flow of its waters reaches far up the other stream. The noise of the waves grows louder, and from out the surrounding verdure peeps a castle with proud battlements. Pressing on, the waters reach the two bridges of Reichenau, the first of which, a quaint, wooden structure, from which wheels and footsteps echo like thunder, spans the Upper Rhine only; while the second lies farther down, where the two streams have already joined: the one, light, green, and clear-for its course was serene; the other with a darker tide-for its path, the Via Mala, was one of strife and storm. But now it is over; they are two brothers who, after long separation, meet and recognize each other. Now they will go through life united-henceforth the world has but one Rhine. The Bishops of Chur were once the lords of Reichenau, and it was they who built the old castle, which afterward became the property of the lords of Planta. If we visit the beautiful, thickly-grown garden, we stand opposite the junction of the two arms of the Rhine. The walls of the castle have offered a shelter to many renowned guests. In the college such scholars as Benjamin Constant were educated, and among the teachers has been found even a crowned head-he who was afterward the citizen-king, Louis Philippe. His appointment happened in a curious way. Herr Chabaud, to whom it had been awarded by the principal of the establishment, was unexpectedly absent; so the young fugitive took his name and his office, after having successfully passed a difficult examination. The departments he undertook were history, geography, mathematics, and the French language. His salary amounted to only four hundred francs. Just beyond Reichenau is Ems, and beyond Ems is Chur, the capital of the canton of the Grisons, a "gray," weatherbeaten mountain-town. We see before us old Roman towers with enigmatical names, a church that has stood for more than a thousand years, narrow streets over whose stony pavements the heavy mail rumbles, and, towering over all, is the lofty Kalanda. Foreign sounds greet our ears on every side, for here is the centre where all the roads of the Grisons meet, here is the gathering-point of all that immense traffic which goes over the Splügen and St. Bernard to the south. The history of the town is as gloomy as its walls, which in the time of the Romans bore the name of Curia Rhetorum. The Emperor Constantine set up his winter-quarters here, which first led to the enlarging of the city; and here, as early as 451, Christianity was established. The Bishop's Palace stands high, and, together with the cathedral and the buildings belonging to it, has almost the appearance of a bold fortress. In the quarter of the town which surrounds this priestly stronghold the Catholics still preponderate. In the lower town—which is rich in original architecture, in pointed gables and dark archways active, arduous life abounds, and the houses reach far into the valley, out of which the river Plessur rushes to the Rhine, The population, which two hundred years ago was exclusively Romansch, the town being called not Chur, but Cuera, is now considerably changed, and a large industrial trade is carried on. Beyond Chur we meet as before with witnesses of the period of national tyranny lonely castles, whose very names announce the hardness and insolence which dwelt in them-Krottenstein, Haldenstein, Liechtenstein-frown on us as we quietly fol JUVALTA. low our path along the valley, thinking here of a song, there of a beautiful maiden who once looked down from those balconies. Passing on, however, we soon find ourselves in quite a different scene, and THE FORLORN HOLE. with quite a change of thought; we are in the midst of the "vortex of fashion," the high life of the present day, when crowds surround us with rustling silk and busy hum. We are at the baths of Ragatz, which in the summer season of the year are the fashion, and they have within the last ten years attained a European reputation. The warm spring which rises at Pfäffers, and whose water is conveyed in iron pipes for nearly half a mile to Ragatz, was discovered by a huntsman about the middle of the thirteenth century. It belonged to the renowned order of Benedictines, who were enthroned high up on the mountain in one of the strongest and oldest abbeys in the land. For a long time the spring was inclosed in a little frail hut, similar to those depicted as bath-houses of the middle ages, and the sick crowded to it from all quarters to be healed. About a hundred and fifty years ago the abbot raised a new building in the expansive style peculiar to the time, and especially popular with the cloister. Now, however, that the whole institution is the property of the state, gigantic palaces stand in the usual splendor of the modern spa, and the rheumatic of all nations are drawn in wheelchairs along its promenade. But there is, besides this outward comfort, a beauty of Nature, which also silently exerts its