CHAPTER XI.[D

"Still those white cliffs faintly glimmer, Still I see my island home."--_Anon._

"Above me are the Alps, The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps, And throned eternity in icy halls Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls The avalanche--the thunderbolt of snow!" _Childe Harold._

Only those who have viewed the white cliffs of Albion sink beneath the circumambient waters, only those who have left Old England on the lee in their out-bound vessel, can fancy the unspeakable emotion, or depict the melancholy feelings with which we first bid our island adieu. We are islanders; all our ideas are severed like our land from other nations; we glory in our insulated position; we glory in our insulated manners; and there breathes not son nor daughter--or if they breathe they deserve not the name of Briton--who does not acutely feel the first severing from home. It is the feeling of the child weaned from the maternal breast--the lover parted from his love--the dying man trembling as he is launched on the sea of futurity; the firm land is gone--the known exchanged for the unknown, or at least dimly shadowed future; above angry skies--beneath unfathomed depths--around faithless waves--and behind the land of our love fast receding, perhaps never to be seen again, or seen when the fire of youth has smouldered low--the energy of youth has been exchanged for the caution of age--and dull reality has shown how vain the dreams of childhood! Looking on the receding shore we feel all our friends are there, and all going away--there all our hopes, our home, our affections. The vessel bears away our mortal frame; the immortal soul lingers behind, nothing can bear it away, nor the heart that is left behind, however far the foot may roam. How full are our feelings, as we ask with the poet,--

"Who shall fill our vacant places? Who shall sing our songs to-night?"

Such were the feelings of Ellen Ravensworth as the packet which bore them left the quiet harbour of Newhaven, and in one minute plunged into the restless, rolling billows of our channel. Having had to wait for the tide, it was already growing dusk when they weighed anchor; the last embers of dying day tipped the crested waves with an uncertain glimmer, and the crescent moon hung in the only clear break of the sky over the west, from which quarter rather a brisk breeze hurried the yeasty waves past: it was, however, a mild, soft wind, and remarkably warm for the season; so Ellen prevailed on her father to allow her to remain on deck, and catch the last glimpse of her native island. Wrapt in a warm Scotch plaid, in a half-reclining attitude, she leant over the vessel's side, and watched her plough her way with full swelling sails towards France. Beside her stood her father, talking to the captain, a bluff, kindhearted sailor, who had voyaged over the round world, and was busily engaged in detailing some of his adventures, or, as sailors would say, spinning a long yarn. But Ellen heeded not their conversation; her heart was far away, as from time to time she lifted her blue eyes, moist with tears, on the lessening shores and giant chalk cliffs that loomed ghost-like and mysteriously through the gloaming.

Though Scotch, Ellen had imbibed all the national feelings for those white cliffs, associated from earliest times with this country's history;--the same cliffs that beheld the ancient Briton paddle his basket-work coracle,--the same cliffs that twice saw the haughty Roman conqueror Julius Cæsar,--that saw the Saxon with fair hair and blue eyes land on the envied isle,--that beheld the fiery Dane,--the proud Norman,--and, later still, the Spanish Armada sail by in false vainglory,--later still the victorious Wellington welcomed home, whilst drums played, "See the conquering hero comes." Though Scotch, Ellen felt towards them a kindred love, as she saw and now lost them again in the murky night, for the first time in her young life. England and Scotland were one now: all petty distinctions were lost--all party failings, all rancour forgotten; it was the same island, the same home; on its dimly-seen shores were centred all her affections; her hopes and fears were all there; her brother and sister; her relatives and friends; her house and home. He, too, was there; he who had so cruelly deserted her; he who had won her heart, and, when tired of it, thrown it away, as the child flings his broken toy. Despite all, she loved, she adored him yet, and to leave him gave the most venomed point to the shaft of affliction. With heart full to bursting--so full it seemed as if a tight band was drawn round it--and feelings those who have felt them know, but cannot describe, she watched the red harbour-light dip often, and at last sink beneath the bounding surges. And when all was gone, the last lingering link broken, tears all unbidden fast coursed our heroine's cheek, and she scarcely heard her father, who, fearing the effect of the cold night air on his daughter, was anxious to hurry her below.

