So much for my experiences of Protestant Germany as regards Sunday occupation. I have, however, said nothing of museums or picture galleries. I should be sorry to misrepresent the kindred commercial cities of Hamburg and Leipsic; but I think they may shake hands on this question, seeing that, at the period of my visit, they possessed neither the one nor the other. I do not say that there were no stored-up curiosities, dignified with the title of museums. But, as far as the public instruction was concerned, they were nearly useless, being little known and less visited, and certainly not accessible on the Sunday. Schwerin, in Mecklenburg, possesses a noble ducal museum of arts and sciences, but this also was closed on the weekly holiday; and in Berlin, where the museum, par excellence, may vie with any in Europe, and which city is otherwise rich in natural and art collections, the doors of all such places were, on the Sunday, strictly closed against the people. Of the good taste which authorises the display of stage scenery and decorations (and that not of the best), and yet forbids the inspection of the masterpieces of painting; of the judgment which patronises beer and tobacco, yet virtually condemns as unholy the sight of the best evidences of nature’s grandeur, and the beautiful results of human efforts in art, it is not necessary to treat here.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
more sundays abroad.
Still on tramp toward the south, we came to Dresden, and there rested five days; but as they were week-days their experiences gave us no insight into the Sunday usages of the place, and I only allude to them because it would seem unbecoming to pass the capital of Saxony without a word; and because I feel morally convinced that of all the art-wonders collected in the Zwinger, Das Grüne Gewölbe, and in the picture gallery, all of which we visited, not any of them are visible to the public on Sunday. [173] On a sultry day in August we struggled, dusty and athirst, into Vienna. It is said that the first impressions of a traveller are the most faithful, and I therefore transcribe from a diary of that time some of my recollections of the first Sunday spent in the capital of Austria. It is not flattering.
“Yesterday (Sunday), we rambled through a part of the city known as Lerchenfeld, in the suburb of St. Joseph, where the low life of Vienna is exhibited. It was a kind of fair. The way was lined with petty booths and stalls, furnished with fruit, pipes, and common pastry. Here were sold live rabbits and birds; there, paper clock-faces, engravings, songs, and figures of saints. In one part was a succession of places of public resort, like our tea-gardens in appearance, but devoted to the sale of other beverages; tea being here almost unknown, except as a medicine. From each of them there streamed the mingled sounds of obstreperous music and human voices, while in several there appeared to be a sort of conjuring exhibition in course of performance. Further on, there came from the opposite side of the way the screaming of a flageolet, heard far above its accompaniment of a violin and a couple of horns, to all of which the shuffling and scraping of many feet formed a sort of dull bass, as the dancers whirled round in their interminable waltz. Looking into the window of the building thus outrageously conspicuous, we saw a motley crowd of persons of both sexes, and in such a variety of costumes as scarcely any other city but Vienna could furnish; some of
them careering round in the excitement of the dance; others impatiently awaiting their turn, or quizzing the dancers; while a third party sat gravely at the side-tables, smoking their pipes, playing at cards, and sipping their wine and beer. Passing onward, we came upon a diminutive merryman, screaming from the platform of his mountebank theatre, the nature of the entertainment and the lowness of the price of admission—‘Only four kreutzers for the first place!’
“Continuing our course, we were attracted into a side-street by a crowd, among whom stood conspicuous a brass musical band, and an old man in a semi-religious costume of black and white, bearing a large wooden crucifix in his hand. In anticipation of some religious ceremony, we waited awhile to watch its development. It was a funeral, and the whole procession soon formed itself in the following order:—First came the large crucifix, then a boy bearing a banner on which was painted the figure of the Virgin; then came six other boys, followed by the same number of girls, all neatly and cleanly dressed; and then the coffin, hung with scarlet drapery, adorned with flowers, and having a small silver crucifix at its head. We were told it was the funeral of a girl of thirteen. Close upon the coffin came the minister, or priest, clad in a black, loosish gown, and wearing a curiously crown-shaped cap, also black. Every head was uncovered as he and the coffin passed. Then came, as we imagined, the real mourners of the dead, followed by six exceedingly old women, mourners by profession, and immediately behind them the brass band which had first attracted our attention. The latter, as soon as the procession was fairly in motion, burst forth into a noisy, and by no means melancholy strain, and continued to play for some time; they suddenly ceased, and there was heard from some one at the head of the procession a Latin prayer, which was immediately echoed by the old women in the rear, in the same drowsy, monotonous tone in which the church responses are usually made. The scene was altogether curious and striking; the progress of the procession was everywhere marked by uncovered heads and signs of sympathy and respect; but in spite of its attempted solemnity, there was a holiday appearance about it which jarred sadly with its real character of grief and death.”
I have given this description a front place because it is the worst thing I can say of Vienna, and in no other part of the city did I ever see its like. During a stay of twelve months, I lost no opportunity of enjoying all that the Viennese enjoyed, or of witnessing whatever
was part of the national customs in festival, holiday, or religious ceremonial. In addition to the Sundays, which were all, to a certain extent, days of rejoicing—there were nine distinct festivals in the year enjoined by the church, and on which, if they fell on week-days, the working people rested from their labours. Of course each of these days had its special religious reference and obligations, and these were in general faithfully observed; but, apart from this, they were essentially holidays, and, as no deduction of wages was made by the employers on their account, they did not fall as a burden upon the working classes. These days were: New Year’s Day, the Annunciation, Good Friday, Easter and Whit Sunday, Corpus Christi Day, All Saints’ Day, the Birth of the Virgin, Christmas Day, and the festival of St. Leopold, the patron saint of Vienna. On the strictly church festivals, with the exception of All Saints’ Day, theatrical performances, and public amusements generally, were interdicted, but rest and quiet recreation, in addition to the religious observances, were their great characteristics. Easter and Whit Monday were among the Volks Feste (people’s feasts), as well as one known as that of the Brigittenau, from the place in which it is held; and another on the first of May, when the laüfer (running footmen) have their races in the Prater, and the emperor permits himself to be mobbed—at least the Emperor Francis did—as he strolls for a half-hour or so among his people in their own park. Then the Bohemians have a special religious festival, when one is astonished to see, in out-of-the-way niches and corners, a perhaps hitherto-unobserved figure of an amiable-looking priest, with a star on his forehead, now hung about and conspicuous with wreaths and festoons of flowers, and bright with the glittering of tiny lamps. This is the Holy St. John of Nepomuk. I have, however, nothing to do with the religious ceremonies of the Catholic Church. It is sufficient for my purpose to know that I watched the solemn and splendid procession of mingled royalty, priest, and people, on Corpus Christi Day, from the open door of a coffee and wine-house in the Kohl-market; and that, at the Easter festival, after ascending and descending the Mount Calvary, near Vienna, or rather having been borne up and down its semicircular flight of steps, and past the modelled groups of painted figures to represent the life of Christ, from the birth to the crowning act of the crucifixion on the summit, I then sauntered away with my landlord (a cabinet-maker) and his family to Weinhaus, to drink of the new wine called heueriger.
It is enough that, on All Saints’ Day, after wandering awhile about a swampy churchyard in the suburb of Maria Hilf, to see the melancholy spot of light which glimmered at each grave-head, I went to the Burg Theatre, and witnessed Shakespeare’s play of “King Lear” (and the best actor in Vienna played the Fool); and further, that I spent the evening of Christmas Day in Daum’s coffee-house in reading Galignani’s Messenger, in order to bring myself, in imagination at least, as near home as possible.