healing power. The Flascherberg, covered here and there with dark woods amid cloven rock, looks down into the valley through which the Rhine rushes hastily; and above the rock, the snowy summit of the Falknis shines with silver brightness. That deep cutting over which the road leads to Bregenz, fortified with a strong bulwark, opposite the imperial frontier, is the St. Lucienstieg; the two castles whose ruins peep down from among the bushes are Freudenberg and Nidberg. The latter is particularly rich in legends, one among them being especially known by its gloomy fascination and the passion which it reveals. The Knight of Nidberg was dreaded far and wide; his towers seemed to be inaccessible, and his strength invincible, wheneve ran enemy attempted to besiege him. But that which valor had not been able to achieve was accomplished by the tlements. There they could see into the open chamber, where the invincible knight lay sleeping; the gentle breeze played in at the window, and the full moonlight fell on the closed lids and heaving breast. It was scarcely five paces across, but neither bridge nor hand stretched over the yawning abyss which parted the sleeper and his foe; but the arrow has wings, and will find neither the abyss too deep nor the way too long. "Fix your arrow, and aim true," whispered the enraged woman in the foeman's ear. For a moment he stood half terrified on the edge of the rock, so powerful was the form of the sleeper; but then the whirring bolt sped through the window, it struck its aim, and the knight passed from life to death. If Ragatz with all its splendor makes a delightful impression on us, the grandeur which we meet with in its wildest form as soon as we have passed Pfäffers does so still more. Here the Tamina, which treachery of a woman, driven to revenge by outraged falls into the Rhine at Ragatz, has worn itself a path love. She well knew his chamber and his deep through an awful ravine; and here-not outside, in slumbers; and she led the foe by a secret path up the smiling landscape - lies the secret of the old the steep castle-hill, till they stood opposite the bat-healing-spring. Dark walls of rock, which rise pre cipitously on either side, confine the rushing torrent, -a long, dark building, in whose passages the rays and have an inexpressibly gloomy appearance, even at summer noon. The narrow, overhanging path, washed by the restless flood, clings painfully to the left. In about three-quarters of an hour we reach the bath-house which the monks have erected here of the sun fall but sparely. There is accommodation here for more than three hundred guests, for it was the only asylum for strangers before Ragatz had developed into a bathing-place. But we have not yet seen the most impressive part of the ravine, for the sky still casts its blue gaze down on us, and, though confined, we are yet in open Nature. Behind the bath-house, however, where the path continues for about five hundred steps, we pass right into the interior, into the very bowels of the rock. Here the ravine becomes a chasm, and, even if the July sun be shining outside, it is damp and dark within. On every side we are surrounded by rocks, which appear to threaten us with approaching destruction. We proceed timidly along the wooden path, till suddenly a steaming vapor rushes toward us, and it seems as though it must stifle and kill if we step within the forbidden circle. Not destruction, however, but blessing, rises out of these obscure depths; for here lies the beneficent spring to which thousands owe their restoration to life and health. If we continue to go northward, we soon reach, at Sargans, the place where, in prehistoric times, there lay a diverging point of the Rhine; for, as many geologists maintain, the course of the river did not originally lead it to Lake Constance, but turned left to Wallenstadt and Zurich, where fewer obstacles lay in its path. This opinion is founded from observations of numerous marks in the rocks, by which the old river-bed may still be identified; and the water-shed between Lake Constance and the Lake of Zurich is, at the present time, so low that it is not difficult to believe this supposition. In the fearful inundation of 1618, as the chronicles tell us, the water-level of the Rhine had already risen so high that it was almost feared that the river would break away a second time to Lake Wallenstadt. The whole valley which we now pass through, as far as the huge basin of Lake Constance, is called par excellence the Rhine Valley. The proud castle of Werdenberg reminds us of the lords who governed it. The tower hangs, like an eyrie, high up on the rock; and here lived the old counts, as quarrelsome and as fond of plundering as the Montforts from whom they sprang. Now, indeed, they have slept for many long years in their stone coffins; but formerly their banners floated proudly on the battlements. The one over Werdenberg was black, that over Sargans was |