# Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843/Part 1/Letter 12

LETTER XII.
Milan, 28th Sept.
I have made a compact with a veturino, to take me and my maid to Geneva for ten napoleons, in six days. He is to provide us with sleeping-rooms, a dinner, and coffee in the morning. This is very reasonable; but we are not to have the carriage to ourselves: he is already engaged to take three English ladies, and I am to join the party. I sent M—— to their hotel to look at our companions; she brings back word that they are certainly ladies—three sisters they are; but, from their accent, she thinks them Irish. Three Irish ladies out on their travels without any attendant, seems odd; but I trust to my maid’s tact as to their being, as she phrased it, really ladies. The whole day has been occupied in getting a passport. P—— had taken mine; and there is always a good deal of trouble in getting a fresh one visé in Austrian Italy.
​The weather is beautiful: it seems, on looking back, that unwillingly as I had remained behind, yet thus I have secured for myself a pleasant journey in fine weather, while my friends encountered inclement skies, and perhaps disasters thereon attendant. It had been agreed that they were not to write, as I should probably leave Milan before a letter could arrive. I cannot, therefore, hear how it has fared with them in their passage across Mont St. Gothard till I reach Paris.
I have taken leave of the Cathedral. I have said adieu to the gardens and walks, which I have paced with a heavy heart the last fortnight. I do not think I should like to live at Milan. The Milanese nobility live much among themselves, keeping their palaces sacred from the Austrian; they do not entertain; and their chief assembly-room is the Opera-house—at least this is the account that strangers give. Probably, if the veil were lifted, and the truth known, we should find something very pleasant hidden behind.
Arona, Tuesday, 29th September.
I quitted Milan at five in the morning. The ladies I was to accompany had desired to spend a day at Como: they had gone the day before, and we were to join at Sesto Callende, at the southern ​extremity of the Lago Maggiore. The drive thither had nothing greatly to recommend it: but Sesto itself is agreeably situated on the borders of the Ticino, just as it leaves the lake, with, to the north, the amphitheatre of the Alps we were about to cross. Here I met the companions of my journey. The first word they spoke discovered their country; they are Scotch, with as rich a Doric accent as the Lowlands can produce. I cannot well explain the reason, but the enigma vanishes on the discovery of their native land; for there is something in Scotch-women more independent than in English and Irish; above all, one expects a better style of person on smaller outward means. They are three sisters, who have been seeing sights all over Italy, and are now returning home. The elder one has mingled something with the world; and besides being acquainted with good Edinburgh society, she has visited our poets of the Lakes. She is well informed, and with a full, unebbing flow of conversation, which, though much, is always sensible and anecdotic; and, when I am not overtired, I find it agreeable. I have no wish to describe or designate further ladies, who, though chance companions, have a right to enjoy the shelter of privacy, undragged into public by one, who has only to congratulate herself that she is for a few days thrown in their way.
​Crossing the Ticino from Sesto, we left Austrian Lombardy for the territories of the King of Sardinia, and were, of course, detained a considerable time at the Dogana. The road lay along the margin of the Lago Maggiore. This lake differs considerably from that of Como: it is wider; higher mountains form its barriers, but they are much further off, and the immediate banks are less precipitous, more cultivated, and diversified with many villages and some considerable towns. The culture, vines and Indian corn, have arrived at maturity, and the fields are alive with labourers, gathering in the last harvest and busied with the vintage. These gay varied fields on one hand, the picturesque and placid lake on the other; the majestic Alps before, and blue sky to dress all in cheerful and summer hues, impart every delight which this journey can have, but one—I cannot help repining that the horses’ heads are not turned the other way, and that I am not entering Italy instead of leaving it. We reached Arona, where we are to sleep, early in the glowing sunny evening, and have walked up a neighbouring height to see the bronze statue of San Carlo Borromeo. It is very striking, of gigantic stature, the attitude commanding and simple; standing as it does on a grassy plot of ground on a hill-side, with huge mountains all around, the beautiful lake at its ​feet,—there is something in it that inspires awe. A colossal figure in a building cannot have the same effect; one is accustomed to it, one knows what it means, and no unexpected emotion is excited. But placed thus, amidst a sublime and majestic scene, the first impression is, not that it is one’s petty self on a larger scale, but a being of a higher order and of grander proportions, better fitted than we pigmies are, to tread the huge round earth and scale the Alps. There is a church adjoining, containing the room where the saint died, and a waxen mask, taken after death; it looks ghastly, but the features are good; it was from this that the face of the statue was modelled.
