LETTER LV.

Cassel.

The city of Cassel is situated on the river Fulda. It consists of an old and new town. The former is the largest and most irregular. The new town is well built; and there, as you may believe, the nobility and officers of the court have their houses. The streets are beautiful, but not over-crowded with inhabitants.

Besides the large chateau in the town of Cassel, which is the Landgrave’s winter residence, he has several villas and castles in different parts of his dominions. Immediately without the town, there is a very beautiful building, in which he dwells for the most part of the summer The apartments there are neat and commodious, some of them adorned with antique statues of considerable value.

None of the rooms are spacious enough to admit of exercising any considerable number of the troops within their walls; but his Highness sometimes indulges in this favourite recreation on the top of this villa, which has a flat roof, most convenient for that purpose.

Around this are some noble parks and gardens, with a very complete orangery. There is also a menagerie, with a considerable collection of curious animals. I saw there a very fine lioness, which has lately lost her husband—an elephant—three camels in fine condition, one of them milk-white, the other two grey, and much taller than the elephant;—an African deer, a fierce and lively animal, with a skin beautifully spotted;—a very tall rain-deer—several leopards—a bear, and a great variety of monkies.—The collection of birds is still more complete, a great many of which are from the East Indies.

In the academy of arts, which is situated in the new town, are some valuable antiques, and other curiosities, among which is a St. John in Mosaic, done after a picture of Raphaël’s, with the following inscription below it:

IMAGINEM S. JOHANNES
EX ITALIA ADVENAM
IN RARUM RARÆ INDUSTRIÆ HUMANÆ MONUMENTUM
HANC COLLOCARI JUSSIT
FREDERICUS II. HASSIÆ LANDGR.
A. M. D. CCLXV.

But this art of copying paintings in Mosaic work, I understand has of late been brought to a much greater degree of perfection at Rome.

In the vestibule is placed the trunk of a laurel tree, with this inscription on the wall behind it.

QUÆ
PER OCTO PRINCIPUM CATTORUM ÆTATIS
IN AMÆNIS INCLYTI CASSEL.
VIRIDARII SPATIAM FLORUIT
LAURUS
ALT. CIRCITER LIV. LAT. IV. PED. RHENAN.
AD TEMPORA HEROUM
SERENISS. DOMUS HASSIÆ
CORONIS CINGENDA,
SENIO, SED NON IMPROLIS, EMORTUA EST
NE VERO TOTA PERIRET
ARBOR APOLLINI SACRA
TRUNCUM IN MUSEO SERVARI JUSSIT
FREDERICUS II. H. L.
A. M. D. CCLXIII.

They also show a sword, which was consecrated by the Pope, and sent to one of the Princes of this family at his setting out on an expedition to the Holy Land. What havoc this sacred weapon made among the infidels I cannot say.—It has a very venerable appearance for a sword, and yet seems little the worse for wear.

Near the old chateau, and a little to one side, is a colonade of small pillars lately built, and intended as an ornament to the ancient castle, though in a very different style of architecture. The slimness of their form appears the more remarkable on account of their vicinity to this Gothic structure.

Some time since, a mountebank came to Cassel, who, besides many other wonderful feats, pretended that he could swallow and digest stones. A Hessian officer walking before the chateau with an English gentleman, who then happened to be at Cassel, asked him, What he thought of the fine new colonade?—It is very fine indeed, replied the stranger; but if you wish it to be durable, you ought to take care not to allow the mountebank to walk this way before breakfast.

Nothing in the country of Hesse is more worthy the admiration of travellers, than the Gothic temple and cascade at Wasenstein. There was originally at this place an old building, which was used by the Princes of this family as a kind of hunting-house. It is situated near the bottom of a high mountain, and has been enlarged and improved at different times. But the present Landgrave’s grandfather, who was a Prince of equal taste and magnificence, formed, upon the face of the mountain opposite to this house, a series of artificial cataracts, cascades, and various kinds of water-works, in the noblest style that can be imagined.

The principal cascades are in the middle, and on each side are stairs of large black stones of a flinty texture, brought from a rock at a considerable distance. Each of these stairs consists of eight hundred steps, leading from the bottom to the summit of the mountain; and when the works are allowed to play, the water flowing over them forms two continued chains of smaller cascades. At convenient distances, as you ascend, are four platforms, with a spacious bason in each; also grottos and caves ornamented with shell-work, statues of Naiads, and sea divinities.—One grotto in particular, called the grotto of Neptune and Amphitrite, is happily imagined, and well executed.

The water rushes from the summit of this mountain in various shapes:—Sometimes in detached cascades, sometimes in large sheets like broad crystalline mirrors; at one place, it is broken by a rock consisting of huge stones, artificially placed for that purpose.—There are also fountains, which eject the water in columns of five or six inches diameter to a considerable height.

All this must have a very brilliant effect when viewed from the bottom. This sight, however, I did not enjoy; for there has been a continued frost ever since we have been at Cassel; and when I visited Wasenstein, the fields were covered with snow, which did not prevent my going to the top, though it made the ascent by the flairs exceedingly difficult.

On the highest part of the mountain, a Gothic temple is built, and upon the top of that an obelisk, which is crowned by a colossal statue of Hercules leaning on his club, in the attitude of the Farnese Hercules. This figure is of copper, and thirty feet in height. There is a staircase within the club by which a man may ascend, and have a view of the country from a window at the top.

Wasenstein, upon the whole, is infinitely the noblest work of the kind I ever saw. I have been allured, there is nothing equal to it in Europe. It has not the air of a modern work, but rather conveys the idea of Roman magnificence.

We think of leaving this within a few days for Brunswick.—I shall not close my letter till we get to Gottingen, where we may probably stay a short time.

P. S. The D. and I took our leave of the Court and our friends yesterday, and actually set out from Cassel this morning; but finding the roads entirely overflowed by the extraordinary swelling of the Fulda, we were obliged to return. A great thaw for some days past dissolving the snow and ice, has occasioned this swelling, and rendered the roads impassable.

After taking leave we could not appear again at court, but dined at one of the messes with the officers.—From this party I am just returned, and finding it uncertain when we may get to Gottingen, I send this to-night.

Adieu.