any notable distinguishing feature. The Cathedral of St. Benigne is the
oldest, dating in its present form from about 1280, though there are
portions which go back still farther. It was originally built as an
abbey church, but the remainder of the abbatial buildings have
disappeared. St. Michael's Church is some four hundred years later than
the cathedral, and has, according to the guide-books, a Renaissance
facade, though it seems to us to be better described as a Moorish
adaptation of the Gothic style. At any rate, it is an inartistic and
unattractive structure and illustrates the poor results often attained
in too great an effort after the unusual. Notre Dame is about the same
date as the cathedral, though it has been so extensively restored as to
have quite a new appearance. Its most remarkable feature is its queer
statuettes--nearly a hundred little figures contorted into endless
expressions and attitudes--which serve as gargoyles. The churches of
Dijon are not particularly noteworthy for their interiors and none has
especially good windows. Our extended sojourn in the city enables us to
visit a number of shops, for which we have heretofore found little time.
These are well-stocked and attractive and quite in keeping with a city
of the size of Dijon. According to Herr Baedeker, the town is famous
"for wine and corn, and its mustard and gingerbread enjoy a wide
reputation."
The Captain and myself take an early train for Tamnay-Chatillon and have
the satisfaction of finding the new axle-rod a perfect fit. We enjoy the
open car and the fine road more than ever after our enforced experience
with the railway train. The country between Tamnay and Dijon is rolling
and the road often winds up or down a great hill for two or three miles
at a stretch, always with even and well-engineered gradients that insure
an easy climb or a long exhilarating coast. There are many glorious
panoramas from the hill-crests--wide reaches of hill and valley, with
groves and vineyards and red-tiled villages nestling in wooded vales or
lying on the sunny slopes. Most of the towns remain unknown to us by
name, but the Captain points out Chateau Chinon clinging to a rather
steep hillside and overshadowed by the vast ruined castle which once
defended it. A portion of the old wall with three watch-towers still
stands--the whole effect being very grim and ancient. Near the town of
Pommard the hills are literally "vine-clad,"--vineyards everywhere
running up to the very edge of the town.
The Hotel St. Louis et de la Poste at Autun does not present a very
attractive exterior, but it proves a pleasant surprise and we are hungry
enough to do justice to an excellent luncheon, having breakfasted in
Dijon at five o'clock. Autun has an unusual cathedral--"a curious
building of the transition period"--some parts of which go back as far
as the tenth century. The beautiful Gothic spire--the first object to
greet our eyes when approaching the town--was built about 1470. Portions
of the old fortifications still remain. St. Andrew's Gate, partly a
restoration, is an imposing portal pierced by four archways and forms
one of the main entrances. There is also the usual museum and Hotel de
Ville to be found in all enterprising provincial towns of France.
Beyond Autun the character of the country changes again; we come into a
less prosperous section, intersected by stone fences which cut the rocky
hillsides into small irregular fields. We pass an occasional
bare-looking village and one or two ruined chateaus and we remark on the
scarcity of ruins in France, so far as we have seen it, as compared with
England. A more fertile and thriving country surrounds Dijon, which we
reach in the late afternoon.
