DISSENTIS--COIRE.
He looks around,
And seeks for good, and finds the good he seeks.
WORDSWORTH.
My first business now was to look for some one to take Leuthold’s
place. Among the candidates who offered themselves I did not find one
whose appearance and style of talk suggested the probability of his
proving somewhat of a companion. I, therefore, despatched a telegram
to my wife, who was at Portresina, to send me by to-morrow’s post a
Poschiavo man, of whom some weeks back I had heard that he was desirous
of acting as my porter. I was not unwilling to try him, because he was
one of the class--a large and characteristic one in the Grisons--which
goes abroad to seek fortune. He had sought his for ten years, but not
with complete success, at the antipodes; and now having returned,
somewhat disappointed at the result of his quest, was for the present
open to any engagement that required only unskilled labour. Their own
country being too poor to find them employment, temporary emigration,
as most of us are aware, is resorted to by a large proportion of the
youth of the Grisons. This is the national tradition. In all the
capitals of the old and new world these temporary emigrants are found
engaged in the production and sale of pastry and confectionery, of
loaf-sugar and sugar-plums, of liqueurs and lemonade. My acquaintance
had endeavoured to amass the competency on which he might return
home, and which would entitle him to a place among the aristocracy
of Poschiavo, by the concoction of lemonade and ices at Sydney, and
at several of the New South Wales diggings. But what with fires, bad
debts, and bad building ventures at speculative diggings, which had
soon been deserted, he had not met with the success which generally
crowns Grison ambition; and so it had come about that he was now
maintaining himself, as chance enabled him, till he might recover heart
for a new effort. Having despatched the telegram for him to meet me
to-morrow evening at Coire, I went on in the afternoon by diligence to
Dissentis.
As we slowly ascended the zigzags which carry the road through the
carefully kept prairies immediately above Andermatt, the picture
presented to us was full of interest to an English eye. I went
over this ground in my ‘Month in Switzerland’ of last year, and in
my narrative of the scenes and incidents of that excursion I said
something of the history of the Oberalp alpe which we are now entering
on, and of the various ways in which it is at present turned to
account. I now again read the scene with undiminished interest. It
was thoroughly Swiss. The mountain side was so steep that skilful
engineering had been required to construct the road. With the exception
of two or three small patches of potatoes on the lower part, nothing
but grass could be grown. But how carefully had the grass been
cultivated! Though on the mountain flanks, which must originally
have been strewn with stones and rocks, not a stone was to be seen,
and only a few protruding rocks remained, which were so large as to
defy removal. Nowhere was there a noxious weed, or a bush. The smooth
emerald-green felt of turf was spread out everywhere, frowned upon by
overhanging craggy summits, whose work of centuries had now been all
undone; or rather what was obstructive in that work had been undone,
and what might be made serviceable had been turned to account. The
showers of stones they had been sending down through all those long
ages to bury the little soil they had helped to form, had by the labour
of successive generations of peasant proprietors been all removed.
There was nothing now that could obstruct the stroke of the scythe, or
the possible growth of a blade of grass. Some of the summits were still
streaked and patched with snow, which suggested that the frost, which
rends the rocks, was up there seldom idle. Along the grassy slopes were
no walls or hedges. Only where a boundary mark might be required, a
stake had been driven into the ground. These rose but a few inches
above the surface. Here and there might be seen a hay grange; but not
many of them, for in the winter the people hereabouts are all collected
into the little town. This, from the first rise, shows as a cluster
of sombre gray houses, amongst which two churches stand pre-eminent.
The season was late this year, and so on the grassy slopes, some of
them very steep, were to be seen busily employed in spreading, or in
collecting the hay several women. They were unshod, for here people
are too chary of whatever costs money, to wear shoes when they can do
without them. On their heads they had orange kerchiefs. The men at
this season are most of them dispersed far and wide in their different
summer employments, by which they will earn a great part of what
will support their families in the long winter; and so the haymaking
devolves in some places almost entirely on the women. To-day as they
stirred it about they made the air fragrant with its scent, that air,
which around us was so purely translucent, but which above our heads
seemed to solidify into a firmament of indigo.
