Was there ever elsewhere such a blue, transparent sky as this here
in Munich? At noon, looking up to it from the street, above the gray
houses, the color and depth are marvelous. It makes a background for the
Grecian art buildings and gateways, that would cheat a risen Athenian
who should see it into the belief that he was restored to his beautiful
city. The color holds, too, toward sundown, and seems to be poured, like
something solid, into the streets of the city.
You should see then the Maximilian Strasse, when the light floods the
platz where Maximilian in bronze sits in his chair, illuminates the
frescoes on the pediments of the Hof Theater, brightens the Pompeian
red under the colonnade of the post-office, and streams down the gay
thoroughfare to the trees and statues in front of the National Museum,
and into the gold-dusted atmosphere beyond the Isar. The street is
filled with promenaders: strangers who saunter along with the red book
in one hand,--a man and his wife, the woman dragged reluctantly past the
windows of fancy articles, which are “so cheap,” the man breaking his
neck to look up at the buildings, especially at the comical heads and
figures in stone that stretch out from the little oriel-windows in the
highest story of the Four Seasons Hotel, and look down upon the moving
throng; Munich bucks in coats of velvet, swinging light canes, and
smoking cigars through long and elaborately carved meerschaum holders;
Munich ladies in dresses of that inconvenient length that neither sweeps
the pavement nor clears it; peasants from the Tyrol, the men in black,
tight breeches, that button from the knee to the ankle, short jackets
and vests set thickly with round silver buttons, and conical hats with
feathers, and the women in short quilted and quilled petticoats, of
barrel-like roundness from the broad hips down, short waists ornamented
with chains and barbarous brooches of white metal, with the oddest
head-gear of gold and silver heirlooms; students with little red or
green embroidered brimless caps, with the ribbon across the breast, a
folded shawl thrown over one shoulder, and the inevitable switch-cane;
porters in red caps, with a coil of twine about the waist; young fellows
from Bohemia, with green coats, or coats trimmed with green, and green
felt hats with a stiff feather stuck in the side; and soldiers by
the hundreds, of all ranks and organizations; common fellows in blue,
staring in at the shop windows, officers in resplendent uniforms,
clanking their swords as they swagger past. Now and then, an elegant
equipage dashes by,--perhaps the four horses of the handsome young
king, with mounted postilions and outriders, or a liveried carriage of
somebody born with a von before his name. As the twilight comes on, the
shutters of the shop windows are put up. It is time to go to the opera,
for the curtain rises at half-past six, or to the beer-gardens, where
delicious music marks, but does not interrupt, the flow of excellent
beer.
Or you may if you choose, and I advise you to do it, walk at the same
hour in the English Garden, which is but a step from the arcades of the
Hof Garden,--but a step to the entrance, whence you may wander for miles
and miles in the most enchanting scenery. Art has not been allowed here
to spoil nature. The trees, which are of magnificent size, are left to
grow naturally;--the Isar, which is turned into it, flows in more
than one stream with its mountain impetuosity; the lake is gracefully
indented and overhung with trees, and presents ever-changing aspects of
loveliness as you walk along its banks; there are open, sunny meadows,
in which single giant trees or splendid groups of them stand, and walks
without end winding under leafy Gothic arches. You know already that
Munich owes this fine park to the foresight and liberality of an
American Tory, Benjamin Thompson (Count Rumford), born in Rumford, Vt.,
who also relieved Munich of beggars.
I have spoken of the number of soldiers in Munich. For six weeks the
Landwehr, or militia, has been in camp in various parts of Bavaria.
There was a grand review of them the other day on the Field of Mars, by
the king, and many of them have now gone home. They strike an unmilitary
man as a very efficient body of troops. So far as I could see, they were
armed with breech-loading rifles. There is a treaty by which Bavaria
agreed to assimilate her military organization to that of Prussia. It is
thus that Bismarck is continually getting ready. But if the Landwehr
is gone, there are yet remaining troops enough of the line. Their chief
use, so far as it concerns me, is to make pageants in the streets, and
to send their bands to play at noon in the public squares. Every day,
when the sun shines down upon the mounted statue of Ludwig I., in front
of the Odeon, a band plays in an open Loggia, and there is always a
crowd of idlers in the square to hear it. Everybody has leisure for that
sort of thing here in Europe; and one can easily learn how to be idle
and let the world wag. They have found out here what is disbelieved
in America,--that the world will continue to turn over once in about
twenty-four hours (they are not accurate as to the time) without their
aid. To return to our soldiers. The cavalry most impresses me; the
men are so finely mounted, and they ride royally. In these sparkling
mornings, when the regiments clatter past, with swelling music and
shining armor, riding away to I know not what adventure and glory, I
confess that I long to follow them. I have long had this desire; and the
other morning, determining to satisfy it, I seized my hat and went after
the prancing procession. I am sorry I did. For, after trudging after
it through street after street, the fine horsemen all rode through an
arched gateway, and disappeared in barracks, to my great disgust; and
the troopers dismounted, and led their steeds into stables.
