hardship sometimes. But it was Switzerland that was awaiting me, and a
brand-new experience. You know how it must have been--the heart-breaking
at the leaving, and yet springing forward with a bound of eagerness to
the unknown. You must have experienced that mixed feeling! What have I
not seen and felt in this wonderland! Unspeakable Switzerland! Every
place has its own special exceeding beauty or grandeur, or both. I came
into it from Chiavenna, by the Val Bregaglia and Maloja Pass, my first
halt being at San Moritz, in the Upper Engadine. This is a fashionable
watering-place, in the midst of the most glorious mountain and lake
scenery, and is a good point from which to make excursions. I think I
shall only tell you of the one I am the proudest of. It was my grand
climb. First, a drive of seventeen miles to the Bernina Hospice, among
the Bernina Alps, and from there a walk of two and a quarter hours, up,
up, to heights far above the tree line, into the vast solitudes of
barren rock and eternal snows--7,800 feet high. Behold me, with
alpenstock, giving all my energy and enthusiasm to it; sometimes by
pretty lakes and prettier tarns--“those wee lakes that looked like tears
dropped in the clefts of lofty mountains;” over bridges spanning
turbulent streams; across narrow ledges of rock and snow; up cliffs that
made me wish I was a kid or a chamois; and ever upward, till my breath
was mere gasping! At last I was there, at the Sassal Massone, perched on
a shelf in the mountain-side, looking on such a spectacle as I may
never see again--the Palu Glacier, sweeping down between two immense
mountains, on my right; opposite, mountains; to the left, a lovely
valley, clothed in the richest, tenderest verdure, and holding an
exquisite lake in its bosom. I gazed and shut my eyes, and gazed and
shut them again and again. This Sassal Massone is a little
refreshment-house cut into the solid rock on a shelf or terrace, with a
seat for the weary climber to rest on while taking in the sublime views.
Thus sitting, a chance turn of my head showed rows of the edelweiss,
that lovely, downy, little Alpine flower, just back and a little above
me, growing right out of the snow. I sprang up to look at them, and then
went to the keeper of the rude hostelry to buy some. He said they were
not for sale; that he kept them for tourists to see; but that he would
provide me a guide to take me to great fields of them not so very far
away. The guide came--the most loutish, stupid-looking creature a
mission ever was intrusted to. We tramped through the snow, kept to our
feet by our alpenstocks and to the goal by our excitement. It was indeed
a vast field of snow, unbroken but by the quantities of the curious
little flowers, which seemed cut out of felt--white, but not snow-white;
just the tinge of common felt. The petals radiated from a pretty center,
a cluster of delicate, palish-gold-colored flowers. The guide looked
from them to us and from us to them, then smiled, stepped back and
bowed--awkwardly, to be sure--for us to pluck for ourselves. He was
instantaneously transformed from the stolid clodhopper I had thought him
to be--not to a god, but a mortal with a beautiful soul.
I gathered to my heart’s content--all that I could carry on the return
tramp. If only I could have brought away the mountain-side with them!
The mere thought made me gasp. With hands full and head and heart
fuller, full to their utmost, I turned away and “came down from the
mountains.” I saw three grand glaciers that day; walked to the foot of
one, and stood gazing in fascination on its fissured walls of ice and
its dangerously beautiful grotto, from which “a glacier torrent” was
pouring forth. Everywhere, except at the very highest points, multitudes
of the loveliest wild flowers were blooming! Is not that a day to be set
apart in one’s life? I am sure I shall never recall it without feeling
myself a grander creature.
From San Moritz to Thusis by the Julier and Schyn Passes. All the routes
have been planned to take in the finest if not most familiarly known
scenery. These passes were another experience of the most varied
wildness, grandeur, bareness and loveliness. First, the slow zigzag of
the diligence into the bleakest regions of grey cloven rocks, piled into
“Alps upon Alps,” till they towered far up above the snow line; then
great tortuous windings down into the heart of such luxuriant vegetation
as is not surpassed, hardly equaled, by that of Ohio’s fertile valleys
and hills. Then--I would lend you my eyes if I could, just to have you
realize what a panorama of sublime beauty Switzerland can give, but I
have no words to picture it. Thusis is situated at the entrance of the
Via Mala, the famous gorge through which that impetuous stripling, the
young Rhine, rushes with such headlong recklessness. A wide and
long-extended valley, surrounded by every kind of mountain and height,
from knolls to snow peaks; two rivers tearing in at one end, uniting and
hurrying onward as the Rhine right through the center, and twenty towns
dotting the distances, with castles and churches perched in every
romantic spot. Why, it seemed to me the earth was growing more
beautiful and wonderful every moment.
