We Passed The Loopholes That Illuminate The Dungeon Vaults, And
An Old Arch, Now Walled Up, Where Prisoners, After Having Been
Strangled, Were Thrown Into The Lake.
Last evening we walked over the castle.
An interesting Swiss woman,
who has taught herself English for the benefit of her visitors, was
our _cicerone_. She seemed to have all the old Swiss vivacity of
attachment for "_liberte et patrie_."
[Illustration: _of a interior space of hewn stone with high vaulted
gothic arches._]
She took us first into the dungeon, with the seven pillars, described
by Byron. There was the pillar to which, for protecting the liberty of
Geneva, BONNEVARD was chained. There the Duke of Savoy kept him for
six years, confined by a chain four feet long. He could take only
three steps, and the stone floor is deeply worn by the prints of those
weary steps. Six years is so easily said; but to _live_ them,
alone, helpless, a man burning with all the fires of manhood, chained
to that pillar of stone, and those three unvarying steps! Two thousand
one hundred and ninety days rose and set the sun, while seedtime and
harvest, winter and summer, and the whole living world went on over
his grave. For him no sun, no moon, no star, no business, no
friendship, no plans - nothing! The great millstone of life emptily
grinding itself away!
What a power of vitality was there in Bonnevard, that he did not sink
in lethargy, and forget himself to stone! But he did not; it is said
that when the victorious Swiss army broke in to liberate him, they
cried, -
"Bonnevard, you are free!"
"_Et Geneve?_"
"Geneva is free also!"
You ought to have heard the enthusiasm with which our guide told this
story!
Near by are the relics of the cell of a companion of Bonnevard, who
made an ineffectual attempt to liberate him. On the wall are still
seen sketches of saints and inscriptions by his hand. This man one day
overcame his jailer, locked him in his cell, ran into the hall above,
and threw himself from a window into the lake, struck a rock, and was
killed instantly. One of the pillars in this vault is covered with
names. I think it is Bonnevard's pillar. There are the names of Byron,
Hunt, Schiller, and many other celebrities.
After we left the dungeons we went up into the judgment hall, where
prisoners were tried, and then into the torture chamber. Here are the
pulleys by which limbs were broken; the beam, all scorched with the
irons by which feet were burned; the oven where the irons were heated;
and there was the stone where they were sometimes laid to be
strangled, after the torture. On that stone, our guide told us, two
thousand Jews, men, women, and children, had been put to death. There
was also, high up, a strong beam across, where criminals were hung;
and a door, now walled up, by which they were thrown into the lake.
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