Our Life in the Swiss Highlands. By J. A. Symonds and his daughter Margaret

Preface

The Essays which compose this volume were written partly by myself and partly by my daughter Margaret. Mine are signed "J. A. S.," hers " M. S." Some of them have not been printed. Others are republished from the Fortnightly Review, the Cornhill Magazine, the Pcdl Mall Gazette, and the St. Moritz Post. I ought to add that two of the series were included in a former book of mine, called Italian Byways, which appeared in 1883. But they are so obviously appropriate to this volume that I felt myself justified in not omitting them from the collection. JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS. Am Hof, Davos-Platz.

CONTENTS PAGE Davos in Winter ...... 1 Davos in the Olden Days . . . . .28 Snow, Frost, Storm, and Avalanche . . .59 , ritual, oiuKii, Notes 104 Chiavenna in April . . . . . .112 Catching a Marmot . . . . .120 Vignettes in Prose and Verse — Davos revisited . . . . . .124 The Alpine Wreath 126 Moonrise and Moonset . . . .128 A February Morning . . . . .129 In the Averser Thai 131 In a Graubiinden Stable ..... 132 Autumn Mists . . . . . .133 A Night upon the Schwartzhorn . . .134 On the Silvretta Glacier 138 Cloud Iridescence . . . . . .142 The Phenomenal Sunsets of 1884 . . .143 An Ode to the Fohn- Wind . . . .145 CONTENTS X PAGE Summer in the Prattigau . . . . .150 Among the Orchards op Tyrol . . .162 Melchior Raqetli ; or, the Life of a Swiss Porter . . . . . . .169 Swiss Athletic Sports . . . . .222 Tobogganing on a Glacier .... 240 Hay Hauling on the Alpine Snow . . .248 A Four Days' Sleigh-Drive . . . .258 A Page of My Life 281 Bacchus in Graubunden ..... 307 Winter Nights at Davos ..... 334 An Epilogue . ' . . . . . .361 OUR LIFE IN THE SWISS HIGHLANDS DAVOS IN WINTER (1878) It has long been acknowledged that high Alpine air in summer is beneficial to people suffering from lung troubles, but only of late years, and in one locality, has the experiment of a winter residence at a considerable elevation above the sea been made.

The general results of that experiment are so satisfactory that the conditions of life in winter at Davos, and the advantages it offers to invalids, ought to be fairly set before the English public. My own experience of eight months spent at Davos, between August 1877 and April 1878, enables me to speak with some confidence ; while a long previous familiarity with the health-stations of the Riviera — Cannes, Bordighera, Nice, Mentone, and San Eemo — furnishes a standard of comparison between two methods of cure at first sight radically opposite. OUR LLFE IN THE SWISS HIGHLANDS 2 Accustomed as we are to think that warmth is essential to the satisfactory treatment of pulmonary complaints, it requires no little courage to face the severity of winter in an Alpine valley, where the snow lies for seven months, and where the ther mometer frequently falls to 10° or 15° Fahren heit below Zero.

Nor is it easy, by any stretch of the imagination, to realise the fact that, in spite of this intense cold, the most sensitive invalids can drive in open sledges with impunity, expose themselves without risk to falling snow through hours of exercise, or sit upon their bedroom bal conies, basking in a hot sun, with the world all white around them, and a spiky row of icicles above their heads. Yet such is a state of things which a few months spent in Davos renders quite familiar; and perhaps the best way of making it intelligible is to describe diffusely, without any scientific pretence or display of theory, what sort of place Davos is, and what manner of life sick people may lead there. Davos is the name given to a district, the princi pal village of which is Davos-am -Platz, situated at an elevation of 5200 feet above the sea.