The ruins of the oldest castle in Switzerland, on the summit of a spur
of the Muttnerhorn, a lofty, rounded mass of rock, partly covered with
trees and grass and flowers, partly showing only sheer rifts of
limestone, rose just in front of my windows. I sat on my balcony and saw
the moon rise among its crumbling towers, sail slowly across and above
them, and mount to the highest heavens; while below me a fine band
played such music as was in perfect harmony with that enchanting
spectacle and my own mood. Next forenoon I drove the length of the Via
Mala, and on my return left the carriage and climbed to that seductive
height all alone, my companion begging off. No, not quite alone. I had
some goats and kids for companions, and am gregarious enough to own I
was glad of even them. They just looked at me with a mild curiosity, and
nibbled on or clambered ahead or waited to let me pass. Perhaps--who
knows?--a biped innovation was as pleasant to them as they were to her!
The view at the top was all I thought it could be. And that is my
description in full. Is it not satisfactory?
There is a legend about this ruin that haunts me. The last lord of the
castle blindfolded his horse and leaped from that fearful height to
certain and awful death. I have seen since I was there a picture by one
of Switzerland’s first artists representing this scene. No danger of my
ever forgetting it now. Then I sped along that rampageous youngster’s
course for several hours, all aglow over the wonders it unrolled before
me, till nightfall brought me to Ragatz, another fashionable
watering-place. Its environs possess, in addition to all I have
heretofore enumerated in the way of mountains, water and vale, what is
said to be the most curious and unique feature in this remarkable little
commonwealth: a gorge in which hot springs are inclosed. Having seen it,
I would not have missed it “for anything,” as my French teacher used to
say. Imagine an enormous fissure in a vast limestone ridge, a mountain;
it might have been cloven there by Atlas in that forepast when such
giants were no fiction. The depth must be from 150 to 200 feet; maybe
more. Those awe-inspiring walls seem almost to meet; for overhead they
swerve in many places toward each other, so as to shut out the light; in
others they part to admit gleams of sunshine and blue sky. Far below, a
glacier stream, the Tamina, is rushing, roaring, throwing up clouds of
spray, and wearing away now, as it has been wearing away for lo! how
many thousand years, that _not_ too solid rock.
A wooden gallery runs along one side following the sinuosities of the
rock, and you have a walk of a quarter of a mile through this strange,
weird, yes, appalling “work of nature,” wrought by that foaming torrent,
to the vaulted passage, “dark as Erebus,” which leads to the springs.
Niagara is not grander or more imposing than this Plutonian gorge in its
way. But, dear me, I will never get through if I try to tell you a tithe
of what I have done and seen. For you see, there is the ascent of Rigi
and ever so much else. Well, “the play will have to be cut.” I went up
Rigi in the cars, saw a sublime sunrise, and walked down on the other
side to Küssnacht! Believe me, I will never do the like again. It was a
four-hours’ tramp, or rather slip and slide, stumble, stick, stagger.
The way is always steep, and then it was slippery from the recent rains.
I am just getting over the stiffness and soreness. No, I would not do it
again for Rigi itself. But this Lucerne is just perfect loveliness, and
I am getting “restored” rapidly.
And here I am ashamed of this long letter, afraid of another sheet, and
have not said what I most wish to say. It is about your book. I am sure
I shall like it, and hope you will stay at home and get it ready for the
public, especially me. Yes, the title is good. I wish I was reading it
this moment in print. I hope you have written to Miss B----. Were you at
the wedding of Miss S----? Tell me about it. But I must stop. I do not
want to--. Good-bye.
L. G. C.
Lucerne, July 26, 1883.
[Illustration]
VIENNA.
I shall make a beginning, but have no idea when I shall reach the finis.
But I thank you beforehand not to say, “and the longest yet,” if it
should be. All equipped and waiting for the opera hour in Vienna; a pale
sunlight dropping from “a lambent sky;” windows wide open,
“To let the outdoor gospels in;”
an easy enough picture to make to the mind’s eye, if you are so
“minded.” The opera hour is 6 o’clock. Isn’t that primitive for the
“second Paris,” as this metropolis is fondly called by many? It strikes
me it is absurdly so and _bien incommode_, as the French say. You see,
dinner is the midday meal all over Germany. This places the supper hour
at 7.30 or 8. So one has to eat too often or not often enough;
“something” before going and a hearty supper afterwards, or only the
latter, at 10 or 11. I do not like either way, but generally omit the
first; and then!
