ch
as the stone-built Town Hall and "Guild House," both very similar in
character to buildings of the same date in sleepy old Flemish towns.
The many gushing fountains of mediaeval bronze and iron-work in the
streets added to the extraordinary picturesqueness of the place. It was
like a scene from an opera in real life. It always puzzled me to think
how the water for these fountains can have been provided on that
dead-flat plain in pre-steam days. There must have been pumps of some
sort. Before 1914, tens of thousands of tourists visited Nuremberg
annually, but the guide-books are almost silent about Brunswick, which
is fully as picturesque.

The standard of material comfort appeared far higher in Brunswick than
in a French provincial town. The manner in which the Spiegelbergs'
house was fitted up seemed very elaborate after the simple appointments
of the Ducros' farm-house, though nothing in the world would have
induced me to own one single object that this Teutonic residence
contained. The Spiegelbergs treated me extremely kindly, and I was
fortunate in being quartered on such agreeable people.

At Nyons there was not one single bookseller, but Brunswick bristled
with book-shops, and, in addition, there were two of those most
excellent lending libraries to be found in every German town. Here
almost every book ever published in German or English was to be found,
as well as a few very cautiously selected French ones, for German
parents were careful then as to what their daughters read.

The great resource of Brunswick was the theatre, such a theatre as does
not exist in any French provincial town, and such a theatre as has
never even been dreamed of in any British town. It was fully as large
as Drury Lane, and was subsidised by the State. I really believe that
every opera ever written was given here, and given quite admirably. In
this town of 60,000 inhabitants, in addition to the opera company,
there was a fine dramatic company, as well as a light opera company,
and a corps de ballet. Sunday, Tuesday and Saturday were devoted to
grand opera, Monday to classical drama (Schiller or Shakespeare),
Wednesday to modern comedy, Friday to light opera or farce. The bill
was constantly changing, and every new piece produced in Berlin or
Vienna was duly presented to the Brunswick public. There are certainly
some things we can learn from Germany! The mounting of the operas was
most excellent, and I have never seen better lighti