harmonizing with the freshness of the air, the serenity of the scene, the neatness of the cottages, the honest and cheerful countenances of the inhabitants, form a combination of magnificence and tranquillity that defies the power of description, either in prose or verse. It was on this very spot, and at this time of evening, that Moore was excited to the following effusion: No, never shall I lose the trace Of what I've felt in this bright place; This mighty scene again I'll seek, At this same calm and glowing hour, And here, at the sublimest shrine That Nature ever reared to thee, Rekindle all that hope divine, And feel my immortality! The sun-beams hovered round the hoary head of Mont Blanc for full half an hour after their parent source had sunk behind the Jura. The "refulgent lamp of night" then rose in splendour, and poured her column of silver light over the rippling wave direct upon us, while we galloped along the winding shores to the gates of Geneva. Although the physical character and costume of the Swiss people do not exhibit such a striking contrast with the character and costume of the French, as the geographical features of Switzerland with those of France—yet the contrast is great, even in the Pays de Vaud, where the two people touch. The complexions change to a healthier tint, owing, no doubt, to air, exercise, and cleanliness. The Swiss are ten times more industrious than the French, and had they half the fertility of soil, they would be ten times richer than their prouder neighbours. As it is, with all their rocks, and snows, and glaciers, and lakes, and forests, they are infinitely more comfortable as to food, drink, clothing, and most of the necessaries of life-and all this from INDUSTRY, which invariably brings in its train HEALTH, WEALTH, and HAPPINESS. That this industry is much connected with, or dependent on religious and political institutions, there can be no doubt. PROTESTANTISM seems to lead as naturally to PROPERTY, through the medium of industry, as POPERY leads to POVERTY, through the medium of idleness! The two sides of the Lake of Geneva exhibit this contrast, though on a small scale. GENEVA. The gates of this ancient and far-famed city recalled my attention to one of the many vexations and taxations to which all are subject on the Continent, VEXATIONS OF THE PASSPORT SYSTEM. 45 but which the traveller feels more severely than any other class, for obvious locomotive reasons :-I mean the PASSPORT SYSTEM. Europe is still, in this respect, what it was in the days of ROMAN DOMINION-one vast and dreary PRISON! According to all just and good laws, a man is considered innocent till he is proved to be guilty. Not so under the passport system. There he is always suspected of being guilty, after repeated proofs of innocence! An Englishman undergoes all necessary scrutiny on landing at Calais, and his passport is found to be "quite correct." But a drive along a road where it would be difficult to beg, borrow, or steal—a passage over a crazy wooden plank, or under a tottering gateway, renders him as great an object of political suspicion, as if he had crossed direct in a balloon from the Cabinet of St. James's-and again he undergoes gendarmerie purification-generally at the expense of a franc for his freedom to the next fortified town. This system is vexatious enough in the "GREAT NATION;" but it is still more taxatious in the fifty little nations through which the traveller passes in rapid succession. A drawbridge and a portcullis are not the only things that cast suspicion of political conspiracy on the unfortunate traveller. A night-cap, or the name of his meal, is a formal procés-verbal against him. He may dine in a town or village on the Continent, and drink his bottle of winemount his mule or his carriage, and proceed without molestation. But if he sup, put on his night-cap, and go to bed-he is a suspected subject—and the master of the hotel is bound to have him purified in the morning by a visit from a whiskered knight of the halbert, who bows, begs, or perhaps blusters, till the traveller gets rid of his accursed presence by a piece of money! The more petty, paltry, and subjugated the principality or state through which you pass, the more rigorous the examination of your passport and baggage, lest you should be plotting against its independance (!!) or infringing on its commerce! The PRINCE of MONACO, for example, (one of Napoleon's imperial brood, I believe) whose town and territory Gulliver would have extinguished with the same ease, and by the same means, as he did the fire in Lilliput, orders a half-starved sergeant, with a