Across the Mulde -- Scenery -- Feet _versus_ Wheels --
Villages -- English Characteristics -- Timbered Houses --
Schneeberg -- Stones for Lamps -- The Way Sunday was Kept
-- The Church -- A Wagon-load of Music -- A Surly Host --
Where the Pepper Grows -- Eybenstock -- Neustädl -- Fir
Forests -- Wildenthal -- Four Sorts of Beer -- Potato
Dumplings -- Up the Auersberg -- Advertisements -- The
School -- The Instrument of Order -- "Look at the
Englishman" -- The Erzgebirge -- The Guard-house -- Into
Bohemia -- Romish Symbols -- Hirschenstand -- Another
Guard-house -- Differences of Race -- Czechs and Germans --
Shabby Carpentry -- Change of Scenery -- Neudeck -- Arrive
at Carlsbad -- A Glass Boot -- Gossip.
The road crosses the Mulde near Oberhaselau, and, winding onwards
between broad, undulating fields, and through patches of forest, rises
gradually, though with frequent ups and downs, into a region more and
more hilly. A bareness of aspect increases on the landscape as you
advance, in contrast with which the stripes and squares of cultivation
on the slopes appear of shining greenness. The views grow wider. They
are peculiar and striking, though deficient in beauty, for the range
of the _Erzgebirge_, as the name indicates, hides its wealth
underground, and makes up by store of mineral treasure for poverty of
surface. Yet, is there not a charm in the tamest of mountain scenery?
It animated me as I walked along on that bright sunshiny morning.
Though the river was far out of sight, were there not a few ponds
gleaming in the hollows? while little brooks ran tinkling down their
unseen channels, and fountains began to appear at the wayside with a
ceaseless sound of bubbling and splashing that fell gratefully on the
ear; and the breeze made a gladsome rustling among the birches that
flung their graceful shadows across the dusty road. Nature is kind to
him who goes on foot, and makes him aware of beauties and delights
never discovered to the traveller on wheels.
There are signs of a numerous population: church spires and villages
in the distance--among them Reichenbach and its ruined castle--and in
little valleys which branch off here and there, teeming with foliage,
snug cottages thickly nestled; and as your eye wanders along the
broken line of tree-tops, it sees many wavy columns of smoke betraying
the site of rural homes scattered beneath. And you begin to notice
something unfamiliar in the dress of the people who inhabit them: blue
and red petticoats are frequent, and scarcely a man but wears the
straight tight-legged boots up to the knee, all black and brightly
polished; for the groups I met were on their way to church. The honest
English style of countenance still prevails; and another English
characteristic may be seen, if you look for it, in the decayed and
illegible condition of the finger-posts.
If the landscape be not picturesque, many of the houses are, with
their timbers, forming zigzags, angles, squares, diamonds, and other
fanciful conceits. Some old and gray, assimilating in colour to the
weather-stained masonry; some painted black in strong relief upon a
pale-red wall. While pausing to examine the details, you will not fail
to admire the taste and skill of the builders of three centuries ago,
who knew how to impart beauty even to the humblest habitations. Now
and then you come upon a house of which the upper storey, faced with
slates, appears as if supported by arches and pilasters fashioned in
the wall beneath; and specimens of these several kinds of architecture
gratify the eye in all the hill-country of Saxony.
Schneeberg, lying in a valley backed by a dark slope of firs, has a
singularly gloomy aspect, which disappears as you descend the hill. It
was eleven on Sunday morning when I entered the town. Because summer
had come, the street lamps were all taken down; but that the chains
and ropes might not hang idle, the lamplighter had tied a big stone or
large brick, by no means ornamental, to the end of every one. A
military band was playing in the market-place; a few shops were open;
and a man hurrying from corner to corner was posting up bills of plays
to be acted in the evening--a little comedy, followed by a piece in
five acts. The prices were, for the first places, 6d., the second,
3d., the third, 2d., which would hardly exclude even the poorest. So,
in Saxony, as elsewhere on the Continent, not only Papists but
Protestants are willing to recreate themselves with music and the
theatre on a Sunday. A half-dozen postilions, who were strutting about
in the full blaze of bright-yellow coats, yellow-banded hats,
jack-boots, and with a bugle slung from the shoulder, seemed as proud
of their dress as the peacocky drum-major did of his.
