The Spell of Switzerland

“When these men had executed all that was arranged, the general, learning that the enemy steadily kept to their post and watched the passes through the day, but that they went to their repose at night in a neighboring town; acting conformably to that state of things, contrived this scheme: – he put his force in motion and led them forward openly and, when he had come near to the difficult places, he pitched his camp not far from the enemy; but, when night came on, he ordered fires to be kindled, and left the greater part of his troops, and, having lightly armed the most efficient men, he made his way through the defiles in the night and took possession of the positions previously held by the enemy; the barbarians having retired to the town as they were in the habit of doing.

“This had all been done before day came on, and, when the barbarians saw what had happened, they at first abstained from any attack; but later, when they observed the crowd of beasts of burden and the cavalry winding out from the defile with much difficulty and in a long-drawn column, they were encouraged to close in upon the line of march. As the barbarians made their attacks in many places, a great loss ensued to the Carthaginians, chiefly among the horses and beasts of burden, yet not so much from the enemy as from the nature of the ground; for, as the pass was not only narrow and rugged, but also precipitous, at every moment and at every shock numbers of the pack-animals fell with their loads over the cliffs. The shock was caused chiefly by the wounded horses, for some of them, in the panic made by their wounds, dashed against the baggage-animals, others with a rush forward knocked over everything that came in their way in this difficult passage, and completed the immense confusion.

“Hannibal, observing this, and reflecting that, even though the troops should escape, the loss of their baggage would certainly be attended with the ruin of the army, advanced to their aid with the detachment that had occupied the heights during the night. As he made his assault from higher ground, he destroyed many of the enemy; but not without suffering equally in return, for the disorder of the march was much increased by the conflict and clamor of these fresh troops. But, when the greater part of the Allobroges had perished in the conflict, and the rest had been compelled to flee for shelter to their homes, then, only, did the remainder of the beasts of burden and the cavalry succeed with great toil and difficulty in emerging from the pass.”

Hannibal seized the town and procured a vast quantity of horses and beasts of burden and captives, as well as corn and cattle, sufficient to maintain his army for several days, and he inspired great fear in all the neighbouring tribes.

When the army began to advance again, the tribesmen came to meet him with green branches and wreaths, as a sign of amity, and they brought with them a plentiful supply of sheep and goats for food. Hannibal, though inclined to be suspicious, still took them for guides and followed them into a still more difficult region. He had good reason for his suspicions, for, as they were passing through a narrow defile where there was very bad footing and steep precipices, they made a sudden attack upon his troops. The pack-animals and the cavalry were in the van; heavy-armed troops guarded the rear, and attack from that quarter was easily resisted; but the natives, as usual, climbed up the precipices above them and rolled down boulders and flung stones which made fearful havoc.

Hannibal was compelled by this action of the enemy to spend the night near what Polybius calls to leukópetron, The White Rock. Now, not far from Bourg-Saint-Maurice, where we had passed so recently, stands a high rock of gypsum, and it is called to this day La Roche Blanche. Here, in all probability, Hannibal kept guard while during the night the horses and pack-animals with enormous difficulty filed out of the valley. Polybius says: —

“On the following day, the enemy having retired, Hannibal joined forces with the cavalry and led forward to the summit of the Alpine pass, no longer meeting with any organized body of the barbarians, but here and there more or less harassed by them, losing a few pack-animals from the rear or from the van when the natives seized an opportunity to dash at them. The elephants rendered Hannibal the greatest service, for, in whatever part of the line they appeared, the enemy dared not approach, being astounded at the strange look of the beasts.”

By this time it was late in the season and the snow was deep on the mountains; and the soldiers, worn out by their terrible toils and the hardships to which they were subjected, were completely disheartened. Like Napoleon and all the great leaders of men, however, Hannibal knew how to play on their emotions and he cheered them by telling them that just below lay Italy and just beyond lay Rome, their ancient enemy.

But the descent was even more difficult than the way up. The snow had fallen and rendered the path over the névé extremely slippery; it was impossible to proceed. So they had to encamp on the mountain ridge, and, in order to widen the road, he engaged his whole force in building up the precipice.

