Kitabı oku: «The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 14, No. 398, November 14, 1829», sayfa 3
The recollection of such a moment as this, is treasured up in the memory as a green spot in the oasis of existence. Fancies come thickly crowding on the mind, which banish for the moment, all feelings of the drear realities of life; if one may be pardoned for being sometimes romantic, it is surely on such occasions as these. We descended the tower—"Please remember the Sexton–!"
The church of Dundry is of great antiquity, and the tower, which is one of the most extraordinary in England, is a fine specimen of early church architecture.
There is another tower, remarkable for the beauty of its situation, which overlooks the Avon, about two miles west of Clifton, at the extremity of the Downs. It is of an octagonal shape, and its name (Cooke's Folly) is said to be derived from the following circumstance:—Several centuries since, the proprietor of the land, a gentleman named Cooke, dreamed that his only son was destined to be killed by the sting of an adder. This idea took such hold of his mind, that in order to avert the dreaded catastrophe, he built this tower, to which he rigidly confined his son. The tradition goes on to relate the futility of all human precautions against the decrees of fate: for a short period after the erection of the tower, an attendant happening to bring in some bundles of fagots in which an adder was coiled, the youth was stung by it and died in consequence.
There has been a beautiful lithographic engraving, published in Bristol, of Cooke's Folly, which includes a view of King's Road.
VYVYAN.
MANNERS & CUSTOMS OF ALL NATIONS
THE GERMANS AND GERMANY
Translated from a German Work, in the Foreign Review, No. 8
Pope Ganganelli compared the Italians with the fire, the French with the air, the English with the water, and us Germans with the earth, omne simile claudicat. The German is not so nimble, brisk, and witty as the Frenchman; the latter gallops ventre à terre, whilst the German at the utmost trots, but holds out longer. The German is not so proud, humoursome, and dry as the Englishman; not so indolent, bigoted, and niggardly as the Italian; but a plain, faithful, modest fellow, indefatigable, staid, quiet, intelligent and brave, yet almost always misknown, purely from his constitution. The words of Tacitus still are true: "nullos mortalium armis aut fide ante Germanos." Should you class the four most cultivated nations of Europe, according to the temperaments, the German would be Phlegma; and as such, I, a German, in German modesty, which foreign countries should duly acknowledge, can assign it only the fourth rank. Among the English, whims are mixed in every thing; amongst the French, gallantry; among the Spaniards, bigotry; among the Germans, when things can go halfway, eating, drinking, and smoking; and the last is the true support of Phlegma. Genius with the Germans, tends to the root, with the French to the blossom, with the British to the fruit. The Italians are imagination; the French, wit; the English, understanding; the Germans, memory. In colonies, Spaniards commence by building a church and cloister; Englishmen a tavern; Frenchmen a fort, where, however, the dancing-floor must not be wanting; the Germans by grubbing the field. A riding-master distinguished them even by their modes of riding; the English hop, the French ride like tailors, the Italian sits on his steed like a frog in the air-pump, the Spaniards sleep there, the Russians wind the upper part of their bodies like puppets, and the German alone sits still like a man—man and horse are one as with the Hungarians.
The royal oak, the favourite tree of our fathers, requires centuries for its full developement, and so long do we also require. The oak is a fairer symbol of the German nation than the German postboy, from which original most foreigners appear to judge of us. A postilion in the north, however, is the true representative of Phlegma. Bad or good roads, bad or good weather, bad or good horses and coach, curses or flattery from the traveller—nothing moves him if his pipe-stump be but smoking, and his schnaps paid.
The hereditary enemy of our neighbours is levity, ours heaviness. In the ancient bass-fiddle, Europe, the thickest string is the German, with deep tone and heavy vibration; but once in vibration, it hums as if it would go on humming for an eternity. Our primitive ancestors deliberated on every thing twice—in drunkenness, and in sobriety; and then they acted. But we, with the most honest and slowest spirit of order—which might, without danger, be spared many reglemens—we lost all elasticity, and sank dismembered into a stupid spirit of slavery, which originated in our passion for imitation, our faintheartedness, and our uncommonly low opinion of ourselves, which often looks like true dog humility. This humility the French have in view, when if naughtily treated by their superiors, by the police, &c., they cry out "Est ce qu'on me prend pour un Allemand?" The Englishman is fond of being represented as a John Bull, but John Bull pushes about him. We, however, are personified by the German Michel, who puts up with a touch on the posterior, and still asks, "What's your pleasure?"
Voltaire sang of the Marechal de Saxe:—
"Et ce fier Saxon que lion croit nè parmè nous,"
exactly like a Maitre d'Hôtel, who, whenever he wished to flatter me, used to say, "Vous savez, Monsieur, je vous regarde presque comme Français." Voltaire was not ashamed at Berlin, when the Prussian soldiers did not enact the Roman legions to his mind, to exclaim in the midst of German princesses, "F–j'ai demandé des hommes, et on me donne des Allemands!" Marechal Schomberg, to whom the impertinent steward, on committing a fault, said, "Parbleu, on me prendra pour un Allemand!" would long ago have set them to rights with his answer, "On a tort, on devrait vous prendra pour un sot!"
To be, not to seem, is still the fairest feature in the character of my—I had almost said nation—of my quiet, thrifty, contented, diligent, honest countrymen. The German, at first glance, appears rarely what he is, and strikes the stranger as awkward and heavy. Yet, behind this plain quiet outside, there often dwells a cultivated mind, reflection, and deep feeling of duty, honour, diligence, and domestic virtue. In our father-land, honesty is universally at home; and during the night, you are safer on the highways and in the forests, than in the streets of Paris or London. "When in foreign countries," says an old author, "I fall in with a man too helpless for a Frenchman, too ceremonious for an Englishman, too pliable for a Spaniard, too lively for a Dutchman, too cordial for an Italian, too modest for a Russian—a man pressing towards me with oblique bows, and doing homage with ineffable self-denial to all that seems of rank; then my heart, and the blood in my face, says, 'that is thy countryman.'" How true! and how often have I lighted on such countrymen.
