so brisk and spirited, that the labourers in the neighbouring fields declare it a remedy for fatigue as well as thirst; and a third, called Heilbrunnen, has so much fixed air, as to effervesce slightly when mixed with wine.

The interesting valley of Andernach has been already described. Its scenery, viewed now from the water, was neither so beautiful, or so striking, as from the road, by which we had before passed. The elevation of the latter, though not great, enabled the eye to take a wider range, and to see mountains, now screened by the nearer rocks of the shore, which added greatly to the grandeur of the scene. The river itself was then also a noble object, either expanding below, or winding in the distance; but, now that we were upon its level, its appearance lost much both in dignity and extent, and even the rocks

on its margin seemed less tremendous, when viewed from below. Something, however, should be allowed in this last respect to our having just quitted wilder landscapes; for, though the banks of the Rhine, in its course from Bingen to Coblentz, are less various and beautiful, than in its passage between Andernach and Bonn, they are more grand and sublime.

But the merits of the different situations for the view of river|scenery have been noticed and contended for by the three persons most authorised by their taste to decide upon them; of whom GRAY has left all his enthusiasm, and nearly all his sublimity, to his two sur|viving friends; so that this opinion is to be understood only with respect to the scenery of the Rhine, and does not presume to mingle with the general question between them. The Rhine now passes by the village and castle of Hammerstein, which, with those of Rheineck, were nearly laid waste by Louis the Fourteenth, the castle of Argen|dorff and the towns of Lintz and Rheinmagen, all exhibiting symp|toms of decay, though Lintz is called a commercial town.

ROLAND'S Castle appears soon after, and, almost beneath it, the island, that bears Adelaide's convent, called Rolands Werth, or the Worth of Roland.

We were now again at the base of the Seven Mountains, whose summits had long aspired in the distance, and, as we passed under the cliffs of Drakenfels, hailed the delightful plain of Goodesberg, though much of it was concealed by the high sedgy bank of the Rhine on the left. The spreading skirts of these favourite mountains accom|panied

us nearly to Bonn, and displayed all their various charms of form and colouring in this our farewell view of them.

The town and palace of Bonn extend with much dignity along the western bank, where the Rhine makes a very bold sweep; one wing of the former overlooking the shore, and the want of unifor|mity in the front, which is seen obliquely, being concealed by the garden groves; the many tall spires of the great church rise over the roof of the palace, and appear to belong to the building.

After leaving Bonn, the shores have little that is interesting, unless in the retrospect of the Seven Mountains, with rich woodlands undu|lating at their feet; and when these, at length, disappear, the Rhine loses for the rest of its course the wild and sublime character, which distinguishes it between Bingen and Bonn. The rich plain, which it waters between the latter place and Cologne, is studded, at every gentle ascent, that bounds it, with abbeys and convents, most of them appropriated to the maintenance of noble Chapters.

Of these, the first is the Ladies Chapter of Vilich, founded in the year 1190, by Megiegor, a Count and Prince of Guelderland, who endowed it richly, and made his own daughter the first abbess; a lady, who had such excellent notions of discipline, that, when any nuns neglected to sing in the choir, she thought a heavy blow on the cheek the best means of restoring their voices. This Chapter is one of the richest in Germany, and is peculiarly valuable to the nobility of this Electorate from its neighbourhood to Bonn, where many of the ladies pass great part of the year with their families. On the

other side of the river is the Benedictine abbey of Siegberg, appro|priated also to nobles, and lying in the midst of its own domains, of which a small town, at the foot of its vineyards, is part. Admission into this society is an affair of the most strict and ceremonious proof, as to the sixteen quarterings in the arms of the candidate, each of which must be unblemished by any plebeian symptoms. Accompa|nied by his genealogy, these quarterings are exposed to view for six weeks and three days, before the election; and, as there is an ample income to be contended for, the candidates do not hesitate to impeach each others' claims by every means in their power. The prelate of this abbey writes himself Count of Guls, Strahlen and Neiderpleis, and has six provostships within his jurisdiction.

Besides this, and similar buildings, the Rhine passes not less than twenty villages in its course from Bonn to Cologne, a distance of pro|bably five-and-twenty English miles.

