COLOGNE, the Colonia Agrilipina of the ancients, it a town of France, and capital of the department of the Roe'', is situated on the left bank of the Rhine, and is of a semicircular form, having its concavity towards the river. In 1187, Philip, ;tilibishop of Ileinsberg, took down the old rils ,of Cologne, and built those with which it is a.±. present surrounded. These walls, which are now in a ruinous state, have 83 towers with conical roofs, 13 principal gates, and a circumference of 10,326 yards, or nearly 6 miles.
The streets, which are all paved with basalt, are nar row, winding, and gloomy, particularly those near the Rhine, which are crowded together for the purposes of commerce. The houses are very high, old, and ruinous, and form n singular mixture of all stiles of building dur ing the last 1000 years. There is now, however, a very considerable number of modern houses. The materials for building arc very expensive, being brought from a considerable distance, and the Dutch stile generally prevails.
The principal squares at Cologne, are the old market, the hay market, and the new market. The last of these is very extensive,and contains a beautiful promenade un der a double row of lime trees. The chief streets, are the Rue Large, the Rue St Jean, the Rue des Apostres, the Rue de Scsenhauser, the Trankgass, and the large street, which extends from the gate of St Severin to that of Eichclstein.
One of the principal edifices in Cologne is the cathe dral church of St Peter's, which was begun in 1248, by the elector Conrad, but remains still an unfinished ruin. Had the design been carried into execution, it would have formed one of the finest and most stupendous Gothic edifices in Europe, and even as it stands at present, over grown with grass, and mouldering away with age, it pre sents a spectacle of unexampled sublimity. In the origi nal plan, the two towers wet c each to have been 500 feet in height ; one of them is only raised 21 feet above the foundation, and the other is no higher than 150 feet, and upon the top is still to be seen the crane by which the stones were raised. The body of the cathedral is very
large. It is divided by four ranges of columns, amount ing to 100, and the four middle ones are no less than forty feet in circumference. Behind the principal altar, which has a most imposing effect, is the chapel of the three kings, which the elector Maximilian built of marble. It contains the bodies of the three kings, and of the martyrs Felix, Nabor, and Gregory of Spolctto. In the year 1789, before the French revolution, the tombs were adorned with diamonds, and precious stones of all kinds, and 226 pieces of antiquity, and was reckoned the most superb and rich monument in Europe ; but we fear, from the silence. of recent travellers, that these spoils have been carried to Paris. A full account, however, of the tombs, and of all their ornaments, is preserved in a work entitled Collection des nierres antiques dont la catsse des saints trois Rois Mages est enrichie dans reglise metro politaine a Cologne, gravies anres leur empreintes, avec discours historique analogue, par J. P. M. N. Bonn, 1781. The cathedral was used as a granary in 1800.
Next to the cathedral in importance and antiquity is the chapter of the ladies of St Marie an Capitole. The church is vast and well illuminated, and appears to have been built in the eighth century. The chapter of St Gereon is very rich and fine. The church, which was built in the eleventh century, has a vast cupola, and is reckoned the finest in Cologne. The chapter of St Ursula, which is filled with the bones of 11,000 virgins, is very ancient. In the choir of the church is a paint ing representing St Ursula arriving at Cologne, with a numerous attendance, in a large ship of war. The other chapters are those of St,Severin, St Cunibert, of the Mere de Dieux a Staffeln, of St (Andrew, of St George, of the Apostles, and of St Cecilia. '7,A t one time Cologne is said to have contained 260 churches and 37 convents.