vals, with scrupulous care, by the great-grand- | more civilized states, the result of any habitual sons of those by whom they were originally purchased. awe for their rank, or of any selfish consideration of the advantage to be derived from cultiThe dress of the women is grotesque and vating their good will. It is the spontanesingular in the extreme. Generally speaking, ous effusion of benevolent feeling, of feeling the waists are worn long, and the petticoats springing from the uncorrupted dictates of their exceedingly short; and the colours of their hearts, and enhanced by the feudal attachment clothes are as bright and various as those of with which they naturally are inclined to rethe men. To persons habituated however to gard those in a higher rank than themselves. the easy and flowing attire of our own coun- Though the Tyrolese are entirely free, and trywomen, the form and style of this dress though the emperor possesses but a nominal appears particularly unbecoming; nor can we sovereignty over them, yet the warm feelings altogether divest ourselves of those ideas of of feudal fidelity have nowhere maintained ridicule which we are accustomed to attach to their place so inviolate as among their mounsuch antiquated forms, both on the stage and tains; and this feeling of feudal respect and in the pictures of the last generation. Among affection is extended by them to the higher the peasant girls, you often meet with much classes, whenever they behave towards them beauty; but, for the most part, the women of with any thing like kindness or gentleness of the Tyrol are not nearly so striking as the manners. It has arisen from the peculiar men; an observation which seems applicable situation of their country, in which there are to most mountainous countries, and to none few of the higher orders, where the peasantry more than to the West Highlands of Scotland. possess almost the entire land of which it It is of more importance to observe that the consists, and where, at the same time, the Tyrolese peasantry are everywhere courteous bonds of feudal attachment have been preserved and pleasing in their demeanor, both towards with scrupulous care, for political reasons, by strangers and their own countrymen. In this their indulgent government, that the peasantry respect, their manners have sometimes been have united the independence and pride of remisrepresented. If a traveller addresses them publican states with the devoted and romantic in a style of insolence or reproach, which is too fidelity to their sovereign, which characterizes often used towards the lower orders in France the inhabitants of monarchical realms. Like or Italy, he will in all probability meet with a the peasants of Switzerland, they regard themrepulse, and if the insult is carried further, he selves as composing the state, and would dismay, perhaps, have cause permanently to re- dain to crouch before any other power. Like pent the indiscretion of his language. For the the Highlanders of Scotland, they are actuated Tyrolese are a free people; and though sub-by the warmest and most enthusiastic loyalty ject to a despotic government, their own state preserves its liberty as entire as if it acknowledged no superior to its own authority. The peasantry too are of a keen and enthusiastic temper; grateful to the last degree for kindness or condescension, but feelingly alive on the other hand to any thing like contempt or derision in the manner of their superiors. Dwelling too in a country where all are equal, and where few noble families or great proprietors are to be found, they are little accustomed to brook insults of any kind, or to submit to language from strangers which they would not tolerate from their own countrymen. A similar temper of mind may be observed among the Scotch Highlanders; it has been noticed in the mountains of Nepaul and Cabul, and has long characterized the Arabian tribes; and indeed it belongs generally to all classes of the people in those situations where the debasing effects of the progress of wealth, and the division of labour have not been felt, and where, from whatever causes, the individuals in the lower ranks of life are called into active and strenuous exertion, and compelled to act for themselves in the conduct of life. If a stranger, however, behaves towards the Tyrolese peasantry with the ordinary courtesy with which an Englishman is accustomed to address the people of his own country, there is no part of the world in which he will meet with a more cordial reception, or where he will find a more affectionate or grateful return for the smallest acts of kindness. Among these untutored people, the gratitude for any good dred on the part of their superiors, is not, as in From towards their sovereign, and like them they Honesty may be regarded as a leading feature in the character of the Tyrolese, as indeed it is of all the German people. In no situation and under no circumstances is a stranger in danger of being deceived by them. They will, in many instances, sacrifice their own interests rather than betray what they consider so sacred a duty as that of preserving inviolate their