It is an open and tolerably broad valley, lying almost exactly south and north, and so placed as, roughly speaking, to be parallel with the Upper Engadine, on the one side, and the Rheinthal, between Chur and Land quart, on the other. The mountains which enclose it are of no commanding altitude ; only one insignificant glacier can be seen from any point in the valley : but the position of great rocky masses both to south and north is such that the most disagreeable winds, whether the keen north wind or the relaxing south-wester, known by the dreaded name of fohn, are fairly excluded. Comparative stillness is, indeed, a great merit of Davos; the best nights and days of winter present a cloudless sky, clear frost, and absolutely unstirred atmosphere. At the same time it would be ridiculous to say that there is no wind in this happy valley.

March there, as elsewhere, is apt to be disturbed and stormy ; and during the summer months the valley-wind, which rises regularly every morning and blows for several hours, will cause discomfort to chilly people who have not learned how to avoid it by taking refuge in the pine - woods or frequenting sheltered promenades. All travellers in Switzerland are well aware that where there is a broad valley lying north and south they will meet with a thalwind. At Davos it is not nearly so strong as in the Upper Engadine or the Rhonthal; nor is it at all dreaded for their patients by the physicians. Colds, strange to say, are rarely caught at Davos, and, if caught, are easily got rid of under prudent observance of ordinary rules. For my own part, I can say with certainty that no wind there ever plagued me or imperilled OUR LLFE IN THE SWISS HIGHLANDS 4 my recovery so much as a mistral at San Remo or a sirocco at Palermo.

Davos was settled in the middle of the thirteenth century by vassals of the Empire, who held it till the people freed themselves in the fifteenth century, and, together with the population of the neighbour ing valleys, formed the independent state of the Graubiinden. The mountaineers are a hardy, sober, frugal race of peasants, owning their own land, and sending the superfluous members of each family, for whom no work can be found at home, forth into the world. In old days the Davosers preferred military service. I have before me the pedigree of one family, called Buol, who now own a large hotel at Davos. I find from it that between the years 1400 and 1800, thirty-eight of its members held various offices in the French, Austrian, Venetian, Dutch, Milanese, Spanish, English, and Neapolitan armies, varying from the rank of Field-Marshal down to that of private soldier.

Nearly as many served their country as governors of districts, captains, generals, and ambassadors. A curious history might be written of this family's vicissitudes, and a strange list of its honours might be drawn up ; for it claims one earldom of the Empire, and two German baronies, as well as a French title of nobility, dating from the reign of Henry IV. Nor is this a solitary in stance. Several Grisons families have old historic names ; and, were they not republican, would bear titles as ancient as any but a select few of the English peerage. Many of these people are, how ever, simple peasants now, and, instead of seeking glory in foreign service, they content themselves with trades and commerce. Until the year 1865 Davos remained in the hands of its own people, who lived substantially and soberly, each family in its great farmhouse of stone or fir-wood, at a discreet distance from their neighbours.

Platz was the capital of the district, where the church with its tall sharp spire stands, where the public business of the Landschaft is transacted in the ancient Rathhaus, and where in those old days there was but one primitive little inn. In that year a German physician of repute and experience, Dr. Unger, determined to try whether high Alpine air was really a cure for serious lung disease. The district physician of that epoch, Dr. Spengler, who is now one of the most popular Kur-aerzte of Davos, had previously observed, first, that phthisis was unknown among the inhabitants of the valley; and secondly, that those Davosers who had contracted pulmonary complaints in foreign countries, made rapid and easy cures on their return. He published the results of his observations in the Deutsche Klinik for 1862, and the reading of his paper impelled Dr. Unger to test the truth of his opinion by personal experience.

Fortunately for the future of Davos, Dr. Unger was himself far gone in consumption, and he was ac companied by a young friend in the same plight. In spite of having to rough it more than invalids find safe or pleasant, both Dr. Unger and his friend, Herr Hugo Richter, derived so much benefit from their first visit, that they persevered and ultimately recovered their health. The result was that Dr. Unger and his fellow-workers have trans formed Davos during the last thirteen years from a mere mountain village into a health - station, frequented by nearly one thousand invalids, who pass the winter with every comfort of good accom modation, excellent food, and not a few amusements. The large majority of these visitors are Germans ; but Poles, Belgians, Russians, Danes, and a good many English and Americans, may now be found in the colony.