30th Sept.
We still wound along the margin of the lake, which opened wider, and its Alpine boundaries grew higher and nearer. At the usual spot we received the usual invitation from boatmen to visit the islands, which I accepted. My companions were tired out by sight-seeing, and declined. I do not minutely describe: these islands are well known. Islands in a lake have a peculiar charm; they are rare too. Three only exist on this lake: Isola Madre; Isola Bella, on which stands the mansion of the Borromeo family, with its terraced grounds; and ​one other, covered by a town inhabited by fishermen. They are at some little distance from shore. An island all to one’s self is ever flattering to the imagination. No one to intrude unknown; the whole rule of the demesne in one’s sovereign hands; and to look from this natural throne amidst the clear waters on the populous shores and glorious mountains that surround the Lago Maggiore, affords a picture of dignified seclusion one covets to realise. Fault has been found with the artificial structure of the gardens of Isola Bella; but it must be remembered that its shape is so conical, that without the assistance of these terraces the soil would be washed into the lake. It is acknowledged that Italian taste in gardening is not our taste; but with the wild mountain paths so near, and scenery impending over on such a scale, that man’s art vanishes among it, as the path of a boat on the sea, one the less objects to a little nook of ground—one’s immediate habitation—being adorned with artificial embellishments. English culture and taste would, indeed, turn these islands into a wilderness of sweets. The palace itself could not be mended. Taken all in all, I should like to live here; here to enjoy the aspect of grand scenery, the pleasures of elegant seclusion, and the advantages of civilisation, joined to the independent delights of a solitude which we would ​hope to people, were it ours, with a few chosen spirits.
Such reveries possessed me, as I fancied life spent here, and pictured English friends arriving down from the mighty Simplon, and Italians taking refuge in my halls from persecution and oppression—a little world of my own—a focus whence would emanate some light for the country around—a school for civilisation, a refuge for the unhappy, a support for merit in adversity: from such a gorgeous dream I was awakened when my foot touched shore, and I was transformed from the Queen of Isola Bella into a poor traveller, humbly pursuing her route in an unpretending vettura. Such, for the most part, has been my life. Dreams of joy and good, which have lent me wings to leave the poverty and desolation of reality. How without such dreams I could have past long sad years, I know not.
We stopped at a pleasant inn at Baveno. A party of English were staying there—sketching, and making excursions in the neighbourhood. They were enjoying themselves, apparently, very much. At Baveno begins the ascent of the Simplon. What it must be, I continually said to myself, to descend this road into Italy, and on the first entrance, to meet this glorious lake, with its luxuriant vegetation; its rich chesnut woods; its thoroughly Italian aspect, so ​indescribably different from Switzerland! With a heavy heart I gazed, till a turn in the road shut out Lago Maggiore and Italy from my sight.
The weather was beautiful. As I have mentioned, two days before there had been rain and storm, the effects of which were very visible. Among them, at different inn-books, were dolorous complaints of travellers detained for days at wretched huts among the mountains. The road was broken up in many places—a circumstance we made light of, for it was no annoyance to alight, and cross the subsiding torrent on a plank. Had it rained, our difficulties had been great. And here we find one of the great evils of the division of Italy. The southern side of the Simplon belongs to the King of Sardinia, but its road leads at once into Lombardy. This sovereign, therefore, purposely neglects the most magnificent Alpine pass that exists, and devotes it as well as he can to ruin, that travellers may be induced to prefer Cenis. If there were no choice except between Cenis and the Simplon, there might be a selfish policy in this; but there are now so many passes, that no one desirous of visiting the north-east of Italy, need be forced to cross Cenis, even if the road of the Simplon were destroyed. However, so it is. A bridge had been carried away five years before. It is rebuilding, but very slowly; and the ​river, when swollen by the melting of the snows or by rains, is a formidable obstacle; besides that, broken by floods and torrents, the Piedmontese portion of the road is in a very rough and inconvenient state. So much for what Pope calls—
”The low ambition and the pride of kings;”
which here shows itself in destroying a work, which if pride, only less pernicious, achieved, yet is a monument of the best and most useful powers of man.
