VAL CAMONICA AND THE GIUDICARIA.
Vineyards and maize, that's pleasant for sore eyes.--CLOUGH.
THE APRICA PASS--EDOLO--VAL CAMONICA--CEDEGOLO--VAL SAVIORE--LAGO
D'ARNO--MONTE CASTELLO--VAL DI FUM--VAL DAONE--LAGO DI LEDRO--RIVA--
THE GORGES OF THE SARCA--VAL RENDENA--THE PRA FIORI--VAL D'ALGONE--
STENICO--THE HIGH ROAD TO TRENT.
Our acquaintances might, I sometimes fancy, be roughly divided into
two classes. There are some who find sympathy in inanimate nature by
itself; there are many to whom the universe speaks only through the
person of their fellow creatures.
With the latter, human interests and emotions are always in the front,
and the most glorious landscape or the most thrilling sunset makes
only a background to the particular mites in whom they are for the
moment interested. Nature is just thought worthy to play a humble
accompaniment to the piece--to act the part of the two or three
fiddlers who are left in the orchestra to give forth soft music when
the heroine dreams, or a triumphant squeak at the approach of the
hero. Such dispositions, and they are often those of most strength or
genius, colour nature out of their own consciousness rather than accept
impressions from without.
[Illustration: THE ADAMELLO AND BRENTA GROUPS.
Stanford's Geogl Estabt, 55 Charing Cross
London: Longmans & Co.]
There is much to be said at the present day for this mood. The long
line of evolution so slightly alluded to in the Book of Genesis between
the mud and the man has been nearly made out. Why should we waste
more time over the lower developments of matter than is necessary to
ascertain our own family history? The human intelligence, philosophers
tell us, is the crowning flower of the universe. Let us then no longer
worship stocks and stones, or invisible and inconceivable abstractions,
but reserve all our attention for the highest thing we know, and
concentrate ourselves on our fellow creatures. Thus perhaps we shall
best urge on that true golden age, when mankind, grown less material,
will burn with a purer jet of intellect, when Mr. Wallace will talk
with spirits who can talk sense and Mr. Galton and artificial selection
will have replaced Cupid with his random darts.
Yet we can never wholly separate ourselves from the system of which we
form a part. 'Homo sum nihil humani' requires such extension as will
include the universe. Positivist congregations are, I believe, in the
habit of expressing their grateful acknowledgments to interplanetary
space. Even advanced thinkers therefore may pardon a sentiment for such
much nearer relations as the crystalline rocks.
Those, however, who deliberately prefer at all times the study of human
emotion to the inarticulate voice of nature must not--unless indeed
they are prepared to live, as few travellers can, amongst the people
of the country--come to the Lombard Alps. Their field of observation
is on the terrace at St. Moritz or on the summit of Piz Languard; and
they will do well to picnic in company amongst Swiss pines rather than
to wander alone under Italian beeches.
The road which links the Adamello country to the Stelvio highway,
and through it to the Bernina Pass and Upper Engadine, leaves the Val
Tellina midway between Tirano and Sondrio, and only a few hours' drive
from Le Prese. For many miles it climbs in one enormous zigzag through
the chestnut forests, until from the last brow overlooking the Val
Tellina it gains a view which, of its kind, has few rivals. I have seen
it twice under very different circumstances.
First in early morning, half-an-hour after a June sunrise, the
air ringing with the song of birds and bells, the high crest of
the Disgrazia golden in light, the long shadows of the Bergamasque
mountains falling across their lower slopes, the white villages caught
here and there by sunbeams, the broad valley throwing off a light cover
of soft mist. Beneath us Italy, around the Alps; and when these two
meet lovingly, what can nature do more?
Again on a late autumn afternoon, in dumb sultry heat, the sunlight
veiled for the most part in yellow mists, but breaking forth from
time to time with vivid force, and answered by lightning from the
thick impenetrable pall lying over the Disgrazia, and the masses
of storm-cloud gathering on the lower ranges. The valley silent and
mournful, all peace and harmony gone, the mountains glaring savagely
from their obscurity, as if their wild nature had broken loose from the
shrinking loveliness at its feet, and was preparing for it outrage and
ruin.
From the inn known as 'The Belvedere' it is still half-an-hour's ascent
to the smooth meadows which form the watershed between the Val Camonica
and the Val Tellina, the well-named Aprica Pass.
The descent towards Edolo lies through the green and fertile Val
Corteno. As the capital of the upper Val Camonica is approached lofty
snow-capped crags tower opposite. These are not part of the main mass
of the Adamello, but belong to the outlying group of Monte Aviolo.
