"July 18th.—Took a long walk to the valley called the Simmenthal, which goes off from the valley of the lake.... The frogs were very beautiful, lively, vocal, and intelligent, and not at all fearful. The butterflies, too, became familiar friends with me, as I sat under the trees on the river's bank. It is wonderful how much intelligence all these animals show when they are treated kindly and quietly; when, in fact, they are treated as having their right and part in creation, instead of being frightened, oppressed, and destroyed.
"Monday, 19th.—Very fine day; walk with dear Sarah on the lake side to Oberhofen, through the beautiful vineyards; very busy were the women and men in trimming the vines, stripping off leaves and tendrils from fruit-bearing branches. The churchyard was beautiful, and the simplicity of the little remembrance posts set upon the graves very pleasant. One who had been too poor to put up an engraved brass plate, or even a painted board, had written with ink on paper the birth and death of the being whose remains were below, and this had been fastened to a board and mounted on the top of a stick at the head of the grave, the paper being protected by a little edge and roof. Such was the simple remembrance; but nature had added her pathos, for under the shelter by the writing a caterpillar had fastened itself and passed into its death-like state of chrysalis; and having ultimately assumed its final state it had winged its way from the spot, and had left the corpse-like relics behind. How old and how beautiful is this figure of the resurrection! surely it can never appear before our eyes without touching the thoughts.
"Tuesday, 27th.—More pleasant rambles: fine. Now we shall think of a move, and really the changing character of the table d'hôte and other things make me in love with the thoughts of home. Dear England, dear home! dear friends! I long to be in and among them all; and where can I expect to be more happy, or better off in anything? Dear home, dear friends, what is all this moving, and bustle, and whirl, and change worth compared to you?
"August 2nd.—Interlaken.... The Jungfrau has been occasionally remarkably fine: in the morning particularly, covered with tiers of clouds, whilst the snow between them was beautifully distinct; and in the evening showing a beautiful series of tints from the base to the summit, according to the proportion of light on the different parts. At one time the summit was beautifully bathed in golden light, whilst the middle part was quite blue, and the snow of its peculiar blue-green colour in the clefts.... Clout-nail making goes on here rather considerably, and is a very neat and pretty operation to observe. I love a smith's shop, and anything relating to a smithy. My father was a smith."
How beautiful is the following description of the waterfall at Brienz Lake: "The sun shone brightly, and the rainbows seen from various points were very beautiful. One at the bottom of a fine but furious fall was very pleasant. There it remained motionless, whilst the gusts and clouds of spray swept furiously across its place, and were dashed against the rock. It looked like a spirit strong in faith and steadfast in the storm of passions sweeping across it; and though it might fade and revive, still it held on to the rock as in hope, and giving hope, and the very drops which in the whirlwind of their fury seemed as if they would carry all away were made to revive it and give it greater beauty."
At length, on September 29th, the small party reach London again, and Faraday's journal ends thus:—"Crossing the new London Bridge street we saw M.'s pleasant face, and shook hands; and though we separated in a moment or two, still we feel and know we are where we ought to be—at home."
Faraday's allusion to his father in the extract above is very pleasing and interesting. We are told that he used to like to pay visits to the scenes of his boyhood and youth, and that he once went to the shop where his father had formerly been employed as a blacksmith, and asked to be allowed to look over the place. When he got to a part of the premises at which there was an opening into the lower workshop, he stopped and said, "I very nearly lost my life there once. I was playing in the upper room at pitching halfpence into a pint pot close by this hole, and having succeeded at a certain distance, I stepped back to try my fortune further off, forgetting the aperture, and down I fell; and if it had not been that my father was working over an anvil fixed just below, I should have fallen on it, broken my back, and probably killed myself. As it was, my father's back just saved mine."
On his return from his Swiss trip, Faraday took up a great part of his work again, and was fully occupied with a few electrical experiments, lectures, and Trinity House work. What has been termed his second great period of research did not commence until 1845. He lectured frequently at the Institution—so frequently indeed that we cannot refer to them here, but must leave them to the chapter on his lectures. Indeed, merely to detail the work which Faraday did would take up considerably more than the whole space of this little book.
In 1844 Faraday became one of the special commissioners appointed to investigate the Haswell colliery explosion. In 1846 his brother Robert met with a fatal accident, and Faraday writes to his wife, who was staying at Tunbridge Wells:—"Dear Heart,—.... Come home, dear. Come and join in the sympathy and comfort needed by many.... My sister and her children have not forgotten the hope in which they were joined together with my dear Robert, and I see its beautiful and consoling influence in the midst of all these troubles. I and you, though joined in the same trouble, have part in the same hope. Come home, dearest.
"Your affectionate husband,