A Residence in France / With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to Switzerland

by James Fenimore Cooper

Boulevards of Frankfort.—Political Disturbances in the town.—Le petit Savoyard.—Distant glimpse of Homberg.—Darmstadt.—The Bergestrasse.—Heidelberg.—Noisy Market-place.—The Ruins and Gardens.—An old Campaigner.—Valley of the Neckar.—Heilbronn.—Ludwigsberg.—Its Palace.—The late Queen of Wurtemberg.—The Birthplace of Schiller.—Comparative claims of Schiller and Goethe.—Stuttgart.—Its Royal Residences.—The Princess of Hechingen.—German Kingdoms.—The King and Queen of Wurtemberg.—Sir Walter Scott.—Tubingen.—Ruin of a Castle of the middle ages.—Hechingen.—Village of Bahlingen.—The Danube.—The Black Forest.—View from a mountain on the frontier of Baden.—Enter Switzerland.

Dear ——,

I have little new to tell you of Frankfort. It appeared to be the same busy, clean, pretty, well-built town, on this visit, as it did at the two others. We examined the boulevards a little more closely than before, and were even more pleased with them than formerly. I have already explained to you that the secret of these tasteful and beautiful walks, so near, and sometimes in the very heart (as at Dresden) of the large German towns, is in the circumstance of the old fortifications being destroyed, and the space thus obtained having been wisely appropriated to health and air. Leipsig, in particular, enjoys a picturesque garden, where formerly there stood nothing but grim guns, and frowning ramparts.

Frankfort has been the subject of recent political disturbances, and, I heard this morning from a banker, that there existed serious discontents all along the Rhine. As far as I can learn, the movement proceeds from a desire in the trading, banking, and manufacturing classes, the nouveaux riches, in short, to reduce the power and influence of the old feudal and territorial nobility. The kingly authority, in our time, is not much of itself, and the principal question has become, how many or how few, or, in short, who are to share in its immunities. In this simple fact lies the germ of the revolution in France, and of reform in England. Money is changing hands, and power must go with it. This is, has been, and ever will be the case, except in those instances in which the great political trust is thrown confidingly into the hands of all; and even then, in half the practical results, money will cheat them out of the advantages. Where the pressure is so great as to produce a recoil, it is the poor against the rich; and where the poor have rights to stand on, the rich are hard at work to get the better of the poor. Such is the curse of Adam, and man himself must be changed before the disease can be cured. All we can do, under the best constructed system, is to mitigate the evil.

We left Frankfort at eleven, declining the services of a celebrated voiturier, called le petit Savoyard, whom François introduced, with a warm recommendation of fidelity and zeal. These men are extensively known, and carry their soubriquets, as ships do their names. The little Savoyard had just discharged a cargo of miladies, bound to England, after having had them on his charter-party eighteen months, and was now on the look-out for a return freight. As his whole equipments were four horses, the harness, and a long whip, he was very desirous of the honour of dragging my carriage a hundred leagues or so, towards any part of the earth whither it might suit my pleasure to proceed. But it is to be presumed that miladies were of full weight, for even François, who comes of a family of voituriers, and has a fellow-feeling for the craft, is obliged to admit that the cattle of le petit appear to have been overworked. This negotiation occupied an hour, and it ended by sending the passport to the post.

We were soon beyond the tower that marks the limits of the territory of Frankfort, on the road to Darmstadt. While mounting an ascent, we had a distant glimpse of the town of Homberg, the capital and almost the whole territory of the principality of Hesse Homberg; a state whose last sovereign had the honour of possessing an English princess for a wife. Truly there must be something in blood, after all; for this potentate has but twenty-three thousand subjects to recommend him!

Darmstadt is one of those towns which are laid out on so large a scale as to appear mean. This is a common fault, both in Germany and America; for the effect of throwing open wide avenues, that one can walk through in five minutes, is to bring the intention into ludicrous contrast with the result. Mannheim is another of these abortions. The disadvantage, however, ends with the appearance, for Darmstadt is spacious, airy, and neat; it is also well-built.

The ancient Landgraves of Hesse Darmstadt have become Grand Dukes, with a material accession of territory, the present sovereign ruling over some 700,000 subjects. The old castle is still standing in the heart of the place, if a town which is all artery can be said to have any heart, and we walked into its gloomy old courts, with the intention of examining it; but the keeper of the keys was not to be found. There is a modern palace of very good architecture near it, and, as usual, extensive gardens, laid out, so far as we could perceive from the outside, in the English taste.

A short distance from Darmstadt, the Bergestrasse (mountain road) commences. It is a perfect level, but got its name from skirting the foot of the mountain, at an elevation to overlook the vast plain of the Palatinate; for we were now on the verge of this ancient territory, which has been merged in the Grand Duchy of Baden by the events of the last half century. I may as well add, that Baden is a respectable state, having nearly 1,300,000 subjects.

The Bergestrasse has many ruins on the heights that overlook it, though the river is never within a league or two of the road. Here we found postilions worthy of their fine track, and, to say the truth, of great skill. In Germany you get but one postilion with four horses, and, as the leaders are always at a great distance from those on the pole, it is an exploit of some delicacy to drive eight miles an hour, riding the near wheel-horse, and governing the team very much by the use of the whip. The cattle are taught to travel without blinkers, and, like men to whom political power is trusted, they are the less dangerous for it. It is your well-trained animal, that is checked up and blinded, who runs away with the carriage of state, as well as the travelling carriage, and breaks the neck of him who rides.