CXLIII.
Baths of Töplitz, Bohemia, Aug. 21, 1858.
From the baths of Baden, in Austria, I came to the old capital, Vienna, which I found dull as usual at this season of the year, as all who can get into the country make their escape. A grand work of improvement is in progress here. The old Bastei, or walls which fortified and surrounded the city, are being torn away and levelled. The concentration of business and residences in the city had increased the average occupancy of houses to seventy persons each, or double the number of any city in Europe, and the want of room for extension had caused the building up of some twenty-five suburbs, towns and villages. The admission of light and air will lessen the mortality, which was in greater proportion to the population than in other well-regulated cities.
We came from Vienna to Prague in one day, by rail. Having visited this city repeatedly, and, I think, described the same, I will not hazard a repetition.
Four hours by rail brought me to this celebrated watering-place, which has been used for the last thousand years. The distance now traversed by the locomotive within a day, cost me more than five days’ travel, by the posts of the country, before these conveyances were introduced.
I found Töplitz much changed since my last visit, years ago. The railroad now connects it with Dresden, the Saxon capital, within a few hours. The town has about six thousand inhabitants, and the number of guests throughout the season equals that amount. Besides numerous hotels, almost every private house furnishes lodgings, and has a particular name, which one would suppose would exhaust the whole vocabulary of words. There are some eighty bathing establishments of all kinds, capable of accommodating four thousand four hundred persons daily with warm baths.
The many romantic walks and drives, the park grounds of the chateau of Prince Clary, to whom the buildings, bath, and spacious garden where I have taken up my abode belong, all afford an infinite variety for the stranger. The majority of the visitors, however, being here ostensibly for health, there is less life and animation than at the watering-places on the Rhine. The character of the guests is less varied. Russians, Germans, and Poles predominate. Only a few French, Italians, English, or Americans are here this season. Indeed the baths generally are less frequented since the late crisis, and the complaint is general in cities as well as places of summer resort, of the falling off of travel.
In the Austrian dominions gaming is not allowed, which pays all the expenses of the great bathing establishments in the little German Duchies, and attracts a different class of society. Here a tax is levied upon every visitor, called Kur-und Musik Taxe, which I hold the receipt for in Baden and here, and as I design visiting Karlsbad and Marienbad, I shall not be forgotten by the collector or by the Barmherzige Brüder, who presents himself as soon as one gets comfortably quartered in his hotel, for a subscription for the infirm poor of all nations, who are received and treated gratis.
We rise at six A.M.; drink of the mineral waters agreeably to medical advice; walk until eight; partake of coffee, milk, and plain bread, without the accompaniment of fresh butter; bathe at ten; repose, without sleeping, in warm clothing, and avoid stimulants, fruits, acids, and fat or greasy food, as long as under treatment.
This place is indebted to Frederick William III., king of Prussia, who visited it annually for nearly a quarter of a century, thereby prolonging his life, and expended yearly about the same sum our President receives for his full term. Consequently the citizens, as well they could, have erected a monument upon what is called King’s Hill, to the memory of their lamented guest.
There is, as usual, a theatre, concert rooms, a shooting house for target exercise, coffee saloons, and music in the open air, all calculated to sustain the drooping spirits of sufferers. I find more persons in little wagons, and chairs upon wheels, drawn or pushed about by servants, than at other baths. I have met with many paralytic cases, but the waters are used for such a variety of diseases, that it would be difficult to enumerate them. Many finish the cure here, after making use of other springs in the early part of the season. It is interesting to hear the counting up of so many more baths, and so much more water to be drunk, before they can escape the exactions of the physicians, and can set their faces towards home, or upon intended travels.
For now nearly a month the friends of monarchy have been expecting the birth of a prince or princess to the crown of Austria. If the former, one hundred and one guns would announce the happy event; but if the latter, the news will fall upon them like a cold shower bath, as I observed two years since in Milan, where the authorities had the great cathedral decorations prepared for the occasion; when the tidings came of another female heir, twenty-one guns only hailed the news, and the celebration was a failure. Amid the expectations of the interested, I notice in the public journal that the empress’s health continues good. I also translate literally an article of court news from the same journal, as follows:
“The Little Wagon of Princess Gisella.—In Laxenburg the little Princess rides often in a little wagon, to which is attached a little donkey. The governess rides upon a similar animal by her side. The sight is extremely delightful, and excites the most intense interest among the park visitors.” Comment is unnecessary.
The birthday of the emperor has just been celebrated by the firing of cannon, ringing of bells, high mass in the church, and music by the band, all of which it is incumbent upon the officials and employees to perform. In order to be conversant with the affair, I attended the dinner given in commemoration, but it struck me that it went off with little enthusiasm, and without that spontaneous effusion of patriotism so marked on public occasions in our country.
Since my last visit, two years since, I find the currency somewhat better. The shinplasters for ten kreutzers, or eight cents, are supplanted by an alloy, and the national bank, on the 13th of October, will make an effort to resume specie payments. It has three hundred and eighty millions of paper guilders afloat, equal to one hundred and ninety millions of dollars. The government of Austria has a debt of two billions of guilders, or one billion dollars, and it is every year increasing the debt. The interest is equal to fifty millions of dollars yearly. What would we think in our country of such a load upon its shoulders? The resources of the country, it is true, are great; but the whole territory does not equal in superficial area the state of Texas. Every source of income is squeezed and pressed out, while the farm laborer obtains only twenty-four kreutzers, or twenty cents per day, not enough to keep body and soul together.