faith with foreigners. In this respect their conduct affords a very striking contrast to the conduct of the French and Italians, whose rapacity and meanness have long been observed and commented on by every traveller. Yet, amidst all our indignation at that character, it may well be doubted, whether it does not arise naturally and inevitably from the system of government to which they have had the misfortune to be subjected. Honesty is a virtue practised and esteemed among men who have a character to support, and who feel their own importance in the scale of society. Generally it will be found to prevail in proportion to the weight which is attached to individual character; that is, to the freedom which the people enjoy. Cheating, on the other hand, is the usual and obvious resource of slaves, of men who have never been taught to respect themselves, and whose personal qualities are entirely overlooked by the higher orders of the state. If England and Switzerland and the Tyrol had been subjected by any train of unfortunate events to the same despotism which nas degraded the character of the lower orders in France and Italy, they would probably have had as little reason as their more servile neighbours to have prided themselves on the honesty and integrity of their national character. Perhaps the most remarkable feature in the character of the Tyrolese, is their uniform PIETY, a feeling which is nowhere so universally diffused as among their sequestered valleys. The most cursory view of the country is sufficient to demonstrate the strong hold which religion has taken of the minds of the peasantry. Chapels are built almost at every half mile on the principal roads, in which the passenger may perform his devotions, or which may awaken the thoughtless mind to a recollection of its religious duties. The rude efforts of art have there been exerted to pourtray the leading events in our Saviour's life; and innumerable figures, carved in wood, attest, in every part of the country, both the barbarous taste of the people, and the fervour of their religious impressions. Even in the higher parts of the mountains, where hardly any vestiges of human cultivation are to be found, in the depth of untrodden forests, or on the summit of seemingly inaccessible cliffs, the symbols of devotion are to be found, and the cross rises everywhere amidst the wilderness, as if to mark the triumph of Christianity over the greatest obstacles of nature. Nor is it only in solitudes or deserts that the vestiges of their devotion are to be found. In the valleys and in the cities it still preserves its ancient sway over the people. On the exterior of most houses the legend of some favourite saint, or the sufferings of some popular martyr, are to be found; and the poor inhabitant thinks himself secure from the greater evils of life under the guardianship of their heavenly aid. In every valley numerous spires are to be seen rising amidst the beauty of the surrounding | scene, and reminding the traveller of the piety of its simple inhabitants. On Sunday the whole people flock to church in their neatest and gayest attire; and so great is the number who thus frequent these places of worship, that it is not unfrequent to see the peasants kneeling on the turf in the churchyard where mass. is performed, from being unable to find a place within its walls. Regularly in the evening prayers are read in every family; and the traveller who passes through the villages at the hour of twilight, often sees through their latticed windows the young and the old kneeling together round their humble fire, or is warned of his approach to human habitation, by hearing their evening hymns stealing through the silence and solitude of the forest. Nor is their devotion confined to acts of external homage, or the observance of an unmeaning ceremony. Debased as their religion is by the absurdities and errors of the Catholic form of worship, and mixed up as it is with innumerable legends and visionary tales, it yet preserves enough of the pure spirit of its divine origin to influence, in a great degree, the conduct of their private lives. The Tyrolese have not yet learned that immorality in private life may be pardoned by the observance of certain ceremonies, or that the profession of faith purchases a dispensation from the rules of obedience. These, the natural and the usual attendants of the Catholic faith in richer states, have not reached their poor and sequestered valleys. The purchase of absolution by money is there almost unknown. In no part of the world are the domestic or conjugal duties more strictly or faithfully observed: and in none do the parish priests exercise a stricter or more conscientious control over the conduct of their flock. Their influence is not weakened, as in a more advanced state of society, by a discordance of religious tenets; nor is the consideration due to this sacred function, lost in the homage paid to rank, or opulence, or power. Placed in the midst of a people who acknowledge no superiors, and who live almost universally from the produce of their little domains, and strangers alike to the arts of luxury, and