Part 12

We hardly gave ourselves time to swallow a hasty _déjeûner_, and then set forth with the charming feeling that we had nothing to do but amuse ourselves. We had not an idea of where we were going, or what we meant to see. All was new, therefore all to us was worth seeing. Only a vague impression floated in our minds that we ought before long to find our way to the cathedral. It was not hard to find; in fact, it was impossible to miss it, for, as we sauntered down the Place de Meir, the golden clock-face on the steeple shone before us like a beacon over the high house-roofs, and

"Far up, the carillon did search The wind."

We pushed our way past the odious touters, clamorously asking in vile French and still viler English if we wished to see the cathedral? had we seen it? did we know we ought to see it? finally, of course, should they show it to us? We were in too mighty a presence to heed them. Above us, almost painfully high, rose the great steeple, pointing up to the clear blue sky. We stood at a corner of the old Marché and gazed and gazed, hardly able at first to take in the idea of its real height, foreshortened as it is when one stands so near. It grew upon us, revealed itself to us, as we looked and wondered, and ever after, while in the city, we seemed to feel its protecting presence, even though it might be hidden from our eyes. And we thought how often must weary sailors, beating up the stormy waters of the North Sea, have longed for a glimpse of that weather-stained tower, token to them of home and safety after some perilous voyage to bring gold and sugar from the New World, or priceless stuffs and spices from the Indies and far Cathay! Or as painters, after long study in the schools of Rome and Venice, made their slow way northward once more across the Alps, to add fresh glory to the Guild of St. Luke, how eagerly they must have watched for the first sight of their cathedral, pointing heavenward out of the flat misty plain, as if to lift their minds from earth into some purer atmosphere!

Yet, splendid as is the casket, still more precious is the treasure it contains. Many men have built cathedrals. There has been but one Rubens; and of all Rubens's works, the "Descent from the Cross" enshrined in Antwerp Cathedral is, one may venture to say without fear of criticism, unquestionably the most wonderful and beautiful. There is a sobriety, a reticence, about it in color, in movement, in drawing, in the exquisite balance of light and shade, in the nobility and yet tenderness of conception, which one hardly looks for in the painter, splendid though he be, of the Assumption of the Virgin over the high altar close by, still less of the gorgeous but revolting Marie de Medici series in the Louvre. To quote Fromentin once more, "_Tout y est contenu, concis, laconique comme dans une page du texte sacré._" Let those who judge him merely by pictures such as the last go to Antwerp, and, casting aside all preconceived ideas, say then whether Peter Paul Rubens shall not be pardoned all his carelessness, his coarseness,--yes, even his horrors,--and be to them henceforth the painter of the noble and majestic "Descent from the Cross."

It was long before we could summon resolution to leave the cathedral. Half a dozen times we started, as many times we turned back to the great triptych to impress some detail more firmly on our minds; and at last, when the door swung to behind us, and we saw the great master's statue standing in dusty sunshine in the Place Verte, we were in no humor for more sight-seeing. So we wandered happily and aimlessly on, now enchanted by some _pignon espagnol_, the quaint gable running up in a series of steps, which was introduced, some say, by the Spaniards, now stopping to scribble down the details of a bit of costume, or to look at a street shrine on a corner house, with its figure and lamp and tinsel flowers, until at last we found ourselves on the quays.

