keenest players; and his withered hand, as he clutched the gold, showed the most splendid ring at the table.

What a sight was this! how melancholy-how humiliating! One's spirits sink to zero at such exhibitions. Baden offers cures for the body-poison for the soul. It is a place whose moral atmosphere is thick with corruption, while all without is fascinatingly beautiful. "0 my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honor, be not thou united!"

The pump-room, whither people go in the morning to drink the waters, must be rather an amusing place when the company is numerous. The water is distributed by men; and there was a man dressed like a hunter, in heavy buckskin breeches, giving out whey from a sort of churn-all this to the sound of fine, soft music, from a band stationed in an arbor near. There is a small temple over the principal spring, which issues from the rocks at the foot of the castle terrace. The place in its vicinity is called, from its heat, by a name which is more usually applied and more appropriate, to gambling-houses.

HEIDELBERG.

WE came hither in the rain, in about three hours and a half from Baden; had a bad dinner at the Prinz Carl, and afterwards drove out the rain having ceased. On our way to the castle we stopped to see the trout-preserves, where a girl fed the fish in a pool, with other fish caught in the river. The trout came up like chickens to

be fed, and some of them would jump quite out of the water at the bait. It was a gloomy den-damp and slippery after the rain; and I felt no disposition to taste fish fed thus-Strasburg fashion-to an unnatural size. The tavern near seemed a place of much resort; and we saw several parties who had come to dine on these gorged trout.

The castle is too well known to require a word of description, and the scene from its height cannot be described. One may give the dimensions of the great tun, and tell of the funny image of the old man that used to keep it, now shown in the same cellar; but the romantic town crowded in between the mountain and the river, and the long reach of the Neckar winding through its fertile vales, visible from this high spot, must be seen with the bodily eyes. The pictures I have seen exaggerate, to my conception, the height of the mountain-at least it seems so to me after seeing the Alps. The castle-terrace, from which we have this view, is itself most beautiful; and from its position commands a very extensive range of prospect each way. The house on the other side of the river-called Hirschgasse-to which the students resort for their absurd duels, was pointed out. There have

been three fought there this morning.

Some of my readers may not know that these duels are but little dangerous to life or limb, although fatal accidents do sometimes occur. The aim is to disfigure the face by sword-cuts, and the lower part of the person is carefully guarded by a sort of quilted armor; and seconds stand by with long swords held under the weapons of the combatants, that they may not, in the forget

fulness of passion, strike lower than the code allows. Duels are said to be much more frequent among the theological students than among the others, and they arise about the merest trifles. They are always fought in a private room, and under great precautions of secresy.

FRANKFORT.

GOETHE has left such a mark in Frankfort that it seems to be his city. The house of whose building he has so much to say in the Autobiography, still stands, handsome and ample, in the Hirsch-Graben; the family arms (three lyres) carved in marble over the door, and just above a slab stating that Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe was born there. His statue, a hideous thing in bronze, stands in the Allée-a square planted with trees. The bas-reliefs on the pedestal appeared to have merit; it is the person of the poet which is so displeasing, from an appearance of excessive clumsiness. The head of Goethe could hardly be spoiled by the dullest artist.

We went, as everybody does, through the Jews' quarter; saw the house of Rothschild and that of his mother -the latter looking almost as old-clothes-ish as the dwellings of her people on each side, The Stædel gallery contains the Influence of Christianity upon the Arts, by Overbeck; the Foolish Virgins, by Schadow; and some other interesting pictures. But the Art-glory of Frankfort is the Ariadne of Dannecker, which is shown in a pavilion built for its reception in a garden near one of the

gates. This statue is well known by casts and engravings, which give a very good idea of it. The place in which it is shown is unfavorable for want of size and elegance; and there is a rose-light upon it which is not agreeable.

Frankfort is the whitest town we have seen. Every house, except those in the old town, is white-a fashion which would oblige all the inhabitants to wear green spectacles if the country were as sunny as ours. It gives the city a bare, uncomfortable look. For my part I much preferred the appearance of the old streets about the Cathedral, where the houses stand with their gables towards the street-the upper stories far over-hanging the lower. There are some very curious old houses in that part of the town; and the Cathedral is one of those that look as if they had been built without any settled plan-irregular, and setting all one's notions of grace and symmetry at defiance. By the mistaken advice of a gentleman with whom we travelled a little way, we put up at the Weisse Schwan instead of the Hotel de Russie recommended by the infallible Murray; and here, at the table d'hôte, we fell in with the whole Germanic Diet, which came near reducing ours uncomfortably. These gentlemen, perhaps from much talking, were extremely hungry; and they filled the eyes and ears of the waiters so completely, that it was not easy for us ordinary travellers to obtain anything to eat. We noted their heads and faces with no little interest, and fancied we had discovered some very fine ones among them, though almost half the heads were either bald or wigged. Their manners were remarkable for bonhommie, and their rela

tions with each other seemed of the most friendly sort. By the manner of their conversation, we concluded that they were continuing the discussions of the morning; but we understood nothing of their wisdom, which was chiefly delivered in German. One or two of those nearest us were disposed to be polite in French, but there was such a din of talk that it was difficult to converse.

We took our seats in the train for Maintz (Mayence) at three, and had a most amusing exhibition of undisguised love-making, between a damsel in pink and her Indian-looking innamerato. For the first time we observe very gay and showy dresses in the public carriages. It must be the vicinity of Wiesbaden that produces the change.

THE BRUNNENS.

WE came to Maintz, in the Grand Duchy of Hesse Darmstadt, to hear the military bands, which play in the public gardens there once a week; and so set up our rest in the Rheinischer Hof, meaning to spend the night, at least. But the bands did not play, for some reason or other; and Wiesbaden being within sixteen minutes by railway, we determined rather to see that famous Brunnen than this old Rhine town. Our desire to see the romantic portion of the Rhine scenery thoroughly, makes us alter our original plan a little-so as to traverse each part of

* The riots and massacre at Frankfort took place in two or three weeks after this peaceful and brotherly dinner.