behind the castle, you pass under the archway of the Giant's Tower
into the great court-yard. The diverse architecture of different
ages strikes the eye; and curious sculptures. In niches on the wall
of Saint Udalrich's chapel stand rows of knights in armour, all
broken and dismembered; and on the front of Otho's Rittersaal, the
heroes of Jewish history and classic fable. You enter the open and
desolate chambers of the ruin; and on every side are medallions and
family arms; the Globe of the Empire and the Golden Fleece, or the
Eagle of the Cesars, resting on the escutcheons of Bavaria and the
Palatinate. Over the windows and door-ways and chimney-pieces, are
sculptures and mouldings of exquisite workmanship; and the eyeis
bewildered by the profusion of caryatides, and arabesques, and
rosettes, and fan-like flutings, and garlands of fruits and flowers
and acorns, and bullocks'-heads with draperies of foliage, and
muzzles of lions, holding rings in their teeth. The cunning hand of
Art was busy for six centuries, in raising and adorning these walls;
the mailed hands of Time and War have defaced and overthrown them in
less than two. Next to the Alhambra of Granada, the Castle of
Heidelberg is the most magnificent ruin of the Middle Ages.

In the valley below flows the rushing stream of the Neckar. Close
from its margin, on the opposite side, rises the Mountain of All
Saints, crowned with the ruins of a convent; and up the valley
stretches the mountain-curtain of the Odenwald. So close and many
are the hills, which eastward shut the valley in, that the river
seems a lake. But westward it opens, upon the broad plain of the
Rhine, like the mouth of a trumpet; and like the blast of a trumpet
is at times the wintry wind through this narrow mountain pass. The
blue Alsatian hills rise beyond; and, on a platform or strip of level
land, between the Neckar and the mountains, right under the castle,