Anna De Koven

“ Thus the golden age of chivalry, rhyming harmoniously with the golden age of the herdsmen, in the blue circle of the Gruyère heights, grew to its noon day.
Then, suddenly as a tempest gathering across the sun pours quick destruction over a parterre of flowers, black horror swallowed up Gruyère. The plague called the Black Death, born in the Levant and rushing like a destroying flood with terrifying rapidity over the borders of Switzerland, penetrated even into the mountain-encircled country of Count Pierre. ”

“ From the heights above the city, with their terrifying war cries, and with the same furious onslaught which had overwhelmed Duke Leopold's glorious horsemen at Morgarten, they fell upon the nobles in a bloody melée in which horses, men and valets perished in a hopeless confusion. Three Gruyère knights were left lifeless on the battlefield and eighty-four others, who thus paid the price of their temerity in thinking to stem the already formidable confederation of citizens and free people in Switzerland. ”

“ Not yet has the cruel light of modern day chased the fairies, the may-maidens, the "servans" and the evil spirits from the forests and the caves. The place where the devil, joining in a coraule, drew the dancing people over a precipice is still shunned by young and old; with pride also will they point out the slope of the Gruyère hill where when the men were fighting at the Pré de Chênes the women drove their goats, each bearing a lighted candle, through the darkness upon an invading horde of Bernois, who, thinking they were devils, fled in affright. ”

“ Their long rule, extending through six centuries of internal wars, during times when oppression was the prerogative of their order, was stained by no single act of cruelty. In the peculiar charm of their race, in the unique influence of their position in Europe, as in the unbroken length of their rule, the counts of Gruyère were the most important of all the noble Swiss families. Titles and aristocratic privileges have long since vanished from republican Switzerland, where liberty triumphant, the age-wrought jewel of a thousand years, shines clearly among the tumults of the warring nations. ”

“ The most illustrious of the sovereigns who presided over the destinies of Gruyère, François I has left an imperishable memory and bore a unique role in the history of the fifteenth century in Switzerland. By a personal force and ability surpassing any of the nobles of his time, he justified the confidence of the suzerains he successively served. Everything possible was accomplished under his administration for the duchy of Savoy, torn between such powers as Burgundy and France. ”

“ Sent by his father, Charles VII of France, at the head of the redoubtable Armagnacs, to help the German emperor to subdue the Confederated Cantons, the dauphin Louis XI had such a taste of the quality of the Swiss soldier as he was never afterwards to forget, when, at the battle of St. Jacques, fighting as heroes never fought before, snatching the arrows from their bleeding wounds, battling to the last, fourteen hundred Swiss despatched eight thousand French and Austrians with eleven hundred of their horses. ”

“ Meeting by moonlight nights to sing their love songs and rhymed legends in the city square, the Gruyère people better loved their dances, the long Celtic Korols (or Coraules) , when, singing in chorus in wild winding farandoles, they went dancing over vales and hills, day in and day out until human strength could bear no more. Such was the famous dance quaintly recounted in ancient French by a Gruyère chronicler.
"It happened one day that the Count de Gruyère returning to his castle, found thereby a great merry-making of young lads and maidens dancing in Koraule. ”

“ Never had Gruyère enjoyed such a rule, and greatly did it redound to his credit that his little pastoral domain was preserved in growing prosperity and independence between the threatening and ambitious republics of Berne and Fribourg. Even in the days of his brilliant youth when he brought his Italian bride, the noble Bonne da Costa, from among the ladies of the Piemontaise court of Savoy, to share with him the pleasures of his charming little domain, he showed how strong a defender he could be of its liberties and possessions. ”

“ The origin of the Gruyère customs, like the coraules and the still observed habit of hanging wreaths on their door posts or in the oak groves, have a derivation of the most distant antiquity, in the Chaldean cradle of the race, in the myths of India and the Orient. The personified forces of Nature, the cloud wraiths of the mountains, the lisping voices of the streams, for many centuries haunting the imaginations of the people, still live in their legends, as they do in Celtic Ireland. ”

“ During all the years of [Pg 36] the fourteenth century the feudal society of Switzerland, although so fiercely attacked by the rising bourgeoisie power, blazed like the leaves in autumn in a passing October glory with the snows of winter seemingly still afar. At Chambéry, the court of Amédée VII of Savoy, called Le Comté Vert from the emerald color of the velvet in which he and his courtiers were clad, the brother rulers of Gruyère took part in all the fêtes and tourneys. ”

