Slide of Alpnach. SS9 
timber, but in a situation which the height, the steepness, and 
the ruggedness of the ground, seemed to render inaccessible. 
They had rarely been visited but by the chamois hunters, and 
it was from them, indeed, that the first information concerning 
the size of the trees and the extent of the forest appears to have 
been received. These woods are in the canton of Unterwalden, 
one of those in which the ancient spirit of the Swiss republics is 
the best preserved ; where the manners are extremely simple, 
the occupations of the people mostly those of agriculture, where 
there are no manufactures, little accumulation of capital, and 
no commercial enterprise. In the possession of such masters, 
the lofty firs of Pilatus were likely to remain long the orna- 
ments of their native mountain. 
‘‘ A few years ago, however, Mr Rupp, a native of Wirtem- 
berg, and a skilful engineer, in which profession he had been 
educated, indignant at the political changes effected in his own 
country, was induced to take refuge among a free people, and 
came to settle in the canton of Schwytz, on the opposite side of 
the lake of Lucerne. The accounts which he heard there of 
the forest just mentioned determined him to visit it, and he was 
so much struck by its appearance, that, long and rugged as the 
descent was, he coi^ceived the bold project of bringing down 
the trees by no other force than their own weight into the lake 
of Lucerne, from which the conveyance to the German Ocean 
was easy and expeditious. A more accurate survey of the 
ground convinced him of the practicability of the project. 
‘‘ He had by this time resided long enough in Switzerland to 
have both his talents and integrity in such estimation, that he 
was able to prevail on a number of the proprietors to form a 
company, with a joint stock, to be laid out in the purchase of 
the forest, and in the construction of the road along which it 
was intended that the trees should slide down into the lake of 
Lucerne, an arm or gulph of which fortunately approaches 
quite near to the bottom of the mountain. The sum required 
for this purpose was very considerable for that country, amount- 
ing to nine or ten thousand pounds ; three thousand to be laid 
out on the purchase of the forest, from the community of Alp- 
nach, the proprietors of it, and the rest being necessary for the 
construction of the singular railway by which the trees wei*e to 
