"Le jeu, est-il fait?"
"Rien ne va plus."
(Make your game, gentlemen. Is the game made? Nothing more goes). Or, at the roulette table, audible announcement of the numbers, and color which wins, determined by the ball in the revolving wheel.
Leaving Wiesbaden, its gamesters, and its mineral spring, the water of which tasted very much like a warm decoction of salt and water, we sped on to Frankfort-on-the-Main. Here we rode through beautiful streets, upon each side of which were broad double houses, surrounded by elegant gardens. Here is the monument of Guttenberg, consisting of the three figures of Guttenberg, Fust and Schöffer, beneath which, on the ornamental work, are likenesses of celebrated printers, and grouped around the monument are figures of Theology, Poetry, History, and Industry.
Here we saw the house in which Goethe was born, and rode down through the Judengasse, or Jews Street. The quarter inhabited by the Jews is a curious old place, some parts too narrow to permit two vehicles passing each other; the unpainted, high, quaint, and solid old wooden houses, totally black with age, stores in the lower stories for the sale of second-hand clothes, and every species of cheap and second-hand merchandise; on all sides were troops and troops of children, with sparkling black eyes, and the unmistakable Jewish nose. The houses had antique carved wood door-posts to deep, dark entries, in which were deeply-worn stairs, that lead away up to the overhanging stories above; and in the entry of one of the blackest and most aged of these old structures yawned a huge trap-door, occupying more than half the space from the threshold to the stair. Peeping down the aperture, left where the half leaf had been raised by its old-fashioned iron ring, I could see nothing but blackness, and imagine how some wealthy Hebrew might have made this the drawbridge to his citadel, so that the robber, who gained access beyond the bolts and chains that guarded the portal, would, with a step, be precipitated into the depths below. An iron ring, a trap-door, and old house in the Jews' quarter—what an amount of capital or material for a sensational story-writer in a cheap publication!
Here, in the Jews' quarter, we were shown the house in which Rothschild was born,—Rōchid they call the name here,—and just as we were emerging from the narrow, gloomy, and dirty passages of this quarter, my eye caught a familiar object in the little grated window of a sort of shop or office. I looked a second time, and there, the central figure amid a straggling display of bank notes of different nationalities, was a five-hundred dollar United States five-twenty bond, a part of the stock in trade of a Jew exchange and money broker, who, notwithstanding the unpretending appearance of his shop, which looked like a prison cell with the outside shutter down from the grated window, would probably have been able to furnish a purchaser ten times the amount on demand if he required it.
In striking contrast to the Judengasse is the Ziel, the finest street in Frankfort, filled with elegant shops and houses. The Jews in Frankfort were so tyrannically treated, that they founded the Jews Street themselves in 1462, and lived exclusively in that quarter of the city till the year 1806, and in olden times, on Sundays and holidays, the entrances to this quarter were closed with gates and bars, and any Jew who ventured into any other part of the city incurred a heavy penalty. Now, midway between Judengasse and the Ziel rise the business offices of the Rothschilds, that opulent family to whom even the proudest in their hours of need would fain doff their caps for favors; and hard by the progress of toleration is marked by a fine new synagogue, built in the Oriental style in 1855.
We rode to the Hessian Monument, as it is called, near one of the city gates; it consists of huge masses of rock heaped together, upon which stands a pillar bearing a sword, helmet, and ram's head, and on the sides are bronze tablets with the names of the Hessians who fell on that spot in 1792. The Latin inscription informs the reader that the monument was erected by Frederick William, King of Prussia, who was an admiring witness of their bravery.
When we rattled over the pavements of the city of Heidelberg, on our way to the Prince Charles Hotel, I looked on all sides for groups and bands of the celebrated students who figure so prominently in novels and stories, and half expected to meet a string of six, arm in arm, walking in the middle of the streets, smoking big meerschaums, and wearing queer-cut clothes and ornamental caps, or singing uproarious college songs. Or I might encounter several devil-may-care fellows, each bearing a scar upon some part of his face, the result of one of those noted Heidelberg duels the story-writers tell of. But either the story-tellers had romanced most magnificently, or we had arrived at a time of day—which we afterwards found to be the case—when the students were engaged in their favorite pastime of swilling lager beer, in the dense atmosphere of tobacco smoke, from scores of pipes, in their favorite coffee-house; for we only met a snuffy old professor in a black velvet skull-cap and big round spectacles, and an occasional very proper-looking young man, save one whose scarlet embroidered cap gave him the appearance of a member of an American base-ball club.
Some forward Americans had gone before us, and secured the remaining rooms in the Prince Charles, which were next the roof; so we were driven to the Adler (eagle), on the same square, an enclosure known as the Cornmarkt, where we were admirably served. Our apartments looked out upon the curious old square with its fountain in the middle, to and from which women went and came all day long, and bore off water in jars, pails, and tubs, some poising a heavy wash-tub full upon their heads, and walking off with a steady gait under the burden. Overlooking the little square, rose the famous Heidelberg Castle, three hundred feet above us; and we could see a steep foot-path leading to it, known as the Burgweg (castle-way), which commenced on the side of the square opposite our hotel.