Heilbronn

“ Grapes, fruit, vegetables and flowering shrubs are largely grown in the neighbourhood, and there are large quarries for sandstone and gypsum and extensive salt-works. By means of the Neckar a considerable trade is carried on in wood, bark, leather, agricultural produce, fruit and cattle.
Heilbronn occupies the site of an old Roman settlement ”

“ The soldiers' excesses at Heilbronn had been blamed, but no one ever talked of their services. The world rung with the tidings of conquests and victories, but it was by their hands that they had been fought and won. ”

“ As there are no walled towns in America, and the example could do no good, we did not make a pilgrimage to the spot. That night we slept at a little town called Bessingheim, with the Neckar, which we had again met at Heilbronn, murmuring beneath our windows. ”

“ One of the first cares of Oxenstiern was to consolidate the German alliance; and, in March 1633, he summoned a meeting at Heilbronn of the States of the four Circles of the Upper and Lower Rhine, Franconia, and Suabia, as well as deputies from Nuremberg, Strasburg, Frankfort, Ulm, Augsburg, and other cities of the empire. The assembly was also attended by ambassadors from France, England, and Holland; and on April 9th was effected the Union of Heilbronn. ”

“ Lower Wimpfen, half a mile further up the Neckar, is sought for its saline baths, whilst its grand church claims the architect’s admiration.
We take leave of the steamboat at Heilbronn, crossing the river as we approach that antique town by a covered bridge, in form like a very elongated cottage with its two end walls out. Why in this city, and in Swiss towns, passengers should be so carefully protected from weather in crossing a river, and left so exposed to it in the streets, remains among the things yet to be explained. ”

“ He told us all about the Heidelberg road, and which were the best places to avoid and which the best ones to tarry at; he charged me less than cost for the things I broke in the night; he put up a fine luncheon for us and added to it a quantity of great light-green plums, the pleasantest fruit in Germany; he was so anxious to do us honor that he would not allow us to walk out of Heilbronn, but called up Goetz von Berlichingen’s horse and cab and made us ride.
I made a sketch of the turnout. It is not a Work, it is only what artists call a “study”—a thing to make a finished picture from. ”

“ Such was the case at Heilbronn, at Rothenburg, where Carlstadt had been active, and at Würzburg. At Frankfort the proletariate formed an organisation which they declared to be Council, Burgomaster, Pope, and Emperor all rolled into one; and most of the small cities opened their gates to the peasants, either because they felt unable to stand a siege or because the commune was relatively stronger in the smaller than in the bigger cities. ”

“ Mr. Harris was graduated in Art about the same time with myself, and we took a studio together. We waited awhile for some orders; then as time began to drag a little, we concluded to make a pedestrian tour. After much consideration, we determined on a trip up the shores of the beautiful Neckar to Heilbronn. ”

“ Thus we went on the first day from Stuttgart to Heilbronn, a distance of about 35 English miles. All went on most quietly. We were able to give away many hundreds of tracts, and about 50 copies of my Narrative, and to a few persons I had the opportunity of speaking a little. The second day's journey was from Heilbronn to Heidelberg. In the large towns we went on most quietly, lest there should be a running together of the people, and the appearance be a political disturbance. ”

“ Place—a certain dull, unfrequented district in the little kingdom of Würtemberg, about twelve miles north of Heilbronn, and six south-east of the Neckar.
Dramatis Personæ:—myself, tall, sunburnt, dusty; in grey suit, straw hat, knapsack and gaiters. In the distance, a broad-backed pedestrian wielding a long stick like an old English quarter-staff. ”

“ Harris carried the little watchlike machine called a "pedometer," whose office is to keep count of a man's steps and tell how far he has walked. Everybody stopped to admire our costumes and give us a hearty:
"Pleasant march to you!"
When we got down town I found that we could go by rail to within five miles of Heilbronn.
The train was just starting, so we jumped aboard and went tearing away in splendid spirits. It was agreed all around that we had done wisely, because it would be just as enjoyable to walk down the Neckar as up it, and it could not be needful to walk both ways. ”