the seductions of fashion, the parish-priest is equally removed from temptation himself, and relieved from guarding against the great sources of wickedness in others. He is at once the priest, and the judge of his parish; the infallible criterion in matters of faith, and the umpire, in the occasional disputes which happen among them. Hence has arisen that remarkable veneration for their spiritual guides, by which the peasantry are distinguished; and it is to this cause that we are to ascribe the singular fact that their priests were their principal leaders in the war with France, and that while their nobles almost universally kept back, the people followed with alacrity the call of their pastors, to take up arms in support of the Austrian cause. In one great virtue, the peasants in this country (in common it must be owned with most Catholic states) are particularly worthy of imitation. The virtue of charity, which is too much overlooked in many Protestant kingdoms, but which the Catholic religion so uniformly and sedulously enjoins, is there practised, to the greatest degree, and by all classes of the people. Perhaps there are few countries in which, owing to the absence of manufactures and great towns, poverty appears so rarely, or in which the great body of the people live so universally in a state of comfort. Yet, whenever wretchedness does appear, it meets with immediate and effectual relief. Nor is their charity confined to actual mendicants, but extends to all whom accident or misfortune has involved in casual distress. Each valley supports its own poor; and the little store of every cottage, like the meal of the Irish cottager, is always open to any one who really requires its assistance. This benevolent disposition springs, no doubt, in a great measure from the simple state in which society exists among these remote districts: but it is to be ascribed not less to the efforts of the clergy, who incessantly enjoin this great Christian duty, and point it out as the chief means of atoning for past transgressions. districts to spread the cultivation of which the Alps, with their savage inhabitants, seemed to them incapable. What is it then which has wrought so wonderful a change in the manners, the habits, and the condition of the inhabitants of those desolate regions? What is it which has spread cultivation through wastes, deemed in ancient times inaccessible to human improvement, and humanized the manners of a people remarkable Much as we may lament the errors of the Catholic, and clearly as we may see its tendency (at least in its more corrupt forms) to nourish private immorality, and extinguish civil liberty, it is yet impossible to deny, that, in the great duty of Christian charity, which it invariably enjoins, it has atoned for a multitude of sins; and to suspect that amidst the austerity and severity of the presbyterian discipline, we have too much lost sight of the charity of the gospel; and that with us a pre-only, under the Roman sway, for the ferocity tended indignation for the vices which involve so many of the poor in distress, too often serves as a pretext for refusing to minister that relief to which, from whatever cause it has arisen, our Saviour tells us that it is entitled. human mind, and spread its beneficial influence among the remotest habitations of men; and which prompted its disciples to leave the luxuries and comforts of southern climates, to diffuse knowledge and humanity through inhospitable realms, and spread, even amidst the regions of winter and desolation, the light and the blessings of a spiritual faith. and barbarism of their institutions? From what cause has it happened that those savage mountaineers, who resisted all the acts of civilization by which the Romans established their sway over mankind, and continued, even to the There is something singularly delightful in overthrow of the empire, impervious to all the the sway which religion thus maintains in efforts of ancient improvement, should, in later these savage and sequestered regions. In times, have so entirely changed their characancient times, we are informed these moun- ter, and have appeared, even from the first tains were inhabited by the Rhætians, the dawn of modern civilization, mild and humane fiercest and most barbarous of the tribes, | in their character and manners? From what who dwelt in the fastnesses of the mountains, but from the influence of RELIGION-of that reand of whose savage manners Livy has given | ligion which calmed the savage feelings of the so striking an account in his description of Hannibal's passage of the Alps. Many Roman legions were impeded in their progress, or thinned of their numbers, by these cruel barbarians; and even after they were reduced to subjection, by the expedition of Drusus, it was still esteemed a service of the utmost danger to leave the high road, or explore the remote recesses of the country. Hence the singular fact, almost incredible in modern times, that even in the days of Pliny, several hundred years after the first passage of these mountains by the Roman troops, the source of both the Rhine and the Iser were unknown; and that