I ordered a steak at the _Fürstenhaus_. "Will you have it
through-broiled or English-broiled?" asked the waiter, and looked a
little surprised at my preference of the former. When the band stopped
playing, numbers of the listeners came into the dining-room for a
_Halbe_ of beer, and sat down to play at cards.
The church, a spacious edifice, crowns the height above the
market-place. After walking twice round it, I discovered a small door
in an angle, which being unfastened gave me admittance. The interior,
with its worn and uneven brick floor, has somewhat of a neglected
look, not unusual in Protestant churches; but there are a few good
paintings, and the altar-piece, representing the Crucifixion, shows
the hand of a master. I was quite alone, and could explore as I
pleased. The altar rises to a great height, adorned with statues, and
crowned by figures of angels. Near it two or three tall crucifixes
lean against the wall; the font, and a lectern upborne by an angel
stand in the centre of the nave, and everywhere are signs of the
Lutheran form of worship. Here and there, constructed with an apparent
disregard of order, are glazed galleries, pews, and closets, and
others that resemble large cages--ugly excrescences, which mar the
fair proportions of the lofty nave. The gallery is fronted by a thick
breastwork of masonry, bearing a heavy coping, and the brick floor is
in many places worn completely through, and the loose lumps are strewn
about. The view from the tower, commanding miles of the mountain
range, more than repays the trouble of the ascent.
There are three services on the Sunday. From six to seven, and from
eight to half-past nine in the morning, and from one to two in the
afternoon. The rest of the day is free; but not for work, as in other
countries. Haymaking, as I was informed, is the only Sunday work
permitted by the law of Saxony. The Sunday school is well attended,
and is not confined to religious subjects, for writing, arithmetic,
and drawing are taught.
While trudging up the hill beyond the town, I passed one of the
springless country wagons, crammed with a military band, the fiddles
and big bass viol hanging behind, on the way to amuse the folk at
Stein with music. They undertake a similar expedition every Sunday in
fine weather to one or other of the surrounding villages.
I met with two novel experiences during the afternoon. One was, that
to sit down in the church at Neustädl is a penance, for the pews are
so narrow that you have to lift up the hinged seat before you can
enter. The other, a few miles farther on the way, was of a surly
_Wirth_, dwelling under the sign of the _Weisses Lamm_ (White Lamb),
whom I begged to draw me a glass of beer cool from the cellar. Instead
of complying, he filled the measure from a can which had been standing
two or three hours on the dresser in all the suffocating heat of the
stove, and placed it before me with a grunt. I ventured to remind him,
with good-humoured words, that lukewarm beer was not acceptable to a
thirsty wayfarer on a hot day; whereupon he retorted, snarling more
like a wolf than a lamb, "Either drink that, or go and get other
where the pepper grows"--_wo der Pfeffer wächst_.
The old sinner availed himself of a form of speech much used among the
Germans to denote a place of intensely high temperature, and
sulphureous withal, in which pepper, being so very pungent a product,
may be supposed to grow.
"Suppose you go first," I answered, "and see if there be any left."
And turning away, I shut the door upon the snarl which he snarled
after me, and went on to Eybenstock, where cool beer in plenty was
forthcoming as soon as asked for.
I told the hostess of my adventure with old Surly. "Just like him,"
she replied, laughing merrily; "nobody ever goes to the _White Lamb_
that can help it. You didn't see any one besides him in the room, I'll
engage." True enough, I did not.
A long, steep acclivity rises between Schneeberg and Eybenstock, from
which you look down into deep, dark gulfs of fir forest, and away to
hills swelling higher and higher in the distance--all alike sombre. So
that when you come to a green vale, with its little hay-fields watered
by a noisy brook, streaked in places with foam, it appears lovely by
contrast. The road makes long curves and zigzags to avoid the heights,
but the old track through the trees still remains, and shortens the
distance at the expense of a little exertion in climbing.