COLOGNE

NOW began to experience the inconveniences of its neighbourhood to the seat of war, some of which had appeared at Bonn from the arrival of families, who could not be lodged in the for|mer place. We were no sooner within the gates, than the throng of people and carriages in a city, which only a few weeks before was almost as silent as gloomy, convinced us we should not find a very easy welcome. The sentinels, when they made the usual enquiry as to our inn, assured us, that there had been no lodgings at the Hotel de Prague for several days, and one of them followed us, to see what others we should find. Through many obstructions by mi|litary and other carriages, we, however, reached this inn, and were soon convinced that there could be no room, the landlord shewing us the chaises in which some of his guests slept, and his billiard table already loaden with beds for others. There was so much confusion meanwhile in the adjoining square, that, upon a slight assurance, we could have believed the French to be within a few miles of the city, and have taken refuge on the opposite bank of the Rhine.

At length, our host told us, that what he believed to be the worst room in the place was still vacant, but might not be so half an hour longer. We followed his man to it, in a distant part of the city, and saw enough in our way of parties taking refreshment in carriages, and

gentlemen carrying their own baggage, to make us contented with a viler cabin than any person can have an idea of, who has not been out of England. The next morning we heard from the mistress of it how fortunately we had been situated, two or three families hav|ing passed the night in the open market-place, and great numbers in their carriages.

The occasion of this excessive pressure upon Cologne was the entry of the French into Brussels, their advances towards Liege, and the immediate prospect of the siege of Maestricht, all which had dis|peopled an immense tract of territory of its wealthier inhabitants, and driven them, together with the French emigrants, upon the confines of Holland and Germany. The Austrian hospitals having been removed from Maestricht, five hundred waggons, laden with sick and wound|ed, had passed through Cologne the day before. The carriages on the roads from Maestricht and Liege were almost as close as in a procession, and at Aix la Chapelle, where these roads meet, there was an obstruction for some hours. While we were at Cologne, another detachment of hospital waggons arrived, some hundreds of which we had the misfortune to see, for they passed before our window. They were all uncovered, so that the emaciated figures and ghastly counte|nances of the soldiers, laid out upon straw in each, were exposed to the rays of a burning sun, as well as to the fruitless pity of passengers; and, as the carriages had no springs, it seemed as if these half-sacrificed victims to war would expire before they could be drawn over the rugged pavement of Cologne. Any person, who had once witnessed

such a sight, would know how to estimate the glories of war, even though there should be a mercenary at every corner to insult his una|voidable feelings and the eternal sacredness of peace, with the slander of disaffection to his country.

We had some thoughts of resuming our course by land from this place, but were now convinced, that it was impracticable, seeing the number of post-horses, which were engaged, and judging of the crowds of travellers, that must fill the inns on the road. Our water|men from Mentz were, however, not allowed to proceed lower, so that we had to comply with the extortions of others, and to give nine louis for a boat from Cologne to Nimeguen. Having, not without some difficulty, obtained this, and stored it with provisions, we again embarked on the Rhine, rejoicing that we were not, for a second night, to make part of the crowd on shore.

Cologne, viewed from the river, appears with more of antient majesty than from any other point. Its quays, extending far along the bank, its lofty ramparts, shaded with old chesnuts, and crowned by many massy towers, black with age; the old gateways opening to the Rhine, and the crowd of steeples, overtopping all, give it a vene|rable and picturesque character. But, however thronged the city now was, the shore without was silent and almost deserted; the sen|tinels, watching at the gates and looking out from the ramparts, or a few women gliding beneath, wrapt in the nun-like scarf, so melan|choly in its appearance and so generally worn at Cologne, were nearly the only persons seen.

The shores, though here flat, when compared with those to the southward, are high enough to obstruct the view of the distant mountains, that rise in the east; in the south, the wild summits of those near Bonn were yet visible, but, after this faint glimpse, we saw them no more.

