University of Virginia Library

74. LETTER LXXIV.

At the foot of a hill in one of the beautiful suburbs
of Vienna, stands a noble palace, called the Lower
Belvidere. On the summit of the hill stands another,
equally mangnificent, called the Upper Belvidere, and
between the two extend broad and princely gardens,
open to the public.

On the lower floor of the entrance-hall in the former
palace, lies the copy, in mosaic, of Leonardo da Vinci's
“Last Supper,” done at Napoleon's order. Though
supposed to be the finest piece of mosaic in the world,
it is so large that they have never found a place for it.
A temporary balcony has been erected on one side of
the room, and the spectator mounts nearly to the

ceiling to get a fair position for looking down upon it.
That unrivalled picture, now going to decay in the
convent at Milan, will probably depend upon this copy
for its name with posterity. The expression in the
faces of the apostles is as accurately preserved as in
the admirable engraving of Morghen.

The remaining halls in the palace are occupied by
a grand collection of antiquities, principally of a warlike
character. When I read in my old worm-eaten Burton,
of “Scanderburg's strength,” I never thought to see
his sword. It stands here against the wall, a long straight
weapon with a cross hilt, which few men could heave
to their shoulders. The tomahawk of poor Montezuma
hangs near it. It was presented to the emperor by the
king of Spain. It is of a dark granite, and polished very
beautifully. What a singular curiosity to find in Austria!

The windows are draped with flags dropping in pieces
with age. This, so in tatters, was renowned in the
crusades. It was carried to the Holy Land and brought
back by the archduke Ferdinand.

A hundred warriors in bright armor stand round the
hall. Their visors are down, their swords in their
hands, their feet planted for a spring. One can scarce
believe there are no men in them. The name of some
renowned soldier is attached to each. This was the
armor of the cruel Visconti of Milan — that, of Duke
Alba of Florence — both costly suits, beautifully inlaid
with gold. In the centre of the room stands a gigantic
fellow in full armor, with a sword on his thigh and a
beam in his right hand. It is the shell of the famous
farmer of Augsburgh, who was in the service of one
of the emperors. He was over eight feet in height,
and limbed in proportion. How near such relics bring
history! With what increased facility one pictures
the warrior to his fancy, seeing his sword, and hearing
the very rattle of his armor. Yet it puts one into Hamlet's
vein to see a contemptible valet lay his hand with
impunity on the armed shoulder, shaking the joints
that once belted the soul of a Visconti! I turned, in
leaving the room, to take a second look at the flag of
the crusade. It had floated, perhaps, over the helmet
of Cæur de Lion. Saladin may have had it in his eye,
assaulting the Christian camp with his pagans.

In the next room hung fifty or sixty portraits of
celebrated individuals, presented in their time to the
emperors of Austria. There was one of Mary of
Scotland. It is a face of superlative loveliness, taken
with a careless and most bewitching half smile, and
yet not without the look of royalty, which one traces
in all the pictures of the unfortunate queen. One of
the emperors of Germany married Phillippina, a farmer's
daughter, and here is her portrait. It is done in the
prim old style of the middle ages, but the face is full
of character. Her husband's portrait hangs beside it,
and she looks more born for an emperor than he.

Hall after hall followed, of costly curiosities. A
volume would not describe them. Two gold busts of
Jupiter and Juno, by Benvenuto Cellini, attracted my
attention particularly. They were very beautiful, but
I would copy them in bronze, and coin “the thunderer
and his queen,” were they mine.

Admiration is the most exhausting thing in the world.
The servitor opened a gate leading into the gardens of
the palace, that we might mount to the Upper Belvidere,
which contains the imperial gallery of paintings.
But I had no more strength. I could have dug in the
field till dinner-time — but to be astonished more than
three hours without respite is beyond me. I took a
stroll in the garden. How delightfully the unmeaning
beauty of a fountain refreshes one after this inward
fatigue. I walked on, up one alley and down another,
happy in finding nothing that surprised me, or worked
upon my imagination, or bothered my historical recollections,
or called upon my wornout superlatives
for expression. I fervently hoped not to have another
new sensation till after dinner.

