equally picturesque. The Hemmerich, Ochlberg, and Lowenberg, recede considerably into distance; but their sloping bases far as the eye can reach exhibit ranges of vineyards; convents and thick woods are seen on the tops of some, whilst those of others split and rent Form turret, dome, or battlement; Or seem fantastically set With cupola and minaret. In gracing my pages with the verse of Sir Walter Scott, whose striking delineations of our own Highland Scenery often find their counterpart in a Rhenish coup d'œil, I am led to remark how much the powers of such a Poet united to the researches of such an Antiquary, are wanted here. Conveyed in the form of some metrical romance, with notes appended like those to the Lady of the Lake, or the Lord of the Isles, how acceptable for both entertainment and instruction to a voyager on the Rhine would be a little more knowledge respecting the remoter history of surrounding objects-a few more romantic traditions concerning the tenantless halls and crumbling towers of the castles, which perfectly astonish the traveller by their unusual number, their extraordinary situations, their magnificent dimensions, and multiplied forms. Of the fierce race who, when fixed in these no longer to be feared abodes, were accustomed to make their lordly presence and supremacy felt in the destructive wantonness of unbridled power, Childe Harold remarks In their baronial feuds and single fields, Between Andernach and Bonn I saw two or three of those enormous rafts which are formed of the accumulated produce of the Swiss and German forests.-One was anchored in the middle of the river, and looked like a floating island. These Krakens of the Rhine are composed of oak and fir floated in smaller rafts down the tributary streams, and, their size constantly increasing till they arrive hereabouts, they make platforms of from four hundred to seven hundred feet long and one hundred and forty feet in breadth. When in motion a dozen boats and more precede them, carrying anchors and cables to guide and arrest their course. The navigation of a raft down the Rhine to Dort in Holland, which is the place of their destination,* is a work of great difficulty. The skill of the German and Dutch pilots who navigate them, in spite of the abrupt turnings, the eddies, the currents, rocks and shoals that oppose their progress, must indeed be of a very peculiar kind, and can be possessed but by few. It requires besides a vast deal of manual labour. The whole complement of rowers and workmen, together with their wives and children, on board one of the first-rates, amounts to the astonishing number of nine hundred or a thousand: a little village containing from forty to sixty wooden houses is erected upon each, which also is furnished with stalls for cattle, a magazine for provisions, &c.-The dwelling appropriated to the use of the master of the raft and the principal super-cargoes was conspicuous for its size and commodiousness.-It is curious to observe these rafts, on their passage, with their companies of rowers stationed About twelve of these rafts annually arrive at Dort in July or August; when the German timber-merchants, having converted their floats into good Dutch ducats, return to their own country. When the water is low, these machines are sometimes months upon the journey.—Campbell's Guide. at each end, making the shores ring again to the sound of their immense oars. The succession of grand natural pictures, which I had been gazing upon since my departure from Mentz and the district of the Rheingau, are undoubtedly similar but not the same-there is alternately the long noble reach; the sudden bend; the lake-like expanse; the shores on both sides lined with towns whose antique fortifications rise in distant view, and villages whose tapering spires of blue slate peer above the embosoming foliage; the mountains clothed with vines and forests, their sides bristled and their summits crowned with the relics of feudal residences, or of cloistered fanes-but the varieties in the shape and character of all these are inexhaustible: it is this circumstance that enhances the pleasure of contemplating scenery, in which there is, as Lord Byron says, * A blending of all beauties; streams and dells, Fruit, foliage, crag, wood, corn-field, mountain, vine, From grey but leafy walls where ruin greenly dwells. The oppositions of light and shade; the rich culture of the hills contrasted with the rugged rocks that often rise from out of the midst of fertility; the bright verdure of the islands which the Rhine is continually forming; the purple bues and misty azure of the distant mountains-these and a thousand other indescribable charms, constitute sources of visual delight which can be imparted only by a view of the objects themselves.-And * There are the ruins of 14 castles on the left bank, and of 15 on the right bank, of the Rhine, from Mentz to Bonn, a distance of 36 leagues. is excitement of no other kind awakened, in contemplating the borders of this graceful and magnificent river? Yes. When we revert to the awful convulsions of the physical world, and the important revolutions of human society, of which the regions it flows through have been successively the theatre-when we meditate on the vast changes, the fearful struggles, the tragic incidents and mournful catastrophes, which they have witnessed from the earliest ages to the very times in which we have ourselves lived and marked the issue of events-"the battles, sieges, fortunes" that bave passed before its green tumultuous current, or within ken of its mountain watchtowers-the shouts of nations that have resounded, and the fates of empires that have been decided, on its shores -when we think of the slaughtered myriads whose bones have bleached on the neighbouring plains, filled up the trenches of its rock-built strong-holds, or found their place of sepulture beneath its wave-when, at each survey we take of the wide and diversified scene, the forms of centuries seem to be embodied with the objects around us, and the record of the past becomes vividly associated with the impression of present realities-it is then that we are irresistibly led to compare the greatness of Nature with the littleness of Man: it is then that we are forcibly struck with the power and goodness of the Author of both; and that the deepest humility unites itself in a grateful mind, with the highest admiration, at the sight of "these His lowest works." But do you pretend, it may be asked, in the course of a three days' journey, however lengthened by celerity of conveyance, or favoured by advantages of season and weather-do you pretend to have experienced that very eminent degree of gratification which the country is capable of communicating? Certainly not. I speak of these scenes but as of things, which before my own hasty and unsatisfied glances came like shadows-so departed. Instead of two or three days, a whole month should be spent between Mentz, Coblentz, and Bonn, in order fully to know and thoroughly to enjoy the beauties and grandeurs with which that space abounds. Adieu to thee, fair Rhine! How long delighted LORD BYRON. |