Went from Zweihitschirne to the Grindenwald with the Saxe-Gotha before us, through a more beautiful valley. Saw the glaciers come into it, with the Eiger, Wetterhorn, and other mountains, most magnificent. Walking about, found two girls who gave us cherries and chatted freely. Found that mules were 18 francs a day. A party came in in the dark at 8 with guides, hallooing and making a lively sound. Dined at 7, and talked about mules, hoping to get return ones etc.
September 22.—Got up. Could not get mules under 18 francs: my foot too bad to walk. Went with Captain Rice and others back to Interlachen. Got into a boat rowed by two men and a boy. Went by Brientz, Calne, to the Griesbach cascade, and then to Brientz—wilder, but not so beautiful as the Lake of Thun. The cascade I did not mount to see on account of my foot. At Brientz an old woman would give us her presence and conversation till one of my companions courted the daughter. Met between Grindenwald and Interlachen L[ord] B[yron] and Mr. H[obhouse]: we saluted.
September 23.—Got up at 4. Tired of my company; and, finding the expense more than I could afford, I went to their bedrooms to wish them good-bye. Set off at 5-1/2; and through fine copse-wooded crags, along the Aar, with cascades on every side, to Meyringen; where I breakfasted with two Germans, an old and a young artist—the old, chatty. Bought a pole. Went to see the Reichenbach, a fine cascade indeed. Thence through the beautiful vale of Nach-im-Grunden, where for a moment I planned a sovereignty; but, walking on, my plans faded before I arrived at Guttannen, where I dined.
Rode all the way to-day—horrible, only passable for men and mules: it is the way to St. Gothard. The road is merely huge unequal masses of granite thrown in a line not the straightest. From Guttannen the road went through the wildest and most sublime scenery I ever read of: vegetation less and less, so that, instead of grass, there was moss; then nothing. Instead of trees, shrubs; then nothing—huge granite rocks leaving hardly room for the road and river. The river's bed the most magnificent imaginable, cut deep and narrow into the solid rock, sinuous, and continually accompanied by cascades, and amazing bold and high single-arched bridges. Snow covering in some parts the whole bed of the river, and so thick and strong that even huge stones have fallen without injuring its crust. There are only two houses between Guttannen and the Hospital: one, a chalet wherein I entered; the other, a cow-herd's. Arrived at 6 o'clock precisely, having walked in only 9-1/2 hours 30 miles at least.
[This is a little indistinct in connexion with what precedes. I suppose that the phrase "rode all the way to-day" must be understood as meaning "all the way up to Guttannen"; and that, after leaving Guttannen, there were 30 miles of walking before the Hospital was reached. Yet this seems an unreasonably heavy day's work in travelling. After "only 9-1/2" the initial written is "m": but I presume it ought to be "h" (hours).]
The Hospital is an old stone ugly building, consonant with the wild scene, where the poor are lodged for nothing; others, us, [as?] an inn.
September 24.—On account of rain did not get up till 7. Set off across the Grimsel, a dreary mountain with snow in every hollow—5000 feet above the Four-canton Lake. Descended on the other side to Obergustellen, where I breakfasted at 10. Thence through Verlican, Guesquerman, Munster, Rexingen, Biel, Blizzen; where, out of the dead flat valley, I began to mount, and the scenery began to increase in beauty. One bridge especially over the Rhone, which fell between two clefts' sides, was beautiful. Sinderwald, Viesch, pine-wood; sax (?) along the rocks, and fine path along the mountain. Very fine, though continued hard rain, which drenched me and hindered my seeing a great deal. To Morel, where I went to bed, and ate a kind of dinner in bed at 7 o'clock.
September 25.—Up at 5; my foot, from having been obliged to walk with the shoe down at heel, very much swelled and too painful to walk. Breakfast. Two students from Brieg, of the Jesuits' College, came in, who had during the vacations been beyond Constance with only two écus neufs in their pockets. It costs them ten batsches a year at College. Impudent one: the other modest-looking, but, when I gave him six francs because he had no more money, he asked me for more on other accounts. The Jesuits been restored two years.
