those parts of Switzerland which are between 2500 and 4000 feet above
the level of the sea. Below the former elevation he does not consider
the mountains to have begun; above the latter heights we get into the
second or Alpine circle. The first region is made up partly of
independent mountains, whose height does not exceed the stipulated 4000
feet, partly of the broad flanks and slopes of loftier mountains. It is
the region of waterfalls. The Jura is the most important of the
independent chains it comprises. Many of the most charming parts of
Switzerland are in the horizontal zone, thus established between 2500
and 4000 feet above the sea. It contains beautiful valleys, some
manufacturing places; the high-roads to Italy traverse it; small
villages, shepherds’ cottages, cow and sheep stables, are found in even
its most elevated valleys. In summer it is overrun by travellers,
wandering in quest of cascades and glaciers; in winter its fashionable
baths and elegant hotels are closed or deserted, and it is enlivened
only by the passage of strings of mules laden with merchandise.
To us the most attractive parts of this book are those where we find the
author wandering in the woodlands, communing with the brute creation,
and unostentatiously displaying his rare familiarity with sylvan sights
and sounds. It is with reference to those chapters, and not to his
geological and meteorological dissertations, that we have more
particularly taken up his work; but before walking with him into the
woods, we are tempted to abridge two curious and interesting pages,
relating to the hollows and caverns frequently found in the Alps. The
worthy naturalist’s German is occasionally as rugged as the rocks he
writes about, and we must aim rather at giving its spirit than at
rigidly rendering its letter.
“Throughout the whole Alpine land,” he says, “hollows are numerous, and
often of very interesting appearance. They assume the most various
forms—gentle recesses of cliffs, with overhanging roofs, regular closed
grottoes or caves, which the Bernese Oberlanders call ‘Balm;’
ravine-like hollows ending in rocky vaults, or communicating with yet
deeper clefts and crevices; and finally, passages broken through the
mountains from daylight to daylight. With these hollows tradition
associates many pious reminiscences of saints and missionaries, and here
and there a chapel or hermitage is still to be found in their vicinity.
The interior of these rocky dwellings is often of singular conformation,
including narrow galleries, deep and gloomy pools of water, and
unexplored precipices, sinking more than a thousand feet into the bowels
of the mountain. In some are found, as signs that in former times they
were used as hiding-places by fugitives, or as dwellings by banditti,
Roman and ancient German coins; in others, petrified bones or
shell-fish; in others, again, rounded fragments of serpentine and of
other descriptions of stone not proper to the mountain; remains of
beasts of prey, which for centuries have been extinct in those regions;
and finally—this especially in the Jura—masses of snow and ice that
never melt. Most of them have an internal coating of stalactites. Almost
more remarkable than these caverns are the _wind-holes_, everywhere
found in the mountains—deep narrow clefts in the rock, which sometimes
have, and sometimes have not, an upper exit. In fine summer weather, a
strong and very cold wind issues from them; in winter, on the contrary,
the air rushes into them, and their temperature is higher than that
without. Such wind-holes are very numerous in the Alps.... The
cow-keepers use them as dairies. They are not without influence upon
animal and vegetable life. When not taken possession of by man, they are
frequently taken advantage of by a fox or marmot, for one of the several
entrances to his earth. Plants will not thrive at their entrance or in
their vicinity, with the exception of some few dark mosses and lichens.
Upon the same natural laws with these wind-holes, depends the existence
of the vast and wonderful ice-caverns which are found in the mountains
far below the snow-line, and which contain, for many months together,
sometimes the whole year through, huge masses of ice. We may cite the
icecavern of St George, situate near Rolle, 2562 feet above the lake of
Geneva, on a shelf of the foremost range of the Jura, which contains
some 2000 hundredweight of ice, and where it freezes even in summer;
also the greatest and most magnificent of all known ice-caverns, the
sheep-hole on the lake of Thun, in a cliff 1500 feet high, 5604 above
the level of the sea, penetrating deep into the mountain, and containing
the strangest formations of ice. Notwithstanding its uninviting aspect,
shepherds and cowherds take refuge within it in stormy or very hot
weather, and it not unfrequently affords shelter to a thousand head of
sheep.”
