Chapter VII: Part 7

I have made the tour of "Unter den Linden," and am sitting here just long enough to collect my wandering thoughts before moving on. I feel as if I had been the victim of one of De Quincey's dreams, and wait the awakening that will release me from its spell. As I recline here at my leisure, with a sandstone fountain making music at my feet, and grapevines and beeches embowering me about, I get a good view of the famous Brandenburg Gate and the statue of Victory, with her chariot and four, on the top. As I look on the magnificent group from where I am on the Thiergarten side, Victory has her back to me, her horses galloping with full speed towards the palace of the king. I had supposed, from pictures I had seen, that she was driving towards the park. I cannot have been mistaken. If so, why was such a ponderous mass turned around?

While endeavoring to explain to myself what seemed so strange, a young man took a seat by my side. Addressing him, "How is it? Isn't Victory reversed?" "_Ja wohl!_" he replies. How assuring the affix "_wohl_" in the hearty German expression of assent! It is the abracadabra that drives out fear, and fills up the great gulf between the stranger and yourself, enabling your sympathies to run over and interchange. Long live the noble people that always say, "Yes, well," and never, "Yes, ill."

"_Ja wohl!_" he replies. "Why?" "Well, you see,"--I knew by the expression lighting up his face that he was going to tell me of something that pleased,--"it was before the last struggle that Victory was driving her horses in the direction of Paris. The war came. The French were victors, and carried off our statue as a trophy to flatter their vanity and decorate their capital at the same time. Good, but in '70 it was our turn. The whipped became whippers. We beat the French and brought our Victory home, replanted her on her original site, with her back to Frankreich, her face looking proudly towards the Fatherland, as if she were glad and happy to be at home."

[Here we pass over pages of description of what was to be seen
in the galleries and churches, to come again to the traveller's
out-door impressions.]

In the first place, the climate, to my surprise, is perfect. I am sitting here at noon in August--smothering with us--in an atmosphere exhilarating and cool; men are passing with light overcoats, as if they were a trifle anxious to anticipate the September winds, and this is what the weather has been since leaving Erin, where it was, to my surprise, too dry and warm. Remember, that all I say about countries and people is only what _I_ have felt and seen. Every evening I wear a light overcoat, and find it about right. In the second place, there is no dust in Berlin, simply because the streets, which are better--all of them--than the concrete around the Philadelphia City Hall, are never allowed to get dirty; are _flooded with water_ and _dried_ every morning, and kept so. Nothing objectionable is permitted to remain on them for a moment. _Clean, uniformed men_--and handsome, gentlemanly-looking fellows they are, too--are constantly moving along with enclosed wheelbarrows, shovels, and brooms, removing whatever may offend; even their instruments for cleaning are designed artistically and free from soil. I can imagine the wheelbarrows attractive as flower receptacles at large gatherings, so graceful are they. You would tie bows on the shovels and hang them on the wall.

With these whatever is offensive on the streets is at once emptied into cast-iron receptacles, in themselves ornamental, arranged along the thoroughfares, and which are emptied before daybreak every day. The streets, as I said before, are many of them flooded with water daily, then dried with enormous squilgees (that's what they are called on shipboard),--that is, a band of rubber fitted into a socket of wood, something like what, with us, careful housewives use to dry windows, except that these are a yard wide, and one sweep of them over a wet street leaves a band its width as dry as a board and as clean as a dinner plate. In order to do this, of course the streets have to be absolutely smooth,--as they are, not the slightest indentation being visible. Then neatly-painted and handsomely-designed water-carts traverse _every_ street a number of times daily, ejecting showers of _misty_ spray; a work of supererogation, you say, to prevent any particle of dust that may be left from getting into the air. It is actually true that a child with a cambric dress could roll in the middle of any crowded thoroughfare with as much security from soil as if occupying a chair in a summer boarding-house.

The cleanliness and order exceeds even that of England or Scotland, than which, until you come to Germany, you think nothing can exceed. If, for example, a gentleman in lighting a cigar throws a match on the street, it is picked up; a leaf from a tree, a bit of paper from a store, a blade of grass, all are at once removed, and by men, too, that are Germans; that is,--clean, respectful, reputable, and intelligent. Even in the business avenues, and around the wholesale stores, the pavements and streets are as clean as the white steps of the homes of Philadelphia. Most of the streets are as wide as our Broad Street, some wider; as, for example, Unter den Linden.

That you may see for yourself this noble highway of the capital, allow me to conduct you across. "When I speak of horses imagine that you see them." Just suppose we are crossing together, and because of the many vehicles and people on horseback, I will take you by the hand, so. We have been admiring the trees and flowers in front of Prince Blücher's palace, one of a series of palaces on each side of the street near the Brandenburg Gate; they stand back from the pavements, and have extensive flower-gardens in front, the only separation between these and the very wide pavement being a low hedge of delicate, almost thornless, magenta roses. You remember--or did I tell you?--with what genial pride the old gardener, yesterday, told us that this same was a perpetual bloomer,--summer and winter,--that it was a German creation,--the development of its efflorescent peculiarity having been begun away back; but that he himself it was, by crossing it with _Rosa centifolia_, that had added the apex to the temple of its perfection,--namely, duplication of petals, diminution of stamen, heliotropism,--turning its face towards the sun, by which acquired habit the winter bloom has become as profuse as that of summer.