About two miles below Cologne, the west bank of the Rhine was covered with hospital waggons and with troops, removed from them, for the purpose of crossing the river, to a mansion, converted by the Elector into an hospital. About a mile lower, but on the opposite bank, is Muhleim, a small town in the dominions of the Elector Palatine, which, in the beginning of the present century, was likely to become a rival of Cologne. A persecution of the Protestant mer|chants of the latter place drove them to Muhleim, where they erected a staple, and began to trade with many advantages over the mother city; but the pusillanimity of the Elector Palatine permitted them to sink under the jealousy of the Colonese merchants; their engines for removing heavy goods from vessels to the shore were ordered to be demolished; and the commerce of the place has since consisted chiefly in the exportation of grain.

The shores are now less enlivened by villages than in the Rheingan and other districts to the southward, where the cultivation and pro|duce of the vineyards afsord, at least, so much employment, that six or seven little towns, each clustered round its church, are frequently visible at once. The course of the river being also wider and less rapid, the succession of objects is flower, and the eye is often

wearied with the uniform lowness of the nearer country, where the antient castle and the perched abbey, so frequent in the Rheingau, seldom appear. Corn lands, with a slight intermixture of wood, border the river from hence to Dusseldorff, and the stream flows, with an even force, through long reaches, scarcely distinguished from each other by any variety of the country, or intervention of towns. Those, which do occur, are called Stammel, Niel, Flietert, Mer|kenich, Westdorff, Langelt, and Woringen; in which last place, the burgesses of Cologne, at the latter end of the thirteenth century, stood a siege against their Archbishop, and, by a successful resist|ance, obtained the enjoyment of some commercial rights, here so rare as to be called privileges. After Dormagen, a small town very slightly provided with the means of benefiting itself by the river, we came opposite to Zons, the fortifications of which are so far preser|ved, as that the boatmen on the Rhine are required to stop before them and give an account of their cargoes.

We were listening to an old French song, and had almost for|gotten the chance of interruption from any abuses of power, when the steersman called to us in a low, but eager voice, and enquired whether we would permit him to attempt passing the castle, where, if we landed, we might probably be detained an hour, or, if the officer was at supper, for the whole night. By the help of twilight and our silence, he thought it possible to glide unnoticed under the opposite bank, or that we should be in very little danger, if the sentinels should obey their order for firing upon all vessels

that might attempt to pass. The insolent tediousness of a German custom-house, and the probable wretchedness of inns at such a place as this, determined us in favour of the man's proposal; we were silent for a quarter of an hour; the men with-held their oars; and the watch|ful garrison of Zons saw us not, or did not think a boat of two tons burthen could be laden with an army for the conquest of Germany.

The evening was not so dark as entirely to deny the view of either shore, while we continued to float between both, and to trace the fea|tures of three or four small towns upon them. Neuss, being at some little distance from the river, was concealed; but we had an accurate remembrance of its hideousness, and, recognizing it for the model of many towns since seen, were pleased with a mode of travelling, which rendered us independent of them. The same mode, however, pre|vented us from visiting Dusseldorff, which we did not reach, till after the shutting of the gates; so that, had we stayed, we must have passed the night in our boat on the outside, a sacrifice of too much time to be made, while an army was advancing to the opposite shore. Being compelled to remain in the boat, we thought it desirable to be, at the same time, proceeding with the stream, and suffered the steers|man to attempt passing another garrison, by whom, as he said, we should otherwise be inevitably detained for the night. He did not effect this, without being noticed by the sentinels, who called and threatened to fire; but, as the boatmen assured us this would scarcely be done, without leave from an officer, who might not be immediately at hand, we yielded to their method of pressing forward as hastily as

possible, and were presently out of sight of Dusseldorff, of which we had seen only the walls and the extensive palace, rising immediately above the water. In the next reach, the boatmen stopped to take breath, and then confessed, that, though we had escaped being de|tained, as they had said, they had saved some florins due for tolls here and at Zons; which saving was their motive for running the risk. Though we would not have encouraged such a purpose, had we been aware of it, since the neglect of an unjust payment might produce an habitual omission of a just one, it did not seem necessary to say much, in behalf of a toll on the Rhine, for which there is no other pretence and no other authority than the power to enforce it.

The loss of Dusseldorff, we were assured, was the less, because the pictures of the celebrated gallery had been carried off to meet those of Manheim, at Munich.

