The Argosy — page 232: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

In the Black Forest. 215 At an unearthly hour next morning, the melancholy musicians again went through their performances as though every air played was one more nail in their coffin. If they resembled the lark in no other sense, at least they imitated him in the matter of early rising. ““And soaring every singest,” could not be said of them as of Shelley’s lark; rather they took themselves and their hearers into unimagined depths—of misery and anguish. Suddenly a window at right angles with mine was opened, and a bass voice in distressed quavers shouted out above the wailing of the catgut, in unmistakable English: ‘‘Man wants but little here below, nor wants that little long.” I hastened for a sight of the philosopher, but the oracle having spoken, had withdrawn, and the casement was closed again. The players evidently took it for a compliment—though an empty one, since it did not rain gold—for they raised between them the ghost of a smile, and wailed on more determinedly than ever. Early that morning we left Rippoldsau, and fine weather still smiled upon us. If there were clouds, it was merely those white fleecy visitants that add so much to the beauty of earth and sky, bringing out the deep blue of the one, throwing strong lights and shades upon the other. We wound about hill after hill of densely wooded pines; or, descending to the level of the vale, ran side by side with the flowing stream; wooded slopes above us, before us, behind us, around us; the trees waving and murmuring as the breeze took them, making, with the ripple of the water, a harmony of sounds that seems to form a connecting link in nature—the winds and wayes, the forests and laughing valleys—binding them eternally to each other. Klosterle was soon left behind, and its church with twin towers, built on the ruins of an old Benedictine monastery; a small, scattered village, where people stay to avoid the greater expense of Rippoldsau, or when its more formidable rival is overflowing. Presently the valley Opened out to make room for the picturesque village of Seebach, reposing snugly under the shelter of the pine hills; a quaint lovely spot, its gabled pointed houses primitive and old-world like, the valley rich in fruit trees and smiling fields. Next came Shapbach, a straggling village where, for the most part, the ground floor of the houses is converted into stables and given up to the cows and horses, the inhabitants modestly retiring to the upper portion of their dwellings ; then Wolfach, the latter a small picturesque town celebrated for its pine-cone baths, a remedy said to be luxu- riously delicious. Toujours perdrix is not desirable ; and so, in spite of the beauties of nature, it was pleasant to pass through these villages and towns, note their quaint houses, and watch the people at their daily work: these hewers of wood and drawers of water. The timber trade is carried on extensively in this district also; saw-mills Have their place—and trees their time for falling. About midday Hornberg was reached, an old town of a certain CoOnniclooolks (SO)