I came to Europe under the impression that there was more drunkenness among us than in any other country, England, perhaps, excepted. A residence of six months in Paris changed my views entirely. You will judge of my surprise when first I saw a platoon of the Royal Guard,—literally a whole platoon, so far as numbers and the order of their promenade was concerned,—staggering drunk, within plain view of the palace of their master. From this time I became more observant, and not a day passed that I did not see men, and even women, in the same situation in the open streets. Usually, when the fact was mentioned to Americans, they expressed surprise, declaring they had never seen such a thing! They were too much amused with other sights to regard this; and then they had come abroad with different notions, and it is easier to float in the current of popular opinion than to stem it. In two or three instances I have taken the unbelievers with me into the streets, where I have never failed to convince them of their mistake in the course of an hour. These experiments, too, were usually made in the better quarters of the town, or near our own residence, where one is much less apt to meet with drunkenness than in the other quarters. On one occasion, a party of four of us went out with this object, and we passed thirteen drunken men, during a walk of an hour. Many of them were so far gone as to be totally unable to walk. I once saw, on the occasion of a festival, three men literally wallowing in the gutter before my window; a degree of beastly degradation I never witnessed in any other country.

The usual reply of a Frenchman, when the subject has been introduced, was that the army of occupation introduced the habit into the capital. But I have spoken to you of M——, a man whose candour is only equalled by his information. He laughed at this account of the matter, saying that he had now known France nearly sixty years; it is his native country; and he says that he cannot see any difference, in this particular, in his time. It is probable that, during the wars of Napoleon, when there was so great a demand for men of the lower classes, it was less usual to encounter this vice in the open streets, than now, for want of subjects; but, by all I can learn, there never was a time when drunkards did not abound in France. I do assure you that, in the course of passing between Paris and London, I have been more struck by drunkenness in the streets of the former, than in those of the latter.

Not long since, I asked a labourer if he ever got grise, and he laughingly told me—"yes, whenever he could." He moreover added, that a good portion of his associates did the same thing. Now I take it, this word grise contains the essence of the superiority of wine over whiskey. It means fuddled, a condition from which one recovers more readily, than from downright drunkenness, and of which the physical effects are not so injurious. I believe the consequences of even total inebriety from wine, are not as bad as those which follow inebriety from whiskey and rum. But your real amateur here is no more content with wine than he is with us; he drinks a white brandy that is pretty near the pure alcohol.

The cholera has laid bare the secrets of drunkenness, all over Europe. At first we were astonished when the disease got among the upper classes; but, with all my experience, I confess I was astonished at hearing it whispered of a gentleman, as I certainly did in a dozen instances—"mais il avait l'habitude de boire trop." Cholera, beyond a question, killed many a sober man, but it also laid bare the fault of many a devotee of the bottle.

Drunkenness, almost as a matter of course, abounds in nearly all, if not in all, the armies of Europe. It is peculiarly the soldier's and the sailor's vice, and some queer scenes have occurred directly under my own eyes here, which go to prove it. Take among others, the fact, that a whole guard, not long since, got drunk in the Faubourg St. Germain, and actually arrested people in the streets and confined them in the guard-house. The Invalids are notorious for staggering back to their quarters; and I presume I have seen a thousand of these worthies, first and last, as happy as if they had all their eyes, and arms, and legs about them. The official reports show ten thousand cases of females arrested for drunkenness, in Paris, during the last year.—But to return to our vineyards.

Although I am quite certain drunkenness is not prevented by the fact that wine is within the reach of the mass, it is easy to see that its use is less injurious, physically, than that of the stronger compounds and distillations, to which the people of the non-vine-growing regions have recourse as substitutes. Nature is a better brewer than man, and the pure juice of the grape is less injurious than the mixed and fiery beverages that are used in America. In reasonable quantities, it is not injurious at all. Five-and-twenty years since, when I first visited Europe, I was astonished to see wine drunk in tumblers. I did not at first understand that half of what I had up to that time been drinking was brandy, under the name of wine.

While our imported wines are, as a whole, so good, we do not always show the same discrimination in choosing. There is very little good champagne, for instance, drunk in America. A vast deal is consumed, and we are beginning to understand that it is properly a table-wine, or one that is to be taken with the meats; but sparkling champagne is, ex necessitate, a wine of inferior quality. No wine mousses, as the French term it, that has body enough to pass a certain period without fermentation. My friend de V—— is a proprietor of vines at Ai, and he tells me that the English take most of their good wines, which are the "still champagnes," and the Russians and the Americans the poor, or the sparkling. A great deal of the sparkling, however, is consumed in France, the price better suiting French economy. But the wine-growers of Champagne themselves speak of us as consumers of their second-class liquors.

I drunk at Paris, as good "sparkling champagne" as anybody I knew, de V—— having the good nature to let me have it, from his cellar, for the price at which it is sold to the dealer and exporter, or at three francs the bottle. The octroi and the transportation bring the price up to about three francs and a half. This then is the cost to the restaurateur and the innkeeper. These sell it again to their customers, at six francs the bottle. Now a bottle of wine ought not, and I presume does not, cost the American dealer any more; the difference in favour of the duty more than equalling the difference against them, in the transportation. This wine is sold in our eating-houses and taverns at two dollars, and even at two dollars and a half, the bottle! In other words, the consumer pays three times the amount of the first cost and charges. Now, it happens, that there is something very like free trade in this article, (to use the vernacular), and here are its fruits; You also see in this fact, the truth of what I have told you of our paying for the want of a class of men who wilt be content to be shopkeepers and innkeepers, and who do not look forward to becoming anything more. I do not say that we are the less respectable for this circumstance, but we are, certainly, as a people, less comfortable. Champagne, Rhenish, and Bordeaux wines ought to be sold in New York, quite as cheap as they are sold in the great towns of the countries in which they are made. They can be bought of the wine-merchants nearly as low, even as things are.

If the innkeepers and steam-boat stewards, of America, would buy and sell low-priced Burgundy wines, that, as the French call it, carry water well, as well as some other wines that might be named, the custom of drinking this innocent and useful beverage at table would become general, attention would then be paid to the vine, and in twenty years we should be consumers of the products of our own vineyards.

The idea that our winters are too severe can hardly be just. There may be mountainous districts where such is the fact, but, in a country that extends from the 27th to the 47th degrees of latitude, it is scarcely possible to suppose the vine cannot flourish. I have told you that wine is made on the Elbe, and it is made in more than half the Swiss cantons. Proper exposures and proper soil are necessary for good wines, anywhere, but nothing is easier than to have both. In America, I fear, we have hitherto sought land that was too rich; or rather, land that is wanting in the proper and peculiar richness that is congenial to the vine. All the great vineyards I have seen, and all of which I can obtain authentic accounts, are on thin gravelly soils; frequently, as is the case in the Rheingau, on decomposed granite, quartz, and sienite. Slate mixed with quartz on a clayish bottom, and with basalt, is esteemed a good soil, as is also marl and gravel. The Germans use rich manures, but I do not think this is the case in France.

The grape that makes good wine is rarely fit to eat. Much care is had to reject the defective fruit, when a delicate wine is expected, just as we cull apples to make fine cider. A really good vineyard is a fortune at once, and a tolerable one is as good a disposition as can be made of land. All the fine wines of Hockheim are said to be the produce of only eight or ten acres. There is certainly more land than this, in the vine, south of the village, but the rest is not esteemed to be Hockheimer.

Time is indispensable to fine wines, and time is a thing that an American lives too fast to spare. The grapes become better by time, although periodically renewed, and the wine improves in the same way. I have told you in these letters, that I passed a vineyard on the lake of Zurich of which there are records to show it has borne the vine five hundred years. Five centuries since, if historians are to be believed, the winters on this lake must have been as severe as they are usually on Champlain; they are almost as severe, even now.

