Page:Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843 - Volume 1.djvu/270

 our dinner over, I repose as well as the sun will let me, which has by this time left one part of our house and invaded another, making every portion, beyond conception, sultry. I never found any heat so oppressive. This arises from Dresden being so inland; and no rain having fallen for six months, the dryness of the atmosphere renders its high temperature penetrating, subtle, burning, intolerable.

Evening comes, and though it does not bring with it sufficient coolness to banish lassitude and even pain, still the heat is diminished, and I go out to walk or drive. If on foot, we go usually to the Terrace of Brühl, to which you ascend by a wide flight of steps from the foot of the bridge. The view here is beautiful. I can imagine circumstances which would render it sublime. It overlooks the Elbe; and were that river in “its pride of place”—full—rushing—stormy—it would add movement and grandeur to the scene. But the waters have ebbed even as the Arno does, till the bathers almost walk across without any chance of getting out of their depth; the bed, as a river’s bed always does when the shrunken stream leaves it exposed, is a deformity to the landscape; and the extreme dryness of the season has caused the fields on the other side to resemble those seen by Charles Lamb from his retreat at Dalston. “Talk of green fields,” he said,