CHAPTER V.
AIX-LA-CHAPELLE.
Change in the aspect of the country in crossing the frontier from Belgium into Prussia—Passports no real inconvenience—Anecdote of a Jamaica planter—First view of Aix-la-Chapelle—Its population and employments—Insurrection of the patriots in 1830—Its absurd termination—The Cathedral of Charlemagne—Its architecture—Donation of Mary, Queen of Scots—The tomb of Charlemagne—His singular mode of interment—The relics in the treasury—The Redoute—Gaming discountenanced in Prussia—The Hotel de Ville—Statue and fountain of Charlemagne—Environs of Aix agreeable—Political condition of the Trans-Rhenan provinces of Prussia—Excellent posting arrangements—Improvement suggested in England—Aspect of the country to Juliers—Juliers—Neuss—Trade in crushing oil might be advantageously introduced in Ireland—The church of St. Quirinus—The Rhine.
Without any material change in the general aspect of the country, a hundred little incidental matters quickly apprize the stranger who has crossed the Belgian frontier, that he has passed into Prussia. The jolting of the pavé is changed, in an instant, for the smooth roll of macadamization: instantaneously, instead of the French he has been accustomed to, he is saluted in German by the douaniers: every stake and wooden bar about the custom-house is accurately ring-streaked, like a barber’s pole, only with white and black instead of crimson—and the lumbering post boy of Belgium, with a half Hibernian license of costume, is replaced by the trim postilion, in his military uniform, and trumpet slung across his shoulder, with a profusion of worsted lace and tassels. The aspect of the country, too, is different, and the broad, French-like, sweeps of hill and valley, which extend through Limbourg, became broken up into wide inclosures, diversified with abundance of woods and luxuriant plantings.
Neither the douaniers, nor the police, gave us the slightest inconvenience; the former, and without any fee, accepted our assurance that our carriage contained nothing contraband, and did not open a single box; the latter visé’d our Belgian passports without delay, and within ten minutes from passing under the barrier, we found ourselves rolling quickly, over an excellent road, to Aix-la-Chapelle. The barrier itself, by the way, is a change from the Belgian;—a ponderous beam of wood, painted, as usual, in circular stripes of white and black, rests right across the road, and being loaded with a heavy weight at one end, is allowed to rise upon a pivot, to allow the traveller to drive under.
Throughout, not only Prussia, but Germany in general, we found the same polite facilities regarding passports, at every frontier and police station at which it was necessary to present them; and although they were, of course, required to be formal, we had neither delay nor annoyance in their investigation. In fact, I am satisfied, from my own experience, that nine-tenths of the outcry against the “tyrannous nuisance of passports,” on the continent, arises from the irregularity of those who carry them, in complying with the stated requirements, or their absurd impatience of a custom, in which, though it is applied indiscriminately to all the world, their self-importance suspects something personal to themselves. An English gentleman from the West Indies, who was travelling some years ago in Switzerland, attended by a faithful negro slave was feelingly assured by him, when fuming at some annoyance of the passport system in the successive cantons, “that it was quite evident they would find no real liberty till they returned to Jamaica.”
On gaining the summit of a long hill, we suddenly looked down upon the turrets and domes of the venerable and imperial city of Charlemagne, in the basin of a deep woody amphitheatre, which rises around it on all sides, covered with waving forests to the very top. No situation could be imagined more charming without anything very picturesque or magnificent. The suburbs extend a long way beyond the old fortifications, and after driving past innumerable villas and pleasant cottages, we passed under a massy square gate surmounted by a high slated roof, and rattled along a coarse lumpy pavement through streets of dirty and desolate houses, with little appearance of either wealth, comfort, or prosperity, on any side. The most striking edifices are the huge hotels, which seem still to enjoy a pretty fair share of patronage, though Aix, like Spa, has of late years been postponed for the baths of Bohemia and the Rhine, and the majority of the travellers whom we meet in the streets are only on the wing, hastening to or returning from a visit to its more distant rivals.
