FROM HEIDELBERG TO NUREMBERG.
UST after I last wrote I left my companions to worry along over their “German lessons,” and ran away to Nuremberg. A very pleasant party was going there on the way to Vienna, and wished me to go along. Of all Germany, divided or united, Nuremberg was my objective point; for in addition to its special attraction as “the most perfect surviving specimen of mediaeval architecture in Europe,” it has a nearer interest to me in that it was the home of my father’s paternal ancestors, as far back as 1570. So I went with alacrity. We left Heidelberg at the reasonable hour of 10:50 a. m. Thanks to the moderate form of tourist life I have adopted, neither the hours of my “beauty sleep” nor that last supreme “forty winks” of the luxuriant morning sleeper, are ever interfered with. Our way lay up the Neckar, and as the train left the Carlsthor it glided—literally glided, the rate of speed not exceeding from twelve to fifteen miles an hour, and it “the fast train,” too!—along the bank of the river, under an avenue of trees, giving ample time for one to take in views that one might delight to shut her eyes and recall in the dreamland hours of some future paradise. There were cone-shaped, beautiful, castle-capped mountains, the long winding valley with the river showing in many a lovely curve and shoot; village after village, in the mellowest tints of Indian red, brown, and drab, gathered around its church or chapel, almost every one with an amazing tall spire; ranges of wooded hills that came together in one direction, or retreated from each other in another, disclosing wonderful vistas;—and the weather! One moment a burst of sunlight; the next a veil of fleecy white clouds that changed into the mistiest blue; presently a dash of rain; then the brilliant clearing up again. Thus continued both views and weather to Heilbronn, forty-two miles. There are two historic points, Wimpfen am Berg, which occupies an old Roman station destroyed by the Huns under Attila; and Sinzheim, where Turenne gained a victory in 1674. I own their history was not half so interesting to me as their beauty. From Heilbronn to Nuremberg, over a hundred miles, the country was one great stretch of farming land, fine soil, and admirably cultivated.
We ran into Nuremberg in a pelting rain. All the hotels full. After being turned away from five, with the most proper apologies be it said, we found lodging, but “no rations” except breakfast, at a private house. This was duly served: coffee, rolls, butter and eggs, the last raw! Fancy our amusement. Having left our names at the various hotels for the first vacancy, next morning the Golden Eagle found a place for us beneath its sheltering wings. We were fortunate in the time of our visit—a grand exposition was in progress. Nearly all of “united Germany,” as well as “little Bavaria,” seemed thronging the hotels and crowding the streets. The Crown Prince and his family occupied two hotels. The exposition continues, and is really a superb attraction. As for the quaint, picturesque old city itself, I cannot believe there is another so fascinating. From its streets, sometimes wide, oftener narrow, always crooked; its houses, eight and ten stories high, with their lofty-peaked gables and red-tiled roofs, with five or more tiers of the funniest little windows; its churches, monuments, and repositories of the best productions of that brilliant constellation of workers—Durer, Kraft, Vischer, Stoss and Hirschvogel—who lived and flourished there together; its shops, tempting with pictures, carvings, castings, and—toys; its museums, that it would take days to tell you about; its curious old bridges spanning the river Pegnitz, that divides it into two parts; the fortifications, consisting of a rampart running round the entire old city, with towers at intervals, and a dry moat, thirty-five feet deep and as many yards wide; its old berg, or castle, that rises on a lofty sandstone rock with “the wide extended prospect” from its walls and windows, and the old lime tree in the court, planted by Queen Kunigunde somewhere from 1004 to 1024; to the cemetery where Durer is buried, with its singular, but the most impressive monuments, plain, massive, low monoliths, with large plates inserted in the tops bearing the inscriptions. From first to last, everywhere and everything, the old town, all alive with the quickest beating of the pulse of the nineteenth century, was a delight and wonder.
Do not dream of a half description of anything; there was too much for one pen—too much for a thousand pens. But you never saw lions, life size, made out of soap, did you? Or temples, pagodas, monuments of every design, made out of buttons, matches, tacks, not mere toys, but big enough for out doors?
Among others of these artistic and architectural structures, was a tall shaft monument of tobacco, fine-cut, twist, stem, and leaves, labeled—fancy my heart-throb on reading—“Maryland,” “Virginia,” “Kentucky.” And these are some of the innumerable sights I saw at the exposition. What else did I see?
“Pussy-cat, Pussy-cat, where have you been?
I have been to London to see the Queen.”
I saw the crown princess and her daughter! I looked at them and they looked at me—took me in as they did the shop-windows, trees, whatever came within the sweep of their roving glance—just as I did them! Such a plain, insignificant little party as they were! The crown prince was not with them. Just two ordinary open carriages, the princess in the first, with her daughter by her side; in the other, a lady and gentleman in attendance. They came out from a shop of carvings just as we were approaching it to enter. And I saw a wedding at the chapel of the Rathhaus (town hall)! Neither the bride nor groom was on the sunny side of forty. She was dressed in a rich heavy black silk, with a white illusion head-dress, that was voluminous enough for a veil, though evidently not intended for one. The ceremony was apparently a simple civil service, conducted by the magistrate, or whatever he was, and an assistant. The bridal party was accompanied by one person only—a gray-haired old gentleman.
How the days sped by! The first thing I knew, ere I was half ready to leave, my last day had come. I bought a package of Nuremberg’s famous gingerbread, and bidding my pleasant party “good-bye,” most reluctantly betook myself to my home-bound train. Traveling, as I was, alone, I was put in the special “ladies’” car, “Fuer Damen,” as it is labeled. Presently, another “lone female” was put in, who proved to be a young German lady. I began to stumble in German to her. She smiled, and replied in tolerable English, it being one of the five languages of which she was in a manner mistress; and she was just beginning the sixth! “I have so much time,” she said simply, in explanation of such learning. She was educated in Geneva. If she is an average example of its pupils, Geneva’s schools must be indeed desirable. And the next thing I knew, our five weeks at Heidelberg were gone, and it was time to “move on” again.
We started for Munich via Baden-Baden, Strassburg and Switzerland—an attractive programme, but not less did it hurt to say another “good-bye” to the pleasant friends we had made—the beautiful Pension, which had come to have a real home feeling; the romantic “ancient university town,” and the grand old castle, both Longfellow-haunted to me; and to the various charming places in the environs—become almost as familiar as the favorite haunts of childhood. Our bright little Fraulein, whose dainty motions made one think of a bird’s, said in her very best English: “You must tired once more get, and soon again come home.” Her eyes were brimming with tears. The good frau mother took me in her arms, and in German fashion pressed each of my cheeks against each of hers. It was a most charming family.