A PRINCESS AND THE SPELL OF THE LAKE
Years ago I used to know the Princess Kóltsova-Masálskaya, who under
the name of Dora d’Istria wrote many stories and semi-historical
works. She was a most cultivated and fascinating woman. In her book,
“Au Bord des Lacs Helvétiques,” she criticizes Lord Byron’s
description of Lake Leman. She says:--
“When one comes in the spring to the Pays de Vaud, one does not at
first see all the beauty so many times celebrated by poets and
travelers. In rereading Byron and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, one is
inclined to conjecture that they were obliged to have recourse to
quite fanciful descriptions, in order to justify their boasts.
“Byron, in spite of the power of his genius, is a rather vulgar
painter of the splendors of nature. He contents himself with vague
traits and what he says of the Lake of Geneva would apply just as
well to the Lake of the Four Cantons or the Lake of Zürich. Rousseau
himself seems to have found the subject only partly poetic, for he
exhausts himself in describing Julie’s imaginary orchard, which would
have been much better situated in the Emmenthal than on the
vine-covered slopes above Lake Leman. In gazing at the hillsides,
rough with the blackened grape-vines, one can easily understand the
motive which prompted the author of ‘La Nouvelle Héloïse’ to prefer an
ideal picture to the reality.
“When one leaves the plain in the month of April, one has already
enjoyed the smiles of the Spring. The fresh young grass covers the
earth with an emerald-colored carpet. The willows swing their silvery
catkins at the edges of the streams, while along the edges of the
forests gleams the silvery calix of the wood-anemone. Here, the vines
are slower; the walnut-trees have not been hasty in opening their big
buds and, as the shores of the Lake of Geneva have very little other
vegetation than walnut-trees and vines, this region presents, during
the first fine days, an aspect not calculated to seduce the eye or
speak to the imagination.
“We should get a very false idea of it, however, if at this season of
the year we visited only the shores of the lake, and did not make our
way up into the mountains where so many fruit trees spread over the
rejuvenated turf the fragrant snow of their petals.”
The Princess tells how Eléonora de Haltingen came to reside at Veytaux
with her mother in November, 1858. She liked to go down to Montreux,
“the principal group of houses in that parish.” She used to follow a
path thus described:--“A foot-path worn among the vines led toward the
grotto surmounted by the terrace of the church. This foot-path was
impracticable for crinolines; no dust was found, or pallid misses with
blue veils, or tourists with airs of conquerors, or noisy
children--all such things spoil the most delicious landscapes. But one
could admire at one’s ease the luxurious vegetation of the vines, the
transparent grapes, the flexible and shining leaves of the maise
growing amid the vineyards....
“We admired the magnificent spectacle spread before our eyes,”
continues her biographer, “as we picked bouquets of the silène which
makes great, rosy clusters in the old walls. These walls are placed
there to hold up the vines and they serve as a retreat for a multitude
of swift lizards which sleep there during the winter and whose bright
little faces and infantile curiosity were a delight to us. As soon as
we had passed a few steps beyond their holes we could see them emerge,
cock up their heads, turning to the right and then to the left, with
their bright eyes sparkling, and then dart away whenever there would
be heard on the path the heavy shoes used by the Vaudois women, for it
is said that their musical ear likes only harmonious noises. This
inquisitiveness must cost the poor little saurians dear. The
bald-buzzards, wheeling in the blue above our heads, seemed by no
means indifferent to their movements. And so we kept finding one and
another that showed traces of an existence very difficult to preserve.
One would lack a paw, another its tail. Finally several, covered with
dust, their skins faded and their eyes dulled, fled precipitately so
as to leave the foot-path free to those of their brethren whose bright
and gilded garb contrasted with their air of wretchedness and
suffering, so deeply does misfortune modify the most sociable
character.”
Then, after they had enlarged their bouquets by jasmine and syringa
blossoms, with Alpine roses and golden-tinged cytisus, they would go
to the grotto and from there to the terrace behind the church. The
Princess thus describes the scene:--
“Sheltered by enormous walnut-trees, this grotto, which opens in a
crag hung with ivy, gives passage to a brook which falls with a gentle
murmur past a bathing establishment, a three-storied, rustic châlet
charming to look at. Jasmines and rose-bush boxes deck the
ground-floor and the first story with their graceful branches and give
the place the appearance of a mass of verdure and of flowers.
“A foot-path, worn under the walnut-trees along the mountain, gives
passage to the church and the terrace, which extends south of the
edifice and affords one of the most beautiful views in the Pays de
Vaud. Of a summer morning, toward nine o’clock, one can find the most
marvellous tints spread over the lake. Over a sparkling azure ground
wander designs in graceful silvery curves. The sapphire itself seems
robbed of its brilliancy beside these waters. The metallic glitter of
the bright blue wing of the king-fisher may give some idea of this
almost fantastic shade, which seems to belong to another universe.
“We could never tire of contemplating this spectacle, the face of
which changes with the color of the sky. Sometimes a cloud, passing
across the mountains of Savoy, cast on their bald brows, or on their
verdant sides, a shadow as gigantic as that of the Roumanian monster,
the winged _zmeou_; again a steam-boat, proudly wearing the banner
with the silver cross, would pour forth into the air a black plume of
smoke and leave on the waves a glittering, foamy wake.
“Facing the terrace of Montreux can be seen the villages of the
Catholic shore,--Boveret and Saint-Gingolph, separated by a big
mountain, La Chaumény, marked by an immense ravine. This shore by its
stern aspect makes a strong contrast with the shore of Vaud, but this
very contrast adds to the originality and the grandeur of the
landscape. The old fortress which served as Bonivard’s prison emerges
at the left from the bosom of the waters, which form a graceful gulf
around its walls. Opposite Chillon, a bouquet of verdure surrounded by
a solid wall forms in the middle of the lake that islet on which that
unknown captive, whose griefs Byron sang, used to feast his eyes.
