ke a dash across the mighty
barrier that shut us away from Italy. Under a lowering sky, and
buffeted by short, sharp gusts of wind, which seemed the heralds of
fiercer blasts, we swung along the reedy shores of the narrowing lake,
the broken sides of the Rigi standing finely up on our right hand.
Winston was satirical about the poor Rigi and its railway, calling it
the Primrose Hill and the Devil's Dyke of Switzerland, the paradise of
trippers, a mountain whose sides are hidden under cataracts of
beer-bottles; but from our point of view, the vulgarities of the
maligned mountain were mellowed by distance, and I neither could nor
would look upon it as contemptible.

Leaving the Lake of the Forest Cantons, we spun along the margin of
the tamer sheet of Zug, to pass, beyond Arth, into the great
wilderness caused by the fearful landslide of a century ago, when a
mighty mass of rock and earth split off from the main bulk of the
Rossberg and thundered down into the valley. The slow processes of
nature had done much to cover up decently all traces of the Titan's
rage, but the huge, bare scar on the side of the Rossberg still told
its tale of tragedy. By the peaceful Lowerzer See the road undulated
pleasantly, and at Schwyz (the hub of Swiss history) we had tea, the
torn and imposing pyramids of the two Myten bravely rearing their
heads above the mists that encumbered the valleys.

There was no need to hurry, for we had the night before us, so we
passed slowly, halting often, along the marvellous Axenstrasse, while
Jack distilled into Molly's willing ears legends from the old heroic
days of Switzerland, before it became the happy haven of
hotel-keepers. From the car we could note the characteristics of the
Cantons which had entered into the famous bond; pastoral and leafy
Unterwalden, with green fields and orchards; Schwyz, also green and
fertile; but Uri (the cold, highland partner in this great alliance),
a country of towering mountains and savage rocks. Molly wanted to get
a boat, and row across to the Ruetli to stand on that spot where, in
1307, Walter Fuerst, Arnold of Melchthal, and Werner Stauffacher took
the famous oath, and very reluctantly she gave up the wish when Jack
pointed to the rising waves, painting in lurid colours the sudden and
dangerous storms that sweep the Lake of Uri. When he went on, however,
to insinuate doubts as to the historic accuracy of these old stories,
and to hint that even William Tell might