The effect of the scene upon you is enhanced by the sense of your being
so many thousand feet above your ordinary level. You are, however,
still going up, and the mown sward is shrinking into Alpine pasture.
The haymakers now at a distance below show like pigmies. The little
town is now no longer sombre gray, but has in the sunlight, and by the
distance, become gleaming white.
As we approached the lake on the summit of the Pass we saw that much
turf had lately been cut for the long cold winter. Up here nature gives
no wood for fuel. Fortunately, however, the climate is not unfavourable
to the growth of plants that in suitable situations produce peat;
though there is considerable difficulty in drying the peat sufficiently
to render it combustible. To effect this we found it set up on rocks,
or, where these could not be found, on inclined banks from which the
rain would quickly run off. I was sorry to see that there was much
soil and sand in this peat, and that, therefore, it was not of the
best kind for producing heat. Still it is the only fuel the locality
supplies; and without it, such even as it is, fewer people could live
at Andermatt, because in that case the cost of a prime necessary of
life would be much increased.
At the head of the lake you are on the top of the Pass, and enter the
Grisons. At first, for some distance, you descend rapidly; and may
think, as you often have occasion to think on Alpine roads, and, too,
with far more reason than here, that the traveller has some need of
faith in the skill of the driver, in the excellence of the materials of
the carriage and harness, and in the training and sure-footedness of
the horses. For some time the road is down rather poor Alpine pastures,
meagre, steep, and rocky: but as we are not looking at the scene with
the eye of a Lincolnshire grazier, we are glad to think that these
meagre-looking steep and rocky pastures will supply many a family with
good milk and cheese, a part of the latter being convertible into
such of the necessaries of their humble lives as they cannot produce
themselves. And are there not grand mountain summits around you? And
is not the valley before you the cradle of the famous Rhine? And are
not all these mountains sending down affluents to the already vigorous
infant? These are the thoughts with which you begin the descent.
You continue the descent, and in due time come to the first village.
You then understand more fully than before the value of the
meagre-looking, steep, and rocky pastures. In the way of cultivated
human food nothing even here can be attempted but potatoes. For
anything else it is still too high, cold, and wet; and the few potatoes
will at the best be very poor, small, watery, immature; and a frost
may at any time prevent their reaching even these degrees of all
but worthlessness. There must, however, be a beginning, and these
industrious people are not slow in making it. A little lower down you
come upon attempts at cultivating in sheltered places with good aspects
rye and barley. It is now August, but here the rye and barley are not
yet in bloom. They are still green and growing; the ear, however, has
just got out of the stem: that is as yet all. If these crops should
ever get so far as to be worth harvesting, you see lofty frames, like
monster clothes-horses, with many bars, upon which the sheaves will be
fastened to improve the poor peasants’ chances of drying and hardening
the grain sufficiently for grinding. You will see, too, that these
growers of rye and barley under difficulties are now busy in attempting
to make hay under similar difficulties, and in a similar fashion. The
mown grass is not spread out on the ground to dry; that would be too
wet for such a purpose; but it also is arranged on frames, only of a
different construction. Each is formed of a post rising about five feet
above the ground, through which are passed two or three bars at right
angles to each other. Each bar has two arms, and each arm projects
from the post about three feet. On these arms the hay is loaded into a
kind of cock, which has this arrangement of the post and bars for an
internal skeleton. It is thus lifted off the damp ground, and is so
held up throughout by the bars, or arms, as to be completely pervious
to the air. In this way it is made in a ventilated cock; and when a
fine day comes, the women come, and carry it home in large hempen
sheets, and with joyful and thankful hearts: for are they not carrying
home what will give their little ones milk in the long winter? And up
here their little ones could not live without that milk.
As you approach Dissentis you see not only that the breadth of
cultivable land has much increased, but also that you have descended
into a more genial stratum of climate. Wheat, and even millet, have
put in an appearance on the scene. Here, in favoured situations, I
found the former so advanced that it seemed to be beginning to show
symptoms of a disposition to change colour.