“Thus,” says the historian, “in one day he completed a passage suitable for horses and baggage-animals, so that, carrying these through at once, and pitching his camp about parts which had as yet escaped the snow, he forwarded the army to the pastures. He brought out the Numidians in successive squads to help in building the road, and it took three days of great difficulty and suffering to get the elephants through. They had come to be in a wretched state by reason of hunger, for the higher points of the Alps, and the parts which reach up to the heights, are utterly without trees and bare, because of the snow remaining constantly summer and winter; but, as the parts along the middle of the mountain-side produced both trees and bushes, they are quite habitable.”

At last, however, after about two weeks in the mountains, they reached the plain of the Po. Livy tells us that Hannibal himself confessed to having lost, from the time he crossed the Rhône, thirty-six thousand men and innumerable horses and other cattle. How many he brought with him into Italy is not known. An exaggerated estimate makes it a hundred thousand infantry and twenty-five thousand cavalry; but it was, perhaps, a third of that number.

The Roman poet, Silius Italicus, who lived in Vergil’s house, but not in his immortality, died just a hundred years after Christ. His verse-history, “Punica,” has come down to us complete. He too gives a description of Hannibal’s wonderful journey: —

“Lone Winter dwells upon those summits drearAnd guards his mansion round the endless year.Mustering from far around his grisly formBlack rains and hailstone-showers and clouds of storm.Here in their wrathful kingdom whirlwinds roamAnd fierce blasts struggle in their Alpine home.The upward sight a swimming darkness shroudsAnd the high crags recede into the clouds…O’er jagged heights and icy fragments rudeThus climb they mid the mountain solitude;And from the rocky summits, haggard, showTheir half-wild visage, clotted thick with snow.Continual drizzlings of the drifting airScar their rough cheeks and stiffen in their hair.Now poured from craggy dens, a headlong force,The Alpine hordes hang threatening on their course;Track the known thickets, beat the mountain-snow,Bound o’er the steeps and, hovering, hem the foe.Here changed the scene; the snows were crimsoned o’er;The hard ice trickled to the tepid gore.With pawing hoof the courser delved the groundAnd rigid frost his clinging fetlock bound:Nor yet his slippery fall the peril ends;The fracturing ice the bony socket rends.Twelve times they measured the long light of dayAnd night’s bleak gloom and urged thro’ wounds their way;Till on the topmost ridge their camp was flungHigh o’er the steepy crags, in airy distance hung.”

“What do you think of that for poetry?” I asked Ruth, and she replied that she did not wonder it was not given to school-boys to study.

“Whose is the translation?” she asked.

“Sir Charles Abraham Elton. But is it fair to melt up a golden, or even a brazen wine-cup and then recast it in an entirely different form and call it a piece of Roman antiquity? That is what these stiff and formal so-called heroic pentameters do with the flowing hexameters of the original.”

“I should like to go to the Saint-Bernard,” I remarked.

“It can be easily arranged,” said my nephew and, as usual, in answer to my wishes came the realization. Instead of describing my own not especially eventful visit to the hospice, – though I could write a rhapsody about the noble dogs, one of whom had only a short time before made a notable rescue of a young American who had wandered off by himself, got lost and nearly perished, – I will give Rogers’s vivid poetic picture. The poet, in his deliberate blank verse, thus pays his respects to the monks: —