The wildness increases beyond Eybenstock. The forest descends upon the
road, and you walk for an hour at a stretch under the shade of firs,
with beech and birch sparsely intermingled, and here and there a
stately pine springing from a mighty base to a height far above the
rest, the topmost branches edged with gold by the declining sunbeams.
Emerging from the grateful shade, we come to Wildenthal, a little
green hollow at the foot of the Auersberg, enclosing a saw-mill, a
school, a few cottages, fields and gardens, and an inn, _Gasthaus zum
Ross_. Great slopes of firs rising on every side shut it out, as it
were, from the rest of the world. The aged hostess at the _Gasthaus_
bustled about with surprising alacrity to answer the calls of her
rustic guests for beer. "_Einfach_," cried one; another, "_Weisses_;"
"_Lager_," broke in a voice from among the party of card-players,
accompanied by a rapping of the pewter tankard-lid; "_Bayerisches_,"
shouted others from the ninepin-alley outside; and she, with her ready
"_Gleich_"--directly--appeasing their impatience.
Of these four kinds of beer, the first--literally Simple--is
equivalent to our small-beer, and is much in request by a certain
class of topers from its low price, and because they can drink it the
whole day without fear of becoming stupid before the evening. The
second--White--is very foamy, and has somewhat the lively flavour of
ginger-beer: after standing some time in the glass a shake round
revives its briskness. The third--Store-beer--is of sufficient
strength to bear a year's keeping; and the fourth--Bavarian--is of a
similar quality. The last two were the most to my liking.
There was greater choice of beer than of viands; and the half-bent old
dame thought fit to apologise because she could give me nothing for
supper but omelettes and _Klese_; the latter a sort of dumpling made
of potatoes and a sprinkling of wheaten flour. "If she had only
known," and so forth. However, I found them palatable, and ate
heartily, and therein she took comfort. Many times did I eat of such
dumplings afterwards, for the relish for them is not confined to
Saxony. Under the name of _Knädeln_, or _Kipfeln_, they are a standing
dish among the Bohemians. To hundreds of families in the _Erzgebirge_
they are the only variety--but without the wheaten flour--in a
perpetual potato diet: rarely can they get even the sour black bread
of the country, and in the years of the potato disease famine and
misery desolated many a hearth.
The guests went away early, and then, as twilight fell, nothing
disturbed the stillness of the vale save the murmur of running water
and the whisper of the breeze among the slopes of firs, inviting to a
contemplative stroll.
I rose on the morrow soon after the sun, and scrambled up the
Auersberg. It was really a scramble, for I pushed at a venture into
the forest, aiming direct for the summit. How the grass and the
diminutive black-eared rye glistened with dewdrops! Early as it was,
the saw-mill had begun its busy clatter, and here and there on the
hills the woodcutters' strokes sounded in the calm morning air. Once
under the trees all signs of a track disappeared; and there were
slopes slippery with decayed vegetation; little swamps richly carpeted
with exquisite mosses; dense patches of bilberry, teeming with berries
as purple ripe as when Kunz plucked in another part of the forest but
a few miles distant. And after all, owing to the tower on the top
having fallen down, and the trees having grown up, the view is
limited to a narrow opening on either side, where an avenue, now
rarely used, affords an easy though tedious ascent. A square block of
stone stands near the remains of the tower, dedicated to an upper
forest-master, who had fulfilled fifty years of service, by his
friends and subordinates. However, there is such a charm in the wild,
lonely forest, that one need not regret half an hour's exertion in
scrambling up a steep hill under its shadow.