“ Although the Bernois burnt the Tour de Trême and captured sixty of the defendants, Count Pierre and his soldiers forced them to retire, and the castle and city of Gruyère were saved. Strong men were these knights and vassals of Gruyère to withstand and gayly to forget the bloody assaults of their determined foes, for in the intervals of war alarms they passed a holiday life of jest and song. ”

“ The banners of Hapsburg and Savoy were united in the determined onslaught upon the powerful city, and a large force from Fribourg, eager to aid in bringing her rival low, swelled the forces of the nobles in a glittering army of three thousand knights, who with their attendant vassals gayly and confidently practised feats of arms before the little fortified city of Laupen while awaiting the arrival of the Bernois. ”

“ For while Louis XI by his evil plotting had enlarged his kingdom, by obliterating the barrier of Burgundy between France and Austria he had at the same time made way for centuries of wars. "Here," said the 15th Louis before the tomb of the last duke of Burgundy, "is the cradle of all our wars." As for Switzerland, the system of mercenary service inaugurated by Louis debased its honor and divided its sons, who, fighting in the opposing armies of Europe, delayed for many years the development and the independence of their country. For a few years only, Savoy and Romand Switzerland enjoyed peace. ”

“ Engaged thus in the mutual support of Savoy, Count Louis, always working heart and soul for peace if he could, for war if compelled, so merited the approbation of the Bernois that their captain wrote that "Count Louis de Gruyère and his brother had conducted themselves as faithful and valorous friends of their allies." Count Louis was also enthusiastic over this new alliance of the Confederates with his beloved Savoy, and declared that "he was resolved to live and die with his allies and that with God's help their united strength would prevail against all foes." ”

“ Among them, Count Pierre de Gruyère, refusing an enormous indemnity for losses at the hands of the Bernois and as ever faithful to his order and to Savoy, took his place with other nobles of his house. [Pg 31] Warriors each one by training and tradition, not yet had any fear of defeat chilled their ardor or their courage, nor had they learned the wisdom of concealing their threatened attack upon the growing republic. ”

“ Resisting first and then happily mingling with their Roman conquerors, the Celtic people were transformed into a Romand race, similar in speech and origin to the French. In the heart of this Romand country was an ancient principality where the essential qualities of the beauty loving [Pg 8] and imaginative races, Roman and Celtic, expressed themselves uniquely. A fountain of Celtic song and legend, a centre of chivalry and warlike power, this principality is known only to the outer world by the pastoral product which bears its name "Gruyère." ”

“ Count François, flower of the race of pastoral kings, presents one more historical example of the brilliant intellect, of the abounding vitality and extraordinary beauty with which nature—unheeding law—seems unwisely to sanction the overwhelming preference and inclination of unmarried lovers. ”

“ The idyllic loveliness of the country is deliciously completed by the vines which are trained over the houses, by the flowers which grow in their windows, so that from spring to [Pg 134] November Gruyère is a garden, ringed by blue mountains under a sky of pure blue. In the Romand country are many exquisite towns such as Romont and Rue, Estavayer, Oron and Morat—happily preserved in their unaltered mediæval perfection. ”

“ Still holding the supreme power, the Church alone could bring the peace for which the country longed. At Romont, near the borders of Gruyère, Hughes, Bishop of Lausanne, invoking a great assembly of prelates, proclaimed the Trêve de Dieu before a throng of people carrying palm branches and crying "Pax, Pax Domini." Thus in this corner of the world was adopted the law originating in Acquitaine, which prevailed over all Europe and which alone controlled in those strange times the violence and the pillage which was the permitted privilege of the robber bishops and the robber lords. ”

“ Such soldiers Louis XI preferred as allies rather than antagonists and, when he succeeded to the throne made haste to attach them to his cause. He was wiser in this than his sister Yolande, who assured of the precious alliance with the leading cities of the Swiss Confederates, lately so ably negotiated by the count of Gruyère, paid less attention to preserving their friendship, than to her ambitious designs upon the vast territories and untold wealth of Burgundy. ”

“ Never was so venal and brutal a war waged at the will of a foreign and detestably traitorous king, and the coming of the great Duke Charles was awaited by all the inhabitants of the Romand country as a welcome deliverance from the hated Bernois. ”

“ Duchess Yolande, although still threatened by the Savoy princes, was sustained upon the throne by her brother who in this one instance was faithful to his promises. She reëstablished the customs of the ducal court and organized plays and festivities; and surrounding herself with a train of musicians, with the soothing sounds of flutes and harps, attempted to forget the fierce trials and tumults of her reign. ”