Well, we have been looking over this two-foot-high blooming hedge-row, and have decided to cross to the gardens on the other side; so now hold my hand and fear not, for life is sacred in the Fatherland, and we are under the protection of the police. You see that the gardens in front of the palaces used by the nobility and foreign ministers are about as wide as Broad Street, the pavement for the public forty feet more. We leave this and cross a strip as wide as an ordinary avenue, paved with square blocks,--this is exclusively for wagons, drays, and all vehicles of trade,--then a row of trees; after this we cross a band about the same width, but as smooth and as hard as granite; this is for pleasure-carriages only; then another row of trees; then a road the width of an ordinary street, which is neither concrete nor Belgian blocks, but a mixture of loam and sand, soft enough to be easy for horses' feet, and damp enough to keep it from being converted into clouds of dust; this is used by equestrians only, and a beautiful sight the lady and gentleman riders present every afternoon on their way to the park. We cross this soft way, and are in a wide promenade, perhaps eighty feet broad, arched over with the branches of lofty oaks, chestnuts, butternuts, lindens, beeches, and the like,--originally lindens only, hence the name "Under the Lindens,"--with elegant seats arranged along its entire length, on one of which we will sit down and rest, for we are half-way across the avenue, or rather series of avenues, which up here is flanked with lofty palaces and gardens of delight. On one side you go to, on the other you come from, the park. The lower part of this multiple avenue, instead of palaces and gardens, has the most magnificent residences, shops, and hotels that I have ever seen....

Germany seems one great family with no foreign help, where each member recognizes and respects the position of the other, and are united in the training of their children and the development of their own minds; but not as though, like other people, they had to _resolve_ to be good; this, as a matter of course; virtue appears to come to them by nature. Everything they do seems a pleasure rather than a task, as if they said that industry and thrift are essential to happiness, labor the prelude to enjoyment; besides, they are never in a hurry. They take an hour to drink a glass of beer, and talk of heaven, earth, and the waters under the earth while sipping it. The gesticulating German, outside of books, I have not yet seen; what they do they do well; they enjoy doing it, and they do it that it may be a joy to others, and it always is. This feeling enters into every service, from the making of a pin to the concocting of a new system of theology, or a free-and-easy way of getting to heaven; and then the universality of culture that prevails, thanks to the standing army and the omnipresent public schools,--they have private schools too, to be sure, but then these snob and denominational affairs, unlike with us, just as the public schools, are under strict _governmental inspection_, and their managers are not permitted to teach what they please, unless what they please is for the good of the pupils, the country, and the people at large. It is because of this national surveillance that the private schools of Germany are said to be as good as those under the direct control of the government.

Familiarizing the pupil with music and the natural sciences is an important part of German education, especially the study of _animal organisms_, "birds, beasts, and reptiles," as we used to say of Goldsmith's "Animated Nature." As an illustration at hand, since sitting here in front of a garden near the Kaiser's palace, putting upon record the above traits, a workman watering a lawn noticed me looking up for a moment, just as he had enveloped the top of a lofty spruce with spray. Of course, as the sun was shining, and each particle of water becoming a prism, the disintegration of the white rays of light resulted in a rainbow, curved partially around the trees. I look at it, racking my memory at the same time for the word I need; he sees I observe it and am pleased; he nods, and says, "_Schön_" (beautiful); I reply, "Very." In a few moments, dragging the hose towards me, throwing the water over a weeping birch, and making another rainbow, he points towards it. "Our Herr Professor Helmholtz," pointing towards the University, "says there are but three prismatic colors, and yet I can now see seven, can't you?--red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet; and I suppose a Frenchman could see seventy, for it is said that they can see colors where other people only see shades." He continues to water the grass, and I, having found my missing link, to write.

[Dr. Woods next describes what is to be seen within the
German beer-gardens,--the music, the decorum, the absence of
intoxication, the intelligence manifested in conversation. Then to
out-door life again.]

Other traits. Houses have curtains on the outside of windows as well as on the inside, and windows are nearly always double, with a space of about four inches between. They open outward and inward, instead of up and down; when closed, all noise is shut out. Indeed, there is no noise on even the busiest streets, which are so smooth that no sounds are heard but those of horses' feet; no screaming of papers or wares of any sort is permitted, and no chimes! Then, again, people in the most ordinary circumstances have fine lace curtains and beautifully woven fabrics hanging around in graceful festoons, portières, statuary, pictures, flowers, birds, and books; often the most beautiful things in the way of prints are pinned frameless on the walls; there are beautiful marquetry floors, but no carpets.

Again, the orchards throughout the country are without protecting walls, just as farms are. At each corner a stone marks the division, and when ploughing, a couple of reversed furrows from stone to stone serves both as a division and promenade, and crops are not only grown to this line of demarcation, but grow over it, so that at a distance there is no division at all. I have seen branches bent to the ground with ripe fruit, and children walking under them to _buy_ from an old woman or man across the way, never apparently even thinking of molesting what is not theirs. This is one of the things that fill you with wonder. In Weimar, between the Goethe House and the principal school, a long branch _loaded with red apples_ hung over the way, almost touching my head, and yet it was under this that hundreds of children passed daily to and from school.

