28 RAMBLES IN WESTERN SWITZERLAND 



into notice, or boldly challenge the admiration which is certainly 

 their due. 



Nor are the mountains in this western part of Switzerland without 

 their proper amount of cold and ice. There are natural ice caverns, 

 where the warmth of the sun never penetrates, and where the rich 

 tracery of nature's crystalline architecture may be studied on a grand 

 scale. There are, too, other and more permanent stalactitic beauties ; 

 for the limestone, of which the Jura is chiefly composed, is often 

 broken into caverns of various sizes, some of them presenting very 

 beautiful appearances, from the infiltration of water charged with 

 carbonate of lime. Of these, I regret to be obliged to acknowledge 

 that I did not see any ; a neglect which arose partly from ignorance, 

 but chiefly from necessity, not having so much time to spare as 

 the subject demanded. 



The first expedition that I made towards the Jura mountains was 

 with a friend, who, to my great loss, could not accompany me on subse- 

 quent occasions. Perhaps, on this account as much as any other, 

 there is a freshness and agreeableness about my reminiscences of this 

 trip, which hardly attaches to other and more extensive explor- 

 ings. I shall give the narrative pretty much as I find it in my jour- 

 nal, and trust to its truth and close adherence to fact to excite inte- 

 rest, rather than to any colouring that I might be tempted to indulge 

 in. 



On a beautiful afternoon in the beginning of August, I embarked 

 with my companion at Lausanne, on board the steam boat which 

 touches there on its way to Geneva ; and in about two hours we 

 landed at the pretty village of Rolle, whence we slowly ascended to 

 an elevation at some few miles distance to the north, on the highest 

 point of which, about eighteen hundred feet above the level of the 

 lake, there is a little summer-house kind of building, marking a spot 

 well known to picturesque hunters in the neighbourhood of Geneva 

 as the " Signal of Bougy." It was our intention to remain here till 

 sunset, and then, having feasted our eyes with the magnificence and 

 beauty of the extensive prospect, we were to make the best of our 

 way to Aubonne, a pretty village, situated at no very great distance. 



We arrived at the signal about half an hour before sunset, and had 

 leisure to look around and admire the noble landscape that presented 

 itself to our view. Owing to the situation of this elevated ridge near 

 the bend of the lake, the whole of the vast sheet of water, extending 

 from Geneva to Villeneuve — a distance of not less than fifty miles — 



