[Footnote A: From "The Rhine." Translated by D.M. Aird.]
[Footnote B: One of the illustrations that accompany this volume shows
the spires in their completed state.]
ROUND ABOUT COBLENZ[A]
BY LADY BLANCHE MURPHY
Coblenz is the place which many years ago gave me my first associations
with the Rhine. From a neighboring town we often drove to Coblenz, and
the wide, calm flow of the river, the low, massive bridge of boats and
the commonplace outskirts of a busy city contributed to make up a very
different picture from that of the poetic "castled" Rhine of German song
and English ballad. The old town has, however, many beauties, tho its
military character looks out through most of them, and reminds us that
the Mosel city (for it originally stood only on that river, and then
crept up to the Rhine), tho a point of union in Nature, has been for
ages, so far as mankind was concerned, a point of defense and watching.
The great fortress, a German Gibraltar, hangs over the river and sets
its teeth in the face of the opposite shore; all the foreign element in
the town is due to the deposits made there by troubles in other
countries, revolution and war sending their exiles, emigres and
prisoners. The history of the town is only a long military record, from
the days of the archbishops of Treves, to whom it was subject.
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