It speaks volumes for the place, and for the genuine nature of the cures effected there, that it has grown up gradually in this short space of time, without the attraction of mineral waters or fascinating specialities of treatment ; without the intervention of speculative capitalists, intent on floating a new watering-place ; without the charms of a luxurious climate, and without the patronage of royal or illustrious names. Until quite recently it has been known to few but middle-class Germans; and, if its fame is now spreading more widely, every step it makes is made through its own merits. There is absolutely nothing in the place — no social ad vantages, no distinguished beauty of scenery, no delightful southern air — nothing but the fact that if you go there ill, it very often happens that you come away better, after a sufficient time spent in the cure process — to recommend a residence in the austere monotony of this frost-bound, snow-clad valley.

The method of cure is very simple. After a minute personal examination of the ordinary kind, your physician tells you to give up medicines, and to sit warmly clothed in the sun as long as it is shining, to eat as much as possible, to drink a fair quantity of Valtelline wine, and not to take any exercise. He comes at first to see you every day, and soon forms a more definite opinion of your capacity and constitution. Then, little by little, he allows you to walk ; at first upon the level, next up-hill, until the daily walks begin to occupy from four to five hours. The one thing relied upon is air. To inhale the maximum quantity of the pure mountain air, and to imbibe the maximum quantity of the keen mountain sunlight, is the sine qud non. Everything else — milk - drinking, douches, baths, friction, counter-irritant applications, and so forth — is subsidiary.

Medicine is very rarely used : and yet the physicians are not pedantic in their dislike of drugs. They only find by long experience that they can get on better without medicine. Therefore they do not use it except iu cases where their observation shows that it is needed. And certainly they are justified by tbe result. 'The worst symptoms of pulmonary sickness — fever, restless nights, cough, blood-spitting, and expectoration — gradually subside by merely living and breathing. The appetite returns, and the power of taking exercise is won derfully increased. When I came to Davos, for example, at the beginning of last August, I could not climb two pairs of stairs without the greatest discomfort. At the end of September I was able to walk 1000 feet up-hill without pain and without fear of hemorrhage.

This progress was maintained throughout the winter; and when I left Davos in April the physician could confirm my own sensation that the lung, which had been seriously injured, was comparatively sound again, and that its wound had been healed. Of course, I do not mean that the impossible had been achieved, or, in other words, that what had ceased to be organic had been recomposed for me, but that the disease had been arrested by a natural process of contrac tion. For such persona] details I hope I may receive indulgence. It is only by translating general into particular statements that a layman can express himself in these matters to his brother-laymen. DAVOS IN WINTER 9 The fact, however theorised, that colds are rarely caught in this keen Alpine climate, and that re current fever tends to disappear, enables the patient to inhale a far greater amount of air than is possible under almost any other conditions, and renders him much freer iu the indulgence of his appetite.

He need not be afraid of eating and drinking what he chooses, while the bracing of his system makes him very ready indeed to eat. The result is that he speedily increases in weight; and if he has the strength to take exercise, his whole body loses the atony of wasting sickness. Davos does indeed seem to offer the advantages of almost unlimited air and general invigoration which we seek in a long sea voyage or a journey up the Nile, without the con finement of the former or the many drawbacks which the latter presents to one who is seriously ill. It has, besides, its own quality of bracing dryness and the stimulus that only comes from rarified cold air. Those who are enthusiastic for this new Alpine method assert that it alone offers a radical cure. Sick folk, they say, may have their lives prolonged, their sufferings mitigated, on the Riviera ; they may live with happiness in Madeira, or may enjoy ex istence above the first Cataract ; but they can only return from the brink of the grave to an active home-life after passing through the summers and winters of the high Alps.

