Rhinе

“ During the time of the Middle Ages, Germany had been filling up with towns and castles, feudal dungeons bearing aloft a helmet and a cross. The cross arose wherever two streets met in a city and at every cross-road in the country; the most beautiful cathedrals in the world and the most magnificent monasteries were reflected in her broad river; and still, in field and forest, in city and country, and along the banks of the Rhine, the false gods were worshipped in secret.
As the church taught that they were to be looked upon as demons, the people dared not treat them badly. ”

“ Swift roll the Rhine’s billows, and water the plains, Where Falkenstein Castle’s majestic remains Their moss-covered turrets still rear: Oft loves the gaunt wolf ’midst the ruins to prowl, What time from the battlements pours the lone owl Her plaints in the passenger’s ear. No longer resound through the vaults of yon hall The song of the minstrel, and mirth of the ball; Those pleasures for ever are fled: There now dwells the bat with her light-shunning brood, There ravens and vultures now clamour for food, And all is dark, silent, and dread! ”

“ The Rhine has ever held a wide fame in the domain of literature. For there is scarcely a place on the river’s banks but has its legend which has been enshrined in song, and some of these songs are so old that the names of their makers have long since been forgotten. Yes, we have to go very far back indeed would we study the poetry of the Rhine adequately; we have to penetrate deeply into the Middle Ages, dim and mysterious. ”

“ But these apart, the scene is one of exquisite beauty and grandeur. The gorge beneath us is lined on both sides with munificent pines, firs, and hemlocks; not stinted and spindled, as they are on our northern hills, nor clipped and shaven, but in all their original, untrimmed, uncut magnificence. In the midst of them sits a castle-like ruin, such as the Rhine seldom affords, England seldomer, and other lands never. Its gray walls, thick and high, its several domes and turrets, its archways and entrances are of the best Rhine quality. ”

“ There are many rivers of greater length and width than the Rhine. Our Mississippi would swallow up half a dozen Rhines. The Hudson is grander, the Tiber, the Po, and the Mincio more classic; the Thames and Seine bear upon their waters greater amounts of wealth and commerce; the Nile and the Euphrates have a greater antiquity; but for a combination of interesting historical incidents and natural scenery, the Rhine surpasses them all. Nature has so ordained it that those who travel in the valley of the Rhine shall see the river, for there never will be a railroad upon its banks. ”

“ He little comprehends the true charm of the Rhine who gazes on the vines on the hill-tops without a thought of the imaginary world with which their recesses have been peopled by the graceful credulity of old; who surveys the steep ruins that overshadow the water, untouched by one lesson from the pensive morality of Time. Everywhere around us is the evidence of perished opinions and departed races; everywhere around us, also, the rejoicing fertility of unconquerable Nature, and the calm progress of Man himself through the infinite cycles of decay. ”

“ To those who may one day visit the Rhine it is hoped that the volume may afford a suitable introduction to a fascinating field of travel, while to such as have already viewed its glories it may serve to renew old associations and awaken cherished memories of a river without peer or parallel in its wealth of story, its boundless mystery, and the hold which it has exercised upon all who have lingered by the hero-trodden paths that wind among its mysterious promontories and song-haunted strands. ”

“ They are empty now and deserted, these grim old castles. Vines creep over the crumbling walls. Mice scurry through the dim rooms, and bats flit about tower and turret. And the great Rhine, as it winds along, buries their secrets under its hurrying water. ”

“ A great many people merely pass up or down the river in a steamer, in a day and a night, and only see the ruins and the other scenery by gazing at them from the deck of the vessel. But in this case they get no idea whatever of the Rhine. It is necessary to travel slowly, to stop frequently at the towns on the bank, to make excursions along the shores and into the interior, and to ascend to the sites of the ruins, and to other elevated points, so as to view the valley and the stream meandering through it from above, or you obtain no correct idea whatever of travelling on the Rhine. ”

“ It is a grand spectacle, when the Rhine is thus charged, to see these countless drifts adjust themselves in their relative position, where they unite by congelation, and convey the idea of the fall of some mountain which has covered the plain with rocks of every dimension. ”

“ Is more than I can tell.”
“There is a sadness in the bells of the Rhine,” continued Mr. Beal, “as they ring from old belfries at evening under the ruins of [240] the castles on the hills. The lords of the Rhine that once heard them are gone forever. The vineyards creep up the hills on the light trellises, and the sun and the earth, as it were, fill the grapes with wine. The woods are as green as of old. The rafts go drifting down the light waves as on feet of air. But the river of history is changed, and one feels the spirit of the change with deep sadness as one listens to the bells.” ”

“ Every great deed, I said, is only accomplished in the soul, at the moment of determination; when it comes outward and is repeated by the body,—which holds the locust,—it disperses into insignificant movements and thirds; but when it is done, as now the operation, it becomes great again, and, ever increasing, flows onward through all time. Thus the Rhine rushes like a giant from its summit, disperses in the fog, falls as rain upon the plain, then it forms itself into clouds, and roams over the sands, and carries suns instead of rainbows. ”

“ He wrote to a friend: “The real charm of the Rhine, beyond the fascination that all rivers and riverine scenery have for most people, is that of literary and historical romance. The Rhine is in this respect the Nile of Europe: though probably none but Germans feel thus strongly. For myself I cannot but think it ought not [170] to be a wholly German river, but from every point of view be the Franco-German boundary.... Germany has much to gain from a true communion with its more charming neighbour. ”

“ The city of Basle stands upon the banks of the Rhine, on the northern frontier of Switzerland. The waters of the Rhine are gathered from hundreds of roaring and turbid torrents which come out, some from vast icy caverns in the glaciers, some from the melting debris of fallen avalanches, some from gushing fountains which break out suddenly through crevices in the rocks or yawning chasms, and some from dark and frightful ravines on the mountain sides, down which they foam and tumble perpetually, fed by vast fields of melting snow above. ”

