Page:The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz (Volume One).djvu/251

 been an officer in the regular army of Baden; Colonel Böhning, a white-haired, venerable-looking free corps commander; Major Heilig, the chief of artillery, about six and a half feet in height, a kindly and very popular officer; Lieutenant Colonel Otto von Corvin, a strikingly handsome young soldier, who had been a lieutenant in the Prussian army, and who, if I remember rightly, like myself, had remained in the fortress accidentally; and Major Mahler, a former lieutenant in the regular army of Baden, a young, gay infantry officer who, many years afterwards, fought for the Union under my command as a Colonel of the Seventy-fifth Pennsylvania, and who was killed at Gettysburg.

The duty which most interested me was that of the lookout, from the height of the castle tower. From there I had a magnificent view—toward the east the mountains in which Baden-Baden is nestled; toward the north the smiling Rhine valley with its rich fields and vineyards, its shady forests and the church steeples of many villages hidden among the fruit trees; toward the south the Black Forest; to the west Alsatia on the opposite side of the Rhine, with far-away blue mountain lines. How beautiful was all this! How benevolent Nature in her rich, lavish goodness! And over there, in these apparently peaceful surroundings, lay “The Enemy,” who had us firmly in his grasp. There I saw the outposts regularly relieved, and the patrols of horsemen busily moving to and fro, keeping a sharp eye upon us so that not a soul of us should escape them. There I saw the batteries of the enemy ready to hurl destruction and death at us. There I saw their camps teeming with human beings, many of whom, aye, perhaps a large majority, thought as we thought and desired what we desired—possibly among them children of neighbors in my native village—and yet, all