Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843/Part 1/Letter 5
LETTER V.
Our journey has reached its termination; but this letter will tell nothing of our present prospects and intentions, for truly they are as yet obscure and unformed: it will but conclude the history of our journey.
The inn at Schaffhausen is large and good, without being first-rate. We engaged a voiturier to take us the next day to Zurich, and bargained to visit the Falls of the Rhine on our way. We wished to reach them by water, as the best approach; but Murray had by a misprint in his Hand-book put seventeen francs instead of seventeen batz, as the price asked for a boat; and as we, as you well know, are perforce economical travellers, we demurred. This misapprehension being set right by the very civil master of the hotel, we engaged a boat, and the carriage was to meet us at the Falls. We embarked in a rough canoe; a man held an oar at the stem, and a woman one at the prow. We sped speedily down the rapid river, and at one point a little apprehension of danger, just enough to make the heart beat, was excited. We approached the Falls, we were hurrying towards the ledge of rocks; it seemed as if we must go right on, when, by a dexterous use of the oars, we found ourselves with one stroke in the calm water of a little cove; the moment was just agreeably fearful; and at the crisis, an eagle had soared majestically above our heads. It is always satisfactory to get a picturesque adjunct or two to add interest when, with toil and time, one has reached a picturesque spot.
The cottage built to let out the Falls as a show is the contrary of all this; but it has some advantages. You see the sight from various points of view, being first on a level with the upper portion of the river, and by degrees, as you descend to other windows and balconies, reach the level of the lower part. The falls of Terni is the finest cataract I have seen: I believe it to be the grandest in Europe; but it is altogether of a different character from the falls of the Rhine. The waters of the Velino are contracted into a narrow channel, and fall in one stream down a deep precipice. The falls of the Rhine are broken into many, and are spread wide across the whole breadth of the river; their descent is never so great, but they are varied by many rocks, which they clothe fantastically with transparent waves, or airy spray.
What words can express—for indeed, for many ideas and emotions there are no words—the feelings excited by the tumult, the uproar and matchless beauty of a cataract, with its eternal, ever-changing veil of misty spray? The knowledge of its ceaseless flow; there, before we were born; there, to be after countless generations have passed away; the sense of its power, that would dash us to atoms without altering the tenor of its way, which gives a shiver to the frame even while we gaze in security from its verge; the radiance of its colouring, the melody of its thunder—can these words convey the impression which the mind receives, while the eye and ear seem all too limited in their powers of perception? No! For as painting cannot picture forth motion, so words are incapable of expressing commotion in the soul. It stirs, like passion, the very depths of our being; like love allied to ruin, yet happy in possession, it fills the soul with mingled agitation and calm. A portion of the cataract arches over the lowest platform, and the spray fell thickly on us, as standing on it and looking up, we saw wave, and rock, and cloud, and the clear heavens through its glittering ever-moving veil. This was a new sight, exceeding anything I had ever before seen; however, not to be wet through, I was obliged quickly to tear myself away.
We crossed the river in a boat, and saw the Falls from the other side—the spot best adapted to painting—and whence the views are generally taken. The carriage met us here, and we rolled along towards Zurich. At first our road was the same as that which we had taken to arrive at Schaffhausen: “We are going back,” cried one; “this won’t do—we must not go back to Höllenthal,” which might be taken as a pun, at least we laughed at it as such. But we soon turned aside. We dined at a pleasant country sort of inn; the scenery was varied and agreeable, though without any approach to magnificence; our pace was very slow, and we became very tired, but at last arrived at Zurich.