Extraordinary characters are given to some of the vines here. Thus some of the Moselle wines, it is said, will not make good vinegar! If this be true, judging by my own experience, vinegar is converted into wines of the Moselle. I know no story of this sort, after all, that is more marvellous than one I have heard of the grandfather of A——, and which I believe to be perfectly true, as it is handed down on authority that can scarcely be called in question.

A pipe of Madeira was sent to him, about the year 1750, which proved to be so bad that, giving it up as a gone case, he ordered it to be put in the sun, with a bottle in its bung-hole, in order that it might, at least, make good vinegar. Bis official station compelled him to entertain a great deal, and his factotum, on these occasions, was a negro, whose name I have forgotten. This fellow, a capital servant when sober, occasionally did as he saw his betters do, and got drunk. Of course this greatly deranged the economy of the government dinners. On one occasion, particular care was taken to keep him in his right senses, and yet at the critical moment he appeared behind his master's chair, as happy as the best of them. This matter was seriously inquired into next day, when it was discovered that a miracle had been going on out of doors, and that the vinegar had been transformed into wine. The tradition is, that this wine was remarkable for its excellence, and that it was long known by the name of the negro, as the best wine of a colony, where more good wine of the sort was drunk, probably, than was ever known by the same number of people, in the same time, anywhere else. Now should one experimenting on a vineyard, in America, find vinegar come from his press, he would never have patience to let it ferment itself back into good liquor. Patience, I conceive, is the only obstacle to our becoming a great wine-growing and a great silk-growing country.

I have been led into these remarks by observing the vineyards here. The qualities of wines, of course, are affected by the positions of the vineyards, for all who can make wine do not make good wine, but the vines of Vevey, owing most probably to their exposure, are said to be the best of Switzerland. The best liquor comes from St. Saphorin, a hamlet that is quite near the town, which lies at the foot of the acclivity, described to you in our approach to this place. The little chateau-looking house that so much struck our fancies, on that occasion, is, in fact, in the immediate neighbourhood of the spot. All these circumstances show how much depends on minor circumstances in the cultivation of the vine, and how much may be expected from the plant, when care is had to respect them.

The heat may be too great for the vineyard as well as the cold. In Italy there is a practice of causing the vines to run on trees, in order to diminish the effect of the heat, by means of the shade they create. But the good wines are nearly everywhere, if not positively everywhere, produced from the short, clipped standards. This fact has induced me to think that we may succeed better with the vine in the middle, and even in the eastern, than in the southern and western states. I take it, the cold is of no importance, provided it be not so intense as to kill the plant, and the season is long enough to permit the fruit to ripen. It would be absurd in me, who have but a very superficial knowledge of the subject, to pretend to be very skillful in this matter, but I cannot help thinking that, if one had patience to try the experiment, it would be found the common the American fox-grape would in time bring a fine wine. It greatly resembles the grapes of some of the best vineyards here, and the fact of its not being a good eating grape is altogether in its favour.

In short, I throw it out as a conjecture more than as an ascertained fact, it is true, but from all I have seen in Europe, I am induced to think that, in making our experiments on the vine, we have been too ambitious to obtain a fat soil, and too warp of the higher latitudes of the country. A gravelly hill-side, in the interior, that has been well stirred, and which has the proper exposure, I cannot but thing would bring good wine, in all the low countries of the middle states.



LETTER XIX.

The Leman Lake.—Excursions on it.—The coast of Savoy.—Grandeur and beauty of the Rocks.—Sunset.—Evening Scene.—American Families residing on the banks of the Lake.—Conversation with a Vevaisan on the subject of America.—The Nullification Question.—America misrepresented in Europe.—Rowland Stephenson in the United States.—Unworthy arts to bring America into disrepute.—Blunders of Europe in respect of America.—The Kentuckians.—Foreign Associations in the States.—Illiberal Opinions of many Americans.—Prejudices.

Dear ——,

Our residence at Vevey, thus far, has been fruitful of pleasure. The lake, with its changeful aspects and movement, wears better even than the Oberland Alps, and we have now become thoroughly convinced of our mistake in establishing ourselves at Berne, beautiful as is that place, in 1828. The motive was a desire to be central, but Switzerland is so small that the distances are of no great moment, and I would advise all our friends who intend to pass a summer in the cantons, and who have need of a house, to choose their station somewhere on the shores of the Leman. Two steam-boats ply daily in different directions, and it is of little consequence at which end one may happen to be. Taking everything into consideration "mon lac est le premier" is true; though it may be questioned if M. de Voltaire ever saw, or had occasion to see, half of its advantages.

We never tire of the Leman, but spend two or three hours every day in the boat. Sometimes we row in front of the town, which literally stands in the water, in some places, musing on the quaint old walls, and listening to the lore of honest John, who moves two crooked oars as leisurely as a lady of the tropic utters, but who has seen great events in his time. Sometimes even this lazy action is too much for the humour of the moment, and we are satisfied with drifting along the shore, for there is generally current enough to carry us the whole length of Vevey in half an hour. Occasionally we are tossed about like an egg-shell, the winds at a distance soon throwing this part of the sheet into commotion. On the whole, however, we have, as yet, had little besides calms, and, what is unusual in Switzerland, not a drop of rain.

We have no reason to suspect the lake to be unhealthy, for we are often out until after sunset, without experiencing any ill effects. The shores are everywhere bold about Vevey, though the meadows and the waters meet near the entrance of the Rhone, some eight or ten miles from this place, in a way to raise the thoughts of rushes and lilies, and a suspicion of fevers. The pure air and excellent food of the mountains, however, have done us all good thus far, and we are looking eagerly forward to the season of grapes, which is drawing near, and which every body says make those who are perfectly well, infinitely better.

I have not yet spoken to you of the greatest charm in the scenery of Vevey, and the one which perhaps has given us the highest degree of satisfaction. The coast of Savoy, immediately opposite the town, is a range of magnificent rocks, that rises some four or five thousand feet above the surface of the water. In general these precipices are nearly perpendicular, though their surfaces are broken by huge ravines, that may well be termed valleys. This is the region that impends over Meillerie, St. Gingoulph, and Evian, towns or hamlets that cling to the bases of the mountains, and form, of themselves, beautiful objects, from this side of the lake. The distance from Vevey to the opposite shore, agreeably to the authority of old John, our boatman, is about five miles, though the great purity of the atmosphere and the height of the land make it appear less. The summit of the rocks of Savoy are broken into the most fantastical forms, so beautifully and evenly drawn, though they are quite irregular and without design, that I have termed them natural arabesques. No description can give you an accurate idea of their beauty, for I know nothing else in nature to compare them to. As they lie nearly south of us, I cannot account for the unusual glow of the atmosphere behind them, at every clear sunset, except from the reflection of the glaciers; Mont Blanc lying in that direction, at the distance of about fifty miles, though invisible. Now the effect of the outline of these rocks, at, or after sunset, relieved by a soft, golden sky, is not only one of the finest sights of Switzerland, but, in its way, is just the most perfect spectacle I have ever beheld. It is not so apt to extort sudden admiration, as the rosy tints and spectral hues of the high Alps, at the same hour; but it wins on you, in the way the lonely shadows of the Apennines grow on the affections, and, so far from tiring or becoming satisfied with their view, each successive evening brings greater delight than the last. You may get some idea of what I mean, by imagining vast arabesques, rounded and drawn in a way that no art can equal, standing out huge, and dark, and grand, in high relief, blending sublimity with a bewitching softness, against a sky. whose light is slowly passing from the glow of fiery gold, to the mildest tints of evening. I scarcely know when this scene is most to be admired; when the rocks appear distinct and brown, showing their material, and the sky is burnished; or when the first are nearly black masses, on whose surfaces nothing is visible, and the void beyond is just pregnant with sufficient light to expose their exquisite forms. Perhaps this is the perfection of the scene, for the gloom of the hour throws a noble mystery over all.