cigar in his mouth, into your room, while breakfasting or dining at MENTONE, to demand 75 cents for liberty to pass through his empire! But all this time we are standing at the gates of Geneva, with as much doubt and anxiety as candidates for admission into the portals of Paradise, although our courier had long preceded us with all kinds of documents, to prove that we were peaceable and not political travellers-subjects of a friendly state-free-born as the sons of Helvetia-and, what is more than all, believing as firmly as Calvin himself, that-the POPE is ANTICHRIST! Whether a senatus consultus of watchmakers and musical snuff-box manufacturers had been summoned to deliberate on the safety or "danger of the republic" in case we were admitted after 10 o'clock, I cannot tell-but there was quite time enough for such a procedure before the bolts were drawn, and we were permitted to enter within the well-guarded walls! Now it would be exquisitely ridiculous and laughable, if it were not so "frivolous and vexatious," to see every little town or city, that can boast of a mud wall or a weather-worn gate, aping, in the midst of profound peace, all the military parade and precaution of Gibraltar, Ceuta, Valetta, or Bergenop-Zoom, with an enemy entrenched on their glacis! Yet this perpetual annoyance, these senseless formalities, this constant infringement on personal liberty, are the boast of European POLICE, though a disgrace to liberal POLICY -rendering, as I said before, the whole Continent one dreary prison, divided into as many cells as there are states, with surly turnkeys at every barrier, to arrest the progress and pick the pocket of the traveller. For the necessity or utility of this harrassing passport system, especially in the interior of kingdoms or states, no one ever could assign me a satisfactory reason. It supports a set of harpies, and keeps travellers in constant fear of losing their credentials-THAT'S ALL! GENEVA, though not the capital of Switzerland, nor even of the Pays de Vaud, is decidedly the Athens of this "land of mountain and of flood." It is a little EDINBURGH in head, and Birmingham in hand. The Genevans are as zealous in the pursuits of literature and science, as they are ingenious in the construction of watches, gold chains, and musical snuff-boxes. Still INDUSTRY is the prominent moral character, even of the Helvetian Athens. There can be little doubt that this character has been stamped on the people here, and perhaps in many other places, more by physical than by moral causes. A keen air, a scanty soil, a superabundance of snow, rock, ice, river and lake, are circumstances that must conduce to industrious and economical habits. The sharp mountain breeze excites feelings not only of cold but of hungertwo powerful stimuli to labour, which, alone, can furnish raiment and food. The paucity of soil and profusion of useless elements in Switzerland, lead to a careful cultivation of every inch of earth that is capable of yielding materials for food, clothing, arts or commerce. Economy, too, is a very necessary ingredient in the character of those who "Force a churlish soil for scanty bread." In spite of all that has been written about the pastoral manners, the simplicity and the hospitality of the Swiss, it is no more than truth to state, that among those classes with which the traveller comes in contact, there is a degree of Jewishness and selfishness, not much surpassed by what is met with in most other parts of Europe. He is not so much cheated, abused, and wrangled with as in Italy-but he is not seldom over-reached by a people, who have made wonderful advances, of late years, in the arts, as well as the sciences of civilized life! Over the magnificent military routes of the Jura and Sim plon, French and Italian morals have rushed, like two mighty torrents, into the valleys of Switzerland—and, like torrents, are rapidly finding their level between the two countries. What shape or form this precious amalgamation, this tertium quid, may ultimately assume, it is not for me to predict. GENEVA itself is singularly well situated for health, cleanliness, and many of the mechanical arts, independently of the romantic and beautiful scenery surrounding it. A small island having split à magnificent river into two streams, immediately as it issues from one of the finest lakes in Europe, the town is thrown across this island and occupies the four opposite banks. Four level bridges maintain an easy communication between all parts of the town; and, as the houses project on piles over the river, the stream runs with a rapid course, not only through, but under a considerable portion of the streets and houses. Advantage is taken of this peculiarity of situation to abridge labour and save expense. It is not less curious than delightful to see the blue and 66 arrowy Rhone" leap joyous through the streets of Geneva, ever ready and willing to lend its powerful aid to industry. It grinds their corn, washes their clothes, spins their cotton, cards their wool, turns their laths—and, in short, is to the inhabitants a gigantic steam-engine, of inexhaustible power, voluntarily and gratuitously supplied by a thousand glaciers and ten thousand mountain streams.