Some very good hotels had been lately built and opened at Zurich. I believe the Hôtel des Bergues, at Geneva, is the model, as it is the best of these Swiss hotels, where every thing is arranged with cleanliness, order, and comfort, surpassing most English inns. To the door of each room was affixed a tariff of prices, moderate for such good hotel accommodation, though not cheap as lodgings for any length of time; but the certainty of the prices, the fixed one franc a-day, per head, for attendance, the extreme cleanliness and order, makes them very agreeable.[1]
We went to the Hôtel du Lac. Prom our balcony we looked out on the lake of Zurich. This lake is not so extensive nor majestic as that of Geneva, with its background of the highest Alps; nor as picturesque and sublime as Lucerne, with its dark lofty precipices and verdant isles; but it is a beautiful lake, with a view of high mountains not very distant, and its immediate banks are well cultivated, and graced by many country-houses. After dinner, I went out in a boat with P , by ourselves; he rowed in the style of the natives, pushing forward, and crossing the oars as they were pulled back;—we crossed the lake, which is not wide at this point, and returned again by moonlight.
We had become tired of our slow voiturier style of proceeding, and were seized by a desire to get on. So we took our places in the diligence for Coire, determined to arrive at the end of our journey as soon as might be.
The diligence was neither clean nor comfortable; we ought to have gone to the end of the lake by the steam-boat. The carriage-road runs at a very little distance from the water’s edge. Half way on the lake is the longest bridge in the world. A bridge across a lake is less liable to be carried away, I suppose, by storms and the swelling of the waters, than over a river, but it ceases to be the picturesque spanning arch that adds such beauty to a landscape; it becomes a mere long low pier. At the end of the lake we took into the diligence a number of passengers, who had come so far by the steam-boat. Our road lay through a valley surrounded by immense mountains, which became higher, closer, and more precipitous as we advanced through the plain at their foot. At one time it seemed as if we must be quite shut in, and then, just as we reached the very extremity of the valley, another lake opened on us—the lake of Wallenstadt, so surrounded by precipitous mountains, that it had been impossible to construct a road round it; but blessings on steam—a traveller’s blessing, who loves to roam far and free, we embarked in a steam-boat, and in an hour arrived at the other end of the lake. The lake of Wallenstadt, surrounded by its high precipitous mountains, is gloomy; indeed, all the region we now travelled was marked by a vastness allied to dreariness, rather than to the majesty of picturesque beauty. Leaving the lake we proceeded along the valley of the Rhine; vast mountain barriers arose on each side, and in the midst was a flat valley, frequently overflowed, with the Rhine in the midst, struggling through a marshy bed. There was something dreary in it; but if the traveller approaches those mountains, and turns aside into their ravines, they instantly disclose scenes graced by all the beauty of Alpine magnificence. I much regretted not visiting the baths of Pfeflers, which I heard to be particularly worth seeing, and only a few miles distant.
At about nine o’clock in the evening we arrived very much fatigued at Coire. Before leaving the diligence-office we secured our places for the following day to Chiavenna. To my great delight I found Italian spoken here. French does not penetrate into these parts; English, if ever found, is a mere exotic, nurtured in particular spots; German, we had none; so now to be able to inquire, and learn, and arrange with facility, was very agreeble. “You do speak Italian!” exclaimed one of my companions in accents of surprise and pleasure;—so many difficulties in the future disappeared under this conviction. I certainly did speak Italian: it had been strange if I did not; not that I could boast of any extraordinary facility of conversation or elegance of diction, but mine was a peculiarly useful Italian; from having lived long in the country, all its household terms were familiar to me; and I remembered the time when it was more natural to me to speak to common people in that language than in my own. I now easily settled for our places; and we repaired to the inn to supper and to bed—we were to set out early in the morning.
