once formed the chief ornament of the famous Abbey of Sts. Ulric and
Afra. I should think that there is no portion of the present building
older than the fourteenth century; while it is evident that the upper
part of the tower is of the middle of the sixteenth. It has a nearly
globular or mosque-shaped termination--so common in the greater number
of the Bavarian churches. It is frequented by congregations both of the
Catholic and Protestant persuasion; and it was highly gratifying to see,
as I saw, human beings assembled under the same roof, equally occupied
in their different forms of adoration, in doing homage to their common
Creator.

Augsburg was once distinguished for great learning and piety, as well as
for political consequence; and she boasts of a very splendid
martyrological roll. At the present day, all is comparatively dull and
quiet; but you can not fail to be struck with the magnificence of many
of the houses, and the air of importance hence given to the streets;
while the paintings upon the outer walls add much to the splendid effect
of the whole. The population of Augsburg is supposed to amount to about
thirty thousand. In the time of Maximilian and Charles V. it was, I make
no doubt, twice as numerous.[B]

[Footnote A: From "A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Taur,"
published in 1821.]

[Footnote B: Augsburg has now (1914) a population of 102,000. Woolen and
cotton goods and machinery are its manufactured products.]