As two or three hours of daylight still remained I walked down the
banks of the stream that descends from the Acletta valley, that I
might see its junction with the Rhine, for here the Rhine, of course,
occupies a prominent place in one’s thoughts, for has it not a
prominent place in the history of the Roman, the French, and the German
Empires, and in the history, too, of the greatest captain of each--the
great Julius, the great Napoleon, and the great Moltke? Behind it, as
a natural and national bulwark, and on its banks, the German people
from the beginning of their known national existence, were growing to
maturity, and organizing themselves. If the history of the white race
be regarded as a whole, this Rhine stands out as the most historic of
all its rivers. Much has directly resulted from its being what it is,
and where it is. Its absence would have so modified the history of the
race as to have brought about a state of things widely different from
that of to-day. The stream I was now tracking down to it--one of the
first threads from which, as it were from so many roving machines, its
first strand is spun--has below the town cut out for about a mile or
less a deep ravine bed, along the rocky channel of which it tumbles,
and twists itself, in its haste to incorporate itself with the nascent
trunk of the famous river. It seemed by its bluster and haste to be
emphasizing its desire to become a part of it, and a participant in its
renown. The actual junction was achieved a little beyond the ravine,
in a more quiet style. The impetuous affluent is now no longer in a
hurry, but will taste to the full the contentment of the consummation
of the hitherto so eagerly sought union. At this point were several
trout-fishers. Up then almost to its source this famous stream is rich
in fish. Its banks will soon be rich with vineyards.
As I had loitered for some time on the banks of the young Rhine, and of
its affluent, the evening was closing in when I returned to Dissentis.
As I passed up the main street I overtook the female swineherd of the
place bringing home for the night the pigs of Dissentis. There were
four or five score of them. She herself brought up the procession that
none might loiter behind. She had been tending them all day in the
ravine just mentioned, which was incapable of cultivation, and on some
stony irreclaimable waste land on the Rhine bank. Each porker knew his
own home in the town. Some ran on in advance of the herd to get as
soon as possible to the supper they knew would be ready for them. Some
did not separate themselves from the herd till they had arrived at the
familiar door. These more quiet-minded members of the herd probably had
no expectation of a supper prepared for them, and were, therefore,
still thinking of the grassy pasture from which they had just been
driven off. The swine were followed, at no great interval, by the
goats with stiffly distended udders. They, too, dispersed themselves
in the same fashion, from the desire to be promptly relieved of their
burden. After the goats, last of all, came the deliberately stepping,
sober-minded cows. The tinkling of their bells was heard over the whole
of the little town. In a few minutes the streets were cleared: every
man, woman, and child appeared to have followed the animals into the
houses to give them their supper, or to draw the milk from them, as
the case might be; or at all events to bed them for the night. Thus
do these hard-pressed peasants from their earliest years learn to
treat their dumb associates kindly, almost as if they were members of
the family, to the support of which they so largely contribute. There
can be few people in Dissentis who do not begin, and end, each day in
company with them. How familiar must they be with the ways and the
wants of the egoistic pig, of the self-asserting, restless goat, and
of the gentle, patient cow! The book of nature, too, is always open
before them, and they are ever interested students of its pages. From
hour to hour they observe the changes of the heavens, and consider what
they import, for to them they import a great deal. How their little
crops, too, are looking they note day by day, for the time that will
be allowed for bringing them to maturity will be so short, that the
loss of sunshine for a few days causes some anxious thoughts. This
dependence upon, and close contact with, nature is a large ingredient
in their education.
_August 3._--Opposite to my hotel was the public fountain of Dissentis.
The functions of a Swiss fountain resemble those of an Eastern well.
To it come daily all the women of the village for the water they will
require for their families. It has, however, other uses besides that of
supplying the water that will be needed within the house. The linen,
the milk vessels, and the cooking utensils of the village are for the
most part washed at the fountain, for it would be hard work to carry
home all the water that might be wanted for these purposes. Here, too,
the daily news of the village is discussed, and put into circulation.
This morning there was a stranger seated on the bench in front of the
Hotel de la Poste, observing those who came to the Dissentis fountain.