A pleasant custom in Berlin, as in London, is window-gardening--windows constructed so on purpose, the glass projecting a couple of feet beyond the side of the house, forming attractive ferneries, wherein are contained various sorts of cryptogami, as well as flowers in bloom, needing but little attention, as the moisture evaporating from the soil, etc., having no way of escaping, is taken up by the leaves. Also at the entrance to houses I have noticed beautiful dwarf apple-trees, with glossy leaves, and bearing an abundance of diminutive fruit. On one of these little trees, yesterday, I counted fifty-three ripe apples. These on the pavement day and night, and just the height of a boy's hand in passing, notwithstanding what I had observed about fenceless orchards, made me suspect them apples of Sodom, or they certainly would have been plucked. To satisfy curiosity, I called on a florist having some for sale, and found that they tasted as good as they looked. I have concluded, therefore, that if Adam and Eve had been Germans there would have been no Fall; and I know no race doing more towards having Eden restored than these same people.

A RAMBLE IN PRUSSIA.

STEPHEN POWERS.

[Country life in Prussia is well delineated in the following
description of a journey on foot from Wittenberg to Potsdam. It
is not an alluring picture, and brings us into the presence of
a stolid generation such as would scarcely be looked for in the
rural districts of that active realm.]

Once out of Wittenberg, I journeyed on along the ancient royal highway, between the ever-welcome colonnades of stately poplars, planted that the royal head might never be scorched by the too ardent sun of summer. The sun shone as brightly as it ever does in blue old Germany, but what a weary, weary land to my eyes, on the pitiless cold May-day, was that sandy champaign, almost utterly naked in its hopeless sterility, and diversified only now and then by a bald-headed knoll, swelling broadly up with a thousand acres! So indescribably blue and cold and pinched was it, without any vegetation but a forest of cultivated pines, which, after a quarter of a century, had struggled up with their wretched, scraggy stems only fifteen feet! The very soil looked blue and thin and skinny, and the rye looked blue, and so meagre and chilled that it could not conceal the ground or the knees of the men who plucked up the weeds.

All the dismal immensity of this fenceless, hedgeless, houseless waste, except an acre of rye in a thousand, was given up to the sorrel, the lichens, and the quitches. The very air seemed poor and attenuated like thin skimmed milk. All the houses were clustered together in little villages far apart, where they huddled close, as if for warmth; the dead, dull peat-fires gave forth no cheerful wreathing smoke; and in all the desolate waste there was scarcely a soul abroad. The faces of the yellow-haired children, who were occasionally watching some geese, were mottled with blue and purple and goose-pimples, and if a man ventured abroad to pluck up weeds in the stunted rye, which seemed to shiver with a kind of rustling, starved chilliness, his hands were bluer than the air. So utterly worn out, so bluish-wan and starved with the lapse of untold centuries, seemed all the earth and the air of that Germany which I looked out upon on that dismal May forenoon.

Lamartine says the blood of the Germans is blue, but that of these Brandenburgers must certainly be sour.

It will readily be believed that I did not undertake a pilgrimage through this inexpressibly bleak region in pursuit of fine landscapes. I wished only to visit, by their own firesides and in their own fields, that sturdy, grim, Puritanic race of Brandenburgers, to whom Prussia is primarily indebted for all her greatness.

It was weary hours after the middle of the day before the spires of Wittenberg disappeared below a sand-hill. The afternoon was far spent, and I began to cast longing glances ahead in search of an eligible tavern, for I thoroughly agree with Dr. Johnson that "there is nothing which has yet been contrived by man by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern."

I had come up with a thumping lout of a young peasant, who strode along with his "clouted shoon," measuring about a yard and a quarter at a stride, whose voice blubbered and gurgled up out of his stomach in such a manner that the fierce wind whisked it away, and left me nothing but an occasional horse-laugh (whereupon I would also laugh, though I had not the remotest notion of the matters whereof he was discoursing); and by his advice I passed several inns, though I found afterwards, to my sorrow, he was looking only for the cheapest. At last we came to one which was meaner than all the others, but I was too weary to go a step farther. It bore the pretentious name of the inn of the Green Linden. It was a mere hovel, built of cobbles and mud-stuccoed, tawny-yellow within, greenish-yellowish without, with an earthen floor and benches around the walls. Above the door were twined some sprigs of Whitsuntide birch, which I had seen during the day on the peasants' hats, wagons, and everywhere.

Around a pine table were eight or ten men and hobbledehoys, each with a _Schoppen_ of terribly stiff beer before him, and most of them smoking the long goosenecked porcelain pipe, while four of them were intent on cards. The men were hard, gristly-faced, sour-blooded fellows, who only muttered now and then a monosyllable, which I could seldom understand; while the youths looked on with the most vacuous, loamy countenances imaginable. So intent were they on the miserable game that they gave no heed to our arrival, and when I endeavored to ascertain who was the landlord, I received only a blank stare or a gesture of impatience. I sat down and waited, and I confess for a few minutes my enthusiasm for the Prussian people fell absolutely to the freezing-point.