“Night was again descending, when my mule,That all day long had climbed among the clouds,Higher and higher still, as by a stairLet down from heaven itself, transporting me,Stopt, to the joy of both, at that low door,That door which ever, as self-opened, movesTo them that knock, and nightly sends abroadMinistering Spirits. Lying on the watch,Two dogs of grave demeanor welcomed me,All meekness, gentleness, though large of limb;And a lay-brother of the Hospital,Who, as we toiled below, had heard by fitsThe distant echoes gaining on his ear,Came and held fast my stirrup in his handWhile I alighted. Long could I have stood,With a religious awe contemplatingThat House, the highest in the Ancient World,And destined to perform from age to ageThe noble service, welcoming as guestsAll of all nations and of every faith;A temple sacred to Humanity!It was a pile of simplest masonry,With narrow windows and vast buttresses,Built to endure the shocks of time and chance;Yet showing many a rent, as well it might,Warred on for ever by the elements,And in an evil day, nor long ago,By violent men – when on the mountain-topThe French and Austrian banners met in conflict.On the same rock beside it stood the church,Reft of its cross, not of its sanctity; …And just below it in that dreary dale,If dale it might be called, so near to heaven,A little lake, where never fish leaped up,Lay like a spot of ink amid the snow;A star, the only one in that small sky,On its dead surface glimmering. ’Twas a placeResembling nothing I had left behind,As if all worldly ties were now dissolved; —And, to incline the mind still more to thought,To thought and sadness, on the Eastern shoreUnder a beetling cliff stood half in gloomA lonely chapel destined for the dead,For such as having wandered from their way,Had perished miserably. Side by side,Within they lie, a mournful company,All in their shrouds, no earth to cover them;Their features full of life yet motionlessIn the broad day, nor soon to suffer change,Though the barred windows, barred against the wolf,Are always open! – But the North blew cold;And bidden to a spare but cheerful meal,I sate among the holy BrotherhoodAt their long board. The fare indeed was suchAs is prescribed on days of abstinence,But might have pleased a nicer taste than mine;And through the floor came up, an ancient croneServing unseen below; while from the roof(The roof, the floor, the walls of native fir)A lamp hung flickering, such as loves to flingIts partial light on Apostolic heads,And sheds a grace on all. Theirs Time as yetHas changed not. Some were almost in the prime;Nor was a brow o’ercast. Seen as they sateRanged round their ample hearth-stone in an hourOf rest they were as gay, as far from guile,As children; answering, and at once, to allThe gentler impulses, to pleasure, mirth;Mingling at intervals with rational talkMusic; and gathering news from them that came,As of some other world. But when the stormRose and the snow rolled on in ocean-waves,When on his face the experienced traveler fell,Sheltering his lips and nostrils with his hands,Then all was changed; and sallying with their packInto that blank of Nature, they becameUnearthly beings. ‘Anselm, higher up,Just where it drifts, a dog howls loud and long,And now, as guided by a voice from Heaven,Digs with his feet. That noble vehemenceWhose can it be but his who never erred?A man lies underneath! Let us to work!But who descends Mont Velan? ’Tis La Croix.Away, away! If not, alas, too late.Homeward he drags an old man and a boy,Faltering and falling and but half-awaked,Asking to sleep again.’ Such their discourse.Oft has a venerable roof received me;Saint-Bruno’s once – where, when the winds were hushed,Nor from the cataract the voice came up,You might have heard the mole work underground,So great the stillness there; none seen throughout,Save when from rock to rock a hermit crossedBy some rude bridge – or one at midnight tolledTo matins, and white habits, issuing forth,Glided along those aisles interminable,All, all observant of the sacred lawOf Silence. Nor in this sequestered spot,Once called ‘Sweet Waters,’ now ‘The Shady Vale,’To me unknown; that house so rich of old,So courteous, and by two that passed that way,Amply requited with immortal verse,The Poet’s payment. – But, among them all,None can with this compare, the dangerous seatOf generous, active Virtue. What tho’ FrostReign everlastingly and ice and snowThaw not, but gather – there is that withinWhich, where it comes, makes Summer; and in thoughtOft am I sitting on the bench beneathTheir garden-plot, where all that vegetatesIs but some scanty lettuce, to observeThose from the South ascending, every stepAs tho’ it were their last, – and instantlyRestored, renewed, advancing as with songs,Soon as they see, turning a lofty crag,That plain, that modest structure, promisingBread to the hungry, to the weary rest.”

CHAPTER XXII

ZÜRICH

ONE morning Ruth brought me my mail. Among the letters was one with the postmark Zürich. The superscription was written in a very individual hand, every letter carefully formed. There is a great deal in the claim made that handwriting is an index of character. Preciseness shows in it; the artistic temperament is betrayed by little flourishes; sincerity, craftiness, other virtues, other weaknesses. I knew in a moment that this letter was from my steamer-friend, Professor Landoldt. It was written in delightfully understandable yet amusingly erratic English and asked me to come and make him a visit. It was his “vacancies” and he and Frau Landoldt would be entirely at my service to show me the city and its “surroundabouts.” If I should be coming “by the train-up” he would meet me “by the station.”