Your letter was waiting for me here on Saturday. This is Wednesday. I
was “ever so glad” to get it. The one pleasure you can never know in its
supremacy till you are “a bronzed wanderer in a foreign land,” is that
of getting letters. I wish--how I wish!--everybody was as good a
correspondent as I am. No matter how often, how brilliant or _how long_
their letters were, they would be “more than welcome,” as the happy
father said on No. 12’s advent in the family circle. That is the right
spirit, even for a letter. But some people--hm! I can’t express them.
Did you mean it? did you know it? your letter was so full of wise
suggestions I put on my study-cap, “and Frank Hazeldean sat down to
think.” To be sure, I _am_ doing a great deal--_all_ I can. If I do not
now, I never shall. I did not make much out of the “brown study” beyond
that; and this. If I were Goethe, or any one that was going to be
anybody, I would do as thoroughly as he. But to think at my age of going
to the heart and bottom of things--how in vain! What is left me but to
skim over the surface like a bird over water, now and then dipping in?
And anyway, is not a clear, graphic, comprehensive superficiality--I am
not sure I can make you understand me--the next best thing to
thoroughness? Have you not known people with that gift with whom it was
a felicity to be thrown? Felicity may not be--is not--such an ultimatum
as beatitude, which is found only in the highest heights and deepest
depths; but think of the light, warmth, sparkle, enjoyment, of the
middle realms of air? Is that an excuse for my busy idleness? Perhaps.
Yet the deeper plunge of my wings comes oftener than you suspect, maybe.
The wider knowledge of and the more intimate contact with the works of
nature, and no less those of my fellow-men--these have been the gains I
have most counted on. My brain “burned with great ideas” equally among
the towering ice-peaks and awe-inspiring glaciers of Zermatt, and in the
presence of the wrecks of Paestum’s sublime temples. To look on such
wonders of creation, be the work of divine or human hands, is to be
driven inward, far within yourself, in search of the creative motive. If
for myself, and my power of accomplishing, I am driven thereby into the
depths of “a profound despair,” my pride in and homage to the worthier
workers are only the greater. But this is enormous egotism. You can have
of _me_ only what you take. You remember that complaint of Swedenborg
to the angel: “I asked you for a fig, and you have given me a grape.” “I
_gave_ you a fig, but you took a grape,” was the angel’s reply.
I shall try to do your bidding in respect to Paris. I have not meant to
do it in haste. Still, neither the lovely city nor “its unknowable,
incomprehensible, original” arouse my interest to a very fervid degree.
When I have come to know both better, I may change.
18th. Don’t you see you are in for a diary? My hostess came in with cake
and fruit, plums, pears, peaches and grapes. I must take some before
going. Of course Eve listened to the voice of the charmer. She always
does, and always with the same result, doesn’t she?
The opera was one of Wagner’s, “Tristian and Isolde.” The story belongs
to the dim, misty regions of English history, mixed up with Irish in a
way quite baffling to one so ignorant of the latter as I am. I wonder if
you know the story. Before telling, I shall wait to hear. I may remind
you that Wagner as a composer always had an idea or ideas to embody. If
you have seen or heard--oh! for a jolt to bring out the right word for
witnessing an opera, which is both seen and heard--Tannhäuser, you will
catch my meaning. It is a story of temptation, sin and repentance
wrought out most powerfully in music of unfortunate love and its
penalty. The heroine is a fine-looking woman, and a powerful actress,
with a voice equal to Wagner’s requirements, which is saying a good
deal; but she lacked magnetism! She did not once sweep me into
forgetfulness, or impotency of criticism. Interpreting ideas through the
highest science of music is a grand and glorious performance, but it is
a fearful tax on the human voice. In Dresden, all the singers of his
music but one sang as if their voices had been overstrained. Here they
sing it as if they had mastered a difficult task, but, like liberty, the
price is eternal vigilance. The orchestral music, though, always makes
up for other deficiencies. I hardly see how it could be finer or more
perfect. The house itself is faultlessly beautiful and comfortable. This
last feature is worth making a note of, for the Grand Opera House in
Paris is stifling, the most unbreathable atmosphere to which I was ever
subjected.
The _mise-en-scene_ here and all over Europe leaves nothing to ask for.
At home by half-past ten; let in by a concierge, who provided us with a
small wax taper to light ourselves up to our apartments. There the
post-opera collation was awaiting. Don’t you wish you had been one at
it? Would not that have been provocation to immense brilliancy?
Scintillant as Sirius--that would have been your rôle.