And yet one never loses a walk here in Munich. I found myself that
morning by the Isar Thor, a restored medieval city gate. The gate is
double, with flanking octagonal towers, inclosing a quadrangle. Upon the
inner wall is a fresco of “The Crucifixion.” Over the outer front is a
representation, in fresco painting, of the triumphal entry into the city
of the Emperor Louis of Bavaria after the battle of Ampfing. On one
side of the gate is a portrait of the Virgin, on gold ground, and on
the other a very passable one of the late Dr. Hawes of Hartford, with
a Pope's hat on. Walking on, I came to another arched gateway and
clock-tower; near it an old church, with a high wall adjoining, whereon
is a fresco of cattle led to slaughter, showing that I am in the
vicinity of the Victual Market; and I enter it through a narrow, crooked
alley. There is nothing there but an assemblage of shabby booths and
fruit-stands, and an ancient stone tower in ruins and overgrown with
ivy.
Leaving this, I came out to the Marian Platz, where stands the column,
with the statue of the Virgin and Child, set up by Maximilian I. in 1638
to celebrate the victory in the battle which established the Catholic
supremacy in Bavaria. It is a favorite praying-place for the lower
classes. Yesterday was a fete day, and the base of the column and half
its height are lost in a mass of flowers and evergreens. In front is
erected an altar with a broad, carpeted platform; and a strip of
the platz before it is inclosed with a railing, within which are
praying-benches. The sun shines down hot; but there are several poor
women kneeling there, with their baskets beside them. I happen along
there at sundown; and there are a score of women kneeling on the hard
stones, outside the railing saying their prayers in loud voices. The
mass of flowers is still sweet and gay and fresh; a fountain with
fantastic figures is flashing near by; the crowd, going home to supper
and beer, gives no heed to the praying; the stolid droschke-drivers
stand listlessly by. At the head of the square is an artillery station,
and a row of cannon frowns on it. On one side is a house with a tablet
in the wall, recording the fact that Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden once
lived in it.
When we came to Munich, the great annual fair was in progress; and the
large Maximilian Platz (not to be confounded with the street of that
name) was filled with booths of cheap merchandise, puppet-shows, lottery
shanties, and all sorts of popular amusements. It was a fine time to
study peasant costumes. The city was crowded with them on Sunday;
and let us not forget that the first visit of the peasants was to the
churches; they invariably attended early mass before they set out upon
the day's pleasure. Most of the churches have services at all hours till
noon, some of them with fine classical and military music. One could not
but be struck with the devotional manner of the simple women, in their
queer costumes, who walked into the gaudy edifices, were absorbed in
their prayers for an hour, and then went away. I suppose they did
not know how odd they looked in their high, round fur hats, or their
fantastic old ornaments, nor that there was anything amiss in bringing
their big baskets into church with them. At least, their simple,
unconscious manner was better than that of many of the city people, some
of whom stare about a good deal, while going through the service, and
stop in the midst of crossings and genuflections to take snuff and pass
it to their neighbors. But there are always present simple and homelike
sort of people, who neither follow the fashions nor look round on them;
respectable, neat old ladies, in the faded and carefully preserved silk
gowns, such as the New England women wear to “meeting.”
No one can help admiring the simplicity, kindliness, and honesty of the
Germans. The universal courtesy and friendliness of manner have a very
different seeming from the politeness of the French. At the hotels in
the country, the landlord and his wife and the servant join in hoping
you will sleep well when you go to bed. The little maid at Heidelberg
who served our meals always went to the extent of wishing us a good
appetite when she had brought in the dinner. Here in Munich the people
we have occasion to address in the street are uniformly courteous. The
shop-keepers are obliging, and rarely servile, like the English. You
are thanked, and punctiliously wished the good-day, whether you purchase
anything or not. In shops tended by women, gentlemen invariably remove
their hats. If you buy only a kreuzer's worth of fruit of an old
woman, she says words that would be, literally translated, “I thank you
beautifully.” With all this, one looks kindly on the childish love the
Germans have for titles. It is, I believe, difficult for the German mind
to comprehend that we can be in good standing at home, unless we have
some title prefixed to our names, or some descriptive phrase added. Our
good landlord, who waits at the table and answers our bell, one of whose
tenants is a living baron, having no title to put on his doorplate under
that of the baron, must needs dub himself “privatier;” and he insists
upon prefixing the name of this unambitious writer with the ennobling
von; and at the least he insists, in common with the tradespeople, that
I am a “Herr Doctor.” The bills of purchases by madame come made out to
“Frau----, well-born.” At a hotel in Heidelberg, where I had registered
my name with that distinctness of penmanship for which newspaper men are
justly conspicuous, and had added to my own name “& wife,” I was not a
little flattered to appear in the reckoning as “Herr Doctor Mamesweise.”