We have had quite enough of Dijon, but we shall remain until morning; an
early start should carry us well toward the German frontier before
night. We find some terribly rough roads to Gray and Vesoul--macadam
which has begun to disintegrate. The country grows quite hilly and
while, in the words of the old hymn, "every prospect pleases," we are
indeed tempted to add that "only man is vile." For the filthiness of
some of the villages and people can only be designated as unspeakable;
if I should describe in plain language the conditions we behold, my book
might be excluded from the mails! The houses of these miserable little
hamlets stretch in single file along both sides of the broad highway. In
one end of the house lives the family and in the other the domestic
animals--pigs, cows and donkeys. Along the road on each side the
muck-piles are almost continuous and reach to the windows of the
cottages. Recent rains have flooded the streets with seepage, which
covers the road to a depth of two or three inches, and the odors may be
imagined--if one feels adequate to such a task. The muck is drained into
pools and cisterns from which huge wooden or iron pumps tower above the
street. By means of these the malodorous liquid is elevated into
wagon-tanks to be hauled away to the fields. And this work is usually
done by the women! In fact, women are accorded equal privileges with a
vengeance in this part of rural France--they outnumber the men in the
fields and no occupation appears too heavy or degraded for them to
engage in. We see many of the older ones herding domestic animals--or
even geese and ducks--by the roadside. Sometimes it is only a single
animal--a cow, donkey, goat or pig--that engages the old crone, who is
usually knitting as well. The pigs, no doubt because of their headstrong
proclivities, are usually confined by a cord held by their keepers, and
with one of these we have an amusing adventure. The pig becomes unruly,
heading straight for our car, and only a vigorous application of the
brakes prevents disaster to the obstreperous brute. But the guardian of
his hogship--who has been hauled around pretty roughly while hanging to
the cord--is in a towering rage and screams no end of scathing language
at us. "You, too, are pigs," is one of her compliments which the Captain
translates, and he says it is just as well to let some of her remarks
stand in the original!
As we approach Remiremont, where we propose to stop for the night, we
enter the great range of hills which form the boundary between France
and Germany and which afford many fine vistas. Endless pine forests
clothe the hillsides and deep narrow valleys slope away from the road
which winds upward along the edges of the hills. Remiremont is a
pleasant old frontier town lying along the Moselle River at the base of
a fortified hill two thousand feet in height. It is cleaner than the
average French town of ten thousand and clear streams of mountain water
run alongside many of its streets. The Hotel du Cheval de Bronze seems a
solid, comfortable old inn and we turn into the courtyard for our
nightly stop. The courtyard immediately adjoins the hotel apartments on
the rear and is not entirely free from objectionable odors--our only
complaint against the Cheval de Bronze. Our rooms front on the street,
the noise being decidedly preferable to the assortment of smells in the
rear. The town has nothing to detain one, and is rather unattractive,
despite its pleasing appearance from a distance. On the main street near
our hotel are the arcades, which have a considerable resemblance to the
famous rows of Chester.
We are awakened early in the morning by the tramp of a large company of
soldiers along the street, for Remiremont, being so near the frontier,
is heavily garrisoned. These French soldiers we have seen everywhere, in
the towns and on the roads, enough of them to remind us that the country
is really a vast military camp. They are rather undersized, as a rule,
and their attire is often slouchy and worse for wear. Their bearing
seems to us anything but soldierly as they shuffle along the streets.
Perhaps we remember this the more because of the contrast we see in
Germany a little later. A good authority, however, tells us that the
French army is in a fine state of preparedness and would give a good
account of itself if called into action.
We are early away from Remiremont on a fine road winding among the
pine-clad hills. Some sixteen miles out of the town we find a splendid
hotel at Gerardmer on a beautiful little lake of the same name in the
Vosges Forest, where we should no doubt have had quite different service
from the Cheval de Bronze. We have no regrets, however, since Remiremont
is worth seeing as a typical small frontier town. At Gerardmer we begin
the long climb over the mountain pass which crosses the German border;
there are several miles of the ascent and in some places the grades are
steep enough to seriously heat the motor. We stop many times on the way
and there is a clear little stream by the roadside from which we
replenish the water in the heated engine. The air grows cooler and more
bracing as we ascend and though it is a fine June day, we see banks of
snow along the road. On either side are great pine trees, through which
we catch occasional glimpses of wooded hills and verdant valleys lying
far beneath us. Despite the cool air, flowers bloom along the road and
the ascent, though rather strenuous, is a delightful one.