After about half an hour the landlord seemed to be disturbed in his mind by a suspicion that I was a foreigner, drew near and ascertained that fact, whereupon he brought me some vile black coffee and some good wheaten _Semmel_, and then returned to his occupation. The players continued at their game far into the night, and though the stakes were of the most trifling nature, often only a half-penny, they displayed a fierce and obstinate eagerness which was surprising. They would rise up on their feet, lean far across the table and smite it with appalling violence. When they at last desisted, and were preparing to disperse, they collected about me, and, finding I was an American, listened to me awhile with a kind of drowsy, immovable passiveness, while the smoke lazily swirled above their heads. Unlike the lively Swabians and the joyous drinkers of the sunny wine of Freiburg, they scarcely asked any questions or expressed any interest beyond grunting their assent or wonder.

At last the host and myself were left alone, and then he proceeded to prepare the only couch he could offer by shaking down on the floor a bundle of rye straw. He tucked me all up, as if I were one of his young _Buben_, shook the hand which I reached out from the straw, and left me with a cheerful _Schlafen Sie wohl_. In the adjoining room a lusty fellow stretched himself on a bench, pillowed his head on a portentous loaf of rye bread, not having even inserted that useful article of diet into a pillow-case, and there he snored--_stertitque supinus_--the livelong night in a tone so audible that I was greatly tempted to rise and introduce a wisp of rye straw judiciously into his windpipe.

When I sat up on my couch next morning, pulling the straw out of my hair, I said to myself, like Richard, "Oh, I have passed a miserable night!" I had not had any "fearful dreams," nor, for that matter, any sleep, that I was aware of; neither had I any "ugly sights," because it was too dark to see them, but I felt them. They appeared to be greatly rejoiced to be permitted, once in their lives, to extract blood out of a man's veins instead of beer.

The next day I passed through spectacles of the most wonderfully minute and unceasing toil. In an artificial pine-forest, where the trees were become too large to be ploughed, there were men on their knees plucking the weeds between the rows; others in long sheep-skin cloaks were weeding fields of flax; a woman was culling in a royal forest the merest sprigs and leaf-stems for fuel; others along the roadside snipped off the close, short fleece of grass, and carried it in mighty bundles on their backs for the stalled cattle. Here a stalwart yeoman lazily leans his chin on his crook, guarding three sheep as they nimbly nibble! Peasant-women, going to the village to hawk their little produce, shuffled along with their wooden shoes, making a prodigious dust, chatting cheerfully with their stolid lords, though they were bowed down nearly to the earth beneath the intolerable weight of vegetables. And the infamous brutal tyrants trudged along beside the poor women, never even offering to touch the burdens with so much as one of their fingers!

I think the Prussians will certainly never "witch the world with noble horsemanship." The horses are splendid creatures for farm-animals, strong and glossy and round, superb as the finest Clydesdales; but the owners seem to have no confidence upon their backs, and little skill in guiding them in vehicles. The Prussians are by no means a chivalric race, in the etymologic sense. In all my travels in Prussia I have yet to see a civilian on horseback outside of a city, and even there it is usually only officers who prance through the streets. The immense superiority of the Hungarian cavalry over the Prussian was abundantly demonstrated in the Bohemian campaign until the magnificent infantry battalions turned the scale; and the dreaded "three Uhlans" of Edmond About were far oftener Poles than Prussians.

It is said that the potentates of Germany, when paying a visit of ceremony to a foreign sovereign, always take with them a favorite charger or two to whose paces they are accustomed, that there may be no blunders or embarrassments in the reviews through their unskilful horsemanship. These poor peasants evince little more confidence in their skill than do their sovereigns, and the outrageously unprofessional and awkward manner in which they handle the noble brutes would enrage a lover of handsome horses beyond endurance. To save toll at the gates, they not unfrequently hitch one horse to a two-horse wagon, so that the pole bruises and thumps his legs in a shameful manner. And then to hitch the head of one gallant horse to the tail of another!

In the village of Beelitz I had an amusing adventure, resulting from my ignorance of the customs of the country, which illustrates a certain phase of Prussian society. Upon entering the village, I began to cast about me for some eligible tavern wherein I might take my customary mid-day repast. The first one I approached was the inn of the Black Horse, but there were rather too many yellow-haired, unwashed children and dingy geese about it; besides, the sign hung down from one corner. The only other inn was the White Eagle, which was scarcely any better, but it was Hobson's choice. It was an extremely small and unpretentious edifice, though with walls nearly a man's stature in thickness, and I could overhear the appetizing clink of knives on plates just inside the door; so, in doubt whether it was really a public tavern or not, I rapped. Only the clink of the dinner-knives responded. The operation was repeated with a certain amount of vigor. There was a kind of objurgatory remark made within, and in a moment the door was opened about two feet, and an immense brawny arm, bared to the elbow, was extended around the edge of the door. In the fingers there was clutched a bunch of some substance which appeared to solicit my closer inspection. A single glance revealed to me the interesting fact that it was bread: it was undoubtedly bread.

