Tom Cringles Log | Page 9

other fanciful
pleasure--house, with its gilded trellised work, and little bells
depending from the eaves of its many roofs, glancing like small golden
balls, rose from out the fast thinning recesses of the woods.
But there was no life in the scene--'twas "Greece, but living Greece no
more,"--not a fishing--boat was near, scarcely a solitary figure crawled
along the beach.
"What is that?" after we had passed Blankanese, said the colonel

quickly. "Who are those?" as a group of three of four men presented
themselves at a sharp turning of the road, that wound along the foot of
the hill close to the shore.
"The uniform of the Prussians," said one.
"Of the Russians," said another.
"Poo," said a third, "it is a picket of the Prince's;" and so it was, but the
very fact of his having advanced his outposts so far, showed how he
trembled for his position.
After answering their hail, we pushed on, and as the clocks were
striking twelve, we were abreast of the strong beams, that were
clamped together with iron, and constituted the boom or chief water
defence of Hamburgh. We passed through, and found an entire
regiment under arms, close by the Custom--house. Somehow or other, I
had drank deep of that John Bull prejudice, which delights to disparage
the physical conformation of our Gallic neighbours, and hugs itself
with the absurd notion, "that on one pair of English legs doth march
three Frenchmen." But when I saw the weather--beaten soldierlike
veterans, who formed this compact battalion, part of the elite of the first
corps, more commanding in its, aspect from severe service having worn
all the gilding and lace away--"there was not a piece of feather in the
host" I felt the reality before me fast overcoming my preconceived
opinion. I had seldom or ever seen so fine a body of men, tall, square,
and muscular, the spread of their shoulders set off from their large red
worsted epaulets, and the solidity of the mass increased by their wide
trowsers, which in my mind contrasted advantageously with the long
gaiters and tight integuments of our own brave fellows.
We approached a group of three mounted officers, and in a few words
the officer, whose prisoner I was, explained the affair to the chef de
baton, whereupon I was immediately placed under the care of' a
sergeant and six rank and file, and marched along the chief canal for a
mile, where I could not help remarking the numberless large rafts--you
could not call them boats--of unpainted pine timber, which had arrived
from the upper Elbe, loaded with grain: with gardens, absolute gardens,
and cowhouses, and piggeries on board; while their crews of
Fierlanders, men, women, and children, cut a most extraordinary
appearance,--the men in their jackets, with buttons like pot--lids, and
trowsers fit to carry a month's provender and a couple of children in;

and the women with bearings about the quarters, as if they had cut
holes in large cheeses, three feet in diameter at least, and stuck
themselves through them--such sterns--and as to their costumes, all
very fine in a Flemish painting, but the devils appeared to be awfully
nasty in real life.
But we carried on until we came to a large open space fronting a
beautiful piece of water, which I was told was the Alster. As I walked
through the narrow streets, I was struck with the peculiarity of the
gables of the tall houses being all turned towards the thoroughfare, and
with the stupendous size of the churches. We halted for a moment, in
the porch of one of the latter, and my notions of decency were not a
little outraged, by seeing it filled with a squadron of dragoons, the men
being in the very act of cleaning their horses.
At length we came to the open space on the Alster, a large parade,
faced by a street of splendid houses on the left hand, with a row of trees
between them, and the water on the right.
There were two regiments of foot bivouacking here, with their arms
piled under the trees, while, the men were variously employed, some on
duty before the houses, others cleaning their accoutrements, and others
again playing at all kinds of games. Presently we came to a crowd of
soldiers clustered round a particular spot, some laughing, others
cracking coarse jests, but none at all in the least serious. We could not
get near enough to see distinctly what was going on; but we afterwards
saw, when the crowd had dispersed, three men in the dress of
respectable burghers, hanging from a low gibbet,--so low in fact, that
although their heads were not six inches from the beam, their feet were
scarcely three from the ground. I was here placed