the naturalist of Rome was content to state, a century after the establishment of a Roman station at Sion, that the Rhone took its rise "in the most hidden parts of the earth, in the region of perpetual night, amidst forests for ever inaccessible to human approach." Hence it is too, that almost all the inscriptions on the votive offerings which have been discovered in the ruins of the temple of Jupiter Penninus, at the summit of the great St. Bernard, and many of which come down to a late period in the history of the empire, speak of the gratitude of the pas-ors of our faith had to struggle in subduing sengers for having escaped the extraordinary perils of the journey. The Roman authors always speak of the Alps with expressions of dismay and horror, as the scenes of only winter and desolation, and as the abodes of barbarous tribes. "Nives cœlo prope immista, tecta informia imposita rupibus pecora jumenta que torrida frigore homines intonsi et inculti, animalia inanimaque omnia rigentia gelu cetera visu quam dictu fædiora terrorem renovarunt." No at tempt accordingly appears to have been made by any of the Romans in later times to explore the remoter recesses of the mountains now so familiar to every traveller; but while the emperors constructed magnificent highways across their summits to connect Italy with the northern provinces of the empire, they suffered the valleys on either side to remain in their pristine state of barbarism, and hastened into remoter * Liv. lib. 21. Universally it has been observed throughout the whole extent of the Alps, that the earliest vestiges of civilization, and the first traces of order and industry which appeared after the overthrow of the Roman empire, were to be found in the immediate neighbourhood of the religious establishments; and it is to the unceasing efforts of the clergy during the centuries of barbarism which followed that event, that the judicious historian of Switzerland ascribes the early civilization and humane disposition of the Helvetic tribes.* Placed as we are at a distance from the time when this great change was effected, and accustomed to manners in which its influence has long ago been established, we can hardly conceive the difficulties with which the earlier profess the cruel propensities, and calming the revengeful passions, that subsisted among the barbarous tribes who had conquered Europe; nor would we, perhaps, be inclined to credit the accounts of the heroic sacrifices which were then made by numbers of great and good men who devoted themselves to the conversion of the Alpine tribes, did not their institutions remain to this day as a monument of their virtue; and did we not still see a number of benevolent men who seclude themselves from the world, and dwell in the regions of perpetual snow, in the hope of rescuing a few individuals from a miserable death. When the traveller on the summit of the St. Bernard reads the warm and touching expressions of gratitude with which the Roman travellers recorded in the temple of Jupiter their gratitude for having escaped the dangers of the pass, * Planta, vol. i. p. 17, &c. see, in all the events by which they are sur rounded, the marks of divinę protection, which is the foundation of their superstition; and the more strongly that they feel rèliance on spiritual interposition, the less inclined are they to sink under the reverses of a temporary life. There is a wide distinction between superstition and the belief in sorcery or witchcraft. The latter is the growth of weakness and credulity, and prevails most among men of a timid disposition, or among ignorant and barbarous nations. The former, though it is founded on ignorance, and yields to the experience and knowledge of mankind, yet springs from the noblest principles of our nature, and is allied to every thing by which the history of our species has been dignified in former times. It will not be pretended, that the Grecian states were deficient either in splendour of talents or heroism of conduct, yet superstition, in its grossest form, attached itself to all their thoughts, and influenced alike the measures of their statesmen and the dreams of their philosophers. The Roman writers placed in that very feeling which we would call superstition, the most honourable charac even in the days of Adrian and the Antonines, and reflects on the perfect safety with which he can now traverse the remotest recesses of the Alps, he will think with thankfulness of the religion by which this wonderful change has been effected, and with veneration of the saint whose name has for a thousand years been affixed to the pass where his influence first reclaimed the people from their barbarous life; and in crossing the defile of Mount Brenner, where the abbey of Wilten first offered an asylum to the pilgrim, he will feel, with a late eloquent and amiable writer, how fortunate it is "that religion has penetrated these fastnesses, impervious to human power, and spread her influence over solitudes where human laws are of no avail; that where precaution is impossible and resistance useless, she spreads her invisible ægis over the traveller, and conducts