The Cathedral
Is A Very Ancient And Curious Gothic Edifice, And The Steeple Is Nearly 450
Feet High.
I happened to enter the Cathedral one day on the occasion of a
solemn requiem celebrated for the soul of Prince Metternich's father.
Had
it been for the son, instead of the father, many an honorable man
persecuted at the instigation of that most machiavelic of all ministers,
might exclaim in making a slight alteration in a well known epitaph:
Cy-git M - - ah! qu'il est bien
Pour son repos et pour le mien!
Among the other striking buildings in the old town is the Hofburg or
Imperial Palace, a very extensive quadrangular building, with a large court
in its centre. A Guard mounts here every day at eleven o'clock. It was in
one of the saloons of this palace that the celebrated Congress of Vienna
was held; a Congress whose labours will be long and severely felt by Europe
and duly appreciated by posterity, who will feel any other sentiment but
that of gratitude for the arrangements entered into there. The Hofburg
was built by Leopold VII in 1200. This building, from its being extremely
irregular and from its having received additions at intervals in the
different styles of architecture, has been aptly enough considered as the
type of the Austrian monarchy, and of its growth from a Markgraviate to an
Empire; in this, by the continued acquisition of foreign territories
differing from each other in manners and hi speech; in that, by the
continued addition of various specimens of architecture and style of
building in its augmentation.
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