eVienna October 19 Wednesday
I spent yesterday until two o'clock in receiving visits from
the American Minister.The Austrian Minister of Finance &c
Little of the day was left for sight seeing, but I improved it
by going to see the Austrian Gallery of Antiquities German
and of all other nations. The collection is one vastly
curious and illustrative of the progress of manners and
customs as well as of the genius of the German races
There was the arms of Charles 5th, and trophies
of many battle fields, as well as a genealogical

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tree containing portraits as well as the branches
of the Princes of the House of Hapsburg. The occasion
served also to enable me to see the gardens
of the City which are got up in the Italian style
and are very stiff and rectangular.
What interested me more than these
was the Metropolitan Church of St Stephen
a noble Gothic structure, very irregular, and
in its parts very unequal — but altogether one
of those noble wonderful medieval structures
of which ^so^ few are found in England, almost none
in Italy, and which can never be reproduced
now when the ^Church^ world is dividing more and
more into sects.
The Church of the Augustine is
very spacious, very plain and unpretending
but it contains a tomb of the Arch Duchess
Christina by Canova, said here to be his
greatest work, and containing the most beautiful
and effective sepulchral monument I have ever seen.
The tomb is a secret vault in the Egyptian
Order. The door is open. Nature with two attending
who carry torches is carrying a urn into the

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tomb. Charity followed by an old beggar and
a youthful young orphan is following, on the right
a lion is sleeping and an angel mourning reclines
upon him. In a chapel of the Church separated
by an iron screen or a are rows of marble
shelves bearing silver urns, which contain
separately the hearts of all the deceased
members of the Royal family. The urns are
large or small according to the maturity
and characters of the deceased. A massive one
contains the heart of Maria Theresa the
most illustrious of the House of Hapsburg, one
of lesser proportions the heart of Marie
Louise Empress of France, and a much smaller
one incloses that of ^her son^ the young Duke of Reichstadt
now known in France as Napoleon the III, of
course this is a barbarous taste. But Courts
seldom change customs and German Courts
never.
In the Evening I went with the Winthrops
and others to the Opera where I saw for the
first time Dr Freinschent, and learned as I

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shall be able to explain to you hereafter
the true secret of the displacement of the
ancient drama by the Modern opera. It was
a magnificent performance, and it quite racked
my imagination although I know so little of
music. I went here to day and to morrow to
see some of the prominent public characters of
Austria, and then I shall resume my journey
homeward by the way of Venice.