towers of the castles of _Geroldseck_ and _Hoh-_ (High) _Barr_,
in the vicinity of Zabern; then nothing more is seen but meadows,
forests, fields, from the centre of which you see now and then
the modest church-steeples of the numerous villages that cover
the fine plain of Alsacia.

On the North side stands a tower of an octangular form,
supporting the spire. This tower consists, as it were, but of
strong buttresses adorned with small columns and statues, and
having large apertures in which very high windows are set and
take nearly the whole breadth on the four sides, where they are.
Among the statues that face the platform, one must be noticed as
being, according to tradition, that of Erwin of Steinbach. In
the interior of this tower are the bells that strike the hours,
that which is called the gates' bell (_Thorglocke_)[1] and also a
clock made in 1786 by two clockmakers of Strasburg, Maybaum
father and son. An inscription over the door leading to the
platform recalls to mind the earthquake of 1728, so violent that
the water was raised from the reservoirs and thrown to a distance
of eighteen feet[2]. In front of the four principal sides of the
octagon tower are turrets with winding stairs, and consisting but
of a series of windows that rise in a spiral form. These elegant
turrets seem hardly to rest on any thing; besides the gallery
that covers them, they communicate with the principal tower but
by means of flat stones that serve as an entrance into a gallery
of the interior of the arch-roof, and which lie at a height of
almost thirty metres. According to the old drawings, these
turrets should have been surmounted by pyramidal spires. They
terminate in a gallery that surrounds the tower, from whence one
enjoys a most admirable view. It is from that spot that rises
the spire (_fleche_), which is an octangular pyramid of an
extraordinary boldness, offering to the astonished gazer nothing
of a massive construction. Six successive tiers of little turrets
are thus pyramidically placed one above the other[3]. Eight
winding stair-cases, narrow and of rich open carvings, lead the
visitor to a massive spot commonly called _the lantern_; higher
up is _the crown_[4], which is not reached without danger, by
means of steps placed outside, and with no other protection than
the wall to which they are fastened; above another widened place,
called _the rose_, the spire is nothing but a column whence jut
out horizontal branches to