which here shows itself in destroying a work, which if pride, only less pernicious, achieved, yet is a monument of the best and most useful powers of man.
1st October.
We slept at Duomo d’Ossola, at the Post, a very comfortable inn, and the next morning we commenced early the passage of the mountain. The carriage was light and comfortable; three sat inside and two in a sort of coupée outside, so we had plenty of room. Our veturino was of Turin; and if any one going to that city see a carriage with the name of Amadeo on it, and he is in search of a veturino, let him engage him at once—a more civil, obliging fellow I never met. He was engaged to provide us with rooms; and every evening he came to me to ask if I was content, or wished for another. We crossed the mountain with the speed of post; indeed, from Duomo d’Ossola to the village of the Simplon, he rode forward with his own horses to spare them, and we had four posters; and afterwards two posters, in addition to his own, till the summit of the mountain was passed.
The weather was admirable; not a cloud. I walked a great deal of the way. I desired to enjoy to the full the sublime scenery of this grand pass: two circumstances occurred to prevent my seeing it in all its sublimity. One, that our horses’ heads were not turned the other way; and I do not repeat this from the sentiment of the thing, but as the simple fact, that to have the best point of view of the mighty features of the scene, you must look towards Italy; and thus as I walked, I stopped continually and turned to catch those views which I had studied with such longing to really see them, in Brockedon’s prints. But the scene was indeed different. He speaks of Alpine horrors; the cascade of icicles; the ice-bound torrent; the snow which, with fantastic shapes covered all, and spreading wide and desolate around, gave a wild and awful appearance to the bare rocks and mighty pines, speaking of storm and avalanche, of danger and death. The snow had fled. We caught glimpses of where it lay eternally on the far summits of the impassable Alps; but we had none. Still the scene in its summer appearance was sublime; abrupt precipices, majestic crags, and naked pinnacles, reared themselves on each side of the ravine formed by the torrent, along which the road is constructed: waterfalls roared around; the pines spread abroad their vast weather-beaten arms, distorted by storms into strange shapes. The road also, now free from snow, gains rather than loses, as we can judge better of the torrents its bridges span, the living granite crags its grottoes perforate, the tumultuous cascades it almost seems to bridle and direct, as their living waters were led by various channels away from our path. There was no horror; but there was grandeur. There was a majestic simplicity that inspired awe; the naked bones of a gigantic world were here: the elemental substance of fair mother Earth, an abode for mighty spirits who need not the ministrations of food and shelter that keep man alive, but whose vast shapes could only find, in these giant crags, a home proportionate to their power. As we approached the village of Simplon, the features of the scene became softer; the summit of the mountain was spread into a grassy meadow, with a lake: villages and cottages peeped out; cattle were grazing; flowers decked the fields; afar off we saw the Alpine ranges towering above, clad in perpetual snow. This sight alone reminded us, that the almost rural scene we viewed, was removed far above the usual resorts of man; and, for at least eight months in the year, was bound in frost and hidden by snow—the resort of tempests, where it becomes labour and pain to exist.
We breakfasted at the Simplon. We found there an English traveller, who told us of the failure of Hammersley’s bank: this was a bathos from sublimity which, yet to many, would have been pathetic; a great blow was given also to many English tourists, his notes being in wide circulation. Fortunately, neither I nor my companions were troubled by it. A few miles after leaving Simplon the descent began. I still walked, for the weather was fine, the air elastic, and I desired greatly to gaze my fill on the mighty and glorious shapes around, so that I could not endure remaining in the carriage. The descent is pretty steep: I believe the greatest difficulties for the construction of the road, presented themselves on the Swiss side. On the Italian, the road is cut for the greater part on the face of the precipices beside the Vedro, and follows the windings of the ravine; but northward, the mountain falls more abruptly. It was necessary to follow the sinuosities of its shape along its shoulder, as it were, and so to reach a neighbouring mountain, divided only by a torrent; this is crossed by a bridge, and then the road turns at an acute angle. I looked long, to study with untaught eyes, why this exact route had been chosen by the engineer; and could judge, by the large circuit he took, of the immense difficulties of his task. This portion of the road belonging to the Swiss, is kept in admirable order, forming a striking contrast with its ruinous condition on the Italian side. We reached Brigg at sunset, and had the satisfaction of knowing that the post could not have taken us quicker; and, for my peculiar instruction, I found that had I left Milan when I intended, I might have joined my grumblings to those of many travellers, who recorded their impatient annoyance of being detained three or four days at the miserable village of Isella, or in a wretched hovel at Divedro, weather-bound by the storms that raged from the 20th to the 24th of September; while for me, all unworthy, the heavens were cloudless and serene.
3rd October.
Our road now lay along the valley of the Rhone, more picturesque far than the valley of the Rhine near Coire. Some of the finest waterfalls in Switzerland precipitate themselves from the cliffs of rock that border the road, or can be reached by a short walk. After the rains, we saw them in great perfection. As I looked on some of these, my imagination was hurried on to endow with life and will these elemental energies. It seemed Love—the love of burning youth, forcing through all obstacles, and with hurry, and dash, and fury making its way; yet beauteous from its nature, sublime from its uncontrollable determination, and thus proceeding right onward to its object, in spite of every let and hindrance, till, having accomplished it, it steals away, almost hidden, almost still, gently murmuring its happiness.
My guide to one of these waterfalls was a deaf and dumb child. She was interesting from the intelligence as well as the beauty of her countenance, and a certain grace of gesture, whose vivacity and distinctness became as intelligible as words.
The valley we threaded is diversified by towns. At Martigny, there are many tablets let into the walls of the houses to say where the waters had reached during the memorable inundation, caused by the tremendous overflow of the Dranse, in 1818. In some parts, conical rocky hills rise in the midst of the valley, crowned by castles. The scenery wants the southern sunny glow which I prefer, but is grand and full of variety.
Geneva, 4th Oct.