Sunday, 28th.—Schaffhausen is a melancholy, triste town. The tinkling of the bells of the church close to my room and the abominable psalmody distracted my ears and shattered my nerves. I got up many hours sooner than I intended, as rest was unattainable. I like rather the bells of convents; there is something cheerful in Catholicism, but these dull Protestants make religion frightful in their way of following it. The nasal melody of these devout Schaffhauseners, who are at this moment screaming themselves hoarse to chant the praises of God, would have met with little mercy if the heathen mythology were in force, as Apollo would have dispatched their discordant souls to the regions below. We went to the proper place to see the famous cataracts; they are tremendous, the noise is more powerful than artillery could make, I believe. I think the fall is about 100 feet. The river does not recover its stillness for some time after the chute ruffles its waters.
RIVAL STREAMS
Monday, 29th.—Set off at 5 o’clock, and bid adieu to the clean cottages and bold, craggy mountains of Switzerland. We were advised against the Basle road, as it approaches so very near the French frontier that we might unwillingly have seen some skirmishes. Here the dwellings of the inhabitants resemble those of Lincolnshire, mud walls, and the inhabitants as filthy as the ground they tread on. The circle of Swabia is reckoned to be a fertile and well-cultivated country and its population proves that its peasantry are well fed. The hills are well covered with fir and oak, the remains of the old Hercynian Forest that once overspread this part of Germany from the Danube to the Rhine. The wild boar and the wolf are the only savage animals that inhabit these regions. The clearing of the forest has very much influenced the climate of Italy; Kirwan thinks by its destruction Lombardy is become warmer. We crossed a ridge of sand hills; on the top of them I observed the rills of water to run in different directions, forming small rivulets to the north and south sides. These continue their course from their original direction. A lively imagination might fancy their lamentations at the impossibility of their ever meeting again in their native country. ‘I go,’ says the northern drop, ‘to join the slow-flowing Danube, and quench the thirst of the heavy-paced, mechanical German, the proud, independent, but crushed Hungarian, and the lazy, ignorant, slavish Turk. In my way I shall wash the walls of Vienna, Presburg, and Belgrade, and then in company with the waters of Poland and of Russia will try to live in harmony with the waters of the Euxine Sea.’ ‘And I,’ says the merry southern drop, ‘will rush on to the rapid Rhine, wash the coast of the brave and hardy Swiss, will then avoid the once cheerful Frenchmen, and frisk down to the North Sea,’ and, if he is of my mind, will avoid the chalky coast of England.
Arrived at midnight at Pallingen; I slept in a billiard room, a meuble neither ornamental, comfortable, nor useful.
Tuesday, 30th.—Hechingen, the first post from where we slept, the seat of the King of Prussia’s family, the Counts of Hohenzollern. They possess a small principality, the revenues of which are 7000l. per annum, yet the great Frederick was descended from a younger branch of this petty prince. A lively Frenchman said, ‘Parbleu, voilà un cadet qui a fait fortune.’ The castle stands upon a high and steep hill. They tell a story of one of its princes seeing from its terrace the rich country of Würtemberg, and saying, ‘What an addition would the petit canton of Würtemberg be to the territory of Hohenzollern.’ We dined there. Just entering Tübingen the country pretty: woods inclining to a valley, watered by a little rill. Tübingen appears to have been new built, but still in that terrible taste which prevails all over Lower Germany. Black beams placed crossways and the interstices filled up with plaster, high roofs, gable ends, and two or three stories of garret windows in the roof; the whole gives a mean appearance and disfigures a town as much as the style of English architecture, though this has the superiority, as the houses have the advantage of being spacious. A filthy, disgusting practice prevails here, that of placing the dunghills precisely in front of their houses. In the towns they are in a line with the bench before the house, on which they sit smoking and regaling themselves after dinner; in the villages, they are in the middle of the streets, and it requires some skill in the postillions to steer safely between them. Beyond Tübingen a noble forest of immense extent, part of the Hercynian; it is full of fine oaks. I cannot make myself in the least understood in the language of which Pope says:—
Language which Boreas might to Auster hold,
More rough than forty Germans when they scold.
I cannot connect two words so as to form the simplest sentence. We reached Stuttgart at 12 o’clock at night.
Lord Mulgrave passed in his way to Milan: some official business carries him. Custine is sent to the Abbey [sic], which is the first step towards the scaffold.[83] Mayence fell on ye 25th.
31st July.—A Scotch gentleman of the name of Stuart, brother to Mrs. Hippisley, showed me everything to be seen. The Academy, a noble institution for young military. The Duke[84] was very extravagant formerly, but he has adopted many salutary reforms. The palace is very grand: it was made in his days of splendour. He has now abandoned this place and Louisbourg[85] and lives totally at Hohenheim, a château upon which he has also spent immense sums. His cruelty is checked by his Duchess, a good woman; but his marriage with her was a mésalliance.