G. Flemwell

“ For Nature in most lavish mood accompanies us. No matter at what season, the two and a half hours road from Bex to Les Plans is full of beauty for the eye and mind, but if there is one season above the others when this beauty is the more bewitching it is that of spring. Oh, why—a thousand times why!—is spring in the Alps so neglected by travellers seeking charm and pleasure? Why are the Kursaals crowded in spring by those who, at Custom’s bidding, are waiting for a later, more healthy and resplendent season? ”

“ In England, Astrantia major, when found, is said to seek the partial shade of copse and spinny, but here on these Alpine fields it is in the full sunshine—and looking very much the better for such boldness. It is as though the higher plants climb, the less they fear the light, extraordinarily searching though this latter be; it is as though they revel in the purity, and, casting retirement to the winds, take on a new and healthier joy in life. ”

“ The clustering fir trees, framed about with velvet plots of green under a clear, blue-grey sky; the suggestion of the infinite in the peaks tossing in the heat-haze like a wild sea beyond the verge of a far-away coast; the chastening awe of the Glacier of Trient and the undertone of the gorge-water below rising like the spirit of reflection bred of the dense solitude of hill and sky—all these fine miracles about you! For this is the charm of Villars, that it lies a kind of lagoon of quiet beauty amid the circling terror of pitiless frost and snow. ”

“ Of goodly and varied company, they are such important units in the rich composition of most Alpine meadows, and, where they grow, they form so compact a groundwork of colouring and so admirable a setting for many of the taller flowers, that it were, indeed, a dereliction of memory to overlook them! What could be lovelier than a wide area of these Clovers in June sown with lilac, rose-tinted, and white Orchids, deep, lustrous-blue Phyteumas, paper-white Paradise Lilies, and infinite hosts of the bright and fascinating little Euphrasia? ”

“ We were more than ever convinced that Morgins enjoys even more snow than a place of its very respectable altitude deserves. The view from the Bellevue has the charm of the prospects from those lesser summits of the Alps that are not too near the greater peaks to be overshadowed, nor too remote to lose the essential majesty of the greater giants. The blending of lake and forest, quiet snow-clad hills, and forest-bound cliffs has a charm lacking in the innermost recesses of the chain. ”

“ The things which are most enduring are the things honestly felt and thought; for the expression of the true self reaches out nearest to satisfaction. Unless, then, we are apes in more than ancestry, Japanese gardening can have no long life among us. Alpine gardening is far more akin to our natural or hereditary instincts; it holds for us the possibility of an easier and more honest appreciation. And it is just here, in this very fact, where lies much of the danger which may overtake and smother the immense and growing enthusiasm with which Alpines are meeting. ”

“ And then, all the time to the left, for nearly five miles, towers the glorious Dent du Midi with its seven peaks. I imagine that there is no more individual, graceful, and arresting mountain in the Alps of the whole wide world. Like the Matterhorn, it stands out, a living personality amid its neighbour mountains. As among the many and striking peaks at Zermatt the eye rests at once and all but always upon the Matterhorn, so among the many and striking peaks in this district of the Rhone valley does the eye immediately rest upon [47] the Dent du Midi. One never tires of it. ”

“ Perhaps the only flower to bless, and bless again, the passage of the scythe over the damp slopes and fields of Alpine Switzerland is Colchicum autumnale, the so-called Autumn Crocus; for, from the close-cropped grass it pushes up its blossoms when all other field-growth has done its utmost. What sorry plight it would be in if the tall yellowing plants and grasses were still left standing, cumbering the ground with a dense and matted vegetation! ”

“ Fleecy clouds driven up by the breeze, ‘shepherded by the slow, unwilling wind’, rested on the highest snows without materially restricting the view. The battlements of the Dent du Midi were free from haze, and the upper reaches of the Val d’Illiez, sadly brown, formed a satisfying contrast to the snowy slopes round Morgins. Poor Champéry! Scores of disconsolate exiles, thirsting for the real winter, deserted Champéry for Morgins during the course of the winter.
VILLARS: A PEEP OF THE DENT DE MORCLES
“Of the descent it is hard to speak with decent restraint. ”

“ To come upon this inimitable flower spread in serried numbers over a large square of ground on a steep slope at an altitude of over 4,000 feet, was not a little surprising. Waving its battalions of fiery blossoms against the grey mist-filled valley beneath, with old sun and wind-stained châlets standing just beside, it was an irresistible motif for a painter. Seemingly as much at home as in any field in England, it appeared of even greater brilliance than with us—having, perhaps, caught something of the humour of the Gentian. ”

“ Will any one deny that a plant which, in a wild, free state, invariably chooses to dwell upon the meadows is not more at home there than when robbed of such pressing, self-sought company? Will any one deny that, for instance, Campanula rhomboidalis, Paradisia Liliastrum, Salvia pratensis, Narcissus poeticus, Veratrum album, or Phyteuma betonicifolium are not infinitely happier when growing together in close company with grasses than when standing in select isolation upon the rockery or the garden-border? ”

“ Go up another day to Les Ecovets, and, looking across to Leysin and the Tours d’Aï and away to Lac Léman and the dim-blue Jura mountains, say if ever ruler of the world claimed more glittering conquest than this of yours. For whether you are mountaineer or one of the people who ‘never walk’, the groves of Les Ecovets will always lure you. Painter, poet, rhapsodist or mere plain, blunt man, you there will find inspiration such as is not written in any book. ”

“ I can think of no feature of the Alpine landscape which could add so much charm and interest to English Alpine gardens as an Alpine meadow, and it is no mean matter for surprise that this feature has not so far claimed the attention it most assuredly merits. Moreover, an Alpine rock-garden shorn of its meadow-setting is less than a picture devoid of its frame. Can any one who knows the Alps imagine what they and their rock-flora would be without the fields and grassy slopes? ”

“ A cloudless day at Bretaye on the Chamossaire slopes, where ski-jumping is organized and whence Mont Blanc and his attendant Aiguilles are seen quite intimately, is a revelation in Alpine winter scenery—the deep ultramarine forests, the crisp and radiant snow, the intense warm-blue shadows, over the whole of which reigns a purity that is dazzling. ”

“ We have no cult beyond Nature’s own cult in this matter. We see, and we are content to see, that Nature has no nice plan and yet is invariably admirable; we see, and we are content to see, that if man, as in Switzerland, chooses to plant his insignificant dwelling in the midst of great, disorderly rocks and crowded acres of brilliant blossoms, it is romantic garden enough and worthy of as close imitation as possible.
With the Japanese, gardening is perhaps more a deeply æsthetic culture than it is the culture of plants. ”