Quitting inanimate for animate objects, Dr Tschudi enumerates the
vertebrals found in Switzerland. Besides domestic animals, he estimates
them at about 430 kinds, of which fifty are mammalia, thirty-two
amphibia, forty-two fish, and no less than 310 different kinds of birds.
The position of Switzerland, midway between the north and south of
Europe, makes it a place of rendezvous for many foreign birds, seen but
rarely, or for short seasons. “Strange guests often come to us,” says
the doctor, “now from the icebergs of the North Sea, then from the hot
plains of Egypt. Ducks and divers, geese and sea-mews, from the polar
regions, meet the African flamingo, the Egyptian ibis, the purple heron
from the Black Sea, the sea-swallow from the Caspian. Many of these are
merely casual visitors—birds that have been scared, disturbed when
brooding, or that have lost their way, as in the case of the flock of
2130 pelicans that appeared on the Bodensee in the year 1768.” Upon the
other hand, in autumn occur regular and systematic changes of quarters,
numbers of birds flying south, to seek the warmer climates of Italy and
Africa, whilst others come from the north, well pleased to winter in
Switzerland. Spring dismisses the strangers, and brings back the
emigrants. Of these, however, but few return to their old accustomed
copses, woods, and valleys. Some have sunk under the fatigues of the
journey, more have been carried off by birds of prey; the greatest
number have fallen victims to man. Dr Tschudi is indignant at the
furious war waged in Italy upon his feathered songsters and favourites.
“Not only snipes, quails, thrushes, pigeons, and suchlike birds, are
taken, but the friendly swallow, so respected in our country; linnets,
nightingales, little singing-birds of all kinds, are unceasingly
assailed, during their passage through the land of citrons, with net and
gun, by young and old of all classes—tradesmen, mechanics, priests, and
nobles. At Bergamo, Verona, Chiavenna, Brescia, millions of birds are
annually taken—for the most part creatures which no one in Switzerland
would dream of injuring, but which we rather cherish for the sake of
their beautiful notes. Therefore is it that Italy, the land of music and
song, is so extraordinarily poor in singing-birds. The same is the case
in the canton of Tessin, which has long been infected with the Italian
bloodthirstiness, and where even sparrows are scarce. From Tessin and
the Valteline the birdcatchers advance to the St Gothard, and to the
mountains of the Grisons, to intercept the friendly little creatures
upon the very frontier with their treacherous nets. Therefore has there
been for some time remarked in Switzerland, a growing and alarming
diminution in the numbers of the insectivorous birds. The canton of
Tessin is much more injured than benefited by its birdcatchers. Fifteen
hundred shooting licenses (which there cost but a franc a-piece) are
annually issued; but birdcatching with nets, snares, lime, traps, owls,
and even with great fowling-floors (_Rocoli_), is free to all. Beyond
the Monte Cenere, a single _rocoladore_ will often take, upon a fine
October day, 1500 small birds. It is easy to understand how great is the
loss of time and labour for a country which, in many branches of
industry, is so far behindhand, and how prejudicial an influence this
wholesale slaughter must have upon the character of the people. In
German Switzerland, upon the other hand, birdcatching is very little
practised, and only against a few sorts of finches and thrushes; and
shooting is confined almost exclusively to large game,—pigeons,
fieldfares, and birds of prey. Small birds are left tolerably
unmolested; the swallows are guarded by the popular piety, and only the
other day (1852) a law for their protection was published in the canton
of Vaud.”
