I have rarely enjoyed traveling more than our first two days’ journey toward Prague.  The range of the Erzgebirge ran along on our right; the snow still lay in patches upon it, but the valleys between, with their little clusters of white cottages, were green and beautiful.  About six miles before reaching Teplitz we passed Kulm, the great battlefield which in a measure decided the fate of Napoleon.  He sent Vandamme with forty thousand men to attack the allies before they could unite their forces, and thus effect their complete destruction.  Only the almost despairing bravery of the Russian guards under Ostermann, who held him in check till the allied troops united, prevented Napoleon’s design.  At the junction of the roads, where the fighting was hottest, the Austrians have erected a monument to one of their generals.  Not far from it is that of Prussia, simple and tasteful.  A woody hill near, with the little village of Kulm at its foot, was the station occupied by Vandamme at the commencement of the battle.  There is now a beautiful chapel on its summit which can be seen far and wide.  A little distance farther the Czar of Russia has erected a third monument, to the memory of the Russians who fell.  Four lions rest on the base of the pedestal, and on the top of the shaft, forty-five feet high, Victory is represented as engraving the date, “Aug. 30, 1813,” on a shield.  The dark pine-covered mountains on the right overlook the whole field and the valley of Torlitz; Napoleon rode along their crests several days after the battle to witness the scene of his defeat.

Teplitz lies in a lovely valley, several miles wide, bounded by the Bohemian mountains on one side and the Erzgebirge on the other.  One straggling peak near is crowned with a picturesque ruin, at whose foot the spacious bath-buildings lie half hidden in foliage.  As we went down the principal street I noticed nearly every house was a hotel; we learned afterward that in summer the usual average of visitors is five thousand.[20] The waters resemble those of the celebrated Carlsbad; they are warm and practically efficacious in rheumatism and diseases of like character.  After leaving Teplitz the road turned to the east, toward a lofty mountain which we had seen the morning before.  The peasants, as they passed by, saluted us with “Christ greet you!”

We stopt for the night at the foot of the peak called the Milleschauer, and must have ascended nearly two thousand feet, for we had a wide view the next morning, altho’ the mists and clouds hid the half of it.  The weather being so unfavorable, we concluded not to ascend, and descended through green fields and orchards snowy with blossoms to Lobositz, on the Elbe.  Here we reached the plains again, where everything wore the luxuriance of summer; it was a pleasant change from the dark and rough scenery we left.

The road passed through Theresienstadt, the fortress of Northern Bohemia.  The little city is surrounded by a double wall and moat which can be filled with water, rendering it almost impossible to be taken.  In the morning we were ferried over the Moldau, and after journeying nearly all day across barren, elevated plains saw, late in the afternoon, the sixty-seven spires of Prague below.