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THE MÜNSTER-THAL.

nothing to admire in it. The outline of the Great Tower is majestic and impressive: indeed the exterior, rising in the centre of a broad area, surrounded by lofty mansions, is sufficiently striking.

I should not forget to mention that there are some splendid windows of painted glass in the Choir worthy of a more congenial situation.

Basle, 28th of September, 1844.

Of course it would be worse than idle to attempt a description of the scenery between the lovely Lake of Bienne and Bâle, rejoicing in the worthy title The Münster Thal,* or indeed between any other two places in the alphabet;-but

"Duller should I be than the fat weed

That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,"

were I to withhold my tribute of admiration to its sublime characteristics.

It is something to have traversed the Jura, something more when Jura's thunder splitten mass rends for us a strange road out of the chasm; but it is more than all to behold those enormous rampires from the chafing torrent at

*The Vale of The Cathedral.

THE MÜNSTER-THAL.

193

their base to the narrow arch of blue sky at their summit, inrobed with vast forests of beach and pine.

You are ushered by a romantic arch of living rock into this wonderous scenery, which, not contented with the gloomy monotony which the grandeur of the mountain, or the purple mists of the deep gorge, disclose, intermingles these silvan ravines with basking meadows of the most delicate verdure, quaint old Villages, and ever and anon façades of perpendicular rock, whose natural Colonnades, sculptured by no architect less mighty than the torrent and the blast, Ellora or Elephanta might envy.

The Birs, at first a small insignificant stream, racing hither and thither over its rocky bed, did at length, as day declined, assume the dignity of a swift but silent stream, whose chief delight it seemed to be to uncoil its purple scarf through meadows more like woven tapestry than mere earthly grass, while ever and anon, girdled with strange antic Towerlets, grim tall Dungeon, Gatehouse, Bridge and Moat, or soaring on its steep green mound, distinguished by the more stately ornaments of Terrace and Grove, some venerable Chateau received the willing homage of the circling

stream.

The tranquil lustre of the brightest harvest moon I ever beheld, exercised to the full her beautifying privilege over all this, alternately pic

194

THE STREETS OF BASLE.

turing, in superb blackness, the outline of the massy buildings, or sparkling in the river that twined enamoured round their base. I may add by way of climax, that this unparalleled scenery extends between forty and fifty miles.

Basle, 30th September, 1844.

BASLE, or (as the Italians more legally, or more musically phrase it) Basilia, at first disappointed

me.

From what earthly source I would fain know do we draw our Home imaginations of the ancient Swiss and German towns? One is always picturing them as the most delightful old monsters of brick, stone, and timber work that can be conceived. Streets just made for two to encounter and lift their hats for about ten yards after they have passed each other, doubtless in gratitude for being allowed to pass at all; mansions apparently in transports of anxiety to embrace each other across the way, in which laudable attempt, with the help of enormous porches, and quatrefoiled and diamond work balconies, they just fail by half a yard! broad Bay windows, whose emblazoned and dusty lattices were intended for any purpose except Light and

Sight; gateways of such menacing iron and oak, that Cerberus himself might be induced to send in his testimonials, and offer the most undeniable references as a candidate for the office of Porter: -In short, one depicts the entire town as a species of terrestrial Tartarus, all gloomy and ghostly, built only as the receptacle for bloody chronicles, or the theatre of mysterious transactions.

What then is the real fact?

Here we are in Basle, with its great River rolling below a crescent of mansions, sufficiently pictorial, in their ensemble, diversified occasionally by the steepled roofs of the old minster, the cupola of some municipal building, the minarets of some pavillion, some aged grove, some trellised and coloured garden, all rejoicing to be near neighbours to their father Rhine, while the uniformly broad gabels, steep roofs of scaly tilework, and deep canopies of eaves, combined to produce a strange and striking Picture.

But where is the gloom, where the grandeur, where the intimations of secret, foul, and midnight deeds?

Alas for the Romance-reader! every house is scrupulously whitewashed, and door and window painted in all the hues of the rainbow, the gaudier the better.

And as for those interesting, though importunate Beings, whose business it is to draw men's curtains at the dead of night,-there is no chance for

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HOTEL OF THE THREE KINGS.

them! for if ever phantom fled before a distasteful fume, the cigars and meerschaums, whose clouds darken all Germany at noonday, would speedily exorcise the fleshless intruder. That Ghost of a surety could have

which ventured to expose them to the pungent exhalations of tobacco.

It is doubtless, her alliance with the illustrious Rhine which bestows upon Basle her pictorial and imposing appearance.

On the evening of our arrival I rambled to the great wooden bridge, and from thence beheld that mighty necromancer, the moon, investing Town and Stream with a prestige truly marvellous. It was a masquerade, stately and sparkling beneath the illusion of festal lamps, but unqualified to endure the Ithuriel touch of the sunlight.

The interior region of the city is a dingy nest of narrow, crooked, and unclean streets; although its principal avenues are broad and piled up with mansions of much apparent cleanliness and even grandeur. The Hotel of the Three Kings is like two corpulent palaces rolled into one, and its accommodations are in every way correspondent to its size. But I cannot even now help laughing at the reply of the young Englishman who pointed it out to me, when I interrogated him as to its excellence, "Excellent?" was his astounded answer. "Why it has sixty windows in front!"