The doctor’s disgust at the wholesale bird-slaughter on the Italian
frontier of Switzerland, is not to be attributed merely to a
naturalist’s sympathy with the sweet-throated objects of his study, and
companions of his solitary rambles. Of all animals, birds are those
which most contribute to the cheerfulness of nature. How strongly one
feels this during a long walk through a lonely country! Quadrupeds fly
and hide themselves at our approach; only now and then we see a hare
scudding away in the distance, or a saucy squirrel perched upon a bough
high over our head; as we walk by the river-side, the trout plashes out
of the water, fly-catching intent. But all these creatures are mute,
shy, and rarely seen, whilst birds are all around us, twittering in the
bushes by our side, flashing their plumage in the sunbeams, warbling in
the trees we walk under, and carolling high aloft in the clouds. How
deadly dull the forest and mountain would be without them! Such,
doubtless, have often been Dr Tschudi’s thoughts when he walked forth
alone to gather knowledge on nature’s page, and they would suffice to
explain his vexation with the birdcatchers. We turn, for another and
more practical reason, to his chapter on the lower animals, and to his
interesting account of the myriads of insects which the first breath of
the _Fön_[3] calls into existence. Many of these insects are extremely
hurtful to vegetation, and do great damage to fields and gardens, even
when decimated by the birds whose nourishment they compose. The May-bug,
especially, appears in the northern valleys of the central Alps in
prodigious swarms, resembling, and as noxious as, the flights of locusts
that afflict more southerly lands. And if the purveyors of Italian
epicures, whom, it appears, nothing less than roast linnets and
nightingale ragout will satisfy, are allowed to continue their work of
devastation amongst the small birds of Switzerland, the times are likely
soon to become good for beetle and caterpillar, and extremely
unfavourable to Helvetian gardeners and farmers. One of the modes of
birdcatching referred to by Dr Tschudi—namely, by means of owls—is
curious and peculiar. He describes it in another place. The sort of owl
most used by the fowler (_Strix passerina_) is found in the woods of
Tessin, where it bears the name of _civetta piccola_. He is domesticated
in the houses, catches mice, eats fruit and _polenta_. The birdcatchers
take him out into the fields, and set him upon a one-legged stool, with
a padded top. A long string is fastened to his leg, and occasionally
pulled, which makes him jump about and play all manner of comical
antics. Round about are decoy-birds, and sticks spread with bird-lime.
The small birds come in flocks to see the fun, settle on the sticks, and
are caught—redbreasts, yellow-hammers, wrens, wagtails, hedge-sparrows,
thrushes of various kinds, &c. &c. The finch family alone are said to be
too knowing to be thus entrapped. They keep up a great noise, but at a
prudent distance. This mode of bird-snaring is followed from July to
November, and the Tessinees, who seem to be a community of birdcatchers,
travel into other cantons to practise it. In Germany the large
screech-owl (_Strix bubo_)—which in Switzerland is carried about in a
box, and shown as a pretext to beg for _batzen_—is used as a decoy for
carrion birds. The sportsman ties him to a peg in the ground, and hides
himself near at hand in a low hut, covered with turf and provided with
loopholes. Soon there is a great gathering of crows, magpies, hawks,
kites, &c., which come croaking and screaming around, and are easily
shot.