It fell in admirably with my plans. Will said that he would send me over in the Moto; he had some writing to do, else he would go along; but he and Ruth would come for me at the end of my visit, and, if the Professor and the Frau Professorin would like to join us, they would take us to the Dolomites over one of the new routes just opened to motor-vehicles.

What could have been kinder? The last part of the proposition I gladly accepted, but as long as I should have to go alone I thought it best to go by train, and taking it leisurely, stop here and there on my way. So I wrote Professor Landoldt that I would be with him in a week. I provided myself with one of those “abonnement-tickets” which are good for a fortnight of unlimited travel at a cost of only $18.50 and allow one to cover almost all the roads of the country – twenty-eight hundred miles – if one should so desire. My photograph was duly pasted in, my signature appended, and I was armed and equipped.

I went first to Yverdon, enjoying the fine view of the Jura, and following with an eager eye the windings of the Thièle River, which here proclaims itself the legitimate child of the Orbe and the Talent; such a parentage assuring beauty. I stopped long enough there to visit the famous convent built by Duke Conrad of Zähringen before the middle of the Twelfth Century and nearly eight hundred years later famous as the scene of Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi’s epoch-making school, after he had been driven from one place to another by jealousies and misunderstandings. It is still used as a school-building. Pestalozzi is kept in memory of the inhabitants by a monument near the railway station. Here, as in many other places, there are interesting remains of the ancient Roman occupation.

Only two miles beyond – and those two miles offering an enchanting view down the Lake of Neuchâtel – is the famous town of Grandson. As the Swiss railway-ticket allows perfect freedom both of passage and of stop-off, I spent the time between two trains in visiting the château of Baron de Blonay, which has a wide view, and the castle that gives its name to the place. It was built in the year 1000, probably just after it was generally decided that the world was not coming to an end immediately. Here took place the great battle which all Switzerland commemorates.

First it was captured in 1475 by the Bernese; then recaptured by Charles the Bold, of Burgundy. Then on March 3, 1476, the duke was surprised and completely annihilated. Hughes de Pierre, of the Chapter of Neuchâtel, who was an eye-witness, tells the story of it in his chronicle: —

“At the first blow the castel of Valmarcus fell into the hands of the Burgundian. As soon as Count Rudolphe learned of it he sent the archers of Rhentelin and a part of our men to guard Pontareuse; all the other men from the country were thrown into Boutry and all along the Areuse, on the farther bank, likewise those of Valengin and Landeron. Nor must we forget seven boat-loads of gentlemen (gens de bien) who came from Vully, Cerlier and Bonneville – all of these worthy people (bons enfans) arriving before Neuchâtel were welcomed by the townspeople and immediately two Chevaliers des Ligues, together with the notable councillors of the city and others, were taken from the said barques straight to the Abbey of Bevaix; a part were lodged there; a part at Chastelard, Cortailloud and at Pontareuse.

“When this had taken place the allies, purposing to bring aid and deliverance to their friends at Grandson, arrived at Neuchâtel in great spirits, with songs of joy and a formidable array, all of them men of martial appearance, fear-inspiring and yet good to see. Immediately on being informed by our men of the disloyalty and cruelty of the duke and the miserable condition of the brave people of Grandson (this report going from mouth to mouth from the first to the last) the said Messieurs des Ligues put on such furious frowns of indignation that no words could express it, all swearing (chevaliers and the rest) that their brothers by life and blood should be avenged without delay and that they would not lose any time for refreshment or rest in the city, but they instantly went to lodge in Auvermé, Corcelle, Cormondrèche, Basle, Colombier, Boudry, Cortaillonds, Bevaix and neighboring places, given aid and welcome everywhere in the county. Then followed the bandière of the city with those of the bourgeoisie who remained there (the most eager having already taken their positions on the Areuse and the Boudry, where they were close together).

“And the day being the second of March, the companies (bandons) being assembled in warlike order, the Messieurs des Ligues before sunrise on the plain between Boudry and Bevaix resolved to dash immediately at the Burgundian without waiting longer for the bandières of Zürich and the horsemen who were late and not as yet arrived at Neuchâtel.

