vance one of their own body to that great and wealthy dignity, if they please.

From Cologne I proceeded to the town of Bonne, which is said to take its name from the pleasantness of its situation. Here the elector resides, and has a very fine palace. The country around is extremely fruitful and plea-1 sant, and is blessed with most of the good things which render the rich magnificent and happy, and remind the poor of their inferiority and wretchedness-particularly wine, which is here remarkably excellent. It contains churches, priests, convents, cloisters, &c; but I need not mention them-what place could exist without them?

I should not forget to tell you, that, at this place, Ju.. lius Cæsar built one of his bridges across the Rhineworks which would have handed down to posterity the name of a common man, for the magnitude of the structure and ingenuity of the contrivance, but are lost in the crowd of astonishing talents which distinguish that brightest of mortals. The greatest biographer of antiquity says of him, that he was as great a general as Hannibal, as great an orator as Cicero, and as great a politician as Augustus; but it might be added, that he was among the first poets of his day-that he was of the first mechanical genius, and the finest gentleman, in Rome.

Nature seems to have formed, in Cæsar, a compendious union of all human talents, as if to demonstrate how unavailing they were when opposed to strict rigid honesty and virtue in the character of Brutus.

To go from Bonne to Frankfort, there are two ways -one over the mountains of Wetterania, the other up the river Rhine. I made no hesitation to adopt the latter, and was rewarded for my choice with the view of as fine a country, inhabited by as fine a race of people, as I had ever seen. Valleys filled with birds, plains enamelled with corn-fields, and the hills covered with vineyards, regaled the eye, and conveyed to the mind all the felicitating ideas of plenty, natural opulence, and true prosperity. My anxiety, however, to get forward, and disengage myself from a species of solitude in a country where, though travelling is cheap, accommodations of

most kinds in the public houses are bad, induced me to push on, without taking the time necessary for makingaccurate observations on the country as I passed; so that, gliding, as it were, imperceptibly, through a number of towns, of which I recollect nothing distinctly but the names of Coblentz and Mentz, I arrived at the great, free, and imperial city of Frankfort on the Maine.

Here I shall stop, for a short time, my relation, in order to give you time for just reflection and examination of what I have already written: and as, in the latter part of it, I have skimmed very lightly over the country, I desire that you will supply the deficiency of my informa tion by close research in books; inform yourself of the great outlines of the Germanic Constitution; look back to its origin, its progress, and its establishment; thence proceed to the distinct parts, or inferior states, of which it is composed; ponder them all well; and from those draw your own inferences, and let me hear what they are with freedom: should they be wrong, I will endeavor to set them right; but should they be right, they will afford me the most lively satisfaction; for they will serve to correct one of the greatest errors under which youth laborsan over-weening, sanguine imagination, that things in this life are, or at least can be modelled into perfection; whereas experience, and a just observation of the history of mankind, will shew, that on this ball things will never be as they ought, but must remain as they are-imperfect.

LETTER XIX.

THE country about Frankfort is delightful,

rich and fruitful, and watered by the beautiful river Maine, which divides the city into two parts, that on the north being called Frankfort, and that on the south, Saxenhausen, from the Saxons, who are supposed to have been the founders of it. The city itself is large, populous, and rich, and distinguished for being the place

where the emperor and king of the Romans is electedthough, by the appointment of Charlemagne, Cologne has a superior claim to that honor. The magistrates, and great part of the inhabitants, are Lutherans or Calvinists; notwithstanding which, most of the churches are in the hands of the Roman Catholics-a laudable instance of the true tolerant spirit of a wise and virtuous institution, and a heavy reflection upon, as well as a noble example to the Popish Powers of Europe.

The territory belonging to Frankfort is of very considerable extent; and the trade carried on through it, by means of the rivers Rhine and Maine, of very great importance, not only to the country itself, but to other commercial nations, and particularly to Great Britain, whose manufactures are sent to Frankfort, and thence circulated through the Continent, in amazing quantities.