“ Some think that they will come through Wimpfen, and then by Weinsberg here, unless Merci bars the way. Others again think that they will make their way down through Stuttgart. Five hundred men march from here tomorrow to Hall, whence they go on to Heilbronn to strengthen the garrison there. All the waggons in the town and country round have been fetched in to carry their stores and baggage and a convoy of ammunition. I should say that you could not do better than go on with the waggons. No one is likely to ask you any questions, for it will be thought that you are drivers. ”

“ Schliz, Die Entstehung der Stadtgemeinde Heilbronn (Leipzig, 1903) ; and A. Küsel, Der Heilbrunner Konvent (Halle, 1878) .
HEILIGENSTADT, a town of Germany, in Prussian Saxony, on the Leine, 32 m. E.N.E. of Cassel, on the railway to Halle. Pop. (1905) , 7955. It possesses an old castle, formerly belonging to the electors of Mainz, one Evangelical and two Roman Catholic churches, several educational establishments, and an infirmary. The principal manufactures are cotton goods, cigars, paper, cement and needles. ”

“ The educational establishments include a gymnasium, a commercial school and an agricultural academy. The town in a commercial point of view is the most important in Württemberg, and possesses an immense variety of manufactures, of which the principal are gold, silver, steel and iron wares, machines, sugar of lead, white lead, vinegar, beer, sugar, tobacco, soap, oil, cement, chemicals, artificial manure, glue, soda, tapestry, paper and cloth. ”

“ We turned in among the inclosing hills, as we approached Heidelberg. The road lay on the right bank of the Neckar, and at every step the scenery acquired new beauty. Heidelberg is on the left bank; to our right, that is, as we advanced up the stream; and is situated on a sort of narrow platform between the river and the hill on which the castle stands. The town itself has a wholly different appearance from those we had recently passed. It has an ancient, picturesque, inartificial look, more consonant with our ideas of German romance. ”

“ One thinks Heidelberg by day—with its surroundings—is the last possibility of the beautiful; but when he sees Heidelberg by night, a fallen Milky Way, with that glittering railway constellation pinned to the border, he requires time to consider upon the verdict.
One never tires of poking about in the dense woods that clothe all these lofty Neckar hills to their tops. The great deeps of a boundless forest have a beguiling and impressive charm in any country; but German legends and fairy tales have given these an added charm. ”

“ The lamps of the city rim the river below, and villas beyond the farther bank are marked by tiny dots of lights in the purple of the groves behind Neuenheim. Across the Neckar-cut gulf of shadow the chestnut-crowned summit of the Heiligenberg stares down solemnly at us, and not all the songs of its blithest [255] nightingales can banish thoughts of its ancient Roman sacrifices nor divert the credulous from vigils over the blue grave lights around the Benedictine cloister where they buried the sainted Abbot of Hirschau. ”

“ For there are no “sights” here, the castle excepted. The quaint old town is friendly and genial, though not more so than many others of this comfortable German father-land; nor is the serene Neckar so exceptional as to occasion pilgrimage.
Heidelberg’s appeals are to the mind, the heart, and the senses: the mind is inspired by her impressive achievements in learning; the heart is touched by her tragic history; and the senses are spellbound by the exceptional charm of her natural beauty. She is never so fair as in the early evening. ”

“ THERE is hardly a man, woman or child in the world who has not heard of Heidelberg, and who does not know something of this famous little city of students, wine, beer, castle and casks. It is a place better known, probably, than any in Europe of its size and non-political importance, and it entertains more sight-seers than any other. It is well worth the attention given it.
Heidelberg is beautifully situated on the River Neckar, about twelve miles from its junction with the Rhine, and a more delightful spot for establishing the seat of a palatial residence does not exist in all Germany. ”