1st October.
We slept at Duomo d’Ossola, at the Post, a very comfortable inn, and the next morning we commenced early the passage of the mountain. The carriage was light and comfortable; three sat inside and two in a sort of coupée outside, so we had plenty of room. Our veturino was of Turin; and if any one going to that city see a carriage with the name of Amadeo on it, and he is in search of a veturino, let him engage him at once—a more civil, obliging fellow I never met. He was engaged to provide us with rooms; and every evening he came to me to ask if I was content, or wished for another. We crossed the mountain with the speed of post; indeed, from Duomo d’Ossola to the village of the Simplon, he rode forward with his own horses to ​spare them, and we had four posters; and afterwards two posters, in addition to his own, till the summit of the mountain was passed.
The weather was admirable; not a cloud. I walked a great deal of the way. I desired to enjoy to the full the sublime scenery of this grand pass: two circumstances occurred to prevent my seeing it in all its sublimity. One, that our horses’ heads were not turned the other way; and I do not repeat this from the sentiment of the thing, but as the simple fact, that to have the best point of view of the mighty features of the scene, you must look towards Italy; and thus as I walked, I stopped continually and turned to catch those views which I had studied with such longing to really see them, in Brockedon’s prints. But the scene was indeed different. He speaks of Alpine horrors; the cascade of icicles; the ice-bound torrent; the snow which, with fantastic shapes covered all, and spreading wide and desolate around, gave a wild and awful appearance to the bare rocks and mighty pines, speaking of storm and avelanche, of danger and death. The snow had fled. We caught glimpses of where it lay eternally on the far summits of the impassable Alps; but we had none. Still the scene in its summer appearance was sublime; abrupt precipices, majestic crags, and naked pinnacles, reared themselves on ​each side of the ravine formed by the torrent, along which the road is constructed: waterfalls roared around; the pines spread abroad their vast weather-beaten arms, distorted by storms into strange shapes. The road also, now free from snow, gains rather than loses, as we can judge better of the torrents its bridges span, the living granite crags its grottoes perforate, the tumultuous cascades it almost seems to bridle and direct, as their living waters were led by various channels away from our path. There was no horror; but there was grandeur. There was a majestic simplicity that inspired awe; the naked bones of a gigantic world were here: the elemental substance of fair mother Earth, an abode for mighty spirits who need not the ministrations of food and shelter that keep man alive, but whose vast shapes could only find, in these giant crags, a home proportionate to their power. As we approached the village of Simplon, the features of the scene became softer; the summit of the mountain was spread into a grassy meadow, with a lake: villages and cottages peeped out; cattle were grazing; flowers decked the fields; afar off we saw the Alpine ranges towering above, clad in perpetual snow. This sight alone reminded us, that the almost rural scene we viewed, was removed far above the usual resorts of man; and, for at least eight months in the year, was ​bound in frost and hidden by snow—the resort of tempests, where it becomes labour and pain to exist.
We breakfasted at the Simplon. We found there an English traveller, who told us of the failure of Hammersley’s bank: this was a bathos from sublimity which, yet to many, would have been pathetic; a great blow was given also to many English tourists, his notes being in wide circulation. Fortunately, neither I nor my companions were troubled by it. A few miles after leaving Simplon the descent began. I still walked, for the weather was fine, the air elastic, and I desired greatly to gaze my fill on the mighty and glorious shapes around, so that I could not endure remaining in the carriage. The descent is pretty steep: I believe the greatest difficulties for the construction of the road, presented themselves on the Swiss side. On the Italian, the road is cut for the greater part on the face of the precipices beside the Vedro, and follows the windings of the ravine; but northward, the mountain falls more abruptly. It was necessary to follow the sinuosities of its shape along its shoulder, as it were, and so to reach a neighbouring mountain, divided only by a torrent; this is crossed by a bridge, and then the road turns at an acute angle. I looked long, to study with untaught eyes, why this exact route had been chosen by the engineer; and could judge, by the large ​circuit he took, of the immense difficulties of his task. This portion of the road belonging to the Swiss, is kept in admirable order, forming a striking contrast with its ruinous condition on the Italian side. We reached Brigg at sunset, and had the satisfaction of knowing that the post could not have taken us quicker; and, for my peculiar instruction, I found that had I left Milan when I intended, I might have joined my grumblings to those of many travellers, who recorded their impatient annoyance of being detained three or four days at the miserable village of Isella, or in a wretched hovel at Divedro, weather-bound by the storms that raged from the 20th to the 24th of September; while for me, all unworthy, the heavens were cloudless and serene.