Edolo lies on either side of a strong green torrent, fed by the
eternal snows, which seems a river compared to the slender streams of
the Bergamasque valleys. Across the bridge on a high platform stand
a large white church and campanile, backed by rich foliage and a
hillside, steep yet fertile, which rises straight into the clouds. The
little mountain-town is mediæval and Italian in character. The streets
are narrow and shady; old coats-of-arms are carved on the walls,
queer-headed monsters glower between the windows, arched loggias run
round the interior courtyards. The place tells you it has a history,
and one wonders for a moment what that history was. We know that German
emperors came this way through the mountains, that Barbarossa confirmed
the liberties of Val Camonica, and that Maximilian once halted within
these walls. Further details must be sought in the works of local
historians and in the libraries of Bergamo or Brescia.
Edolo has long been notorious for bad inns. Lately, however, the 'Leone
d'Oro,' the house in the centre of the town, has come into the hands of
a most well-meaning proprietor, who provides very fair food and lodging
at reasonable prices. Unfortunately nothing seems to get rid of the
extraordinarily pungent flavour of stables which has for years pervaded
the premises. I can only compare it to that of an underground stall in
Armenia, in which it was once my ill-fortune to spend the night. Such
a smell convinces one that at least there can be no difficulty as to
means of conveyance. Strangers are doubly annoyed when they discover
that they are in one of the few towns in the Alps where it is often
impossible at short notice to get horses or a carriage. If animals
even cannot endure the atmosphere, it is surely high time to advertise
'Wanted a Hercules.'
On my last visit the demand for a carriage and pair was triumphantly
met by the production of a diligence that had retired on account of old
age and failing powers from public service, but was still ready to do
a job for friends. Although built to contain some fifteen persons, it
was so ingeniously arranged that, except from the box-seats, nothing
could possibly be seen except the horses' tails and a few yards of
highroad. We were compelled to cluster round the driver like a bunch
of schoolboys, leaving the body of our machine to lumber along empty in
the rear.
To drive down Val Camonica on a fresh summer's morning before the
sunlight has lost its first grace and glitter, when, without a breath
of wind, every particle in earth and air, and even our own dull frames,
seem to vibrate with the joy of existence, is to have one of the most
delicious sensations imaginable. The scenery rivals and equals that
of the Val d'Aosta near Villeneuve. The valley curves gracefully, the
hillsides are cut by ravines or open out into great bays rich with
woods. Every bush stands clearly defined in the translucent air, every
leaf reflects back from a lustrous surface, unclogged by damp and
smuts, the welcome sunbeams with which the whole atmosphere is in a
dance. Lower down the slopes sweep out in folds of chestnut forest.
High overhead a company of granitic peaks stand up stiff and straight
in their icy armour against an Italian sky.
Below the opening of Val di Malga there is a long straight reach of
road; then Val Paisco, with a path leading to Val di Scalve, is passed
on the right and a bridge crossed. Amidst broken ground and closing
hillsides we approached Cedegolo, a considerable village, built
between two torrents and under sheltering rocks, in a sunny romantic
situation. As we drove up the street a quack doctor, taking advantage
of the assembly drawn down to Sunday high mass, was haranguing a
crowd of bright-kerchiefed girls and bronzed peasants from the hill
villages. Women from the lower valley were offering for sale grapes,
figs and peaches of the second crop, the latter red as roses and hard
as bullets.
The inn here has been visited and commended by several travellers
as clean and comfortable. Such praise it fully merits, but on other
grounds we had much reason to complain of the Cedegolans.
The habit of asking a very great deal more than you expect to get,
common in foreign, and particularly in Italian shops, is perhaps
as often an amusement as a vexation. The practice is most likely a
survival from the old system of barter, which must have necessarily
been incompatible with fixed prices. It will always be routed when time
becomes of more value to the purchaser than a possible diminution in
price. Heavy denunciations of its immorality sound to me rather odd
when they come from the mouths of those who themselves adopt in large
affairs the very same practice they condemn in small. Why it should
be dishonest to ask more than you will take for a ring or a piece of
lace, but perfectly right and fair to do the same for a house or estate
is a difficult question. The answer must be sought from our worthy
countryman who discourses on the rascality of the Jew with whom he
haggled six months for a cameo, and if he wants to get rid of a farm is
ready to fight for the hundreds sterling as hardly as ever shopkeeper
for the francs.
But the inconvenience of a system of bargain becomes, it must
be allowed, intolerable, when it is adopted by innkeepers. Their
charges differ from others in not being usually a subject of previous
arrangement. From the beginning the relation is a friendly one; there
is, or ought to be, a tacit understanding between host and guest that
no undue advantage will be taken. An extortionate bill is felt by the
traveller as a breach of good faith, and he resents it accordingly.
Of course it is always open to him to settle the price of everything
before he takes it. But fortunately this precaution is seldom
necessary, and it is much too tiresome to be adopted generally on the
chance.
However, I must, I fear, recommend this last resource to those who
visit Cedegolo, or the more western Bergamasque valleys. If they do not
adopt it they will often have to choose between paying five francs for
a bed or having their parting delayed and embittered by a discussion,
which, whatever its result weak concession or successful protest,
leaves behind it nothing but unpleasant recollections.