This was an unexpectedly prompt response to my desires, and presented an opportunity for the acquisition of a limited amount of provisions cheap, but one of which my conscience would not permit me to avail myself. However, I scrutinized the bread with quite a lively interest. It was manifestly good bread, but was now somewhat dry: indeed, I may say it was altogether devoid of moisture. Presently the hand holding this article of diet executed a sudden movement of impatience, or as it were of beckoning or blandishment, as if I were expected to take this bread and masticate the same. But as I still hesitated, the hand was suddenly withdrawn into the tavern, there was a very audible remark made inside, and then the brawny hostess owning the hand presented herself at the door, and immediately appeared to have made an astounding discovery. Blushes and embarrassment! Stammerings! Mutual explanations! Ample and shamefaced apologies! A substantial dinner of boiled beef and cabbage! _Moral:_ In a country where beggars are numerous never knock at the tavern door.

THE SALT-MINES OF WIELICZKA.[A]

J. ROSS BROWNE.

[J. Ross Browne, author of "Yusef," "Crusoe's Island," "The Land
of Thor," etc., is well known for the humorous vein of many of
his productions. Such is the case with "An American Family in
Germany," from which we make the following selection. It is at
once humorous and instructive. The extract given, however, is
simply descriptive, having too much of interest in itself to need
any adventitious aid. The mine described may serve in a measure
as an artificial counterpart to our natural Mammoth Cave. Descent
into the mine was made by means of a long rope with canvas straps
for seats. There is a stairway cut in solid rock-salt, but it is
wet and slippery, and the rope is usually chosen in preference.]

[Footnote A: From "An American Family in Germany." Copyright, Harper & Brothers.]

In a few minutes we touched bottom, or rather, by something like instinct, the machine stopped just as we reached the base of the shaft, and allowed us to glide off gently on the firm earth. We are now at the first stage of our journey, having descended something over two hundred feet. The ramifications of the various tunnels are so intricate and extensive that they may be said to resemble more the streets of a large city than a series of excavations made in the bowels of the earth. These subterranean passages are named after various kings and emperors, and diverge in every direction, opening at intervals into spacious caverns and apartments, and undermining the country for a distance of several miles. Some of them pass entirely under the town of Wieliczka. In general they are supported by massive beams of wood, and where the overhanging masses of salt require a still stronger support they are sustained by immense columns of the original stratum. In former times almost all the passages were upheld by pillars of salt, but wherever it has been practicable these have been removed and beams of timber substituted. The first stratum consists of an amalgam of salt and dark-colored clay. Deeper down come alternate strata of marl, pebbles, sand, and blocks of crystal salt. The inferior or green salt is nearest to the surface; the crystal, called _schilika_, lies in the deeper parts.

From the subordinate officer sent by the Inspector-General to accompany us I learned many interesting particulars in reference to the manner of procuring the salt. He also told some amusing legends of the prominent places, and furnished me with some statistics, which, if true, are certainly wonderful. For instance, to traverse the various passages and chambers embraced within the four distinct stories of which the mines consist, and see every object of interest, would require three weeks. The aggregate length of the whole is four hundred English miles; the greatest depth yet reached is two thousand three hundred feet. The number of workmen employed in the various operations underground, exclusive of those above, is upward of a thousand. The amount of salt annually dug out is two hundred millions of pounds, which, at the average market value, would be worth ten millions of gulden. Immense as this yield is, it is inconsiderable, taking into view the unlimited capacity of the mines. With proper machinery and a judicious investment of labor the quantity of salt that might be excavated is almost beyond conjecture.

It is natural to suppose that the air in these vast subterranean passages must be impure, and consequently deleterious to health. Such, however, does not appear to be the case. It is both dry and pure, and, so far as I could judge by breathing it, not in the least oppressive. The miners are said to be remarkable for longevity. Several of them, according to the guide, have worked in the mines for forty years, and have never been sick a day. The equability of the temperature is probably conducive to health. Only a few degrees of variation are shown by the thermometer between summer and winter. It is true that in some of the deepest recesses, which are not sufficiently ventilated, hydrogen gas occasionally collects. In one instance it caught fire, and cost the loss of many lives, but precautions have since been taken to prevent similar accidents.

I was greatly impressed by the profound silence of these vast caverns. When we stood still the utter absence of sound was appalling. The falling of a pin would have been a relief. Not even the faintest vibration in the air was perceptible. No desert could be more silent, no solitude more awful. I stood apart from the guides and lamp-bearers in a separate vault, at the distance of a few hundred feet, in order that I might fully appreciate this profound inertion, and it really seemed as if the world were no more.

From some of these tunnels we emerged into open caverns, where a few workmen were employed at their dreary labors. I was surprised that there were not more to be seen, but was informed that they are scattered in small parties through miles of earth, so that the number is not apparent to the casual visitor. As we approached the places where they are at work the dull clicking of the picks and hammers produced a singular effect through the vast solitudes, as if the gnomes, supposed to inhabit gloomy pits, were busily engaged at their diabolical arts.

We came suddenly upon one group of workmen, under a shelving ledge, who were occupied in detaching masses of crystallized salt from a cleft in which they worked. They were naked to the middle, having nothing on but coarse trousers and boots, and wrought with their crowbars and picks by the light of a few grease-lamps held by grimy little boys, with shaggy heads,--members, no doubt, of the same subterranean family.