Here, where Van Noort, where Rubens, where Jordaens made studies among the rude fishermen for their pictures of the Miraculous Draught,--here, where generations of painters from their day down to our own have loved to dwell upon the changing aspects of the quiet river, the hurrying quays, the picturesque people,--here was indeed a spot where we humble disciples of Apelles might hope to gather inspiration from the example of the great departed. So we hunted out a pile of wood on the very brink of the river, a quiet corner where we ran no risk of being trampled underfoot by gigantic Flemish dray-horses or knocked down by heavily laden wagons; and there we sat peacefully, sketching the long reaches of the Scheldt bathed in a flood of golden haze. Up it sailed long low boats, floating past us with full red sails, flat, faint, wooded shores behind them, a tall smoking chimney or little church-spire breaking the blue line of the trees here and there. The river reaches were full of repose to eye and mind alike, and our thoughts turned instinctively to Van de Velde, to his glassy water, where little gleams catch the curl of some lazy ripple, and his skiffs and schooners floating in a veil of filmy gold, which warms his usual pearly grays, while they in turn give a sober undertone to the golden glory. A contrast to the quiet river was the foreground of the picture, where a steamer was lading for some distant voyage, funnels, rigging, hull, a great mass of black and brown against the pale golden water, and the bustling quay, where horses, men, carriages, foot-passengers, long low trollies,--apparently on only two wheels, so minute were the front pair,--piled high with bales and barrels, were jumbled in inextricable confusion.

We were working away, thankful that every one was too full of his own business to care to look at us, when suddenly a pleasant smell of burning made us wonder whether the municipality were trying to fumigate the town and overpower the very unsavory odors around us. Presently blacks began to settle on our sketch-books. Then burning morsels flew through the air, and, turning round, we saw that a quantity of bales standing on the quay twenty yards behind us were on fire. Half a dozen bystanders looked on with true Flemish phlegm. A woman in blue and gray, with yellow sabots, stood watching on a fallen mast. Then others began to arrive, and as the flames rose higher some slight interest arose with them. The gray woman turned and ran for the pompiers. The interest grew and spread among the gathering crowd. Soldiers just landing from the Tête de Flandre caught sight of the crackling flames and rushed towards them. Stevedores left the lading of their steamer, and, leaping across masts and spars, with sacks over their heads and their blue blouses puffed into balloons by the wind, rushed to the scene of action. M---- and I thought it prudent to retire to a street-corner, away from the turmoil.

Such a street! all in warm shade, with rich reds and grays and browns among its high-roofed houses. Out of the Fish-Market close by poured a motley crowd,--men in blue jerseys, men in red jerkins, men in shirt-sleeves, little lads in sailor-clothes with bright yellow sabots, women with yellow sabots and blue stockings, or yellow stockings and black sabots, or black shoes and pink stockings, women in three-cornered shawls, women in long black cloaks. The tardily-awakened interest had grown into intense excitement. Every one ran,--soldiers, ladies, porters, priests; and as we left the Quai Vandyck to go home, and looked up at the stone lace-work of the cathedral tower against the bright blue sky, the pompiers raced past us with their little hand-engine, to find that the fire had burnt itself out.

Too tired by our long day to walk any more, but unwilling to waste the evening in our rooms, we chartered a comfortable little carriage and drove down to the Port just after sunset. The cathedral tower stood stately and sombre against a pale-pink sky. Against this delicate background, too, we caught fantastic irregular outlines of old houses at every turn of the streets. The busy Quai Vandyck we now saw under a completely changed aspect. The pink of the upper sky melted into yellow, the yellow into a heavy blue-purple blending with the farther shore of the river. The bands of color, intensified by black masts and sails rising from yet blacker hulls lying under the bank, were reflected in the opalescent water; while fluttering pennons on a forest of fishing-boats looked, as M---- said, "like a shoal of minnows."

As we drove along in the growing darkness the scene was weird and strange. We caught glimpses of black figures, with heavy burdens on their shoulders, rushing up and down gangways of loading steamers like the demons of some Walpurgisnacht, lighted by oil-cans flaming from their two spouts. Then came a street of ancient houses,--we could see only the steps of their gables against the sky,--and, instead of a roadway below, the street was full of water and ships, sails half furled, lights, red, green, and yellow, repeating themselves in long reflections amid the black boats on the smooth surface of the canal. Across the river steamer-lights crept to and fro. Low carts, with huge horses that brought to mind Paul Potter's etching of "The Friesland Horse," grazed past us. Then came a black mass,--the house of the Hanseatic League. Then great docks like the sea, stretching away infinitely into the darkness, a mysterious confusion of masts, spars, cordage, chimneys, lights, water, black hulls. On shore a tangle of carts and trollies standing horseless, barrels, cotton-bales, wool-sacks. A locomotive snorted past us in dangerous proximity, appearing one knew not from whence, disappearing again into the gloom. Electric lights flashed on ahead far up the line. We passed more huge warehouses, more canals, more narrow streets. Then the Port and its strange life, its flaming oil-cans, its murky darkness, were left behind, and we found ourselves back in nineteenth-century civilization, driving down the new Frenchified boulevards, with only the statue of David Teniers and the Italian facade of Rubens's house to remind us where we were.