In this respect the unfrequented German Alps are happier resorts for
the wanderer. One could wish that these Italians had a little less
vigour of imagination, and did not see in every foreigner a mine of
unlimited wealth. If the story of the golden-egg-laying goose exists in
their language, the nearest branch of the National Alpine Club would do
well to distribute it as a tract throughout Cedegolo, and in one or two
other villages which I should be happy to indicate.
Val Saviore, the valley which joins Val Camonica at Cedegolo, is a
deep, short trough running west and east. The hillsides on the left
bank of its stream are steep and uninhabited. High upon them a white
spot is conspicuous against the green. It is an ice-cave, where
the snow never melts from year's end to year's end. The opposite
sunward-facing slopes are more gentle, and the principal villages lie
high up on the mountain side. Behind them two torrents issue out of
deep recesses, the Val di Salarno and Val d'Adame, the heads of which
are closed by branches of the great Adamello ice-field.[37]
A short zigzag amongst the boles and roots of an old chestnut forest
brought us to the level of the straight trench-like valley, from
which no view is gained of the neighbouring snows. But the scenery had
scarcely time to grow monotonous before we reached Fresine, a smutty
charcoal-burners' hamlet on the banks of the Salarno torrent, and at
the foot of the northern hillside.
A little further are the few houses of Isola, so called from their
peninsular position between the torrent issuing from Val d'Adame
and the smaller stream from Lago d'Arno. The hillside to be climbed
before we could see this lake, shown on maps as one of the largest of
high Alpine tarns, looked very long, steep and warm, and it proved
considerably longer, steeper and warmer than it looked. It is one
of the greatest climbs of its kind in the Alps. The Adamello valleys
abound in steep steps or 'scalas,' but this surpasses all the others,
near or far. From Isola to the water's edge the barometer showed a
difference of level of over 4,000 feet. For two-thirds of the ascent
the gradient and character of the path are the same as those of a
turret staircase, and the only level places are old charcoal-burners'
platforms. For the rest of the way the track, after having climbed
the cliff-faces which enclose the lower falls, penetrates the mountain
side by a cleft, through which the stream descends in a succession of
cascades and rapids. Except for its ambition to do too many feet in the
hour, the path could not be pleasanter. It winds through a shifting
and picturesque foreground of wood, crag and water, behind which
the far-off peaks of the Zupo, Bella Vista and Palu shine like snowy
pavilions spread out against the evening sun.
It might be worth a geologist's or physical geographer's while to
follow this track. On the vexed question of the share of work done by
glaciers in excavating valleys and lake-basins I do not presume to
offer an opinion. But I think a careful examination of the Adamello
group could scarcely fail to repay the trouble and add some new
materials for the discussion. In the numerous lakes scattered amongst
the upper branches of Val Camonica the followers of Professor Ramsay
may find support for their views. The believers in the potent action
of glaciers in the excavation of valleys will see in the Val di Fum
one of the few valleys in the Alps which answer to the picture fancy
draws of what a nice-dug valley should be like. On the other hand they
would be called on to explain how the majority of glaciers came to act
in a manner so unlike planes, and left the Val di Genova, and nearly
every other valley of the group, a mere flight of stairs. If the bed
of the Lago d'Arno was once occupied by ice it must have presented an
appearance not unlike the lowest plain of the Mandron Glacier, with a
tongue curling over towards Val Saviore.
A warm glow still rested on the granite ridges and glaciers, but in the
hollow all was already blue and grey, when the level of Lago d'Arno at
last opened before our eyes. A long, still sheet of dark water wound
away out of sight between bare hillsides, broken only here and there
by a solitary pine. There was no sound but the gentle lapping of the
waves or the continual murmur of a distant waterfall. The air seemed
fraught with a solemn peacefulness, the strange mere to be a living
thing asleep among the dead mountains. It was a scene to recall all
old legends of enchanted pools, and a spectre bark or an arm 'robed in
white samite' would in the falling gloom have seemed perfectly natural
and in keeping.
The character of the landscape was in no respect Italian. It was
scarcely Swiss, but rather, if I may judge of the unseen from painters,
Norwegian. High Alpine tarns are for the most part circular or
straight-sided; seldom, like Lago d'Arno, long, serpentine sheets of
water. Moreover its great height above the sea, by giving sternness
to the shores and bringing the snows down close upon them, naturally
suggests a more northern latitude.
We hurried along the rough hillside in search of the fisherman's hut
which was to be our night quarters. We found it among the boulders on
the very brink of the water.
Previous experience of Adamello huts had inspired me with the deepest
distrust of our prospects. But this time our shelter, if lowly in
outward appearance, proved comfortable enough inside. At one end of the
little cabin blazed a cheery fire, the smoke of which, for a wonder,
found its way out without first making the round of the interior. At
the other end was a hay-bed, arranged like a berth in two shelves,
one above the other. The centre was occupied by a bench; and there
were spoons and mugs stuck into odd holes and corners. Two worthy but
fussy fowls cackled away under the roof, apparently embarrassed by
the hospitable reflection that with their best endeavours they could
hardly provide eggs for the whole party. The only other tenant in
possession was a bright-eyed boy. A great many English boys would have
seen in his tenement their ideal of a Robinson Crusoe home. Even to
us disillusioned wanderers it looked fascinating, and had we been any
of us fishermen we might have been induced to spend a day or two in
paddling about in the triangular tub which was moored close by.