3rd October.
Our road now lay along the valley of the Rhone, more picturesque far than the valley of the Rhine near Coire. Some of the finest waterfalls in Switzerland precipitate themselves from the cliffs of rock that border the road, or can be reached by a short walk. After the rains, we saw them in great perfection. As I looked on some of these, my imagination was hurried on to endow with life and will these elemental energies. It seemed Love—the love of burning youth, forcing through all obstacles, ​and with hurry, and dash, and fury making its way; yet beauteous from its nature, sublime from its uncontrollable determination, and thus proceeding right onward to its object, in spite of every let and hindrance, till, having accomplished it, it steals away, almost hidden, almost still, gently murmuring its happiness.
My guide to one of these waterfalls was a deaf and dumb child. She was interesting from the intelligence as well as the beauty of her countenance, and a certain grace of gesture, whose vivacity and distinctness became as intelligible as words.
The valley we threaded is diversified by towns. At Martigny, there are many tablets let into the walls of the houses to say where the waters had reached during the memorable inundation, caused by the tremendous overflow of the Dranse, in 1818. In some parts, conical rocky hills rise in the midst of the valley, crowned by castles. The scenery wants the southern sunny glow which I prefer, but is grand and full of variety.
Geneva 4th Oct.
On Friday night, we slept at Sion. The next day, at noon, we reached Saint Maurice, where I left my companions. I had a whim, instead of coasting along the side of the lake by Saint Gingoux, to go to Vevay, and make the voyage in the steamer. I was in the ​wrong, I afterwards found; for, being alone, I had no heart to walk about and see sights at Vevay, and the day for my voyage proved cloudy and cold, so that a could not gain sight of Mont Blanc, for the sake of which I had undertaken it. However, on this account, I bade adieu to my companions at Saint Maurice, and jumped into the coupée of a diligence, which took me to Vevay. And the next morning, bleak and cloudy, as I have said, I embarked on board the steamer.
I felt now that I had passed a boundary-line, and was in another country, meeting people with a totally different set of ideas and associations. The subject of the war with Mehemet Ali, and of the dissensions with France, was raging at its heights; and several persons thought me very rash to venture into that country. The fate of English travellers at the time of the peace of Amiens can never be forgotten. It was not a pleasant day for my voyage, as I have said. The far Alps were hid; the wide lake looked drear. At length, I caught a glimpse of the scenes among which I had lived, when first I stepped out from childhood into life. There, on the shores of Bellerive, stood Diodati; and our humble dwelling, Maison Chapuis, nestled close to the lake below. There were the terraces, the vineyards, the upward path threading them, the little port where our boat lay moored; I could mark and recognise a thousand ​slight peculiarities, familiar objects then—forgotten since—now replete with recollections and associations. Was I the same person who had lived there, the companion of the dead? For all were gone: even my young child, whom I had looked upon as the joy of future years, had died in infancy—not one hope, then in fair bud, had opened into maturity; storm, and blight, and death, had passed over, and destroyed all. While yet very young, I had reached the position of an aged person, driven back on memory for companionship with the beloved; and now I looked on the inanimate objects that had surrounded me, which survived, the same in aspect as then, to feel that all my life since was but an unreal phantasmagoria—the shades that gathered round that scene were the realities—the substance and truth of the soul’s life, which I shall, I trust, hereafter rejoin.
Disappointed in my voyage, for it was dreary, I arrived at Geneva, and took refuge in the Hôtel de Bergues—the model and perfection of these Swiss hotels, where all is conducted on a system that no number of guests can disturb, and a certainty of expense, always convenient. I dined at the table d’hôte. The tables lined three sides of a large salle-à-manger, and were crowded by a happy flock of travellers, all turning their steps towards Italy. The talk was Hammersley’s failure, the consequence ​of which had been very disastrous to the poorer race of travellers. It was a fine evening; and I walked a little about the town, and took my place in the diligence for Lyons.
10th Oct.