At Brieg[[19]] I sent for the curate, a good old man of sixty. We conversed together in Latin for two hours; not at all troublesome in enquiries, but kind in answering them. The Valaisians resisted two years against the French in 93. It was the only part of the country in which they did so, except Unterwalden, and then it was only the peasants, and in every village there was a French party. The cruelty of the French was dreadful; they stuck their prisoners in a variety of ways like sheep. One old man of eighty, who had never left his house but whom they found eating, they strangled, and then put meat and bottles by him as if he had died apoplectic. They fought very hard and bravely, but such was the power of numbers united to the force of treachery that they were obliged to yield. In 1813, after the French had quitted Brieg, they again attempted to penetrate from Italy by the Simplon; when the Brieg, Kelor [?], and other villagers, joined by only one company of Austrians, surrounded them in the night, and took them prisoners. In Schwytz [?] and Unterwalden the division was more strongly marked. In Unterwalden (where was the scene) the men [?] divided and fought against each other, some joining the French from Stanz [?] to Engelberg. They were for freedom, and fought as the cause deserved. They killed 5000 French, more than double their own number; women fought; they were in all 2100 Swiss. One maid in the ranks, when her comrades were obliged to retreat, seeing a cannon yet unfired, went with a rope-end and fired it, killing thirty [?] French. She was taken; a pardon was offered. She said, "I do not acknowledge any pardon; my action is not pardonable; a thief [one?] pardons, not a just man." They killed her with swords. The hundred men who came from the higher part of Schwytz, attempting to go to their relief, were through their own countrymen forced to cut their way and march by night; and, when in retreating they came to the other shore of Lucerne Lake, they had again to cut through their own countrymen to arrive at their homes, they refusing them permission to pass. The Austrians, for the help the higher Valaisians gave them, from sovereigns have made them subjects to the lower Valaisians. The curate came in again, with a description of the Simplon; sat an hour and a half, then left the book. When [he was] not here I have written the part of my Journal I missed at the time, and the extract from his book. He came in again about 6 with a basket of prunes for me, and offered to go with me half-way, as he had to go to a church on the way.
September 26.—Got up at 5. The curate came, and, my foot being better, I set off. He showed me the bridge over the Massa where was a battle, and the ruins of a tyrant's tower. We came to his church, where he showed me the miraculous figure that was found in the Rhone. He told me the lower Valaisians were ready to join the French in '13, and that, in spite of this, they [the Austrians?] had given them a majority of voices. Left me in sight of Brieg, telling me he hoped to see me again in heaven. I walked on to Brieg; breakfasted, and then set off along the Simplon, a magnificent road indeed. It is cut in many places through the rocks, in others built up to its side. It has caverns and bridges always wide enough for four carriages; it ascends all the way to the new Hospice, and again descends from it. At its side are houses of refuge (as they are called) where many are kept by government, with privilege of selling food to help the passers-by. There is in each a room with a bed where one can go in case of rain, accident, etc.; and, when the time for avalanches etc., these men are obliged to accompany the travellers from house to house. Just where the rising ends the new Hospital was to have been erected, and is half done, but stopped now. A little farther on is the old one; whither I went, and got a dinner in the cell of one of the monks; bread, wine, cold meat, and nuts. He seemed very ennuyé; his words slowly fell; said they were St. Augustines, not St. Bernardites. That St. Bernard was a mere reformer of the order. They have been here since 1810 only, in an old castle for which they pay £20 a year. The Simplon was a department of France, and rather well off on account of the quantity of work and money, and not having the droits revenues. The Archduke Regnier was there a few days ago incog., and they did not recognize him—which mortified them very much. It is six leagues hither from Brieg, so that I had walked twenty-six miles.