THE RHINE.
And here we change the land of facts for the land of fictions. We now enter the regions of romance and robbery—of love and murder—of tilts and tournaments—of dungeons deep and turrets lofty—of crusades against the creed of the Ottoman abroad, and of forays against the property or life of the neighbour at home—of riot and revelry in the castle, and of penury and superstition in the cottage—of beetling precipice and winding river—of basaltic rock and clustering vine—of wassail war and vintage carol. It is probable that few ascend this famous river without experiencing some feelings of disappointment, although none will acknowledge it, lest their taste should be condemned, and themselves voted to be barbarians, insensible alike to the beauties of nature and the wonders of art. But the Rhine, like many a fine child, has been spoiled—especially by poets and painters. The tourists and romance-writers, too, have combined to spoil the Rhine-child—for although all romance-writers are not tourists, yet all tourists are, ex officio, romance-writers.
Thus the mountains of the Rhine, though none of them are much higher than the rock of Gibraltar—are represented as “stupendous”—every dingle and dell that opens between the hills, is painted as more beautiful than the valley of Rasselas, Chamounix, or Grindenwalde—the river itself is made to flow like liquid emeralds or sapphires, though it receives so many muddy streams, after its partial filter in Constance, that it is nearly as yellow as the Tiber, and as turbid as the Thames, before it gets half-way between Schaffhausen and Dusseldorf.[6] The vines too, which are strung on stunted sticks, like onions,—enclosed between rude stone terraces—and which more frequently disfigure than embellish the banks of the Rhine, are extolled beyond those of Italy, which are gracefully festooned from tree to tree, bending down the branches with the weight of delicious grapes. Notwithstanding these and many other deficiencies on the one hand, and exaggerations on the other (which all will acknowledge in their hearts, though none will declare by their tongues), the Rhine is the most picturesque, beautiful, romantic, and interesting river on the face of our globe. I have twice ascended, and thrice descended the stream, from its source in the Alps to its sepulture in the ocean—with various lateral excursions—and still with undiminished pleasure. But then I came to the survey with a conviction that, like all other places of the kind, it was flattered by the painter, falsified by the poet, and dressed in meretricious ornaments by the tourist and novellist. I was therefore not disappointed, but highly gratified.