I Could
Have Fancied Myself Transported To Lapland Or Greenland, On Meeting
Every Where Carts To Which Two, Three, Or
Four dogs were harnessed.
One pair of dogs will drag three hundredweight on level ground; but
when they encounter a
Hill, the driver must lend a helping hand.
These dogs are, besides, careful guardians; and I would not advise
any one to approach a car of this kind, as it stands before the inn-
door, while the proprietor is quenching his thirst within, on the
money he has just earned.
At five o'clock on the morning of the 15th of April I left Prague,
and rode for fourteen miles in the mail-carriage, as far as Obristwy
on the Elbe, at which place I embarked for Dresden, on board the
steamer Bohemia, of fifty-horse power, a miserable old craft,
apparently a stranger to beauty and comfort from her youth up. The
price charged for this short passage of eight or nine hours is
enormously dear. The travellers will, however, soon have their
revenge on the extortionate proprietors; a railroad is constructing,
by means of which this distance will be traversed in a much shorter
time, and at a great saving of expense.
But at any rate the journey by water is the more agreeable; the way
lies through very picturesque scenery, and at length through "Saxon
Switzerland" itself. The commencement of the journey is, however,
far from pleasing. On the right are naked hills, and on the left
large plains, over which, last spring, the swollen stream rolled,
partly covering the trees and the roofs of the cottages.
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