Under the German empire, Aix-la-Chapelle possessed sufficient resources within itself, to enable it to support the dignity of a free imperial city. Its woollen manufactures were long famous in Europe, and the manufacture of cloth is still one of its most lucrative employments. Coals are abundant in its vicinity, and it has likewise an extensive trade in the construction of machinery, which was introduced here by one of the ubiquitous Cockerills of Seraing. He experienced, however, in 1830, an ungenerous return for all his enterprise, his house and premises being one day sacked and plundered by a band of mutinous rioters. The population of Aix-la-Chapelle are eminently Catholic, and its working population swelled by perpetual emigrations from Verviers and Liege, were inspired with the utmost sympathy for the proceedings of the patriots of the Belgian revolution. Their character, however, was of the worst description, and a love of plunder contended with a love of country in the composition of their patriotism. The intelligence of the three days of July at Paris, had warmed this double enthusiasm to a dangerous glow, but when upon this revolution supervened the three days of September at Brussels, their generous ardour in the cause of liberty was no longer to be restrained within common bounds; and, at length, one evening, on the arrival of the diligence from Liege with tricolor cockades on the horses’ heads, the latent fires of freedom burst forth; even the strong walls of the prison could not restrain the patriotic ardour of its inmates, who being enlarged by their generous countrymen immediately shared with them the benefits of their previous observations, and leading them to the most promising spots for helping themselves, they proceeded amidst animating cries of “Vive les Belges!” and “Vive la liberté!” to divide the furniture and dispose of the stocks in trade of the wealthier inhabitants and shopkeepers.
Mr. Cockerill being most obnoxious as a manufacturer, who gave extensive employment to the poor, and had his mansion furnished with a degree of intolerable elegance and comfort, was speedily taught the incompatibility of such habits and enjoyments with the principles of genuine liberty; and in the course of a few hours, the contents of his residence, valued at 50,000 dollars, disappeared, and along with it the liberators took charge of his money, consisting of 135,000 francs in bank-notes, and 25,000 more in silver and gold. The progress of the patriots was, however, checked by the appearance of their vulgar enemies, the police; a hundred and twenty of whom, under the command of a despot, named Brendamour, prevented the torch of freedom from taking its “radiant ground,” and by a few discharges of musketry amongst the “liberators,”
Repress’d their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of their souls.
Some forty or fifty “lofty spirits” were disenthralled by this volley of the burgher guards, several others were wounded and made prisoners, but a vast number escaped across the frontiers, to unite with their kindred hearts in Belgium; and seventy, who were tried on the insulting imputation of robbery and incendiarism, were basely condemned by the Prussian authorities to undergo the inglorious punishments awarded to such offences. So ended the revolution of Aix-la-Chapelle.
Aix-la-Chapelle is still a venerable old city, especially when seen from a distance, and its very name is connected with imperial ideas; Charlemagne and his chivalry, Kings, Emperors and Popes, wars, congresses and treaties, all of which have, at one time or another, been associated with its name. But it has now few objects of great interest within itself—its interest is with the past. Its Dom Kirke, the chapel whence the ancient city of Achen derived its appellation, to distinguish it from others of the same name in Savoy and Provence, like some relic from the sea encrusted with shells and parasites, is scarcely discernible in the midst of the coatings of modern buildings with which it is shut up and enveloped,—a confused agglomeration of styles, Gothic, Saxon, Byzantine and Moresco. But the central dome, the nucleus of the entire building, and that portion said to have been originally selected to cover in the Emperor’s tomb, stand still erect and firm, no doubt in consequence of perpetual repairs and restorations, “a thousand years roll over it in vain,” and it exhibits, unquestionably, the oldest specimen of Saxon architecture in the world. It had been originally a simple domed octagon, with arched windows in each of its sides, and surrounded within by a gallery, sustained by pillars of porphery, from the Palace of the Exarch of Ravenna, which were carried hither by Charlemagne. These are at least identical—they have survived the ravage of the Normans, and all the subsequent ravages of Germany till the French greedy
To rive what Goth and Turk, and Time had spared,
carried them off to Paris, and as only a portion of them were ever returned, they have not yet relieved the white-washed columns by which they were replaced.
Other chapels have, at various times, been run out from the sides of the ancient centre, so that the whole is now an informal and confused mass, but without anything striking or magnificent, unless it be the large windows of the choir built about five hundred years ago, which as they rise from the foundation quite to the vaulted roof give it the appearance of a gigantic conservatory. Suspended in the midst of the choir is a crown for the Virgin, the gift of Queen Mary of Scotland, and in various parts of the church are hung a greater profusion of those votive models of broken limbs and infant’s marks than I have seen elsewhere.
