Among the crooked, irregular houses, low-storied and unpretentious, which form the streets of Hermanstadt, there is one which stands out conspicuous from its neighbors, resembling as it does nothing else in the town. This is the Bruckenthal palace, a stately building which might right well be placed by the side of some of the most aristocratic residences at Vienna, and of which even the Grand Canal at Venice need not be ashamed—but here absolutely out of place and incongruous. Looking like a nobleman amid a group of simple burghers, everything about this building has an air thoroughly aristocratic and grand seignior: the broad two-storied fa?ade richly ornamented, the fantastically wrought iron gratings over the lower windows, the double escutcheon hanging above the stately entrance, even the very garret windows looking out of the high-pitched triple roof, have the appearance of old-fashioned picture-frames which only want to be filled up with appropriate rococo figures.
As we step through the roomy porte-cochère into a spacious court, we glance round half expecting to see a swelling porter or gorgeously attired Suisse prepared to challenge our entrance, and instinctively we fumble in our pocket for our card-case; but no one appears, and all is silent as death. Passing over the grass-grown stones which pave the court, we step through a capacious archway into a second court as large as the first, and surrounded in the same manner by the building running round to form another quadrangle. Here apparently are the stables, as a stone-carved horse’s head above a door at the farther end apprises us, and hither we direct our steps in hopes of finding some stable-boy or groom to guide us, and tell us to whom this vast silent palace belongs.
The stable door is ajar, and we push it open, but pause in astonishment on the threshold, met by the stony stare of countless unseeing{310} eyes. A stable it is undoubtedly, as testify the carved stone cribs and partitioned-off stalls—six stalls on the one side, six on the other, roomy and luxurious, fit only for the pampered stud of a monarch or of an English fox-hunter, but which now, deserted of its rightful occupants, has been usurped by a collection of plaster casts and terra-cotta copies of ancient statues. Where majestic Arabs used formerly to be stabled, now stands a naked simpering Venus, and the Dying Gladiator writhes on the flag-stones once pawed by impatient hoofs.
THE BRUCKENTHAL PALACE.[71]
By-and-by we come across some one, who in a few words gives us the history of the Bruckenthal palace.
Samuel Bruckenthal, of Saxon family, was raised alike to the rank of baron and to the position of governor of Transylvania by the Empress Maria Theresa, this being the first instance of a Saxon being thus distinguished. In this capacity he governed the land for fourteen years, from 1773 to 1787, and much good is recorded of the manner in which he filled his office, and of the benefits he conferred on the land. Baron Samuel Bruckenthal was a special favorite of the great empress, who seems to have overpowered both him and his{311} family with riches and favors of all kinds. Besides this splendid palace (truly magnificent for the country and the time when it was built), and which boasted of a picture-gallery and an exceedingly valuable library, the Bruckenthal family became possessed of extensive landed property, some of which was to belong to them unconditionally, other estates being granted to the family for a period of ninety-nine years, afterwards reverting to the Crown. Likewise, villas and manufactories, summer and winter residences, gardens and hot-houses, which have belonged to them, are to be met with in all directions.
Baron Bruckenthal, who died in 1803, had decreed in his last will, dated 1802, that the gallery and museum he had formed were to be thrown open for the benefit of his Saxon townsmen; while his second heir, Baron Joseph Bruckenthal, further decreed, in a will dated 1867, that in the case of the male line of his family becoming extinct, the palace, inclusive of the picture-gallery, library, etc., should revert to the Evangelical Gymnasium at Hermanstadt, along with the interest of a capital of thirty-six thousand florins, to be expended in keeping up the edifice and adding to the collection. The contingency thus provided for having come to pass a dozen years ago, the directors have appropriated different suites of apartments for various purposes of public utility and instruction. Thus the lofty vaulted stables were found to be conveniently adapted for containing the models for a school of design; while up-stairs the gilded ball-room has been converted into a cabinet of natural history. Here rows of stuffed birds, as well as double-headed lambs, eight-legged puppies, and other such interesting deformities, are ranged on shelves against the crumbling gilt mouldings which run round the room; and tattered remnants of the rich crimson damask once clothing the walls hang rustling against glass jars, in which are displayed the horrid coils of many loathsome reptiles preserved in spirits of wine. Truly a sad downfall for these sumptuous apartments, where high-born dames were wont to glide in stately minuets over the polished floor!
The picture-gallery, opened to the public on appointed days, contains above a thousand pictures, which, filling fifteen rooms, are divided off into the three schools to which they belong—viz., Italian, Dutch, and German. The greater part of these pictures is said to have been purchased from French refugees at the time of the First Revolution, many families having then sought an asylum in Hungary and Transylvania.
{312}
Mr. Boner, in his work on Transylvania, has thought fit to condemn in a wholesale manner the contents of this gallery as “wretched daubs fit only for a broker’s stall,” a verdict as rash as unjust, and which has since been refuted by the opinion of competent judges. Of course, in a small provincial town like Hermanstadt, situated at the extreme east of the Austrian empire, it would be unreasonable to expect to find in a private gallery collected in the eighteenth century priceless chefs-d’?uvres of the kind we travel hundreds of miles to admire in the Louvre or at Dresden. No doubt, also, some of the paintings erroneously attributed to famous masters, such as Rubens or Titian, are but good copies of original works, while the parentage of a good number of others is unknown, or matter for guess-work. Granting all this, however, the wonder is rather, I think, to find such a very presentable collection of paintings of second and third rank in a small country town, among which no intelligent and straightforward connoisseur can fail to pass some hours without both pleasure and profit.
The best picture in the gallery, and the most celebrated, is the portrait of Charles I. of England, and of his wife, Henrietta Maria, by Vandyck, which has brought many Englishmen hither in hopes of purchasing it.
The library, now numbering about forty thousand volumes, is added to each year from part of the legacy attached to the Bruckenthal palace, and is a great boon to the town; for not only does it comprise a comfortable reading-room, to which any one may have gratuitous access, but all sorts of works are freely placed at the disposal of those who wish to study them at home, on condition of signing a voucher by which the party holds himself responsible for loss or damage to the work.
The Bruckenthal library is indeed a great and valuable resource to those banished to this remote corner of the globe, and it is only surprising that more people do not avail themselves of the advantages which permit one to enjoy at home, sometimes for two or three months at a time, several valuable works of history, biography, or science. Some of the editions of older classical authors are most beautifully bound and illustrated with fine copperplates—perfect éditions de luxe, such as one rarely sees nowadays.
Many curious manuscripts, principally relating to the country, are also here to be found; but the gem of the collection, and by far its most interesting and precious object, is a prayer-book of the fifteenth century, which, written on finest vellum, contains six hundred and thirty pages in small quarto, each page being adorned with some of the finest specimens of the illuminated art to be met with anywhere.
The collection of coins is exceedingly remarkable, containing, as it does, abundant specimens of the ancient Greek, Dacian, and Roman coins, which are continually turning up in the soil, as well as of all the various branches of Transylvanian coinage in the Middle Ages. An assemblage of old Saxon ceramic objects, such as jugs and plates, may also be mentioned, as well as samples of old German embroidery, and some exceedingly beautiful pieces of jewellery belonging to the Saxon burgher, and peasant costumes.
The least interesting part of the museum is what is called the African and Japanese Cabinet, hardly deserving such a pompous designation, as the objects it mostly contains (savage weapons, dried alligators, etc., added to the collecti............