that day to be
neutral in the Franco-Prussian quarrel.

The disorder in the land made me feel that I must get nearer to my
base, so I hurriedly left Vienna for Munich, which I found seething
with agitation, for, like Austria, Bavaria had only a few years before
been Prussia's enemy, and so far as the populace was concerned all
was in doubt as to what course would now be taken. The rumour was that
McMahon had crossed the Rhine at Strassburg with 150,000 men, and was
marching to interpose between Northern and Southern Germany.

At the Ober-Pollinger I heard in the inn, amid the stormy discussion
of the crisis, something quite out of harmony with the spirit of the
hour. The first performance was to be given in the Royal Opera House
of a work of Richard Wagner, the _Rheingold_. Wagner in those
days had not attained his great fame, and, to a man like me, who had
no especial interest in music, was a name almost unknown, but I went
with the crowd, thinking to help out a dreary evening rather than to
enjoy a masterpiece. The house was crowded. In the centre before the
stage an ample space was occupied by the royal box, richly carved and
draped. Presently the King entered, a slender, graceful figure in a
dress suit, his dark rather melancholy face looking handsome in the
gorgeous setting of the theatre. The crowded audience rose to their
feet in a tumult of enthusiasm. The air resounded with "Hoch! Hoch!"
the German cheer, and handkerchiefs waved like a snow-storm. The
King bowed right and left in acknowledgment of the plaudits, and
the performance of the evening was kept long in waiting. The line of
Bavarian kings has perhaps little title to our respect. The Ludwig
of fifty years ago was a voluptuary, vacillating, like another Louis
Quinze, between debauchery and a weak pietism. He probably merited the
cuts of the relentless scourge of Heine than which no instrument of
chastisement was ever more unsparing, and which in his case was put
to its most merciless use; but he loved art and lavished his revenues
upon pictures, statues, and churches, which the world admires,
imparting a benefit, though his subjects groaned. His successor,
whom I saw, was a man morbid and without force, who early came to a
sorrowful end. His redeeming quality was a fine aesthetic taste,
which he had no doubt through heredity, together with a sad burden of
disease. The world remembers kindly that he was a prodigal patron of
art.

I went to Heidelberg