“Hic jacet Ludovica Henricæ, Landgrafia Hessiæ,
“sexu fœmina, ingenio vir.”
“Here lies Louisa Henrietta, Landgravine of Hesse,
“a woman in form, in mind a man.”
A short distance from the garden is a park in which wild boars are kept for hunting. The religion of the dutchy is Lutheran. The affairs of the state are conducted by a court of regency, and other courts, composed of counsellors and a president, who regulate the military, administer the laws, digest the finance, and superintend all matters that relate to religion. Those who complain of “the law’s delay” in England, would be speedily reconciled to the tardity of its progress were they to commence a suit in Germany, where it excited considerable surprise that the procrastination of Mr. Hastings’ trial, which lasted seven years and three months, should have caused any murmurs amongst us, that period being thought a moderate one by almost every German. Living in this dutchy is very cheap: a bachelor can keep a horse, dine at the first table d’hôte, and drink a bottle of wine a day, and mingle in the best circles, upon one hundred pounds per annum. The society in Darmstadt is very agreeable. As the minds of the men and women are so highly cultivated and accomplished in Germany, every party presents some mode or other, equally delightful and blameless, to make Time smile, and to strew over his passage with flowers. The country round Darmstadt is very beautiful, and abounds with corn and various sorts of fruit-trees, which are frequently unprotected by any fence, and the common path winds through avenues of them. Amongst other delicious fruit, there is a red plumb called zwetschen, peculiar to the south of Germany, which grows in great richness and luxuriance in this dutchy. As a proof of the profusion in which it grows, in one of my rambles with some friends, I met a boy laden with a basket full of them, who sold us 130 for some little pieces, amounting to a penny English; and the little rogue looked back with an arch smile as we separated, as if he had made a highly profitable bargain. As I was walking in the principal street with a friend of mine, I was struck with the following expression: “Look at that officer; would you believe it that with so fine a person, and a mind to correspond with it, he has received two baskets?” My surprise at the expression was dissolved by being informed, that when a lady refuses an offer of love, she sends the luckless lover a little basket as a token of her disinclination to receive his addresses.
The French interest is powerful in Darmstadt, although amongst all the princes of the Rhenish confederation, no one has displayed more energy and spirit than the Grand Duke. A striking instance of this occurred to one of my companions: in this dutchy, and I believe in other parts of Germany, there is a law that renders it penal to drive off the road upon the grass, but the postillion who drove him, having, to spare his horses, offended against the law, archly turned round to him and said, “Pray, Sir, in case I should be prosecuted, say you are a Frenchman, and then they will not make me pay the penalty.”
The antipathy between the natives of Darmstadt and their neighbours of Hesse Cassel, is as inveterate as that between the English and French. As I was preparing to set off for Heidelburg, we heard that the troops of Darmstadt were expected to march at a moment’s notice to seize upon Hanau, a town belonging to Hesse Cassel, which has afforded frequent subject of broil between the two countries; but upon inquiry, we were privately informed, that Bonaparte was expected to call upon the Grand Duke to march his contingent to the field of battle against the Prussians, with whom immediate hostilities were thought to be inevitable. I much regretted that this approaching storm, which began to spread a deep shade over the political horizon, prevented me from extending my excursion further into Germany, a country to which Nature has been very bountiful, where the women unite refined accomplishments to the charms of person, and where the men are distinguished for their genius, probity, and indefatigable industry, and both for an unaffected urbanity of manners.
Upon my return to Francfort, part of the French army rushed in like a torrent, on its way to give the Prussians battle. It had rained very hard all the day on which the advance guard entered; but every soldier, although covered with mud, and wet to the skin, went, or rather danced, singing merrily all the way, to the house where he was to be quartered. This city has been dreadfully drained at various times, by the immense number of French troops which have been billeted upon the inhabitants: at one time they had fifty thousand to support, and to supply with various articles of clothing for six months. Every house had a certain number billeted upon them, according to its size and the opulence of the family. Upon their march the French are as little encumbered as possible; in their way they compel the farmer, butcher, baker, &c. to furnish them with what they want, for which notes are given by the proper officers, if they have no cash, to the seller, according to the price agreed upon, which is generally a very fair one, and which the paymaster in the rear of the army discharges upon coming up.
As the gathering tempest prevented me from penetrating into the south of Germany beyond Darmstadt, I applied to M. Bacher, the French minister, for permission to return pour changer to Rotterdam, by the way of Brussels, Antwerp, &c. but the old, shrewd politician, in a very crabbed manner refused, and ordered me to keep on the right bank of the Rhine. Thus was I obliged to retrace my steps; however, it enabled me again to contemplate the sublime and beautiful scenes of the Rhine, which I did in a boat, the cabin and roof of which were crammed with passengers to various cities on different sides of the river: the wind was against us, but the stream was strong, of which our boatmen availed themselves by placing the vessel transversely, and, without rowing or towing, in two days and a half we bade adieu to our voyageurs, a little before we reached Cologne, where we landed at Duitz, and retrod our steps, which enabled me here and there to correct errors and supply omissions. At Wesel we arrived at half past six o’clock in the evening, and found the gates shut, which compelled us to sleep upon straw at a little inn in the suburbs. At six the next morning, we beheld a sad massacre perpetrating by the engineers and soldiers of the garrison, upon all the trees in the neighbourhood that could conceal or assist an enemy in approaching the town, and for a similar reason several houses in the suburbs were marked for destruction. Such is the commencement of the horrors of war! The Prussians were expected to lay siege to this strongly fortified town in a few days, which induced the Grand Duke of Berg, who was in the citadel at the time, to have recourse to these severe preparations.
After pursuing our route through Amsterdam, where the great fair was holding, during which the Dutch character became absolutely lively, through Leyden and Rotterdam, at the last of which we were sadly annoyed about our necessary passports of departure, which require the signature of the King’s secretary at the Hague, and the countersign of a Dutch commissioner, appointed, during my absence, for such purpose at Rotterdam, in consequence of the French ambassador’s power over such matters having been withdrawn, we at length, like hunted hares, arrived at the spot from whence we started, viz. Maesland-sluys, where, after undergoing the vexation of more forms and ceremonies before our old friend the commodore, on board of his guard-ship, we embarked in the identical dismal galliot which brought us to Holland, and after expecting every moment an order of embargo, we got out to sea, where we endured no common misery for six days and nights, after which I landed again upon my beloved native country: