SECT. CXIV. ORNAMENTED GRAVES AT BALSTAL. AT Balstal, a village situated near Mount Jura, we went to see a cataract, of which we had heard a magnificent description. The rocky channel was bold and romantic, but the heat had dried up its waters. Our path lay through the church-yard of the village, and we were particularly struck with the pious homage paid to the memory of the dead, not only in the gilded tomb-stones and painted crosses, which were stuck thick over the ground, but in the humble affection which had given the grave itself an air of animation, by planting the pink, the violet, and other sweet-scented herbs, on the green mounds, beneath which reposed the mould ering dust. Instead of the murky atmosphere and repulsive gloom of a receptacle of the dead, the churchyard, placed amidst woods, rocks, and pastoral hills, and emitting the sweet fragrance of newly-springing flowers, and the fresh garlands which were hung around tombs, excited pleasing images of hope to the mind, and led to soothing meditation. I recollected the wish of Ossian, "Olay me, ye that see the light, near some rocks of my hills; let the thick hazels be around; let the rustling oak be near. Green be the place of my rest; and let the sound of the distant torrent be heard." How remote from these tender cares of mourning humanity is the treatment observed in France towards the dead; and which might seem a relapse to barbarism, if we did not find, even among the most savage nations, some civilized marks of human reverence, some decent ceremonial, paid to the relies of our mortal nature! It might perhaps be necessary to restrain the display of that vanity which, before the revolution, decked its mockery of woe with idle pomp and pageantry; but stern, indeed, must be the reformer, who admires that cold-blooded philosophy which consigns those to whom we are bound by the holiest ties of humanity, or the dearest feelings of the heart, without regret, to the un hallowed procèsverbal of a municipal officer, who strides away with indecent haste before the yet unstiffened corpse, hurls it into the common pit, among undistinguished heaps of dead. During the epocha of the worship of reason, a tacit approbation of this annihilation of vulgar prejudices might have been wrung from fear; since, at that time, amongst the well-fed monsters in the republic, death and the grave -"Upturn'd "Their nostrils wide into the murky air, and revelled on the dead, as their pioneers, terror and Jacobin government, rioted on the living. We returned to Basil on a Sunday morning, time enough to join a throng of worshippers at the French protestant church, whose respectful demeanour and devout attention formed a singular and soothing contrast to the coarse impiety we had so lately witnessed at Paris, where we had seen altars overthrown, the surplice and the mitre transformed into caparisons for horses; had heard the commissionaries of revolution ary committees boast, that, at their Bacchanalian orgies, their gross libations had been poured from sacramental cups; and had observed, that no political blasphemy was so striking to those reformers as the slightest mark of respect for religion. The practice of shutting up the gates of the Swiss towns during divine service, to prevent the rolling of carriages, though attended with inconvenience to travellers, is so far pleasing, as it consecrates one day in seven to relaxation and repose. The strict observance of this day of rest in Switzerland forms an agreeable contrast to the busy, as well as dissipated manner in which both Sunday and Decadi are passed in France; which festivals being ever at war with each other, neither is celebrated with respect. Not only are the stated returns of intervals of rest necessary for man, but the voice of mercy calls aloud on the French legislature to interpose between the rest less activity or the avarice of the master, and the beast. Nothing is more pleasing than to observe throughout Switzerland the care and even tenderness which is shewn to the animal creation; while in France they feel the primary cause of labour inflicted in all its severity. Sunday and Decadi alike, the loaded horse drags on his heavy burden; alike the merciless lash forever resounds along the streets, and those whose nerves are not steeled against every pain but their own, are denied the relief of knowing, that an appointed respite from toil is the privilege of that miserable race. Among the moral diversities of Switzerland, none are marked with more precision than their territorial belief. In a ride of two or three hours from the canton of Basil into that of Soleure, and over a branch of the canton of Berne into that of Lucerne, we found ourselves alternately on catholic and protestant