I left Geneva in the coupée of the diligence, and found myself alone in it. Our fine weather returned, and the drive was pleasant; but still, from the height of Jura, Mont Blanc was veiled from my sight.
Here we fell into the hands of the French douane, a long and troublesome operation. One is always impatient of stoppages in travelling. At length we were allowed to proceed. The way, amidst the vast range of the Jura, was interesting. I remembered it as dreary; but summer dressed all in smiles and cheerfulness. We continued near the Rhone; and the aspect of the river lent life and variety to the scene. I enjoyed it in a melancholy grumbling way, losing myself, as I best might, in fantastic dreams and endlesss reveries. In some things, the travelling in the coupée of a diligence is not so bad. Your limbs are not confined and manacled as in an English stage-coach. I never travelled all night in the latter, and cannot imagine how it can be endured: it is bad enough for a few hours. The meals are the worst part of French public travelling—turned out all together ​to feed at one table, loaded with badly-dressed French dishes, with difficulty persuading a servant to allow you to make yourself comfortable with cold water and a towel, being perpetually reminded in consequence you must go without your dinner.
By this time I became aware of a truth which had dawned on me before, that the French common people have lost much of that grace of manner which once distinguished them above all other people. More courteous than the Italians they could not be; but, while their manners were more artificial, they were more playful and winning. All this has changed. I did not remark the alteration so much with regard to myself, as in their mode of speaking to one another. The “Madame” and “Monsieur,” with which stable-boys and old beggar-women used to address each other, with the deference of courtiers, has vanished. No trace is to be found of it in France. A shadow faintly exists among Parisian shopkeepers, when speaking to their customers; but only there is the traditional phraseology still used: the courteous accent, the soft manner, erst so charming, exists no longer. I speak of a thing known and acknowledged by the French themselves. They want to be powerful; they believe money must obtain power; they wish to imitate the English, whose influence they attribute to their money-making propensities: but now and then they go a step ​beyond, and remind one of Mrs. Trollope’s description of the Americans. Their phraseology, once so delicately, and even to us more straight-forward people, amusingly deferential (not to superiors only, but toward one another), is become blunt, and almost rude. The French allege several causes for this change, which they date from the revolution of 1830. Some say it arises from every citizen turning out as one of the National Guard in his turn, so that they all get a ton de garnison: others attribute it to their imitation of the English. Of course, in the times of the ancien régime, the courtly tone found an echo and reflection from the royal ante-chambers down to the very ends of the kingdom. This had faded by degrees, till the revolution of ‘30 gave it the coup-de-grâce. I grieved very much. Perhaps more than any people, as I see them now, the French require the restraint of good manners. They are desirous of pleasing, it is true; but their amour propre is so sensitive, and their tempers so quick, that they are easily betrayed into anger and vehemence. I am more sorry, on another score. The blessing which the world now needs is the steady progress of civilisation: freedom, by degrees, it will have, I believe. Meanwhile, as the fruits of liberty, we wish to perceive the tendency of the low to rise to the level of the high—not the high to be dragged down to the low. This, we are told by many, is the inevitable tendency ​of equality of means and privileges. I will hope not: for on that hope is built every endeavour to banish ignorance, and hard labour and penury, from political society.
This is a long digression: but I have not much more to say. We arrived in Lyons at half-past three in the morning, and with difficulty got admitted into an hotel. The system of French hotels has no resemblance to that of the Swiss; and you must conclude from this, that they do not emulate them in activity, order, and comfort. I was bound for Paris; and proceeded by the steamer, up the Seine, to Chalons. On board these long, narrow, river steamers, I found the same defects—the air, most agreeable to a traveller, of neatness, and civility, was absent. There is, however, no real fault to be found, and I should not mention this were it not a change; and I sincerely wish the French would return to what they once were, and give us all lessons of pleasing manners, instead of imitating and exaggerating our faults, and adding to them an impress all their own—a sort of fierceness when displeased, which is more startling than our sullenness. As I said, this has no reference to any act towards myself; but the winning tone and manner that had pleased me of old no longer appeared, and it was in the phraseology used among each other that the change was most remarkable.
Saturday, 10th.
