buried on the eve of St. Andrew 1318 and his bier was supported to the grave by eight ladies. Though a canon of the Cathedral, he devoted his muse to the praise of woman; his was that romantic enthusiasm which inspired the Minnesingers, resulting from the mystic adoration of the Virgin, making the Mother of the Saviour the ideal of beauty the mystic Deity of every heart thence elevating the soul into Platonic rhapsodies, and throwing a poetic halo about the sex. I own to a little relish of Schiller's ridicule of the Minnesingers however, when I think of this simple priest, who must have known as much about the genuine passion of love as the gilt cherubim of his Cathedral did, or as the Abbé who was playing the game of definitions, and having the question put to him: What is Love? (amour) answered demurely: ,Un mot qui contient trois voyelles et deux consonnes.“ Schiller says: " If the sparrows should ever think ,,of writing or publishing an almanac of love, it probably ,,would be composed in the same style: A garden, a ,,tree, a hedge, and a sweetheart; quite right—some,,what such are the objects which have place in the head ,,of a sparrow: and the flowers they exhale; and the fruits ,,they ripen; and there is a branch on which the bird sits ,,and sings in the sunshine; and the spring comes, and ,,the winter goes, and nothing results but ennui." Those who, like Schiller, delight in the development of strong passion, can never probably abide the forced conceits of the,,dolz pleurai“. But all reverence to the good canon of Mainz, moaning like a solitary sparrow upon the house-top; though the sex since his day, have assumed

new code of rights and forsworn the insipidity of sucking-dove life, yet they have not neglected their champion, and a new monument has replaced the old one, which was destroyed by some accident, erected by

the ladies of Mayence in 1843, bearing his portrait in basrelief from the chisel of Schwanthaler.

There are two massive brazen doors opening from the Cathedral into the market-place on which is inscribed the Magna Charta of Mayence. These doors and the privileges conferred by the charter, were the gifts of Willigis to the citizens, A. D. 1000. In the various chapels which are found along both sides of the church many sumptuous altars are seen, but to a plain unpretending one a miracle is attached which is a curious proof of the naïve simplicity of the people's belief in those faroff ages. — „An Image of the Virgin stood in this chapel; on her feet she wore a pair of golden slippers the votive offering of St. Crispin perhaps be that as it may, a poor itinerant fiddler starving and miserable, after playing unsuccessfully through the streets of Mayence, entered the Cathedral und kneeling before the altar of the Virgin, put up his prayer for succor; looking about him and ob serving the church was quite empty, he, in a moment of devotional zeal, tuned up the old fiddle and sung a hymn to the Virgin. So earnest was he, so warmed up his heart, that he again threw himself upon his knees before her altar. On rising, the statue of the Virgin dexterously kicked out her left foot and deposited the golden slipper in the ragged bosom of the fiddler. Elated by his good fortune, he flew to a jeweller's shop to exchange the gift for money. It was recognized; he was arrested for sacrilege, judged and condemned to be executed in the Speise-Markt opposite the brazen doors of the Cathedral. His judges treated his story as an impudent falsehood. Arrived at the foot of the scaffold, he asked, as a dying request, to be permitted to offer one prayer and sing one hymn at the altar of the Virgin. They could not refuse, - it would have been an impiety equal to his sacrilege.

Closely guarded, he was allowed to enter the church; he prayed and sang as he had done before. The Virgin lifted her other foot and flung the remaining slipper into his bosom; all present witnessed it, none could deny the miraculous interposition in his favor, and the fiddler went free." On leaving the Cathedral, we went to the open space where Thorwaldsen's statue of Guttemberg is placed, the expense of which was defrayed by all Europe. His house no longer exists, but that in which he established his first printing-press was shown us; he was the inventor of the moveable types as all know. With this, we had exhausted what Mayence offered to interest us and we returned to Wiesbaden, crossing the superb bridge which unites Mayence to Castel, 1665 feet long; and driving among gardens and orchards in that state of perfect cultivation which characterizes Nassau. The precision and neatness of the market - gardens must be seen to be realized; there is not a hand's breadth of ground that is not rendered available. Many of these small proprietors depend entirely on the produce of these little spots of earth and necessity compels them to cherish them with such care.

CHAPTER VI.

THE RHEINGAU.

In heart I am a very boy,

Haunting the woods, the waterfalls,

The ivies on gray castle walls:

Watching in silent joy

When the broad sun goes down the west."

Alex. Smith.

A beautiful episode was that, when stealing for a time. from the monotonous routine of bath-life at Wiesbaden, we went among the mountains of the Rheingau. I can now appreciate the glowing enthusiasm of the Germans. for this, the garden paradise of their country. We landed at Bingen; there was a walk, shaded by lindens, down upon the shore of the Rhine; here and there, a resting seat. To this I found my way the first evening. Beyond lies the bleaching-ground for the city-housewives, whose diligent maidens were spreading and watering, or folding and piling in baskets, masses of house-linen; all was conducted in that quiet orderly manner, so peculiarly national; they might have wondered why I sat and gazed so intently on them. Just as the girls were giving their last sprinkle, preparatory to leaving, the sun began to sink behind the Falkenberg, and I hurried down to a bend in the shore, to see the river in its glory before the night fell. The sides of the mountains lay in deep shad

ow below, where the impetuous waters, chafing over ridges of sunken rocks, break their way through a passage called Bingen-Loch, closed in from sight by the dark promontory of the Falkenberg. A deep grey had fallen upon nature; the hush of night seemed already there, when slowly the cloud-lids parted and the great golden eye beamed out for a moment, revealing away back, the green river-islands and the bristling vineyards of the Jobannisberg, in powerful contrast with the black pools and turbulent eddies of the Bingen-Loch whirling past the Mäusethurm, which rests on its little green islet-that legendary tower where Bishop Hatto met his doom. I sauntered slowly along the river-bank till night closed in, then home through the garden, on which our windows opened. The damp evening-air exhaled perfume from beds of mignonette and rose-trees in full flower. Among the shrubberies stood white statues; there a Bacchante holding up a cluster of ripe grapes; here, a long-robed Ceres, with wheat-sheaf and sickle; fronting our window, the indolent Apollino, leaning against a tree-stump, his arm negligently thrown over his head. For a moment, in the still twilight there came a nightingale and perched upon the uplifted arm; it warbled derisively I fancied. The lazy Apollo had left his lyre no one knows where; no poet was at hand to lend him one, so the beautiful incident passed off into thin air, where many a lovely thing has vanished before. It was the first time I had heard a nightingale. They are so cherished in Germany, that to kill one or disturb a nest, subjects the offender to a severe penalty of the law.

The early morning-sun on the morrow found us floating down the current of the Rhine in a small row-boat, We were bound to Rheinstein, a proud castle of the thirteenth century, on whose walls Rudolph von Habsburg