As to their personal appearance, it was evident that the hard work and
poor fare of many generations had not dwarfed the race, for those who
came were generally above what we should regard as the middle height.
Their features, however, as might have been expected, were somewhat
hard. Their dress was sombre: they are not a people who much affect
colour. Their _coiffure_ was simple: upon it not much time or care had
been bestowed. Their _chaussure_ at this early hour was with most of
them that of nature. In their manner there was not much of liveliness,
not, I suppose, because that would have been deemed unbecoming in
public, but probably because they might not have been disposed to it.
The hardness of their lives must bring with it some hardness of manner.
These good women had already been up some hours, milking the cows and
goats, and providing their husbands’ and children’s breakfasts; and
this might have taken out of them some of that freshness of feeling
that would have been in keeping with the freshness of the morning. They
might, too, have been desirous of getting as quickly as possible to the
hay-field, and the prospect of the hard work there awaiting them might
have had something to do with making them grave and taciturn.
The telegraph bureau is on the ground floor of the hotel. Here the
instrument, as is generally the case in Switzerland, was in charge
of a young woman. What would the last generation in the valley, or
the abbots and monks of their forefathers’ time, have thought of a
young woman of Dissentis earning her livelihood by keeping Dissentis
in instantaneous communication with all Europe, the new world, and
the antipodes? When the locomotive and marine engine were invented
man began to move to and fro upon the earth. This movement, however,
is still only at its beginning. When the electric telegraph was
invented all the world was enabled to converse with all the world.
This conversation, too, is still only at its beginning. And yet it is
to these two agencies that we must attribute the rapidity with which
events march in these times. But as this rapidity is so great at the
beginning what are we to suppose that it will be a century hence?
This is what no man can imagine. The astounding character of the last
war in Europe was due to the railway and the telegraph. Whatever at
this moment most engrosses attention, and agitates thought, as for
instance the organization of the working classes, the rapid combined
action of the leaders of aggressive Ultramontanism, and even the recent
development in ‘leaps and bounds’ of the commerce of the world, are
mainly due to the same causes. And if one of these causes is more
potent than the other, it is that all the world can now converse
with all the world, because it is this that in these days enables
for any purpose a whole kingdom, a whole continent, or the whole
world, to organize itself. We may compare the rapidity with which
these inventions have been turned to account with the snail’s pace at
which letters, the most fruitful of all human inventions, have been
manifesting their powers and uses. For how many thousands of years
have they been working for the overthrow of ignorance, superstition,
and injustice! It is true that in this work mighty advances have been
made: yet when we survey the whole field we see that hitherto only so
much has been done as to give assurance that a great deal more will
be achieved in the future. What has been accomplished gives us ground
for the hope that it is but a glimpse of what is to come. They have
done, or at all events have rendered possible the doing of, almost all
that has been done for us. What we notice is that it seems to have
been done so slowly. Perhaps the electric telegraph by collecting and
disseminating intelligence, and enabling people everywhere to converse
with each other, is destined to lighten this reproach of letters, that
they have not been so rapidly or widely fruitful as might have been
expected.
At Dissentis the magician who manipulated this instrument of
instantaneous communication with all the world, was a little body,
very little, with very gentle voice and manner. By the side of the
instrument she was working had been placed a bouquet of flowers,
white marguerites, and red geraniums, with a carnation or two--a
flower you see everywhere in Switzerland, generally in a pot, or box
at the _châlet_ window, for the Swiss are as fond of it, and tend it
as lovingly, as the modern Greeks. These flowers much brightened the
aspect of things, and took off from their office look. On my asking
for a _billet_ for the 10.30 A.M. diligence for Coire, the little body
filled it in, and handed it to me made out in my proper name. The
traveller, presuming on a previous conversation, commented upon this.
‘Now I see that you are in every respect a little Fairy. You know
everything.’
_Little Fairy._ ‘It is that in these days little Fairies must learn to
read, and yesterday evening your _sac_ was left for some time in my
bureau.’
_Traveller._ ‘Yes. But in learning to read letters they have not
forgotten their old skill in reading what is meant by a present of
flowers.’
