They use in these parts a machine with various wheels to turn the spits. They bind closely a strong cord round a great spindle of iron; this unwinds itself, and, the movement thereof being arrested somehow, the process lasts an hour. When it stops the machine has to be wound up afresh. As to smoke-jacks we saw several of these. So great is the abundance of iron that, besides fitting gratings of divers sorts to their windows and doors, they cover even the wooden shutters with plates of iron. Here we came again into the land of vines, which we had lost sight of since we quitted Augsburg. Round about these parts most of the houses have every storey vaulted. In Germany they do what we cannot do in France, to wit, they use hollow tiles to cover the narrowest slopes of roofing, as in their clock towers. Their tiling is smaller and more hollowed, and sometimes plastered at the joints. We quitted Brixen on the morning of the morrow, and traversed the same wide open valley, the roadsides being adorned with divers fine houses. Travelling with the river Eisock on our left, we passed a small village named Clause,[100] inhabited by various sorts of workers, and at the end of three leagues came to Colman[101] in time for dinner, a small place where the archduke has a pleasure-house.
At table they gave us, together with silver goblets, others of painted earthenware, and they washed the glasses with white salt. The first service was sent up in a hot dish, very handy, which they placed on the table with an iron implement. It contained eggs poached with butter. On quitting this place we found the road somewhat narrow, and the rocks closed upon us so much that the pass was hardly wide enough for ourselves and the river together. In sooth we should have been in danger of pushing one another into the abyss, if they had not built between the river and the wayfarers a wall which was continued in places a German league at a stretch. The more lofty of the mountains which stood around us were wild rocks, some in solid masses, some scored and broken up by the passage of the torrents, and some of a kind of shale which let fall below innumerable fragments of astonishing size, wherefore it impressed us that it would be perilous to travel here during a tempest. We saw likewise whole forests of pine trees torn up by the roots which still carried masses of earth. But the country is well peopled, for, beyond these lower hills, we caught sight of others higher up, cultivated and inhabited; and we learned also that above these were fine, broad, level fields and good houses occupied by rich farmers, who raised abundant corn for the villages below. We crossed the stream by one of the numerous wooden bridges and then had it on our left hand. Amongst other objects we saw a castle, perched on the loftiest and most inaccessible point of the mountains, which they told us belonged to a baron of the country, who lived there and enjoyed his fine lands and hunting. Beyond these hills there is always to be seen the range of high Alps, which we left to themselves. They indeed bar the issue from this pass, so that the traveller has continually to return to the course of the stream, and to emerge again at some turn or other. This county of Tirol, which yields no revenue except from the mountains, is worth three hundred thousand florins a year to the archduke, more than he gets from all the rest of his dominions. We crossed the river again by a stone bridge, and, after a bout of four leagues, we arrived in good time at Bolzan.[102]
This town, about the size of Libourne, is situated on the river before named, and is somewhat less pleasing than other towns we had visited in Germany, so much so that M. de Montaigne exclaimed that it was evident we were about to cross the German border. The streets are narrow, and there is no fine public place, but we still found fountains, running water, paintings, and glass windows. Wine is so plentiful that they supply the whole of Germany with what it needs, and the bread eaten in these mountains is the best in the world. The church is a very fine one, and possesses amongst other things a wooden organ, which is very high and placed close to the crucifix by the great altar. But the player sits some twelve feet lower, beside the column to which the organ is attached, and the bellows are underground outside the church, about fifteen paces behind the organist. The open space in which this town is situated is only just large enough to contain it, but the mountains to the right hand stand back somewhat, thus giving a little extra ground. From here M. de Montaigne wrote to François Hottoman, whom he had met at Basel, “that albeit he was bound for Italy, he had fared so well in Germany that he quitted it with much regret; that strangers had to suffer the exactions of innkeepers there as elsewhere, but that this abuse would soon right itself, and that the traveller would no longer be at the mercy of guides and interpreters who sold him and shared the profit. In every other respect he had always met with unbounded courtesy and convenience, and was specially struck with the justice and security everywhere prevalent.”[103] We left Bolzan early on Friday morning, and at two leagues’ end we halted for breakfast and to feed our horses at Brounsol.[104]
This was a small village standing above the river Eysock which, after bearing us company so far, now mixed itself with the Adisse[105] and flowed therewith to the Adriatic Sea, broad and tranquil, and no longer resembling the brawling and furious torrents of the mountains above. The plain, too, became a little broader as far as Trante,[106] and the hills showed their peaks less prominently. The slopes of these, however, are less fertile than those higher up, and in the valley are some swamps which encroach upon the road in places, but elsewhere the travelling is easy in the bottom of the valley and along the plain. Two leagues after leaving Brounsol we came to a large village where a great crowd was assembled by reason of a fair. Farther on was another well-built village, called Solorne,[107] where the archduke has a small castle on the left of the road, set in a strange position on the point of a rock. Five leagues’ journey took us to Trante, where we arrived in time for bed.