Some of the men were lying on their backs, punching away with tremendous toil at the ragged masses of salt overhead, their heads, faces, and bodies glittering with the showers of salt grit that fell upon them, while others stood up to their armpits in dark holes delving into the lower crevices. Seeing our lights, they stopped to gaze at us. Was it possible they were human beings, these bearded, shaggy, grimy-looking monsters? Surely, if so, they well represented the infernal character of the place. Never upon earth (the surface of it I mean) had I seen such a monstrous group,--shocks of hair all powdered with salt, glaring eyeballs overhung by white lashes flashing in the fitful blaze of lamps, brawny forms glittering with crystal powder, and marked by dark currents of sweat. No wonder I stared at them with something akin to distrust. They might be monsters in reality, and take a sudden notion to hurl me into one of their infernal pits by way of pastime, in which case the only consolation would be, that where there was such an abundance of salt there would be no difficulty about the preservation of my remains.

After all, there was something sad in the condition of these poor wretches, shut out from the glorious light of day, immured in deep dark pits, hundreds of feet underground, rooting, as it were, for life in the bowels of the earth. Surely the salt with which other men flavor their food is gathered with infinite toil, and mingled with bitter sweat!

Yet, strange as it may seem, I was informed by the guide that these workmen are so accustomed to this kind of life that they prefer it to any other. By the rules of the Directory they are divided into gangs, as on board a ship. The working gang is not permitted to remain under ground more than eight hours; it is then relieved. The current belief that some of them live in the mines is not sustained by the facts. In former times it is quite probable that such was the case. At present the administration of affairs is more humane than it was in an earlier period in the history of the mines. The operatives are free to quit whenever they please, as in any private establishment. Plenty of others are always ready to take their places. The pay is good, averaging from thirty kreutzers to a florin a day. Whenever it is practicable the work is done by the piece. Each man receives so much for a specified result. Good workmen can make two or three hundred florins a year. The salt is gotten out in various forms, according to the depth of the stratum. Where it is mixed with an amalgam of hard earth it is cut into cylindrical blocks, and exported in that form to Russia. The finer qualities are crushed, and packed in barrels for exportation to various parts of Prussia and Austria....

After a long and interesting journey through various subterranean streets and caverns, we emerged into the chamber of Michelawic, which is of such vast proportions that it is difficult for the eye to penetrate its mysterious gloom. A magnificent chandelier, cut out of the crystal salt, hangs from the ceiling. On grand occasions this is brilliantly lighted, and rich strains of music reverberate through the chamber. Nothing can equal the stupendous effects of a full band of brass instruments performing in this vast cavern. The sounds are flung back from wall to wall, and float upward, whirling from ledge to ledge, till the ear loses them in the distance; then down they fall again with a volume and fulness almost supernatural. It is impossible to determine from what quarter they emanate, whether from above or below, so rich, varied, and confusing is the reverberation. Our guide, in a fine mellow voice, sang us a mining song, to test the effects, and I must say I never heard such music before. Indeed, so inspiring was it that I could not refrain from a snatch of my own favorite melody,--

"Oh, California! you're the land for me!"

And when I heard it repeated by a thousand mysterious spirits of the air, and hurled back at me from each crystallized point of the cavern, the effect was so fine that I was struck perfectly dumb with astonishment. Lablache never made such music in his life, and no other singer of my acquaintance would be worthy of attempting it.

Soon after leaving the chamber of Michelawic we passed over a series of wooden foot-ways and corridors, extending a distance of fifteen hundred feet, through a great variety of apartments and rugged passages, named after the royal families of Poland and Austria. There were courts, and imperial rooms, and obelisks; chapels, shrines, saints, and martyrs; long rows of niches, containing statues of the old kings of Poland, all cut out of the solid salt. The design and execution of some of these were admirable, and the effect was gratifying, as well from the artistic skill displayed as the peculiarity of the material.

Descending to a second stage by means of a rough wooden stairway, which winds around the walls of an immense cavern of irregular shape, we wandered through a series of tunnels, opening occasionally into chambers of prodigious height and dimensions, till our guides announced that we were approaching the Infernal Lake. The lamp-bearers in front held up their lamps, and, peering through the fitful gloom, I could discern, some distance in advance, a sheet of water, the surface of which glistened with a supernatural light. Arriving at the edge of this mysterious lake, which might well pass for the river Styx, a boat approached from the opposite shore, drawn by means of a rope. Numerous dark-looking imps were at work dragging it through the water. The sides rippled in the sluggish pool, and a hollow reverberation sounded from the dark walls of the cavern.

A gate-way was thrown open, and we descended some steps and entered the boat. It was a square, flat-bottomed craft, decorated with fancy colors, containing seats on each side, and capable of accommodating a large party. We took our places, and at a signal from the guide the boat moved slowly and silently over the dark depths, which seemed almost of inky blackness in the gloom.

As we thus floated on the infernal pool the solitude was awful. I could not but shudder at the thought that we were nearly five hundred feet beneath the surface of the earth. The dismal black walls, roughly hewn from the solid stratum of salt and marl; the tremendous heights overhead, and the apparent great depth underneath; the fitful glare of the torches, the rough, grimy faces of the attendants, and their wild costumes, gave a peculiarly infernal aspect to the scene. It was weird and sombre beyond conception.

