supplies of beer and sausages, to Nuremberg.




A CITY LIVING ON THE PAST

Nuremberg, or Nurnberg, was built, I believe, about the beginning of
time. At least, in an old black-letter history of the city which I
have seen, illustrated with powerful wood-cuts, the first
representation is that of the creation of the world, which is
immediately followed by another of Nuremberg. No one who visits it
is likely to dispute its antiquity. "Nobody ever goes to Nuremberg
but Americans," said a cynical British officer at Chamouny; "but they
always go there. I never saw an American who had n't been or was not
going to Nuremberg." Well, I suppose they wish to see the
oldest-looking, and, next to a true Briton on his travels, the oddest
thing on the Continent. The city lives in the past still, and on its
memories, keeping its old walls and moat entire, and nearly fourscore
wall-towers, in stern array. But grass grows in the moat, fruit
trees thrive there, and vines clamber on the walls. One wanders
about in the queer streets with the feeling of being transported back
to the Middle Ages; but it is difficult to reproduce the impression
on paper. Who can describe the narrow and intricate ways; the odd
houses with many little gables; great roofs breaking out from eaves
to ridgepole, with dozens of dormer-windows; hanging balconies of
stone, carved and figure-beset, ornamented and frescoed fronts; the
archways, leading into queer courts and alleys, and out again into
broad streets; the towers and fantastic steeples; and the many old
bridges, with obelisks and memorials of triumphal entries of