beyond the village of Mourbach, bordered with fine hills, at the extreme point of which lies Bredenheim. On this side, the blue mountains of the Rheingau, enliven the stream, here forming a majestic lake, reflecting beautifully the outlines of Schurstein, Ellfeld, and Walluf. At some distance you behold, shadowed forth in darkened splendour, the Johannisberg and the Rochusberg, and further below appears the rocky chasm of Bingen, where the Rhine seems to terminate. Towards Mayence, Castel, and Hocheim, the vine is not less splendid, though of a different description. On the left we now behold the red towers of Mayence, and see

Castel (Station).-Hotel: Barth. A town and fortress on the right bank, almost a suburb of Mayence, 2,500 inhabitants, and connected with it by a bridge of boats. Here is the principal station of the Wiesbaden and Frankfort Railway. MAYENCE (Station), or Mainz, in German. Inns: Hotel d'Angleterre-a first-rate and excellent hotel, in front of the bridge, and commanding beautiful views of the Rhine; landlord, Mr. Specht, who exports Rhine wines at wholesale prices.

Hotel de Hollande, an old established house, under a new proprietor. Good and reasonable. Rheinischer Hof, kept by Mr. Haenlin. One of the best hotels on the Rhine, and deservedly recommended.

Population, 53,902.

English Church service is performed each Sunday in the Lycée, formerly Jesuits' College.

Mayence fills a large page in the volume of Continental history, and though at present it differs much from what it was when the residence of the first German Elector,-when arts and sciences flourished, and when it was at the summit of its glory, yet it must ever prove interesting to the student of human institutions and of history, who cannot but revere it as the emporium of two things which make the world its debtor, and which have had the greatest influence in effecting human improvement-the emancipation of trade from the exactions of the feudal aristocracy and the invention of the printing press.

It has been a frontier fortress from the earliest and most remote periods, and yet continues to be one of the strongest in Germany, as its situation

is the finest, rising up a part of a hill on the bank where the yellowish Maine has its confluence with the Rhine It was called the Moguntiacum of the Romans, and owes its existence to the fortress which rusus Germanicus built there, on the spot where Marcus Agrippa, under Augustus, had formed a fortified camp. To that period belongs the acron, or Drusus stone, yet seen on the rampart, and the aqueduct near Zahlbach. Mayence enjoyed its most glorious epoch in the second half of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and there it was that the troubadours (Minnesaüger) had their principal seat. The fifteenth century became glorious to Mayence by the invention of the art of printing and as the birthplace and residence of John Gensfleisch, called Guttenberg, the inventor of moveable types. A splendid bronze statue, modelled by Thorwalsden, was erected to his memory in 1337, in the open space facing the theatre, from general contributions, which amounted to 26,000fl. The Civil Casino now occupies the site of his house, which stood at the end of the Schuster-gass. In the corner house, between Emmeran-street and the Pfandhaus-street, Gensfleisch (goose-flesh) was born, and his first printing-office was the house called Hofzun Jungue, or Faiberhof. The new houses of the Schuster-gass now occupy the site of the church of St. Francis, in which he was buried.

He

Arnold Von Walboten, also a citizen, originated the plan whereby commerce was delivered from the exactions and oppressions of knightly highwaymen who overran the entire continent in the thirteenth century with their strongholds. suggested a confederation of cities, which led to the formation of the Rhenish League in 1247. Under the energetic reign of the Emperor Rudolph of Hapsburg, this same Walboten instigated the reduction to their present picturesque condition of the ruined castles along the banks of the Rhine.

With the year 1792 began the most eventful and unfortunate period of the history of Mayence, when Custine appeared before the town and took it without resistance. In 1793 the French evacuated it after a determined defence, having obtained an honourable capitulation, and appeared before it again in 1794, with a powerful besieging army, from which it was delivered in 1795 by the

victory of General Clairfait, after which an Austrian garrison occupied it until 1797, when the cession of the left bank of the Rhine to the French caused to Mayence a total change of all its relations. By the peace of Paris the city was again incorporated with Germany, and in 1816 ceded to the Grand Duke of Hesse-Darmstadt, to whom it still belongs, and is one of the most important towns in his dominions. It is one of the chief fortresses of the German Confederation, having a garrison of 8,000, and is the capital of Rhenish Hesse.

The Kurfurstliche Schloss, or ancient palace of the Electors of Mayence, now a museum; the Grossherzogliche Schloss, originally the Teutonic house, which Napoleon lodged in, and the Arsenal, are situated upon the quay where the steamer stops.

The chief objects of attraction in Mayence are the Cathedral, erected partly in the tenth century, by Archbishop Willeges, but not completed until the eleventh century. It is a vast red building, choked upon the north and south-west by mean houses. It is built in the massive round style of architecture. Conflagrations, bombardments by the Prussians, and desecrations by the French, who turned it into a magazine and barracks, in 1813, have severely injured the edifice, the original of which is only preserved at the east end, behind the altar. At this end the octagonal tower has been surmounted with a cupola of cast-iron 70 feet high. It has a double choir, and high altars at the east and west, with two transepts. The most beautiful of the two choirs is that of All Saints, containing a very fine window, built in 1317. The double chapel of St. Gothard is an interesting specimen of the Gothic style, built in 1136, and to the shame of the owners, is now let as a leather warehouse. In the interior of the cathedral are several monuments worth seeing, among the most worthy are those of Archbishop Peter Von Asfeldt crowning Henry VII., Louis the Bavarian, and John King of Bohemia, Prince Albert of Saxony, Canon Bernard Von Breidenbach, Archbishop Borthold Von Henneberg, Fastrada, wife of Charlemagne, close to the magnificent doorway leading into the cloisters, Minstrel of Minnesinger (praise the ladies), who was carried to his grave by the ladies of Mayence, so great a favourite was he of

theirs; St. Boniface, first Archbishop of Mayence and Apostle of Germany; he was an Englishman, born at Crediton, in Devonshire, and professor of poetry, history, rhetoric, and the Holy Scriptures in the Benedictine Abbey of Nutsall, near Winchester. He left England with eleven other monks to preach the gospel in Germany, and was created Bishop by Gregory II., and Archbishop and Primate of Germany by Gregory III., and Archbishop of Mentz, as the German metropolitan see, by Pope Zachary.

The Pulpit will attract attention; an ancient font of lead behind the eastern altar, and the brazen doors opening into the Market-street. The doors are of the tenth century. Bishop Adelbert I., in 1135, had engraven on the upper valves an edict granting important privileges to the city in consideration of his gratitude to the citizens who delivered him from the hands of the emperor, whose person they seized and detained until the bishop was restored to them. Two very ancient chalices are preserved in the sanctuary. The canons of this cathedral returned rather a remarkable answer to the Pope on the occasion of his reproving them for their luxurious and worldly manner of living. It was, "We have more wine than is needed by the mass, but not sufficient to turn our mills with."

The Churches of St. Stephen and St. Ignatius, the former of which is pleasantly situated on the most elevated spot of the town, and contains some altarpieces interesting to the lovers of art. The church of St. Peter contains a splendid chime of bells, and the parish church of St. Emmeran has a beautiful altarpiece, representing the Ascension of the Virgin.

The Museum has a collection of paintings no ways distinguished. It however contains a very large collection of Roman antiquities, consisting of 27 altars and votive tablets, 60 Legion stones with inscriptions, and a model of the double stone bridge which Napoleon proposed to throw over the Rhine here.

The Town Library contains more than 80,000 volumes, among which are many rare and excellent works. In it are the Psalterium of 1459, the Bible of 1462, the Catholicum of 1460, and several thousand more books belonging to the century in which