Daylight had barely lighted us to our goal, and now night added its
mystery to this wild spot. Faint rays from a still unseen moon lit up
the opposite peaks and snows, the great stars shone and were reflected
in the dark depths of sky and lake which faced each other.
In the earliest dawn the fisherboy launched his craft, and soon
returned with a fine pink-fleshed trout which we carried off with us.
He then led us up the steep rocks behind his hut to regain the track we
had left the night before.
The path from Isola is not the only route to the Passo di Monte Campo.
We shortly joined a broader track, which makes a long circuit from
the lower valley, and is said to be passable for horses, which the
staircase we had climbed could scarcely be called, though cows were
evidently in the habit of using it. When we left our boy it was quite a
pleasure, after the impositions of the last few days, to see his simple
delight over a piece of silver. The metal is rare in Italy in these
days of paper currency.
The lake, seen from the high terraces which we were now traversing,
appeared to be about three miles in length. It does not entirely
fill the basin, at the upper end of which is an alp and a small pool.
Higher up on the right lie the ice-fields and blunt summits of Monte
Castello. The ridge to be crossed now comes into view--a long saw,
the teeth of which, tolerably uniform in height, stretch from a rocky
eminence (Monte Campo) on the north to the glaciers on the south. The
path, running as a terrace along a steep hillside, gains, with little
climbing, a broad grassy gap near the foot of Monte Campo. The ruined
cabin on the crest may either be a douanier's outpost or a relic of the
Garibaldian corps, which in 1866 bivouacked here with bold intentions
but small result. This country has not been fortunate for the Italian
Irregulars. A body who established themselves near Ponte di Legno, and
talked largely about invading Val di Sole, were surprised one morning
by the Austrians anticipating their visit. The unlucky volunteers were
all at breakfast, scattered about the village, and before they could
offer any effective resistance were crushed with great slaughter.
Beyond the level meadows of Val di Fum rose the massive peak of the
Carè Alto, on this side an impossible precipice. But otherwise the
view was limited, and we readily decided to add the Monte del Castello
to our day's work. A most convenient goat-path, skirting the roots
of the rock-teeth, brought us to the edge of the ice. The glacier
was steep and slippery, and only just manageable without steps. The
top proved a double-crested ridge of loose granite boulders. On the
further and slightly lower point was a wooden cross, planted probably
by some shepherd from the Val del Leno, the glen on the southern flank
of the mountain. It would be easy to climb Monte del Castello from
the level of Lago d'Arno and to descend by this valley to Boazze;
and the route is recommended to mountaineers who already know Val
di Fum. In itself, Monte Castello is, it must be confessed, a very
inferior peak. It does not reach 10,000 feet, and it is out-topped
by a southern outlier, probably Monte Frerone. But as a view-point it
has merits. The long line of glaciers and peaks between the Adamello
and the Carè Alto presents an imposing appearance. From the opposite
horizons the Schreckhorn and Cimon della Pala, a worthy pair, exchange
greetings. The Grand Paradis is also in sight; but too many famous and
familiar forms are conspicuous by their absence, and one finds oneself
longing for the extra 1,000 feet of height which would sink half the
subordinate ridges and give true greatness its proper place.
We returned to the pass, whence a short zigzag leads down to the
pasturage and brilliantly blue lakelet known as the Alpe and Lago di
Caf. A broken hillside, on which scattered pines make foregrounds for
a picturesque view of the Carè Alto, the prominent peak of all this
country, slopes down upon the valley at the point where the torrent of
Val di Fum first leaves the level and plunges into a narrow gorge.
Val di Fum is said to be a corruption of Val dei Fini, a name due
to the ridge on its west being the limit between the territories
of Trent and Brescia. It is a broad, level meadow some eight miles
long, valuable as pasturage, and as such a subject of contention in
former times. The highest alp is known as the Coel dei Vighi, from
its former possessors, the commune of Vigo in Val Rendena, who drove
their cows thither by a paved track leading over a pass from Val San
Valentino. Over the door of the principal châlet of a lower alp is the
inscription--
1656 A. d. 18 L . . . . o,
which is read '1656 addì 18 Luglio,' and records what a local writer
with reason calls a 'fatto luttuosissimo.'
Then, as now, the commune of Daone were in possession of the pasturage.
The Cedegolans, however, imagined themselves to have a better claim to
it. With some brutality they proceeded to enforce their supposed rights
by bursting in a body on the châlets, suffocating the seven shepherds
in the large caldron, and cutting the legs of all the herd. After this
story we no longer wondered at the greed and depravity of the modern
villagers, the descendants of these ruffians. The claim so iniquitously
enforced does not seem to have been practically known in recent times,
but a strong tradition of it must have lingered to induce the Austrian
Engineers to give the Val di Fum to Lombardy on their large map.