_Little Fairy._ ‘Flowers fade, and so sometimes does their meaning.’
On the opposite side of the road to the hotel _Condrau de la Poste_,
is, to the left of the fountain, the hotel _Condrau de la Couronne_.
The latter Condrau is the editor of the Romansch newspaper which is
published at Dissentis. I was told that he was a well-educated man, had
for some time been tutor in a French family, and was entitled to write
himself Professor. I took away with me a copy of that week’s impression
of his paper. I found that it was not difficult by the aid of Latin and
Italian to make out the meaning of the printed Romansch of Dissentis,
though probably, if I had heard it read, I should not have understood
one word in ten.
At 10.30 was under weigh for Coire. The day was fine, and the
conductor arranged a seat for me on the roof upon the luggage. The
drive was pleasant and interesting. I can, however, only give of it
such generalities as might have been seen from my seat on the roof.
Of course the mountains most obtrude themselves on the eye. They vary
much. Some are grassed, some are wooded to the top; some show much
naked rock; of these some terminate in jagged points, some in rounded
domes; some that you see through gaps in the bounding ridges gleam with
sun-lit snowfields. As a rule the valley is wide, and so its bounding
ranges stand back to such a distance that they can be well taken in by
the eye from bottom to top, and in combination with their neighbours.
They can be leisurely and sufficiently seen.
Another point observable in this grand long valley is the regular
improvement in the vegetation which accompanies your descent. This
has been already noted as far as Dissentis. In reaching that place
yesterday afternoon we had passed from the treeless Alpine zone of
altitude down to that of late maturing wheat. When you reach Coire,
thirty-eight miles lower down, wheat has been superseded by maize,
and you are among vineyards, which had begun to show themselves seven
miles higher up at Reichenau. Between Dissentis and Reichenau different
kinds of fruit trees, and of garden vegetables successively appeared on
the scene. As the fruit trees began to come in, the frames for drying
wheat, and other kinds of grain, began to die out. Above Reichenau
are some naked glaring ravines cut deep into the white calcareous
soil. Here the bottom land has so widened out as to give space for
knolls and hills, some in wood, some in grass. As you descend an
improvement, corresponding to that in the vegetation, is simultaneously
observable in the houses and villages. As nature becomes more kindly
and bountiful, human life becomes more varied, more easy, and more
embellished. Long before you reach Reichenau good roomy substantial
houses begin to appear in the small towns. Many of these are surrounded
with gardens, of which you see nothing in the higher part of the
valley, but which after they have become possible continue to improve
all the way down. At last at Coire there is about the main street an
air of something that gives it a not quite unfamiliar aspect. It seems
as if a third-rate piece of Paris had been transported to the valley,
and there dropped between the mountains.
At Coire, if you have some time before you, and nothing else to do, you
will perhaps go to the Cathedral. You will there hear the old story
of Saints and wonders, as if there had been better men and greater
wonders a thousand years ago than there are now. Here the Saint was a
British king, of a date when there were no kings in Britain. You will
have met with British and Irish Saints elsewhere. You ask why these
legends of British and Irish Saints of that day, but no Saints now?
Have we degenerated so much from our fathers? I trow not. We are not
worse than were they. We may, perhaps, be somewhat better. How, then,
has it come to pass that these islands have ceased to be a factory
of Saints? Is it because other people have at last come to know us?
No longer are we so separated from them by the sea as to be in their
eyes almost another world; and as they have come to know us they have
arrived at the discovery that we are very much like themselves, at
all events in not being more productive of Saints than themselves. In
those times people wanted the idea of a nation of Saints. This they
could not imagine of their wicked selves, or of any of their still more
wicked neighbours, for they very well knew of themselves and of their
neighbours, that they were always trying to overreach, and plunder,
and knock on the head, and oppress each other; and so they localized
this idea beyond sea, and the British Isles became a kind of realized
Christian Atlantis. Tacitus, because the Romans were vicious, invested
the distant Germans with a halo of rude virtues. For much the same kind
of reason did the ages of ignorance and violence go to the British
Isles for so many of their Saints.