V

VIENNA

FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF THE CAPITAL[A]

BY BAYARD TAYLOR

I have at last seen the thousand wonders of this great capital, this German Paris, this connecting-link between the civilization of Europe and the barbaric magnificence of the East.  It looks familiar to be in a city again whose streets are thronged with people and resound with the din and bustle of business.  It reminds me of the never-ending crowds of London or the life and tumult of our scarcely less active New York.  The morning of our arrival we sallied out from our lodgings in the Leopoldstadt to explore the world before us.  Entering the broad Praterstrasse, we passed down to the little arm of the Danube which separates this part of the new city from the old.  A row of magnificent coffee-houses occupy the bank, and numbers of persons were taking their breakfasts in the shady porticos.  The Ferdinand’s Bridge, which crosses the stream, was filled with people; in the motley crowd we saw the dark-eyed Greek, and Turks in their turbans and flowing robes.  Little brown Hungarian boys were going around selling bunches of lilies, and Italians with baskets of oranges stood by the sidewalk.

The throng became greater as we penetrated into the old city.  The streets were filled with carts and carriages, and, as there are no side-pavements, it required constant attention to keep out of their way.  Splendid shops fitted up with great taste occupied the whole of the lower stories, and goods of all kinds hung beneath the canvas awnings in front of them.  Almost every store or shop was dedicated to some particular person or place, which was represented on a large panel by the door.  The number of these paintings added much to the splendor of the scene; I was gratified to find, among the images of kings and dukes, one dedicated “To the American,” with an Indian chief in full costume.

The Altstadt, or “old city,” which contains about sixty thousand inhabitants, is completely separated from the suburbs, whose population, taking the whole extent within the outer barrier, numbers nearly half a million.[B] It is situated on a small arm of the Danube and encompassed by a series of public promenades, gardens and walks, varying from a quarter to half a mile in length, called the “Glacis.”  This formerly belonged to the fortifications of the city, but as the suburbs grew up so rapidly on all sides, it was changed appropriately to a public walk.  The city is still surrounded with a massive wall and a deep wide moat, but, since it was taken by Napoleon in 1809, the moat has been changed into a garden with a beautiful carriage-road along the bottom around the whole city.

It is a beautiful sight to stand on the summit of the wall and look over the broad Glacis, with its shady roads branching in every direction and filled with inexhaustible streams of people.  The Vorstaedte, or new cities, stretch in a circle, around beyond this; all the finest buildings front on the Glacis, among which the splendid Vienna Theater and the church of San Carlo Borromeo are conspicuous.  The mountains of the Vienna forest bound the view, with here and there a stately castle on their woody summits.