ROUTE LVI.

LONDON TO HAMBURG.

STEAM-BOATS go twice a week, starting from London and from Hamburg Wednesday and Saturday mornings: they set off so early in the morning that it is advisable to sleep on board the night before. The average passage is about 52 hours, though it sometimes takes 60 or 70. A traveller leaving London on Saturday morning commonly reaches Hamburg early on Monday.-He has the greater part of that day to look about him there, and he may set out for Berlin by the Schnellpost in the evening, and breakfast there on Wed

nesday morning, i. e. in four days from London.

About 25 miles from the mouth of the Elbe lies the island of Heligoland (Holyland), so named from the Temple of Hertha (Earth), the goddess worshipped by the ancient Saxons, which stood on it. It was ceded to Great Britain in 1807, and some fortifications are raised on it. Its population amounts to 3000. At the time when Napoleon had excluded England from the continent, it was important as a war-station; and from its situation near the mouths of the rivers Elbe and Weser, it then became a considerable smuggling depôt. Its male inhabitants are chiefly fishermen, sailors, and

pilots. The sea is fast consuming its shores; and, in the course of time, will, in all probability, leave nothing behind but a sandbank; it is now about two miles in circumference, but is diminishing daily.

(1.) At the mouth of the Elbe stand the lighthouse and town of Cuxhaven, on a small angle of territory belonging to Hamburg. Vessels lie at anchor off this place waiting for favourable winds; it is also the station for the sailing packets to Harwich. It is a watering place frequented by the inhabitants of Hamburg for sea-bathing. Beyond Cuxhaven, the left bank of the Elbe belongs to Hanover; it is for the most part flat and uninteresting. The only towns on this side are Stade, an unimportant place, and Haarburg, opposite Hamburg. The land on the (rt.) bank is the territory of the Duchy of Holstein, belonging to Denmark; it rises into gentle slopes, covered, for some distance below Hamburg, with wood, interspersed with handsome villas and gardens belonging to opulent merchants. On this side lies the small town of Glückstadt, capital of Holstein, with 6000 inhabitants. Higher up the little fishing village of Blankenese, with its houses scattered along the slope and among the trees one above another, is passed; and last of all, the town of ALTONA, which joins Hamburg, and from the river seems to form a part of it, though within the Danish territory. It has risen to great mercantile prosperity, perhaps to the prejudice of its neighbour, so that the Hamburgers say that its name agrees with its situation, as it is All-zu-nah (All too near). It is the most commercial and populous town in Denmark next to Copenhagen, having 27,000 inhabitants..

HAMBURG, Inns: Belvedere ;Hôtel de Pétersburg, well situated and comfortable;- Hôtel de Russie, on the Jungfersteig, has a good table-d'hôte.

Hamburg is situated at a distance of about 80 miles from the mouth of the Elbe, at the junction of a small stream called the Alster with the Elbe. Being a Free Town, the duties levied are so small, that travellers are not bothered with any Customhouse examination on landing, but passports are usually demanded, and the traveller's name and profession are entered at the Baumhaus, near the port. Its population is reckoned at 121,000. There are about 6000 Jews, who, to the disgrace of this free town, are treated with the utmost illiberality, almost as a Pariah caste, being interdicted by law not only from enjoying the rights of citizens, but even from practising any handicraft trade.

Money accounts are kept in marks and schillings; there are 16 schillings in a mark. The mark banco and rix-dollar banco are imaginary coins. The marc banco is to the current marc as 16 to 13. rent coins are,

The cur

The gates of Hamburg are shut every evening at dusk, and a toll, increasing progressively every hour till 12, is demanded from all who pass. Down to the year 1836 neither ingress nor egress was allowed to any one after midnight; but this inconvenient regulation is now removed, and persons may pass and repass all through the night, upon payment of one mark each. All eatables brought into the town are taxed at the gates, and even private carriages are sometimes searched, and game found in them has been seized,

The executive government of the town is vested in a council or senate,

composed of burgomasters, lawyers, and merchants, elected for life. The person chosen must accept the office, or quit the city, at the same time forfeiting one-tenth of his property. The members wear a quaint garb, a black velvet cloak, and high crowned hat. The legislative power is placed in the hands of three Colleges selected from the general body of citizens.