These are the sights that form the grandest features in Swiss scenery. That of the high peaks cut off from the earth by the clouds, is perhaps the most extraordinary of them all; but I think this of the rocks of Savoy the one that wins the most on the affections, although this opinion is formed from a knowledge of the general fact that objects which astonish so greatly at first, do not, as a rule, continue the longest to afford pleasure, for I never saw the former spectacle but twice and on one of those occasions, imperfectly. No dilettanti were ever more punctual at the opening of the orchestra, than we are at this evening exhibition, which, very much like a line and expressive harmony, grows upon us at each repetition. All this end of the lake, as we float lazily before the town, with the water like a mirror, the acclivity behind the town gradually darkening upward under the retiring light, the remote Alpine pastures just throwing out their chalets, the rocks of Savoy and the sublime glen of the Rhone, with the glacier of Mont Velan in its depths, raising its white peak into the broad day long after evening has shadowed everything below, forms the most perfect natural picture I have ever seen.

You can easily fancy how much we enjoy all this. John and his boat have been in requisition nearly every evening since our arrival; and the old fellow has dropped so readily into our humours, that his oars rise and fall in a way to produce a melancholy ripple, and little else. The sympathy between us is perfect, and I have almost fancied that his oars daily grow more crooked and picturesque.

We are not alone, however, in the possession of so much natural beauty. No less than seven American families, including ourselves, are either temporarily established on or quite near this lake, or are leisurely moving around its banks. The fame of the beauty of the women has already reached our ears, though, sooth to say, a reputation of that sort is not very difficult of attainment in this part of the world. With one of these families we were intimate in Italy, the tie of country being a little increased by the fact that some of their connexions were also ours. They hurried from Lausanne to meet us, the moment they were apprized of our arrival, and the old relations have been re-established between us. Since this meeting excursions have been planned, and it is probable that I may have something to communicate, in reference to them.

A day or two since I met a Vevaisan on the public promenade, with whom business had led to a slight acquaintance. We saluted, and pursued our walk together. The conversation soon turned on the news from America, where nullification is, just now, menacing disunion. The Swiss are the only people, in Europe, who appear to me to feel any concern in what has been generally considered to be a crisis in our affairs. I do not wish to be understood as saying that individuals of other nations do not feel the same friendly interest in our prosperity, for perhaps a million such might be enumerated in the different nations of Europe, the extreme liberals everywhere looking to our example as so much authority in favour of their doctrines; but, after excluding the mass, who have too much to do to live, to trouble themselves with concerns so remote, so far as my knowledge extends, the great majority on this side the Atlantic, without much distinction of country, Switzerland excepted, are waiting with confidence and impatience for the knell of the Union. I might repeat to you many mawkish and unmeaning declarations to the contrary of all this, but I deem them to be mere phrases of society to which no one, in the least acquainted with the world, can attach any importance; and which, as they have never deceived me, I cannot wish should be made the means of deceiving you. Men generally hesitate to avow in terms, the selfishness and illiberality that regulate all their acts and wishes, and he who is credulous enough to mistake words for deeds, or even thoughts, in this quarter of the world, will soon become the dupe of more than half of those he meets. I believe I never mentioned to you an anecdote of Sir James Mackintosh, which bears directly on this subject. It was at a dinner given by Sir ——, that some one inquired if he (Sir James Mackintosh) had ever discovered the author of a certain libellous attack on himself. "Not absolutely, though I have no doubt that —— was the person. I suspected him at once; but meeting him in Pall Mall, soon after the article appeared, he turned round and walked the whole length of the street with me, covering me with protestations of admiration and esteem, and then I felt quite sure of my man!"

My Vevaisan made many inquiries as to the probable result of the present struggle, and appeared greatly gratified when I told him that I apprehended no serious danger to the republic. I made him laugh by mentioning the opinion of the witty Abbe Correa, who said, "The Americans are great talkers on political subjects; you would think they were about to fly to their arms, and just as you expect a revolution, they go home and drink tea." My acquaintance was anxious to know if our government had sufficient strength to put down nullification by force, for he had learned there was but a single sloop of war, and less than a battalion of troops, in the disaffected part of the country. I told him we possessed all the means that are possessed in other countries to suppress rebellion, although we had not thought it necessary to resort to the same system of organization. Our government was mild in principle, and did not wish to oppress even minorities; but I made no doubt of the attachment of a vast majority to the Union, and, when matters really came to a crisis, if rational compromise could not effect the object, I thought nine men in ten would rally in its defence. I did not believe that even civil war was to produce results in America different from what it produced elsewhere. Men would fight in a republic as they fought in monarchies, until they were tired, and an arrangement would follow. It was not common for a people of the same origin, of similar habits, and contiguous territory, to dismember an empire by civil war, unless violence had been used in bringing them together, or conquest had first opened the way to disunion. I did not know that we were always to escape the evils of humanity any more than others, or why they were to fall heavier on us, when they proceeded from the same causes, than on our neighbours. As respects the small force in Carolina, I thought it argued our comparative strength, rather than our comparative weakness. Here were loud threats of resistance, organized and even legal means to effect it, and yet the laws were respected, when sustained by only a sloop of war and two companies of artillery. If France were to recall her battalions from La Vendee, Austria her divisions from Italy, Russia her armies from Poland, or England her troops from India or Ireland, we all know that those several countries would be lost, in six months, to their present possessors. As we had our force in reserve, it really appeared to me that either our disaffection was very different from the disaffection of Europe, or that our institutions contained some conservative principle that did not usually exist in this hemisphere. My Vevaisan was curious to know to which of these circumstances I ascribed the present quiet in Carolina. I told him to both. The opposition in that state, as a whole, were honest in their views; and, though some probably meant disunion, the greater part did not. It was a governing principle of our system to seek redress by appeals to the source of power, and the majority were probable looking still, to that quarter, of relief. Under other systems, rebellion, nine times in ten, having a different object, would not be checked by this expectation.

The Swiss listened to all this attentively, and remarked that America had been much misrepresented in Europe, and that the opinion was then getting to be general in his country, from improper motives. He told me that a great deal had been said about the proceedings in the case of Rowland Stephenson, and he frankly asked me to explain them; for, being a commercial man, he admitted that injurious impressions had been made even on himself in relation to that affair. This was the third Swiss who had alluded to this subject, the other two instances occurring at Rome. In the latter cases, I understood pretty distinctly that there were reports current that the Americans were so desirous of obtaining rich emigrants, that they had rescued a criminal in order to reap the benefit of his gold!

Of course I explained the matter, by simply stating the facts, adding, that the case was an admirable illustration of the treatment America had received from Europe, ever since 1776. An Englishman, a member of Parliament, by the way, had absconded from his own country, taking shelter in ours, by the mere accident of meeting at sea a Swedish brig bound thither. A reward was offered for his arrest, and certain individuals had taken on themselves, instigated by whom I know not, to arrest him on a retired road, in Georgia, and to bring him covertly within the jurisdiction of New York, with the intention to send him clandestinely on board a packet bound to Europe. Now a grosser abuse than an act like this could not well be committed. No form of law was observed, and the whole proceeding was a violation of justice, and of the sovereignty of the two states interested. It is true the man arrested was said to be guilty of gross fraud; but where such practices obtain, guilt will soon cease to be necessary in order to commit violence. The innocent may be arrested wrongfully, too. As soon as the circumstances became known, an application was made to the proper authorities for relief, which was granted on a principle that obtained in all civilized countries, where right is stronger than might. Had any one been transferred from Canada to England, under similar circumstances, he would have been entitled to the same relief, and there is not a jurist in England who does not know the fact; and yet this transaction, which, if it redound to the discredit of either nation at all, (an exaggerated opinion, I admit,) must redound to the discredit of that which produced the delinquent, and actually preferred him to one of its highest legislative stations, has been so tortured all over Europe, as to leave an impression unfavourable to America!