I amused myself during breakfast with the _Erzgebirgischer Anzeiger_,
a small quarto newspaper, published at Schneeberg thrice a week; the
price twelve _neugroschen_ (about fifteen pence) per quarter. Beer and
amusements occupied a large space among the advertisements; for every
village and every _Wirthshaus_ in the forest, of any notoriety,
promised music or dancing on Sundays, sometimes both; and fortunate
was the one that could announce the military band. Double _Lager_
beer, a penny the pot, was offered in abundance sufficient to satisfy
the thirstiest. "Stewed meat and fresh sausages next Friday," is the
inducement held out by one ambitious little alehouse: and an
enterprising refectioner declares, "In my garden it gives fine
weather." And, as the _Dresdner Anzeiger_ shows, they do similar
things in the metropolis. A coffee-house keeper, "up four steps,"
says: "My most honoured sir, I permit myself the freedom to invite you
to a cup of coffee next Sunday afternoon at three o'clock." Certain
young men publish their sentiments concerning their hostess, beginning
with
"Angels until now have led thee,"
and so on. A fortunate husband and father thanks Madame Krändel for
the "happy _Entbindung_" of his wife, and publishes his wife's maiden
name. Parents announce the death of a child, and invite their friends
to "quiet sympathy." A stray Berlin paper makes it clear that a like
practice prevails in the capital of Prussia. But most amusing of all
was the advertisement, in French and English, of the landlord of the
_Golden Star_, at Bonn. Here it is:
"De cet hôtel la renommée
Promet sans exagération
Que vous y trouverez
Le comble de la perfection.
Le luxe de la salle à manger
Surpassera même votre idée."
"By all visitors of the Rhine
Known as one of the most fine
And best conducted models
Of all Continental hotels.
The dining-room allowed to be
A grand pattern of luxury."
Which does not say much for the bard of Bonn. Besides these there was
the _Illustrated Village Barber_, a paper published at Leipzig, full
of humorous cuts, over which the rustics chuckled not a little.[A]
Wildenthal has no church; the people, therefore, are dependent on
Eybenstock, three miles distant, for sermons, baptisms, marriages, and
burials; but, in common with other villages, it has a good
schoolhouse. Hearing the sound of voices as I passed, I went in, and
had a talk with the master, who was a model of politeness. He had
about a hundred scholars, of both sexes, in a room well-lighted and
ventilated, with a spelling-frame, and black music board, ruled for
four parts, and other appliances of education placed along the walls.
Threepence a week--two and a half _neugroschen_--is the highest rate
paid at country schools; but there are two lower rates to suit folk of
scanty means, and the very poorest pay nothing. The children attend
school from the age of six up to fourteen, with no vacations except a
fortnight at each of the three rural ingatherings--haymaking, harvest,
and potato-digging. The hours of attendance are from seven to ten in
the forenoon, one to four in the afternoon.
"Yes, they are pretty good children," said the master, in reply to my
inquiry; "I have not much trouble to keep them in order; but, in case
of need, here is a little instrument (_kleines Instrument_) which
comes to my aid;" and he produced a small birch from a secret place
behind his desk.
A general nudging went through the school, and quick, sly looks from
one to the other, at sight of the interwoven twigs. "Ha! ha!" cried
the master, "you see they recognise it. However, 'tis very seldom
called for."
Then, mounting his rostrum, he said: "Now, children, tell me--which is
the most famous country in the world?"
"_Eng-land!_" from all the hundred voices.
"Is it a most highly renowned country?"
"_Ja--ja--ja!_"
"And how is the chief city named?"
"_Lundun_"--the _u_ sounded as in full.
"And when Saxony wants factories, and steam-engines, and
spinning-machinery, and railways, who is it sends them hither, or
comes over and makes them?"
"_Eng-land!_" again, and with enthusiasm.
"Good. Now, children, look at the _Herr_ standing here by my
side--look at him, I say, for he comes from that famous
country--_Eng-land!_"
It was a trial to my courage to become thus unexpectedly the object
for all eyes, and feeling bound to say something in return for the
master's compliment, I replied that, "If England did do so much for
Saxony, it was only paying back in another form the prowess and vigour
which the Saxons long time ago had carried into England. Moreover, in
Saxony all children could read; but in England there were many boys
and girls who could not read."
"Is it possible!" exclaimed the master, holding up his hands. "How can
that be?"
"It is part of our liberty. Any one in England is perfectly free to be
ignorant if he likes it best."
"Remarkable!" answered the dominie; and he inquired concerning the
amount of salary paid to schoolmasters in England. His own appeared
very small in comparison; but were it not that bread was unusually
dear, and firewood five dollars the _Klafter_--notwithstanding the
vast forests--he was quite content, and could live in comfort.