Hamburg is one of the three remaining Hanse towns, and is chiefly remarkable as one of the first trading cities of Europe. It is intersected by canals, and in this respect, and in the antiquated appearance of its houses, bears a resemblance to the towns of Holland. Nearly 2000 vessels clear out of the port annually: the Elbe is navigable thus far for ships of considerable burthen, which can enter the harbour and transmit their cargoes in barges to the merchants' doors. Their warehouses and dwellings are generally under one roof. Much banking and funded business is done here, and the town possesses considerable sugar refineries.

The traveller must not expect fine buildings, or valuable collections here. The objects chiefly calculated to attract a stranger's attention are, first, the costumes seen in the streets of Hamburg; they are not a little singular. Servant girls, housemaids, and cooks, according to the custom of the place, rarely appear in public except in the gayest attire; with lace caps, long kid gloves, and a splendid shawl. The last article is elegantly arranged under the arm so as to conceal a basket shaped like a child's coffin, containing dirty cloths, butter or cheese, or other articles purchased at market, as the case may be. The peasants who frequent the market wear a very picturesque attire; they are chiefly natives of a part of the Hamburg territory bordering on the Elbe, called Vierland, which is principally laid out in gardens, and supplies the market with vegetables.

Funeral processions in Hamburg

are not composed of friends of the deceased, but of hired mourners, called Reiten Diener, dressed in black, with plaited ruffs round their necks, wigs, short Spanish cloaks, and swords. The same persons, whose number is limited to sixteen, attend at marriage festivals, and form also a sort of body-guard to the magistrates. Their situations were formerly purchased at a high price, in consideration of the perquisites and fees attached to them. Upon the death of a burgomaster or other personage of importance in the town, the town trumpeter, a civic officer, is set to blow a dirge from one of the steeples.

A large portion of the poorer inhabitants live in cellars under the houses. In winter, and after a prevalence of west winds, which drive the waters of the German Ocean into the mouth of the Elbe, the tides rise to a great height, (sometimes even exceeding 20 feet,) inundating all the streets near the river. The tenants of these cellars are then driven from their habitations by the water, which keeps possession of them for days, leaving them filled with ooze, and in a most unhealthy condition from the moisture. A humane law compels those who lodge above, to receive and succour their poorer brethren below at such seasons of calamity.

The churches have little architectural beauty. St. Michael's has one of the highest steeples in Europe, 456 feet high, about 100 feet higher than St. Paul's, from which the town and the Elbe, nearly as far as the sea, Holstein on the north, and Hanover on the south, present themselves advantageously to view. It is also the station of the fire-watch (§ 39).

The Stadthaus is not remarkable as an edifice, but the Senate holds its meetings in it.

At three o'clock the merchants, &c., meet in the Exchange. Near it are the news and reading-rooms, called Börsenhalle, a sort of Lloyd's coffee-house, supported by subscrip

tions. A stranger can be introduced for two or three days to read the papers, after which he is expected to subscribe.

The Harmonia is another club (§ 40), partaking of a literary as well as mercantile character.

The charitable institutions of Hamburg are on a most munificent scale. The Orphan Asylum provides for 600 children, who are received as infants, reared, educated, and bound apprentices to some useful trade. The Great Hospital in the suburb of St. George is capable of containing from 4000 to 5000 sick. The yearly cost of supporting this admirable institution is nearly 17,000. Its utility is not confined to the poor alone, as even persons of the higher classes resort to the hospital to avail themselves of the advantages of the excellent medical treatment which they may here obtain. Such patients are admitted as lodgers on payment of a sum varying from 8d. to 8s. a day. The House in which Klopstock the poet lived thirty years and died, is No. 232 in the Konigsstrasse.

Roeding's Museum is a collection of odds and ends, with some real curiosities, where half an hour may be spent when there is nothing better to do.

The Jungfersteig (Maiden's Walk) is a broad walk, by the side of a basin of water formed by damming up the river Alster. It is the fashionable promenade, especially resorted to in the summer evenings, when the surface of the water is covered with gaily painted boats filled with water parties. It is flanked by handsome rows of new houses. At the water-side are the two most frequented cafés in the town. There are floating baths on the Alster.

The New Theatre is one of the largest in Germany, and the performances and music generally very good. The play begins at six and usually ends before ten. The public ball-rooms in and about the town,

though not frequented by the most respectable classes, being often the resort of low company, deserve to be looked at as one of the peculiarities of the place. The best are the Elbe Pavilion, and the Schweitzer Pavilion.

