Twenty years around the world

by John Guy Vassar

The valley and mountain scenery of the Salz-Kammergut, and the position of this place, thirteen thousand five hundred feet above the level of the sea, can scarcely be described for their beauty. The Government Salt Works here are on a stupendous scale, and are a source of great revenue.

The governments derive large sums from the sale of wood, which is seen piled by thousands of cords upon the banks of the Traum and Ischel streams, and the quantities dashing down the mountain torrents from the melting of the snows, afford a curious spectacle. All possible contrivances, through barriers, to unite the floating masses and aqueducts to bring the required quantities together, for piling and drying, before they are sent to navigable water for sale, or for the boiling of the salt flowing through pipes from the bowels of the mountains, are seen.

The town from which I write has a population of less than twenty thousand; it is in a most romantic position, and is full of interest. The birthplace of Mozart, with a monument to his memory, an immense cathedral of freestone and marble, and the fortification upon the summit of Monchsberg, make a lovely picture in the distance. The rock was tunnelled between 1763 and ’67 by Archbishop Sigismund III., four hundred and fifty feet through, twenty-two feet high, and twenty-two feet wide; it forms one of the entrances to the city, and resembles somewhat the grotto of Posilippo, near Naples.

An excursion for a day to Konigsee, an inclosed lake, with its occasional precipitate rocky walls, and water six hundred feet deep, with its echoes and the rumbling sound of the avalanches from the towering snowy mountains, from seven to eight thousand feet high, rowed in flat bottomed skiffs by two lusty women with men’s black hats, is something novel, to say the least. The Hunting Chateau, the Ice Chapel, and the Cataract, come in for a part of the interest, and one is rejoiced to get back to the little hotel of embarkation with an appetite for Lachsforellen, or salmon trout, and the wild game of the country.

We returned by Bechtesgaden, a small town, occupying a high picturesque position, and celebrated for wood, horn, and ivory cut work, similar to the Swiss ware. The population are in part employed in this business; their manufactures find a market abroad, and were it not for the continual annoyance of custom-houses and travel, one would be tempted to fill his trunk and carpet-bag with their pretty trifles.

The Salt Works at Hallein, about seven miles from here, which I have just visited, are of an entirely different character from those of Cracow. Instead of the rock salt being excavated from the bowels of the earth, the mountains are filled with the saline material, which is extracted by means of fresh water introduced into the pits, and then conveyed through wooden logs to the two salt establishments in the valley below.

The ascent to the summit of the Durenburg, from the town, is about two and a half miles; it is rather tiresome to climb, but the constant changing views relieve one from the fatigue. When we arrived at the house where the descent begins, we rested ourselves, before entering, in a cooler atmosphere; and giving our hats and superfluous garments to our valet, with orders to meet us at the place of egress half way down the mountain side, we put ourselves in miner’s costume, with a cap and heavy buck-skin gloves, to relieve the friction of the cables or ropes, in sliding down the rollers.

Preceded by our Steiger, my Russian companion and myself, flambeaux in hand, entered the gallery of Obersteinberg, and passed two thousand two hundred and twenty-eight feet to the first Rollen, or inclined plane of forty degrees. The gallery road bed is of plank, with wood rails on each side for the truck carts to remove the sand, after the salt is extracted, and for the bringing in of materials to support the sides and roofs of these narrow passages. Branch avenues, right and left, extend in different directions in the mountain. The Rollen leads from story to story, as we descend (there are five stories in all), until we find ourselves one thousand five hundred feet below. They are formed of two parallel ranges of round slippery beams, joined at the end, and connecting from top to bottom. One places himself behind the miner-guide, who carries the torch, sitting astride with one thigh resting on a cable rope, grasping the same with the right hand, which serves to moderate the speed, and to establish his position, and then with locomotive motion finds himself two hundred and forty feet below in short notice. As we pass through the different passages, a fairy scene suddenly presented itself: a hundred lights are reflected in the splendid sheet of water, three hundred feet long, and one hundred and eighty feet wide, and our ferry boat, by means of a rope and pulley, is drawn down to the opposite side, when we continue our march.

This is one of twenty-two similar lakes, where fresh water is introduced, and the saline properties for a month absorbed, when it runs to the salt houses for the process of boiling and crystallizing. The mines date from the fifteenth century. The quantity annually extracted is four hundred thousand centners, of one hundred pounds each; it may be increased if needed. In 1761 the mines fell in, and fossil salt was discovered. A museum, or collection of specimens, with monuments to the memories of the founders and Emperors, are within these deep recesses.

The egress from the mine below is through a narrow, calcareous stone arch, two and a half feet wide, six feet high, and six thousand feet long, commenced in 1541, and finished in forty-two years. One comes out seated astride a car running upon a slanting rail bed, drawn by one boy, and pushed by a second, at full trot. When the distance is half accomplished, the light through the opening looks like a brilliant star in the distance, and one hails with pleasure the cheering blaze of day.