large baskets of earth were suspended and vines planted in them. A few miles from Mayence and near the village of Oestrich, is the celebrated chateau of Prince Metternich, called Johannisberg, of which you have often heard so much.

From this vineyard comes the far-famed Johannisberger wine, very much in demand with us. The chateau and vineyard are on the top of a high hill—a most romantic location. The vineyard contains only 70 acres, and averages about 160 casks per year. Thus you see we can't possibly get much from Johannisberg. The best of these wines are put away in the large cellars of the chateau, and the rest sold to whoever may wish to buy them. A few miles above, nearly adjoining, is the Steinberg chateau, where the Stein wines are made, almost equal to the Johannisberg. Thus, all along the Rhine are different chateaus, where different kinds of Rhine wines are made. I find, however, that the great majority of wines shipped to our country are bought up by the wholesale merchant, who mixes them (all pure wines) to suit color and taste-bottles and labels, and ships them abroad. It is very seldom, indeed, that a real pure bottle of Johannisberg wine reaches America. The wine may be the pure juice of the grape, but not from the Chateau Johannisberg.

Everybody talks Dutch here. A few moments ago a chubby-faced, red-cheeked chambermaid came into my room with a pitcher of hot water— for there being no barbers here, every man shaves

himself: says I, "Parlez vous l'anglé?" Said she, "Yaw, hot wather." "D-n it," says I, "do you speak English?" "Yaw, yaw--goot hot wather!

I had read Bulwer's Pilgrims of the Rhine, and remembered Byron's description:

"The castled crags of Drachenfels

Frown o'er the wide and winding Rhine,
Whose breast of waters broadly swells
Between the banks which bear the vine,
And peasant girls with deep blue eyes
Walk smilingly o'er this Paradise"-

but must confess that I am disappointed. To one fresh from the wild scenes of Switzerland the Rhine is tame and spiritless. There is much beauty, but little grandeur. The villages are picturesque, the castles interesting, as evidences of feudal power, and the river is a quiet tranquil stream of a pale green color, just such scenery as would please a love-sick maiden. But the grandeur of Mount Blanc is wanting the rugged precipices of the Bay of Uri-the lofty mountains of Loch Lomond-even the Trosachs of Lake Katrine, are all far more sublime than any thing on the Rhine. Still tourists run crazy over the Rhine.

On the steamer coming down, were about 1,001 men and women, all with guide-books, and sketchbooks, knapsacks and carpet-bags, and all "Pilgrims of the Rhine," determined to be charmed, determined to be delighted, determined to be enraptured. Says Miss Araminta Horsefly, (a lan

guishing maid of sixteen,) "O mamma! do look at that nice old castle. Isn't it a love of a thing?” Lady Penelope Penfeather, (a very spirituelle widow,) "Oh, yes, it is charming-b-e-a-u-t-i-ful." There is a legend about the seven sisters who lived in that castle. A huge Dutchman here chimes in, "Yah, dat ish goot," while an English cockney, with a glass screwed into his eye, drawls out, "Yas, dem foin." I am sick of the Rhine. The boats are small and miserably constructed. In case it rains, unless you have an umbrella, you had better jump into the river at once in order to keep from getting wet.

On landing here, every thing is in confusion. Everybody is in everybody's way, keeping everybody as long as possible from getting everybody's baggage. If our friend Capt. Cotton would only run the Kenner or the Capitol up the Rhine with the stars and stripes, and learn these people something about the comforts and luxuries of an American steamer, I verily believe the travelling public would build him a monument on the "castled crags of Drachenfels."

Adieu. I am off to-night for Brussels and the field of Waterloo.

H. W. A.

LETTER NO. XVII.

EDITORS ADVOCATE :

HOTEL RUBENS, ANTWERP, BELGIUM,

September 6, 1859.

Gentlemen-I arrived at this place last night, and have spent the day in visiting the various churches, and studying the paintings of the great Rubens. This city was his home, and here are to be found his great master-pieces. In the Cathedral of Notre Dame is his "Descent from the Cross," and "The Crucifixion." The last is considered by artists to be one of the best paintings in the world. For great agony of expression in the dying thief, there is nothing like it. It is terribly frightful, so much so, that you involuntarily turn from it with a shudder. Rubens is almost deified in Belgium, and particularly in Antwerp. The Church of St. Jacques is the richest in marble sculpture and statuary of any in Belgium. Here is to be seen the altar-piece of Carrara marble brought by Rubens from Italy. In the museum

are thirteen more of his paintings, all of them considered as great treasures, and which no money could buy. Here are also six original paintings by Van Dyck, most excellent specimens of this great master. He excels in portraits, while Rubens' great forte was in representing the dead body and the agony of the dying. When Napoleon took Belgium, the first thing he did was to seize these paintings, and carry them off to Paris, but after the battle of Waterloo, they were brought back and restored to their lawful owners. There are a

great many private galleries of most excellent paintings in Antwerp, all rich in the works of the old masters. It seems that the moderns have lost the art (or rather have never found it) of great conception in painting-they also fail in the coloring. No modern artist has ever equalled the rich coloring of Rembrandt and Rubens, or the soft, silky touch of Murillo and Raphael.

The works of art are so rich and numerous in Antwerp, that a traveller could stay here for months. In the Church of St. Paul are the finest specimens of carving in oak-the pulpit is a wonderful triumph of a Jesuit's chisel. It represents Christ meeting the fishermen Peter and Andrew, all full size. The nets and fishes, the rocks and waves, the attitude of the fishermen, and the expression of the features of the Saviour, all are wonderfully given. In the museum of paintings is a very large painting by Frans Floris, (Flemish school,) called "The Descent of the Fallen Angels." On one of these