At the summit we come to the customs offices of the two countries, a few
yards apart. Here we bid farewell to France and slip across the border
into the Fatherland, as its natives so love to call it. A wonderful old
official, who seems to embody all the dignity and power of the empire he
serves, comes out of the customs house. His flowing gray beard is a full
yard long and the stem of his mighty porcelain pipe is still longer. He
is clad in a faultless uniform and wears a military cap bespangled with
appropriate emblems--altogether, a marvel of that official glory in
which the Germans so delight. His functions, however, do not correspond
with his personal splendor, for he only officially countersigns our
Royal Automobile Club passport, delivers us a pair of number plates and,
lastly, collects a fee of some fifteen marks. He gives us a certificate
showing that we are now entitled to travel the highways of the empire
for two weeks, and should we remain longer we shall have to pay an
additional fee on leaving the country. The Captain waves an approved
military adieu, to which the official solemnly responds and we set out
in search of adventure in the land of the Kaiser.
IV
COLMAR TO OBERAMMERGAU
Had we crossed a sea instead of an imaginary dividing line we could
hardly have found a more abrupt change in the characteristics of people
and country than we discover when we descend into the broad green valley
of the Rhine. We have a series of fine views as we glide down the easy
grades and around the sweeping curves of the splendid road that leads
from the crest to the wide plain along the river--glimpses of towns and
villages lying far beneath, beyond long stretches of wooded hills. On
our way we meet peasants driving teams of huge horses hitched to heavy
logging wagons. The horses go into a panic at the sight of the car and
the drivers seem even more panicky than the brutes; it is quite apparent
that the motor is not so common in Germany as in England and France.
The province of Alsace, by which we enter Germany, was held by France
from the time of Napoleon until 1871, but it never entirely lost its
German peculiarities during the French occupation. Its villages and
farmhouses are distinctly Teutonic, though the larger towns show more
traces of French influence. Colmar, some twenty miles from the border,
is the first city--a place of about forty thousand people and
interesting to Americans as the birthplace of the sculptor, Bartholdi,
who designed the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor. It is a
substantially built town with an enormous Gothic church and its museum
has a famous collection of pictures by early German masters.
A few miles from Colmar we come to the Rhine, so famed in German song
and story, a green, rushing flood that seems momentarily to threaten the
destruction of the pontoon bridge which bears us across. Beyond the
river the level but poorly surfaced road leads to Freiburg, a handsome
city of about seventy-five thousand people. It is a noted manufacturing
town and has an ancient university with about two thousand students. Its
cathedral is one of the finest Gothic structures in Germany, the great
tower, three hundred and eighty feet in height, being the earliest and
most perfect of its kind. The windows of fourteenth-century glass are
particularly fine and there are many remarkable paintings of a little
later date. The city has other important churches and many beautiful
public buildings and monuments. Indeed, Freiburg is a good example of
the neatness, cleanliness and civic pride that prevails in most of the
larger German cities. It has many excellent hotels and we have a
well-served luncheon at the Victoria. We should stop for the day at
Freiburg were it not for our unexpected delay at Dijon; we must hasten
if we are to reach Oberammergau in time for our reservations. In the
three remaining daylight hours we make a swift run to Tuttlingen, some
sixty miles eastward, passing several small villages and two good-sized
towns, Neustadt and Donaueschingen, on the way. The latter is near the
head waters of the Danube, and from here we follow the river to
Tuttlingen. We pass through a beautifully wooded country and several
inns along the way indicate that this section is a frequented pleasure
resort. There are many charming panoramas from the road, which in places
swings around the hillsides some distance above the river.
Had we known the fate in store for us at Tuttlingen, we should surely
have stopped at one of the hotels which we hastily passed in our dash
for that town. But we reach it just at dusk--a place of about fifteen
thousand people--and turn in rather dubiously at the unattractive Post
Hotel. If the Post is a fair sample of the country inns of Germany, the
tourist should keep clear of country inns when possible. On entering we
meet an assortment of odors not especially conducive to good appetite
for the evening meal, and this proves of the kind that requires a good
appetite. We are hungry, but not hungry enough to eat the Post's fare
with anything like relish and we are haunted by considerable misgivings
about the little we do consume. The Post, however, does not lack
patronage, though it seems to come mainly from German commercial men who
are seeking trade in the thriving town.