“The mountain region of Switzerland,” says Dr Tschudi, in one of the
many pleasing passages of this volume, “possesses no kinds of birds
quite peculiar to itself, and which do not also appear in the
corresponding regions of adjacent lands, and not many kinds that do not,
at least occasionally, show themselves in the plain.[4] The greater
number, especially of the smaller birds, alternate between the hill and
the mountain regions, and in winter gladly seek the fields, forests, and
bushes of the lowlands and of the mild valleys. But their sweetest song,
their summer joys, their merriest time, are in the mountains. There they
live like rich gentlemen, who, in the fine season, repair to their
country-houses. Their table is ever spread, and their perch ready; their
friends are ever at hand to sport and rejoice with them. There is a
peculiarity about their jubilation in their mountain forests. No
nightingale pipes her melodious notes, seldom a linnet is heard, rarely
that capital singer, the black-headed titmouse—and yet wood and rock
resound again with the joyous concert. True it is that good-will, and
joyous, gushing vitality, often atone for the absence of natural harmony
and artistic skill. Before the rosy mists of morning have announced the
sun’s approach—often before even a light tint in the east has indicated
its point of rising, and whilst the stars still glitter brightly in the
dark-blue sky—a low rumbling noise is heard, issuing from a tall old
fir; then follow chattering clapping notes, growing quicker and quicker;
and finally, a long string of hissing sounds, like the whetting or
sharpening of a blade. It is the heathcock’s coupling time. With
distorted eyes he trips and dances about upon his bough, whilst in the
bushes below the hens quietly repose, and respectfully behold the
foolish capers of their lord and master. He is not long left to enliven
the forest alone. Some marsh-birds in the neighbouring reeds have been
piping ever since midnight, and become zealous in their song, now that
the sun approaches. Then the blackbird awakes, shakes the dew from the
glossy sable of his plumage, whets his bill against the bough, and hops
higher up in the maple-tree, almost wondering to find that twilight is
becoming daylight, and that the forest still sleeps. Twice, thrice, he
sends a summons, over the tree tops, across to the opposite mountain,
and down into the valley, on whose brooks thin banks of vapour rest.
Then he puts forth, with might and fire, his magnificent notes,
alternately gay and plaintive, and rouses the whole woodland region into
life. The cuckoo’s musical call resounds afar in the forest. Thin blue
columns of smoke issue from the cottage chimneys in the valley; there is
barking of dogs in the farmyards, and the tinkling of a cow-bell; the
birds rise from bushes, grass, and rocks, and soar upon the wing, to see
the sun, and to praise kind Mother Nature, who has once more sent them
the cheerful light. Many a poor little flutterer rejoices that the
anxious, dangerous night is past. He sat upon a twig, his head buried in
his feathers, when by the starlight he saw a forest-owl fly noiselessly
through the trees in search of prey. The rock-marten came from the
valley, the ermine from the cliff, the pine-martin descended from his
squirrel’s nest, the fox prowled amongst the bushes. All these the bird
had seen. On the tree, in the air, on the ground—destruction was all
around him. Many weary hours had he sat out, not daring to stir,
protected and concealed by a few young beech-leaves. How gladly he now
leaps forth, and extols the safety of life, and the protection of light!
The chaffinch sounds his clear and powerful notes, the redbreast sings
on the summit of the larch, the greenfinch in the alder-bush, the
yellow-hammer and redfinch in the underwood. The flaxfinch, the
titmouse, the golden-crested and the common wren, exert their various
voices; the ringdove coos, the woodpecker taps at his tree. But above
all these cheerful sounds are heard the potent voice of the mistle-bird,
the melodious notes of the tree-lark, and the inimitable chant of the
thrush. What a morning concert in those green glades!”
And what a pretty bit of sylvan description is this, showing a hearty
love of nature, and close observation of her ways! Dr Tschudi has
invited himself to pass the day with the birds, and he avails himself of
the opportunity to observe and note down the details of their domestic
life, like some impertinent foreigner whom a hospitable country
gentleman has invited to pass a week at “The Grange,” and who requites
the courtesy by printing the minutest particulars of his host’s
housekeeping. But the most susceptible bird could find nothing offensive
in the doctor’s revelations. It is hard to say how he managed to
observe, without alarming, his feathered entertainers. He must have
covered himself with leaves, or lain, for hours, _perdu_ beneath a bush,
suppressing his breath till his presence was forgotten, or till he was
taken for part of the landscape, for a log or a fossil—for he had to do
with a timorous race, easily panic-stricken and silenced. Suddenly
chirping and piping, singing, cooing, and hammering, all ceased at once.