At five in the morning we were in the yard of the diligence-office. We were in high spirits—for that night we should sleep in Italy. The diligence was a very comfortable one; there were few other passengers, and those were of a respectable class. We still continued along the valley of the Rhine, and at length entered the pass of the Via Mala, where we alighted to walk. It is here that the giant wall of the Alps shuts out the Swiss from Italy. Before the Alp itself (the Splugen) is reached, another huge mountain rises to divide the countries. A few years ago, there was no path except across this mountain, which being very exposed, and difficult even to danger, the Splugen was only traversed by shepherds and travellers of the country on mules or on foot. But now, a new and most marvellous road has been constructed—the mountain in question is, to the extent of several miles, cleft from the summit to the base, and a sheer precipice of 4000 feet rises on either side. The Rhine, swift and strong, but in width a span, flows in the narrow depth below. The road has been constructed on the face of the precipice, now cut into the side, now perforated through the living rock into galleries: it passes, at intervals, from one side of the ravine to the other, and bridges of a single arch span the chasm. The precipices, indeed, approach so near, in parts, that a fallen tree could not reach the river below, but lay wedged in mid-way. It may be imagined how singular and sublime this pass is, in its naked simplicity. After proceeding about a mile, you look back and see the country you had left, through the narrow opening of the gigantic crags, set like a painting in this cloud-reaching frame. It is giddy work to look down over the parapet that protects the road, and mark the arrowy rushing of the imprisoned river. Mid-way in the pass, the precipices approach so near that you might fancy that a strong man could leap across. This was the region visited by storm, flood, and desolation in 1834. The Rhine had risen several hundred feet, and, aided by the torrents from the mountains, had torn up the road, swept away a bridge, and laid waste the whole region. An English traveller, then on his road to Chiavenna, relates that he traversed the chasm on a rotten uneven plank, and found but few inches remaining of the road overhanging the river.[2] It was an awful invasion of one element on another. The whole road to Chiavenna was broken up, and the face of the mountain so changed that, when reconstructed, the direction of the route was in many places entirely altered. The region of these changes was pointed out to us; but no discernible traces remained of where the road had been. All here was devastation—the giant ruins of a primæval world; and the puny remnants of man’s handiwork were utterly obliterated. Puny, however, as our operations are, when Nature decrees by one effort that they should cease to exist, while she reposes they may be regarded proudly, and commodiously traversed by the ant-like insects that make it their path.
We dined at the village of Splugen. It was cold, and we had a fire. Here we dropped all our fellow-travellers,—some were going over the St. Bernardin, and proceeded very comfortably alone. It was a dreary-looking mountain that we had to cross, by zigzags, at first long, and diminishing as we ascended; the day, too, was drear; and we were immersed in a snow-storm towards the summit. Naked and sublime, the mountain stretched out around; and dim mists, chilling blasts, and driving snow added to its grandeur. We reached the dogana at the top; and here our things were examined.
The custom-house officer was very civil—complained of his station, where it always rained—at that moment it was raining—and, having caused the lids of one or two trunks to be lifted, they were closed again, and the ceremony was over. More time, however, was consumed in signing passports and papers; and then we set off down hill, swiftly and merrily, with two horses—the leaders being unharnessed and trotting down gravely after us, without any one to lead or drive them.
All Italian travellers know what it is, after toiling up the bleak, bare, northern, Swiss side of an Alp, to descend towards ever-vernal Italy. The rhododendron, in thick bushes, in full bloom, first adorned the mountain sides; then, pine forests; then, chesnut groves; the mountain was cleft into woody ravines; the waterfalls scattered their spray and their gracious melody; flowery and green, and clothed in radiance, and gifted with plenty, Italy opened upon us. Thus,—and be not shocked at the illustration, for it is all God’s creation,—after dreary old age and the sickening pass of death, does the saint open his eyes on Paradise. Chiavenna is situated in a fertile valley at the foot of the Splugen—it is glowing in rich and sunny vegetation. The inn is good; but the rooms were large and somewhat dreary. So near our bourne, low spirits crept over some of us, I know not why. To me, indeed, there was something even thrilling and affecting in the aspect of the commonest objects around. Every traveller can tell you how each country bears a distinctive mark in the mere setting out of the room of an inn, which would enable a man who had visited it before, if, transported by magic, he opened his eyes in the morning in a strange bed, to know to what country he had been removed. Window-curtains, the very wash-hand stands, they were all such as bad been familiar to me in Italy long, long ago. I had not seen them since those young and happy days. Strange and indescribable emotions invaded me; recollections, long forgotten, arose fresh and strong by mere force of association, produced by those objects being presented to my eye, inspiring a mixture of pleasure and pain, almost amounting to agony.
