No. 144.] 35 



of the age. If a few highly deserving agriculturists like M. Tellen- 

 berg, at his admirable Agricultural Institution at Hofwyl, near 

 Berne, have done much to raise high the standard of excellence, 

 this is the exception, not the general rule. 



Land adjacent to the large towns is dear; not a foot that is now 

 under the plow can be bought for a sum less than $500 an acre. 

 But this would be the minimum price; it often exceeds $1000, a 

 league from any large town like Basle or Geneva. Capitalists 

 are content to make an investment at this rate, though they do 

 not obtain two per cent for the money embarked. Real estate is 

 in none of the cantons burthened with heavy taxes, nor are the 

 toils of industry wasted by an idle and profligate nobility. The 

 truth is, everybody here lives within his income, and he deems 

 it a sin to go beyond it. The millionaire that lives on a patri- 

 mony descended from a long train of frugal and industrious an.- 

 cestors, never thinks to trench on his estate, but is deemed a 

 sluggard, or a man of no reputation, if he does not make some 

 additional capital. Drones leave the country and spend their 

 estates in foreign lands. If a Swiss girl at service gets only $25 

 a year, she will reserve $15 out of her earnings in a savings bank. 

 Bience failures are almost unknown in any of the commercial, and 

 much less the pastoral cantons. This is the true cause why Basle, 

 Zurich, and the Valley of the Jura has no beggars, and the eye is 

 greeted everywhere by neat cottages and a cleanly-clad and well-fed 

 population. Among the rural classes, the females belonging to 

 the families of small estates all labor in the field. Many of these 

 simple and laborious maids have a considerable share of beauty 

 in youth, but where the ruddy cheek has faded, the haggard 

 face becomes ugly. It lacks that which will brighten the human 

 countenance with the reflex of its own beauty, intelligence, when 

 impressed even upon the furrowed brow. We do not like to 

 draw invidious comparisons, but can say that the inhabitants who 

 live in the cantons where the reformed religion prevails, are 

 almost known by cantonal boundaries, and they will lose nothing 

 in a juxtaposition with their neighbors, in point of skill, order, 

 and intelligence; but we regret to state that in those parts of 

 Switzerland where the Romish priests have full sway, poverty 

 and idleness stare you in the face. 