Beyond Wildenthal, the ascent is almost continuous: now the road
traverses a clearing where the new undergrowth hides the many
scattered stumps; now a grassy slope thickly bestrewn with wild
flowers; now a great breadth of forest, where boulders peer out
between the stems, and brooks flow noisily, and long bunches of hairy
moss hang from the branches, and the new shoots of the firs, tipped
with amber and gold, glisten and glow in the light of the morning sun.
Ever deeper into the hills; the solitude interrupted now and then by a
gang of charcoal-burners with their wagons, or an aristocratic
carriage, or an humble chaise, speeding on its way from Carlsbad. Or
the sound of the axe echoes through the wood, followed by the crash of
a falling tree. And always the wind murmurs among the trees, swelling
at times to a fitful roar.
I saw a stone-breaker at work, afflicted with a huge goitre. He earns
a dollar and a half per week, and complains sadly of the dearness of
bread, and the hardness of the blue granite.
Gradually the tall forest gives place to scrubby-looking firs, stony
patches, rough with hardy heath, offering a wild and dreary prospect.
Presently a square stone, standing by the road, exhibits on one side
_K. Sachsen_ (Kingdom of Saxony), on the other _K. Boehmen_, and
passing this you are in Bohemia. Near it is the guard-house, where two
soldiers are always on the watch. One of them asked me if my knapsack
contained anything for duty, accepted my negative without demur, and
invited me to sit down and have a chat on the turfy seat by the side
of the door. It was a pleasure to see a new face, for their life was
very monotonous, looking out, from noon of one day to noon of the
next, for honest folk and smugglers, suffering none to pass
unquestioned. They were not much troubled with contrabandists, for
these free-traders shun the highway, and cross the frontier by secret
paths in lonely parts of the mountains.
The summit here forms a table-land some three thousand feet above the
sea-level, with a prospect by no means cheering; limited by the
stunted firs, except towards the south-west, where a few black,
dreary-looking undulations terminate the view. The road, however, soon
begins to descend to a less inhospitable region, and presently makes a
sudden dip, for the slope of the _Erzgebirge_, long and gradual
towards Saxony, is abrupt on the Bohemian side. The other mountain
ranges present a similar formation. Then we come to tall trees, and
grassy glades, stony clearings, and acres of bilberries. A little
farther, and the sight of a crucifix, bearing a gilt Christ, by the
wayside, and of miserable wooden cottages, roofed with shingles,
convinces you that the frontier is really crossed. A valley opens
where haymakers are busy; the men wearing the straight tight boots,
the women barefoot, and with a kerchief pinned hood-fashion under the
chin. "_Gelobt sei Jesus Christus_"--Praised be Jesus Christ--salute
the children as you pass, and some of them stand still with an
expectant look. Then posts, and a toll-bar, painted in the diagonal
stripes of black and yellow, which symbolise imperial Austria. The bar
is kept down, but sufficiently high above the ground for a man to walk
under it without ducking. Having passed this you are in
Hirschenstand--the first Bohemian village.
"Perhaps you come out of Saxony?" said a man, stepping from a house
that had a double eagle above the door, and holding out his hand for
my passport.
He was very civil, and also very positive in his assurance that he
could not grant me a _visa_ for Prague; only for Carlsbad, and he
wished me a pleasant journey. A few yards farther I turned into the
inn to dine, and at once met with characteristic specimens of the two
races who inhabit Bohemia. There was the German, with a round, flat,
hairy face, stolid in expression, and somewhat sluggish in movement,
and by his side the Czech, or Stock-Bohemian, whose oval countenance,
high intellectual forehead, arched eyebrows, clear olive complexion,
unrelieved by moustache or whisker, presented a marked contrast; the
Sclavonian, bright-eyed and animated; the Teuton, dull and heavy. Yet
the latter is gaining upon his lively neighbour. The German population
is every year increasing, and the Czechish language is spoken within a
narrower circle. The contrast between the two races will be something
for observation during our walk, and with another noticeable
difference when we approach the frontier of Silesia.
