SECTION V. PRUSSIA, CONTINUED - - MECKLENBURG HANOVER-BRUNSWICK HESSE CASSEL-THE HANSE TOWNS, &c. ROUTE 56. London to Hamburg 57. Hamburg to Lübeck and Travemünde PAGE ROUTE 58. Hamburg to Stralsund, and Rügen, by Schwerin, Dobberan, and Rostock 59. Hamburg to Hanover, Brunswick, or Hildesheim, RAIL. 340 60. Hamburg to Bremen and Oldenburg 341 61. Hamburg to Berlin, RAIL. 62. Berlin to Magdeburg, by Potzdum and Brandenburg, RAIL. 63. Berlin to Leipzig, by Wittenburg, Köthen, Halle, Worlitz, and Dessau, RAIL. 359 69. Düsseldorf to Bremen, Münster 364 64. Magdeburg to Leipzig by Köthen, RAIL. 65. Berlin to Dresden, RAIL. 368 66. Cologne to Berlin, by Min den, Hanover, Brunswick, and Magdeburg, RAIL. 67 Düsseldorf to Berlin, by El HARTZ. Nordhausen to Magdeburg 74 a. Descent of the Weser. Cassel to Bremen 396 404 406 368 74 b. Wittenberge to Magdeburg, {ROUTE 56. LONDON TO HAMBURG. STEAM-BOATS start from London and from Hamburg, Wednesday and Saturday mornings: they set off so early in the morning that it is advisable to sleep on board the night before. The average passage is about 52 hours, though it sometimes takes 60 or 70. About 25 miles from the mouth of the Elbe lies the island of Heligoland (Holyland), so named from the Temple of Hertha (Earth), the goddess worshipped by the ancient Saxons, which stood on it. It was ceded to Great Britain in 1807, and some fortifications are raised on it. Its population amounts to 3,000. At the time when Napoleon had excluded England from the continent, it was important as a war-station; and from its situation near the mouths of the rivers Elbe and Weser, it then became a considerable smuggling depôt. Its male inhabitants are chiefly fishermen, sailors, and pilots. The destruction of its shores by the sea has been much exaggerated. It has been recently shown that the wellknown map of Heligoland, by Meyer, according to which the island contained 9 parishes, is entirely a work of imagination. On comparing a map made in 1793 by the Danish engineer, Wessel, with the measurements of M. Wiebel, recently made, it appeared that "the co-efficient of destruction in a century, for the whole circumference, was not more than 3 feet." It appears also that in the time of Adam of Bremen, whose description is extant, and of Charlemagne, the island was only a little larger than at present. See Geol. Journal, vol. iv. pt. 2. p. 32. 1. At the mouth of the Elbe stand the lighthouse and town of Cuxhaven, on a small angle of territory belonging to Hamburg. Vessels lie at anchor off this place waiting for favourable winds. It is a watering place frequented by the inhabitants of Hamburg for seabathing. In winter, when the Elbe is frozen over, it is necessary to proceed from Hamburg by land to meet the steamers at Cuxhaven, a tedious and expensive journey, crossing the Elbe to Haarburg, and descending its 1. bank. Beyond Cuxhaven, the left bank of the Elbe belongs to Hanover. Opposite to Stade, an Hanoverian sloop of war is stationed to enforce the toll levied by Hanover in virtue of an ancient imperial grant on vessels and cargoes passing up the Elbe. The land on the rt. bank is the territory of the Duchy of Holstein, belonging to Denmark; it rises in gentle slopes, covered, for some distance below Hamburg, with wood, interspersed with handsome villas and gardens belonging to opulent merchants. On this side lies the small town of Glückstadt, with 6000 inhab., now connected with Altona by Railway. Higher up the little fishing village of Blankenese, with its houses scattered along the slope and among the trees one above another, is passed; and above it, the town of rt. ALTONA, which joins Hamburg, and from the river seems to form a part of it, though within the Danish territory. It has risen to great mercantile prosperity, perhaps to the prejudice of its neighbour, so that the Hamburghers say that its name agrees with its situation, as it is All-zu-nah (All too near). In commercial respects it is a perfectly free town,- —no duties being levied, and the custom-house line for Holstein runs outside of it. It is the most commercial and populous town in Denmark next to Copenhagen, having 27,000 inhab. A Railroad runs from Altona to Kiel on the Baltic. (See HANDBOOK for N. EUROPE, DENMARK, &c.) A handsome new Quay has been constructed at Hamburg along the Elbe, and the harbour has been deepened, but passengers by sea-going steamers usually embark and disembark in boats to and from the vessel. rt. HAMBURG.