It was now dark for two or three hours, but we did not hear of any town or view worth waiting to observe. The first object in the dawn was the island of Kaiserwerth, on which there is a small town, twice besieged in the wars of Louis the Fourteenth, and now in the condition, to which military glory has reduced so many others. One of the mines in the last siege blew so large a part of the walls over the island into the Rhine, that the navigation of the river was, for some time, obstructed by them. The dominion of this island, for which the Elector of Cologne and the Elector Palatine contended, was decided so lately as 1768 by the authority of the Chamber of Wetzlaar, who summoned the King of Prussia to assist them with his

troops, as the Armée exécutrice de l'Empire, and the Elector Palatine was put in possession of it, notwithstanding the remonstrances of his rival.

As the morning advanced, we reached the villages of Kreuzberg, Rheinam and Einingen; and, at five, stopped at Urdingen, a town on the west bank of the Rhine, at which the Elector of Cologne takes his northernmost toll, and a place of more commerce than we had expected to see short of Holland. Great part of this is in timber, which it adds to the floats annually sent to that country; a sort of expedition so curious and useful, that we shall make no apology for introducing the following account of it.

TIMBER FLOATS ON THE RHINE.

THESE are formed chiefly at Andernach, but consist of the fellings of almost every German forest, which, by streams, or short land carriage, can be brought to the Rhine. Having passed the rocks of Bingen and the rapids of St. Goar in small detachments, the several rafts are compacted at some town not higher than Andernach, into one immense body, of which an idea may be formed from this list of dimensions.

The length is from 700 to 1000 feet; the breadth from 50 to 90; the depth, when manned with the whole crew, usually seven feet. The trees in the principal rafts are not less than 70 feet long, of which ten compose a rast.

On this sort of floating island, five hundred labourers of different classes are employed, maintained and lodged, during the whole voy|age; and a little street of deal huts is built upon it for their reception. The captain's dwelling and the kitchen are distinguished from the other apartments by being somewhat better built.

The first rafts, laid down in this structure, are called the founda|tion, and are always either of oak, or sir-trees, bound together at their tops, and strengthened with firs, fastened upon them crossways by iron spikes. When this foundation has been carefully compacted, the other rafts are laid upon it, the trees of each being bound together in the same manner, and each stratum fastened to that beneath it. The surface is rendered even; storehouses and other apartments are raised; and the whole is again strengthened by large masts of oak.

Before the main body proceed several thin and narrow rafts, com|posed only of one floor of timbers, which, being held at a certain distance from the float by masts of oak, are used to give it direction and force, according to the efforts of the labourers upon them.

Behind it, are a great number of small boats, of which fifteen or sixteen, guided by seven men each, are laden with anchors and cables; others contain articles of light rigging, and some are used for messages from this populous and important fleet to the towns, which it passes. There are twelve sorts of cordage, each having a name used only by the float-masters; among the largest are cables of four hun|dred yards long and eleven inches diameter. Iron chains are also used in several parts of the structure.

The consumption of provisions on board such a float is estimated for each voyage at fifteen or twenty thousand pounds of fresh meat, between forty and fifty thousand pounds of bread, ten or fifteen thou|sand pounds of cheese, one thousand or fifteen hundred pounds of butter, eight hundred or one thousand pounds of dried meat, and five or six hundred tons of beer.

The apartments on the deck are, first, that of the pilot, which is near one of the magazines, and, opposite to it, that of the persons called masters of the float: another class, called masters of the valets, have also their apartment; near it is that of the valets, and then that of the sub-valets; after this are the cabins of the tyrolois, or last class of persons, employed in the float, of whom eighty or an hundred sleep upon straw in each, to the humber of more than four hundred in all. There is, lastly, one large eating-room, in which the greater part of this crew dine at the same time.

The pilot, who conducts the fleet from Andernach to Dusseldorff, quits it there, and another is engaged at the same salary, that is, five hundred florins, or 42 l. ; each has his sub-pilot, at nearly the same price. About twenty tolls are paid in the course of the voyage, the amount of which varies with the size of the fleet and the estimation of its value, in which latter respect the proprietors are so much sub|ject to the caprice of customhouse officers, that the first signal of their intention to depart is to collect all these gentlemen from the neigh|bourhood, and to give them a grand dinner on board. After this, the float is sounded and measured, and their demands upon the owners settled.

