III.

MORE SUNDAYS ABROAD.

Still on tramp toward the south, we came to Dresden, and there rested
five days; but as they were week-days their experiences gave us no
insight into the Sunday usages of the place, and I only allude to them
because it would seem unbecoming to pass the capital of Saxony without a
word; and because I feel morally convinced that of all the art-wonders
collected in the Zwinger, Das Grune Gewolbe, and in the picture gallery,
all of which we visited, not any of them are visible to the public on
Sunday. {173} On a sultry day in August we struggled, dusty and athirst,
into Vienna. It is said that the first impressions of a traveller are
the most faithful, and I therefore transcribe from a diary of that time
some of my recollections of the first Sunday spent in the capital of
Austria. It is not flattering.

"Yesterday (Sunday), we rambled through a part of the city known as
Lerchenfeld, in the suburb of St. Joseph, where the low life of Vienna is
exhibited. It was a kind of fair. The way was lined with petty booths
and stalls, furnished with fruit, pipes, and common pastry. Here were
sold live rabbits and birds; there, paper clock-faces, engravings, songs,
and figures of saints. In one part was a succession of places of public
resort, like our tea-gardens in appearance, but devoted to the sale of
other beverages; tea being here almost unknown, except as a medicine.
From each of them there streamed the mingled sounds of obstreperous music
and human voices, while in several there appeared to be a sort of
conjuring exhibition in course of performance. Further on, there came
from the opposite side of the way the screaming of a flageolet, heard far
above its accompaniment of a violin and a couple of horns, to all of
which the shuffling and scraping of many feet formed a sort of dull bass,
as the dancers whirled round in their interminable waltz. Looking into
the window of the building thus outrageously conspicuous, we saw a motley
crowd of persons of both sexes, and in such a variety of costumes as
scarcely any other city but Vienna could furnish; some of them careering
round in the excitement of the dance; others impatiently awaiting their
turn, or quizzing the dancers; while a third party sat gravely at the
side-tables, smoking their pipes, playing at cards, and sipping their
wine and beer. Passing onward, we came upon a diminutive merryman,
screaming from the platform of his mountebank th