Now I tell you, dear ——, as I told my Vevaisan, that this case is a very fair example of the manner in which, for seven years, I have now been an attentive observer of the unworthy arts used to bring us into disrepute. The power to injure, in order to serve their own selfish views, which old-established and great nations possess over one like our own, is not fully appreciated in America, nor do we attach sufficient importance to the consequences. I am not conscious of a disposition to shut my eyes to our own peculiar national defects, more especially since the means of comparison have rendered me more sensible of their nature and existence; but nothing can be more apparent to any man of ordinary capacity, who has enjoyed the opportunities necessary to form a correct judgment, than the fact, that the defects usually imputed to us here, such as the want of morals, honesty, order, decency, liberality, and religion, are, in truth, as the world goes, the strong points of American character; while some of those on which we are a little too apt to pride ourselves,—intelligence, taste, manners, and education, for instance, as applied to all beyond the base of society,—are, in truth, those on which it would most become us to be silent. Others may tell you differently, especially those who are under the influence of the "trading humanities," a class that is singularly addicted to philanthropy or vituperation, as the balance-sheet happens to show variations of profit and loss.

I told my Swiss that one of the reasons why Europe made so many blunders in her predictions about America, was owing to the fact that she sought her information in sources ill qualified, and, perhaps, ill disposed to impart it. Most of the information of this nature that either entered or left America, came, like her goods, through two or three great channels, or sea-ports, and these were thronged with the natives of half the countries of Europe; commercial adventurers, of whom not one in five ever got to feel or think like Americans. These men, in some places, possess even a direct influence over a portion of the press, and by these means, as well as by their extended correspondence, they disseminate erroneous notions of the country abroad. The cities themselves, as a rule, or rather the prominent actors in the towns, do not represent the tone of the nation, as is proved on nearly every distinctive political question that arises, by the towns almost uniformly being found in the minority, simply because they are purely trading communities, follow the instinct of their varying interests, and are ready to shout in the rear of any leader who may espouse them. Now these foreign merchants, as a class, are always found on the side which is the most estranged from the regular action of the institutions of the country. In America, intelligence is not confined to the towns; but, as a rule, there is less of it there than among the rural population. As a proof of the errors which obtain on the subject of America in Europe, I instanced the opinion which betrayed itself in England, the nation which ought to know us best, during the war of 1812. Feeling a commercial jealousy itself, its government naturally supposed her enemies were among the merchants, and that her friends were to be found in the interior. The fact would have exactly reversed this opinion, an opinion whose existence is betrayed in a hundred ways, and especially in the publications of the day. It was under this notion that our invaders made an appeal to the Kentuckians for support! Now, there was not, probably, a portion of the earth where less sympathy was to be found for England than in Kentucky, or, in short, along the whole western frontier of America, where, right or wrong, the people attribute most of their Indian wars to the instigation of that power. Few foreigners took sufficient interest in the country to probe such a feeling; and England, being left to her crude conjectures, and to theories of her own, had probably been thus led into one of the most absurd of all the blunders of this nature that she could possibly have committed. I believe that a large proportion of the erroneous notions which exist in Europe, concerning American facts, proceed from the prejudices of this class of the inhabitants.[36]

[Footnote 36: This was the opinion of the writer, while in Europe. Since his return, he has seen much reason to confirm it. Last year, in a free conversation with a foreign diplomatic agent on the state of public feeling in regard to certain political measures, the diplomate affirmed that, according to his experience, the talent, property, and respectability of the country were all against the government. This is the worn-out cant of England; and yet, when reform has been brought to the touchstone, its greatest opponents have been found among the parvenus. On being requested to mention individuals, the diplomatic man in question named three New York merchants, all of whom are foreigners by birth, neither of whom can speak good English, neither of whom could influence a vote—neither of whom had, probably, ever read the constitution or could understand it if he had read it, and neither of whom was, in principle, any more than an every-day common-place reflection of the antiquated notions of the class to which he belonged in other nations, and in which he had been, educated, and under the influence of which he had arrived here.]

In order to appreciate the influence of such a class of men, it is necessary to recollect their numbers, wealth, and union, it has often been a source of mortification to me to see the columns of the leading journals of the largest town of the republic, teeming with reports of the celebrations of English, Irish, German, French, and Scotch societies; and in which the sentiments promulgated, half of the time, are foreign rather than American. Charitable associations, as charities, may be well enough, but the institutions of the country, so generous and liberal in themselves, are outraged by every factitious attempt to overshadow them by these appeals to the prejudices and recollections of another state of society. At least, we might be spared the parade in the journals, and the offensive appearance of monopolizing the land, which these accounts assume. Intelligent travellers observe and comment on these things, and one of them quaintly asked me, not long since, "if really there were no Americans in America?" Can it be matter of surprise that when the stranger sees these men so prominent in print and in society, (in many instances quite deservedly), he should mistake their influence, and attach an importance to their opinions which they do not deserve? That Europe has been receiving false notions of America from some source, during the present century, is proved by the results so completely discrediting her open predictions; and, while I know that many Americans have innocently aided in the deception, I have little doubt that the foreign merchants established in the country have been one of the principal causes of the errors.

It is only necessary to look back within our own time, to note the progress of opinion, and to appreciate the value of those notions that some still cherish, as containing all that is sound and true in human policy. Thirty years ago, the opinion that it was unsafe to teach the inferior classes to read, "as it only enabled then to read bad books," was a common and favourite sentiment of the upper classes in England. To-day, it is a part of the established system of Austria to instruct her people! I confess that I now feel mortified and grieved when I meet with an American gentleman who professes anything but liberal opinions, as respects the rights of his fellow-creatures. Although never illiberal, I trust, I do not pretend that my own notions have not undergone changes, since, by being removed from the pressure of the society in which I was born, my position, perhaps, enables me to look around, less influenced by personal considerations than is usual; but one of the strongest feelings created by an absence of so many years from he me, is the conviction that no American can justly lay claim to be, what might be and ought to be the most exalted of human beings, the milder graces of the Christian character excepted, an American gentleman, without this liberality entering thoroughly into the whole composition of his mind. By liberal sentiments, however, I do not mean any of the fraudulent cant that is used, in order to delude the credulous; but the generous, manly determination to let all enjoy equal political rights, and to bring those to whom authority is necessarily confided, as far as practicable, under the control of the community they serve. Opinions like these have little in common with the miserable devices of demagogues, who teach the doctrine that the people are infallible; or that the aggregation of fallible parts, acting, too, with diminished responsibilities, form an infallible whole; which is a doctrine almost as absurd as that which teaches us to believe "the people are their own worst enemies;" a doctrine, which, if true, ought to induce those who profess it, to forbid any man from managing his own affairs, but compel him to confide them to the management of others; since the elementary principle is the same in communities and individuals, and, as regards interests, neither would go wrong unless deceived.

I shall not conceal from you the mortification and regret I have felt at discovering, from this distance, and it is more easily discovered from a distance than when near by, how far, how very far, the educated classes of America are, in opinion, (in my poor judgment, at least), behind the fortunes of the country. Notions are certainly still entertained at home, among this class, that are frankly abandoned here, by men of any capacity, let their political sect be what it may; and I have frequently seen assertions and arguments used, in Congress, that, I think, the dullest Tory would now hesitate about using in Parliament. I do not say that certain great prejudices are not yet prevalent in England, that are exploded with us; but my remark applies to some of the old and cherished theories of government, which have been kept alive as theories in England, long after they have ceased to be recognised in practice, and some of which, indeed, like that of the doctrine of a balance between different powers in the state, never had any other than a theoretical existence, at all. The absurd doctrine just mentioned has many devout believers, at this moment, in America, when a moment's examination must show its fallacy. The democracy of a country, in the nature of things, will possess its physical force. Now give to the physical force of a community an equal political power, and the moment it finds itself gravely interested in supporting or defeating any measure, it will fall back on its strength, set the other estates at defiance, and blow your boasted balance of power to the winds! There never has been an active democratical feature in the government of England; nor have the commons, since they have enjoyed anything like independence, been aught but an auxiliary to the aristocracy, in a modified form. While the king was strong, the two bodies united to put him down, and, as he got to be weak, they gradually became identified, to reap the advantages. What is to come remains to be seen.



LETTER XX.

