The region takes its name Tarasp, terra aspera, from the castle, which stands on a hill of splintered rock some distance from the principal springs. On the hillside is the hamlet of Sparsels, with a curious fountain-shrine; and below, by a little lake, Fontana, with the parish church and a Capuchin hospice, for, owing to the long tenure of the seigniory by Austria, this commune, alone in the Engadine, has remained Catholic. In the eleventh century, after long disputes, the castle and seigniory became vested in the bishopric of Chur. In 1239 they passed to the counts of Tirol, and remained Austrian till, by the Treaty of Luneville in 1801, they were made over to Graubünden as a set-off to various fiefs of the bishopric of Chur scattered in the Vorarlberg and Tirol. There are enchanting views of this loveliest nook of the Lower Engadine from the windows of the castle, whose latest purchaser is the ex-Grand-Duke of Hesse.

Descending the valley, we pass the ruin of the Romanesque church of St. Peter on a rocky hill. Then the villages of Sent and Crusch, 'The Cross,' a little below which a road crosses the Inn to Sur En on the right bank at the opening of the sequestered Val d'Uina.

About a mile and a half below Crusch is the deep ravine through which the Sinestra flows to the Inn. On a rocky hill above is the ruined castle of Tschanuf, the seat till the beginning of last century of an episcopal castellan who controlled the jurisdiction of the Lower Engadine. Less than an hour up the wild and lovely Val Sinestra are some famous springs impregnated with iron, arsenic, and other minerals, and highly charged with carbonic acid gas. Centuries before the present high-road and Kurhaus facilitated access to and use of them, their virtues were known in the Engadine and Tirol, and a little band of sufferers flocked yearly to this secluded glen, living in tents while they drank the waters and bathed with pristine simplicity under a spreading elder tree in troughs in which the water was warmed by heated stones.

Descending the Inn Valley we come to Ramuosch in a fertile nook of ancient cultivation. Its interesting church, which formerly claimed to enshrine the wonder-working remains of St. Florin, was long a place of pilgrimage both for Engadiners and Tirolese. Though the saint was priest of Ramuosch, his birthplace was Matsch in Tirol, and every year on his festival the chest that was believed to hold his bones was carried in solemn procession from Ramuosch to Matsch, some eight hours distant, and back. In 1530 it occurred to the authorities of Ramuosch to open the chest, which was found to contain nothing but rags. Ramuosch was then halting at the crossways, and this cruel disillusion decided it for the Reformation.*

* 'At the commencement of the great schism the Government of the Three Leagues, after listening to incontrovertible arguments on both sides in a theological conference at Ilanz in January, 1526, decided to be perfectly neutral, leaving individual consciences free, and allowing each commune to decide for itself to which persuasion it would officially belong. Thus the people settled for themselves the question that concerned them so deeply, which in the rest of Europe was mainly decided over their heads by rulers often actuated by considerations far from religious' ('Upper Engadine,' p. 168).

On the right below Ramuosch a fine waterfall marks the entrance to the pent, pine-clad Val d'Assa. In a cliff some two hours up is a stalactite cavern and a spring known as Fontana chi staina, 'the spring that stands still.' Its final channel is probably a natural siphon that empties a hidden reservoir three times a day, and ceases to flow while it is refilling.

In a fertile widening of the Inn Valley is the village of Strada and, perched high above, that of Tschlin. Dark woods clothe the right bank of the Inn, now swollen by the melting of many glaciers to a considerable stream. Then we come to Punt Martina, in German Martinsbruck, standing amid grand scenery at the end of the Engadine. By the iron bridge beyond it we pass into Tirol. In front the road winds up wooded slopes, and then climbs and cuts its way among the slate rocks of the romantic Finstermünz Pass. On the left a new road drops down along the Swiss side of the Novella gorge to Alt Finstermünz, far below, where antiquated fortifications cling to the sheer cliffs, under which the straitened stream flows swift and deep. Old wooden bridges from either jealous bank meet in the vaulted gangway of a square tower set on a submerged rock in midstream.

V
THE NATIONAL PARK

This great reserve has added a unique attraction to the Engadine. The idea was for a long time the aspiration of an elect few, leavening public opinion and pestering the Government. At last they had their reward. For years the authorities that in an admirable reciprocity govern and are governed by the population of Switzerland cautiously committed themselves to the enterprise. In 1906 they appointed a Naturschutzkommission to report on a desirable region to be sequestrated. In 1909 a Naturschutzbund was formed to supplement official efforts. The commission negotiated rights in first one fragment then another of the selected and authorized area: from the commune of Zernez in 1909 the Val Cluoza, in 1910 the Val Tantermozza and the northern and western slopes of Piz Esan; from the commune of S-chanf in 1911 the southern slopes of Piz Esan and Piz Quatervals, the Val Muschauns, and part of the right side of Val Trupchum; from the commune of Scuol and the pastoral league of Tavrü most of the east side of the S-charl district; from Zernez in 1913 the Praspol, Schera, and Stavelchod districts. All concessions were with option of renewal. Right of emption was also secured over the region linking the two unequal areas into which the appropriations fall. This is termed the Verbindungsgebiet, roughly speaking the Val Nuglia, the upper Val Plavna, and the heights bordering both. In 1914 a resolution of the Federal Council gave legislative seal to the transactions, banning to human enterprise some fifty square miles. The addition of the linking domain will bring the area up to about eighty square miles. Of course, the figures give the horizontal projection on the map; the surface measurement would be considerably more, as anyone who has had to do with real property that is 'mostly on end' will realize.