The next best place to that which I have mentioned, for viewing the falls, is in a boat, brought as close as prudence will permit to the boiling eddies. In a camera obscura opposite the falls, is a reflected picture of the cataract—but I cannot imagine why it should be preferable to the real object before our eyes.
There is a “German Switzerland” on the banks of the Elbe—and so is there a “Swiss Germany” on the banks of the Rhine. From Schaffhause to Constance, Zurich, Berne, and even Geneva, the country is pretty and well cultivated; but it is not Switzerland till we get past the above points, and penetrate among the mountains. For the same reason that we should ascend the Rhine from Holland, we ought to enter Switzerland from the North, so that the grandeur and majesty of the scenery may be always on the increase till we ascend the Splugen, the St. Gothard, the Simplon, the St. Bernard, or the Mount Cenis.
Pursuing our route to the next Spa on the list of this tour, we come to Zurich.
Zurich, like Geneva, is situated between a placid lake and a crystal river. Lake Leman, having filtered its waters, discharges them through the “blue and arrowy Rhone,” into the tideless Mediterranean, not to pass on to the vast Atlantic, but again to rise in exhalations to the clouds, and fall—Heaven knows where. The lake of Zurich has a different taste. It sends its purified waters through the Limmatt, to mingle with the Rhine, (also freed from impurities in the lake of Constance,) and thence to find its way to the great Northern Ocean—probably to visit the Thames, the Ohio, or even the Ganges, before it makes another aerial voyage to the skies.
The scenery about Zurich is tame and insipid, compared with that about Geneva, where the Jura and the high Alps in the distance, contrast with the lovely Pais de Vaud in the vicinity of the lake.
LAKE OF WALLENSTADT.
This lake, which is only a good day’s journey from Zurich, presents, in my opinion, the finest lake-scenery in Switzerland. The mountains, on the northern shore, rise almost perpendicularly to the height of five or six thousand feet, sprinkled with ledges of rock, on which are perched the shepherd’s chalet, and giving footing and scanty nutriment to the pine and alpine shrubs and flowers. The mountains on the southern side are equally high, but not so perpendicular in their descent to the lake; but the whole circle of scenery is most magnificent. The transit of the lake is east and west, a distance of some twelve or thirteen miles, and the passage is usually favoured by a kind of trade wind, which blows from the westward during one part of the day, and from the eastward during the other. The little village of Wesen, is the point of embarkation from the Zurich side, and is situated most romantically under stupendous mountains. We started at two o’clock, with carriage, horses, and live lumber, in the passage-boat, which did not convey much idea of safety, being low, flat, and rigged with a tall frail mast and square sail. The dangers of the Wallenstadt navigation are, no doubt exaggerated; but it is evident that, along the whole of the northern board of the lake there is but one small spot where a boat could put in for safety in a storm. Along this shore we sailed with a fine breeze, and enjoyed the prospect of one of the finest scenes in Switzerland. The mountains on the northern board are so high and precipitous, that I think it is physically impossible for a gale of wind to blow direct on the shore, when a boat comes close to the rocks. It could only be by the impulse of the waves that a boat might be forced amongst the breakers. Accidents, however, very seldom happen. The afternoon was clear sunshine—the boatmen abandoned the oars, being wafted along by a fine breeze—the song was commenced—and the Ranz de Vache was returned from the ledges of rock, and patches of vegetation among the cliffs, by many a blithsome shepherd, tending his flocks, or collecting his little autumnal harvest—the long and slender cataracts poured in sheets of gauze along many a craggy precipice—and the whole scene was kept as a moving panorama by the steady progression of the boat.
In the enjoyment of Swiss or Alpine scenery, everything depends on the state of the atmosphere, and on that of our health and spirits at the time. Hence it is that one person is delighted with a prospect, which another passes without pleasure or surprize at all. Of this I am certain, that a good view of this lake’s scenery can never be erased from the memory.