NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Feb. 



is sterile and hard, and her population is already 

 too great to subsist well upon the small propor- 

 tion of arable land within her borders. 



In the midst of the last paragraph, the sound 

 of many voices singing the wild notes so peculiar 

 to the Swiss, called me down to the common room 

 of the hotel. About fifteen young men and maid- 

 ens from the neighboring village of Frutigen had 

 come down for a visit, and were sitting round a 

 long table, which was covered with bottles of 

 wine and glasses, singing in their own language, 

 which is, I believe, a sort of German, the songs 

 of their native hills. Some of their music was 

 very striking. The peculiar falsetto which we 

 have often heard in the streets in America, from 

 the Swiss singers, is the characteristic of their 

 songs. A wild, loud chorus, like the warbling of 

 a lark as he mounts heavenward, closes almost 

 every stanza. The strangers, guests in the house, 

 thronged around and contributed to the payment 

 of the bill for refreshments by laying a few shil- 

 lings in silver on the table, to which no objection 

 was made. At the close of one of the songs, one 

 of the men, who appeared to be the leader of the 

 band of singers, turned to us and inquired in 

 pretty good English, if there was any Amer- 

 ican in our number. I replied that I was an 

 American, and the only one in the house. He 

 said, "I am an American too, and I am glad to 

 see you, sir." He took me by the hand, and held 

 me a long time, seeming really affected at the 

 meeting. The music was hushed while he inform- 

 ed me that he was born in Switzerland, but was ta- 

 ken to America, to the State of Ohio, by his 

 father, who bought a thousand acres of land there, 

 that he had lived in America fifteen years, and 

 had returned nine years ago to Switzerland to 

 live with a wealthy uncle ; that his father had died, 

 but his mother and brothers and sisters still re- 

 mained prosperous, where he hoped soon to join 

 them. He said he had seen but tl^ii-ee persons 

 who spoke English in all the nine years, and he 

 repeated many times, "I am glad to see you, sir, 

 I am glad to see an American." He said he had 

 been naturalized, and asked, "How does our new 

 President get along with the government ?" He 

 asked me to drink wine with him, and standing 

 in the midst of the Swiss singers and several 

 English gentlemen and ladies, we touched our 

 glasses, according to the custom of the country, 

 and drank to the sentiment which I proposed, and 

 he repeated to his friends, "The free countries, 

 America and Switzerland." I afterwards had a 

 few minutes' conversation with him alone, and 

 asked as to the condition of Switzerland. He 

 says the government is good and the people in- 

 telligent, but that they are poor. The land is 

 generally owned by those who till it, but they 

 have usually but three or four acres ; that many 



of the farms are mortgaged to gentlemen in 

 Berne, and the owners have great difficulty in 

 paying their interest, and so they struggle on in 

 poverty. He says many have been injured by 

 strong drink, and that the number of paupers is 

 very great, and is a h^avy tax on the people. 



It is manifest at once to the traveller that there 

 is great poverty in thi' land. At almost every 

 step old men, women and children are begging 

 for alms. A great many persons of both sexes 

 are seen with large swellings on the neck, some 

 of them almost frightful in size. It is not un- 

 common to see two or three women thus afflicted 

 in a company of half a dozen of the decent, re- 

 spectable population. It is attributed by many 

 to the use of the snow water which comes down 

 from the mountains. Whatever it juay be, it is a 

 sore dispensation upon the people of Switzer- 

 land. 



I have referred to the use of Avine in these 

 wine-growing countries. Two kinds are in com- 

 mon use, the red and white. They are kept for 

 common use in casks like cider, which they very 

 much resemble in taste and in strength, though I 

 think the common white wine here has not so much 

 intoxicating eff'ect as common cider of New Eng- 

 land. It is at some hotels put on the table with- 

 out extra charge, a pint bottle to each guest. 

 The common price of the cheap wine is about 

 twenty cents a quart bottle. The same wine is 

 kept a year or two, and sold under different names, 

 at three or four times as much. 



I called for different kinds at one small hotel 

 on the road, and the charge was twice as much 

 for one as the other kind, and thf landlady con- 

 fessed, upon my telling her that they were the 

 same, that all the difference was that the best 

 was a year the older. The hotel cards offer wines 

 at all prices, from twenty cents to two dollars. 

 The cheap wines are in very common use, and in 

 my judgment are infinitely better than the stupify- 

 ing beer of the English and Germans. 



Wine-making is becoming a considerable bus- 

 iness in America, and the question whether the 

 use of light wines tends to promote temperance 

 or intemperance is open for discussion. With a 

 view to this question, I have made it a point to 

 test the wines in common use where I have trav- 

 elled. Leaving myself at liberty to refer to the 

 subject again, I will close abruptly at the end of 

 my paper. Your friend, 



II. F. French. 



MOKTAB. 



The ancients made a kind of mortar so very 

 hard and binding, that it is now found to be al- 

 most impossible to separate the parts of some of 

 their buildings. The lime used in these harder 

 mortars is said to have been prepared from the 

 very hardest stones, sometimes from marble. 