North Germany commences as soon as you leave behind you Nurenberg and Cassel. Cassel, in comparison with Hamburg resembles an Italian town. The Thuringian Forest separates north and south. The north is a coast-land, commerce its destination; the south inland: hence agriculture and industry are more suitable. The spirit of the South German is more directed to what is domestic: a fruitful soil rewards his labour, and alleviates it by the juice of the grape. The mouths of his rivers and his harbours allure the North German into foreign lands; his father-land is there, where he finds what he seeks, and what his own country has denied him. The South German must hence be more self-dependent, for he has a father-land at home full of blessing and beauty;—the North German has to seek one elsewhere; and this makes him more pliant, more polished, more active; but also more ostentatious, less to be confided in, more adventurous. This distinction is primeval. The North Germans mingled themselves with the Britons, Gauls, Italians, and Slavonians; the Alemanni and Bavarians remained in their native country.
The southern sky draws forth a vegetable world more luxuriant, fierier, spicier; the northern, a much duller, waterier, colder, and the men are so too, except where government and education have powerfully encroached. In the north the people have evidently less fancy and feeling, less genialness and versatility, even flatter, duller physiognomies, but also evidently greater intelligence, more consideration, seriousness, and constancy. The wastes, storms, and floods, the unthankful, sandy, moory country, must of themselves make the people more serious, more enterprising, more capable of contentment than in the south, where Nature is not so like a step-mother, nay, has flattered her favourites, thereby rendering them light-minded, indolent, and desirous of enjoying. Here the flesh triumphs over the spirit; there the spirit over the flesh, "nos besoins sont nos forces!"
The North German is hence more solid, gloomier, more retired, less kindly. Here you may still find the athletic forms of Tacitus, with blue eyes and yellow, or, more properly, red hair, which are rarer in the south. In the north the men seem to me more handsome, in the south the women. The South German is softer, and on the other hand his speech harder. The North German, though without wine, writes many a noble catch, which we in the south troll over our wine. The inhabitants of the wine countries have fewer singers of wine than those of the beer countries; the latter sing of it, the former are fonder of drinking it. It is as with songs of love; one sings of his mistress, seldom of his wife.
The North and South German bear the same relation to each other as beer and schnaps to wine, as bilberries to grapes, as butter and cheese to roast and dessert, as mountains and levels, as leagues and miles. In the south or wine land prevails a lighter, sprightlier, tone of intercourse; in the land of beer and schnaps with its moist air, all seems more dubious and measured; and thus the moment of enjoyment passes over. The sex is livelier in the south and more complaisant, without on that account being more wanton. In the south there is everywhere more nature, in nature herself as in man, and most of all with the sex. In the north more culture and art, in the south more natural capability, as well as more nature and life.
The southern climate is softer, hence the wine; and the loose, light, fruitful soil compensates for the high, bare mountains. In the south we are more advanced in gardening, agriculture, tillage, and cattle-breeding. The south is not only richer in towns, palaces, and gardens, but also in excellently built villages of stone, and not of wood and earth. In the north many such villages would be called towns. What a difference between our cleanly cottages, and the filthy huts and half-stalls of the north. The very waters in the south are clear, flowing, rustling; in the north muddy, sneaking, stagnant. There the fountains gush spontaneously from the rocks; here they must first be dug out of the earth. The south extracts its treasures from the soil; the north more from commerce and manufactures. There the national capital is more in the hands of the nobility (the church) and the peasantry; here more in those of the merchant and manufacturer. Prussia, Saxony, Hanover, &c. are more free from debt than Austria, Bavaria, Würtemberg, Baden, &c., because in the former there is less feasting and revelry; but the latter countries in themselves are richer, fuller of enjoyment. North Germany, in regard to road police, post regulations, inns, meat, drink, and lodging—large towns excepted—is in a state of semi-barbarism compared with the south.
Among all the North Germans the Saxon is the friendliest, distinguished by culture, diligence, and high spirit of contentment. But it is strange what a difference the Elbe makes between him and his neighbour. The Brandenburger or Prussian is vivacious, talkative, ceremonious, often dogmatical; the Saxon considerate, reserved, poorer in words; the former, prepossessed with what is new, feels delight in public places, loves to shine, and is the man of the world; the Saxon rather hates what is new, wishes to enjoy in silence in the circle of his own, and loves rural nature. Frugality is common to both; but it will go hard before other things become common between Prussians and Saxons. The Hessians have long distinguished themselves by bravery and military spirit, which leads to hardiness, patience, and contentment with little. Among the North Germans, those who live on the sea-coasts seem to me the rudest and most different from the South Germans; but the Prussians least of all.
The Swabian and Franconian is lively, loquacious, genial; and the Rheinlander is so in a still higher degree; but among the former I think there will be found more true-heartedness, inoffensiveness, and simplicity of manners, especially with the female sex, where it borders on naïveté. This good-nature which, as it were, surrenders itself, while others are lying in wait, and is hence easily over-reached, or leaves others the advantage, very naturally gave rise to the false proverb:—"The Swabian does not come to the years of discretion till forty." Swabians, Franconians, and Rheinlanders are our true sanguineans; and the last altogether our German-French, who dance through life like their Rhine-gnats.