TRENT
To face p. 180, vol. i.
Trante is somewhat larger than Aagen, an unpleasant place, and quite lacking in the grace of the German towns, with narrow and crooked streets.[108] Two leagues before reaching it we heard the Italian tongue, and the town itself is equally divided between the two languages, one quarter thereof being called after the Germans, with a church in which they have a preacher of their own speech. We heard no talk of the new forms of religion after we left Augsburg. In Trante, which is on the Adisse, we saw the cathedral, which had a look of great antiquity,[109] and the same may be said of a square tower near thereto. We likewise visited Notre Dame, the new church where the Council was held, in which church there is an organ, the gift of a private gentleman. This is exceedingly beautiful; it is set up in a marble gallery which is carved and adorned with divers fine statues, those of some singing children being especially lovely.[110] This church was built by Bernardus Clesius Cardinalis in 1520, a native of Trante and afterwards bishop.[111] Trante is a free town under the charge and governance of the bishop, but at a time when they were hard pressed in a struggle with the Venetians, the people called in the Count of Tirol to help them, and in return therefor he has retained certain authority and rights over the town. There has been a contention between him and the bishop over this matter, but the bishop, who is a Cardinal Madruccio, now holds possession.[112]
On this point M. de Montaigne said “that he had taken note during his journey of those citizens who had done good service to the towns where they were born; of the Foulcres of Augsburg, to whom was due the main part of the embellishment of that city, who had placed palaces at all the crossings of the streets, and filled the churches with all kinds of works of art; of this Cardinal Clesius also, who, besides building this church and several streets at his own charges, added a very fine building to the castle of the town.” The outside of this building is nothing remarkable, but within it is furnished and painted and enriched in a fashion beyond anything that can be imagined. All the panel work below is enriched with painted patterns, the bosses of the ceilings are gilded and carven, the floors are made of a kind of hardened earth painted like marble, a part of the rooms being fitted after one fashion, and part, à l’Allemande, with stoves. One of these is of porcelain darkened to the colour of bronze, and made in the form of a group of large human figures, which, being heated warm the room. Moreover there are certain others, stationed close to the wall, which give out water, this being brought to them from the fountain in the court below. This is a fine piece of work. We saw there also amongst the other designs on the ceilings a torchlight procession by night, which M. de Montaigne admired greatly, also two or three circular chambers, in one of which was an inscription recording how “Clesius, having been sent in the year 1530 to the coronation of the Emperor Charles V. by Pope Clement VII., on St. Matthias’s Day, as envoy on the part of Ferdinand, King of Hungary and Bohemia, Count of Tirol, and brother of the aforenamed Emperor, was made a cardinal, being already Bishop of Trent.” Moreover, they have set round the chamber the armorial bearings, and painted on the walls the arms and the names of the gentlemen who accompanied him: some fifty in number, all counts and barons owing service to the bishopric. In one of these chambers there is a trap door through which a man can slip into the town without passing the main entrance, and two richly ornamented chimney-pieces. This was an excellent cardinal. The Foulcres have done great building work, but they have built for their posterity, while the cardinal aforesaid has built for the public weal, for he has left this castle, together with the furniture still in it worth more than a hundred thousand crowns, to his successors in office. Besides this he left to the public fund of the bishopric a hundred and fifty silver thalers, which is held without payment of interest on the same. In spite of these benefactions they have left his church of Notre Dame unfinished, and have erected a very mean tomb over his body. His successors provide themselves with no other furniture than the aforenamed for the castle. Some of this is fitted for the winter, some for the summer, and none of it can be alienated.
Here they reckon distance by the Italian mile, of which five go to make one mile of Germany, and they count the hours through to twenty-four without dividing them in the midst. We found good lodging at the “Rose,” and left Trante on the Saturday after dinner. We followed a road like the last we traversed in the valley, which was here wider and girt by higher, uninhabited mountains, having the river Adisse on our right hand. There we passed a castle[113] belonging to the archduke, which commands the road, like various other strongholds elsewhere, built to control the passage, and arrived at Rovere[114] very late, after travelling fifteen miles. Never until now did we journey in the dewfall,[115] so carefully had we laid out our time on the road.