This morning, we were to proceed to Colico, at the head of the lake of Como, there to embark on board the steamer. We engaged a voiture, which cost more than we had hoped or expected. We drove through a desolate region,—huge, precipitous, bare Alps on either side,—in the midst, a marshy plain. The road is good, but difficult to keep up. The Adda flows into the lake, over a wide rock-strewn bed, broken into many channels. It is a mountain torrent, perpetually swollen by rain and snow into a cataract that breaks down all obstacles, and tears away the road.
We arrived at Colico two hours too early. The inn was uninviting: we did not enter it. We tried to amuse ourselves by strolling about on the shore of the lake. The air was bleak and cold; now and then it threatened rain. At length, welcome signal of release, the steamer, appeared; another hour had yet to pass while it crossed over to us, and we were on board.
Our plan, formed from the experience of others, had been to take up our quarters at Bellaggio—look at a map, and you will see the situation. The Lake of Como is long, and, in proportion, narrow. About midway between Colico and the town of Como, in its widest part, it is divided into two lakes—one taking a more eastern course to Lecco; the other, to Como. On the narrow, rocky promontory that divides these two branches, looking towards the north, Bellaggio is situated. The steamer, however, did not stop there, but on the opposite shore, Cadenabbia, which looked southward, and commanded a view of Bellaggio and the mountains beyond, surmounting Varenna. We were landed at the Grande Albergo di Cadenabbia. A tall, slight, rather good-looking, fair-moustached master of the inn, welcomed us with a flourish. And here we are.
Strange to say, there is discontent among us. The weather is dreary, the lake tempest-tossed; and, stranger still, we are tired of mountains. I, who think a flat country insupportable, yet wish for lower hills, and a view of a wider expanse of sky: the eye longs for space. I remembered once how the sense of sight had felt relieved when I exchanged the narrow ravine, in which the Baths of Lucca are placed, for the view over the plains of Lombardy, commanded from our villa among the Euganean hills. But it was not this alone that made us sad and discontented. This feeling frequently assails travellers when their journey has come to a temporary close; and that close is not home. It will disappear to-morrow. Meanwhile, to relieve my thoughts from painful impressions, I have written this letter. And now, it is night; the sky is dark; the waves still lash the shore. I pray that no ruin, arising from that fatal element, may befal me here; and I say good night to you—to myself—to the world.—Farewell.
- ↑ Crossing lately from Boulogne to Folkestone, I find, that in the new hotel still in progress, but partly opened, at the latter place, they are following this plan; and a printed tariff is hung up in each room. All is clean and comfortable, and the attendants civil and willing. If it keeps its promise, it will do well; and strangers especially will be glad to avoid the pretending exorbitancy of Dover.—(Note 1844.)
- ↑ Mr. Hayward, in the interesting account with which he has favoured his friends of his perilous journey over the Splugen in 1834. Mr. Hayward says, that the storm in question was what is called there a Wolkenbruch, (cloud-break or water-spout). A mass of clouds, surcharged with electric matter and rain, which had been collecting for weeks along the whole range of the Alps, came down at last like an avalanche from the sky. I once witnessed a phenomenon of this sort at Genoa. The Italians called it a Meteora. A cloud, surcharged with electricity and water, burst above our heads in one torrent of what was rather a cataract than rain. It lasted about twenty minutes, and sufficed to carry away all the bridges over the Bisanzio, flowing between Genoa and Albaro, and to lay flat all the walls which in that hilly country support the soil—so that the landscape was opened and greatly improved. Cottages, cattle, and even persons were carried away. In the Alps, such a rush of water from the heavens was aided by the torrents that rushed from the mountain tops, and a sudden melting of snows.