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The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 398, November 14, 1829 by Various
page 25 of 48 (52%)
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.

The Bavarian is straight-forward, frank but dry, blunt, and he has
hitherto been ruder, more ignorant, more fond of quarrel and drinking,
more given up to superstition and old things than others; for his land
was the home of priestcraft and monkery. You may ever distinguish the
national Bavarian by his nervous squat body, small round head, and
beer-belly, immediately beneath which the trousers begin; hence the
braces or belt is indispensible. The showy belt, is, as in the Tyrol,
matter of national pomp, so with the girls the boddice; and both are as
little known in the north as the platted hair of the maidens--perhaps
relics of the knight's girdle, bandalier, and breastplate; for noble
knighthood flourished chiefly in the south.

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