As usual in this part of the Alps we scarcely reach the valley before
meeting a fine waterfall. At first the gorge descends in steps,
separated by swampy platforms; lower down, its fall becomes more
regular, gradually steepening as it approaches Boazze. The ground is
broken and rugged, and the path until recent improvements must have
been very bad. The Chiese is a noble torrent, green and clear despite
its glacier birth, and a perpetual delight to the eyes, whether it
leaps in white foam over some ash-hung crag or swirls in pure eddies in
a bubbling caldron.
Boazze, a sawmill and a châlet, stands in a sharp angle under wooded
cliffs. The houses are built, like villages in the Northern Caucasus,
of huge, red, unsmoothed pine-trunks. The woodcutters have amused their
leisure by painting imaginative titles over the various doors. Here we
read 'Cafè e Billiardo,' there 'Sala di Recreazione,' or 'Buvetta.'
But the thirsty traveller must not be deluded thereby into expecting
anything but a glass of the very roughest of country wine.
It is a long but very beautiful three hours' walk down Val Daone to
the high-road at Pieve di Buono. The mountains are not so high as
those which surround Val di Genova, but they are rich in colour and
picturesque in form. There are steep steps, down which the river
thunders in sheets of foam, level meadow expanses, tall cliffs fringed
with graceful foliage. Side-glens break through the walls on either
hand, and give glimpses into an upper land of lawns and pines, from
which we are being rapidly carried away towards hillsides clothed
with walnuts and chestnuts and all green Italian things. Some two
hours from Boazze the Chiese is left to fight its own way out through
a deep ravine, and the road takes an upward inclination. On a warm
afternoon one is disposed to feel strongly the egotism of the Daonians
in requiring everybody to pass through their high-perched village.
Although they may own the whole valley, a short cut through the
vineyards would have been, one fancies, a harmless concession to public
convenience.
The village overlooks a wide basin, clothed in vineyards and studded
with castles and churches. A long road circling from hamlet to hamlet
plunges at last upon Pieve di Buono, a double row of houses lying in
the bottom along either side of the high-road. A country inn offers
rest and refreshment to those who are unwilling or unable to get a
carriage and push on for Tione or Condino.
Here we enter fairly on the valleys of the Giudicaria, so called in
witness of certain rights early granted to the inhabitants by the
Bishops of Trent. This mountain region has little in common with the
Swiss Alps. The low elevation of the valleys, their sunny exposure,
and the gentle slope of their hillsides, give the scenery an air of
richness rarely found at the very base of great snow-mountains. The
frequent and gay-looking villages, the woods of chestnuts, the knots of
walnut-trees, the great fields of yellow-podded maize, the luxuriant
vines and orchards, have the charm which the spontaneous bounty and
colour of southern nature always exercise on the native of the more
reserved and sober North. No contrast could be at once more sudden and
more welcome than that offered by these softer landscapes to the eye
fresh from the rugged granite of the Adamello chain.
Life here, it is evident, is not the hard struggle with a stubborn and
grudging nature of the peasant of Uri or the Upper Engadine. Corn and
wine grow at every man's door, and the mountains offer abundant timber
and pasturage.
There remains, it is true, sufficient call for energy: torrents to be
embanked, hillsides to be terraced, gorges to be pierced by high-roads.
But all this lies well within the powers of a population which unites
in some degree German industry with Italian grace. Massive dykes
stem the stream and protect the water-meadows of Pinzolo; one of the
finest roads in Europe, built entirely at the cost of the neighbouring
'communes,' traverses the two great gorges of the Sarca. Here we see no
squalor, none of that sufferance of decay and ruin in whatever is old
which amongst southern Europeans as well as Orientals is often found
united with lavish expenditure on what is new.
The exceptional wellbeing and intelligence of the people is no doubt
to some extent referable to the physical features of their country.
The Northern Alps seem to have been more or less laid out according to
rule; valley is severed from valley by lofty and abrupt ridges; thus
isolation and seclusion are enforced on the mountain communities. Here
one can imagine that nature first planned a rolling hill-country and
put in the mountains as an afterthought, planting them here and there
at haphazard in isolated masses. Intercourse is thus rendered easy, for
the heads of the valleys are often rolling pasturages. It is in fact
rather the lower gorges than the crests of the hills which sever the
different districts. Val Rendena can always go to Val di Sole or Val
Buona; the defile of the Sarca has been but lately pierced.
Moreover, whatever may be the value of Mr. Ruskin's remarks on the
moral influence of granite, there can be no doubt of its material
advantages, and some of the orderly appearance of Val Rendena is
certainly due to its geology. The clean grey stone of the Adamello
is ever at hand in the form of erratic boulders, and is found useful
for every purpose, from a bell-tower or a dyke to a curbstone or a
vine-prop.
