[Illustration: A VOSGIAN SCENE]
Travellers stinted for time cannot properly enjoy the pastoral scenes, not the least charm of which is the frank, pleasant character of the people. Wherever we go we make friends and hear confidences. To these peasant folks, who live so secluded from the outer world, the annual influx of visitors from July to September is a positive boon, moral as well as material. The women are especially confidential, inviting us into their homely yet not poverty-stricken kitchens, keeping us as long as they can whilst they chat about their own lives or ask us questions. The beauty, politeness, and clear direct speech of the children, are remarkable. Life here is laborious, but downright want I should say rare. As in the Jura, the forest gorges and park-like solitudes are disturbed by the sound of hammer and wheel, and a tall factory chimney not infrequently spoils a wild landscape. The greater part of the people gain, their livelihood in the manufactories, very little land here being suitable for tillage.
Gérardmer is famous for its cheeses; another local industry is turnery and the weaving of linen, the linen manufactories employing many hands, whilst not a mountain cottage is without its handloom for winter use. Weaving at home is chiefly resorted to as a means of livelihood in winter, when the country is covered with snow and no out-door occupations are possible. Embroidery is also a special fabric of the Vosges, but its real wealth lies in mines of salt and iron, and mineral waters.
One chief feature in Gérardmer is the congeries of handsome buildings bearing the inscription "École Communale" and how stringently the new educational law is enforced throughout France may be gathered from the spectacle of schoolboys at drill. We saw three squadrons, each under the charge of a separate master, evidently made up from all classes of the community. Some of the boys were poorly, nay, miserably, clad, others wore good homely clothes, a few were really well dressed.
Our first week at Gérardmer was wet and chilly. Fires and winter clothes would have been acceptable, but at last came warmth and sunshine, and we set off for the Col de la Schlucht, the grandest feature of the Vosges, and the goal of every traveller in these regions.
[Illustration: CIRQUE DE RETOURNEMER]
There is a strange contrast between the calm valley of Gérardmer, a little haven of tranquil loveliness and repose, and the awful solitude and austerity of the Schlucht, from which it is separated by a few hours only. Not even a cold grey day can turn Gérardmer into a dreary place, but in the most brilliant sunshine this mountain pass is none the less majestic and solemn. One obtains the sense of contrast by slow degrees, so that the mind is prepared for it and in the mood for it. The acme, the culminating point of Vosges scenery is thus reached by a gradually ascending scale of beauty and grandeur from the moment we quit Gérardmer, till we stand on the loftiest summit of the Vosges chain, dominating the Schlucht. For the first half-hour we skirt the alder-fringed banks of the tossing, foaming little river Vologne, as it winds amid lawny spaces, on either side the fir-clad ridges rising like ramparts. Here all is gentleness and golden calm, but soon we quit this warm, sunny region, and enter the dark forest road curling upwards to the airy pinnacle to which we are bound. More than once we have to halt on our way. One must stop to look at the cascade made by the Vologne, never surely fuller than now, one of the prettiest cascades in the world, masses of snow-white foam tumbling over a long, uneven stair of granite through the midst of a fairy glen. The sound of these rushing waters is long in our ears as we continue to climb the splendid mountain road that leads to the Schlucht, and nowhere else. From a giddy terrace cut in the sides of the shelving forest ridge we now get a prospect of the little lakes of Longuemer and Retournemer, twin gems of superlative loveliness in the wildest environment. Deep down they lie, the two silvery sheets of water with their verdant holms, making a little world of peace and beauty, a toy dropped amid Titanic awfulness and splendour. The vantage ground is on the edge of a dizzy precipice, but the picture thus sternly framed is too exquisite to be easily abandoned. We gaze and gaze in spite of the vast height from which we contemplate it; and when at last we tear ourselves away from the engaging scene, we are in a region all ruggedness and sublimity, on either side rocky scarps and gloomy forests, with reminders by the wayside that we are approaching an Alpine flora. Nothing can be wilder or more solitary than the scene. For the greater part, the forests through which our road is cut are unfrequented, except by the wild boar, deer, and wild cat, and in winter time the fine mountain roads are rendered impenetrable by the accumulation of snow.
This approach to the Col is by a tunnel cut in the granite, fit entrance to one of the wildest regions in France. The road now makes a sudden bend towards the châlet cresting the Col, and we are able in a moment to realize its tremendous position.
From our little châlet we look upon what seems no mere cleft in a mountain chain, but in the vast globe itself. This huge hollow, brought about by some strange geological perturbation, is the valley of Münster, no longer a part of French territory, but of Prussian Elsass. The road we have come by lies behind us, but another as formidable winds under the upper mountain ridge towards Münster, whilst the pedestrian may follow a tiny green footpath that will lead him thither, right through the heart of the pass. Looking deep down we discern here and there scattered châlets amid green spaces far away. These are the homesteads or chaumes of the herdsmen, all smiling cheerfulness now, but deserted in winter. Except for such little dwellings, barely discernible, so distant are they, there is no break in the solitary scene, no sign of life at all.
The châlet is a fair hostelry for unfastidious travellers, its chief drawback being the propensity of tourists to get up at three o'clock in the morning in order to behold the sunrise from the Hoheneck. Good beds, good food, and from the windows, one of the finest prospects in the world, might well tempt many to linger here in spite of the disturbance above mentioned. For the lover of flowers this halting-place would be delightful.