472 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1818. 



the people should meet with any 

 great consideration from an as- 

 sembly of Ministers, from Sove- 

 reign Powers. But on my hinting 

 this to one of the Members of the 

 Assembly, he assured me that 

 Hussia, Prussia, and the great 

 Powers of Europe who have 

 Ambassadors at Frankfort, are 

 resolved to exert their influence 

 to put the States Jn possession 

 of Constitutions — whatever may 

 be the reluctance of many Sove- 

 reigns. I trust these liberal 

 intentions may be acted on — 

 called for as they are by the 

 claims of reason and enlightened 

 justice, the repeated promises of 

 Sovereigns, when in want of their 

 people's services — and the solemn 

 engagement of the Act of Confe- 

 deration. 



I made the other day a short 

 excursion into the Odenwald (the 

 ivooil of Odin) — a wild and inter- 

 esting district extending about 

 ten leagues from Darmstadt to 

 the Neckar in length, and from 

 the Berg-strasse to the Maine in 

 breadth. We posted as far as 

 Heppenheim — a small village 

 under the mountains on the 

 Eerg-strasse, which so much 

 resembles all the villages on this 

 beautiful road, that to describe 

 one is to describe all. They are 

 generally situated at the opening 

 of a narrow valley in the chain 

 of woody mountains. A rapid 

 stream descends through this 

 opening by a winding valley from 

 the mountainous Odenwald, rat- 

 tling along the village street — 

 the^ village housevpives washing 

 their cloaths — the children playing 

 — and the ducks and geese dab- 

 bling in its lim.pid course. 



We took a bol or guide at 



Heppenheim, and pursued on foot 

 the course of the little stream, 

 which came brawling through 

 the narrow valley between two 

 high shelving mountains, covered 

 with trim vineyards, or luxuriant 

 beech woods. The mountain on 

 the right, at the mouth of the 

 valley, is crowned by the moul- 

 dering walls of the old castle of 

 Starkenburg — one of the most 

 considerable of the many ruins 

 along the Berg-strasse chain. 

 The castle was built in 1066 by 

 an old Abbot of Lorsch, as a 

 bulwark against the attacks of 

 his rival, a Bishop of Bremen, 

 who covetted the Abbot's fat 

 monastery. In later years it fell 

 into the hands of the Elector of 

 Mayence, and was the residence 

 of a Burgrave, and a Garrison, 

 giving its name of Starkenburg 

 (Strong Castle) to the surround- 

 ing county of Starkenburg, now 

 comprised in the Grand Duchy 

 of Hesse. 



After proceeding up the valley 

 for some distance, we crossed the 

 fields, gradually ascending a hill, 

 from whence the wild, rich, scenes 

 of the Odenwald with their forests 

 and mountains lay before us as 

 far as the eye could reach. We 

 appeared now in an entirely new 

 world. The interminable plain 

 of sands and fir forest stretching 

 on the west side of the Berg- 

 strasse mountains, now gave place 

 to a rich diversified scene — pre- 

 senting a continual succession of 

 abrupt mountain and dale, forest 

 and corn country. With all its 

 cultivated fertility, the rugged 

 mountains^ the luxuriance of the 

 beech forests which cover them, 

 the masses of granite stuck in the 

 slopes of every hill, and the rough 



rocky 



