GREECE AND HER DELIVERER.
Four happy tramps in company, we passed the frontiers of Austria and
Bavaria, near Berchtesgaden, in the hazy shimmering of an autumn morning
sun. We came from the lakes and mountain regions of Upper Austria, and
already yearned towards Munich, the Bavarian capital, as our next station
and brief resting place. The sun seemed to have melted into the air, for
we walked through it rather than beneath it, and sought in vain for
coolness and shelter among the plum trees which lined the public road.
Halting as the night closed in at the frontier town, Reichenhall, with
its quaint old streets, and its distant fortress, casting a lengthened
protective shadow over the place, we felt the indescribable luxury of the
foot-traveller's rest; as readily enjoyed at such times on a litter of
straw in the common room of an alehouse as between the cumbersome
comforts of two German feather beds. Both the ale and the feather beds
were at our service at Reichenhall, and we did not neglect them.
In the morning our road lay by sombre, romantic Traunstein, and what was
better still, by the glistening waters of the lake of Chiem, whose broad
surface was so unruffled, that the wide expanse seemed to lie in a
hollow, and a delicious coolness whispered rather than blew across its
tranquil waves. The day was waning as we made a half circuit round the
edge of the lake, and the deepening night only stayed our steps and drove
us to rest, after a march of twenty-four miles, in the village of
Seebruck. At Rosenheim we were challenged by the Bavarian sentinel, who
held post on a stone bridge leading to the town, but it was rather in
kindliness than suspicion; and with some useful information as to our
route, and a cheering valediction, we pursued our way. The villages of
Weisham and Aibling lay before us, and must be passed before night; and
it was in the immediate neighbourhood of these places, although I confess
to some indistinctness as to the precise locality, that we came upon an
object which at once surprised and delighted us.
By the side of the road, on a slight elevation, stood a beautiful stone
monument, of the purest Grecian architecture, and of the most delicate
workmanship. It was fresh and sharp from the chisel of the sculptor, and
looked so stately and graceful in the midst of the level landscape and
simple village scenery that we halted spontaneously to examine it. "Can
it be the memorial of some battle?" exclaimed one. "Or a devotional
shrine?" "Or a tomb?" Not any one of these. Its purpose was as
singular as the sentiment it expressed would have been beautiful and
touching, but for its presumption. Graven deeply into the stone were
words in the German language to this effect: "This monument is raised in
remembrance of the parting of Louis, King of Bavaria, with his second son
Otho, who here left his bereaved father to become the Deliverer of
Greece." As we stood and read these words the vision of the fond father
and proud king, taking his last farewell of the son whom he fondly
believed destined to fulfil so great a mission, floated before us, to be
replaced the next instant by the no less eloquent picture of the court of
the then King Otho, a German colony in the midst of the Greek people,
living upon its blood, and wantoning with its treasure; and of this same
Greek people, driven at length into fury by the rapacity of the hated
Tudesca, who filled every position of authority and grasped at every
office of emolument, and hunting them like a routed army out of the land.
Still there was a depth of paternal affection in the words upon the
monument, which impressed us with respect, as the miniature temple, with
its delicate columns and classical proportions, had inspired us with
admiration.
We pursued our way along the dull road, now halting a moment to cool our
fevered feet, now restlessly shifting our knapsacks in the vain hope of
lightening the burden, when, being in the immediate neighbourhood of the
village of Aibling, we came upon a second monument equally classical in
form, though of less pretensions than the first. A twice-told tale,
uttered this time in a woman's accents; for the block of stone repeated
the same story in almost identical words.
"Here the Queen of Bavaria parted with her beloved second son Otho, only
comforted in her affliction by the knowledge that he has left her to
become the Deliverer of Greece."
The hopes of the King and Queen of Bavaria, thus unluckily commemorated
by these monuments, were no less at that time the hopes and the belief of
all Europe--with what little of prophetic spirit full twenty years of
experience has shown. Greece, swarming with Bavarian adventurers, till
goaded to the utmost she drove them from her bosom; Greece, bankrupt,
apathetic, and ungrateful; a Greek port blockaded by the ships of her
first defender, and her vessels held in pawn for the payment of a
miserable debt; Greece, piratical, dissembling, and rebellious, aiding in
her weak and greedy ambition the worst enemy of Europe--so runs the
story--but Greek deliverance not yet. Her joint occupation by French and
English forces, and the possible imposition of a provisional government,
may indeed lead to the unprophesied consummation--her deliverance--from
King Otho.
No doubt, those monuments of mingled weakness and arrogance still whiten
in the air; as for us, we continued our march towards the Bavarian
capital, slept at a pilgrimage church that night, and on the following
morning made a bargain with the driver of a country cart who had
overtaken us, and seated on the rough timber which formed his load,
jolted into Munich.
King Louis then reigned in Bavaria, but being so indifferent a prophet
could not foresee his own speedy abdication.