Vienna is an immense city (two hundred and fifty
thousand inhabitants), but its heart only is walled in.
You may walk from gate to gate in twenty minutes.
In leaving the walls you come upon a feature of the
city which distinguishes it from every other in Europe.
Its rampart is encircled by an open park (called
the Glacis), a quarter of a mile in width and perhaps
three miles in circuit, which is, in fact, in the centre
of Vienna. The streets commence again on the other
side of it, and on going from one part of the city to
the other, you constantly cross this lovely belt of verdure,
which girds her heart like a cestus of health.
The top of the rampart itself is planted with trees, and,
commanding beautiful views in every direction, it is
generally thronged with people. (It was a favorite
walk of the Duke of Reichstadt.) Between this and
the Glacis lies a deep trench, crossed by drawbridges
at every gate, the bottom of which is cultivated prettily
as a flower-garden. Altogether Vienna is a beautiful
city. Paris may have single views about the
Tuileries that are finer than anything of the same
kind here, but this capital of western Europe, as a
whole, is quite the most imposing city I have seen.

The Glacis is full of gardens. I requested my disagreeable
necessity of a valet, this afternoon, to take
me to two or three of the most general resorts of the
people. We passed out by one of the city gates, five
minutes walk from the hotel, and entered immediately
into a crowd of people, sauntering up and down under
the alleys of the Glacis. A little farther on we found
a fanciful building, buried in trees, and occupied as
a summer café. In a little circular temple in front
was stationed a band of music, and around it for a considerable
distance were placed small tables, filled just
now with elegantly-dressed people, eating ices, or
drinking coffee. It was in every respect like a private
fête champêtre. I wandered about for an hour, expecting
involuntarily to meet some acquaintance — there
was such a look of kindness and unreserve throughout.
It is a desolate feeling to be alone in such a
crowd.

We jumped into a carriage and drove round the
Glacis for a mile, passing everywhere crowds of people
idling leisurely along and evidently out for pleasure.
We stopped before a superb façade, near one of
the gates of the city. It was the entrance to the
Volksgarten. We entered in front of a fountain, and
turning up a path to the left, found our way almost
impeded by another crowd. A semicircular building,
with a range of columns in front encircling a stand for
a band of music, was surrounded by perhaps two or
three thousand people. Small tables and seats under
trees, were spread in every direction within reach of
the music. The band played charmingly. Waiters
in white jackets and aprons were running to and fro,
receiving and obeying orders for refreshments, and
here again all seemed abandoned to one spirit of enjoyment.
I had thought we must have left all Vienna
at the other garden. I wondered how so many
people could be spared from their occupations and
families. It was no holyday. “It is always as gay in
fair weather,” said Karl.

A little back into the garden stands a beautiful little
structure, on the model of the temple of Theseus in
Greece. It was built for Canova's group of “Theseus
and the Centaur,” bought by the emperor. I had
seen copies of it in Rome, but was of course much
more struck with the original. It is a noble piece of
sculpture.

Still father back, on the rise of a mount, stood
another fanciful café, with another band of music — and
another crowd! After we had walked around it, my
man was hurrying me away. “You have not seen the
augarten,” said he. It stands upon a little green
island in the Danube, and is more extensive than either
of the others. But I was content where I was; and

dismissing my Asmodeus, I determined to spend the
evening wandering about in the crowds alone. The
sun went down, the lamps were lit, the alleys were illuminated,
the crowd increased, and the emperor himself
could not have given a gayer evening's entertainment.

Vienna has the reputation of being the most profligate
capital in Europe. Perhaps it is so. There is
certainly, even to a stranger, no lack of temptation to
every species of pleasure. But there is, besides, a
degree of simplicity and confidence in the manners of
the Viennese which I had believed peculiar to America,
and inconsistent with the state of society in Europe.
In the most public resorts, and at all hours of
the day and evening, modest and respectable young
women of the middle classes walk alone perfectly secure
from molestation. They sit under the trees in
these public gardens, eat ices at the cafés, walk home
unattended, and no one seems to dream of impropriety.
Whole families, too, spend the afternoon upon a
seat in a thronged place of resort, their children playing
about them, the father reading, and the mother
sewing or knitting, quite unconscious of observation.
The lower and middle classes live all summer, I am
told, out of doors. It is never oppressively warm in
this latitude, and their houses are deserted after three
or four o'clock in the afternoon, and the whole population
pours out to the different gardens on the Glacis,
where till midnight, they seem perfectly happy in
the enjoyment of the innocent and unexpensive pleasures
which a wise government has provided for them.

The nobles and richer class pass their summer in
the circle of rural villages near the city. They are
nested about on the hills, and crowded with small and
lovely rural villas, more like the neighborhood of Boston
than anything I have seen in Europe.

Baden, where the emperor passes much of his time,
is called “the miniature Switzerland.” Its baths are
excellent, its hills are cut into retired and charming
walks, and from June till September it is one of the
gayest of watering-places. It is about a two hours'
drive from the city, and omnibuses at a very low rate,
run between at all times of the day. The Austrians
seldom travel, and the reason is evident. They have
everything for which others travel, at home