oved it.

About half past seven on the appointed evening we crossed the lower
bridge, with some American students, in a pouring rain, and started up
the road which borders the Neunheim side of the river. This roadway was
densely packed with carriages and foot-passengers; the former of all
ages, and the latter of all ages and both sexes. This black and solid
mass was struggling painfully onward, through the slop, the darkness,
and the deluge. We waded along for three-quarters of a mile, and finally
took up a position in an unsheltered beer-garden directly opposite
the Castle. We could not SEE the Castle--or anything else, for that
matter--but we could dimly discern the outlines of the mountain over the
way, through the pervading blackness, and knew whereabouts the Castle
was located. We stood on one of the hundred benches in the garden, under
our umbrellas; the other ninety-nine were occupied by standing men and
women, and they also had umbrellas. All the region round about, and up
and down the river-road, was a dense wilderness of humanity hidden
under an unbroken pavement of carriage tops and umbrellas. Thus we stood
during two drenching hours. No rain fell on my head, but the converging
whalebone points of a dozen neighboring umbrellas poured little cooling
steams of water down my neck, and sometimes into my ears, and thus kept
me from getting hot and impatient. I had the rheumatism, too, and
had heard that this was good for it. Afterward, however, I was led to
believe that the water treatment is NOT good for rheumatism. There were
even little girls in that dreadful place. A man held one in his arms,
just in front of me, for as much as an hour, with umbrella-drippings
soaking into her clothing all the time.

In the circumstances, two hours was a good while for us to have to wait,
but when the illumination did at last come, we felt repaid. It came
unexpectedly, of course--things always do, that have been long looked
and longed for. With a perfectly breath-taking suddenness several mast
sheaves of varicolored rockets were vomited skyward out of the black
throats of the Castle towers, accompanied by a thundering crash of
sound, and instantly every detail of the prodigious ruin stood revealed
against the mountainside and glowing with an almost intolerable splendor
of fire and color. For some little time the whole building was a
blinding crimson mass, the towers continued to spout thick columns of
rockets aloft, and overh