Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843/Part 3/Letter 4
LETTER IV.
Entrance to the Tyrol.—Village Fête.—Pass Strub.—Swartz.—Inspruck.
We left Salzburg at ten o’clock, on a fine sunny morning. We were about to penetrate the most celebrated passes of the Tyrol,—and the name has magic in it. We wound through the plain of the Salzkammergut, hedged in by lofty mountains, that rise sheer and abrupt from the plain, without any apparent opening by which their recesses may be penetrated. The Tyrol is the most continuously mountainous district in Europe. Switzerland contains plains and lakes—the Tyrol has only defiles and ravines, hedged in closely on all sides by precipice and mountain; while, in the depths, the torrents from the hills unite and form rivers, which turn many a mill-wheel destined for domestic use, besides carrying the riches of the country (salt) down various canals, fed by them, till it reaches the Danube. Once, these streams were laden with the hopes—the fate—of the Tyrolese, and watched with beating hearts by the heroes about to combat for their country—by the women and children who sympathised with and aided the stronger sex in their glorious struggle. The night of the 8th April, 1809, was fixed on for the general rising of the peasantry against the French and Bavarians: the signal agreed upon was throwing sawdust into the Inn, which floated down, and was seen and understood by the peasants. In addition to this, a plank with a little pennon was launched on the river and borne down the stream, and hailed with enthusiasm, as it carried the tidings that all were about to rise to liberate their country.
It is by these defiles—that of the Saal—and afterwards of the Inn—that travellers reach the Brenner. We approached the mighty crags, and by degrees they closed around us, and we found ourselves in a ravine, with the Saal—a common name of a river in Germany—flowing through its depth. This sort of route is familiar to all who have travelled among mountains. Thus are these districts traversed. The chains of mountains are intersected by ravines, and torrents work their way in the depth; the road is carried along the margin—now ascending, now descending, now turning the huge shoulder of a hill, now penetrating into its recesses, according as the formation of the pass requires.
Soon after leaving Salzburg, we came upon a strip of Bavarian territory; and it was necessary to stop at the last Austrian Custom-house, to have our luggage loaded. While this was being done, the sounds of a fiddle caused us to peep into the public room of a little inn. A marriage was being celebrated, and dancing going on. A curious sight it was. The men are a handsome race, dressed as we are accustomed to see them represented—the jacket, tight breeches fastened at the knee, the sash round the waist, stockings and shoes, and high hat and feather, form a very becoming costume for a good figure. But, alas! for the women: their waists are placed up between their shoulders; their petticoats, short; a peaked man’s hat, like a Welchwoman’s, completes their ungainly appearance. Nor did I see any beauty: the youngest were weather-beaten and clumsy: they were destitute of all soft feminine grace, and seemed a cross between a boy and an old woman. The dancing is infinitely strange. They walz with impetuosity— with frenzy—interspersing their dance with certain capers, twists, hugs and leaps, which evidently excited great admiration: a Highland fling was nothing to it. We found Murray’s description true to the letter, and were much amused. Remember, too, that amidst all the twirlings, springs, and kickings, in which they indulged, the dance was performed with a gravity worthy of a Parisian ball-room, and with infinite precision; no jostling; no romping; their capers were executed by rule, and with perfect decorum.
The pass we continued to penetrate—Pass Strub, which forms the portal of the Tyrol—is one of the most beautiful in the world. We left the Saal; and now crossing the huge shoulders of mighty hills, now thridding other deep gorges, we wound our tortuous way, till we should reach the Unter Innthal, or valley of the lower Inn. This night we slept at Waidringen, a very rustic place; but we were comfortable enough. Our fare was wild food: we had supper, our rooms, and coffee in the morning; and our bill amounted to four Bavarian florins, for five persons.
