A Day on Mount Righi
Every traveller has a few un-forget-able days in his experiences; and one of these is the day he spends on the great observatory of the Alps, Mount Righi. If it is a stormy day he never forgets his disappointment; if it is a clear one he never forgets his delight. Yesterday was a fair one after many dark days and fog-bound. The sun conquered the mists as full-orbed truth vanquishes error.
We set off from Lucerne in the morning. A swift steamer took us over the blue water of the peerless lake in half an hour to Kussnacht. Here we landed, and securing a Swiss lad for porter of overcoats we started for the Culm. Pedestrianism is fashionable in Switzerland; it is vulgar to ride except for weak-ankled men and ladies. One of my companions wore a pair of thick boots which he said u knew every road among the Oberland Alps.” The distance to the mountain-house is at least six miles — the first part of the way through orchards loaded with fruit. On every side we pass brown-faced women (innocent of bonnets) toiling in the fields, for in Switzerland woman is made a beast of burthen. I have seen a young girl hitched with a small steer before a cart. They are healthy, virtuous, and even the poorest female peasants seemed happy under their hard lot.
By 12 o’clock we had reached the half-way house, drenched with perspiration. We halted at the smoky chalet, and found a loaf of the delicious Swiss bread, and a bowl of milk, for this is the land that literally “flows with milk and honey.” I peeped into the side-room of the cottage and discovered a stream of water flowing through it, with a dozen bottles of wine and beer keeping cool in the bottom of the stream for the refreshment of mountain-clamber ers. Over head on the rough timbers was a sort of ark or huge box in which the family enjoy their dormitory. In such rude cabins dwell the hard-toiling peasantry of this beautiful land; from such homes came forth the stalwart arms that fought the battles for Tell and liberty.
While we are lunching under the trees we be-, gin to catch ravishing views of the lake below us — of Lucerne — of the bluest of blue waters of Lake Zug, and of the distant vineyards towards the Rhine. The last part of the. way is like Christian’s ascent of the Hill Difficulty, where the pilgrim “falls from running to walking, and from walking to clambering on the knees.” Wearily we toiled on until three o’clock when the welcome balcony of the “Hotel du Righi-Culm” broke upon our delighted eyes, and the summit was gained. Overcoats are in demand at once, for a July noonday on the Righi is about like our November. We are 5670 feet above the sea-level, and on a bare mound, destitute of trees, but covered with a soft velvet turf. For that single acre of ground the landlord paid ten thousand dollars!
With map in hand we commence our survey of the wonderful panorama. Forty mountains are in sight — nearly all the finest lakes in Switzerland — and a circumference of three hundred miles, with every variety of scene from the polar solitudes of the ice-clad Wetterhorn to the emerald vineyards that nestle in the vales of Zurich. The lofty group right before us are the Mouch, the Eigher, and the beautiful Jungfrau. This is the mountain which Prof. Agassiz had the hardihood to ascend, when even his guide gave out through cold and terror. It is commonly enveloped in clouds, but towards sunset last evening the “bride of the Alps” unveiled herself, and stood forth in snowy vesture to receive the parting kiss of the king of day.
Next to the Jungfrau lies the enormous glacier of Grindlewald which projects its shelf of blue ice clear to the borders of the vineyards and the harvest fields. That glacier is of solid ice eight hundred feet in thickness, and the drippings of its Summer thaw supply a rapid river! Towards its summit no sun-beams ever have even softened one of its glittering pinnacles, and every drop of rain that descends from the clouds is frozen to snow before it touches the ice-sea beneath! As the sun falls on that glorious glacier, it shines like a stairway of pearl leading up from earth to heaven. An arch of cloud o’erhangs it, and through it we gaze, as the seer of Patmos gazed through into the streets of shining gold like unto transparent glass.
Beyond this glacier tower the four pyramids of the Wetterhorn, or the “Peak of Tempests.” Then comes the Finster-aahorn or “Peak of Darkness;” then the Schrekhorn or “Peak of Terror.” But -why attempt to enumerate the whole retinue of mighty mountains that here do wait before the throne of the Great King? Earth has no sublimer scene. In no spot can one open the one hundred and fourth Psalm, and so take in the transcendent grandeur that must have possessed him who first sang it in the Creator’s praise.
For hours I stood enraptured with the icemountains in the South. Then I turned eastward, and the panorama changed. Instead of bold bleak battlements of ice and granite, lo! a sweet green vale lay before me so far down that the houses seemed but nut-shells, and the highways but threads across the landscape. This was the famous and ill-fated valley of Goldau. Above it hangs the Rossberg mountain, and that huge scar on its side marks the spot whence the avalanche of earth broke away that overwhelmed the unhappy village in its fall. It occurred on the afternoon of September 2, 1806. The inhabitants were startled by a sound like thunder. The air began to fill with black dust. In five minutes the lid of their mighty sepulchre had fallen; and in one huge grave three miles in length lie buried four hundred and fifty beings, husband and wife, parent and child, lover and mistress! It is now one heap of broken earth, covered with a few scattered chestnuts, through whose branches the evening winds sigh forth the requiem of departed Goldau. From the dizzy summit of the Righi, multitudes look down on that vast grave with silent awe, and turn shuddering from the spectacle.
Beyond the Rossberg lies the celebrated battle-field of Morgarten. The lake of Zug — with the church of Kappel beside which Zwingle the reformer fell — spreads its pavement of sapphire below us. Then the eye takes in the spot where the heroic Tell shot the tyrant Gessler. Off to the West — glittering in the setting sun like a golden shield — shines the Lake of Sempach. On its shores Arnold of Winkelreid gained his famous victory at the price of his own precious blood.
What an assemblage. What a panorama of history illuminated with settings of mountains and of waters — of icy coronets set upon the everlasting hills! We question whether our globe has another spectacle more sublimely eloquent in its utterances to the eye of the historian, the poet, or the student of nature in her most magnificent unfoldings.
While we stood,. at sunset, gazing on the en-, rapturing scene, the notes of an Alpine horn sounded out through the crystal air! This was all that was needed to complete the enchantment. The liquid music echoed back and forth from cliff to cliff, until it seemed to be strained of all its grosser qualities and returned in pure delicious melody upon the ear. It was a dream of Switzerland from my boyhood’s days, all realized in one ecstatic moment. And as the visions of the past came back — of Arnold, of Tell, of Zwingle, and of the glorified Calvin — I was ready to break into tears and weep with wonder and with
From such scenes it is not easy to turn away; but on Monday next I set my face homeward. The object of my brief tour is accomplished, and
I cannot consent to be seeking for the pleasures of
foreign travel while the William Tells of my own
dear native land are warring the decisive conflict
for our nation’s life and liberty.
Lucerne, August 9, 1862.