Many of the streets of Munich are broad and beautiful, and the squares adorned with statues. A bronze obelisk in the Karolinenplatz, nearly a hundred feet high, formed from captured cannon, is erected in memory of the Bavarians who fell in the army of Bonaparte during the Russian campaign; and statues of King Louis and Schiller are in the Odeon Platz; while in another square is another statue, formed from captured cannon, of Maximilian I., surrounded by four other statues of distinguished Bavarians.
The new palace which we visited was rich in elegant pictures, beautiful frescoes, and works of art. In one series of rooms were great paintings illustrating the history of Bavaria. Some of the rooms containing them bore the names of Hall of Marriage, Hall of Treachery, Hall of Revenge, &c., the scenes in these apartments being those historical events in which these characteristics were prominent. Schwanthaler and Kaulbach's pencils have contributed liberally to the decoration of many of the rooms, particularly the Throne Room, which contains the illustrations of a German poem, painted by Kaulbach, and another room with thirty or forty illustrations of Goethe's works, by the same artist.
The Hall of Frederick Barbarossa contains fine large paintings of scenes in his life, including his battle and victory in the third crusade. Then we have the Hall of Charlemagne, with great pictures of his battle scenes, and the Hall of Beauties, which contains a series of portraits of beautiful women of Bavaria, painted by order of the late king, without regard to rank or station; so that here the peasant girl jostles the banker's daughter, and the duchess finds herself face to face with the child of a cobbler—the stamp of beauty being the signet that admitted each to this collection, which, in truth, does honor to the king's judgment.
The great Throne Room is a magnificent apartment, one hundred and eight feet long and seventy-five wide. At the upper end of the throne, and on either side between the tall marble Corinthian pillars with gold capitals, stand twelve colossal statues in gilt bronze. The statues, which are ten feet high, were designed by Schwanthaler, and represent the different princes of the house of Bavaria, beginning with Otho, 1253, and ending with Charles XII., 1798. The figures are very finely executed, and in the costumes and weapons show the progress of civilization. This room is, in truth, a royal one, and is as fit to hold a royal reception in as one could wish. In fact, as we look round through Munich, capital of the little kingdom of Bavaria, with its less than five million souls, we get the impression that it has art, wealth, galleries, libraries, &c., enough for the capital of an empire of five times its size.
Munich makes beer that is celebrated for its quality, and the quantity drank here is something fabulous. I am confident it is a necessity at all the gardens where the musical performances are given; and apropos, the superb music which one may listen to here for a mere trifle is astonishing. I visited one of these gardens, where Gung'l's band of about forty performers played a splendid programme—twelve compositions of Strauss, Wagner, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, and Gung'l. But those Strauss and Gung'l waltzes and galops—they were given with a precision and spirit that were positively electrical. One could almost hear the dancers' feet slip to the luxurious murmuring of the waltz, or catch the gusts of air that whirled from the rush of the rattling galop. Admission to this concert was eight cents, and order what you choose—a glass of beer for four or five cents, or a bottle of wine at from twenty cents to two dollars.
One of the monuments which old King Louis, or Ludwig, as they call him here, leaves behind him is the Basilica of St. Boniface, built to commemorate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the king's marriage—the finest church in Munich, and built in imitation of a Roman basilica of the sixth century. The interior presents a superb sight, the roof being supported by sixty-four splendid columns of gray marble, making a nave and four aisles. The view through the length of these aisles, amid the forest of pillars for a distance of two hundred and eighty-five feet, and up to the roof, which is eighty feet from the pavement, and represents the firmament studded with golden stars, is inexpressibly beautiful. The magnificent frescoes on the walls, perfections in the art, by Henry Hess and his students, and the splendid pictures illustrating the progress of Christianity in Germany, and scenes in the life of St. Boniface, heighten the effect. The church was finished in 1850, and has all the beauty and freshness of modern workmanship upon an ancient model. It is certainly one of the most elegant and artistical of ecclesiastical interiors. The sarcophagus of King Louis and of his queen, Therese, is in this church, and beneath it a crypt for the interment of the Benedictine monks, who are in some way or other attached to the church.
In the great cathedral—a huge brick building three hundred and twenty feet in length, with its windows sixty-seven feet high, filled with the rich stained glass of the fifteenth century—we saw the monument of the Emperor Louis, erected in 1622, upheld upon the shoulders of four stalwart knights, armed cap-à-pie, in bronze, the size of life.
The public library of Munich is another storehouse of treasures. It is a huge three-story building, with a superb staircase and magnificent architectural interior, and contains eight hundred and fifty thousand books, and twenty-two thousand manuscripts, besides coins and literary curiosities of priceless value, such as block-books, printed anterior to 1500, manuscripts of the New Testament, in the seventh and eighth centuries, the code of laws given by Alaric to the West Goths in 506, Luther's Bible, containing his own and Melanchthon's portraits, and other rarities of like interest. This library is the second largest in existence, being exceeded in extent only by that of Paris.
But the reader will tire of Munich and its art treasures, if we do not; so we will bid them a reluctant adieu, and take train for Salzburg. This was an eight hours' ride, and of no particular note, except that at every crossing on the railroad, and at intervals on the line, we saw switch-tenders, or station-masters, who were in the red uniform of the railroad company, and stood upright in military position, with hand raised to the cap in salute, as the train whizzed past them. Arrived at Salzburg, we went to the fine Hotel de l'Europe, where, among other excellences of the Austrian cuisine, we had Austrian bread, the best in the world, such as, once tasted, makes the eater ever long for it, and establish it in his mind as the standard by which the quality of all others is regulated.
The city is on the River Salza, and in quite a picturesque situation, at the foot of the great Alpine heights, with a semicircle of mountains about it. The plain, or valley, about the city is rich in beautiful gardens, orchards, groves, and country houses, the dark-wooded heights and slopes of the mountains forming the framework of the picture, and in the centre Salzburg Castle perched upon its high rock, reminding one very much, from its appearance and position, of Edinburgh Castle.