The Equinox.—Storm on the Lake.—Chase of a little Boat.—Chateau of Blonay.—Drive to Lausanne.—Mont Benon.—Trip to Geneva in the Winkelried.—Improvements in Geneva.—Russian Travellers.—M. Pozzo di Borgo.—Table d'hote.—Extravagant Affirmations of a Frenchman.—Conversation with a Scotchman.—American Duels.—Visit at a Swiss Country-house.—English Customs affected in America.—Social Intercourse in the United States.—Difference between a European and an American Foot and Hand.—Violent Gale.—Sheltered position of Vevey.—Promenade.—Picturesque View.—The great Square.—Invitation.—Mountain Excursion.—An American Lieutenant.—Anecdote.—Extensive Prospect.—Chateau of Glayrole.

Dear ——,

We have had a touch of the equinox, and the Leman has been in a foam, but its miniature anger, though terrible enough at times, to those who are embarked on its waters, can never rise to the dignity of a surf and a rolling sea. The rain kept me housed, and old John and I seized the occasion to convert a block of pine into a Leman bark, for P——. The next day proving fair, our vessel, fitted with two latine sails, and carrying a weather helm, was committed to the waves, and away she went, on a wind, toward the opposite shore. P——, of course, was delighted, and clapped his hands, until, perceiving that it was getting off the land, he compelled us to enter the boat and give chase. A chase it was, truly; for the little thing went skipping from wave, to wave, in such a business-like manner, that I once thought it would go all the way to Savoy. Luckily a flaw caused it to tack, when it soon became our prize. We were a long distance off when the boat was overtaken, and I thought the views behind the town finer, at that position, than when nearer in. I was particularly struck with the appearance of the little chateau of Blonay, which is still the residence of a family of the same name, that has been seated, for more than seven centuries, on the same rocky terrace. I was delighted to hear that its present owner is a liberal, as every ancient gentleman should be. Such a man ought to be cautious how he tarnishes his lineage with unjust or ungenerous sentiments.

The equinoctial blow returned the next day, and the lake became really fine, in a new point of view; for, aided by the mountains, it succeeded in getting up a very respectable appearance of fury. The sail-boats vanished, and even the steamers went through it with a good deal of struggling and reluctance.

As soon as the weather became better, we went to Lausanne, preferring the road, with a view to see the country. It is not easy to fancy anything prettier than this drive, which ran, nearly the whole distance, along the foot of hills, that would be mountains anywhere else, and quite near the water. The day was beautiful, and we had the lake, with its varying scenery and movement, the whole time in sight; while the road, an excellent solid wheel-track, wound between the walls of vineyards, and was so narrow as scarcely to admit the passage of two carriages at a time. At a short distance from Lausanne, we left the margin of the lake, and ascended to the level of the town, through a wooded and beautifully ornamented country.

We found our friends established in one of the numberless villas that dot the broken land around the place, with their windows commanding most of that glorious view that I have already described to you. Mont Benon, a beautiful promenade, was close at hand, and, in the near view, the eye ranged over fields, verdant and smooth lawns, irregular in their surfaces, and broken by woods and country-houses. A long attenuated reach of the lake stretched away towards Geneva, while the upper end terminated in its noble mountains, and the mysterious, glen-like gorge of Valais. We returned from this excursion in the evening, delighted with the exterior of Lausanne, and more and more convinced that, all things considered, the shores of this lake unite greater beauties, with better advantages as a residence, than any other part of Switzerland.

After remaining at Vevey a day or two longer, I went to Geneva, in the Winkelried, which had got a new commander; one as unaffected as his predecessor had been fantastical. Our progress was slow, and, although we reached the port early enough to prevent being locked out, with the exception of a passage across Lake George, in which the motion seemed expressly intended for the lovers of the picturesque, I think this the most deliberate run, or rather walk, I ever made by steam.

I found Geneva much changed, for the better, in the last four years. Most of the hideous sheds had been pulled down from the fronts of the houses, and a stone pier is building, that puts the mighty port of New York, with her commercial energies, to shame. In other respects, I saw no material alterations in the place. The town was crowded, more of the travellers being French, and fewer English, than common. As for the Russians, they appear to have vanished from the earth, to my regret; for in addition to being among the most polished people one meets, (I speak of those who travel), your Russian uniformly treats the American kindly. I have met with more personal civilities, conveyed in a delicate manner, from these people, and especially from the diplomatic agents of Russia, than from any others in Europe, and, on the whole, I have cause, personally, to complain of none; or, in other words, I do not think that personal feeling warps my judgment, in this matter. M. Pozzo di Borgo, when he gave large entertainments, sent a number of tickets to Mr. Brown to be distributed among his countrymen, and I have heard this gentleman say, no other foreign minister paid him this attention. All this may be the result of policy, but it is something to obtain civil treatment in this world, on any terms. You must be here, to understand how completely we are overlooked.

Late as we were, we were in time for dinner, which I took at a table d'hote that was well crowded with French. I passed as an Englishman, as a matter of course, and had reason to be much amused with some of the conversation. One young Frenchman very coolly affirmed that two members had lately fought with pistols in the hall of Congress, during the session, and his intelligence was received with many very proper exclamations of horror. The young man referred to the rencontre which took place on the terrace of the Capitol, in which the party assailed was a member of Congress; but I have no doubt he believed all he said, for such is the desire to blacken the American name just now, that every unfavourable incident is seized upon and exaggerated, without shame or remorse. I had a strong desire to tell this young man that the affair to which he alluded, did not differ essentially from that of M. Calemard de Lafayette[37], with the exception that no one was slain at Washington; but I thought it wiser to preserve my incognito.

[Footnote 37: This unfortunate gentleman was no relation of the family of Lafayette, his proper appellation being that of M. Calemard. Fayette, so far as I can discover, is an old French word, or perhaps a provincial word, that signifies a sort of hedge, and has been frequently used as a territorial appellation, like de la Haie.]

The next day our French party was replaced by another, and the master of the house promoted me to the upper end of his table, as an old boarder. Here I found myself, once more, in company with an Englishman, an Irishman, and a Scotchman. The two former sat opposite to me, and the last at my side. The civilities of the table passed between us, especially between the Scotchman and myself, with whom I fell into discourse. After a little while, my neighbour, a sensible shrewd fellow enough, by the way of illustrating his opinion, and to get the better of me, cited some English practice, in connexion with "you in England." I told him I was no Englishman. "No Englishman! you are not a Scotchman?" "Certainly not." "Still less an Irishman!" "No." My companion now looked at me as hard as a well-bred man might, and said earnestly, "Where did you learn to speak English so well?" "At home, as you did—I am an American." "Umph!" and a silence of a minute; followed by abruptly putting the question of—"What is the reason that your duels in America are so bloody?—I allude particularly to some fought in the Mediterranean by your naval officers. We get along, with less vindicative fighting." As this was rather a sharp and sudden shot, I thought it best to fire back, and I told him, "that as to the Mediterranean, our officers were of opinion they were ill-treated, till they began to shoot those who inflicted the injuries; since which time all had gone on more smoothly. According to their experience, their own mode of fighting was much the most efficacious, in that instance at least."

As he bore this good-naturedly, thinking perhaps his abrupt question merited a saucy answer, we soon became good friends. He made a remark or two, in better taste than the last, on the facts of America, and I assured him he was in error, showing him wherein his error lay. He then asked me why some of our own people did not correct the false impressions of Europe, on the subject of America, for the European could only judge by the information laid before him. He then mentioned two or three American writers, who he thought would do the world a service by giving it a book or two, on the subject. I told him that if they wrote honestly and frankly, Europe would not read their books, for prejudice was not easily overcome, and no favourable account of us would be acceptable. It would not be enough for us to confess our real faults, but we should be required to confess the precise faults that, according to the notions of this quarter of the world, we are morally, logically, and politically bound to possess. This he would not admit, for what man is ever willing to confess that his own opinions are prejudiced?

