Great as is the splendor of some of our English peers, I almost fear the suspicion of using a traveller’s license when I tell of Eszterházy’s magnificence. Within a few miles of this same spot he has three other palaces of equal size.
Just at the southern extremity of the lake stands Eszterház, a huge building in the most florid Italian style, built only in 1700, and already uninhabited for sixty years. Its marble halls, brilliant with gold and painting, are still fresh as when first built. The chamber of Marie Theresa is unchanged since the great queen reposed there; the whole interior is in such a state that it might be rendered habitable to-morrow; but the gardens are already overgrown with weeds, and have almost lost their original form; the numberless pleasure-houses are yielding to the damp position in which they are placed, and are fast crumbling away; while the beautiful theatre, for which an Italian company was formerly maintained, is now stripped of its splendid mirrors, and serves only as a dwelling for the dormant bats, which hang in festoons from its gilded cornices. England is famous for her noble castles and her rich mansions, yet we can have little idea of a splendor such as Eszterház must formerly have presented. Crowded as it was by the most beautiful women of four countries, its three hundred and sixty strangers’ rooms filled with guests, its concerts directed by a Haydn, its opera supplied by Italian artists, its gardens ornamented by a gay throng of visitors, hosts of richly-clothed attendants thronging its antechambers, and its gates guarded by the grenadiers of its princely master, its magnificence must have exceeded that of half of the royal courts of Europe. I know of nothing but Versailles which gives one so high a notion of the costly splendor of a past age as Eszterház.
Haydn was for more than thirty years maestro di capello to Prince Eszterházy; and, during that period, lived chiefly with the family. His portrait is still preserved, and it is almost the only picture of much interest the palace contains. Haydn was a very poor and obscure person when he was appointed one of the prince’s band; so much so, that no one thought even of giving the necessary orders for his being admitted into the palace. The following anecdote of his introduction to the prince is recounted by Carpani:
“The Maestro Friedberg, a friend and admirer of Haydn, lived with Prince Eszterházy. Regretting that Haydn should be overlooked, he persuaded him to compose a symphony worthy of being performed on the birthday of his highness. Haydn consented; the day arrived; the prince, according to custom, took his seat in the midst of his court, and Friedberg distributed the parts of Haydn’s symphony to the performers. Scarcely had the musicians got through the first allegro, when the prince interrupted them to ask who was the author of so beautiful a piece. Friedberg dragged the modest, trembling Haydn from a corner of the room into which he had crept, and presented him as the fortunate composer. ’What,’ cried the prince, as he came forward, ‘that Blackymoor!’ (Haydn’s complexion was none of those which mock the lily’s whiteness.) ‘Well, blacky, from henceforth you shall be in my service; what’s your name?’ ‘Joseph Haydn.’ ‘But you are already one of my band; how is it I never saw you here before?’ The modesty of the young composer closed his lips, but the prince soon put him at his ease. ‘Go and get some clothes suitable to your rank,—don’t let me see you any more in such a guise; you are too small; you look miserable, sir; get some new clothes, a fine wig with flowing curls, a lace collar, and red heels to your shoes. But mind, let your heels be high, that the elevation of your person may harmonize with that of your music. Go, and my attendants will supply you with all you want.’ ... The next day Haydn was travestied into a gentleman. Friedberg often told me of the awkwardness of the poor Maestrino in his new habiliments. He had such a gawky look that everybody burst into a laugh at his appearance. His reputation, however, as his genius had room to manifest itself, grew daily, and he soon obtained so completely the good-will of his master, that the extraordinary favor of wearing his own hair and his simple clothes was granted to his entreaties. The surname of the Blackymoor, however, which the prince had bestowed upon him, stuck to him for years after.”
The only part of Eszterház at present occupied is the stables, which had just received an importation of twelve beautiful thoroughbred horses from England, with some very promising young stock. An old English groom had been sent out with them, and bitterly did he complain of the difficulties he had to encounter before he could convince the beamters—a race of hungry stewards by whom the estates of the nobles are mismanaged and the revenues plundered—of the many little wants and luxuries requisite for English race-horses.
The estates of Prince Eszterházy are said to equal the kingdom of Würtemberg in size; it is certain they contain one hundred and thirty villages, forty towns, and thirty-four castles! The annual revenue from such vast possessions is said, however, not to amount to one hundred and fifty thousand pounds per annum, though it is capable of considerable increase. The incumbrances at the present time are greater than with most other Hungarian magnates, few of whom are indebted to a less amount than half their incomes.
I remember some years since an anecdote going the rounds of the papers to the effect that Prince Eszterházy had astonished one of our great agriculturists who had shown him his flock of two thousand sheep, and asked him with some little pride if he could show as many, by telling him that he had more shepherds than the other had sheep! By a reckoning made upon the spot, with one well acquainted, we found the saying literally true. The winter flock of Merinos is maintained at two hundred and fifty thousand, to every hundred of which one shepherd is allowed, thus making the number of shepherds two thousand five hundred! But, as a spirituelle of the neighborhood observed when we were discussing these matters, “Les Eszterházys font tout en grand: le feu prince a doté deux cents maîtresses, et pensionné cent enfans illégitimes!”
It is not right to leave Eszterház without mention of Hánystock, or the wild man of the Hanság. The Hanság is a bog about twenty miles long, on the borders of which Eszterház is built. About eighty years since, in some part of this bog, an extraordinary creature is said to have been found, possessing something of the human form, but with scarcely any other quality that could entitle it to a place among our species. It was three feet high, apparently of about the middle age, strongly built, and said to have webbed feet and hands. It was unable to utter any articulate sounds, lived entirely on fish and frogs, showed no signs of any passion or feeling, except fear and anger, and was in every respect in the lowest state of brutality. The most curious part of its history is that no one ever heard of it till accidentally found by a peasant in the bog, when it was brought to Eszterház, where, after remaining fourteen months, it escaped, and was never heard of again. I believe there is some reason to suspect an imposition, for an Italian adventurer appeared and disappeared about the same time with Hánystock, and though unable to cite name or place, I feel pretty certain that a similar occurrence took place in another part of Europe soon after.
A few miles from Eisenstadt, and just on the confines of Austria, is a yet more interesting monument of what we should call feudal greatness, belonging to the Eszterházy family. The castle of Forchtenstein, built by a Count Eszterházy, is still in a perfect state of preservation. It is placed on a bold rock, and commands a view of the whole country to the northeast and south. It is now used as a prison for Prince Eszterházy’s peasantry,—for he is one of the few who retain the right of life and death, the jus gladii, on his own estates,—and is consequently guarded by a small detachment of very venerable-looking grenadiers.
The castle is sufficiently modern to have been laid out for the employment of artillery, as may be seen by the heavy bastions and long curtains, and is still sufficiently old to bear marks of the Gothic architect about it, of which the high watch-tower is not the least elegant. The interior has all the inconvenient straightness of a walled-in castle, and the apartments are for the most part small and simple. The most interesting object after the well, which is one hundred and seventy yards deep, and said to have been worked in the solid rock by Turkish prisoners, is the collection of arms. Besides arms sufficient for a regiment of foot and another of horse, which ere this an Eszterházy has equipped and maintained at his own cost, there is the gala equipment of a troop of cavalry which attended one of the princesses on her wedding-day, thirty pieces of artillery, suits of plain black armor for several hundred men, many curious specimens of early German matchlocks, and a quantity of Turkish arms of almost every description.