ART MUSEUMS OF DRESDEN.

ELIZABETH PEAKE.

["Pen Pictures of Europe," by Elizabeth Peake, is amply worth reading by all who wish to gain a rapid acquaintance with what is worth seeing on that continent. Its interesting descriptions are so many and varied that choice among them is not easy to make, and we present what our traveller saw in Dresden and at Potsdam simply as examples of the whole.]

We have been to the picture-gallery. There were between two and three thousand pictures. There were Raphael, Holbein, Correggio, Titian, Carlo Dolce, Paul Veronese, Rubens, Rembrandt, Vandyke, Guido, Ruysdael, Wouvermans, Claude, Poussin, and I do not know who else; but I would give them all, and more besides, for the portraits of Charlemagne and Sigismund by Dürer, and the historical painting of the peace of Westphalia, with its forty-seven original portraits by Sandrart. I do really think that I have seen a million of paintings, and have come to the sad conclusion that I have precious little love for pictures,--for paintings.

The magnificent frescos I admire as much as any one. But the thousands of Madonnas,--Raphael's "Madonna di San Sisto," which cost forty thousand dollars, I like better than any I have yet seen, next to that old painting of Leonardo da Vinci in the old church not far from Milan,--all the Madonnas have pretty eyes, pretty faces, pretty attitudes; but they do not come up to my idea of the Virgin. Then there are so many nude Venuses, and all sorts of nudities, that the artists who painted them ought to have been condemned to go without clothes, even in cold weather, to see how they would like it; and when they died they should have every bone in the human body carved as ornaments on their tombstone as I saw somewhere in my travels. The heads of the old men are exceedingly fine and natural; but many of the portraits have such affected attitudes that they seem ridiculous to me. I suppose it used to be the fashion to _take an attitude_ when they sat for a portrait.

Mrs. Siddons's portrait, in London, and one of Mary Queen of Scots and her page, were the most beautiful and faultless to my taste of all I saw in England.

Murillo's beggar boys and girls did not know enough to assume an attitude; and of course they please, because they are natural.

Did you ever see persons sit where they could see themselves in a mirror, conversing, and still looking at themselves with a sort of half consciousness they were doing so, and thinking that you were not noticing that they did so? I say, did you ever notice what a ridiculous and puzzled expression it gives to their faces? Well, this is just the expression of the greater part of these so celebrated portraits and paintings. It is appalling to think of,--I mean my want of taste,--but I do like to see pictures look natural. "How will madame have potatoes, sauté or grillé, or au naturel?" The word _naturel_ sounds so charmingly after all I have seen, that I reply joyously, "Au naturel;" and he brought me boiled potatoes,--just what I liked. I forgot to mention that we went again to the opera in Munich, in the small theatre in the king's palace. The opera was "Alessandra Stradella," by Flotow. I never heard sweeter music; and Nachbaur, who took the part of Stradella, was not only a magnificent tenor, but a perfect Adonis in person. He would meet with success in New York.