him secure under her protection through all the dangers of his way. When, in such situations, he reflects upon his security, and recollects that these mountains, so savage and so well adapted to the purposes of murderers and banditti, have not, in the memory of man, been stained with human blood, he ought to do justice to the cause, and gratefully acknowledge the beneficial influence of religion. Im-teristic of their people, and ascribed to it the pressed with these reflections, he will behold, with indulgence, perhaps even with interest, the crosses which frequently mark the brow of a precipice, and the little chapels hollowed out of the rock where the road is narrowed; he will consider them as so many pledges of security; and rest assured, that, as long as the pious mountaineer continues to adore the "Good Shepherd,' and to beg the prayer of the 'afflicted mother,' he will never cease to befriend the traveller, nor to discharge the duties of hospitality."* It must be admitted, at the same time, that the Tyrolese are in the greatest degree superstitious, and that their devotion, warm and enthusiastic as it is, is frequently misplaced in the object of its worship. There is probably no country in which the belief in supernatural powers, in the gift of prophecy to particular individuals, and the agency of spiritual beings in human affairs, is more universally established. It forms, indeed, part of their religious creed, and blends in the most singular manner with the legendary tales and romantic adventures which they have attached to the history of their saints. But we would err most egregiously, if we imagined that this superstition with which the whole people are tinged, savours at all of a weak or timid disposition, or that it is any indication of a degraded national character. It partakes of the savage character of the scenery in which they dwell, and is ennobled by the generous sentiments which prevail among the lowest classes of the people. The same men who imagine that they see the crucifix bend its head in the dusk of the evening, and who hear the rattle of arms amid the solitude of the mountains, are fearless of death when it approaches them through the agency of human power. It is a strong feeling of religion, and a disposition to * Eustace, i. 98. memorable series of triumphs by which the history of the republic was distinguished. "Nulla inquam republià aut major aut sanctior fuit," says Livy; and it is to their deep sense of religion that Cicero imputes the unparalleled success with which the arms of the republic were attended.* Yet the religious feeling which was so intimately blended with the Roman character, and which guided the actions and formed the minds of the great men who adorned her history, was for the most part little else than that firm reliance on the special interposition of Providence, which is the origin of superstition. The Saracens, during the wars which followed the introduction of the Mohammedan faith, were superstitious to the highest degree, yet with how many brilliant and glorious qualities was their character distinguished, when they triumphantly carried the Crescent of Mohammed from the snows of the Himmaleh to the shores of the Atlantic. The crusaders even of the highest rank, believed firmly in the miracles and prophecies which were said to have accompanied the march of the Christian army; nor is it perhaps possible to find in history an example of such extraordinary consequences as followed the supposed discovery of the Holy Lance in the siege of Antioch; yet who will deny to these great men the praise of heroic enterprise and noble manners? Human nature has nowhere appeared in such glorious colours as in the Jerusalem Delivered of Tasso, where the firmness and constancy of the Roman patriot is blended with the courtesy of chivalrous manners, and the exalted piety of Christian faith; yet superstition formed a part of the character of all his heroes; the courage of Tancred failed when he heard the voice of Clorinda in the charmed tree; and the bravest of his comrades trembled when they entered the enchanted forest, where * Liv. lib. i.; Cic. de Off. lib. i. c. 11 "Esce all hor de la selva un suon repente, lated, come to withdraw the attention from the distant magnificence of nature; while the weakness of the individual is forgotten in the aggregate force of numbers, or in the distractions of civilized life. But amidst the solitude of the Alps no such change can take place. The greatest works of man appear there as nothing amidst the stupendous objects of nature; the distractions of artificial society are unknown amongst its simple inhabitants; and the individual is left in solitude to receive the impressions which the sublime scenery in which he is placed is fitted to produce. Upon minds so circumstanced the changes of external nature come to be considered as the immediate work of some invisible power; the shadows that fall in the lakes at sunrise, are interpreted as the indication of the approach of hostile forests is thought to be the lamentations of the dead, who are expiating their sins-and the mists that flit over the summits