The road which runs through Pieve di Buono leads northwards over a
low pass, protected by several forts, to Tione, southwards past the
shores of Lago d'Idro to Salo or Brescia. But a more tempting branch
turns suddenly east and mounts through the fine gorge of Val Ampola,
the scene of Garibaldi's solitary success in 1866, to marshy uplands,
whence it descends on the still basin of Lago di Ledro, a Cumberland
tarn as far as hill-shapes go, but girt round with all the warmth and
colour of Italy. The landscape is imbued with cheerful sweetness, but
without any pretence to mountain sublimity. The little 'pension' lately
opened at Pieve di Ledro may, however, well detain for a few days
those who can dispense for a time with snow and wild crags and find
satisfaction in more homely beauties.
It is a country for strolls, not for expeditions, for idle rambles over
the forested hillsides among the tall alders and untamed hedgerows
which fringe the lake, or along the banks of the delicious stream
which flows from it, dancing down between the boles of chestnuts and
vine-trellises until under a spreading fig-tree it makes a last, bold,
green leap into the broad waters of the Lago di Garda.
The air at Ledro is already, after the mountains, soft and warm, and
the 2,000 feet of descent to Riva are a surprise. The road runs near
the torrent through a narrow glen, between vineyards, mulberries,
fig-orchards, and villages, in September a very Alcinous' garden of
ripeness.
Suddenly the verdure ceases on the brink of the great mural precipice
which overhangs the upper end of Lago di Garda. After several zigzags
the road boldly turns on to the face of the rock. The descent to Riva
is henceforth a mere groove blasted out of a smooth perpendicular
cliff. Deep below lie the dark waters, flecked by white birdlike
sails flying southwards before the morning breeze; opposite is the
broad crest of Monte Baldo rising above an olive-fringed shore. The
horses trot swiftly in and out of the tunnels and round the slow
bullock-waggons creaking heavily up to the hills. Riva bursts suddenly
into view, a line of bright-coloured houses and mediæval towers
crowded in between the lake, red cactus-spotted cliffs, and a wealth of
olive-gardens, orchards and cane-brakes--the most southern scene north
of Naples.
But before the latter half of September Riva is too hot to linger in.
Delicious as is an evening spent in the inn garden, where supper is
served under a trellis overlooking the moonlit lake, it scarcely makes
up the second time for a night spent in vain resistance to the assaults
of mosquitoes. It is best to return to the mountains which are still so
near at hand.
The river, which here enters the lake, will be our guide back to the
snows. No stream in Europe can boast a more varied or splendid youth
than the unknown Sarca, famous in its smooth-flowing old age, when it
issues again from Lago di Garda, under the new name of Mincio. It is
only necessary to look for a moment at the map to see what vicissitudes
the Sarca encounters, and what struggles it has to go through. One
is tempted to imagine that after Nature had once settled the Alpine
streams of this region in their proper and comfortable beds she gave
the whole country a rough squeeze, heaving up a hill here, making a
huge split there, and turning everything topsy-turvy. The Adige has, I
fancy, been cheated somehow out of the Lago di Garda. The Sarca clearly
ought to have joined the Chiese, and flowed down into Lago d'Idro.
There is something very unnatural about the eastward reach from Tione,
even before one knows how prodigious a feat in hill-splitting it really
is.[38]
Thanks, however, to its singular course, the scenery along the banks
of the Sarca is extraordinarily varied. Roughly speaking, the river's
progress may be divided into four great stages. The first, beginning
from the lake, is the Val del Lago, the deep trench which forms the
continuation of the Garda basin. Two or three miles through high-walled
gardens and vineyards which recall the environs of an eastern city
bring us to Arco, lying under a huge castled crag. After leaving
behind the broad streets and cypress avenues of the hot-looking
town, the drive grows monotonous. The road stretches on through the
half-desolate, half-luxuriant valley, from time to time the wheels
rattle over pavement, and we pass through the long, gloomy street of
some roadside village. The trough is now a wilderness of fallen blocks,
the road crosses a bridge, and winds along under great cliffs, which
threaten further destruction. Alle Sarche, a wayside inn where the road
from the Giudicaria joins that from Riva to Trent, is the end of the
first stage in our journey.
The valley continues in a straight line, but our river suddenly bursts
out of a deep narrow cleft in the wall of rock which has so long
overhung us.
The road first climbs the cliff-face by two long zigzags, then a
terrace cut in a bare bold wall of yellow rock pierces the jaws of the
defile. High up on the opposite cliff runs the thin track from Molveno
to Castel Toblino. The Sarca, victorious over all obstructions, glides
along its narrow bed swiftly, yet smoothly, that Mr. Macgregor, or some
one accustomed to those fearful feats in a 'cañon' pictorially recorded
in books of North American travel, might find it possible to shoot the
defile. When the walls break back a rich valley opens round us. The
red crags of the Brenta chain glow for a moment in the north, then the
Baths of Comano, a health-resort of local celebrity, is passed, and
Stenico and its castle are seen on the right, high-perched on a green
brow, holding the keys of the upper valley. The road and the river
force their way side by side through an extraordinary cleft, split
or cut through the heart of a chain rising on either side 6,000 feet
above the gulf. The gorge is greener and less savage than the last, yet
on a still more magnificent scale. Slender streams fall in glittering
showers from the shelves above, and are carried under or over the road
by ingeniously-contrived shafts or galleries.
