Avenches is only about a mile from Morat. It has been called a modern Pompeii. Under the auspices of the Society for the Preservation of Roman Antiquities it has been more or less thoroughly investigated and archeologized, and one may stand in the very forum where perhaps Cæsar stood.
From Morat I came up to Fribourg, which, to me, was so interesting that I should have liked to stay there a week. In the old days it must have made a natural castle standing on its acropolis almost surrounded by the Sarine River. Indeed, some of the medieval walls and towers are still left to bespeak its military prestige. Ancient churches make it picturesque. That of Saint Nicholas was begun about a hundred years after the town was founded; it has wonderful stained-glass windows, dating back to the Fourteenth Century, carved stalls, and a glorious organ with seven thousand eight hundred pipes. I was fortunate enough to be there while the organist was playing. But most church organs are out of tune. Variations of temperature so easily affect the pipes.
I was pleased to know that the Catholic Bishop of Lausanne resides in Fribourg, which, indeed, is largely a Catholic town. The ancient linden-tree on the Place de l’Hotel-de-Ville would have delighted Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, who was always measuring big trunks. This is more than four meters in circumference, and, like every other big tree, it traces its pedigree back to a tiny slip stuck into the ground. It was brought by the young Freiburger, who, having run all the way from Morat, announced the news of the great battle there in 1476 by crying “Victory” and falling dead of his wounds and exhaustion. Probably Pheidippides brought a willow wand which grew into a monstrous tree.
The great suspension bridges also are worth seeing, and every vantage-point has a magnificent view.
Bern was my next objective point. I delighted in the quaint old arcaded streets made under the grey stone houses with their green Venetian shutters, and in the Sixteenth-Century fountains. An abundance of water is one of the most blessed gifts of the gods. I put up at the Bernerhof Hotel and spent a day “seeing the sights.”
Bern was founded by Berthold V of Zähringen in the Twelfth Century, the same Berthold that built Fribourg. Legend makes it out that he named his new city after the quarry of his favourite priest. This proved to be a bear. He spoke his will in a rhyme:
“Holtz, lass dich hauen gern,
Die Stadt muss heissen Bern.”
AN OLD STREET IN BERN.