Yesterday we went to the royal palace, a very ancient and ungainly-looking building. Our object was to visit the green rooms, or vaults, which contain all kinds of rare objects-jewels, ivory, bronzes, and costly things,--which I suppose were intended to show the magnificence of the Saxon kings, who once were among the richest sovereigns in Europe. There are eight of these rooms on the ground-floor of the palace. I wish you could have been with us to have seen all the curiosities, and to have heard the custodian, who spoke English, tell us all about what he showed us. It is impossible to remember a tenth part of what one sees, so I was glad when the custodian said, as he entered the first room, which contains the bronzes, "Laties, here is more as a huntred fine bronzes; the best fon Italy, I show you ze masterpieces. Zis is Antinous; here is Apollo; dis leetle dog is curious; is of hammered iron, not cast hammered. 'Tis by Peter Vischer. You see he scratch himself,--very funny, very curious. Zis crucifix made by John of Bologna,--a masterpiece." I kept close to him to ask him more particularly about many things. The next room was the ivory room. I wish you could have heard him pronounce "my lady" in three or four different ways. There were four hundred and eighty-four pieces of ivory wonderfully carved. "Here, melaty, one little piece. Two drunken musicians fighting. Made by Dinglinger." "Who was Dinglinger?" I asked. "He was yeweller of te court, melaty." After seeing all in the room, he said, "Zis way, laties, if you please, one leetle step down. Here are ze mosaics. Zis table Florentine mosaic; best of ze tables." There were large life sized portraits on each side of the windows. I asked, "Whose portrait is this?" "Christian II., melaty. He always drink sixteen pottles of wine in one day,--sixteen pottles, melaty." I was much pleased with a magnificent chimney-piece, made of the different kinds of china manufactured here, and ornamented with the various kinds of stone found in Saxony. In the fourth room I noticed a peculiar clock, made in the form of the tower of Babel. One gold chalice, ornamented with precious gems, made by Benvenuto Cellini, attracted my attention. I asked about another portrait. "Augusta ze Strong, melaty. He took a horseshoe in his hand and broke it in two. Very strong, melaty, very strong." I had heard the story of his stopping at a shop to have a shoe put on his horse. Selecting a shoe, he took it in his hand, and breaking it, said it was not strong enough. The smith, after shoeing his horse, asked for a dollar. Augustus threw down a silver dollar. The smith took it up, and rolling it over in his fingers in the form of a cigar, asked if the dollar was a good one.

A little farther, the custodian took up a golden egg. "Here, laties, is one golden egg. I will open it, and you will see it contains a golden chicken. I will open ze chicken; it has in it ze Polish crown. I will open ze crown, and show you one fine ring. All zese rings are for show, for curiosity, for playthings." The next room contained the largest pearls; one represents the body of a court dwarf, and is as large as a hen's egg. In the seventh room we were shown the regalia used at the coronation of Augustus Second as king of Poland, and then brought here to be kept for the coronation of Saxon princes who might at some future time be crowned at Cracow. There, too, were the swords of John Sobieski and Solyman II., of Turkey. The hilts of these swords seemed one mass of diamonds. The shoulder-knot of the queens of Poland containing six hundred and sixty-two diamonds! Then the diamond buttons, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, and other precious stones were as wonderful on account of their abundance as they were for their great beauty. I could only think of Sinbad the sailor, of Aladdin and his wonderful lamp, and all the fairy-tales of diamonds and gems I had read in my life. In the last there were emeralds one and a half inches large, and a model of the throne and court of the great Mogul Aurengzebe, at which Dinglinger and eighteen men worked eight years, and were paid fifty-nine thousand thalers! A costly plaything. All the Saxon crown jewels, collected from the time of the Elector Maurice, 1541, were one blaze of light and beauty. Boxes are always ready for packing them, particularly in time of war, when they are taken to the fortress of Königstein.

We have been over the bridge to the Japanese palace to see the collections of porcelain from the earliest times until now. The Portuguese were the first to bring porcelain to Europe from China and Japan, and Saxony was the first European country in which its manufacture was begun. Von Tzschirnhausen was making experiments in his three glass huts when, in 1701, he was joined by John Frederic Böttger, an alchemist, who said he had succeeded in finding the philosopher's stone, and who, in the presence of witnesses, melted eighteen two groschen pieces, sprinkled into the liquid mass a reddish powder, and changed them into the finest gold. However that may have been, he found a species of earth in the neighborhood of Meissen which suited his purposes, and began the manufacture of porcelain, which at the present day is carried on there in a large establishment called the royal porcelain manufactory of Dresden china. Meissen is not far from Dresden, but I am afraid we shall not have time to go there.

