Among other sights, while at Ballenstedt—it was in 1878—we went to the Duke of Brunswick’s castle of Blankenburg; not going over its four hundred chambers, but confining ourselves very much to the billiard-room and chapel. In that apartment the walls were decorated with engravings of race-horses, and of British sports of every kind—fox-hunting, cricket, and other games—all that are ever seen in shop-windows or elsewhere. A billiard-table occupied a corner of the room, with the rules of the game hung near it. The ducal family were Anglicized by the war, and the black dress of the troops is still worn. The chairs in the room were all backed by the arms of England and the Order of the Garter.
In the chapel there is an ivory crucifix attributed to Michael Angelo. The floor is, in one place, ostentatiously unboarded, to show the foundation to be rock.
Ballenstedt is a pleasant summer town. There is a fine avenue leading to the castle, and to the public gardens; the forest is close at hand, and a chain of trout streams and lakes descends from the neighbouring hills.
The Affenthaler valley, too, abuts on the place, leading to Falconstein, in whose castle are some of the noblest stag-antlers ever seen.
All that is written, all that comes to pass, has its concluding chapter; I am fast approaching mine.
In writing these memoirs, a love of my fellows has dominated my pen, as it does, always, in what I compose, for serious perusal. I am sometimes surprised at finding how this feeling keeps the upper hand, as, in the ordinary sense, it is not always deserved, nor always quite felt at starting: but it warms. As I began by saying, so I repeat, that, in a certain way, I am my own posterity; and, perhaps, I revive in myself the better feelings that a dead man would assuredly experience if he came suddenly to life.
I may end by saying yet a few more words about myself in concluding. As a sort of posterity I may allude even to the circumstance that my memory serves me as well as ever, as this memoir shows, and that, but for my disaster, I could give myself a certificate of health that would satisfy the most prying of life insurance companies.
I have all the buoyancy of youth! As a sort of posterity I have almost a disposition, in some things, to appreciate myself; but at this point decency forbids. I have quite recently written, 1st, a volume of “Epigrams,” from an experience quite deserving the attention of every innocent novice who looks up to mankind; 2nd, a volume of “Sonnets”; 3rd, my “Memoirs”; 4th, “Miscellaneous Essays and Verse.”
My mind holds out; it has increased in accuracy up to the present time, now that my 84th year has set in with a rush. But I find that my eyesight deteriorates, though slowly, and that, like everything else that is inevitable, I can bear it, though I should like to have my observers back, so lovely is the clear light of day!