"It is getting cold, Ellen, dear; had you not better descend to the cabin, now? Captain Hardy and I will assist you, as the sea is getting pretty rough."

Ellen rose without answering; and, with the jolly captain's help, who was only too glad to give his hand to the Scotch belle, and said many pretty things, praising her as the best sailor he had ever taken across the Channel, reached her berth.

The sea got rougher every minute, and the groaning and creaking of the planks, the shrill whistling of the wind through the cordage, and the occasional shout of the pilot, were sounds sufficient to instil terror into landsmen's minds; but both Mr. Ravensworth and his daughter proved excellent sailors; and Ellen's mind was too busy with other things to bestow more than a passing thought on her present situation. Whilst her father, with the captain and two other passengers, engaged in a friendly rubber at whist over their grog, she amused herself by listening to the chat of the stewardess, a pretty little Frenchwoman, whose vivacity helped to dispel her sad thoughts, whilst it also gave her an opportunity of testing her powers in French conversation, which, however little it satisfied herself, was declared to be beyond all praise by the Frenchwoman, with her natural politeness. Ellen was, however, a really finished French scholar, and only required a month or two in Paris, as her companion told her, to become quite perfect in pronunciation.

In a few hours, after a pleasant though somewhat rough passage, the motion of the vessel ceased, and all the passengers hurried on deck, and in the gray twilight of the early dawning reached Dieppe. There was nothing peculiarly foreign in the appearance of this place, and, had it not been for the French cries which assailed our travellers' ears, they might have almost fancied themselves at Newhaven again, so similar was the appearance of the chalk downs. After a cursory examination of passports and baggage by the custom-house officers, who did everything in the politest manner, our friends, accompanied by Jean Lacroix, their courier, disembarked, and Ellen stood on foreign land. The porters of the various cafés beset them on all sides, offering to carry monsieur's luggage, and each recommending his own café or hotel. Jean, however, was well up to his trade, and, engaging the right man, led his charges to a small café on the quay side, where they might breakfast, and then proceed to the post-house, and set out on their journey at once.

The first insight Ellen had into foreign life was not a very flattering one: sour bread, and very indifferent milk and butter, accompanied, however, with excellent coffee, composed their matutinal meal. Jean begged mad'moiselle not to think Dieppe was like Paris.

On their way to the post-house, they passed the market-place, where numbers of carts, and peasants in blue vestments, crowded the square; on one side of which stood a fine Gothic cathedral; here, too, Ellen saw a band of soldiers, in their red trousers, blue coats, and red caps. Their full, leg-of-mutton-shaped trousers, slight figures drawn in tightly at the waist, and rapid, undisciplined-looking march, contrasted with the Highland regiments she had been accustomed to, certainly when weighed in the balance of her mind were found wanting. The gay little soldiers seemed to regard her tall figure with equal surprise. Ellen's first insight into the French army was not very encouraging, but Jean assured her the Cuirassiers in Paris were equal to any soldiers in the world.

By this time their travelling carriage was ready, and Ellen was not sorry to turn her back on dirty little Dieppe. The carriage was large and roomy, though not on the easiest springs in the world, drawn by four noble horses, whose magnificent appearance required no courier to point out as worthy her admiration; and she frankly acknowledged, to Jean's delight, she had seen no post horses at all like them even in Old England.

As it is not our intention to weary our reader with a journal of our friends' travels to Switzerland, we shall briefly glance over the journey.