“ He who knows his Rhine and loves it must take of its charms in small doses, or satiety is the outcome. There are those, of course, who can travel from Dan to Beersheba and cry, "'Tis all barren"; but the ordinarily intelligent traveller may find much to delight and interest on the banks of the Rhine, always provided that he suits his mood to his environment, and takes but little of Rhine scenery at a time. ”

“ July 7, 1808.
* * * Ah, the rainbow even now setting its diamond foot on the meadow at Ingelheim and reaching over the house to Mount St. John is just like the blissful illusion I have of thee and me! The Rhine, spreading out its net to catch the vision of its banks of paradise, is like this flame of life nourished by reflections of the unattainable. Let it then win nothing more from reality than this illusion; it will give to me the peculiar spirit and the character expressive of my own self, just as the reflection does to the river in which it is mirrored. ”

“ The Rhineland, in spite of its minor vicissitudes of lordship, is and has always been Germanic, and its annals are part and parcel of those of the Teutonic Holy Roman Empire and of the German Empire that succeeded it. The marshes of the mouth of the Rhine early differentiated themselves both from Germany and from the Gallic provinces farther south; Dutch they were and Dutch they will ever remain; their history and their culture and their art are by themselves. The same is true of Champagne, Picardy, Burgundy, Bar, and of the lands between them and the Seine. ”

“ Finally, to contrast the scenery of the Rhine and the Rhone, in vine- covered hills they are alike— the rivers are much on a par— the Rhine rather the grander— the Rhone more varied by the hills coming forward and again receding or folding in the most romantic manner back and forward. No verdure from grass or pasture is to be seen on the Rhone banks, the more Southern character of the vegetation being from ferns springing from a sterile soil. The Rhine has its numerous castles, but against these are the snow-clad mountains seen from the Rhone. ”

“ Another came running presently, And he was pale as pale could be; “Fly, my Lord Bishop, fly!” quoth he, “Ten thousand rats are coming this way— The Lord forgive you for yesterday!” “I’ll go to my tower on the Rhine,” replied he, “’Tis the safest place in Germany; The walls are high and the shores are steep, And the stream is strong and the water deep.” Bishop Hatto fearfully hastened away, And he crossed the Rhine without delay, And reached his tower, and barred with care All windows, doors, and loop-holes there. ”

“ Before the city lies a wide plain, rich and smiling, full of corn-fields and vineyards, with here and there a curious-looking spire or a couple of dome-topped towers marking the place of a village or small town, and beyond the plain, glistening in a long, long wavy line of silver, glides a broad river—the mighty Rhine. ”

“ The magic of Father Rhine will certainly exercise its power upon the Crown Prince likewise. And when you joyfully pass the cup and sing a new song, then I hope that your spirits may rise and enjoy the beautiful moments as becomes happy German youths! But may the source from which you draw your joys be as clear and pure as the golden juice of the grape, may it be deep and constant as Father Rhine! If we look about us in the joyous Rhineland, our history rises up before us in very palpable form. ”

“ Thusis is situated at the entrance of the Via Mala, the famous gorge through which that impetuous stripling, the young Rhine, rushes with such headlong recklessness. A wide and long-extended valley, surrounded by every kind of mountain and height, from knolls to snow peaks; two rivers tearing in at one end, uniting and hurrying onward as the Rhine right through the center, and twenty towns dotting the distances, with castles and churches perched in every romantic spot. Why, it seemed to me the earth was growing more beautiful and wonderful every moment. ”

“ Varied and valuable as are the traditional tales of other streams, none possess that colour of intensity and mystery, that spell of ancient profundity which belong to the legends of the Rhine. In perusing these we feel our very souls plunged in darkness as that of the carven gloom of some Gothic cathedral or the Cimmerian depths of some ancient forest unpierced by sun-shafts. ”

“ Then having recovered, he hurried back to the Rhine urged by an irresistible longing.
A wooded island lay in the deep-blue waters. The setting sun threw a golden light over the hills; numberless vineyards flanked the mountains, hedges of [Pg 175] beeches were on one side, the murmur of waters on the other, and above the pinnacles of a knight's castle among the legendary rocks where once a terrible beast lived, over all the heavens clothed with a garment of silver stars. ”

“ The congress of Vienna (1815) restored the lower part of the Rhenish valley to Germany, but it was not till the war of 1870-71 that the recovery of Alsace and Lorraine made the Rhine once more “Germany's river, not Germany's frontier.” In the military history of all these centuries constant allusion is made to the Rhine, its passages and its fortresses. Every general who has fought in its neighbourhood has at one time or another had to provide for a crossing of the Rhine, from Julius Caesar, who crossed it twice, down to our own time. ”

“ High above them rose the vast dismantled ruins of Rheinfels, the lightning darting through its shattered casements and broken arches, and brightening the gloomy trees that here and there clothed the rocks, and tossed to the angry wind. Swift wheeled the water-birds over the river, dipping their plumage in the white foam, and uttering their discordant screams. A storm upon the Rhine has a grandeur it is in vain to paint. Its rocks, its foliage, the feudal ruins that everywhere rise from the lofty heights, speaking in characters of stern decay of many a former battle against time and tempest ”

“ Of all places that suggest Chaos, a poor bare beginning of things, that place is the desolate spot in which the Hinter Rhine takes its rise. It is called Paradise, and if ever man required to cheer himself with a euphemism, it might be here. From Splügen to Hinterrhein extends a flat tract of country on every inch of which nature has left an impression as of exhausted powers. And yet, under those external marks of sterility, lurks the beginning of a great thing, the Rhine, its fruitful valleys, its grandeur, its world-renowned towns. ”