Drawn by André Castaigne. Half-tone plate engraved by H. C. Merrill

A BAND OF GIPSIES TRAVELING ALONG THE ST. BERNARD PASS

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Unfortunately, most of the early documents in regard to the dogs were destroyed by fire, but the existing traditions of the antiquity of the race are confirmed by the escutcheon of an ancient Swiss family which I discovered in the archives of the city of Zurich. Four families of the fourteenth century have dogs as ornaments of the escutcheon helmet. They are Stubenweg, Aichelberg, Hailigberg, and the counts of Toggenburg, the latter famous in history and still flourishing in Austria. The escutcheons are most carefully painted, and show four distinct and clearly defined types of dogs. The type over the escutcheon of the family of Hailigberg shows a striking resemblance to the St. Bernard dog of to-day, with all the characteristic signs. Mountains crowned by hospices used to be called sacred mountains or Hailigberg (present style Heiligberg) during the Middle Ages, and from this it may safely be deducted that the knights of Hailigberg, took the picture of a hospice dog for their helmet ornament.

For ages the St. Bernard dogs have been trained for their service in a peculiar manner: one old and one young dog are sent together daily down the Valley of Death toward the nearest human habitation; two others on the south side toward St. Rémy, their footprints in the snow indicating to lost travelers with unfailing certainty the exact line of the road buried under the snow. The younger dogs are taught by the older ones to show to travelers the way to the hospice by barking and jumping and running ahead of them toward the summit of the pass. If they happen to find a poor half-frozen victim, they try to restore animation by licking the hands and face. Then they hasten back to the hospice and announce their discovery by barking.

Great credit is due to the Kynological Society of Switzerland for the preservation, improvement, and popularization of the hospice dogs in their pure type. In the latter part of the last century the English type, as described above, threatened to become generally established as the correct one. At an international Kynological Congress convened by that society in Zurich in 1887, the characteristic marks of the pure hospice type were laid down and acknowledged by the delegates of all countries, England included. In 1885 the first pure St. Bernard dogs were introduced into Germany by Prince Albrecht of Solms-Braunfels, and as they became very popular in a short time, a St. Bernard Club was organized in Munich in 1891 for the express purpose of improving the St. Bernard breed by organizing an exposition with competent judges, and publishing annually a book of genealogy.

The first Napoleon, who crossed the St. Bernard with his army, cavalry, artillery, and all, between the fifteenth and twenty-first of May, 1800, was very fond of these dogs and kept some in his room while resting at the hospice. Near the entrance of the largest building, erected in the seventeenth century, there is a big bell, rung by travelers to announce their arrival. Opposite the bell a large marble tablet commemorates the passage of Napoleon, dedicated by the government of the then republic, now the Swiss canton of Valais. His army was the last to cross the St. Bernard, and in the place of armies of soldiers, those of tourists invade the historic pass every year. They are most numerous in August, for the snow rarely melts before July and begins to fall again early in September, to stay till the following July. The poor priests are then left to themselves for about ten months, when the next summer’s sun makes the carriage-road again practicable.

The founder of the hospice, with its brotherhood, has at last received a monument, which he well deserved. His statue was unveiled during the summer of 1905, and stands on the spot which the many thousands have had to pass who, after being rescued by his successors, have resumed their journey to the valleys below and to renewed life.