Passing through a down country very like the south of Sussex or Kent, their road soon became more interesting as they approached the rich pastures and orchards for which Normandy is celebrated; and the tall poplars which often fringed the road, and occasional glimpses of the Seine, with its green islands, and now and then a vineyard on a southern aspect, interested Ellen not a little during her first stage to Rouen. In this fine old town she was doubly interested, by viewing the city sacred to the memories of our Norman line, and the ill-fated Joan of Arc; she saw also the tomb where the heart of Lion Richard lies, the Cathedral of Notre Dame, and the fine church of St. Ouen. A longer day's journey brought them to Paris, and so pretty was the country between, that our heroine was almost sorry when the capital of la belle France appeared. There they stayed two days, which they spent in seeing the sights of this wonderful city--but as Switzerland was the point to which they hurried, and Mr. Ravensworth was unwilling to lose the advantage of the wonderfully fine warm weather in any town, he soon left the dissipated city, and pushed on by long stages to Bâle, which he reached late on the evening of Saturday, and intended to spend Sunday there. It was a beautiful evening, and Ellen was indeed charmed with the first sight of the Rhine's broadly swelling breast of waters, rushing swiftly beneath the very windows of their hotel. It was the largest river, of course, she had ever seen, and its clear light green waters, eddying round the pillars of the bridge, partly built of stone and partly of wood, on account of the ice, impressed an image on her mind's eye time would take long to obliterate, if it ever could. Bâle seemed the first really foreign looking town, and the houses not unlike those of the old town of Edinburgh, though certainly more neat and clean, quite took the love of her Caledonian mind.

On the following evening Ellen hailed Lucerne on its own beautiful lake; and if Bâle had pleased, Lucerne charmed her. Here they lingered a day and saw the strange Kapell Brücke, with its pictures of the deeds of saints and warriors of Swiss celebrity, and, more wonderful still, the monumental lion, sculptured out of the living rock in commemoration of the brave Swiss guard, slaughtered in defending the Tuileries in 1792. The aspect of the dying lion, with the broken spear in its side, from which is welling his life-blood, yet defending in its dying agonies the shield of France, is the most touching and beautiful design ever perfected by art.

But it was not these, nor the pretty village, that charmed Ellen, it was the lake so still, so green, so transparent--it was the mountain guards that rose around--the rocky mountain where tradition says the unhappy Pilate ended a miserable existence, and which still bears his name, and is nearly always the resting-place of clouds, whilst every other hill shows clear, as if an evil nature belonged to it--Rigi, cut out against the clear blue sky, on whose summit yonder knoll, diminished by its height to a mole-hill, is the grand hotel which wayfarers up this hill rest at--and further up the lake still glimpses of the higher Alps of Schwytz and Engelberg, with their diadems of everlasting snow;--it was these, and other hills all mirrored in the still lake, that shone like a looking-glass below, that charmed the Scotch eye, to which all scenery, lacking the Scotch hills, is tame and domestic. Early next morning, having procured a boat and two strong Swiss rowers, our travellers were pulled up the lake as far as Kussnacht, a small Alpine village at the foot of the Rigi, from which village they were to make the ascent. Ellen, seated on a sure-footed Swiss pony, with a sturdy boy to guide it, and Mr. Ravensworth and Jean with their Alpenstocks, both excellent mountaineers, soon accomplished the ascent, neither very difficult nor arduous; but ere they reached the summit they were enveloped in clouds that drifted thicker and thicker around them, and precluded all hopes of seeing the sunset; rather a disappointment, but a very common one to Alpine mountain climbers. The merry conversation of a large party composed of English, Germans, Americans, and a few French and Italians, and the excellent table d'hote passed away a long evening very happily, and all retired with the hopes that Sol would be more auspicious next morning.