We are away early in the morning, following a rough, neglected road some
dozen miles to Ludwigshaven at the head of Lake Constance, or the Boden
See, as the Germans style it. A new highway leading down to the lake
shore is not yet open, though nearly ready, and we descend over a
temporary road which winds among tree stumps and drops down twenty per
cent grades for a couple of miles. We are thankful that we have only the
descent to make; I doubt whether our forty-horse engine would ever have
pulled us up the "bank," as a Yorkshire man would describe it.
But having reached the level of the lake, we find a splendid road
closely following the shore for forty miles and affording views of some
of the finest and most famous scenery in Europe. In all our journeyings
we have had few more glorious runs. The clear balmy June day floods
everything with light and color. The lake lies still and blue as the
heavens above, and beyond its shining expanse rise the snow-capped forms
of the Swiss Alps, their rugged ranks standing sharply against the
silvery horizon. At their feet stretches the green line of the shore and
above it the dense shadows of the pines that cover the slopes to the
snow line. It is a scene of inspiring beauty that one sees to best
advantage from the open road. Near at hand green fields stretch to the
hills, no great distance away, and the belated fruit-tree blossoms load
the air with perfume. Hay-making is in progress in the little
fields--women swing the scythes or handle the rakes and pitchforks while
staid old cows draw the heavy, awkward carts. There are several pleasant
little towns along the shore, rather neater and cleaner than the average
German village, though even these are not free from occasional touches
of filthiness. Near the center of the lake is Friedrichshafen, a popular
resort with numerous hotels. There is a beautiful drive along the lake,
bordered with shrubs and trees, and fronting on this is the
comfortable-looking Deutsches Haus, surrounded by gardens which extend
to the shore. We remember the Deutsches Haus particularly, since on its
glass-enclosed veranda we are served with an excellent luncheon. As we
resume our journey, feeling at peace with the world, and open up a
little on the smooth lakeside road, the Captain exclaims:
"If I had all the money I could possibly want, do you know what I'd do?
I'd just buy a motor, don't you know, and do nothing on earth but tour
about Europe!"
And we all agree that under such conditions and on such a day his
proposed vocation seems an ideal one.
Friedrichshafen, I should have said, was the home of Count Zeppelin of
airship fame, and as we passed through the town his immense craft was
being made ready for an experimental trip. It was then attracting much
attention in Germany and was the precourser of the only line of
commercial airships now in existence.
Lindau, a small resort built on an island about three hundred yards from
the shore, marks the point of our departure from Lake Constance. We
enter the town over a narrow causeway which connects it with the main
road, but find little to detain us. We climb the steep winding road
leading out of the valley and for the remainder of the day our course
wends among the foothills of the Bavarian Alps. It proves a delightful
run; we witness constantly changing displays of color and glorious
effects of light and shadow. Thunder storms are raging in the mountains
and at intervals they sweep down and envelop our road in a dash of
summer rain. Above us tower the majestic Alps; in places the dazzling
whiteness of the snow still lies against the barren rocks or amidst the
dense green of the pines, while above the summits roll blue-gray cumulus
clouds glowing with vivid lightning or brilliant with occasional bursts
of sunshine. Near at hand stretch green meadows of the foothills,
variegated with great splashes of blue or yellow flowers as though some
giant painter had swept his brush across the landscape. The effect is
shown with striking fidelity in the picture by the late John MacWhirter
R. A. which I have reproduced, though it is quite impossible on so small
a scale to give an adequate idea of the original canvas--much less of
the enchanting scene itself.
Among the foothills and often well up the mountainsides are the
characteristic chalets of Tyrol and an occasional ruined castle crowns
some seemingly inaccessible rock. We pass several quaint little towns
and many isolated houses, all very different from any we have seen
elsewhere. The houses are mostly of plaster and often ornamented with
queer designs and pictures in brilliant colors. The people are
picturesque, too; the women and girls dress in the peculiar costume of
the country; the men wear knitted jackets and knee pants with silver
buckles and their peaked hats are often decorated with a feather or two.
