On the other hand, there is a strong tendency, perhaps a kind of bravado, which aims at showing that we are no longer overawed by the past as were our ancestors; that we live very much in the present, with one eye on the immediate future, and that we do not so much say “Let the dead bury their dead” as “Let us at once bury all that is moribund”. In short, an egotistical irreverence stalks abroad with regard to the past, as well as an exorbitant sentimentality, and our pressing necessity is to beware of both and to keep in the middle of the road. Now this is just the happy and wise position which Lucerne seems to occupy at present. The merest feather will show which way the wind is blowing, and in the current edition of the Official Guidebook there is no trace of the phrase employed in an earlier edition: “In a town where the present is so beautiful, we may well let the past be forgotten”. Beautiful most certainly the town is to-day, and that is partly because the beauty of its past is not forgotten.
History is boiled down and compressed into tabloid form in another guidebook. “In olden times,” it hurriedly tells us, “there stood upon the banks of the Reuss a little village of fishermen, for which the founding of the convent of St. Leodegar, about the year 735, became the first event of importance. The little place grew up by and by into a town, and the time came when it was strong enough to lay its hands upon the trade of the lake. Later on, when the peasantry of the inner cantons concluded that alliance, out of which in time the Swiss confederacy was to rise, Lucerne did not hesitate to join them, so that from the year 1332 the history of the Confederacy has been also that of Lucerne.” That is all very true as far as it goes; food in the form of a tabloid is never quite satisfactory. But probably the majority of visitors will be content with this high essence, not caring to dive deeper into antecedent waters to fish up Lacustrians, Alemanni, King Pepin, the Abbot of Murbach, or the Dukes of Hapsburg. There are, however, certain tit-bits of history—or are they of legend?—which are always palatable, and among these is a story meriting a place by the side of that recounted of Tell and his son. It dates from 1362, from the time, that is to say, when the hold of Austria upon Lucerne was weakening under the contagious example set the townspeople by their neighbours of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden. Things had reached such a pass that the partisans of Austria had had to leave the town, and the Bailiff of Rothenbourg, Governor of the district, was vowing vengeance and plotting with certain traitors among the Swiss
THE RIGI FROM THE MUSEGG; LUCERNE
to retake the town by night and put the townspeople to the sword. After dark, on 29th June, a little boy, Pierre Hohdorf, who had been bathing in the lake and had fallen asleep on the shore, was awakened by the stealthy tread of armed men creeping warily towards a cave beneath the Abbey of the Tailors. Recognizing the Governor among the number, and knowing well the bad blood existing between the Austrians and the townspeople, Pierre Hohdorf, under cover of the reeds, followed these men to their meeting-place, but was surprised by a newcomer, taken by this latter into the cave, denounced as a spy, and threatened with instant death. The boy could only confess that he had fallen asleep after his bath, had been awakened by footsteps, and had become curious to know what was the matter. This was not considered a satisfactory explanation by his captors; a dagger was already uplifted above his breast, when the Governor intervened, caused little Pierre to swear that he would never reveal to a living soul anything of what he had seen or heard, and then allowed him to go free. The boy made his way in all haste to the town and to the Abbey of the Butchers, where he saw that lights were still burning. Entering the building and going to the hall where numbers of citizens were talking and drinking, Pierre went straight up to the big stove and thus addressed it:—“O stove, you are not a living soul; I may therefore tell you what I have just seen and heard without breaking the oath which the Austrians have forced me to take”. He then went on to tell the stove the whole of his adventure. At first the men thought it was just a child’s prank; but they soon pricked up their ears, realized the seriousness of what they were hearing, buckled on their swords, shouldered their battle-axes, hurried out into the streets, and awaited the coming of the Austrians and traitors. As one o’clock struck, the enemy stole out from the Abbey of the Tailors, were quickly confronted and after a fierce struggle were either killed or routed, the arch-traitor, Jean de Malters, together with the Governor, saving their lives in flight.
But Lucerne suffers somewhat from the brilliant history of her near neighbours, her precursors in Swiss freedom. William Tell and his famous companions monopolize so much of the atmosphere that the average visitor is probably satisfied if he supplements a knowledge of their exploits with what he can pick up casually in his strolls around the town.[1] In this way, if he finds himself in the Pfistergasse and notices the ancient three-storied building known as “von Moos’s Haus”, he will come into contact with Ruskin, who made of it one of his exquisitely careful drawings; in this way, at the Gütsch, he will learn how Queen Victoria loved the alleys midst the stately pines; in this way he will hear of Richard Wagner’s erstwhile residence for some six prolific years at Tribschen, the country house nestling among Teutonic-looking poplar trees on the promontory not far beyond the airship station, and of how the great man was wont to wend his way of an afternoon to Dubeli’s Café in the Fürren Gasse, where he smoked his pipe and in all probability sought inspiration for Die Meistersinger, the Siegfried Götterdämmerung, and the Siegfried-Idyll, and perhaps discussed philosophy with Nietzche, who was a frequent visitor to Tribschen in those friendly days before he discovered that the great composer was merely a “clever rattlesnake”. In this way, too, the visitor will hear of the droll doings of Fridli an der Halden, popularly known as Bruder Fritschi, who flourished in the fifteenth century and founded a merry festival which, in the shape of the Fritschi Procession, is still kept up at carnival-time. Many tales are told of this worthy. He seems to have been a prime favourite, not only in Lucerne, but far afield, being on several occasions held captive in some distant town.
“The news reached Lucerne”, we are told, “that Fritschi was being detained at Basle, whereupon the burgomaster and council of the former town at once declared war, announcing that within eight days they would appear in force before Basle and demand the release of the prisoner. They received the reply that their appearance was eagerly looked for, and that the greater the number of the enemy, the better pleased the Basle folk would be. The expedition really took place. Several hundred of the men of Lucerne, with the two burgomasters and eighteen councillors at their head, marched to Basle, where they were received by the burgomaster and council and a host of citizens in martial attire. Brother Fritschi welcomed his fellow-townsmen from a window of one of the best houses, and several days were spent in feasting and revelry.”
The lighter side of warfare, this, and without doubt a welcome interlude in what were seriously stirring times. Frivolous history, do you call it? Is, then, serious history a record only of long faces, and a reserve