At five o'clock the shrill blasts of a Swiss horn roused every sleeper, and wrapt in blankets or whatever they could easiest lay their hands upon, a motley crew hastened to see the sun rise from the Kulm, or summit. The morning air was clear as crystal, cold, and invigorating,--all augured well. Not a cloud, not a misty wreath, not a speck studded the blue arch of heaven. It was not darkness nor shadow, but a clear obscurity that hung like a veil over nature; beneath, the lakes were like a black mirror, the valleys dark; around, the snowy Alps were clearly defined against the sky, and not a vestige of fog nor mist lay on their sides; even Mont Pilate had for once dropped his cloudy cap, and his sharp forehead of rocks was cut out against the dark firmament. Above hung the morning star, and a thin silver thread, the waning moon was dropping behind distant Jungfrau. About fifty people, among whom we recognize Ellen and her father, watched for the sun with all the earnestness of the Ghebers hastening to pay their morning devotions to the god of day. Soon a growing brightness tinted the east where the hills were lowest; and now it was no longer to the east, but to the giant Alps of the Bernese chain westward that every eye is turned, for there will be seen the first streak with which Pallantias' finger shall stain nature. Soon the highest peak of the Bernese giants catches the first rosy pink of dawn--then alp after alp owns the blush of day, and flashes back the golden glory, and as the sun himself wheels above the hills his beams are cast lower and lower; ridge after ridge grows bright; even gloomy Pilate smiles in his ray, and the valleys beneath with rivers, woods, and plains become more and more distinct, till they burst into sunshine, and then the whole panorama above and below revels in the warm beams, from the mighty Eiger, giant of Bern, to the lakes from which mists now rise, and float like wool far beneath. After a parting gaze our friends, in common with others, left the Kulm, and after partaking of a cheerful breakfast, descended on the other side of the Rigi to Weggis, where again they took a boat and rowed to the summit of the lake, whose scenery grew still grander and more romantic as they passed Tell's lovely chapel, and neared Fluellen, where they took an early table d'hote, being desirous of hurrying forward to the Hospenthal that day.

Leaving Fluellen about two o'clock they proceeded in an open carriage drawn by three horses along a pretty road with fruit and walnut trees on either side, Swiss chalets and mountains all covered with woods on the left, and sloping fields running down on the right towards the river of Reuss. The afternoon was intensely hot, and the sun beat down with great fierceness into the valley; our travellers also were much annoyed by gnats and gadflies. Passing the small village of Altorf, famous for Tell's exploit, the road nears the Reuss, and is very pretty, owing to the walnut trees that fringe its sides, till they reached Amstäg where horses were changed. The road then began gradually to ascend, crossing the Reuss several times. The river now began to grow into a wild mountain torrent, steeper grew the ascent now and steeper, and the Alps closed in the valley, till it became a scene of wildness and great desolation. Here and there the ragged rocks overhung the road, as it toiled upwards, and often galleries were cut through ledges that crossed the path. Upward still the carriage went, and light soon began to fail them in the regions most dismal.

Ellen and her father now got out of the carriage, and walked up the steep incline, leaving their vehicle behind them. As the road wound round and round, they often saw it far below them, a speck on the white road, dimly seen in the darkness growing every minute deeper, and by-and-by the sharp crack of the driver's whip, that echoed like a pistol shot, or the peculiar song of the Switzer who drove, with its falsetto notes, only told them where it was, unless they caught a glimpse of the lamps creeping upwards. Star after star broke out on high, and soon the whole sky was one glorious canopy of flashing, glittering lights, far more brilliant than Ellen had ever seen them in the misty north. Soon they approached the part called the Devil's Bridge, where a thin single arch spans the dismal gulf, through which the impetuous stream now roared. Rent rocks on either side along whose ridges ran their road, and the stream foaming in misty white beneath--gloomy caverns through which from time to time lay their path, beetling depths spanned by thread-like bridges, and high above the spectral snow peaks, and rugged rocks on whose sterile sides not even the pine could find sustenance; all presented a scene of savage grandeur--lone, desolate, and loveless magnificence too nearly allied to our heroine's state of mind, not to find in her a sympathizer. She took a kind of melancholy delight in gazing on the gap of desolation through which the mad torrent thundered, and only compared it to her own frame of mind. At a late hour the travellers reached the Hospenthal, where a comfortable supper awaited them. The sharp mountain air at this elevated position sharpened all their appetites, and Mr. Ravensworth fancied he already saw a change for the better in his daughter's appearance.