Hamburg had once the misfortune to be a fortified town, and in consequence was subjected to the horrors of a siege from the French, and was twice occupied by their armies, who, under Davoust in 1813, exercised the most cruel severities and atrocities upon the inhabitants. The Ramparts no longer exist, being levelled and converted into delightful boulevards or gardens, neatly laid out, which extend nearly round the town, and between the Two Alster basins. A most pleasing view of the town and river, the shipping and opposite shore of the Elbe, presents itself from the eminence at the extremity of these walks nearest to Altona, called the Stintfang.

Outside the Damm Gate is the public cemetery, which deserves a visit, as exhibiting the customs and usages of Germany with regard to the resting-place of the dead (§ 41).

The merchants of Hamburg are celebrated for their hospitality and the goodness of their dinners, as all strangers can testify who are well introduced. It is customary to give vails to servants in private houses;

they expect at least two marcs from each visiter. The English residents here are very numerous, and their language is almost universally understood even by the Germans. They are about to erect a church for themselves, of which the foundation was laid in 1836. At present the English service is performed in a temporary building. A British Consul and vice consul reside here.

Hackney coaches, called Droskies, ply for hire in all the principal thoroughfares of the town. They

are good and cheap. Any distance within the town costs about 8d., and if hired by the hour the charge is 1s. 6d.

Environs. It is a very pleasant drive to descend the right bank of the Elbe from Altona to Blankenese. The slopes bordering on the river are studded with country-seats of merchants, and possess considerable natural beauty. Between Hamburg and Altona lies a sort of neutral ground, a narrow strip of about half a mile, called Hamburgerburg, occupied by low taverns and dancingrooms; in fact, a sort of Wapping, extending to the gate of Altona, where the uniform of the sentinel and the Danish coat of arms mark the frontier of Holstein. At the further end of Altona is the suburb of Ottonsee, where the brave Duke of Brunswick died, in 1806, from the wound he had received in the battle of Jena. In the churchyard, by the side of the road, and under an umbrageous elm, is the tomb of Klopstock, author of the "Messiah." Here is also a monument to the 1138 Hamburgers, who perished in 1813-14 during the siege and occupation of Hamburg by the French. Further on the right is Rainville's tavern and garden, overlooking the Elbe. The house itself was inha'bited successively by Dumourier and Bourrienne. The view is fine, the cuisine very tolerable, and in fine summer afternoons very respectable company repair hither to dine or take coffee. Booth's nursery gar dens, near Wandsbeck, contain many choice and rare flowers. The amateur of horticulture will do wisely in purchasing seeds of stocks, wall-flowers, &c., which are brought to singular perfection here. At Blankenese, about six miles from Hamburg, Mr. Bauer's pleasure-grounds, thrown open to the public on Thursdays and Sundays, are a common resort of the cockneys of Hamburg.

In an opposite direction, about three miles from Hamburg, lies the village of Wandsbeck, in a very pretty situation. Every Sunday and holyday it overflows with visiters from Hamburg of all classes, who repair

hither to walk in the gardens of the Schloss, and enjoy the amusements of waltzing and music. Tycho Brahe the astronomer, and Voss the poet, resided here.

In 1813, the French, under Marshal Davoust, threw a wooden bridge, 15,000 feet long, over the Elbe to the Hanoverian shore, or rather, united the islands by a series of bridges which lasted till 1818. Their place is now supplied by a steamer, which runs twice a day in about an hour and a half between Hamburg and Haarburg.

Schnellposts go five times a week to Berlin.

Three times a week to Hanover and Bremen,

1 ROUTE LVII. HAMBURG TO LUBEC,

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by Schoenberg 8 Germ. 383 English miles; by Oldeslohe 9 Germ. 46 English miles.

The road is one of the worst in Europe, and has been pronounced a disgrace to any civilized country. It is nothing but a track marked by wheels in the deep sand, which is here and there interspersed with large boulder stones. The selfish

policy of the king of Denmark keeps it in its present execrable condition, in the hope of compelling travellers and goods to pass through the Sound, where they must pay toll to him. Failing in this, it is his wish to make Kiel, a town of his own dominion, the port of embarkation on the way to St. Petersburg, in preference to Lubec, which would cause a useless detour and loss of time to travellers going from Hamburg. It is believed that a remonstrance from the Emperor of Russia is likely soon to put an end to this nuisance, and that the road will forthwith be macadamized. As it is, though the distance is only 38 miles, it forms, stoppages included, a long day's journey, of 10 or 12 hours, the more tedious because the country is uninteresting. There