These offerings often accompany the prayers for the recovery of the object represented, or are hung up in grateful commemoration of the event—may not the singular custom be referable to the incident of the Philistines recorded by Samuel, when in order to get rid of the emerods and the plague of mice with which they were afflicted, they were directed by “the priests and diviners” to make five golden emerods and six golden mice according to the number of their cities and their lords, and to offer them for a trespass-offering for having taken the ark captive, “for one plague was upon them and upon their lords.”
But the most solemn object in “that ancient oratory” is the huge black flag that closes down the tomb of Charlemagne—it lies under the centre of the gigantic dome, beneath a huge gilded candelabrum, a gift of the Emperor Barbarossa, designed to burn above the grave of the conqueror which, bears the brief but sublime inscription in brazen letters sunk in the solid stone “CAROLO MAGNO.” An extraordinary incident is connected with this impressive sepulchre. The Emperor, Otto III, two hundred years after the death of Charlemagne, caused the stone to be lifted and descended into the sepulchre of the buried monarch—he found him not prostrate in decay, but seated upon a throne of marble, covered with bosses of gold—the crown upon his bony brow—the royal dalmatic robe around his fleshless shoulders—his right hand resting on the sword, which the song of the troubadours has immortalized as the “irrésistible Joyeuse,” and in his left the sceptre and the orb, the emblems of a dominion which was co-extensive with the globe itself. The pilgrims pouch which he had borne in life as an emblem of humility was still hanging from his girdle, and on his knees an illuminated transcript of the gospels. The Emperor removed the regalia to Nuremberg, whence they were afterwards transferred to Vienna, and there in the imperial jewel chamber in the Schweitzer-Hof, are still to be seen the royal paraphernalia of Charlemagne, the crown set with rude uncut gems, such as may rarely be referred to a period a thousand years ago. The body was replaced in a sarcophagus of alabaster in the tomb, but, has long since disappeared, and the marble chair on which it was seated, is still shown in one of the alcoves of the gallery above.
This striking incident suggested the following lines, which were given to me by a Lady, with whose exquisite productions the public are already familiar—Mrs. Alaric A. Watts. They have not before appeared in type.
THE TOMB OF CHARLEMAGNE.
Whose is this fair sarcophogus?
A hero’s shrine, a Christian’s tomb;
Whose sable pall, a banner waves,
Whose canopy a minster’s dome,—
What heart reposeth 'neath its shade
Whose ashes thus enshrined lie?
Ask, of the nations gathered round,
For each can make reply!
The sunny south hath heard his voice,
The frigid north his face hath seen,
The patriarch east, his foot hath trod
The barbarous west—his own hath been,
The common air proclaimed his name,
Where’ere the breath of heaven hath blown,
His sceptred galleys walked the main;
And claimed it as their own.
Still ask you of the silent guest,
Who finds in death his bed below;
Pavia,[16] hast thou the secret kept,
Nor thou revealed it Ronceveaux?
Brave brotherhood of Paladin’s
Bear ye no witness of his reign?
Ye kingly minstrels—answer us,
Who sang of Charlemagne!
Say hero did thy lordly will
In death demand a monarch’s throne,
To bear into eternity,
What time had made thine own!
The regal crown that prince’s wear,
The royal robe—the well proved shield,
The good sword of thy red right hand,
Which only thine could wield.
Repose brave spirit for the day,
Of stormy strife hath long been o’er,
Rest till the last dread trumpet bray,
And thou awake to sleep no more.
Time hath not seen thy kindred soul,
Its roll of fame is still unfurled,
Peace to thee, rock of Chrystendom,
Whose deeds have filled the world!
Aix-la-Chapelle, as a city, is, as I have said, eminently Catholic, and the minster is at all times crowded with devotees, and objects of the most pitiable deformity. The “treasury” of the Cathedral too, is surprisingly rich in relics, girdles of the virgin, the napkin in which Herodias’ daughter received the head of John the Baptist, Aron’s rod, a stick of the true cross, some genuine manna from the wilderness, and a whole inventory of such other trumpery as are usually to be found in these pious “marine stores.” Still the Dom Kirke is a most interesting spot, for there is a sufficiency of reality about it, to connect its present condition with the past.
