26 



PEOF. E. HULL, ON GENEVA AND CHAMOUNIX 



sailing boats ; no tram lines through the streets, no turbines 

 for supplying the inhabitants with water and with power for 

 driving tramcars and turning machinery. 



Now all is changed except the splendid scenery of the 

 landscape viewed from the banks of Lake Leman, some fine 

 hotels and houses with the cathedral, occupying a commanding 

 position in the upper part of the town. On visiting this church, 

 severely plain and destitute of E.G. decoration, I was startled 

 by seeing the name of John Knox conspicuously posted on a 

 slab in tlie wall, reminding the A'isitor that the Scotch 

 Eeformer had during those stormy times visited Geneva, and 

 occupied for a while Calvin's pulpit ; and in memory of this 

 brotherly visit a very beautiful annex called " the Macchabees " 

 has been elected on the south side, where Presbyterians 

 meet to worship on the Sabbath, according to a ritual closely 

 resembling, if not identical with, that of the Church of Scotland 

 at the present day. " Calvin's Chair," of plain hard oak, stands 

 beneath the elaborately carved pulpit, which replaces the 

 original one of the sixteenth century. The chair is regarded 

 with veneration as a monument of the Eeformer. What times 

 of relioious fervour were those when the images and ornaments 

 of the Eoman worship were pulled down and destroyed, and 

 the bishops and priests were given the choice of accepting the 

 Protestant faith or of quitting their sanctuary for an asylum 

 in France or Italy. In these days of " passive resistance " it is 

 difficult to picture to ourselves the perfervid rehgious convictions 

 by which Switzerland was swayed from end to end, and which 

 resulted in bringing over to the Protestant faith the cities of 

 Geneva, Lausanne, Zurich, Basle and Berne. But Lucerne and 

 the seven Forest Cantons retained their attachment to the 

 papacy — after a severe struggle between their opposing forces 

 and those of Berne. 



The great turhine installation of the lihonc. — When at my 

 first visit I stood by the banks of the Ehone below Geneva, 

 there was probably nothing to intercept the course of the stream 

 as it issued forth from the lake ; a pure, ever-llowing sheet of 

 water, which had entered at tlie upper end of the lake brown 

 and turgid with glacier mud. This mud had subsided in the 

 still waters, and has within the Christian era added an extensive 

 tract of fiat alluvial soil as shown by the remains of a Eoman 

 fort which once stood on the banks of the lake about a mile 

 above the present margin in the valley of the u[)per Ehone 

 above Villeneuve. Now, however, half the volume of the river 

 is utilized for turning a grand installation of powerful 