I mention this little incident, because its spirit, in my deliberate judgment, forms the rule, in the case of the feeling of all British subjects, and I am sorry to say the subjects of most other European countries; and the mawkish sentiment and honeyed words that sometimes appear in toasts, tavern dinners, and public speeches, the exception. I may be wrong, as well as another, but this, I repeat for the twentieth time, is the result of my own observations; you know under what opportunities these observations have been made, and how far they are likely to be influenced by personal considerations.

In the evening I accompanied a gentleman, whose acquaintance I had made at Rome, to the country-house of a family that I had also had the pleasure of meeting during their winter's residence in that town. We passed out by the gate of Savoy, and walked a mile or two, among country-houses and pleasant alleys of trees, to a dwelling not unlike one of our own, on the Island of Manhattan, though furnished with more taste and comfort than it is usual to meet in America. M. and Mad. N—— were engaged to pass the evening at the house of a connexion near by, and they frankly proposed that we should be of the party. Of course we assented, leaving them to be the judges of what was proper.

At this second dwelling, a stone's throw from the other, we found a small party of sensible and well-bred people, who received me as a stranger, with marked politeness, but with great simplicity. I was struck with the repast, which was exactly like what a country tea is, or perhaps I ought to say, used to be, in respectable families, at home, who have not, or had not, much of the habits of the world. We all sat round a large table, and, among other good things that were served, was an excellent fruit tart! I could almost fancy myself in New England, where I remember a judge of a supreme court once gave me custards, at a similar entertainment. The family we had gone to see, were perhaps a little too elegant for such a set-out, for I had seen them in Rome with mi-lordi and monsignori, at their six o'clock dinners; but the quiet good sense with which everybody dropped into their own distinctive habits at home, caused me to make a comparison between them and ourselves, much to the disadvantage of the latter. I do not mean that usages ought not to change, but that usages should be consistent with themselves, and based on their general fitness and convenience for the society for which they are intended. This is good sense, which is commonly not only good-breeding, but high-breeding.

The Genevois are French in their language, in their literature, and consequently in many of their notions. Still they have independence enough to have hours, habits, and rules of intercourse that they find suited to their own particular condition. The fashions of Paris, beyond the point of reason, would scarcely influence them; and the answer would probably be, were a discrepancy between the customs pointed out, "that the usage may suit Paris, but it does not suit Geneva." How is it with, us? Our women read in novels and magazines, that are usually written by those who have no access to the society they write about, and which they oftener caricature than describe, that people of quality in England go late to parties; and they go late to parties, too, to be like English people of quality. Let me make a short comparison, by way of illustration. The English woman of quality, in town, rises at an hour between nine and twelve. She is dressed by her maid, and if there are children, they are brought to her by a child's maid: nourishing them herself is almost out of the question. Her breakfast is eaten between eleven and one. At three or four she may lunch. At four she drives out; at half-past seven she dines. At ten she begins to think of the evening's amusement, and is ready for it, whatever it may be, unless it should happen to be the opera, or the theatre, (the latter being almost proscribed as vulgar), when she necessarily forces herself to hours a little earlier. She returns home, between one and four, is undressed by her maid, and sleeps until ten or even one, according to circumstances. These are late hours, certainly, and in some respects unwise; but they have their peculiar advantages, and, at all events, they are consistent with themselves.

In New York, the house is open for morning visits at twelve, and with a large straggling town, bad attendance at the door, and a total want of convenience in public vehicles, unless one travels in a stage-coach, yclept an omnibus, it is closed at three, for dinner. Sending a card would be little short of social treason. We are too country-bred for such an impertinence. After dinner, there is an interval of three hours, when tea is served, and the mistress of the house is at a loss for employment until ten, when she goes into the world, in order to visit at the hour she has heard, or read, that fashion prescribes such visits ought to be made, in other countries, England in particular. Here she remains until one or two, returns home, undresses herself, passes a sleepless morning, perhaps, on account of a cross child, and rises at seven to make her husband's coffee at eight!

There is no exaggeration in this, for such is the dependence and imitation of a country that has not sufficient tone to think and act for itself, in still graver matters, that the case might even be made stronger, with great truth.—The men are no wiser. When invited, they dine at six; and at home, as a rule, they dine between three and four. A man who is much in society, dines out at least half his time, and consequently he is eating one day at four and the next at six, all winter!

The object of this digression is to tell you that, so far as my observation goes, we are the only people who do not think and act for ourselves, in these matters. French millinery may pass current throughout Christendom, for mere modes of dress are habits scarce worth resisting; but in Germany, Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, or wherever we have resided, I have uniformly found that, in all essentials, the people have hours and usages of their own, founded on their own governing peculiarities of condition. In America, there is a constant struggle between the force of things and imitation, and the former often proving the strongest, it frequently renders the latter lame, and, of course, ungraceful. In consequence of this fact, social intercourse with us is attended with greater personal sacrifices, and returns less satisfaction, than in most other countries. There are other causes, beyond a doubt, to assist in producing such a result; more especially in a town like New York, that doubles its population in less than twenty years; but the want of independence, and the weakness of not adapting our usages to our peculiar condition, ought to be ranked among the first. In some cases, necessity compels us to be Americans, but whenever there is a tolerable chance, we endeavour to become "second chop English."

In a fit of gallantry, I entered a jeweller's shop, next day, and bought a dozen or fifteen rings, with a view to distribute them, on my return, among my young country women at Vevey, of whom there were now not less than eight or ten, three families having met at that place. It may serve to make the ladies of your family smile, when I add, that, though I was aware of the difference between a European and an American foot and hand,[38] every one of my rings, but three, had to be cut, in order to be worn! It will show you how little one part of mankind know the other, if I add, that I have often met with allusions in this quarter of the world to the females of America, in which the writers have evidently supposed them to be coarse and masculine! The country is deemed vulgar, and by a very obvious association, it has been assumed that the women of such a country must have the same physical peculiarities as the coarse and vulgar here. How false this notion is, let the rings of Geneva testify; for when I presented my offerings, I was almost laughed out of countenance.

[Footnote 38: The southern parts of Europe form an exception.]

A wind called the bise had been blowing for the last twenty-four hours, and when we left Vevey the gale was so strong, that the steam-boat had great difficulty in getting ahead. This is a north wind, and it forces the water, at times, into the narrow pass at the head of the lake, in a way to cause a rise of some two or three feet. We had taken a large empty bark in tow, but by the time we reached Nyon, where the lake widens suddenly, the boat pitched and struggled so hard, as to render it advisable to cast off the tow, after which we did much better. The poor fellow, as he fell off broadside to the sea, which made a fair breach over him, and set a shred of sail, reminded me of a man who had been fancying himself in luck, by tugging at the heels of a prosperous friend, but who is unexpectedly cut adrift, when he is found troublesome. I did not understand his philosophy, for, instead of hauling in for the nearest anchorage, he kept away before it, and ran down for Geneva, as straight as a bee that is humming towards its hive.

The lake gradually grew more tranquil as we proceeded north, and from Lausanne to Vevey we actually had smooth water. I saw vessels becalmed, or with baffling winds, under this shore, while the bise was blowing stiff, a few leagues farther down the lake. When I got home I was surprised to hear that the family had been boating the previous evening, and that there had scarcely been any wind during the day. This difference was owing to the sheltered position of Vevey, of which the fact may serve to give you a better notion than a more laboured description.

The following morning was market-day, and I walked upon the promenade early, to witness the arrival of the boats. There was not a breath of wind, even to leeward, for the bise had blown itself out of breath. The bay of Naples, in a calm, scarcely presents a more picturesque view, than the head of the lake did, on this occasion. I counted more than fifty boats in sight; all steering towards Vevey, stealing along the water, some crossing from Savoy, in converging lines, some coming down, and others up the sheet, from different points on the Swiss side. The great square was soon crowded, and I walked among the peasants to observe their costumes and listen to their language. Neither, however, was remarkable, all speaking French, and, at need, all I believe using a patois, which does not vary essentially from that of Vaud. There was a good deal of fruit, some of which was pretty good, though it did not appear in the abundance we had been taught to expect. The grapes were coming in, and they promised to be fine. Though it is still early for them, we have them served at breakfast, regularly, for they are said to be particularly healthful when eaten with the morning dew on them. We try to believe ourselves the better for a regimen that is too agreeable to be lightly dropped. Among other things in the market, I observed the inner husks of Indian corn, that had been dried in a kiln or oven, rubbed, and which were now offered for sale as the stuffing of beds. It struck me that this was a great improvement on straw.