But to return to the Japanese palace. There were costly selections of Chinese, Japanese, East Indian, Dresden, and Sèvres porcelain. It is really astonishing to see what improvement was made in Dresden china in twenty years, and then from those twenty years until the present time. There are twenty rooms in the basement of this building which are filled with these collections. I only wish they had put them in the story above, where ever so much old statuary is placed, for then they could be seen to so much better advantage, and the statuary be kept in the shade, where, in my opinion, a good lot of it should always be. Kändler's model of a huge monument to Augustus (III. of Poland and II. of Saxony) is entirely of porcelain, and cost twelve thousand thalers. A camellia, thirty-eight inches high, modelled by Schiefer, in Meissen, in 1836, is most beautiful. We were shown plates which cost three or four hundred dollars apiece. The bust of the queen of Prussia, given by her husband, Frederic William III., to this collection, is exquisite. A white lace veil was carelessly thrown over the head. I looked at it, and thought it strange that a lace veil should be thrown over a bust of china, and spoke to the guide about it. He said the veil was china too. I examined it closely; the work on the border was perfect, and you could see the head and neck through the veil as plainly as if it had been real lace. The Sèvres china given by the first Napoleon was the handsomest of any we saw. Some majolica vases were very fine, and cost about ten thousand dollars each. There were Chinese gods, made in China, of the most beautiful porcelain, but as hideous in form as they were beautiful in material.

We went to the armory, said to be the finest collection of the kind in Europe. In the first room we were shown many curiosities: the work-table of "Mother Anna," made of petrified wood, which the attendant wished me to notice particularly, because it was a _petrifactation_.

Then there was a clock with a bear striking the seconds on a drum; another clock imitated a chime of bells; Luther's drinking-cup, made of gold, and holding about a pint; and a beautiful cabinet presented to him by his friend and protector, the Elector of Saxony, and which, after his death, was sold to the government by his family. The next room was filled with implements of sports and the chase, all very curious.

On we went, from room to room, looking at the suits of armor which had been worn by the electors of Saxony,--their tilting suits, their parade suits; the horses they rode on parade, stuffed and equipped; and their masters' suits put on figures to represent those distinguished personages; so you could fancy yourself walking among them, and seeing them as they looked when living. Nothing could exceed the splendor of the horses' accoutrements,--precious stones almost covered their harness; the scabbards of one or two swords were set with jewels and diamonds their whole length; in those times jewels and diamonds were as plentiful as blackberries. The housing of one of the kings, when he went sleigh-riding, was crimson velvet embroidered with gold, and two or three hundred little bells that looked like gold fastened on all over it. There were the cuirass of Augustus the Strong, which weighed one hundred pounds, and his cap, that weighed twenty-five. Napoleon's saddle, and many other saddles, had jewels set in them that many a lady would be proud to wear.

One great curiosity was a Turkish tent, taken at the siege of Vienna, in 1683. It was set up in one room with all its furniture. The ground-work was crimson embroidered with gold. I should think it was large enough to accommodate twenty persons. There were also the armor worn by John Sobieski at the same siege, and the pistols worn by Charles XII. of Sweden on the day of his death. Some of the tilting suits worn at tournaments weighed two hundred pounds.

I never saw anything like these Germans for curious and strange things. One of the curious and costly toys I saw when we went to the green rooms was a bird's nest, flowers, etc., made of flour and water. I do not know whether I told you of a painting on cobweb which we saw in the museum at Munich. There were four or five panes of glass nearly covered with cobwebs, which had a landscape painted on them. In some things I do not admire the taste: two large porcelain pitchers, that would hold two gallons, and cost thousands of dollars, had handles made to represent large spotted adders, or snakes.

If I did not understand German I would not know half the time what they meant when they are trying to talk to me in English. Showing me some china cups that were first made with handles, the man said, "You see, zese are ze first made wiz hankles." Speaking of something being most convenient, he said, the "commodest."