Not far from the minster is one of those atrocious bagnios, the disgrace and disgust of continental watering places, a licensed hell—to the modified credit of Prussia, it is the only one in her dominions, and tolerated only on the humiliating representation, that were it abolished, our countrymen and others would utterly desert the baths of Aix-la-Chapelle, for the more distant Brunnens of Nassau and Baden, which would still continue the dishonoring attraction. The inhabitants themselves, however, and the officers of the garrison are strictly forbidden to cross the threshold—a striking rebuke to the crowds of strangers who frequent it. It seems to be a spacious building with no external attractions, and the lower story occupied by fancy shops and booksellers.
The Hôtel de Ville a remarkable, and now almost ruinous old building, is said to occupy the site of the birth place of Charlemagne, and one of the lofty towers embedded in the building is ascribed to the Romans, whose bathing propensities found a thousand allurements in the hot springs of this beautiful valley. The interior contains a series of halls and saloons, in which congresses have been held, and treaties of peace negociated at various times, during the last century and the present, including that of 1818, when the allied armies were withdrawn from France. Its walls, covered with frescoes and its ceilings once richly stuccoed are now dropping into dust and decay, and the prestige of antiquity is destroyed by converting it into the bureau of the police, at the door of which a crowd of impatient English, were muttering “curses not loud but deep,” upon the vexations of the passport system.
In the little square opposite it, stands a fountain of stone, surmounted by the bronze statue of Charlemagne, which has afforded a model for so many of his portraits, standing in armour, crowned, and with the orb in one hand and his renowned falchion in the other. This work of art received as usual, the sterling mark of the French virtuosi, by performing the pilgrimage to the Louvre. On either side of the fountain are two pedestals each supporting a huge bronze eagle.
Aix, as a halting place for invalids, may be a sufficiently agreeable spot for a temporary stay, the air from its situation must be mild and healthful, and the views around it are in every way charming. The merits and virtues of its waters, whatever they are, are of course as salubrious now as before the revolution of fashion, and the hills around it abound in agreeable and healthful excursions. The obelisk on the Louisberg rising immediately above the city, which was raised by Napoleon to commemorate his victories, was upturned by the Cossacks in search of the coins which they understood it to be the custom to deposit in the foundation of such erections, but was restored by the King of Prussia, and its vaunting inscriptions obliterated. The little village of Borcette or Burscheid, at the foot of the hill opposite the Louisberg, and about half a mile from the city gates, is another cockneyfied lounge of the citizens and invalids, with mathematical flower-beds and gravel walks in right angles and parallels. At all these places are to be found the usual pastimes, theatres, music-bands, bazaars, cafés, dancing, and all the unmeaning petits jeus of a watering place.
Aix-la-Chapelle is the capital of the Trans-Rhenan provinces, conferred upon Prussia at the Congress of Vienna, when they were taken out of that symmetrical boundary, which Napoleon had taught France, to look to as the natural frontier of her dominions. If no other consideration weighed with the allied sovereigns in forming the kingdom of the Netherlands, than the erection of a controlling state upon the north of France; a glance at the map might suggest to geographical politicians the singularity of connecting Prussia by one straggling line, with France on the one hand and Prussia on the other, and the greater propriety of having added these provinces to augment the importance of the newly-erected state, to whose manufacturing interests, the boon of an additional million and a half of consumers, would have been an important acquisition. It is just probable that such a disposition might have given it greater permanence, though it would have been by establishing from the first a preponderance of the Roman Catholic party to the prejudice of the Dutch Protestants. As it is, however, the feelings of the people themselves, so far as my enquiries were accurately answered, are those of perfect contentment with their present position; and the firm but temperate resolution of the late King, Prussia has as yet been perfectly successful in satisfying them as to the nature of their real interests. The absurd and drunken riots I have alluded to in 1830, and the contumacious audacity of the Archbishop of Cologne two years back, are the only instances I have heard of disaffection or insubordination.
