320 



GEEMANY. 



Bohemia, Saxony, and Tburingia, it is very dense, and nowhere more so than in 

 the Prussian province of Saxony. 



The Saale, on entering that province, runs past the watering-place of Kosen 

 (2,055 inhabitants) and the famous school of ScJiuIpfoda, at which Fichte, 

 Novalis, Klopstock, Ranke, and Mitscherlich were educated. It then flows round 

 the industrial city of Naumhurg (16,258 inhabitants), the native place of Lepsius, 

 likewise a pupil of Schulpforta. After having been joined by the Unstrut, which 

 flows past the mining town of Sangersliausen (8,475 inhabitants), the Saale washes 

 the foot of vine-clad hills, and runs through Wcisscnfeh (16,924 inhabitants), 

 which is inferior to Naumhurg and Zeitz (16,480 inhabitants), an ancient Slav 

 town to the west of it, as a seat of industry. Numerous battles have been fought 

 in this region, wdiich is traversed by the roads leading from Prussia and Saxony to 

 the defiles of Thuringia. At Rosshach Frederick II. beat the French under 

 Soubise in 1757. At Lutzcn (2,875 inhabitants) Gustavus Adolphus, in 1632, 



Fig. 184. — Halle and its Salt Lake. 

 Scale 1 : 220,000. 



5 Miles. 



was struck down in the hour of his triumph, and Napoleon achieved a victory in 

 1813. At Mersehurg (13,664 inhabitants), in the north, Henry the Fowler 

 defeated the Hungarians in 933. Merseburg has a fine cathedral, and during the 

 eleventh century it was a favourite residence of the German emperors. Its fairs 

 were as important in the Middle Ages as are those of Leipzig now. Salt mines 

 are w^orked in its neighbourhood, and to the same source llalle (60,503 inhabit- 

 ants), lower down on the Saale, is indebted for its existence. The salt-makers, or 

 Ilallorcn, who are believed to be of Celtic origin, have retained some of their 

 ancient customs and their cspvit dfi corps to the present day. Towards the close 

 of the seventeenth century, Halle, the " Town of S:dt," acquired additional 

 importance by becoming the seat of a university at present frequented by nearly 

 a thousand students. The town has several learned societies, and its orphanage, 

 founded by Francke in 1698, is one of the largest institutions of that kind in the 

 world. The interior of the town, with its old churches, its " red tower," and a statue 

 of Hiindel, the most famous of its children, possesses features of originality, but 



