We Stopped Two Hours At Sion To Mend A
Wheel And This Gave Me Time To Ascend The Mountain On Which The Castle
Stands.
There were several masons and workmen employed in the construction
of a church which they are erecting at the request and entire expense of
His Sardinian Majesty.
I could not ascertain what were the reasons that
induced the King to build a church in a foreign territory. I did not
observe either on the road or in any of the village thro' which we passed
any striking specimen of Valaisan female beauty; but I often remarked the
prominent bosom that Rousseau describes as frequent among them. We met with
several cretins or idiots, all of whom had goitres in a greater or less
degree. These souls of God without sin, as the cretins are called, are
very merry souls; they always appear to be laughing. They seem to have
adopted and united three systems of philosophy: they are Diogenes as to
independence and neglect of decency and cleanliness; Democriti as to their
disposition to laugh perpetually; and Aristippi inasmuch as they seem to be
perfectly contented with their state. They are in general fat and well fed,
for the poorest inhabitants give them something. They have a good deal of
cunning, and many curious anecdotes are related of them which shews that
they are endowed with a sort of sagacity resembling the instinct of
animals. I recollect one myself mentioned by Zimmermann in his Essay on
Solitude, of a cretin who was accustomed to imitate with his voice the
sound of the village clock whenever it struck the hours and quarters; one
day, by some accident, the clock stopped; yet the cretin went through the
chimes of the hours and quarters with the same regularity as the clock
would have done had it been going.
We arrived at night at the village of Brieg at the foot of the Simplon and
put up at a very comfortable inn. Brieg and Glisse are two small villages
lying within a quarter of a mile distance from each other. The direct road
runs thro' Brieg and is a great advantage to this town; while Glisse lost
this benefit from the opposition shewn by its inhabitants to the annexation
of the Valais to the French Empire. They now deeply regret this refusal as
few travellers chuse to stop at Glisse.
Passage of the Simplon.
Chi mi dara la voce e le parole
Convenienti a si nobil soggetto?[52]
Who will vouchsafe me voice that shall ascend
As high as I would raise my noble theme?
- Trans. W.S. ROSE.
How shall I describe the Simplon and the impressions that magnificent piece
of work, the chaussee across it, made on my mind? On arrival at the
village of the Simplon, which lies at nearly the greatest elevation off the
road and is more than half-way across, I wrote in my enthusiasm for the
author of this gigantic work, the following lines:
O viaggiator, se avessi tu veduto
Quel monte, pria che fosse il cammin fatto,
Leveresti le mani, e stupefatto
Diresti, "chi l'avrebbe mai creduto?
Son come quel d'Alcide i tuoi miracoli!
Vincesti, Napoleon', piu grandi ostacoli!"
Imagine a fine road or causeway broad enough for three carriages to go
abreast, cut in the flanks of the mountains, winding along their contours,
sometimes zigzag on the flank of one ravine, and sometimes turning off
nearly at right angles to the flank of another; separated from each other
by precipices of tremendous depth, and communicating by one-arched bridges
of surprising boldness; besides stone bridges at each re-entering angle, to
let pass off the water which flows from the innumerable cascades, which
fall from the summits of the mountains. Ice and snow eternal on the various
pics or aiguilles (as the summits are here called) which tower above
your head, and yet in the midst of these belles horreurs the road is so
well constructed, so smooth, and the slope so gentle that when there are
fogs, which often happen here and prevent you from beholding the
surrounding scenery, you would suppose you were travelling on a plain the
whole time. Balustrades are affixed on the sides of the most abrupt
precipices and buttresses also in order to secure the exterior part of the
chaussee. On the whole length of the chaussee on the exterior side are
conical stones of four feet in height at ten paces distant from each other,
in order to mark the road in case of its being covered with snow. There are
besides maisons de refuge or cottages, at a distance of one league from
each other, wherein are stationed persons to give assistance and food to
travellers, or passengers who may be detained by the snow storms. There is
always in these cabins a plentiful supply of biscuit, cheese, salt and
smoked meats, wine, brandy and fire-wood. In those parts of the road where
the sides of the ravines are not sloping enough to admit of the road being
cut along them, subterraneous galleries have been pierced through the rock,
some of fifty, some of a hundred and more yards in length, and nearly as
broad as the rest of the road. In a word it appears to me the grandest work
imagined or made by man, and when combined with its extreme utility, far
surpasses what is related of the Seven Wonders of the world. There are
fifty-two bridges throughout the whole of this route, which begins at the
distance of three miles from Geneva, skirts the southern shore of the lake,
runs thro' the whole Valais, traverses the Simplon and issuing from the
gorges of the mountains at Domo d'Ossola terminates at Rho in the Milanese.
From Brieg to the toll-house, the highest part of the road, the distance is
about 18 miles. It made me dreadfully giddy to look down the various
precipices; and what adds to the vertigo one feels is the deafening noise
of the various waterfalls.
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