We stayed during our visit to Aix-la-Chapelle at an admirable hotel, the “Grand Monarque,” large enough to lodge a whole hospital of invalids, whether suffering from one or other of the “maladies Anglaises,” consumption or ennui. In the morning when we were to take our departure for Dusseldorff, we found, after waiting an hour for the arrival of our horses from the posting office, that the waiter over night had neglected his instructions to order them, when a delay of nearly an hour had to take place till our passports could be sent to the chief of the department and the error rectified.
An admirable regulation prevails throughout the entire of Germany with regard to posting, which might, with the best effect, be introduced in England, and without any government interference in the affair. Before starting, the post master, who is an officer of the crown, delivers to the traveller a printed form signed by himself, and specifying the items of every charge for the stage he is setting out upon, the distance, the number of horses, the mileage, and the tolls; this, if erroneous, is corrected on the spot, and the stranger is thus freed from all wrangling or apprehension of imposture. The posting tariff, at the same time, regulates the “trinkgelt,” the fee of the postillion, which is but five silver groschen, or six-pence for a German mile containing four and two-thirds English; but this the traveller is expected, though he must not be solicited to exceed, provided he is satisfied with the performance of his post-boy, and in general double the amount, or at the utmost three-half-pence per mile will excite a lively gratitude.
The face of the country, between Aix-la-Chapelle and the Rhine, without being picturesque in any degree, is proverbially rich and luxuriant, especially the ancient Duchy of Juliers, now extinguished, which surrounds the fortified city of the same name. Every town and village we passed through was but a congregation of agricultural dwellings—every building was converted into a barn—and even from the windows of some ruinous towers, we saw the projecting sheaves of the early harvest, which had been already gathered in.
Juliers, where we breakfasted, is a fortified city, built in the midst of an apparently swampy level, but so begirt and encompassed with ramparts and fosses, that it is said to be impregnable to every assault but that of starvation. We drove over drawbridges and under covered ways without end; the passage winding from side to side, till it seemed to issue in the opposite direction from that at which it entered the side of the fortification, and we halted for an excellent breakfast at a most unpromising inn, the “Drei Königen,” in the centre of the town, which as Juliers is the highway to Dusseldorff and Cologne, was beset by diligences and calèches of every conceivable shape and model. Juliers has no trade, and its sole support seems to be the regular victualling of a garrison of 3,000 Prussians, and the almost equally regular reception of twice as many English tourists on wing to the Rhine, or returning from it.
Between Juliers and Neuss, on the banks of the river, we scarcely saw an acre of pasture land or meadow, all seemed to be under cultivation, and the wonder is, where they find fodder for their cattle, unless they have been effectually weaned off all appreciation of grass or clover. Neuss is a bustling, industrious little community of some four or five thousand inhabitants, busily engaged in the manufacture of linen and woollen cloth, and having numerous mills for an operation that I am surprised is not attempted in Ireland, the crushing of vegetable oils. At a time when the capture of whales is said to be becoming most precarious, and the demand is increased beyond expectation by the augmentation of machinery and the increase of railroads, which seem to have more than counterbalanced the introduction of gas, it would surely be found as lucrative in the rich soil of Ireland as that of Flanders or the Rhine, to grow hemp and colza with a view to express the oil for the consumption. A windmill, such as one sees thousands of in Holland and Belgium, with all the machinery for this purpose, can be put up, I understand, for £150, or even less.
Neuss is mentioned by Tacitus as Novesium, and Drusus is said to have constructed a bridge across the Rhine above the town, at the same spot where there is now a swinging bridge to convey passengers to Dusseldorff. It has a very remarkable church, the steeple of which serves as a pedestal for a large and spirited statue of St. Quirinus, who with an unfurled flag in his hand, performs double duty as its patron and weather-cock. The building itself is of some Saxon or Norman architecture, closely resembling that of Charlemagne at Aix-la-Chapelle, and underneath it is a singular crypt, with groined arches, supported by low truncated columns, and having altogether an air of the remotest antiquity.
About a mile and a half from the town, we drove upon the platform of the swinging bridge, along with a crowd of horses, cattle and foot passengers, and in less than five minutes were carried over by the mere action of the rapid current to the opposite side, where a drive of another mile or two through gardens and suburbs, brought us to the Breitenbacher-Hof, in the central square of Dusseldorff.
THE END.
APPENDIX.