The Tyrol was ever celebrated for the beauty of its scenery, and the integrity and simplicity of its inhabitants. In 1780, Mr. Beckford travelled here, and celebrates, in various of his inimitable Letters, “the Tyrol, a country of picturesque wonders.” “Here,” he says, “those lofty peaks, those steeps of wood I delight in, lay before us. Innumerable clear springs gushed out on every side, overhung by luxuriant shrubs in blossom; soft blue vapours rest upon the hills, above which rise mountains that bear plains of snow into the clouds.”
The Tyrol is now endowed with a higher interest: it is hallowed by a glorious struggle, which gifts every rock, and precipice, and mountain-stream, with a tale of wonder.
The Tyrol became by inheritance a possession of the house of Hapsburgh as far back as the fourteenth century. The princes of Austria showed themselves worthy sovereigns of this province. The internal government of the country was the object of wise legislation; and, in spite of the opposition of Pope and noble, and imperial city, the Tyrolese received the gift of a free constitution, and governed and taxed themselves. These blessings are guarded by the fact that the soil of the mountains is their own. There are no noble landlords to carry off the wealth of the country in the shape of rents, forcing the labourers to waste their lives in penury and toil, that they may squander in vice and luxury. The peasant possesses the land he cultivates. He is independent, pious, and honest. No mercenary troops have ever been hired among these mountains; but the Tyrolese are not unwarlike. They are devotedly attached to the House of Austria, which conferred their privileges, protected them, exacted few taxes, and in no way displayed the cloven foot of despotism, in this happy region. Their domestic government is carried on by themselves. They furnish a slight contingent to the imperial armies, which is looked upon as an opening to active life, and operates rather beneficially on the population. They are accustomed to the use of arms, for the militia is called out and exercised each year. They are a happy, brave, religious, free, and virtuous people.
But what is all this to ambition? It suited the views of Napoleon that the Tyrol should belong to Bavaria, when he raised it from an electorate to a kingdom; and by the treaty of Presburg in 1805, Austria ceded, with reluctance it is true, but still it ceded, the best jewel of its crown. The Tyrolese had lately, under the command of the Austrians, defended their passes against the Bavarians with heroic bravery—now they were to become subjects of the inimical power.
Their very hearts revolted against their change of masters. But they had far worse to suffer. Their new sovereign promised solemnly to govern them by their old laws, and to respect their institutions; but no sooner were the Bavarian authorities established in the country, than these stipulations were basely violated. The constitution was at once overthrown by a royal edict. Hitherto they had taxed themselves; now eight new and oppressive taxes were imposed and levied with rigour. Convents and monasteries were confiscated, their estates sold, and their chalices and other sacred treasures seized, melted down, carried off. Not content with inflicting these wrongs and insults, Bavaria attempted to obliterate the very name of the Tyrol from the map of Europe. The district was divided into provinces, called after the various rivers which flowed through them. The inhabitants were ordered to change their language, and only permitted to use that of their forefathers for four more years.
Napoleon, when the country rose against this misrule, declared "the Bavarians did not know how to govern the Tyrolese, and were unworthy to reign over that noble country.” But these words only add greater heinousness to his crimes against them; for his exactions on Bavaria were the primal cause of the heavy taxes—his example had taught that the best way to tame a people was to give them new names, and change their local demarcations; and when they revolted against the tyranny which he himself declared unworthy, he punished without mercy the oppressed, wronged, and insulted insurgents.
What wonder that the Tyrolese detested their new rulers; or that, fondly attached to their old ones, they should hear and answer with enthusiasm the call of one of their ancient princes. When war again broke out between France and Austria, the Archduke John called on the Tyrolese, in a spirited and exciting proclamation, to expel the French and Bavarians. With transport they prepared to obey. The country rose to a man: women and children assisted; carrying to the scattered peasantry the watchword, "s’ist zeit,” “it is time,” which bade them at once assemble and prepare for action. Slightly aided by the Austrian regular troops, at the cost of many victories and some defeats, they drove the enemy from their country.