On the morning of departure, every labourer takes his post, the rowers on their benches, the guides of the leading rafts on theirs, and each boat's crew in its own vessel. The eldest of the valet|masters then makes the tour of the whole float, examines the labourers, passes them in review, and dismisses those, who are unfit. He afterwards addresses them in a short speech; recommends regu|larity and alertness; and repeats the terms of their engagement, that each shall have five crowns and a half, besides provisions, for the ordinary voyage; that, in case of delay by accident, they shall work three days, gratis; but that, after that time, each shall be paid at the rate of twelve creitzers, about four pence, per day.

After this, the labourers have a repast, and then, each being at his post, the pilot, who stands on high near the rudder, takes off his hat and calls out,

"Let us all pray."

In an instant there is the happy spectacle of all these numbers on their knees, imploring a blessing on their undertaking.

The anchors, which were fastened on the shores, are now brought on board, the pilot gives a signal, and the rowers put the whole float in motion, while the crews of the several boats ply round it to facili|tate the departure.

Dort in Holland is the destination of all these floats, the sale of one of which occupies several months, and frequently produces 350,000 florins, or more than 30,000 l.

URDINGEN

HAS a neat market-place and some symptoms of greater comfort than are usual in the towns of the Electorate of Cologne; but it is subject to violent floods, so much so, that at the inn, which is, at least, an hundred and fifty yards from the shore, a brass plate, nailed upon the door of the parlour, relates, that the river had risen to that height; about five feet from the ground.

After resting here, five hours, we returned to our little bark, with the spirits inspired by favourable weather, and were soon borne away on the ample current of the Rhine.

Large Dutch vessels, bound to Cologne, now frequently appeared, and refreshed us once again with the shew of neatness, industry and prosperity. The boatmen learned, that several of these were from Rotterdam, laden with the effects of Flemish refugees, brought thi|ther from Ostend; and others were carrying military stores for the use, as they said, of the Emperor. The ordinary trade of the Dutch with Germany, in tea, coffee, English cloths and English hardware, which we had heard at Mentz was slackened by the expected ap|proach of armies, now seemed to be exchanged for the conveyance of property from scenes of actual distress to those not likely to be long exempted from it.

A little beyond Urdingen, the town of Bodberg marks the north|ern

extremity of the long and narrow dominions of Cologne, once so far connected with Holland, as that the Archbishop had jurisdic|tion over the Bishop of Holland, and the Chapter of Utrecht. But Philip the Second, before the States had resisted his plundering, ob|tained of the Pope, that they should not be subject to any foreign see; and the Bishop had a residence assigned to him at Haerlem.

The Rhine is now bounded on the left by the country of Meurs; and, having, after a few miles, part of the Duchy of Cleves on the right, it becomes thus enclosed by the territories of the King of Prussia, under whose dominion it rolls, till the States of Guelderland repose upon one bank, and, soon after, those of Utrecht, on the other. We were here, of course, in the country of tolls; and our waterman could not promise how far we should proceed in the day, since it was impossible to estimate the delays of the collectors. Meurs has no place, except small villages, near the river; but, at the com|mencement of the Duchy of Cleves, the influx of the Ruhr into the Rhine makes a small port, at which all vessels are obliged to stop, and pay for a Prussian pass. Some Dutch barks, of probably one hundred and twenty tons burthen, we were assured would not be dis|missed for less than fifty ducats, or twenty guineas each. The town is called the Ruhort, and we had abundance of time to view it, for the Collector would not come to the boat, but ordered that we should walk up, and make our appearance before him.

It is a small place, rendered busy by a dock-yard for building ves|sels to be employed on the Rhine, and has somewhat of the fresh

appearance, exhibited by such towns as seem to be built for present use, rather than to subsist because they have once been erected. In the dock, which opens to the Ruhr, two vessels of about sixty tons each were nearly finished, and with more capital, many might no doubt be built for the Dutch, timber and labour being here much cheaper than in Holland.