The worst bit of the journey is from Chalons to Paris. The road is much frequented. I was obliged to wait a day for places in the diligence, and then could only get bad ones, in the intérieur, with three little boys going to school in Paris from Marseilles, and a sort of tutor conveying them; for boys are never trusted, as with us, to go about alone; such a proceeding would be looked upon as flagrantly improper. Nothing can equal the care with which French youth are guarded from contact with the world; girls in our boarding-schools are less shut up. They rise early, work hard—(a boy once said to me, “We are always at work; but we do it very slow”)—little or no exercise, and poor fare. Such is the fate of the noblest French youths, as well as those of an inferior class, at the highest public schools.
It had been pleasant travelling under different circumstances, in a picturesque country, for the weather continued serene and warm; but the drear extent of this part of France is uninteresting; and besides, two days and two nights in a diligence was, if nothing else, extremely fatiguing. We came to an end at last—the dreary, comfortless moment of arriving in a metropolis by a public conveyance, ​especially in Paris, where the luggage must be examined before it leaves the diligence office—this moment was also over, and in a short time I found myself comfortably lodged in Hotel Chatham—a quiet hotel—not more expensive, I fancy, than any other, and Madame l’Hôte herself is an agreeable person to deal with.
Paris, 12th Oct.
I send you the following graphic account of the perilous journey of my friends, after they parted from me at Milan, sent me by P——’s fellow-traveller. I had let them go without anticipation of evil, and felt not a pang of fear on their account, while lingering so disconsolately behind; so blind are we poor mortals to events near at hand, while we tremble at unseen ills! Imagine what the difficulties of the journey had been, if I, as we intended, had accompanied them. I could not have crossed the mountain as they did. Compare, I entreat you, my easy pleasant drive, with their perilous exposure to the elements.
“We started from Milan at four o'clock, p.m., on the 20th of September—raining cats and dogs—alone inside the diligence as far as Como—recognised by the good folks del’ Angelo (what a fuss ​they made, landlord and all!), though we only stayed in the town five minutes, waiting for the mail letters. Went on to a little dirty pothouse, a post from Como, to supper, as they called it—all garlic (the cost, one franc and a half)—quite uneatable. About a quarter past ten arrived at Bissone, on the borders of the Lake of Lugano.
“At Como we picked up a very agreeable priest, who, observing on the continued rain for many days past, and pouring doubly down at the time, said that he feared we should not be able to get across the lake, as they had been unable to make the passage the day before for many hours.
“After waiting at Bissone for an hour, and after many misgivings as to the result of the quarrel going on outside between the Austrian mail-guard and the deputation of boatmen, we learned gladly, and yet with some alarm, that we were about to embark. The wind was howling, shrieking, roaring, and, more than all, it was blowing, pulling, tearing, and tugging. It had ceased to rain, and the clouds were driving, as if they were behind their time, and afraid of being overtaken by the fellow behind. We were ushered on to a raft, about twelve yards long and six broad, whereon the diligence, horses and all, were quietly standing. There were no sides to the raft, but a parapet of about a foot high, so that the ​water rushed every now and then over our feet. When we got full into the wind, we expected to be upset every moment. The priest prayed, evidently sincerely, for he was quite calm and engrossed. P—— and I pulled and pushed alternately at the diligence, to moderate the alarming vibrations, which threatened to topple the whole thing over, assisted by the whole number of boatmen, incapacitated, by the breaking of their oars, for anything active in the propelling way, but oaths. (We had had double the usual number of men, at double the usual price per man.) I asked P—— what we had better do?—we were dreadfully hot with our exercise. He said, ‘Jump over and swim till the horses are drowned, and then swim back to the raft.’ This would have been the best plan if, as seemed inevitable, we had gone over. So we took off our coats and boots, and put them inside the diligence. But we did get safe over, though very far from the proper landing-place, and after a very unusually long passage.