We stopped a while in the middle of the lake to notice the strange effect of the plashing of the waters, when disturbed by a rocking motion of the boat, against the massive walls on either side. The reverberation was fearfully deep, rolling and swelling from point to point, till lost in the labyrinth of shafts and crevices far in the distance. Around and above us were innumerable ruffed points jutting out from the solid stratum, and archways reaching across deep fissures, and beams of timber braced against overhanging masses of rock. The sombre hue of the toppling canopy and rugged walls was relieved only by the points of crystal salt upon which the lights glistened; mysterious shadows flitted in the air; and pale, greenish scintillations shot out of the gloom. It was, in truth, a subterranean universe of darkness, made visible by torches of grease and stars of salt, with an infernal sea in its midst, and inhabited by a very doubtful set of people, half earthly and wholly Satanic in appearance.

Continuing our voyage, after some minutes we approached a point beyond which all was an unfathomable wilderness of jagged walls and yawning caverns. Suddenly a blaze of blue fire burst from the gloom, throwing a ghastly hue over the crystal pinnacles, then faded slowly away. The guides now covered their lights, and we were left in utter darkness. Groans and cries were heard in the air, and plashing sounds echoed from the shores of the infernal lake. As these ceased a terrific report broke upon the stillness, and out of the gloom arose a blaze of red fire, gradually assuming shape till it stood before us in the form of a magnificent triumphal arch, bearing upon its front the illuminated motto,--

=Glück-Auf!=

signifying, "Good luck to you!" or, literally, "Luck upon it!" the famous greeting of the miners. Under this triumphal arch we passed slowly into an immense chamber, of such vast proportions and rugged outline that the eye failed to penetrate its profound depths. Then from various corridors, high among the conglomerate crags, descended mysterious voices, crying, one after another, "Glück-auf! Glück-auf! Glück-auf!" till the reverberation united them all in a grand chorus, so deep, so rich, varied, and powerful that mortal ears could encompass no more. Was it real? Could these be human voices and earthly sounds, or were they the distempered fantasy of a dream?

At a signal from our guide the chorus ceased, and shooting fires broke out from the toppling heights, and the whole grand chamber, in all its majesty, was illuminated with showers of colored stars. The inverted arches of fire in the water--the reflected images of rocks, corridors and precipices--the sudden contrasts of light and gloom--the scintillations of the crystal salt points--formed a scene of miraculous and indescribable grandeur. Unable to control my enthusiasm, I shouted at the top of my voice, "Glück-auf! Glück-auf!" The cry was caught up by the guides and torch-bearers; it arose and was echoed from rock to rock by the chorus singers, till, like the live thunder, it leaped

"the rattling crags among." ...

After visiting many chapels and shrines cut out of the solid salt, we emerged into the Chamber of Letow, the magnificent saloon of Entertainment, where, on grand occasions, such as the visit of the Emperor or any member of the imperial family, the whole of this vast chamber is brilliantly illuminated. Six splendid chandeliers, carved from the crystal salt, hang from the ceiling. An alcove at the upper end, approached from a series of steps, contains a throne of green and ruby-colored salt upon which the Emperor sits. Transparent pictures and devices are arranged in the background to give additional splendor to the imperial boudoir, and the crystallizations with which the walls glitter reflect the many colored lights with a dazzling effect. The door-ways, statues, and columns are decorated with flowers and evergreens; the floors are sprinkled with salts of various hues; the galleries are festooned with flags; and the whole chamber is aglow with transparencies and brilliant lights....

Although the mass of the stratum of which this grand chamber is composed is of a darkish color, yet the very darkness of the ground-work serves all the better to show by contrast the glittering points of salt. The effect is inconceivably rich. The arched roof; the high rugged walls, hewn out of the solid rock; the marks of the pick and chisel visible in furrows all over, all sparkling with saline gems, give the whole cavern the appearance of being studded with diamonds. It reminds one of the grottoes under the sea described by Gulnare in the Arabian Nights. When it is considered, too, that all this splendor and these festivities--the illuminated galleries and alcoves, the chandeliers and decorations, the vast concourse of guests, the music, the dancing, the wild and fanciful costumes--are five hundred feet below the surface of the earth, it is no exaggeration to say that the spectacle is unparalleled. Nothing to equal it in a similar way can be seen in any other part of the world. We next descended by a series of stairways to the third story. This differs but little from those already described, except that the deeper one goes the wilder and more rugged become the ramifications of the mines. At one point in our journey we entered a spacious chamber some eighty or one hundred feet high. Here the guide paused, and in an impressive manner struck his stick against the floor. When the reverberation had ceased he announced the important circumstance that we now stood directly under the Infernal Lake! "Ya! mein Herr," said he, "that wonderful lake, over which we sailed in a boat not half an hour ago, is over our heads, and if it should break through it would drown every one of us!" "Rather an unpleasant pickle," I thought, but could not translate the pun into German, and so let it pass.

It appears that the waters of this lake found a vent at one time, and deluged a large portion of the mines, and those of the panic-stricken operatives who were distant from the main shafts communicating with the surface of the earth were suffocated while attempting to escape. Others, in their fright, fled at random, and, falling into deep pits, were dashed to atoms. In 1644 another destructive fire took place. All the wood-work was seized by the devouring flames, men and horses were roasted to death, and many of the workmen who escaped subsequently died of their injuries. This was one of the most fearful conflagrations on record. It lasted an entire year. The chambers and tunnels, deprived of their support, fell together in many places, causing immense destruction to the works. Even a considerable portion of the town of Wieliczka sank into the earth, and was engulfed in the general ruin.