The rocks at length withdraw, the hills open, and while we ascend
gently amongst orchards and rich fields of Indian corn, the Carè Alto
suddenly raises his icy horn over the green lower range. We are close
to Tione, and at another of the great turning-points in the Sarca
valley.
Tione itself is a thoroughly Italian country town, with dark narrow
streets crossed by archways, large houses built round courtyards,
low-roofed cafés, and miscellaneous shops. A happy sign of the times
may be seen in the conversion of the large barrack outside the town
into an elementary school.
Here we are but a short distance from Pieve di Buono, and a two hours'
drive would complete the circle. The valleys of the Sarca and Chiese
are at this point separated only by a low grassy ridge over which runs
a fine high-road, defended, like every road in this country, by a chain
of forts, the scene of some of the desultory skirmishes of 1866.
Above Tione the broad open basin which divides the granite and the
dolomite is known as Val Rendena. Owing to its peculiar situation
between two mountain-chains unconnected at their head, but little is
seen of the higher summits, and the landscape is rich and smiling. The
road, winding at first high on a wooded hillside, commands a charming
view of the upper valley as far as Pinzolo.
Orchards and cornfields separate the rapidly succeeding hamlets,
each of which resembles its neighbour. The method of construction
in this country is peculiar. The lower stories only, containing the
living-rooms, are built of stone; from the top of their walls rise
large upright beams supporting an immensely broad roof. The spaces
between the beams are not filled up, and the whole edifice has the air
of having been begun on too large a scale, and temporarily completed
and roofed in. The great upstairs barn is used for the storage of wood,
hay, corn, and all sorts of inflammable dry goods. The roof being also
of wood, the lightning finds it easy enough to set the whole mass in
a blaze, and fires arising from this cause are of common occurrence.
Caresolo, the next village above Pinzolo, was almost completely
destroyed in a night-storm during the autumn of 1873.
The openings of two lateral glens, Val di San Valentino and Val di
Borzago, are passed in quick succession. Near the latter stands the
oldest church in the valley, a square box covered with ruined frescoes,
and said to mark the spot of the martyrdom of St. Vigilius, a great
local evangeliser and patron saint. Heathenism lingered in this remote
region until the eighth century, and two hundred years earlier the
first unfortunate missionary was done to death by the inhabitants of
Mortaso, who, according to the tradition, finding no stones handy,
used their loaves as missiles. For this unlucky piece of barbarity the
perpetual hardness of their bread, even at the present day, is said to
be a punishment. It is difficult, however, to believe that loaves which
could kill a saint can have been very soft to begin with.
To judge from their habits and from the size and number of their
churches, the people are still as remarkable for devotion to their
religion as they were in pagan days. The wayfarer passing along
the valley in the early morning sees a crowd both of men and women
streaming out from early mass. In most cases the church seems to have
been rebuilt and enlarged in modern times, and a curious effect is
often produced by the juxtaposition of the huge whitewashed building
and the campanile of the older structure, a little stone tower with
circular-headed apertures, which scarcely reaches to the upper windows
of its overgrown companion.
The river is presently crossed, and as we approach the end of our long
drive and of the third stage in the Sarca's progress the mouth of Val
di Genova comes into sight on the left, and the snows of the Presanella
shine for a moment above the lower ridges. We are now within half a
mile of Pinzolo, the Grindelwald, or Cortina of this country. But in
this chapter I propose to confine myself to the southern approaches
to the two groups of the Adamello and the Brenta. The excursions round
Pinzolo must be reserved for future pages.
For the moment I shall ask the reader to stop short at the neighbouring
village of Giustino, and return with me thence to Trent by a byway
which enables us to avoid retracing our steps through Tione.
The walk from Val Rendena to Stenico, through Val d'Algone, is
dismissed in the guide-books with a few words of faint praise which
raise no expectation of its varied beauty. We left Pinzolo one
perfectly cloudless morning, to descend to the shores of Lago di Garda,
having for our companion a peasant familiar as the man who, seven years
before, had led me up to the Bocca dei Camozzi under pretence of its
being the pass to Molveno. To-day he was only engaged as an attendant
on the donkey which carried our traps; and it was chiefly to the
quadruped's sagacity that we trusted not to be misled.
We soon quitted the high-road down the valley, and climbed a steep
pavé past the stations leading to a whitewashed church perched on a
knoll amongst the mossy chestnut-groves. A large village, with a trim
granite-edged fountain and a tall campanile, was soon left below.