Instead of crossing the pass of St. Gothard, which was Mr. Ravensworth's first intention, in order to see the north of Italy, Jean advised them to take advantage of the cloudless fine weather and see the Alps better by making the tour of the Oberland. Accordingly, next day having procured ponies, as the carriage road went no further, they set off at an early hour, and reaching Realp, crossed a small rivulet, and proceeded on a mere bridle path along the steep sides of the Sidli Alp, leaving St. Gothard and its glaciers behind them; and with Finstaarhorn conspicuous among his lofty brethren in front, and the beautiful, but ragged rocky peaks of the Galenstock on the right, ere long halted at the Furca, where they rested an hour. Descending on the other side, with the Finstaarhorn showing magnificently, every peak cut out against the clear sky, they soon reached the Rhone glacier, taking its rise from the shoulder of Galenstock, and, as in descending it filled the vale, becoming more wonderful; from its white birthplace of eternal snows, to the dirty moraine in which it ended, brindled, cracked, and split into crevasses, emitting glorious blue rays of light, by its downward way over the rocks whose hardened mass the huge glacier ground and polished. Beneath from a cave of ice flowed the cold beginnings of the blue exulting river of Geneva. It seemed a fit birthplace for the mighty river, and as Ellen gazed on the Rhone's cold and icy cradle, still frozen amid the green valley, still unthawing under the genial sunshine, it seemed to emblematize her present position. Her heart was cold and loveless as that icy glacier, yet from that chilling mass burst the living waters that spread plenty over sunny plains; and she thought, and it was a comforting thought, that perhaps from her misery might spring a stream of events as glorious. Already her woe had softened her heart: was it the beginning of the stream which should "make glad the city of our God?"

Leaving the wonderful glacier that had awakened such thoughts, their road now lay up a remarkably steep mountain side across a path rugged with stones, and often down steps cut in the naked rock, till our party reached the Lake of the Dead, a desolate and lonely sheet of water fed by the snows, and so called from the bodies of unfortunate travellers who lost their lives in the pass being thrown into its cold dark waters. After passing this lake, and occasionally treading over masses of eternal ice and snow, a steep and toilsome descent brought our weary travellers to the Grimsel, a hospice lying in a small valley, sufficiently elevated, however, to be beyond the region of vegetation. After the rest of the night they again commenced their descent, and after some hours again hailed some stunted trees; which increased in size as they went lower, till they were once more surrounded by woods. The Aar, down whose stream their path long lay, was gradually increasing into a fine river, and at Handek Ellen saw the beautiful waterfall with its iris hovering above in the midst of the waters. From thence the path lay through verdant pastures and real Swiss pastoral scenery, numerous little chalets dotting the green hill sides, which stretched upwards to the everlasting snows. The peasants were busy at haymaking, and the sweet breath of the hay, the tinkling of the flock's bells, or the wild glee of some Swiss maiden, were all sweet and gentle sounds and sights after the stern sublimity, and the roaring torrents they had so lately left. A long but pleasant ride brought them to Reichenbach as the sun was setting.