Was it inexplicable that I did not want to get up this morning at all?
Yet I had to. Why? I think I have not told you. The object of my
pilgrimage here is to have the treatment of the finest aurist in Europe.
I am not over-sanguine, but hope for some benefit. Deafness is a very
trying deficiency. I dread any increase, so I thought I ought to give
myself the chance of even partial “benefit.” The custom of “specialists”
is to receive the patients at their offices and there treat them. My
hour is half-past nine a. m. Hence the loss of that delicious morning
dawdle and drowse.
Would you not like a peep into this magician’s quarters? They are what
may be called “stunning,” I can tell you. Every time I go into them I
finger my ducats pensively and sigh, “Needless to ask; we know who pays
for the piper.” First, a square ante-chamber, with frescoed ceiling and
pictures on the walls. I have not more than glanced at this. From this
two doors, through which I have been passed; one leading to a private
reception-room, the other to the public. I go to the former, as I have
my hour and am not to be kept waiting. It is an oblong room with green
hangings on the walls and very dark, old oak furniture. There is a large
cabinet, the glass doors lined with green silk. I have not seen what is
in it. In one corner is a beautiful pedestal, on which is a bronze copy
of that famous head of Homer in the Naples Museum. Between it and a door
leading into the examining office is a Venetian mirror surrounded by
small, rare paintings. There is a woman’s head that would haunt you for
many a day could you see it. There are two handsome glass cases with
tier upon tier of the bony structure of the ear mounted beautifully for
inspection. In the examination-room, dark, crimson hangings, its ceiling
an oval fresco of a blue, summer sky, flecked with fleecy films of
clouds; and in the oval border at the ends four medallion portraits of
eminent physicians, there is a book-case filled with fine editions of
Shakespeare, Byron, Humbolt, Lessing, Goethe, etc., a cabinet of ebony
inlaid with ivory, on which stands a bronze head of Hippocrates,
statuettes, curious little clocks, etc. Another cabinet has some dainty
bits of china, a pair of candlesticks of tortoise shell inlaid with
ivory, and more of such things than would fill several sheets. On the
walls are most excellent copies of Rembrandt’s portraits of himself and
that “wife Saskia” he was so proud of. The frames of these are simply
“works of art” in wood carving. Two landscapes by Zimmerman, the first
time I have encountered him out of the large and public galleries. The
large public reception-room is fit for a palace; the walls from ceiling
to floor covered with pictures; tables, cabinets and chairs in ebony
inlaid with ivory; rare mirrors and china, etc. Now, I have not
enumerated the half. What do you think of it? Is it any wonder I and my
ducats have a private confab over it?
From that interview this morning, still not much more than half awake
and alert, we went to the Palace to see the “cabinet of coins and
antiques.” The “coins” always overwhelm me, so much time must be given
to do anything with them, so I am disheartened. I passed soon to the
“antiques.” How your eyes would snap to find themselves gazing at the
seal ring of Alaric, a large sapphire with a head in intaglio and a
heavy setting looking like hammered gold. What a giant he must have been
if the size of the ring did no injustice to the finger. And a large vase
of Cleopatra’s, gold-gilt with a wide border of exquisite cameos,
carvings and precious gems, and the center a portrait of herself in
“jewels, rich jewels of the mine.” Also, an agate vase of twenty-nine
and one-half inches in diameter, from the bridal treasure of Mary of
Burgundy. Nothing interested me more than a bronze tablet, with a
prohibition of the Bacchanalia, 186 years before Christ. I made out a
few words in the time I gave it.
Yesterday morning I was at the Imperial Library, in the same edifice;
the right name is the Imperial Berg. There I saw fragments of the Gospel
of the Sixth Century on purple parchment with silver and gold letters;
of Genesis, of the Fourth; a map of the Roman roads, A. D. 160; Tasso’s
own copy (manuscript) of “Jerusalem Delivered,” and the prayer-book of
Charles V. The poet was not sparing of erasures, and the prayer-book was
pretty well thumbed. “Men die but their works live after them--” and
what tales they do tell on them.
I could write on and on, filling up the interval since the last letter,
but, to quote from an old Cincinnati physician, “Enough is a plenty.”
L. G. C.
Vienna, October 17, 1883.
[Illustration]
SIENA.
February 22d, we took the train for Nice, via Lyons and Marseilles.