The fairs of Frankfort are talked of all over Europeof such importance are they in the world of commerce. They are held, one at Easter, and another in September, and continue for three weeks, during which time the resort of people there from all quarters is astonishing. Every thing is done by the government to render them as attractive to merchants as possible; and taxes or duties are extremely low-a bale of the value of ten or twenty thousand crowns paying duty only about ten or eleven pence of our money. All commodities from all parts of the world are sold there, and circulated through the empire; but, particularly, books are sold in prodigious quantities. After the fairs are over, the shops of the foreign merchants are shut up, and their names written over their doors.

To give an idea of the great importance these fairs are to commerce, I need only mention, that in the present war, the impediments thrown by the French in the way of the transit of goods up the Rhine, and the shutting up that fair, gave a most alarming paralysis to the manufacturing establishments of England, and a shock to public credit in consequence, that would, but for the timely interference of Parliament, have, in all probability, been fatal to the national credit.

Frankfort is, in many respects, a pleasant place: the merchants are extremely convivial and sociable, and form clubs, where they meet to drink tea and coffee, and play at cards. There is a play-house also, a great number of coffee-houses, and other houses of entertainment in abundance. The country around is covered with woods and vineyards, and the circumjacent villages are very pleasant, and well supplied with houses of entertainment, to which the inhabitants of the city resort in the Summer season and the inns in Frankfort are excellent.

A singular custom prevails here, which I think worth mentioning: Taverns are denoted by pine trees planted before the doors of them; and the different prices of the wines in their cellars are marked in cyphers on the door-posts.

In the town here is presented the original Golden Bull, or Pope's Authority, which contains the rules and orders to be observed at the election of the Emperors. The Golden Bull is never shown to strangers but in the presence of two of the council and the secretary—It is a little manuscript in quarto, consisting of forty-two leaves of parchment, with a gold seal of three inches in diameter, of the value of twenty ducats, hung to it by a cord of yellow silk. It is said to be written in Latin and Gothic characters, without diphthongs; and kept in a black box, together with two written translations of it into the German language.

It is said of Frankfort, that the Roman Catholics pos sess the churches, the Lutherans the dignities, and the Calvinists the riches. It is therefore one of the few places in Christendom where the churches and the riches do not go into the same hands.

In

From Frankfort to Augsburgh, I passed through a number of towns, all of them so very inconsiderable as not to merit any particular description. The way lies from the Palatinate through the Circle of Suabia. the extreme end of the Palatinate, and immediately before entering the Dutchy of Wirtemberg, the country is covered with fir-trees, and money is so scarce in it, that a loaf of wheaten bread, weighing eight pounds, costs but two pence,

The city of Augsburgh is the capital of a bishopric of that name in the Circle of Suabia, and is worthy of the attention of the classical traveller for its antiquity. About twelve years before the birth of Christ, Augustus Cæsar subdued all this country, and, on the place where Augsburgh now stands, formed a colony, gave the town the name of Augusta Vindelicorum, and put it under the government of Drusus the brother of Tiberius, afterwards emperor of Rome. The inhabitants of this place were the Vindelici, a branch of the Illyrians. But, ancient though it be, it has little more of antiquity to entitle it to notice than the bare name; for it has been pillaged so often, particularly by that monster Attila, that there are scarcely any remains of its antiquity to be found.

Augsburgh is now, however, a handsome city-the public buildings in general magnificent, and adorned with fountains, water engines of a curious construction, and statues.

The most rich and splendid part of the town belongs to a family of the name of Fuggers (originally descended from a weaver), who enriched themselves by commerce, and one of whom rendered not only himself, but the whole family, conspicuous, by entertaining the Emperor Charles the Fifth in a superb manner, and supplying him with money, and then throwing his bond into the fire; in return for which the emperor made him a count of the empire.

This city is remarkable for goldsmith's ware; and its mechanics are equal to any in the world, for works in gold, ivory, clocks, and time-pieces; and they engrave better than any people in Germany, which brings them considerable profits. But what they are, above all other people eminent for, is the manufacturing steel-chains so prodigiously fine, that when one of them, of a span in length, has been put about the neck of a flea, it lifts up the whole of it as it leaps; and yet those are sold for less than a shilling of our money a piece.

Controversy, and difference in religious opinions, which has almost, ever since the commencement of Christianity, disgraced the human understanding, and defaced society, imposes upon the liberal well-thinking traveller, the