After the boatman had satisfied the Collector, we resumed our voyage, very well contented to have been detained only an hour. The woody heights of Cleves now broke the flat monotony of the eastern shore, the antiquity of whose forests is commemorated by Tacitus in the name of Saltus Teutoburgensis, supposed to have been bounded here by the town now called Duisbourg:

—"haud procul Teutoburgensi saltu, in quo reliquiae Vari legionumque msepultae dicebantur"—

"Unburied remain, Inglorious on the plain."

These forests were also celebrated for their herds of wild horses; and the town of Duisbourg, having been rendered an University in 1655, is thus panegyrized by a German poet:

Dis ist die Deutsche Burg, vor langst gar hochgeehrt Von vielen König und auch Kaiserlichen Kronen: Der schöne Musenthron, wo kluge Leute wohnen; Und wo die Kausmannschast so manchen Bürger nährt

This is the German town, that's fam'd so long By throned Kings, and gentle Muses' song; Where learned folks live well on princely pay, And commerce makes so many Burghers gay.

Of the commerce there were still some signs in half a dozen vessels, collected on the beach. Whether the University also subsists, or is any thing more than a free school, which is frequently called an University in Germany, we did not learn.

WESEL.

AFTER five or six small towns, or villages, more, the Rhine reaches the well known fortified town and state prison of Wesel; a place, not always unfavourable to freedom, for here RAPIN, driven from the district now called La Vendée in France, by Louis the Fourteenth's persecution of Protestants, retired to write his His|tory; recollecting, perhaps, that it had before sheltered refugees from the tyranny of the Duke of Alva, and our sanguinary Mary.

The towers and citadel of Wesel give it the appearance of a mili|tary place, and it is frequently so mentioned; but the truth is, that the late King of Prussia, with the same fear of his subjects, which was felt by Joseph the Second in Flanders, demolished all

the effectual works, except those of the citadel; a policy not very injurious to the Monarch in this instance, but which, in Flanders, has submitted the country to be twice over-run in three years, and has in fact been the most decisive of passed events in their influence upon present circumstances.

The reformed worship is exercised in the two principal churches, but the Catholics have two or three monasteries, and there is a Chap|ter of Noble Ladies, of whom two thirds are Protestants, and one third Catholic; an arrangement which probably accounts for their having no settled and common residence.

Opposite to Wesel is Burick, the fortifications of which remain, and are probably intended to serve instead of the demolished works of the former place, being connected with it by a flying-bridge over the Rhine. A little lower are the remains of the old chateau of Fur|stemberg, on a hill where the ladies of the noble Cistercian nunnery of Furstemberg had once a delightful seat, now deserted for the society of Xanten.

Xanten, the first place at which we had stopped in Germany, and the last, for a long tract, which we had seen with pleasure, Xanten, now distinguishable, at a small distance from the river, by its spires, reminded us of the gay hopes we had formed on leaving it; with a new world spread out before us, for curiosity, and, as we thought, for admiration; yet did not render the remembrance of disappoint|ment, as to the last respect, painful, for even the little information we had gained seemed to be worth the labour of acquiring it.

The exchange of indefinite for exact ideas is for ever desirable. Without this journey of eleven or twelve hundred miles we should have considered Germany, as its position in maps and description in books represent it, to be important, powerful and prosperous; or, even if it had been called wretched, the idea would have been indi|stinct, and the assertion, perhaps, not wholly credited. The greatest and, as it is reasonable to believe, the best part of Germany we have now seen, and, in whatever train of reasoning it is noticed, have an opinion how it should be valued. Those, who cannot guess at causes, may be sure of effects; and having seen, that there is little individual prosperity in Germany, little diffusion of intelligence, manners, or even of the means for comfort, few sources of independence, or honourable wealth, and no examples of the poverty, in which there may be pride, it was not less perceptible, that there can be no general importance, no weight in the balance of useful, that is, peaceful power, and no place, but that of an instrument, even in the desperate exer|cises of politics.