There was something peculiar in the room as well as in the guests; at
one side a tall clock, and very tall candlesticks; in the middle a
chopping-block, bearing a heap of sausage-meat; a washing-tub and
copper-pans in one corner, and on the opposite side a species of
bagatelle-board, on which the ball is expected to find its way into
the holes between long palisades of little wires: an exciting game;
for even the slow German was quickened as he watched the constant
repulsions of the little globe hovering round the highest number only
to fail of entering.
Here, too, were the tall wooden chairs which are seldom seen beyond
the Austrian frontier. It made me smile to renew acquaintance with the
lanky, spider-legged things. Not the most comfortable contrivance for
dispelling weariness, as you would perhaps think, reader, were you to
see one. They are, however, very cheap; not more than thirty-five
kreutzers apiece, made of pine, and a florin when of hard wood. Both
curiosities in their way.
Hirschenstand will hardly prepossess you in favour of Bohemian
villages, for its houses are shabby boarded structures, put up with a
wonderful disregard of order and neatness--windows all awry, the
chimney anyhow, and the fit of the door a scandal to carpentry. And
the cottages scattered about the valley, and for some distance along
the road, preserve the family likeness strongly marked. They would
have a touch of the picturesque with far projecting eaves, but the
roofs are not made to overhang. You might easily fancy that the land
had not yet recovered from the effects of the exterminating Hussite
wars, out of which arose the proverb, "Scarce as Bohemian villages."
But Carlsbad is nearly seven hours distant, and we must hasten
onwards. The road still descends: the prospect opens over forests far
broader than on the Saxon side: valleys branch off, and the scenery
improves. Rocks choke the brooks, and burst out from the slopes; rows
of ash, lime, and cherry-trees, bordering the road, succeed to the
firs, and large whitewashed houses with tall roofs to the shabby
cottages. Then iron works; and little needle factories driven by a
mere spoutful of water rattling and buzzing merrily as grasshoppers.
Then Neudeck, where a high rock overtops the houses, and projects into
the street, having the appearance, when first seen, of an ancient
tower. We shall see similar strange-looking rocks, from time to time,
on the hill-side, as if to prepare us for rocky scenes of wonderful
character in a subsequent part of our travel. A high steep hill close
to the town is cut up with zigzags, by which the devout may ascend
from station to station to the Calvary on the top, from whence the
view, at all events, will repay the trouble. The road was made, and
the stations and chapel were built, at the cost of an ancient maiden
lady, who a few years ago expended 27,000 dollars in the purchase of
the hill for the good of her soul.
Now the road descends through a vale between broad fields of wheat and
potatoes, to the smoky porcelain manufacturing town of Alt, where your
eye will, perhaps, be attracted by a few pretty faces among the women,
set off by a pink, blue, or green jacket, and petticoat of a different
colour. But for the most part the women have a dowdy appearance, of
which the Czechs, as we shall by-and-by see, exhibit the dowdiest
examples.
Still the road descends towards the black group of hills which
encircle Carlsbad. It was nearly dark when I crossed the bridge and
entered the celebrated watering-place. At first I thought every house
an inn, for every front carries a sign--somewhat puzzling to a belated
stranger. At length the _Gasthof zum Morgenstern_ opened its door to
receive me; much to my comfort, for I was very tired, having walked
altogether thirty miles. Great was my enjoyment of rest. At supper the
landlord brought the beer in a large boot-shaped glass, and placed it
before me with the chuckling remark that he liked his guests to be
able to say they had one time in their lives drunk out of a boot.
His wife, who appeared to be as good-humoured as she was
good-looking, amused me with her gossip. Her especial delight was to
laugh at the peculiarities of her guests, and their mistakes in
speaking German. One, a bilious Greek, had come down one morning with
his hand to his head complaining of _Fuss-schmerz_--foot-ache. The
Saxons, she said, could not cook, or make good butter, and were ready
to drink a quart of any kind of brown fluid, and believe it to be
coffee.
FOOTNOTE:
[A] In Saxony there are published 220 newspapers; in Austria, 271; in
Bavaria, 178.