THE JUMPING PROCESSION AT ECHTERNACH.

M. OGLE.

[The modern enlightenment of Europe is a class enlightenment
only. The mass of many populations still dwell in the shadow
of mediæval superstition. As one example of this we append the
following description of a curious religious mania, a relic from
the centuries of mediævalism. The party of travellers with whom
we have to deal had seen all there was to see in Trier (Treves),
and the suggestion was made to go see the jumping procession at
Echternach, which would come off on Whit-Tuesday. An expedition
thither was accordingly organized.]

Our party was to consist of three carriage loads, and our escort were all to be _en civile_, and this last determination, I may remark, was, to a Prussian officer, a very weighty one. A Prussian officer, be it known, is always in uniform; the government do not hide away the army that fights their battles, protects their soil, and upholds their honor, for fear of wounding the susceptibilities and irritating the nerves of the working classes; the country is proud of its army, and the army is proud of its uniform, and, as a rule, a Prussian officer always wears it. On this occasion, however, the uniform was to be doffed, and the extent and style of our friends' respective possessions _en civile_, and their appearance under the metamorphosis, became a very important item in the general arrangements. Some gloried in the perfection of their projected "get up;" one or two had never possessed a suit of plain clothes since they entered the army; one had everything but a hat; another, having come from Dusseldorf on leave, was incapable of the transformation; still, with this one exception, all were looking forward to appearing, for one day, as civilians.

At a quarter to five on Whit-Tuesday we started in our carriage to seek a "topper" for our host and relative, Herr V. Hartstein Hochstein, four of his brother officers having generously promised him the required article. Our first venture was an unlucky one; the borrowed hat would not remain on Hartstein's head, and though we made every possible effort to stretch it with feet and knees, our efforts were unavailing, and we had to try again. The second friend acknowledged that he had recklessly promised what he was incapable of performing; a third passed out a hat of indifferent color, and which, on trial, at once extinguished our friend as far as his coat collar. In fear and dread, and with incessant reference to our watches, we drove to our fourth and last hope. Here a hat, carefully wrapped in a number of the _Cölnische Zeitung_, was handed to us, and with a little manoeuvring we settled that it might do. Having "requisitioned" two colored bandanas from a friend who was getting himself up for the expedition with the most elaborate care, Hartstein put his head into our hands, and by dint of wrapping, and twisting, and folding, the hat was firmly settled in its place, without other inconvenience than the corner of a red pocket-handkerchief occasionally falling over his nose, and another corner permanently hanging over his left ear.

But these were comparative trifles; we reached the fine old Moselle Bridge, not much behind time, found our friends awaiting us, and started. This bridge, one of the many Roman monuments with which this strange old city abounds, was built in the reign of Augustus; only a portion of the massive foundation, and a few of the grand original pillars formed of enormous blocks of basalt, and fastened together by huge iron clamps, now remain. In all probability the bridge would still be standing in its integrity had it not been for "the most civilized nation of modern Europe," who did their best, under their great king Louis XIV., to destroy this magnificent memorial of old world times. The ruined arches were restored and the bridge partially rebuilt by one of the Prince Electors in 1717, and in spite of its restoration, it is even now worthy of the venerable city to which it belongs.

Crossing the bridge, we turned to the right, and passing the village of Pallien, soon reached the foot of a spur of the Eifel range, a mountainous tract in the Province of Lower Rhine, extending from Coblenz, through Trier and Metz, into France. On these Eifel mountains are many extinct volcanoes; the soil is only suited for the pine-forests which cover their sides; and the dirty, rough, and poverty-stricken look of the villagers among the scattered and desolate hamlets marks them unmistakably as charcoal-burners.

After literally winding our way through this wild scenery for more than an hour, we suddenly came upon the lovely valley of the Sauer; so lovely that it is said to have attracted Willibrod by its beauty to found his Benedictine monastery on the river's banks; beautiful indeed it is, with its wooded hills and cultivated slopes; and beautiful it must have been so to have enthralled a worn and weary monk and missionary in the eighth century.

But before entering the valley I must relate a slight incident that occurred, as it especially characterizes a social phase in Prussia. We were anxiously toiling up a steep incline in single file, not even daring to rest our horses, for fear they should not be able to hold up the carriages, when a sudden turn showed us a small public-house at the top of the hill, in front of which sat a young _Fähnrich_ (ensign). Two large carts laden with forage stood directly across the road, occupying its entire width, and two troopers, looking remarkably the worse for dirt, with pipes in their mouths, hands in their pockets, and outstretched legs in the form of a reversed V, quietly contemplated our struggling and perilous ascent. "In God's name," shouted the driver of the first carriage, "make room for us up there; we cannot halt, and if we cannot get on the level we shall roll backward, and all be killed." No answer and no movement; we were becoming desperate. One of the officers _en civile_, forgetting his present insignificance, put out his head and shouted, "Move your carts, pigs, or I'll know the reason why; would you see us all roll back to perdition?" "Roll away, holiday burghers, roll away," contemptuously drawled out one of the chivalrous troopers, "the royal forage is not going to move for you."