LETTER XII.

Vienna-Magnificence of the Emperor's Manage-The Young Queen of Hungary -The Palace-Hall of Curiosities. Jewelry, etc.-The Polytechnic School-Geometrical Figures described by the Vibrations of Musical Notes-Liberal Provision for the Public Institutions--Popularity of te Emperor.

I HAD quite forgotten, in packing up my little portmanteau to leave the ship, that I was coming so far north. Scarce a week ago, in the south of Italy, we were panting in linen jackets. I find myself shivering here, in a latitude five hundred miles north of Boston, with no remedy but exercise and an extra shirt, for a cold that would grace December.

It is amusing, sometimes, to abandon one's self to a valet de place. Compelled to resort to one from my ignorance of the German, I have fallen upon a dropsical fellow, with a Bardolph nose, whose French is execrable, and whose selection of objects of curiosity is worthy of his appearance. His first point was the emperor's stables. We had walked a mile and a half to see them. Here were two or three hundred horses of all breeds, in a building that the emperor himself might live in, with a magnificent inner court for a menage, and a wilderness of grooms, dogs, and other appurtenances. I am as fond of a horse as most people, but with all Vienna before me, and little time to lose, I

broke into the midst of the head groom's pedigrees, and requested to be shown the way out. Monsieur Karl did not take the

hint. We walked on a half mile, and stopped before another large building. "What is this !""The imperial carriagehouse, monseigneur." I was about turning on my heel and taking my liberty into my own hands, when the large door flew open, and the blaze of gilding from within, turned me from my purpose. I thought I had seen the ne plus ultra of equipages at Rome. The imperial family of Austria ride in more style than his holiness. The models are lighter and handsomer, while the gold and crimson is put on quite as resplendently. The most curious part of the show were ten or twelve state traineaux or sleighs. I can conceive nothing more brilliant than a turn-out of these magnificent structures upon the snow. They are built with aerial lightness, of gold and sable, with a seat fifteen or twenty feet from the ground, and are driven, with two or four horses, by the royal personage himself. The grace of their shape and the splendor of their gilded trappings are inconceivable to one who has never seen them.

Our way lay through the court of the imperial palace. A large crowd was collected round a carriage with four horses standing at the side-door. As we approached it, all hats flew off, and a beautiful woman, of perhaps twenty-eight, came down the steps, leading a handsome boy of two or three years. It was the young queen of Hungary and her son. If I had seen such a face in a cottage ornée on the borders of an American lake, i should have thought it made for the spot.

We entered a door of the palace at which stood a ferociouslooking Croat sentinel, near seven feet high. Three German travelling students had just been ref. sed admittance. A little

man appeared at the ring of the bell within, and after a preliminary explanation by my valet, probably a lie, he made a low bow, and invited me to enter. I waited a moment, and a permission was brought me to see the imperial treasury. Handing it to Karl, I requested him to get permission inserted for my three friends at the door. He accomplished it in the same incomprehensible manner in which he had obtained my own, and introducing them with the ill-disguised contempt of a valet for all men with dusty coats, we commenced the rounds of the curiosities together.

A large clock, facing us as we entered, was just striking. From either side of its base, like companies of gentlemen and ladies advancing to greet each other, appeared figures in the dress and semblance of the royal family of Austria, who remained a moment, and then retired, bowing themselves courteously out backward. It is a costly affair, presented by the landgrave of Hesse to Maria Theresa, in 1750.

After a succession of watches, snuff-boxes, necklaces, and jewels of every description, we came to the famous Florentine diamond, said to be the largest in the world. It was lost by a duke of Burgundy upon the battle-field of Granson, found by a soldier, who parted with it for five florins, sold again, and found its way at last to the royal treasury of Florence, whence it was brought to Vienna. Its weight is one hundred and thirty-nine and a half carats, and it is estimated at one million forty-three thousand three hundred and thirty-four florins. It looks like a lump of light. Enormous diamonds surround it, but it hangs among them like Hesperus among the stars.

The next side of the gallery is occupied by specimens of carved ivory. Many of them are antique, and half of them are

more beautiful than decent. There were two bas-reliefs among them by Raphael Donner, which were worth, to my eye, all the gems in the gallery. They were taken from scripture, and represented the Woman of Samaria at the well, and Hagar waiting for the death of her son. No powers of elocution, no enhancement of poetry, could bring those touching passages of the Bible so movingly to the heart. The latter particularly arrested me. The melancholy beauty of Hagar, sitting with her head bowed upon her knees, while her boy is lying a little way off, beneath a shrub of the desert, is a piece of unparalleled workmanship. It may well hang in the treasury of an emperor

Miniatures of the royal family in their childhood, set in costly gems, massive plate curiously chased, services of gold, robes of diamonds, gem-hilted swords, dishes wrought of solid integral agates, and finally the crown and sceptre of Austria upon ed velvet cushions, looking very much like their imitations on the stage, were among the world of splendors unfolded to our eyes. The Florentine diamond and the bas-reliefs by Raphael Donner were all I coveted. The beauty of the diamond was royal. It needed no imagination to feel its value. A savage would pick it up in the desert for a star dropped out of the sky. For the rest, the demand on my admiration fatigued me, and I was glad to escape with my dusty' friends from the university, and exchange courtesies in the free air. One of them spoke English a little, and called me "Mister Englishman," on bidding me a ieu. I was afraid of a beer-shop scene in Vienna, and did not correct the mistake.

As we

were going out of the court, four covered wagons, drawn each by four superb horses, dashed through the gate. I waited a moment to see what they contained. Thirty or forty

servants in livery came out from the palace, and took from the wagons quantities of empty baskets carefully labelled with directions. They were from Schoenbrunn, where the emperor is at present residing with his court, and had come to market for the imperial kitchen. It should be a good dinner that requires sixteen such horses to carry to the cook.

It was the hungry hour of two, and I was still musing on the emperor's dinner, and admiring the anxious interest his servants took in their disposition of the baskets, when a blast of military music came to my ear. It was from the barracks of the imperial guard, and I stepped under the arch, and listened to them an hour. How gloriously they played! It was probably the finest band in Austria. I have heard much good music, but of its kind this was like a new sensation to me. They stand, in playing, just under the window at which the emperor appears daily when in the city.

I have been indebted to Mr. Schwartz, the American consul at Vienna, for a very unusual degree of kindness. Among other polite attentions, he procured for me to-day an admission to the Polytechnic school—a favor granted with difficulty, except on the appointed days for public visits.

The Polytechnic school was established in 1816, by the present emperor. The building stands outside the rampart of the city, of elegant proportions, and about as large as all the buildings of Yale or Harvard college thrown into one. Its object is to promote instruction in the practical sciences, or, in other words, to give a practical education for the trades, commerce, or manufactures. It is divided into three departments. The first is preparatory, and the course occupies two years. The studies are religion and morals, elementary mathematics, natural history,