V 
TIIE ALPS. C25 
Gracise Alpes, and Graciis Montes, (by Tacitus ;) wliich extend from 
west to east, between St. Bernard and the Adula, or St. Gothard ; and 
thus they run out^betvveen the Valese to the north, and the Milanese 
to the south. With these are continued the Alpes Rhaeticae to the 
head of the river Piave ; a part of which are the Alpes Tridentinse, 
to the north of Trent. To these join the Alpes Noricae, reaching to 
Dolbach in Tyrol, to the north of the river Tajaniento r thence begin 
the Alpes CarnicoG, or of Carninicae, expending to the springs of the 
Save : and the last, called Alpes Pannonicae and Juliae, extend to the 
springs of the Kulpe. Some, however, extend the Alps to the north 
of Dalmatia, others again to Thrace and the Euxine, but their ter- 
mination at the Kulpe, as above, is more generally received. They 
were formerly called Albia Alpionia. 
Through these mountains Hannibal forced his passage into Italy 
by pouring vinegar, it has been said, on the rock, heated by burning 
large piles of wood on them, by which means they became crumbled ; 
but it is more certain that the French army under Bonaparte effected 
a passage into Piedmont over the Great St. B.ernard, previous to the 
defeat of the Austrian army near Marengo, on the June 14, 1800. 
The Alps are covered with perpetual snow : they are the highest 
mountains in Europe, being, according to some geometricians, about 
two miles in perpendicular height. They begin at the Mediterranean, 
and, stretching northw'ard, separate Piedmont and Savoy from the 
adjacent countries ; whence directing their course to the east, they 
form the boundary between Switzerland and Italy, and terminate 
near the extremity of the Adriatic sea, north-east of Venice. It was 
over the western parts of these mountains, towards Piedmont, that 
Hannibal forced his passage. The prospect from many parts of this 
enormous range of mountains is extremely romantic, especially 
towards the north-west. One of the most celebrated is the grand 
Chartreuse, where is a monastery founded by St. Bruno about the 
year 1084. From Echelles, a little village in the mountains of Savoy, 
to the top of the Chartreuse, the distance is six miles. Along this 
course, the road runs winding up, for the most part not six feet broad. 
On one hand is the wood, with pine-trees hanging over head ; on the 
other, a prodigious precipice almost perpendicular, at the bottom of 
which rolls a torrent, that, sometimes tumbling among the fragments 
of stone which have fallen from on high, and sometimes precipitating 
itself from vast descents with a noise like thunder, rendered yet more 
tremendous by the echo from the mountains on each side, concurs to 
form one of the most romantic and astonishing scenes in nature. 
On the top of the mountain is the convent of St. Bruno, which is 
the superior of the whole order. The inhabitants consist of one 
hundred fathers, with three hundred servants, who grind their corn, 
press their wine, and perform every domestic office, even to tire mak- 
ing of their clothes. In the Album of the fathers is an admired 
Alcaic ode, written by the late ingenious Mr. Gray when he visited 
the Chartreuse, and which has since been published among bis works. 
The glaciers of Savoy are also justly reckoned amongst the most stu- 
pendous works of nature. These are immense masses of ice, lodged 
upon the gentler declivities amidst the Alps, and exhibiting represen- 
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