They were replaced by the hoarse and hungry cry of the pigeon-hawk,
hovering ominously over the wood, whose melodious denizens buried
themselves, mute and trembling, in its deepest foliage. The peril past,
they again emerged, recommenced roulades and trills that a Grisi might
envy, and industriously sought their breakfast—berries, insects, seeds.
Thus passes the morning, in song and banqueting; hot noon is the silent
time in the forest, when its denizens take their siesta, with the
exception of a few indefatigable warblers, whom nothing will silence.
Towards evening the choir is again active, but the concert lacks
somewhat of the vigour and freshness of the morning’s performance. It is
a farewell to light—which the other welcomed. Night falls, and once more
the stillness is only broken by the hooting of owls, and the heavy
circling of the bat.
Of this last-named singular animal, the link between bird and beast, Dr
Tschudi discourses at some length, giving curious results of his
observations of their habits, and taking occasion to animadvert on the
unaccountable repugnance entertained by men for certain animals, which
they persecute as foes, when they ought to favour and foster them as
useful friends. He had already touched on this point when talking of the
Swiss snakes. On the subject of bats he writes as follows: “They are the
owls amongst mammalia; like them they are dismal, nocturnal, carnivorous
creatures, unamiable and shy. Our naturalists are probably still far
from a thorough knowledge of them, their secret abodes and nocturnal
habits rendering this very difficult to attain. And in this respect
natural history receives small aid from man, who loathes the bat,
because he does not know that it is his benefactor; kills it when he
can, and throws it away. Strange it is that man has such a profound
aversion and almost invincible horror for many animals which are
positively useful and no way injurious! He shuns and persecutes toads
and lizards, which destroy so many locusts, worms, spiders, flies, and
snails; blind worms and snakes, which rid him of vermin and of mice;
moles, owls, and bats, which are his true benefactors, and should be
carefully protected. The last named are, like swallows, active
destroyers of insects, and devour millions of beetles, injurious water
insects, tree-caterpillars, cabbage-butterflies, night-moths, and
May-bugs, and crunch, with their numerous and extremely sharp teeth,
even the hard-winged dung-beetle. Certainly they have not the agreeable
aspect or the amiable manners of canaries or goldfinches; they are wild
and fierce, and ready enough to open their wide red gullets against the
head of man. They are hard to tame, and, when held captive, usually
refuse all nourishment. Their musky smell, the thin oily skin of their
wings, their tawny hair, their hissing and grumbling, their little tail
and their claws, are not particularly attractive; but one might forgive
them all that, and leave them in peace, inasmuch as they do great and
good service. Popular superstition classes them as venomous, with toads,
frogs, and snakes. They are just as little so as any of these, and have
not the absurd passion attributed to them of flying into people’s hair.
Weasels and polecats, martens and dogs, and especially owls, their sworn
foes, persecute them sufficiently, to prevent their numbers ever
becoming troublesome to man, though he should leave them unmolested.
“In winter we see no bats, unless by chance upon extraordinarily warm
evenings, and people often ask what becomes of them in the cold season.
Were they birds, they would fly southwards; were they proper quadrupeds,
they would dig holes to shelter themselves from the cold: as it is,
their only resource is to seek warm hiding-places. Moreover, insects,
their habitual food, disappear in winter time. So, as soon as frost sets
in, they look for caves, sheltered clefts in the rocks, old chimneys,
and other shelter of the same kind, hook themselves on to the wall with
the thumbs of their fore-feet, one over the other, and sleep until the
warmth of spring again awakes them. The blood circulates slowly through
their little bodies; stabbing, burning, or cutting occasions them
convulsions, but does not awaken them from their winter torpidity. Taken
into a warm place, they gradually awaken. Their vitality is in some
respects very tenacious, in others easily destroyed: thus the slightest
bodily injury kills them, but they resist for a very long time the
action of electricity and of the air-pump, and can endure hunger longer
than any other of the mammalia.”