-Inns: Streit's hotel, very comfortable, the best; the landlady is English; Hotel St. Petersburg, well situated at the corner of the Jungfernstieg and the Alster Arcades. Hotel de Russie; Kronprinz; Victoria Hotel; Alster Hotel; Hotel de l' Europe. These are on the old and new Jungfernstieg and the Alsterdamm. Charges: bed and dinner 24 sch. each, breakfast 12 sch., a bottle of wine 16 sch. Hamburg is situated about 80 m. from the mouth of the Elbe, at the junction of a small stream called the Alster, with the Elbe. Being a Free Town, the duties levied are so small that travellers are not bothered with any Custom-house examination landing; but passports are sometimes demanded. Its population is reckoned at 145,000. There are about 10,000 Jews. The Current Coins are The Mark Courant Pieces of 8 Schillings 4 Sch. on 1 Sch. (copper) nearly Rix dollar (specie) Mark Banco (imaginary)= 1 53 = 15 Most of these coins are so much worn, that care is required in taking them: even the natives are sometimes puzzled to know what they are. Many of them are valueless out of Hamburg. The landlords at the hotels will generally change English money. The regular money-changers are very extortionate. The English sovereign usually realises 17 marks 4 sch., and is sometimes taken in payment for 17 m. 8 sch. = Alster Basin, levelling almost all the buildings, public and private, over an area of many acres, nearly in the form of a triangle, sweeping down 1749 houses, 61 streets, besides courts and alleys, and even crossing the broad canal of the Alster. The attempts made to arrest the flames when the engines had proved useless, were, first, to Money accounts are kept in marks pull down the houses, but in unroofing and schillings; there are 16 schillings them the timbers and rafters were laid in a mark. The marc banco and rix open, and more readily caught fire from dollar banco are imaginary coins. The the sparks lodging in them. Artillery mark banco is to the current mark as was next employed to batter them down, 20 to 16. The piece of dollar Kas- but the balls only made holes in the sengeld is the most common, and is walls, and passed through. Finally, the worth 31 schillings currency. There plan of blowing them up with gunare also pieces of 2 schillings, sch. powder was resorted to; and this use(called a Sechsling), 4 sch (Dreiling). ful but dangerous task was executed by The Pruss. dollar goes for 40 sch. the English engineer Lindley, who, for1 Danish mark 5 schillings. Piece tunately for the town, was present at of 8 Rigsbank skillings = 24 sch. the time, and understood the proper Hamburg is one of the four remain-mode of proceeding. The first check ing Free towns, and is chiefly remarkable as the first trading sea-port of Germany. It is intersected by canals, called Fleethen (Fleet ditches?), and in this respect, in the antiquated appearance of its houses, and in the trees growing in its streets, bears a resemblance, in the old part of the town, to the towns of Holland. During the last 4 years, on an average 4000 vessels entered. The Elbe is navigable thus far for ships of considerable burden, which can enter the harbour and transfer their cargoes in barges to the merchants' doors, whose warehouses and dwellings generally adjoin. There are no docks. Much banking and funding business is done here; besides which it is the depôt for a large part of the exports and imports of the North of Europe. The sugar refineries have diminished of late. By the dreadful fire of 1842 Hamburg sustained a calamity unequalled in extent except by the fire of London. The conflagration broke out in the Deichstrasse, near the Elbe, on Thursday, May 5., from what cause is unknown, and raged until the following Sunday in spite of all efforts to oppose it; widening as it advanced until it had involved in destruction 2 sides of the was given to the fire by blowing up the Rathhaus and Bank, in whose cellars were deposited a vast treasure in silver bars. The churches of St. Nicholas, St. Peter, and St. Gertrude were speedily consumed; the New Exchange, though surrounded by the flames, escaped almost by a miracle uninjured. The sympathy caused by this event in all parts of the globe was proved by the voluntary subscriptions raised for the sufferers, amounting to near 400,000l., of which England contributed 41,000l. Besides this immense sums were raised by loan, so that Hamburg has now the largest national debt, in proportion to its population, of any continental state, and is in this respect nearly on a par with Great Britain. Hamburg has profited to a certain extent by the calamity in the improvements introduced in laying out the new buildings, the widening of streets, the construction of sewers, and the filling up of some of the stagnant fleeths or ditches. These improvements were planned and conducted by Mr. Lindley. A new and handsome Rathhaus is to be built on one side of a new square fronting the Börse. The finest of the new buildings are near the Alster. Many of them are of vast extent, and have |