I had received a visit the day before from a principal inhabitant of Vevey, with an invitation to breakfast, at his country-house, on the heights. This gratuitous civility was not to be declined, though it was our desire to be quiet, as we considered the residence at Vevey, a sort of villagiatura, after Paris. Accordingly, I got into a char, and climbed the mountain for a mile and a half, through beautiful pastures and orchards, by narrow winding lanes, that, towards the end, got to be of a very primitive character. Without this little excursion, I should have formed no just idea of the variety in the environs of the place, and should have lost a good deal of their beauty. I have told you that this acclivity rises behind the town, for a distance exceeding a mile, but I am now persuaded it would have been nearer the truth had I said a league. The majesty of Swiss nature constantly deceives the eye, and it requires great care and much experience to prevent falling into these mistakes. The house I sought, stood on a little natural terrace, a speck on the broad breast of the mountain, or what would be called a mountain, were it not for the granite piles in its neighbourhood, and was beautifully surrounded by woods, pastures, and orchards. We were above the vine.

A small party, chiefly females, of good manners and great good sense, were assembled, and our entertainment was very much what it ought to be, simple, good, and without fuss. After I had been formally presented to the rest of the company, a young man approached, and was introduced as a countryman. It was a lieutenant of the navy, who had found his way up from the Mediterranean squadron to this spot. It is so unusual to meet Americans under such circumstances, that his presence was an agreeable surprise. Our people abound in the taverns and public conveyances, but it is quite rare that they are met in European society at all.

One of the guests to-day recounted an anecdote of Cambacere's, which was in keeping with a good banquet. He and the arch-chancelier were returning from a breakfast in the country, together, when he made a remark on the unusual silence of his companion. The answer was, "Je digere."

We walked through the grounds, which were prettily disposed, and had several good look-outs. From one of the latter we got a commanding view of all the adjacent district. This acclivity is neither a cote, as the French call them, nor a hill-side, nor yet a mountain, but a region. Its breadth is sufficiently great to contain hamlets, as you already know, and, seen from this point, the town of Vevey came into the view, as a mere particle. The head of the lake lay deep in the distance, and it was only when the eye rose to the pinnacles of rock, hoary with glaciers above, that one could at all conceive he was not already perched on a magnificent Alp. The different guests pointed out their several residences, which were visible at the distance of miles, perhaps, all seated on the same verdant acclivity.

I descended on foot, the road being too precipitous in places to render even a char pleasant. On rejoining the domestic circle, we took boat and pulled towards the little chateau-looking dwelling, on a narrow verdant peninsula, which, as you may remember, had first caught my eye on approaching Vevey, as the very spot that a hunter of the picturesque would like for a temporary residence. The distance was about a mile, and, the condition of the house excepted, a nearer view confirmed all our first impressions. It had been a small chateau, and was called Glayrole. It stands near the hamlet of St. Saphorin, which, both Francois and Jean maintain, produces the best wines of Vaud, and, though now reduced to the condition of a dilapidated farm-house, has still some remains of its ancient state. There is a ceiling, in the Ritter Saal, that can almost vie with that of the castle of Habsburg, though it is less smoked. The road, more resembling the wheel-track of a lawn than a highway, runs quite near the house on one side, while the blue and limpid lake washes the foot of the little promontory.



LETTER XXI.

Embark in the Winkelried.—Discussion with an Englishman.—The Valais.—Free Trade.—The Drance.—Terrible Inundation.—Liddes.—Mountain Scenery.—A Mountain Basin.—Dead-houses.—Melancholy Spectacle.—Approach of Night.—Desolate Region.—Convent of the Great St. Bernard.—Our Reception there.—Unhealthiness of the Situation.—The Superior.—Conversation during Supper.—Coal-mine on the Mountain.—Night in the Convent.

Dear ——,

After spending a few more days in the same delightful and listless enjoyments, my friend C—— came over from Lausanne, and we embarked in the Winkelried, on the afternoon of the 25th September, as she hove-to off our mole, on her way up the lake. We anchored off Villeneuve in less than an hour, there being neither port, nor wharf, nor mole at that place. In a few minutes we were in a three-horse conveyance, called a diligence, and were trotting across the broad meadows of the Rhone towards Bex, where we found one of our American families, the T——s, on their way to Italy.

C—— and myself ate some excellent quails for supper in the public room. An Englishman was taking the same repast, at another table, near us, and he inquired for news, wishing particularly to know the state of things about Antwerp. This led to a little conversation, when I observed that, had the interests of France been consulted at the revolution of 1830, Belgium would have been received into the kingdom. Our Englishman grunted at this, and asked me what Europe would have said to it. My answer was, that when both parties were agreed, I did not see what Europe had to do with the matter; and that, at all events, the right Europe could have to interfere was founded in might; and such was the state of south-western Germany, Italy, Savoy, Spain, and even England, that I was of opinion Europe would have been glad enough to take things quietly. At all events, a war would only have made the matter worse for the allied monarchs. The other stared at me in amazement, muttered an audible dissent, and, I make no doubt, set me down as a most disloyal subject; for, while extending her empire, and spreading her commercial system, (her Free Trade a l'Anglaise!) over every nook and corner of the earth where she can get footing, nothing sounds more treasonable to the ears of a loyal Englishman than to give the French possession of Antwerp, or the Russians possession of Constantinople. So inveterate become his national feelings on such subjects, that I am persuaded a portion of his antipathy to the Americans arises from a disgust at hearing notions that have been, as it were, bred in and in, through his own moral system, contemned in a language that he deems his own peculiar property. Men, in such circumstances, are rarely very philosophical or very just.

We were off in a char with the dawn. Of course you will understand that we entered the Valais by its famous bridge, and passed St. Maurice, and the water-fall a la Teniers; for you have already travelled along this road with me. I saw no reason to change my opinion of the Valais, which looked as chill and repulsive now as it did in 1828, though we were so early on the road as to escape the horrible sight of the basking cretins, most of whom were still housed. Nor can I tell you how far these people have been elevated in the scale of men by an increasing desire for riches.

At Martigny we breakfasted, while the innkeeper sent for a guide. The canton has put these men under a rigid police, the prices being regulated by law, and the certificate of the traveller becoming important to them. This your advocate of the absurdity called Free Trade will look upon as tyranny, it being more for the interest of human intercourse than the traveller who arrives in a strange country should be cheated by a hackney-coachman, or the driver of a cart, or stand higgling an hour in the streets, than to violate an abstraction that can do no one any good! If travelling will not take the minor points of free tradeism out of a man, I hold him to be incorrigible. But such is humanity! There cannot be even a general truth, that our infirmities do not lead us to push it into falsehood, in particular practice. Men are no more fitted to live under a system that should carry out the extreme doctrines of this theory, than they are fitted to live without law; and the legislator who should attempt the thing in practice, would soon find himself in the condition of Don Quixote, after he had liberated the galley-slaves from their fetters:—in other words, he would be cheated the first moment circumstances compelled him to make a hard bargain with a stranger. Were the canton of Valais to say, you shall be a guide, and such shall be your pay, the imputation of tyranny might lie; by saying, you may be a guide, and such must be your pay, it merely legislates for an interest that calls for particular protection in a particular way, to prevent abuses.