Spent the first night at the former and remained long enough next
morning for a drive that took in the best part of the busy, populous,
prosperous city. It is ever so much larger than I was thinking of, and
its situation is one of extreme beauty. It is situated at the confluence
of the Rhone and the Saone. Those lovely rivers wind picturesquely
through it, spanned by handsome bridges--the Rhone by eight and the
Saone by thirteen--dividing it into three parts, edged by broad quays
and shaded by trees. The ranges of near hills are surmounted by fine
residences, from which the loveliest views stretch out to misty
mountains in the distance to the east, south and west. Nothing was
wanting.
From there to Avignon was simply ravishing. The route descended the
valley of the Rhone, almost touching its lapping wavelets. We “stopped
off” at Avignon till the next train, which gave several hours--time
enough to see the special things I had in my mind. Of course, it was a
kind of pilgrimage to the shrine of Petrarch’s Laura. We saw the old
Papal palace, the home of the popes during that century (from 1309-77)
of their residence there. It is an interesting but dirty old pile, being
used now as a barracks--French soldiers, in common with their nation,
being not especially clean and neat. The torture and the prison towers
were interesting historically, but the beautiful faded frescoes on the
walls of the popes’ private chapel rather obliterated everything else.
In one place, Petrarch’s face shone forth in almost its original
freshness. The hair was golden, and the dark hazel eyes looked straight
out with a living look, as if the brain behind were busy over all they
looked upon. Mounting a little higher, we peeped into the cathedral; and
higher still, we reached the Rocher des Doms, an abrupt eminence laid
out in pleasant grounds, that command what is said to be one of the most
beautiful prospects in France.
Thence we drove to the Musée Calvet, which contains the Vernet gallery,
pictures of the four generations of that family of artists. There was a
portrait of Petrarch, over which hung one of Laura. In the garden
attached is a simple, tasteful monument to Laura--a square pedestal
surmounted by a globe, from which rises a cross with a wreath of flowers
hung upon it. It is all of white marble. From there we continued our
drive across the bridge, from which is seen an old bridge stretching
about two-thirds of the way across the river, with crumbling walls and
arches. One end is entirely gone. I am sure it is left just as it is
because of its effectiveness as a feature in the view.
Recrossing the bridge, we drove around the greater part of the city to
see the fine old walls dating 1349, and still in an admirable state of
preservation.
The moon was just full, and rose as we shot out of the station for our
sixty-five miles run to Marseilles. We remained at Marseilles for
several hours next morning, and had the inevitable drive. It was along
the quay, and I had my first glimpse of the “blue Mediterranean.” It was
an animated and thoroughly foreign spectacle; but the wind was high and
biting, and the dust excessive, which made everything and everybody look
dirty, even myself; so I was glad to settle down in our car for Nice.
We were soon in the “tropics,” olive orchards, orange and lemon groves,
almond trees in bloom, palm trees, etc., lining both sides of the track.
At Cannes, an English lady, titled, Lady G----, got into our carriage,
and she was thoroughly well-bred and agreeable. The train was crowded,
and her husband had to go into another car, our “carriage” being for
ladies only. No exception, even for “my lord.” Lady G---- then pointed
out Gladstone’s villa and other beautiful places, and told us with a
low, amused ripple of laughter of her gambling at Monte Carlo--it was
very mild; she laid down a five-franc-piece, and lost; laid down
another, and won; “so I quit even,” she said. We went to different
hotels. Her carriage and servants in livery were waiting for her; and
ours, a special one sent from the hotel for just us two--was waiting for
us. Another carriage from our hotel bore thither a handsome baron, with
a “love of a dog;” and as we arrived at the same time, our arrival
created something of a sensation! It was a lovely hotel, right on the
sea front, with a beautiful tropical garden in front--one wing ran out
in front too; it was a two-story châlet. I had the corner room with
windows taking in all that beautiful out-doors. I saw the moon rise out
of the sea; and at intervals all night, watched her course to her
setting. Then I saw the magical clouds and lights of the dawn on the
water, and Venus rise and hurry away to herald the sun coming up in all
his glory.
We went to hear Bishop Littlejohn, of Rhode Island, at the American
Chapel in the forenoon; walked on the fashionable promenade in the early
afternoon; then a tram-drive to the cemetery to see Gambetta’s monument
and grave. The cemetery is on a high hill whose top is a fine plateau.
In the most conspicuous part is a large square railed in by an iron
fence entirely concealed by floral devices. In the center of this square
rises a lofty pyramid, composed of floral offerings of every conceivable
device, that were sent, it would seem, from the uttermost parts of the
earth, to his funeral. Scattered round are other pyramids of the same. I
think they said in Paris there were five hundred thousand floral
offerings or tributes sent.