A respect for the persons of learning, or thought, who live, as the impertinence of high and the ignorance of low society forces them to live, in a strict and fastidious retirement, cannot alter the general estimation of the country, in any respect here considered; their conversation with each other has no influence upon the com|munity; their works cannot have a present, though they will have a general and a permanent effect. The humbler classes, from whom prosperity should result in peace, and strength in war, give little of

either to Germany; and man is very seldom negatively stationed; when not useful to his fellow-creatures, he is generally somewhat injurious. The substantial debasement of the German peasantry, that is, their want of ordinary intelligence, re-acts upon the means that produced it, and, continuing their inferiority, continues many injurious effects upon the rest of Europe.

That Germany should be thus essentially humble, perhaps, none would have ventured to foresee. The materialist could not have found it in the climate. The politician might hastily expect it from the arbitrary character of the governments, but must hesitate, when he recollects how France advanced in science and manufactures, under the dominion of Louis the Fourteenth, greatly more despotic than the usual administrations in Germany. Perhaps, the only solu|tion for this difference of effects from apparently similar causes is, that the greater extent of his territory, as well as the better opportu|nities of his subjects for commerce, enabled Louis to gratify his taste for splendour, at the same time that they shewed his ambition a means of indulgence, by increasing the means of his people. Ger|many, frittered into several score of sovereignties, has no opulent power; no considerable income, remaining after the payment of its armies; few wealthy individuals. The Emperor, with fifty-six titles, does not gain a florin by his chief dignity; or Granvelle, the Minister of Charles the Fifth, would have been contradicted when he said so in the Chamber of Princes. The Elector Palatine is almost the only Prince, whose revenue is not absorbed by political, military

and household establishments; and though, in an advanced state of society, or in opulent nations, what is called patronage is seldom ne|cessary, and must, perhaps, be as injurious to the happiness as it is to the dignity of those who receive it, nothing is more certain than that there have been periods in the history of all countries, when the libe|rality of the Prince, or the more independent protection of beneficed institutions, was necessary to the existence of curiosity and know|ledge. At such times, a large expenditure, if directed by taste, or even by vanity, afforded a slow recompense for the aggressions, that might support it, by spreading a desire of distinction for some intel|lectual accomplishment, as the claim to notice from the court; and the improvement of mind circulated, by more general encourage|ment, till every town and village had its men of science. Thus it was that the despotism of Louis the Fourteenth had a different effect from that of his contemporary German Princes, who, by no oppres|sions, could raise a sufficient income, to make their own expenditure the involuntary means of improving the intellectual condition of their people.

From the neighbourhood of Xanten, in which we were induced thus to estimate what had been gained, since we saw it last, and from a shore that gradually rises into the many woody heights around Cal|car and Cleves, the Rhine speedily reaches Rees, a town on the right bank, built advantageously at an angle, made by a flexu••e of the river to the left.

We landed to view this place, and were soon persuaded, by the

Dutch-like cleanliness and civility of the people at the inn, to remain there for the night, rather than to attempt reaching Emmerick.

Rees is near enough to Holland to have some of its advantages; and, whatever contempt it may be natural for English travellers, at the commencement of their tour, to feel for Dutch dullness and covet|ousness, nothing but some experience of Germany is necessary to make them rejoice in a return to the neatness, the civility, the com|forts, quietness, and even the good humour and intelligence to be easily found in Holland. Such, at least, was the change, produced in our minds by a journey from Nimeguen to Friburg. The lower classes of the Dutch, and it is the conduct of such classes, that every where has the chief influence upon the comforts of others, are not only without the malignant fullenness of the Germans, and, therefore, ready to return you services for money, but are also much superior to them in intelligence and docility. Frequent oppor|tunities of gain, and the habit of comparing them, sharpen intellects, which might otherwise never be exercised. In a commercial coun|try, the humblest persons have opportunities of profiting by their qualifications; they are, therefore, in some degree, prepared for bet|ter conditions, and do not feel that angry envy of others, which arises from the consciousness of some irremediable distinction.

The inhabitants of Rees speak both Dutch and German; and it was pleasing to hear at the inn the sulky yaw of the latter exchan|ged for the civil Yaw well, Mynheer, of the Dutch. The town is built chiefly of brick, like those in Holland; the streets light; the

market-place spacious, and the houses well preserved. It is of no great extent, but the space within the walls is filled, though this must have been sometimes partly cleared by the sieges, to which Rees was subject in the war of Philip the Second upon the Dutch. A few emi|grants from Brussels and Maestricht were now sheltered in it; but there was no garrison and no other symptom of its neighbourhood to the scene of hostilities, than the arrival of a Prussian commissary to collect hay and corn. We were cheered by the re-appearance of prosperity in a country, where it is so seldom to be seen, and passed a better evening in this little town, than in any other between Fri|burg and Holland.