Our guide appeared with two mules harnessed to a char a banc, and we proceeded. The fragment of a village which the traveller passes for Martigny, on his way to Italy, is not the true hamlet of that name, but a small collection of houses that has sprung up since the construction of the Simplon road. The real place is a mile distant, and of a much more rural and Swiss character. Driving through this hamlet, we took our way along the winding bank of a torrent called the Drance, the direction, at first, being south. The road was not bad, but the valley had dwindled to a gorge, and, though broken and wild, was not sufficiently so to be grand. After travelling a few miles, we reached a point where our own route diverged from the course of the Drance, which came in from the east, while we journeyed south. This Drance is the stream that produced the terrible inundation a few years since. The calamity was produced by an accumulation of ice higher in the gorges, which formed a temporary lake. The canton made noble efforts to avert the evil, and men were employed as miners, to cut a passage for the water, through the ice, but their labour proved useless, although they had made a channel, and the danger was greatly lessened. Before half the water had escaped, however, the ice gave way, and let the remainder of the lake down in a flood. The descent was terrific, sweeping before it every thing that came in its way, and although so distant, and there was so much space, the village of Martigny was deluged, and several of its people lost their lives. The water rose to the height of several feet on the plain of the great valley, before it could disgorge itself into the Rhone.

The ascents now became more severe, though we occasionally made as sharp descents. The road lay through a broken valley, the mountains retiring from each other a little, and the wheel-track was very much like those we saw in our own hilly country, some thirty years since, though less obstructed by mud. At one o'clock we reached Liddes, a crowded, rude, and dirty hamlet, where we made a frugal repast. Here we were compelled to quit the char, and to saddle the mules. The guide also engaged another man to accompany us with a horse, that carried provender for himself, and for the two animals we had brought with us. We then mounted, and proceeded.

On quitting Liddes, the road, or rather path, for it had dwindled to that, led through a valley that had some low meadows; after which the ascents became more decided, though the course had always been upward. The vegetation gradually grew less and less, the tree diminishing to the bush, and finally disappearing altogether, while the grasses became coarse and wiry, or were entirely superseded by moss. We went through a hamlet or two, composed of stones stained apparently with iron ore, and, as the huts were covered with the same material, instead of lending the landscape a more humanized air, they rather added to its appearance of sterile dreariness. There were a few tolerably good bits of savage mountain scenes, especially in a wooded glen or two by the wayside; but, on the whole, I thought this the least striking of the Swiss mountains I had ascended.

We entered a sort of mountain basin, that was bounded on one side by the glacier of Mont Velan; that which so beautifully bounds the view up the Valais, as seen from Vevey. I was disappointed in finding an object which, in the distance, was so white and shining, much disfigured and tarnished by fragments of broken rock. Still the summit shone, in cold and spotless lustre. There was herbage for a few goats here, and some one had commenced the walls of a rude building that was intended for an inn. No one was at work near it, a hut of stone, for the shelter of the goatherds, being all that looked like a finished human habitation.

Winding our way across and out of this valley, we came to a turn in the rocks, and beheld two more stone cabins, low and covered, so as to resemble what in America are called root-houses. They stood a little from the path, on the naked rock. Crossing to them, we dismounted and looked into the first. It was empty, had a little straw, and was intended for a refuge, in the event of storms. Thrusting my head into the other, after the eye had got a little accustomed to the light, I saw a grinning corpse seated against the remotest side. The body looked like a mummy, but the clothes were still on it, and various shreds of garments lay about the place. The remains of other bodies, that had gradually shrunk into shapeless masses, were also dimly visible. Human bones, too, were scattered around. It is scarcely necessary to add that this was one of the dead-houses, or places in which the bodies of those who perish on the mountain are deposited, to waste away, or to be claimed, as others may or may not feel an interest in their remains. Interment could only be effected by penetrating the rock, for there was no longer any soil, and such is the purity of the atmosphere that putrescence never occurs.

I asked the guide if he knew anything of the man, whose body still retained some of the semblance of humanity. He told me he remembered him well, having been at the convent in his company. It was a poor mason, who had crossed the col, from Piemont, in quest of work; failing of which, he had left Liddes, near nightfall, in order to enjoy the unremitting hospitality of the monks on his return, about a fortnight later. His body was found on the bare rock, quite near the refuge, on the following day. The poor fellow had probably perished in the dark, within a few yards of shelter, without knowing it. Hunger and cold, aided, perhaps, by that refuge of the miserable, brandy, had destroyed him. He had been dead now two years, and yet his remains preserved a hideous resemblance to the living man.

Turning away from this melancholy spectacle, I looked about me with renewed interest. The sun had set, and evening was casting its shadows over the valley below, which might still be seen through the gorges of our path. The air above, and the brown peaks that rose around us like gloomy giants, were still visible in a mellow saddened light, and I thought I had never witnessed a more poetical, or a more vivid picture of the approach of night. Following the direction of the upward path, a track that was visible only by the broken fragments of rock, and which now ascended suddenly, an opening was seen between two dark granite piles, through which the sky beyond still shone, lustrous and pearly. This opening appeared to be but a span. It was the col, or the summit of the path, and gazing at it, in that pure atmosphere, I supposed it might be half a mile beyond and above us. The guide shook his head at this conjecture, and told me it was still a weary league!

At this intelligence we hurried to bestride our mules, which by this time were fagged, and as melancholy as the mountains. When we left the refuge there were no traces of the sun on any of the peaks or glaciers. A more sombre ascent cannot be imagined. Vegetation had absolutely disappeared, and in its place lay scattered the fragments of the ferruginous looking rocks. The hue of every object was gloomy as desolation could make it, and the increasing obscurity served to deepen the intense interest we felt. Although constantly and industriously ascending towards the light, it receded faster than we could climb. After half an hour of toil, it finally deserted us to the night. At this moment the guide pointed to a mass that I had thought a fragment of the living rock, and said it was the roof a building. It still appeared so near, that I fancied we had arrived; but minute after minute went by, and this too was gradually swallowed up in the gloom. At the end of another quarter of an hour, we came to a place where the path, always steep since quitting the refuge, actually began to ascend by a flight of broad steps formed in the living rock, like that already mentioned on the Righi, though less precipitous. My weary mule seemed at times, to be tottering beneath my weight, or hanging in suspense, undecided, whether or not to yield to the downward pressure. It was quite dark, and I thought it best to trust to his instinct and his recollections. This unpleasant struggle between animal force and the attraction of gravitation, in which the part I played was merely to contribute to the latter, lasted nearly a quarter of an hour longer, when the mules appeared to be suddenly relieved. They moved more briskly for a minute, and then stopped before a pile of rock, that a second look in the dark enabled us to see was made of stone, thrown into the form of a large rude edifice. This was the celebrated convent of the Great St. Bernard!

I bethought me of the Romans, of the marauders of the middle ages, of the charity of a thousand years, and of Napoleon, as throwing a leg over the crupper, my foot first touched the rock. Our approach had been heard, for noises ascend far through such a medium, and we were met at the door by a monk in a black gown, a queer Asiatic-looking cap, and a movement that was as laical as that of a garcon de cafe. He hastily enquired if there were any ladies, and I thought he appeared disappointed when we told him no. He showed us very civilly, however, into a room, that was warmed by a stove, and which already contained two travellers, who had the air of decent tradesmen who were crossing the mountain on business. A table was set for supper, and a lamp or two threw a dim light around.

The little community soon assembled, the prior excepted, and the supper was served. I had brought a letter for the clavier, a sort of caterer, who is accustomed to wander through the vallies in quest of contributions; and this appeared to be a good time for presenting it, as our reception had an awkward coldness that was unpleasant. The letter was read, but it made no apparent difference in the warmth of our treatment then or afterwards. I presume the writer had unwittingly thrown the chill, which the American name almost invariably carries with it, over our reception.

By this time seven of the Augustines were in the room; four of whom were canons, and three novices. The entire community is composed of about thirty, who are professed, with a suitable number who are in their noviciate; but only eight in all are habitually kept on the mountain, the rest residing in a convent in the bourg, as the real village of Martigny is called. It is said that the keen air of the col affects the lungs after a time, and that few can resist its influence for a long continued period. You will remember that this building is the most elevated permanent abode in Europe, if not in the Old World, standing at a height of about 8,000 English feet above the sea.