The stories of the gigantic drinkers of antiquity are startling; but I think they may be accounted for. Natural philosophers inform us, that objects seen through a mist are magnified to the senses; and so it is with the feats which we are asked to contemplate through the mist of ages: they are probably not so astounding as they appear. One may say of each story, so venerable and enlarged by age, as the good Dominican did to the congregation whom he had affected to tears by the warmth of one of his legendary sermons. “Do not cry so, my brethren,” said the Preacher; “for, after all, perhaps it’s not true.”
It must be allowed, however, that the stories of wine-bibbers of later times than those when the son of Aristides gained his living by singing ballads in the streets of Athens, or the heir of Cicero drank draughts longer than his sire’s orations, lack nothing whatever of the marvellous. And this reminds me of an incident, quod alibi narravi, and which I will narrate here, by way of illustration of this portion of my subject.
AN INCIDENT OF TRAVEL.
It is now some twelve years ago that I was, in company with two Norwegians, in Prague, loitering beneath the tower of that sacred edifice dedicated to the fearful dancer, St. Vitus. The tower was the same which the drunken Emperor Wenceslaus had caused to be shortened, by some thirty or forty feet, because he took it into his head that it would one day fall, and crush him as he lay on his uneasy couch in the Hradschin. I remarked to my companions, that the empire, in its palmy days, had often been well-nigh lost through the mad caprices of tippling Kaisers.
“There was not a Kaiser of them all,” said Löwenskiold, “who permanently injured either himself or his country by his devotion to drinking.”
“What!” said I; “not even Maximilian?”
“Not even Maximilian,” remarked Knudtzen. “The people, indeed, were occasionally a trifle startled at seeing their ruler proceed, either to the camp or council, with as much white wine in him as might serve the universe for sauces. They slightly objected, on hearing that he walked rosy and reeling to confession; and they were not edified at understanding that his private Almoner stirred up his punch with a silver crucifix. They even remonstrated with Maximilian when he had been once within an ace of destroying Ulm in a drunken frolic. And what was his reply? He kept the deputation of remonstrants the whole night in his palace, and invited the citizens to assemble, at day-break, on whatever spots commanded a view of the towers of the cathedral. The Emperor and the Committee of Moderates finished two hundred and ten bottles of Rhine wine while they waited for sunrise. This, among a temperate party of one score and one, was a tolerable allowance for each individual. At dawn, all Ulm was up, and every eye directed to the cathedral. The towers had scarcely flung back the first rays from heaven, when a joyous procession issued from the imperial residence. The whole party, the Emperor excepted, were as drunk as Æschylus. With difficulty did they follow their Lord, who, at the very top of his speed, and carrying a heavy waggon-wheel on his shoulder, ran to the cathedral, ascended the stairs leading to the summit of one of the towers, and appeared on the rampart, before his straggling followers had reached the low-arched door beneath. With a light bound, he sprang on one of the highest parts of the castellated portion, where there was scarcely footing for him. In that position, however, he poised the wheel aloft with his right hand, let it gently descend on to the foot which he extended above the heads of the multitude, and, holding it there for a moment or two, ended by hurling it into the air, and catching it again, ere it fell on the astounded and admiring crowd below.
“‘There, you calves!’ cried the Emperor, as he gazed tranquilly down on the sea of heads below; ‘do you dare complain that Niedersteiner touches your master’s nerves?’
“‘Never again!’ exclaimed the delighted mass. ‘What can we do to testify our affection for Your Majesty?’
“‘Toss those gentlemen into a tub of Selzer-water,’ said Maximilian, ‘and send me half-a-dozen of Hochheimer, and half-a-dozen blood-puddings, for breakfast.’”