Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. I.djvu/187

Rh went on at the same time towards a higher change, a greater history? It did not appear as if it had. My eye followed it with regret upon its tedious last journey, till it was hidden from view by a mountain.

Towards evening, I was driving along the banks of a mighty river, the cheerful waters of which flowed calmly through a flourishing region. It was the Rhine, now enriched with the Aar, the Reuss, and the Limmat, forever renewed from their sources in the Alps and the Jura. A glowing evening crimson-flushed the distant country towards which the mighty stream was flowing, and towards which I was journeying by its side.

I saluted it again with joy at Basle.

Basle has many great memories, and amongst these various noble and distinguished individuals. Œcolampadius and Erasmus lived and taught here. The noble Italian refugees and friends of the Reformation, Olympia Morata, from Ferrara, distinguished by birth, learning, and the noblest character, Curione and his daughters, found here an asylum.

The chief honor to Basle at this moment, appeared to me to be the publisher of the monthly journal, “Protestantische Blätter,” Dr. Heinrich Geltzer, and this periodical itself, with its liberal and comprehensive spirit, as well as the great Missionary Institute, which makes this city a centre of missionary activity, not alone in Switzerland, but in Protestant Germany. Here the men intending to become missionaries are prepared to preach the Gospel to “all people and to all creatures.” Here, again, they are assembled at the great missionary festivals, and together with them