The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-12-07

K MOST people are utterly unable to
V contemplate bear without
laughing and / have always pic
tured the Almighty as smiling when He
fashioned this drol plantigrade It is
impossible for bruln to be serious whether
ambllng in astral configuration through
the clumsy mazes of his polar dance or
perambuating in the flesh where the
srotesque companions his every move
ment and characterizes his every atti-
tude.
AS have admired Ursus in the extreme
1t may be imagined that my pleasure
was acute upon my initial visit to Bern,
a city whose name signifies bear and
where the animal is encountered in stone,
bronze, fresco and living flesh.
In approaching the capital of Switzer-
land, the traveller traversesi some of the
grandest and most sublime scenery that
the land of the Alps has to offer and
this holds good no matter from what di-
rection the approach is made. Sublimlty
is stamped upon the face of every crag,
cliff and cataract; peak after peak stares
at you over the shoulders of innumer-
able companions with visage wreathed
in smiles of sunlit snowy radiance or
suffused with the thrilling aspect of the
mountain storm, and the winds breathe
an eternal paean or a sempiternal
threnody. Here it is that one also hears
those wild. sweet melodies that scarcely
seem to belong to this earth and the re-
frain of which fingers forever in the
travellers memory: it is the famous RAM
dez Vaches, or Kuhreihen, which the cat
tie so well know whether breathed by
lip or horn, which summons them in
June to higher and sweeter pastures,
mingled with the Standardization of the
COW bells and the lowing of the kline.
Here is likewise a spiritual music fash
Toned for the ears of imagination alone,
borne on the wing of the wrath and
created by the magic wand of the legend.
A majority of such legends are associated
with some castle and en- route to Bern
from Basle one passes the Castle Grim
menstein. once the home of mighty
hunter. Despite the pleadings of his pious
wife, Grimmenstein insisted upon desc
Grating the Sabbath by engaging in the
chase. Upon one of these occasions he
wantonly slew a doe and her young, but
just as the mother beast breathed her
last the slayer was surprised to be con-
fronted by giant, who had sprung up
from the cath and angrily shook his
fist, exclaiming that the harmless ami
mails would be avenged. Grimmenstein
was awed at the spectacle and dessting
from further hunting for the day re-
turned to his castle only to find his wife
and children dying from the very wounds
which had brought death to the doe and
her young. Ever since that time the lord
of the castle occasionally rises from his
grave and winds his hunting horn till
the mountains are resonant with his
blasts as he again starts out over noun.
tain and dale in quest of game.
But there is a larum more terrifying
than that of the horn of the spectral
Sabbath breaker which may be heard i'll
this locality and that is thunder of the
hooves of the Wild Huntsman's steed as
he rushes through the land with his
encourage of ghostly companions. The
identity of this huntsman is not quite
settled, as some declare him to be Odin
the Scandinavian god, with his train of
heather deities, and others pronounce
him no other than Dietrich Won Bern, ae-
companied by escort of steel mailed
warriors. But whoever he may be. he al
ways rides coal black steed and storm
clouds announce his passing.
Bern, the capital of the Swiss confed-
Grafton, is most charmingly situated upon
a cliff overlooking the river Aare. Ira
dition names as its founder one Berthold
V of Zahringen and several reasons are
assigned for its appellation: The favorite
hero of that country was Dietrich of
Verona, the great Dietrich of history;
but the Germans pronounced Verona as