“On the other side, and at the same hour, Duke Charles advanced with great noise of trumpets and clarions. Those of Schwyz, Thun and others (whose names we can not easily recall) started forth above Valmarcus. The bandières of Soleure, Bern, Lucerne, Fribourg, and that of Neuchâtel which included three hundred citizens and more, as well as that of Landeron and the hommes royés of M. de Langern, led straight to the plain; those of Siebenthal, Unterwald, Morat, Biel and others followed the shore of the lake.

“Soon before the battle-line of the Ligues the Burgundian troops superbly accoutered came forth; there was found the duke with his most trusty cavaliers. Soon the charge was made; soon Les Chartreux de la Lance were crushed and overthrown. After this attack the Ligues, spying all the swarming crowd (formilière) of the Burgundians near Concize, planted their pikes and banners in the ground, and with one accord, falling on their knees, asked the favor of their mighty God.

“The duke, seeing this act, swore: ‘By Saint George these dogs are crying mercy. Cannoniers, fire on those villains!’

“But all his words were of no avail. The Ligues like hail (gresles) fell upon his men, slashing, thrusting those handsome gallants on all sides. So well and so completely discomfited all along the route were those poor Burgundians that they were scattered like smoke borne away by the wind.”

Other chroniclers tell of the defeat of the duke and the brave deeds of the allies, and how the duke’s horsemen tried to escape but were run down by the infantry and many were killed. Another tells how the sun dazzled them as from a mirror and how the trumpet of Ury bellowed and the horns of Lucerne sent forth such terrible sounds that the people of the Duke of Burgundy were seized with terror and fled. The duke tried to stop them, but it was all in vain; they abandoned their camp, and all its treasures fell into the hands of the allies.

These contemporary accounts are all more or less full of inaccuracies; it is well known now exactly how the battle took place and how the Burgundian army of about fifty thousand with five hundred pieces of artillery was so completely defeated.

The mere facts were these. On Feb. 18, 1476, the Duke Charles assaulted Grandson; on the twenty-eighth the garrison surrendered and the next day were all massacred. On the same day the duke went to the Château of Vaulxmarcus (now Vaumarcus). Its master, Messire de Neuchâtel, surrendered, throwing himself on his knees and begging to be allowed to retire with his garrison of forty. The duke kept the baron but let the garrison go, who were wildly indignant at not having been allowed to fight. The forty scattered and spread the news, and that brought the allies together. The duke had an impregnable position, but the Swiss, by making a feint of attacking Vaulxmarcus, tried to draw him out. Had he not lacked provisions for so formidable an army, he might have resisted, but he had to advance on Neuchâtel, and the sudden attack of the confederates, who numbered only between twenty and twenty-five thousand men, was irresistible. Many of the Swiss cities possess relics of this great victory, which is the one great event for the Cantons to exult over and no doubt did much to prepare the way for the future Confederacy. At Soleure one sees the costume of Charles’s court jester. Lucerne has the great seal of Burgundy. At the University Library at Geneva are miniatures which belonged to the duke.

If the Duke of Brunswick left twenty million francs to Geneva, – and, by the way, the heirs of his illegitimate daughter are trying to get it away from the town, – Neuchâtel had a benefactor in David de Purry, who left four and a half millions, and he also has a statue. I did not stop to look into the Municipal Museum, but I took the train to the top of the Chaumont, which gives a fine bird’s-eye view of the city, the lake, and the whole range of the Alps.

I crossed the lake from Neuchâtel to Morat. The lake is a little less than eight kilometers long and is about one hundred and fifty-three meters deep. It connects with the Lake of Bienne by a stream tamed to service. It connects by the Broye with the Lake of Morat, which is like a family reduced in circumstances. It once washed the walls of the ancient city of Aventicum, capital of the Helvetii, and after the Romans captured it, a city of large importance. Both lake and town have shrunk. The lake is about as long as the Lake of Neuchâtel is wide, and the town, now Avenches, lives in its past. Omar Khayyâm would have found a topic for a poem in the solitary Corinthian column from the temple of Apollo standing nearly twelve meters high and serving only as the support for a family of storks most respectable as far as their antiquity is concerned.

Avenches is only about a mile from Morat. It has been called a modern Pompeii. Under the auspices of the Society for the Preservation of Roman Antiquities it has been more or less thoroughly investigated and archeologized, and one may stand in the very forum where perhaps Cæsar stood.