Whether this proud claim be really justified must be left to experts and prolonged experience to decide. To the same tribunal must be referred the question whether, if the case be established, the result is obtained by checking and obliterating the germs of a disease that tends to reproduce itself in the affected organ ; or by fortifying the constitution and rendering it less liable to the attacks of cold ; or by the diminished pressure of the atmosphere on debili tated organs of respiration ; or by the perfect purity of air that travels over boundless fields of snow, untainted by exhalations, charged neither with dust nor gases, nor yet with Professor Tyndall's redoubt able bacteria ; or else by the tension of the nervous system that reanimates and rallies the last sparks of life in an exhausted organism.

I am myself inclined to believe that somewhat too much is claimed for Davos by its devotees, and that instances of quite as complete a cure can also be adduced by rival methods — by the long sea voyage, the Dahabeeyah, and the residence in tropic or sub tropic climates. But this at least seems proved, that a large percentage of almost hopeless cases attain rapidly and without relapse at Davos to the condition of ordinary health, and that this desirable result is effected at a very small pecuniary outlay, with no collateral risk, and with no sacrifice of the common conveniences of civilised life. Not only DAVOS IN WINTER 11 the cases recorded in technical treatises, but the testimony of many persons with whom I have conversed upon the details of their cure, together with my own experience, based upon a comparison of Davos with Italy and the Riviera, convince me that it is the soundest, surest, and most radical system as yet discovered.

It is a great injury to any new system to describe it in too roseate colours, or to withhold the drawbacks which it shares with all things that are merely ours and mortal. No candid advocate can conceal the fact that there are serious deductions to be made from the great advantages offered by Davos. First and foremost stands the fact that life in a confined Alpine valley during winter is monotonous. It is true that the post comes regularly every day, and that the Swiss post for letters, books, and parcels is so admirably managed that almost anything a man desires can be had within forty-eight hours from London. It is true that the Alps, in their winter robe of snow, offer a spectacle which for novelty and splendour is not surpassed by anything the fancy can imagine. It is true that sledging is an excellent amusement, and that a fair amount of skating can be reckoned on.

It is also true that the climate enables weak people to enjoy all opportunities of rational amusement without stint or hindrance. But, in spite of this, life is monotonous. The mechanic pacings to and fro, which are a condition of the cure, become irksome ; and the discontented invalid is apt to sigh for the blue Mediterranean and the skies he remem bers on a sunny Riviera shore. Then it cannot be denied that a great deal of snow falls in the winter. The peasants concur in telling me that it is rare to have four fine weeks together, and my own experi ence of one winter, not exceptionally bad, leads me to expect two snowy days to three fine ones. Snow fall is, however, no interruption to exercise, and I never found that my health suffered from bad weather. On the contrary, I had the exhilarating consciousness that I could bear it, harden myself against it, and advance steadily under conditions which in England would have been hopeless.

Another drawback to the system is the stern and strict rule of health which the invalid must observe if he wishes to secure its advantages. He must be content to rise early in order to enjoy the first gleams of sunshine, and to retire to bed early in order to get the pre scribed quantity of sleep. He must not shirk his daily exercise upon the same frost-hardened roads, varied by nothing better than sledge exercise in favourable weather, or by the Canadian amusement of " tobogganing." Many who have not moral energy enough to live the ascetic life for several months together, neutralise the good of the climate by lounging in cafes and billiard-rooms, by smoking DA VOS IN WINTER 13 and drinking, by sitting up late at night, and by trading on the stimulus of the air to pass a lazy, good-for-nothing existence, which leaves them where it found them.

Still, it might be argued that, in this respect at any rate, Davos does not differ from other health stations. It is well known that people who spend the winter at Cannes or Mentone often disobey the directions of their doctors, and suffer in consequence ; while Davos offers less enticements to imprudent living than places where nature and society are more alluring. Another disadvantage, shared in common with the Riviera, is the problem, where to pass the spring ? It is pretty generally conceded by the doctors that to stay on in Davos after the second week in April is unadvisable. The great mass of winter snow is then melting, the roads are almost impassable by walkers, and the sun has acquired great power. Chills, almost unknown in the winter or the summer, may now be taken, and the irksomeness of the protracted residence in one place is beginning to tell on nerves and spirits.