The ascent then became hot and tiresome for a time, where the path
perversely left the woods and chose for its zigzags a loose, dusty,
shadeless slope. The summit of the Presanella was now in view. The
ungainly hump here representing the mountain is the greatest possible
contrast to the noble mass which, with its long escarped sides and icy
pinnacles, towers above the Tonale road. The Grivola is the only other
peak I know of which undergoes so complete a transformation. Above the
bare ascent lies a sloping shelf of meadow, dotted with hay-châlets.
The path then enters the forest, the thick stems of which shut out all
distant view. Suddenly they open and leave room for a smooth level
glade: shut round by a green wall of pines, it is a place where an
altar to Pan may have risen out of the mossy sward, and shepherds have
held their sylvan revelries. This 'leafy pleasantness' is the top of
the ridge known by the poetical name of the Pra Fiori. Behind us the
icy comb of the Carè Alto gleamed through the branches; in front the
massive form of a dolomite peak towered over the tree-tops. Bearing to
the left, and descending very slightly from the pass, we came in a few
minutes to a grassy brow adorned with beech-trees. A more beautiful
site is hardly to be found; and here, with one consent, we built our
ideal Alpine châlet.
Below us lay the smooth level of the Val d'Algone; on one side rose the
bare, torn, and fretted face of a great dolomite, surrounded by lower
ridges scarcely less precipitous, but clothed in green wherever trees
or herbage could take root. Towards the south the distant hills beyond
the Sarca waved in gradations of purple and blue through the shimmer of
the Italian sunshine.
A short zigzag through thick copses took us down to the meadows. The
large solitary building in their midst is a glass manufactory. At this
point a good car-road begins, which, branching lower down, leads either
to Tione or Stenico.
The loftier dolomites were soon lost to view behind a bend in the
valley, and the road plunged down a deep and narrow glen between banks
of nodding cyclamens, bold crags, and the greenest of green hillsides.
About two hours' walk from the glass manufactory the gorge of the
Sarca opened in front, and the road to Stenico, leaving the stream to
fall into it, wound at a level round the face of perpendicular cliffs.
Tione and its village-dotted valley were seen for a few moments before
our backs were turned to them, and we fairly entered the gorge of the
Sarca. The high-road and river thread side by side the intricacies of
the great cleft; our way lay along a shelf blasted out of the cliffs
a thousand feet above them. The rays of a midday sun streamed full
upon us from an unclouded heaven, and every rock reflected back the
glow of light and heat. Notwithstanding, we walked briskly on, for
the castle of Stenico was full in view and scarcely a mile distant.
Before reaching it we had to make the circuit of a gorge. From the hot
golden rocks overhead a great fountain burst forth and poured down in
a cool cascade, the waters of which were soon captured in channels
and spread amongst terraced orchards and fig gardens, green--not as
we know greenness--but with the vivid colour of Broussa or Damascus.
Under the shade of the picturesque old covered bridge which crosses
the stream, we halted for a few minutes to admire a view almost unique
in my Alpine experience. Close beside us stood the castle of Stenico,
perched high on a crag, commanding on one side the entrance to the
gorge, overlooking on the other a wide sunny basin, girt by verdant
ridges compared to which the shores of Como are bare and brown. The
hollows and lower slopes sparkle with villages, and teem with Indian
corn and trailing vines. The hills do not, as in the Northern Alps,
rise in continuous ridges, but are broken up into masses of the most
romantically beautiful forms. Such may have been the scenery of the
fairest portions of Asia Minor before the Mahometan conquest brought
desolation upon the land.
A steep car-road connects Stenico with the high-road to Trent and Riva.
At Alle Sarche we left the Sarca and our old tracks, and turned sharply
to the north. The little pool of Lago Toblino is rendered picturesque
by its castle, an old fortified dwelling standing on a peninsula,
and defended landwards by crenellated battlements. Beyond the lake
a long ascent leads first through luxuriant orchards to Padernione,
then through tame scenery to Vezzano, a large country town lying in
an upland plain. Another climb brought us to a higher basin, still
rich in vines and fig-trees. At its further end we plunged into a
ravine. An Austrian fort crowned the hill above us, another was built
in the bottom, right across road and stream, a scowling black and
yellow-striped dragon of the defile. Rattling over its drawbridges,
we followed the water for some distance through a narrow cleft, until
suddenly the wide valley of the Adige broke on our eyes, backed by rich
mountain-slopes. In the centre of the landscape rose the many towers of
Trent, a dark ancient city surrounded by a ring of bright modern villas
scattered on the neighbouring hills.
FOOTNOTES:
[37] See Appendix A. for mention of the passes they offer.
[38] The suggestions made here at haphazard are, I see,
seriously supported by Dr. Julius Morstadt in a long article
_Ueber die Terraingestaltung in Südwestlichen Tirol_ in the
last publication of the German Alpine Club, _Zeitschrift des
Deutschen Alpenvereins_, Band V. Heft 1, 1874.