We are in Berlin, magnificent Berlin: what can I say for it? better,
what can’t I say for it? It seems to be a city where all requirements
are met and filled; nothing being left undone that would gratify the
taste of the most critical connoisseur. Here we see the best in art;
royalty, your next-door neighbor, keeping a respectful distance,
however. Beauty everywhere, stores laden with the choicest wares
(reasonable, too), more soldiers than you could ever possibly look at;
at every turn, nook, and corner, one of these uniform knights bobs up
in sight; and wherever you read the word “Verboden” it means exactly
that, and you quietly acquiesce. If it were not for some of these
little differences you could scarcely realize you were anywhere else
but in an American city. Berlin, like Paris and London, knows no night,
as social evil is equally as great here as in these two other great
cities. They are lax in their treatment of these night prowlers. You
can’t help but think that its splendor will soon equal that of Rome,
and its licentiousness not far behind. At the close of the Thirty
Years’ War, 1648, Berlin had only a few hundred inhabitants. It is now
one of the world’s great cities. The phenomenal rise of Prussia and its
predominance in German affairs gave to its leading city immense
influence and remarkable prosperity, Prussia making herself the leader
of the movement that finally welded together the twenty-six states now
constituting the German Empire, with the Prussian King as Kaiser. It is
essentially modern, and, despite the disadvantages of its location, is
without doubt one of the handsomest cities of Europe. Notable among its
many fine buildings are the Royal Palace and that of the Emperor and
Crown Prince, and the Royal Library, containing a million volumes. We
visited the winter and summer homes (palaces) of the present king and
queen, the Mausoleum at Charlottenburg, and the palace of Frederick the
Great at Potsdam. We passed through the park, Sans Souci, with its
great fountain, around whose basin stand eight marble figures, of which
the Venus (Pigalle) is the most beautiful. Straight ahead we ascended a
broad flight of steps, sixty-six feet high, broken by six terraces,
edged by the most beautiful roses extending their vast length, then by
the graves of Frederick the Great’s dogs. The Emperor himself wished to
be buried here, that he might truly be sans souci. We now enter the
palace of Sans Souci, consisting of only one story. The rooms are in
the same order as Frederick left them. The most interesting apartment
throughout was the room of Voltaire, with its curious wood-carving and
painted walls, designed by Frederick to represent the character of the
French—the peacock typifying his vanity, the ape his mimicry, the
parrot his garrulity. The great infidel visited and died here, where he
taught the king French, and at one time criticising the king’s efforts
at bookmaking so severely that he was held in great disfavor by
Frederick. We had an extra privilege in the new palace, the summer home
of the present Emperor, he being absent on a visit to some of his fifty
or more palaces. We were allowed entrée, the palace being closed to
visitors from May till November. It contains two hundred apartments,
the Imperial family residing in the north wing. The Shell salon is most
beautiful, its entire ceiling and walls decorated with gorgeous shells
and precious stones—souvenirs brought back by William II. from his
travels. Some of the amethysts and topazes are as large as huge blocks
of coal.
We listened to Sousa play at the Royal Garden (for one mark). This is a
bewilderingly beautiful spot, lying adjacent to the Tier gardens, so
enchanting in the twilight. As we came down the Grand Boulevard (which
runs the full length of this wilderness of beauty), we saw groups (very
close together) of the most illustrious statuary in pure white marble,
standing the entire length of the wooded boulevard, like silent
sentinels keeping watch over this beautiful domain. Some of these were
not yet unveiled. All of them were the gift of the Kaiser. While
lingering in this enchanted spot, sipping wine and listening to Sousa
playing his inimitable “Washington Post,” we met at the same table a
gentleman who spoke good English—the very first we had heard since we
left home. We found him to be a celebrated musician, the head of the
Conservatory of Music, and he had been fifteen years with Theodore
Thomas in Cincinnati. He thoroughly enjoyed Sousa, and said “the
Germans were perfectly delighted with Sousa’s rendition of Wagner.”
What greater compliment could he expect?—their loved Wagner. We
conjectured a great deal on why Berlin should be so great a city, lying
away in the interior of the Empire, with no waterways; and why it
should be selected as the nucleus of the modern world of art, with its
grand institutions of learning, and constantly changing collections of
all that is truly new and admirable. One finds here the most varied
products of industrial art, such as bronze, brasswork, glass,
porcelain, etchings, lithographs, and carbon prints, side by side with
the most costly productions of modern art. If one only had the time,
they would have but to walk in some of the large salons, where in rapid
succession appear the works of both native and foreign artists, where
they can be enjoyed at one’s ease. “Unter den Linden,” with its double
rows of lime trees forming a fine avenue, is the finest Street in
Berlin. We were domiciled at the corner of “Unter den Linden” and
“Friedrich Strasse.” Around this street great numbers of celebrated
buildings are erected, from the close of the seventeenth century up to
the present, including the School of Arts and Sciences, royal stables,
universities and palaces of Kaiser Wilhelm I; the old Museum, a
beautiful building in Greek style, all abounding in collections of
choice antiques, art, in the way of frescos, bronzes, gems, vases,
pictures, stationery, and everything on earth to delight the eye of the
connoisseur as well as to tire it; so that royalty and its environs
lose half their interest when forced to gorge oneself day in and day
out. To say that every school of art on earth, from early Italian to
Dutch, Flemish, on down to modern art, is represented in a marked
degree of excellence, would be putting it mildly. We were taken by the
gentleman we met in the Royal Garden, after the concert, to the “Kaiser
Keller,” the well-known Delmonico or Sherry of Berlin. The edifice
calls for the admiration of all. “The Keller” is the corporation of an
idea which has floated in Schönner’s fancy for many years. It is the
expression in stone, iron, and wood of “Hauff’s Phantasy” in Brerner
Raths Keller. The happy manner in which the architect has managed to
clothe his conception renders a walk through the vault and its rooms
(and a stop-over for a drink) very attractive.
[Illustration]
For a few days we turn our heads away from the glitter and display of
royalty, to drink of the famous Wiesbaden waters and rest our eyes, for
a time at least. In Germany the average American, who rests so securely
under his time-honored banner, the Stars and Stripes, enjoying all the
comforts of modern civilization, cares very little about Germany’s
standing army or navy; for he feels sure that Uncle Sam can, with a
week’s notice or less, summon to his command an army or navy that could
lick any army they could encounter, or sink any foreign fleet they
decided upon. This large army of troops, ever in evidence, seems to be
as much in earnest as though the enemy lay in camp about them. We see a
little less of the military pomp and trappings in Wiesbaden than
Berlin, but every few steps stands a soldier by the gaudy portal of his
miniature home.