“In the midst of this smiling landscape, the towers of Chillon, I
confess, saddened my imagination more than it did Eléonora’s. When, as
we sat on the terrace, I told her about the long captivity of
Bonivard, who left in the pavement the circle of his footprints as
he went round and round his pillar like a wild beast; when I spoke
with animation of the instruments of torture and the oubliettes,
which, in that sinister fortress, are a witness to the violences and
the iniquities of feudal society, I noticed without a pang that she
gave these questions only slight heed....
[Illustration: THE CASTLE OF CHÂTELARD AND THE SAVOY ALPS.]
“When one wishes to go to Clarens without straying far from the lake,
one passes at some distance from the principal village of the parish
of Montreux. We almost always stopped at the end of a wide and
picturesque ravine watered by a torrent called the _baie_ of Montreux;
here the view is lovely. If one looks toward the lake, Veytaux is to
be seen at the right, hidden like a doves’ nest between Mont Cau and
Mont Sonchaud; beyond Veytaux, Chillon thrusts its massive walls into
the waters. At the right, the quadrangular manoir of Châtelard, with
its thick walls, and narrow windows, stands in its isolation on its
hill. When one turns toward the church of Montreux, one is astonished
at the small space occupied by the chief village of this parish,
formed by the houses of Les Planches and Le Châtelard and known by
that name all over Europe. Concealed among thick walnut-trees and
Virginian poplars, these houses are built between two rounded hills,
one of which, called Le Rigi Vaudois, lifts aloft a great châlet in
red wood. Behind the habitations appears in the distance a mountain
with ragged summit, which the winter makes white with its snows and
the summer covers with a pallid verdure diversified with fir-trees
here and there.”
The Princess also paints a pretty picture of the lake in winter:--
“The gulls had reappeared along the shore. The vines were completely
despoiled. Over the whole landscape spread a thick fog, which
sometimes concealed the mountains and thus gave Lake Leman the
appearance of a sea. By the beginning of December the sun was still
struggling with the mists; often the mountains seemed cut in two by a
luminous band which fell thickly over the lake, and stretched toward
Vevey in dark folds. Above the peaks of Savoy, whose summits, now
marked with streaks of snow, glittered in the sun, still shone the
Italian sky like a consolation or like a hope.
“The lake itself was losing its lovely azure tints. I remember one day
when we were seated on the road leading from Veytaux to the church,
behind a low hedge of Bengal roses. Lake Leman was still blue in
patches, but, for the most part, somber clouds with silver fringes
were reflected in its melancholy waters. The gulf of Chillon was
filled with a dark triangle, the shadow of the neighboring mountains.
At the right the gulf of Vernex was glittering in the sunlight, a
light the appearance of which we loved to salute, for its struggle
with the darkness interested us as much as it would the worshipers of
Ormuzd.
“When the landscape seemed completely asleep in the fog, suddenly a
ray of sunlight would give it back all its brilliancy and life. One
afternoon, as I was coming home with Eléonora from the terrace of the
church, the sun appeared over the crest of Mont Sonchaud. The
fir-trees arising above the snow then put on their loveliest tints.
Whole masses of these trees remained in the shadow; a few were of a
greenish yellow; others bore on their crests what seemed like a
fantastic aureole.
“Arriving at Veytaux by the path which crosses the vineyards by a
murmuring brook, we found a still more beautiful view. Between the two
mountains that shelter the village, there rise at some distance two
peaks of unequal shape; and these two are the only ones at this season
as yet covered with snow. Their alabaster summits, standing out
against a faint mist, shone as if one of the Olympians, celebrated in
the song of the divine Homer, had touched them with his immortal foot.
“But at sunset especially did we most enjoy the magnificent sight of
the lake, which could be seen from my windows in its whole length. An
orange light then stained the west at the place where the mountains of
Savoy dip down into the lake. These mountains stood out boldly against
the blazing horizon. At the right a purple zone crowned the hills and
grew feebler toward Vevey; in the midst of the lake flamed a
marvellous fire, while the waters were somber under Villeneuve, of a
pallid blue under Veytaux, and of a pearly gray color, cut by red
bands, along the shores of Savoy.
“One evening this spectacle, though still fascinating, had something
saddening about it. The mountains of Savoy were enveloped in a thick
veil, surmounted by a canopy of pale azure illuminated by the dying
sun. The veil grew larger toward Lausanne and formed a sort of chain
of vapors, heaped up and climbing into space. A few lines of the color
of blood streaked these gloomy masses. Such might have been the earth
after the deluges of primitive times, when a ray of light began to
smile across the darkness on a desolate universe.
“In the last week of December the snow, which had grown deep on the
mountains, kept us from all walking. Nothing is so sad as a lake when
it is surrounded by a winter landscape. The dazzling brilliancy of the
snow spreads across the water, which was formerly the rival of the
sapphire, a leaden hue more funereal than that of stagnant pools of
the marsh. Here and there the steeper crags pierce through the pall
with which they are covered and stand up like lugubrious sentinels. A
miserly light comes down from the ashen-hued sky. One hears nothing
but the hoarse cries of the gulls and the reiterated cawing of the
crows as they fly in flocks along the shores of the lake and seem to
delight in this spectacle of death.
“I have lived too long among the frozen fens of Ingria to love these
melancholy pomps of winter, though they charm the imagination of some
persons. Eléonora, though born on the foggy banks of the Rhine, was
like me in loving the glory of the _Day_. She would have agreed with
Goethe, who, as he lay dying, cried: ‘More light! More light!’”