Our road averages fair, though a few short stretches are desperately
bad--this unevenness we have noted in German roads generally. In one
place where the rain has been especially heavy we plunge through a
veritable quagmire, and we find spots so rough and stony as to make very
uncomfortable going. We finally strike the fine highway which follows
the River Lech and brings us into the mountain town of Fussen. It is a
snug little place of some five thousand people, nestling in a narrow
valley through which rushes a swift, emerald-green river. The
Bayerischer-Hof proves a pleasant surprise; one of the cleanest,
brightest and best-conducted inns we have found anywhere. Our large,
well-lighted rooms afford a magnificent view of the snow-capped
mountains, which seem only a little distance away. The landlord, a
fine-looking, full-bearded native who speaks English fluently, gives the
touch of personal attention that one so much appreciates in the often
monotonous round of hotel life. To the rear of the hotel is a
beer-garden where brilliant lights and good music in the evening attract
the guests and townspeople in considerable numbers. Several other
American motor parties stop at the hotel and we especially notice one
French car because it carries nine people--and it is not a large car,
either! The Bayerischer-Hof is first-class in every particular, and we
find when we come to depart that the charges are first-class, too. The
Captain is exasperated when we are asked sixty cents per gallon for
"benzin" and says we will chance doing better on the way--a decision
which, as it happens, causes us no little grief and some expense.
Fussen has an impressive Gothic castle--a vast, turreted, towered,
battlemented affair with gray walls and red-tiled roof which looms over
the town from the slope above the river. I fear, though, that the castle
is a good deal of a sham, for there are spots where the stucco has
fallen from the walls, revealing wooden lath beneath, and while in
Fussen they call it a "thirteenth-century" building, Baedeker gives its
date as two or three hundred years later. It was never intended as a
defensive structure, being originally built as the residence of the
Bishop of Augsburg. It is now occupied by the district court and the
interior is hardly worth a visit.
[Illustration: CASTLE AT FUSSEN]
Oberammergau lies over the mountain to the east of Fussen, scarcely ten
miles away in a direct line, but to reach it we are compelled to go by
the way of Schongau, about four times as far. We pursue a narrow,
sinuous mountain road, very muddy in places. We have been warned of one
exceptionally bad hill--a twenty-five per cent grade, according to the
Royal Automobile Club itinerary--but we give the matter little thought.
It proves a straight incline of half a mile and about midway the sharp
ascent our motor gasps and comes to a sudden stop. We soon ascertain
that the angle is too great for the gasoline to flow from the nearly
empty tank, and we regret the Captain's economy at Fussen. A number of
peasants gather about us to stare at our predicament, but they show
nothing of the amusement that an American crowd would find in such a
situation. A woman engages the Captain in conversation and informs us
that she is the owner of a good team of horses, which will be the best
solution of our difficulties. "Wie viel?" Seventy-five marks, or about
eighteen dollars, looks right to her and she sticks to her price, too.
Her only response to the Captain's indignant protests is that she keeps
a road-house at the top of the hill, where he can find her if he decides
we need her services. And she departs in the lordly manner of one who
has delivered an ultimatum from which there is no appeal. A peasant
tells us that the woman makes a good income fleecing stranded motorists
and that the German automobile clubs have published warnings against
her. He says that a farmer near by will help us out for the modest sum
of ten marks and offers to bring him to the scene; he also consoles us
by telling us that five cars besides our own have stalled on the hill
during the day. The farmer arrives before long with a spanking big team,
which gives us the needed lift, and the grade soon permits the motor to
get in its work.
We reach Oberammergau about two o'clock, only to find another instance
where the Captain's economical tendency has worked to our disadvantage.
He had declined to pay the price asked by Cook's agency in London for
reservation of rooms and seats for the Passion Play and had arranged for
these with a German firm, Shenker & Co. at Freiburg. On inquiring at the
office of the concern in the village we find no record of our
reservations and no tickets to be had. "Shenker is surely a 'rotter,'"
says the Captain, immensely disgusted, and it requires no small effort
to find quarters, but we at last secure tiny rooms in a peasant's
cottage in the outskirts of the village. Tickets we finally obtain by an
earnest appeal at Cook's offices, though at considerable premium.