of the mountains, seem to be the distant skirts of vast armies borne in the whirlwind, and treading in the storm. Examples of this kind may teach us, that although superstition in the age and among the society in which we live is the mark of a feeble mind, yet that in less enlightened ages or parts of the world, it is the mark only of an ardent and enthusiastic disposition, such as is the foundation of every thing that is great or generous in character, or elevated and spiritual in feeling. A people, in fact, strongly impressed with religious feeling, and to whom experience has not taught the means by which Providence acts in human affairs, must be superstitious; for it is the universal propensity of uninstructed man, to imagine that a special interposition of the Deity is necessary to accom-bands-the howl of the winds through the plish the manifestation of his will, or the accomplishment of his purposes in human affairs. Nor is there any thing impossible or absurd in such a supposition. It might have been, that future events were to be revealed on particular occasions to mankind, as they were during the days of ancient prophecy, and that the course of human events was to be maintained by special interpositions of divine power. Experience alone teaches us, that this is not the case; it alone shows, that the intentions of Providence are carried into effect through the intervention of human agents, and that the laws of the moral world work out their own accomplishment by the voluntary acts of free agents. When we see how difficult it is to make persons even of cultivated understanding comprehend this subject even in the present age, and with all the experience which former times have furnished, we may cease to wonder at the superstition which prevails among the peasants of the Tyrol; we may believe, that situated as they are, it is the natural effusion of a pious spirit untaught by the experience of other ages; and we may discern, in the extravagancies of their legendary creed, not less than in the sublime piety of Newton, the operation of those common laws by which man is bound to his Creator. The scenery of Tyrol, and of the adjacent provinces of Styria and Carinthia, is singularly adapted to nourish romantic and superstitious ideas among the peasantry. In every part of the world the grandeur of mountain scenery has been found to be the prolific parent of superstition. It was the mists, and the blue lakes, and the sounding cataracts of Caledonia, which gave birth to the sublime but gloomy dreams of Ossian. The same cause has operated to a still greater degree among the Alps of Tyrol. The sublimity of the objects with which man is there surrounded-the resistless power of the elements which he finds continually in action-the utter insignificance of his own species, when compared with the gigantic objects in which he is placed, conspire to produce that distrust of himself, and that disposition to cling to higher powers, which is the foundation of superstitious feeling. In cities and in plains, the labour of man effaces in a certain degree these impressons; the works which he has there accumu The Gothic ruins with which the Tyrol is filled, contribute in a remarkable manner to keep alive these superstitious feelings. In many of the valleys old castles of vast dimensions are perched on the summit of lofty crags, or raise their mouldering towers high on the mountains above the aged forests with which they are surrounded. These castles, once the abode of feudal power, have long since been abandoned, or have gradually gone to decay, without being actually dismantled by the proprietors. With all of them the people connect some romantic or terrible exploit; and the bloody deeds of feudal anarchy are remembered with terror by the peasants who dwell in the villages at their feet. Lights are often observed at night in towers which have been uninhabited for centuries; and bloody figures have been distinctly seen to flit through their deserted halls. The armour which still hangs on the walls in many of the greater castles, has been observed to move, and the plumes to wave, when the Tyrolese army were victorious in war. Groans are still heard in the neighbourhood of the dungeons where the victims of feudal tyranny were formerly slain; and the cruel baron, who persecuted his people in his savage passion for the chase, is often heard to shriek in the forests of the Unterberg, and to howl as he flies from the dogs, whom he had trained to the scent of human blood. Superstitions, too, of a gentler and more holy kind, have arisen from the devout feelings of the people, and the associations connected with particular spots where persons of extraordi nary sanctity have dwelt. In many of the farthest recesses of the mountains, on the verge of perpetual desolation, hermits in former times fixed their abode; and the imagination of the peasants still fancies that their spirits hover around the spot where their earthly trials were endured. Shepherds who have passed in the gloom of the evening by the cell where the bones of a saint are laid, relate that they dis tinctly heard his voice as he repeated his |