* Society is very cheap in Geneva. In England, although the press is free, there is a tremendous tax on the tongue, which is the true cause of John Bull's taciturnity, even when he quits his native land. In London, for example, a lady or a gentleman can no more open their mouths in company, without previously undergoing a heavy contribution to a host of trades-people, than a country member can make a speech in Parliament, without first getting it by heart. In Geneva, and many other places on the Continent, words are merely wind, and cost little more than the exertion of utterance. In English society it is much more expensive to swallow bad air in a crowded drawing-room, than turtle-soup and champagne in the Albion Tavern. In Geneva, a pair of pattens and an umbrella serve for carriage and horses-while the housemaid who has assisted to dress her mistress, performs the office of footman, in conducting her to the SOIRÉE. There, conversation is enlivened and sweet * The amiable and highly-gifted authoress of "Sketches in Italy," has allowed herself sometimes to embellish a little. Thus, she compares the noise of the Rhone passing through Geneva to that of thunder, and its velocity to that of lightning. The fretting of the stream against the wooden pillars of the bridges and the numerous piles on which the houses are erected, causes a wild and not unpleasing murmur, especially during the stillness of night, which is as unlike to that of thunder, as its velocity is to that of the electric flash. The Rhone may run here about six or seven miles an hour. ened by music, tea, and bon-bons-the gentlemen, in groups, discussing foreign or domestic politics-while the stranger, from nine till twelve o'clock, has the supreme felicity to Hear the pretty ladies talk Tittle tattle, tittle tattle, Like their pattens, as they walk, Prittle prattle, prittle prattle. About midnight, the female footman, with her lantern, is announced in a whisper to each fair visitor; and, at this dread hour, the clattering patten, the murmuring Rhone, and the hollow-toned watchman, often combine to break the slumbers of the weary tourist at the ECU, or BALANCE, by an unwelcome serenade “Resounding long in listening Fancy's ear." Englishmen, who travel with their families, should avoid Geneva, where their wives and daughters are liable to be seduced and themselves ruined. This species of seduction has not hitherto received a name; but I shall venture to call it BIJOUTERIE. I am sorry to say that, although the BRITISH is reputed a moral nation and the FRENCH a dissolute one, the ladies of the former are endeavouring, by every means in their power, to introduce this same BIJOUTERIE into their native land; while, to our shame be it spoken, the French have stationed certain moral censors, called DOUANIERS, in every avenue through the Jura Mountains to prevent its passing into France. LAUSANNE---VEVAY---CHILLON. The drive from Geneva to Lausanne, and thence to Chillon and the entrance of the Vallais, presents some of the finest scenery on the surface of the globe. It has been described, in glowing colours, by Rousseau, Byron, Gibbon, Moore, and a hundred others-but by none more faithfully than by Mr. Burford, who has laid Englishmen under great obligations, by presenting to their astonished eyes, in Leicester Square and the Strand, some of the sublimest and most beautiful views in the world, divested of all the inconvenience of cloud, fog, or rain-of all the toil and expense of travelling by land and water—yet with all these elements in their proper places, combining to form a most accurate representation of Nature. The Panorama taken from Lausanne was one of the best which this ingenious artist ever exhibited. The journey round this side of the lake has the advantage of being on classic ground, and the train of recollections associated with the lives and writings of Voltaire, Necker, Rousseau, Gibbon, and Byron, add not a little to the interest of the scenes, as they pass in succession before the mental and bodily |