But peace was again to prove fatal to them. By the treaty that was signed after the battle of Wagram, they were ceded anew to Bavaria. What wonder that they shrunk from the hated yoke, whose weight they had before experienced, and almost without hope, yet resolved not to yield. They continued the heroic struggle; and in this last contest, their combats and their victories were even more wonderful than in the first instance.
Every portion of the route we traversed had been the scene of victory or defeat, and rendered illustrious by the struggle for liberty. Our road lay through Unter Innthal, which presented mountain scenery, infinitely various in aspect;—glen, wood, and stream;—sunrise, noon, and sunset—shine and shadow added perpetual changes to the ravines and their skreens of precipices. I confess there was none of the charm of Styria or the Salzkammergut. It was beautiful and sublime to pass through, to look upon, but the wish to take up my abode in any of these solitudes never presented itself to my mind. I have even seen passes I have admired more; it bears some resemblance to that of Saint Jean le Maurienne, for instance, on the way from Chablais to Mont Cenis; but that is more beautiful from its walnut-trees and loftier Alps.
We slept at Swartz—a town of sad celebrity in the wars of 1809. The Bavarians took it by storm, and were guilty of cruelties which the historian refuses to depict, as too horrible and too sickening for his pages.[1] A new race has sprung up; but the town has not recovered its former prosperity.
The inn here is excellent; it is kept by Rainer, known in England as one of the Tyrolese minstrels. His rooms are clean and comfortable; we fared sumptuously, indulging in Rhenish wine. Our bill, with all this, was only ten florins, or thirteen shillings and fourpence, for all; by which you may judge for how small a sum a man alone, bent on economy, might make a tour of the Tyrol.
Leaving Swartz, by degrees the pass widened, and from a height we saw Inspruck, white and nest-like, basking in the valley beneath. All this portion of the country was the theatre of many mortal combats between the Tyrolese and Bavarians and French, in 1809. The town was taken and retaken several times; the bridge of Hall, the Brenner, and Berg Isel, were the scenes of gallant exploits; and the rustic chiefs of these hardy mountaineers were often victorious over officers, who, commanding disciplined troops, disdained the ill-armed and tumultuous peasantry with whom they had to contend. Dietfurth, a Bavarian colonel, had boasted at Munich that, “with his regiment and two squadrons of horse, he would disperse the ragged mob.” He was wounded to death in one of the assaults, when Inspruck was taken; and while lying in the guard-house of that city, singularly added to the enthusiasm of the pious, not to say superstitious, peasantry. He asked, Who had been their leader? “No one,” was the reply; “we fought equally for God, the Emperor, and our native country.” “That is surprising,” said Dietfurth; “for I saw him frequently pass me on a white horse.” These words caused the report to spread that their patron saint, St. James, frequently celebrated in Spanish annals of Moorish wars for his white charger, had appeared in person to guard the city, placed under his especial protection.
Besides this more modern source of interest, we were told to look with curiosity at an old castle, from a high window of which Wallenstein, then a page of the Margraf of Burgau, fell to the ground without hurting himself—an accident which was said to have sown in his mind the seeds of that superstitious reverence for his own fortune which followed him through life, and was the instigator of many of his exploits. Unfortunately for the fame of the castle, Wallenstein’s biographers tell us that this story is a fiction; that he was never page to the said nobleman; never inhabited this castle.
Inspruck, lying in the centre of a little plain, surrounded by Alps, with its tall steeple and white walls, has a thousand times been painted, and is a sort of ideal of what these Alpine cities are. It is clean and fair; one wide well-paved street, which midway enlarges into a square, runs the whole length. There is an immense hotel, usually thronged with travellers, as the road into Italy by Munich, and by the passes of the Tyrol or the Stelvio, is much frequented. We had a very good breakfast here, for which we paid as much as for supper, rooms, and breakfast the night before; the numerous English have taught them high charges. Here we found some letters from England, and wrote answers, and rambled about, but saw not half of what we ought to have seen in this capital of a free country.
- ↑ Alison’s History of Europe.