206 



ALPS. 



example, and proved the usefulness of those great 

 avenues. But the years of peace, which have 

 followed his dethronement, while they have inde- 

 finitely increased the amount of communication be- 

 tween Italy and other countries, have at the same 

 time afforded to the governments concerned, the 

 leisure and means requisite for multiplying these 

 works of public utility. 



The Alpine highways resemble each other in 

 their great features, and are among the proudest 

 (instructions of art. They would almost impress 

 u- with the belief, that nothing is impracticable to 

 ingenuity and labour. These roads usually pursue 

 the course of streams, or valleys, gaining a higher 

 level on their Cities, as occasion offers, and at length 

 climbing the principal ridge by what are called 

 tourniquets, a succession of terraces connected at 

 their ends alternately in a serpentine manner. 

 Their course often lies along the sides of precipices, 

 jutting out over fearful depths, or crossing torrents 

 and ravines upon bridges of giddy height. Some- 

 times it appears as if the road had come to an end, 

 against an insuperable steep, or projecting spur of 

 the mountain. But here the skill of the engineer 

 eludes the difficulty, sometimes by throwing a 

 bridge through the air, to the opposite side, and 

 sometimes by entering the rock itself with a sub- 

 terranean gallery. In places particularly exposed 

 to avalanches, the road either buries itself in the 

 rock, or is protected by massive stone arches, form- 

 ing covered ways, over the passages exposed. Much 

 Injury", still, is done, every year, to these roads by 

 the descents of snow and of water, and they are 

 kept in repair at great expense, by the governments 

 to which they respectively belong. 



The highest of the passes over which a carriage 

 road has been constructed, is that of the Monjte 

 Stelvio, on the route from Botzon to Milan. It 

 was made by the emperor of Austria, since 1814, 

 to establish a communication with the Milanese, 

 without quitting his own territory. The summit 

 ridge, which it crosses, is more than nine thousand 

 feet above the level of the sea, and seven hundred 

 above the estimated line of perpetual snow, in its 

 latitude. This great elevation rendered it one of the 

 most arduous roads in its formation, as it is one of 

 the most difficult to keep in repair. It was found 

 necessary to construct from two to three thousand 

 feet of galleries or covered ways, to shelter the 

 road from avalanches and falling rocks, which sweep 

 over it in certain places. " On this road," says Mr 

 Brockedon, " shortly after leaving Prad, the mag- 

 nificent mountain of the Ortler-spitz opens suddenly 

 on the view of the traveller, with a vast and ap- 

 palling effect, as it is seen from its extreme summit 

 to its base, robed in everlasting snows, which 

 descend on its sides in enormous glaciers, and 

 stream into the valley below. Immense masses of 

 rock, in themselves mountains, throw out their 

 black and scathed forms, in striking contrast with 

 the brightness of the glaciers which they separate." 

 This part of the route, or rather the whole ascent 

 from Drofoi, the author considers " without a par- 

 allel in Alpine scenery." 



The passage of the Brenner, leading from In- 

 spruck to the Lago di Guarda and Verona, is the 

 lowest which crosses the great chain of Alps, being 

 only 4700 feet above the level of the sea. It is 

 also one of the oldest of these roads. A dark, 

 narrow vajley between Sterzing and Mittenwald, 

 is famous for having been the place of a successful 

 resistance of the Tyrolese, under Andrew Hofer, 



against the French and Bavarian army in 1800 

 Great numbers of the latter were destroyed hv 

 stones rolled down upon them from the heights, 

 which overhang the defile. 



The pass of the Splugcn, leading from Coire, the 

 capital of the Grisons, to Lake Ooino, is said, in 

 Starke's Guide-book, to "surpass in iu:iiniili<Tnt, 

 sublime and awful scenery, tvery other carriage 

 road in Europe." We know not how far th- 

 clusive praise may be just, but we are certain, from 

 ocular conviction, that a portion of this road, called 

 the Via mala, extending several miles between the 

 villages of Andeer and Tusis, richly merits all the 

 terrific encomiums it has received. It is the dee|> 

 and narrow gorge through which the Ilinter Rhine 

 makes its escape from the mountains, between 

 mural precipices a thousand feet in height, and just, 

 far enough asunder, for about four miles, to furnish 

 a scanty bed to the torrent. How the Romans 

 made their way through this chasm, into Kluutia, or 

 the barbarians afterwards broke through the same 

 truck into Italy, no one at the present day can 

 imagine ; except by supposing them to have diverged 

 to the neighbouring mountains ; for the sides of the 

 chasm are perpendicular rock, and the bottom is 

 monopolized in a most unqualified manner, by the 

 furious and turbulent Rhine. The modern road is 

 a shelf, or notch, formed about midway in the pre- 

 cipice, and several times disappearing within the 

 rock, for many rods together. A bridge crosses 

 the chasm, at such a height, that the Rhine, always 

 chafed and foaming, looks, from it, like a white 

 cord, in the perpendicular distance ; and a large 

 stone, dropped from the parapet, seems floating for 

 several seconds in the air, and when it strikes the 

 water, a loud explosion is sent upward. In Novem- 

 ber and December, 1800, a French army of reserve, 

 under Macdonald, crossed the Splugen, enduring 

 the horrors and hardships of an Alpine winter, being 

 arrested by the obliteration of the path, and losing 

 many men and horses, by the avalanches. The 

 sufferings of this passage are recorded by Count 

 Philip de Segur, a well known historian of military 

 disasters. 



On the north side of the ridge of Splugen, and 

 near the village of the same name, a road diverges 

 through the valley of the Rheinwald, and crossing 

 Mount Bernardino, follows the course of the Moesa 

 till it joins the Ticino, and the road from St 

 Gothard. It then continues to the Lago Maggiore 

 and a branch of it to the Lugano. On the principal 

 lakes there are now established steamboats, which 

 ply daily between the extremities of these waters. 

 We observed, that they generally bear the classical 

 names of the lakes which they traverse, ks II Lario, 

 II Verbano, Le Leman, &c. The scenery afforded 

 by the passage through Lakes Como and Maggiore 

 is exquisitely picturesque. 



Persons going from central Switzerland by Altorf 

 to the Lake Maggiore, may now cross in carriages 

 the pass of St Gothard, celebrated alike for its 

 romantic scenery, and its military history. The 

 name of Suvaroff is engraved on a rock, near tin: 

 desolate summit, at a place where that commander 

 obtained a victory over the French in 1799- The 

 celebrated Devil's Bridge, over the torrent of the 

 Reuss, is a single arch of seventy feet span, thrown 

 across a rushing cataract, at the height of a hundred 

 feet above the water. " It is impossible," says Mr 

 Brockedon, " to think of such a structure, in such 

 a situation, without shuddering at the idea of the 

 danger to which those who built it must have been 