ground. In whatever cause originated these whimsical bounda ries of their geographic religion, which heretofore lighted up so often the flames of civil dissension, it is soothing to observe, that, since the beginning of the present century, the Swiss have observed that the sword is not the most persuasive weapon of religious controversy. Two religions, that of the Roman church, and an assemblage of dogmas of the sixteenth century, called the Helvetic confession, are the exclusive religions of the Helvetic confederacy. Hume has somewhere observed, that the hatred of polemics is most inveterate, where the points in dispute are the least remote ; it is not, therefore, suprising, that civil dissensions in Switzerland should have been carried to such excess, since the faith, for which both parties contended, is conceived in the same spirit of intolerance, and buried in the same labyrinth of incomprehensibility. MISS WILLIAMS. SECT. CXV. CURIOSITIES OF BASIL COMPARATIVE VIEW OF FRENCH AND SWISS PEASANTRY BEFORE THE REVOLUTION SERFS. DURING our stay at Basil, we visited, like other travellers, the arsenal, the ornaments of which are composed of shields, swords, and breastplates, which, from their enormous size, would crush ten modern eitizens of Basil, and reminded us of Nestor's speech, where he exclaims "A god-like race of heroes once I knew, "Such as no more these aged eyes shall view " POPE'S Homer. We then proceeded to the cathedral, a fine piece of architecture, but disfigured without by a coating of red paint what is most interesting within is the tomb of Erasmus, a frugal tablet of common marble stuck against the wall. At the public library we were shown, with extreme politeness, the various and valuable curiosities it contains; such as the collection of manuscripts, which is highly precious; manuscript letters of Erasmus ; the original sketches of most of the fine pictures of Holbein, the Passion, painted in the first style of this master ; and other admirable pieces, worthy of the public library and museum of Paris. We saw Mr. Mechel's fine collection of engravings; and we also visited the hideous series of figures called the Dance of Death, painted by Kleber, a pupil of Holbein. After seeing these, and some other less important curiosities, we took leave of our friends at Basil, in order to enjoy a view of the sublime and beautiful objects of the country. A stranger who travels through France into Switzerland, cannot fail to observe the different appearance of the habitations of the peasantry of each country. The abject condition of this class in France, previous to the revolution, was one of the most prominent fea tures of the wretchedness of the government; and sufficient time has not yet elapsed to change the external marks of misery. The commanding chateau still frowns in gloomy magnificence over the mud-walled hut, though the inhabitants are now possessed of equal rights. In Switzerland, the peasant's habitation, however poor, has the air of comfort and convenience. Every wooden cottage has its garden, or orchard; and the limpid brook, running before the door of the thatch, gives the whole an air of freshness. The peasants of the canton of Basil are, like the generality of peasants in Switzerland, well clothed and fed, have the liberty, which is no small prerogative, of judging, in the first instance, their own disputes, without the intervention of the bailiff, whose treasury is too often swelled by the fines of contention; and have also the privilege of bearing arms. Their neighbours, the French peasantry, need no longer look upon these advantages with the glance of envy or the sigh of regret; since, for the French husbandman, above every other class of Frenchmen, the revolution hitherto has been made: while the nobility, the clergy, the pensioners of the state, have been ruined; while commerce, for a while annihilated amidst the overwhelming shock of political convulsions, is now. but slowly awakening once more to life; the husbandman, emancipated from every feudal claim, exonerated from every species of personal servitude, disburdened of every tax, and relieved from every oppression, has, above all others, had cause to bless the dawn of liberty. Even the horrible tempest of revolutionary terror passed harmless over his head; and while the palace was devasted, and the chateau levelled to the ground, his cottage stood erect; amidst the violation of all other possessions, his property, with the exception of a few revolutionary requisitions, was respected; and amidst hosts of executioners, his person was safe. During the long course and vast depreciations of paper money, the farmer paid with the labour of a week the rents of the year; and was enabled, not only to |