“ Its history dates from the Roman monuments on its hills, and is associated with the romantic times of the counts-palatine of the Rhine.
“The world-wide fame of Heidelberg arises from its university. This was founded in 1386, and is the oldest in Germany. It made Heidelberg a student-town; there art flourished and free thought grew, and it became the gem of German cities.
“The ancient Castle of Heidelberg is one of the wonders of Germany. It is like a ruined town of palaces, and historic and poetic associations are as thick as are the violets among its ruins. ”

“ At the end of a solitary pine forest she found herself at last near to the haunted Holtermann. The road from the valley of the Seven mills and Heidelberg intersected the roads leading to the villages of the Odenwald. Many a traveller had here lost his way, in troublesome times many a rich miller from below had here been eased of his purse by footpads lying in wait, and children had seen hobgoblins, will 'o' the wisps, moaning women, or heard the sounds of mocking laughter in the dusky woods. Why had the heartless priest chosen such a spot? In terror she walked along in the twilight. ”

“ HEIDELBERG. N Heidelberg. Think of it! What an energetic idler I am grown! The Neckar lies a pistol-shot from my windows; high hills rise on the thither side, looking so home-like—Maysville home, like Mr. W.’s, where you came once upon a time. When my glance darts out the windows and rests upon them, suddenly I catch my breath, and I am not sure whether it is pain or pleasure I feel. Half way up they are cultivated, but the tops are wooded. Just over my head the old castle looms up among the trees. ”

“ So we left the valley and took quarters at the Schloss Hotel, on the hill, above the Castle.
Heidelberg lies at the mouth of a narrow gorge—a gorge the shape of a shepherd’s crook; if one looks up it he perceives that it is about straight, for a mile and a half, then makes a sharp curve to the right and disappears. This gorge—along whose bottom pours the swift Neckar—is confined between (or cloven through) a couple of long, steep ridges, a thousand feet high and densely wooded clear to their summits, with the exception of one section which has been shaved and put under cultivation. ”

“ You will say—I have heard you say—that Heidelberg wants no beauty unborrowed of the eye; but if history had not clothed it in recollections, fancy must have invested it in its own dreams. It is true, that it is a mere modern edifice compared with all the classic, and most of the gothic ruins; yet over Heidelberg there hangs a terror and a mystery peculiar to itself: for the mind which acquiesces in decay, recoils from destruction. ”

“ Heidelberg, in the unfolding history of German science and German spirit, took a distinguished stand, and yet exists it, in the full-grown image of this scientific life of Germany, an important and essential member. At the mention of this university, start up in the memory renowned names, the recollection of great crises in the history of literature. It is, to the whole student youth of Germany, the spot of promise and of desire. It stands foremost amongst those German universities to which even from abroad, from beyond the Rhine, the Alps, even the ocean, scholars assemble themselves. ”

“ The variety of nationalities which meet in Heidelberg give an intellectual activity to the associate-life of that student-world; and preserve it, at least, from the eternal monotony of fixed conventional forms, stale jests, fade word-wit, and bookworm pedantry. The happy-spirited, practical, intelligent Palatine; the simple, honest Swabian, who has seen only the world which lies between his own mountains, but with his sound, clear intellect, penetrates through every thing; the open Rhinelander; the pithy Hessian; the polite, socially-accomplished, well-bred, reserved North-German ”

“ These would be tedious, nor are they necessary to give some impression of Heidelberg in its most delightful season. The most romantic and picturesque of all German cities, and therefore most thronged by romance-hunting tourists, its good old social character is still happily preserved. The last Revolution has fortunately spared it, and in spite of railroads beside its mountains, and steamboats on the Neckar, it will be for many years to come one of the pleasantest spots in Europe. ”

“ As one approaches Heidelberg, the bed of the Necker, strewn with rocks, widens. One sees the wharf of the town and the town itself, which wears a pleasant mien. The back-ground of the whole picture ends in a tall earthly horizon: it seems to bar the stream.
A red-brick triumphal arch marks the entrance to Heidelberg. To the left, on a hill, stand the ruins of a medieval castle. Apart from their picturesque effect and some popular traditions, the remains of the Gothic period interest only the nations whose work they are. ”