Therefore the colony breaks up. Some go to German baths, some to Montreux on the Lake of Geneva, some to the Italian lakes. But wherever the invalids may go, they feel the transition from the bracing mountain air to a lower climate very trying. Strange to say, they now suffer cold for the first time for many months. They have borne 42° of frost with only an increased sense of exhilaration during February and March ; they have driven in open sledges over the Spliigen with only a delightful consciousness of freedom and security ; they have been half buried in avalanches and snowstorms on the Fluela and Maloja : but they settle at Bellagio, and shiver in a temperature of 60°. Accustomed to the most perfect dryness, they resent the tepid moisture of the plains. Having been indulged all through the winter with double windows and warm rooms, they hate the draughts and stagnant chilliness of an Italian residence.

Nothing can make up to them for the loss of the subtle, allpervasive stimulus to which they are habituated. After a while, in deed, the disagreeable sensation passes away, and they recognise that they are only returning with an immensely increased vital force to the ordinary conditions of their old existence. But it requires some self-restraint and much observance of hygienic rules to effect the transition without injury. I think they would do well to use sub-Alpine situations, like Glion, on the Lake of Geneva, or Monte Generoso, above Como, as intermediate stations between the Grisons and the plains of Europe. Mere dry cold they need not dread. Davos has surrounded them with triple brass to brave it. But they have to fear dampness, heat, and all those elements which go to make up what is called a DA VOS LN WINTER 15 relaxing climate.

After all, no one who has once benefited by a Davos winter would shrink from another season there because of this slight drawback, when his own sensations and the verdict of his medical adviser assure him that he is far more capable of bearing adverse influences than he was six months ago. So much of the cure at Davos depends ou exercise that it is wise for those who are very weak to seek it tolerably early in the autumn, not later than the middle of August perhaps, in order that they may acclimatise themselves while the season is yet warm, and get upon their legs before the snow has fallen. The first snow generally conies in the middle of November ; and if an invalid arrives at that time, he may be debarred from the benefit of the winter by not being able to leave his room. That some occupation is desirable during the winter months need hardly be stated.

Those only suffer from the monotony of the place to any serious extent who are absolutely without resources in themselves ; but any one who is able to amuse himself with reading will find to his delight that he can study with increased facility, all his faculties, both mental and physical, being quickened ; and his only regret will be that so little time is left after the prescribed hours of exercise and rest have been observed. There are many excellent hotels at Davos, all of which have grown up under the inspection of the medical authorities, and are therefore above the average in sanitary arrangements. All fear of typhoid or malarious fevers, those too real bugbears of many southern watering-places, may at present, at least, be dismissed from the mind at Davos. The water supplied is first-rate in quality, and the food is both abundant and well-served.

The houses are solidly built of stone, with double windows for the winter months. All are warmed throughout, but not on the same principle. Some of the hotels have a system of steam-heating which may, I think, be fairly criticised. Stoves of brick and china are used in the other houses ; and these work so admirably that one never suffers from closeness or overheating. Before I tried it, I confess that I dreaded a winter at Davos on account of these stoves and double windows, which I knew were necessary in a climate of such rigour. But I never suffered the least inconvenience from them. It may here be incidentally remarked that in ordinary weather one lighting of the stove a day suffices. A temperature of 56° in a sitting-room, and of 45° in a bedroom, is quite agreeable to an invalid who feels chilly in England with his room below 65° by day and 60° by night.