Early next day the trio started for Grindelwald, and on their way made a slight detour to see the lovely glacier of Rosenlaui, under whose clear ice cavern they went, and once more remarked the wonderful blue lights of the crevasses and clefts. The scenery here was grand and beautiful in the extreme; as the ponies wound their upward way Wellhorn and glittering Wetterhorn filled the gap of the valley rough with woods. Wetterhorn in shape like a pyramid of the most perfect form, the icy crown sparkling like diamonds in the sun, defined with a clearness, not to be credited till seen, against the cloudless dark blue sky. From Grindelwald, where Ellen saw a noble dog of the Saint Bernard's breed, they ascended the pass of the Great Scheideck and went over the Wengern Alp, passing the very foot of the Virgin Jungfrau, with Wetterhorn, Wellhorn, and the giant Eiger standing like sentinels around them as they pryed into the secrets of the everlasting hills. On this day they heard the thundering avalanche, and saw its shattered mass bound like a cataract down the rocky precipices, with a roar we could not credit the silver thread gliding down those black rocks capable of making, till we remember that what seems like dust of snow is tons of solid ice, and what look to us like grass or moss on the hillside, are mighty pines, so much does vastness deceive our senses! Here, too, Ellen heard the melody of the Swiss horn echoed in indescribable sweetness from the snowy peaks--tossed from hill to vocal hill, till so attenuated does the thread of tone become, the ear loses its "linked sweetness long drawn out," yet knows not when it faded, and fancy prolongs the chord even after the Alps have forgotten it. A tremendous pathway down the Wengern alp, so steep that they had to leave their horses and pursue it on foot, brought them to Lauterbrunnen, a wonderful valley with cliffs on all sides, shut in by the now distant Jungfrau. Down the precipitous sides glance many streams, conspicuous amongst all the Staubbach or Dust fall. From this valley a pleasant drive of about nine miles brought our party to Interlachen, where they stayed over the Sunday, and on Monday drove along the banks of the lovely Lake of Thun, whose scenery was of a softer nature and more like Ellen's native lochs. At any other time she would probably have preferred this style to the sterile scenery they had left, but now her mind rather dwelt on the grand and desolate region she had lately seen, than on the softer beauty of Thun, and when they reached Kandersteg Ellen hailed with delight the hoary Alps she now looked on almost as friends.

Next day they rode up the Gemmi Pass, and when they had surmounted the steep ascent, lunched at the desolate inn of the Schwarenbach, the scene of a terrible murder, near the ice-fed waters of Dauben See; dismounting they began the hazardous and wonderful descent of the Gemmi. The road was not then, as now, defended by balustrades, and as the zigzag pathway wound downwards round and round, it led them over the face of a precipice to the valley below, and often made our heroine almost giddy to look at the depths beneath, and the threatening rocks above, as she seemed like a fly scaling down a wall. The scene and panorama were splendid; beneath was the village of Leukerbad, the houses of which were small as gravel in appearance, and in front the glorious chain of the Alps separating Valais from Italy, Monte Rosa, Weisshorn, and the bare rocky summit of the Matterhorn, or Mount Cervin, and a hundred lesser peaks rose like clouds before, and presented one of the most wonderful views abroad. At Leukerbad Mr. Ravensworth stayed a day to rest, and saw the curious baths and echelles, or ladders, by which the people in the valley communicate with a small village on the heights above. Thence a fine drive down a road along the Dala brought them to Leuk, and crossing the Rhone, now grown a considerable stream, but shorn of its beauty by the debris of winter floods scattered around its many streams, they gained the splendid Simplon road, along which easy stages brought them to the head of Geneva, and Villeneuve, whence they proceeded to Vevay, where they were to make a stay of a week.

Many an excursion did Ellen and her father make on blue Leman, and went over the ground of Chillon, and many another place, made hallowed soil by Byron's and Voltaire's, Rousseau's and Gibbon's genius. Childe Harold was the text-book on these occasions. It was on one of these excursions Ellen fell in with her old friends, Lord and Lady Arranmore, who were touring Geneva on their way home from Naples. English people naturally draw together when abroad; and Ellen and the young Marchioness used to make many an evening ramble together, while the Marquis and Mr. Ravensworth rode out in the surrounding country. From Vevay the whole party travelled together to Geneva, where they put up at the same hotel, and were to stay a week also; here again their excursions continued. The eventful nature of one of these evening sails demands another chapter, in consequence of the influence it has on the history of our heroine.