about it.

One morning, at Bingen,--I assure you it was not six o'clock,--we
took a big little rowboat, and dropped down the stream, past the
Mouse Tower, where the cruel Bishop Hatto was eaten up by rats, under
the shattered Castle of Ehrenfels, round the bend to the little
village of Assmannshausen, on the hills back of which is grown the
famous red wine of that name. On the bank walked in line a dozen
peasants, men and women, in picturesque dress, towing, by a line
passed from shoulder to shoulder, a boat filled with marketing for
Rudesheim. We were bound up the Niederwald, the mountain opposite
Bingen, whose noble crown of forest attracted us. At the landing,
donkeys awaited us; and we began the ascent, a stout, good-natured
German girl acting as guide and driver. Behind us, on the opposite
shore, set round about with a wealth of foliage, was the Castle of
Rheinstein, a fortress more pleasing in its proportions and situation
than any other. Our way was through the little town which is jammed
into the gorge; and as we clattered up the pavement, past the church,
its heavy bell began to ring loudly for matins, the sound
reverberating in the narrow way, and following us with its
benediction when we were far up the hill, breathing the fresh,
inspiring morning air. The top of the Niederwald is a splendid
forest of trees, which no impious Frenchman has been allowed to trim,
and cut into allees of arches, taking one in thought across the water
to the free Adirondacks. We walked for a long time under the welcome
shade, approaching the brow of the hill now and then, where some
tower or hermitage is erected, for a view of the Rhine and the Nahe,
the villages below, and the hills around; and then crossed the
mountain, down through cherry orchards, and vine yards, walled up,
with images of Christ on the cross on the angles of the walls, down