“We, after some delay, at about one o’clock, got under weigh for Lugano (by coach and horses). Lovely ride, by this far the loveliest of the lakes; quite fine, barring the clouds—full moon—the road lay close by the lake, but very high above it—no parapets. Arrived at Lugano about two. Shivered and smoked for an hour, and started again. Got to ​Bellinzona about nine in the morning, and over a road much impaired by the rain as far as Giornico. Here the road became so bad, that the horses did little else than walk, the alternative being a stand-still. At last, at Faido, a man opened the door, and, with a perfectly uninterested air, gave us some, we did not know what, information, and then joined a group of silent staring idlers like himself. We paid no attention for some time, till it struck us they were long in changing horses. We then learned that the road towards Airolo was utterly broken up and carried away; and if the rain ceased, and the torrents consented to shrink au plus vite, the road could not be restored in much less than a month. After long consultations—we were seven: an Italian of Genoa, in bright blue trousers; an Uri grazier, about seven feet high; P——, myself, two other passengers, and the mail-guard—the two nameless travellers and myself were for sleeping where we were, and off in the morning. The guard said he must be off if he could get a guide. There was found to be a track, avoiding the Dazio Grande, over the mountains; but only one guide could be found who had ever gone the road, and he only once, in the great floods of 1834.
“Well, after dining, we started off. I was lame, but P—— promised he would stick by me; it still rained boa-constrictors, its constant practice of an ​afternoon, forenoon, and early morning. We had about 30 guides, variously laden with our lighter impediments; the obstacles were escorted by a larger detachment, at a slower pace. The guides squabbled, and it was dark, with rain and clouds; it was about 3 o’clock. The guides divided; P—— was involved in a mist of guides, so that I could not discover him. They and he set off on the higher road. I waited till I was nearly left alone, and then followed the only guide who knew the route. I should have been lost, no doubt, but for that man, who came back for me once when I had been standing a quarter of an hour alone—scarcely able to keep my footing on the slanting sides of the mountain, and by my obstruction creating quite a shallow or rapid in the stream in which I stood. No road, nor track, nor print of a footstep to be seen, before or behind, and no one in sight for a quarter of an hour. The torrent 100 yards below, sheer below, roaring till I was deaf; and its foam rising higher than my position, nearly blinded me, together with the incessant rain. This was just over the worst part of the Dazio Grande; where the road, at least what was left of it, was 60 feet under the torrent in its present state. The Ticino had carried away about 150 yards of road here, and about 30 yards further on. The pass is called Dazio Grande, on account of the tolls exacted to pay the great expense occasioned by ​the casualties to which its dangerous position subjects it. We saved the toll, at any rate. Well, the guide came back for me, and made holes for my feet, and rescued me; it was a rescue, and no mistake. The blue Italian here joined us, crying like a child. In another place we had to wait a quarter of an hour, to improvise a bridge over an extempore torrent, which, on this its first public appearance, was rolling rocks the size of a cow about like marbles. It carried its antidote, however, with it in the shape of a tottering pine, over which we crossed. The danger was probably not less than being principal in an ordinary duel; but to this we had become indifferent by this time; also perfectly indifferent (I at least) to the want of either shoes or stockings—the soles of each had utterly disappeared. Our pace during the greater part of this road (to which the tops of the houses in a London street would be a royal road) was a fast run.
“After about three hours we rejoined the road, and arrived at an inn, at Piota; here we waited, and then P—— and his twenty fellow-travellers rejoined us, with certainly an equally momentous account of their road; theirs was the wrong one, and they were really providentially saved. After two hours quick walking, re-inspirited by a tumbler of kirch-wasser per man, we got to Airolo—a nice clean but cold inn, jolly English-loving fat landlord, and pretty ​daughters. The next day up St. Gothard—very cold—the snow falling so fast, that, looking back, the tracks of the wheels and horses were filled up and imperceptible before we were out of sight of the place where they had been. This pass, though, perhaps, not equal to the Splugen, as a work of engineering (je n’en sais rien), is, I swear, infinitely more terrific in bad, and, I should think, more beautiful in fine weather.
“At Hospital we dined, and got into a car alone, which drove for a league through a lake, somewhere in which was the road: we might have been near it. Through Andermatt, thence by a shocking, most perilous road—no parapets—over the Devil’s Bridge before we were aware of it: it is very fine on looking back; but there is another by it, quite as grand in position, though something safer. Thence at last to Amstag; whence, indifferent at last to broken roads and torrents dashing across our path, half carrying the horse away into the Reuss, we got to Altorf and Fluelen; good inn. To our joy and surprise the honourable Austrians took all additional expenses on themselves, and our payment at Milan covered all. We here embarked on board the steamer on the lake of Lucerne, which you know as well as I. Excuse this incoherent scrawl, if you read it; and excuse the extreme personality of my narrative.”