This I know to be the fact; for I am at present shivering on Monte Generoso, with my thermometer at 62°, to an DAVOS IN WINTER 17 extent I never knew at Davos-Platz. There was not a single day in the whole winter on which I was debarred from taking a moderate amount of exercise, and on a large majority of days I spent from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the open air, partly walking and partly sitting when I was not driving, often adding a walk at night before bedtime. At sunset there is no appreciable chill, though it is then advisable to supplement the loss of sun-heat by exercise. That delicate people should sit in the middle of the snow for hours together, under con ditions of temperature described above, and that the snow itself should not rapidly begin to melt around them, may seem incredible ; but such is the ordinary practice at Davos, and neither the extreme of solar heat nor the intensity of frost presents the slightest inconvenience.

The gradual approach of winter is very lovely at Davos. The valley itself is not beautiful, as Alpine valleys go, though it has scenery both picturesque and grand within easy reach. But when summer is passing into autumn, even the bare slopes of the least romantic glen are glorified. Golden lights and crimson are cast over the gray-green world by the fading of innumerable plants. Then the larches begin to put on sallow tints that deepen into orange, burning against the solid blue sky like amber. The frosts are severe at night, aud the meadow grass turns dry and wan. The last lilac crocuses die upon the fields. Icicles, hanging from water-course or mill-wheel, glitter in the noonday sunlight. The wind blows keenly from the north, and now the snow begins to fall and thaw, and freeze, and fall and thaw again.

The seasons are confused; wonderful days of flawless purity are intermingled with storm and gloom. At last the time conies when a great snowfall has to be expected. There is hard frost in the early morning, and at nine o'clock the thermometer stands at 2°. The sky is clear, but it clouds rapidly with films of cirrus and of stratus in the south and west. Soon it is covered over with gray vapour in a level sheet, all the hill-tops standing hard against the steely heavens. The cold wind from the west freezes the moustache to one's pipe-stem. By noon the air is thick with a congealed mist ; the tempera ture meanwhile has risen, and a little snow falls at intervals. The valleys are filled with a curious opaque blue, from which the peaks rise, phantom like and pallid, into the gray air, scarcely distinguish able from their background.

The pine-forests on the mountain-sides are of darkest indigo. There is an indescribable stillness and a sense of incubation. The wind has fallen. Later on, the snow-flakes flutter silently and sparely through the lifeless air. The most distant landscape is quite blotted out. Alter sunset the clouds have settled down upon the hills, and the snow comes in thick, impenetrable fleeces. At night our hair crackles and sparkles when we brush it. Next morning there is a foot and a half of finely-powdered snow, and still the snow is falling. Strangely loom the chalets through the semi-solid whiteness. Yet the air is now dry and singularly soothing. The pines are heavy with their wadded coverings ; now and again one shakes him self in silence, and his burden falls in a white cloud, to leave a black-green patch upon the hillside, whitening again as the imperturbable fall continues.

The stakes by the roadside are almost buried. No sound is audible. Nothing is seen but the snow plough, a long raft of planks with a heavy stone at its stern and a sharp prow, drawn by four strong horses and driven by a young man erect upon the stem. So we live through two days and nights, and on the third a north wind blows. The snow-clouds break and hang upon the hills in scattered fleeces, glimpses of blue sky shine through, and sunlight glints along the heavy masses. The blues of the shadows are everywhere intense. As the clouds disperse, they form in moulded domes, tawny like sun-burned marble in the distant south lands. Every chalet is a miracle of fantastic curves, built by the heavy hanging snow. Snow lies mounded on the roads and fields, writhed into loveliest wreaths, or outspread in the softest undulations.

All the irregularities of the hills are softened into swelling billows like the mouldings of Titanic statuary. It happened once or twice last winter that such a clearing after snowfall took place at full moon. Then the moon rose in a swirl of fleecy vapour — clouds above, beneath, and all around. The sky was blue as steel, and infinitely deep with mist-entangled stars. The horn above which she first appears stood carved of solid black, and through the valley's length from end to end yawned chasms and clefts of liquid darkness. As the moon rose, the clouds were con quered and massed into rolling waves upon the ridges of the hills. The spaces of open sky grew still more blue. At last the silver light comes flooding over all, and here and there the fresh snow glistens on the crags. There is movement, palpita tion, life of light through earth and sky.