In the morning, having no disgust to impel us, we were some|what tardy in embarking; and the boatmen, who had found out the way of reviving our impatience, talked of the great distance of Hol|land, till they had us on board. Five or six well-looking villages presently appear after leaving Rees, the next port to which is Em|merick, once an Hanseatic town, and still a place of some dignity, from spires and towers, but certainly not of much commerce, for we could not see more than two vessels on the beach.

This is the town, at which a Governor and General, appointed by Philip the Second, with probably half a dozen titles, asserting his ex|cellence, serenity and honour, gave an instance of baseness, scarcely ever exceeded even by Philip himself. Approaching the place, which was then neutral, the inhabitants went out to him with an entreaty, that he would not send troops into it, and, probably by

something more than entreaty, obtained his promise, that they should be spared. In spite of this promise, of the remonstrances of the inha|bitants, and of the representations of a clergyman, that the Spanish assurances of having engaged in the war chiefly for the interests of the Catholic religion could not be credited, if acts, contrary to the precepts of all religion, were daily perpetrated; in spite of these, Mendoza, the Spanish commander, sent in four hundred troops, but with another promise, that their number should not be increased, and with this consolation for the burgesses, that the Spanish Colonel of the detachment was directed to swear in their presence, to admit no more, even if they should be offered to him.

Mendoza had estimated this man's heart by his own, and consi|dered his oath only as a convenient delusion for preventing the resist|ance of the inhabitants. He accordingly sent other troops to him, under the command of a foreign hireling, and with a peremptory order for their admission; but the honest Spaniard gave him this reply,

"Though the General has set the example, I will not violate my faith."

Passing Emmerick with much pleasure, we speedily came to the point at which the Rhine, dividing itself into two streams, loses its name immediately in the one, and presently after in the other. Some writer has compared this merging to the voluntary surrender of exertions and views, by which affectionate parents lose themselves in their children. The stream, which bends to the west, takes the name of the Waal; that, which flows in the general direction of the

river, retains its name, for a few miles, when another stream issues to the northward, and takes that of the Yssel. The old river is still recognized, after this separation, and the town of Rhenen takes its name from it; but, about a mile lower, it yields to the denomination of the Leck, which, like that of the Waal, does not long enjoy its usurped distinction. The Waal, or Wahl, being joined by the Maas, as the Dutch, or the Meuse, as the French call it, near Bommel, takes the name of that river, and, soon after, the Leck merges in their united stream, which carries the title of the Maas by Rotterdam, Schiedam and Flaarding, into the German ocean.

We did not yield to this artificial distinction, so far as to think our|selves taking leave of the Rhine, or losing the stream, that had pre|sented to us, at first, features of the boldest grandeur, mingled with others of the sweetest beauty, and then borne us safely past a shore, pressed by the hasty steps of distress, as well as threatened by those of ravage from a flying and a pursuing army. Nor does the river change the character it has lately assumed; but still passes with an even, wide and forceful current between cultivated or pastoral levels, bounded, at some distance, by gradual, woody ascents.

Among these heights and woods, Cleves is visible to the left, and those, who see it only at this distance, may repeat the dictionary descriptions of its grandeur and consequence as a capital. Soon after, Schenckenkanze, a small fort, built on the point of the long island, round which the Rhine and the Waal slow, occurs; and then the

southern extremity of the province of Utrecht. We were glad to see this commencement of the dominions of the United States, though the shore opposite to them was still Prussian; and, telling the boat|men, if they had occasion to stop at any town, to touch only upon the free bank, they humoured us so far as to row out of the current for the sake of approaching it; in short, we stepped no more upon German land; and, within a few miles, were enveloped, on both sides, by the prospering, abounding plains of the Dutch provinces. Italiam! Italiam!

Notes

• * 1.1

  Dr. Samuel Johnson.