The quantity of food and attention bestowed upon me for one florin filled me with astonishment; “and certainly,” said I to myself, “a man may travel very far indeed, before he will find provisions and civility cheaper than in the duchy of Nassau!” The meat alone which was offered to me, if it had been thrown at my head raw, would have been not only a most excellent bargain, but much more than any one could possibly have expected for the money; but when it was presented to me, cooked up with sauces of various flavours, attended with omelettes, fruits, tarts, puddings, preserves, fish, &c. &c., and served with a quantity of politeness and civility which seemed to be infinite, I own I felt that in the scene around me there existed quite as much refreshment and food for the mind as for the body.
It is seldom or ever that I pay the slightest attention to dinner conversation, the dishes, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, being, in my opinion, so very much better; however, much against my will, I overheard some people talking of a duel, which I will mention, hoping it may tend to show by what disgusting, fiend-like sentiments this practice can be disgraced.
A couple of Germans, having quarrelled about some beautiful lady, met with sabres in their hands to fight a duel. The ugly one, who was of course the most violent of the two, after many attempts to deprive his hated adversary, of his life, at last aimed a desperate blow at his head, which, though it missed its object, yet fell upon, and actually cut off, the good-looking man’s nose. It had scarcely reached the ground, when its owner, feeling that his beauty was gone, instantly threw away his sword, and with both arms extended, eagerly bent forward with the intention to pick up his own property and replace it; but the ugly German no sooner observed the intention, than, darting forwards with the malice of the devil himself, he jumped upon the nose, and before its master’s face crushed it and ground it to atoms!
In strolling very slowly about the town, after dinner, the first object which aroused my curiosity was a steam I observed rising through the iron gratings, which at the corners of the streets, covered the main drains or common sewers of the town. At first I thought it proceeded from washerwomen, pig-scalders, or some such artificial cause; but I no sooner reached the great Koch-brunnen (boiling spring), than I learnt it was the natural temperature of the Wiesbaden waters that had thus attracted my attention.
As I stood before this immense cauldron, with eyes staring at the volume of steam which was arising from it, and with ears listening to a civil person who was voluntarily explaining to me that there were fifteen other springs in the town, their temperature being at all times of the year about 140° of Fahrenheit, I could not help feeling a sort of unpleasant sensation, similar to what I had experienced on the edges of Etna and Vesuvius; in short, I had been so little accustomed to live in a town heated by subterranean fire, that it just crossed my mind, whether, in case the engineer below, from laziness, should put on too many coals at once, or from carelessness should neglect to keep open his proper valves, an explosion might not take place, which would suddenly send me, Koch-brunnen, Wiesbaden, and Co., on a shooting excursion to the Duke’s lofty hunting-seat, the Platte. The ground in the vicinity of these springs is so warm that in winter the snow does not remain upon it; and formerly, when these waters used to flow from the town into a small lake, from not freezing, it became in hard weather the resort of birds of all descriptions: indeed, even now, they say that that part of the Rhine into which the Wiesbaden waters eventually flow, is observed to be always remarkably free from ice.
Wiesbaden, inhabited by people called Mattiaci, was not only known to the Romans, but fortified by the twenty-second legion, who also built baths, the remains of which exist to the present day. Even in such remote ages, it was observed that these waters retained their heat longer than common water, or salt water, of the same specific gravity, heated to the same degree; indeed, Pliny remarked—“Sunt et Mattiaci in Germania fontes calidi, quorum haustus triduo fervet.”
The town of Wiesbaden is evidently one which does not appreciate the luxury of “home, sweet home;” for it is built, not for itself, but for strangers; and though most people loudly admire the size of the buildings, yet, to my mind, there is something very melancholy in seeing houses so much too fine for the style of inhabitants to whom they belong. A city of lodging-houses, like an army of mercenaries, may to each individual be a profitable speculation, but no brilliant uniform, or external show, can secretly compensate for the want of national self-pride which glows in the heart of a soldier, standing under his country’s colours, or in the mind of a man living consistently in his own little home.
About twenty years ago, the inhabitants of Wiesbaden were pent up in narrow, dirty streets, surrounded by swampy ditches and an old Roman wall. A complete new town has since been erected, and accommodation has thus been afforded for upwards of 12,000 strangers, the population of the place, men, women, and children included, scarcely amounting to 8000 souls.
During the gay season, of course all is bustle and delight; but I can conceive nothing less cheerful than such a place must become, when all its motley visiters having flown away, winter begins to look it in the face; however, certainly the inhabitants of Wiesbaden do not seem to view the subject at all in this point of view, for they all talk with great pride of their fine new town, and strut about their large houses like children wearing men’s shoes ten times too big for their feet.
The most striking object at Wiesbaden is a large square, bounded on one side by a handsome theatre, on two others by a colonnade of shops, and on a third by a very handsome building called the Cursaal, an edifice 430 feet in length, having, in front, a portico supported by six Ionic columns, above which there is inscribed, in gold letters—