Swiss's name was Claude, and that he left Geneva the day after his wedding, his wife and a female friend coming to see us off. I paid him six louis-d'or and ten francs bonnemain, or 5l. 48. English, and was well served in every respect; but we started on the 24th of May, and arrived on the 1st of June. My note concludes: After seeing Italy, the road has but little to interest, and one is glad to reach the end of the journey.' The interest, now, is that such a journey is historical. Who, in 1864, will perform the feat of going from Geneva to Paris, in nine days, with the same pair of horses?

As a contrast to the above, you can now, in the course of four-andtwenty hours, traverse the whole of France by its longest diagonals; which is a much more extensive sweep than that which took me nine days. This certainly is rather a fatiguing trot; but it is an approach to the migratory powers of the swallow and the crane. In 1864, a very respectable continental tour may be completed in less time than it could be half begun thirty or forty years ago.

Two advantages result. You want to see a place or a province, and you dart down upon it at once with all your faculties fresh. By making one grand stride by night, when the country you traverse is veiled in darkness, you escape all temptation to linger and loiter, and consequently to lose valuable time. Many and many a travelling project has been rendered abortive by syren attractions which peeped out along the road. Myself and small party once set off to see Brittany. Our route lay through Normandy. But Normandy is very pleasant; and the women's caps are funny to behold. They give you a warm foot-bath after your dip in the sea; or if you like to bathe in cyder, you easily can, there are such oceans of it. And they do not breakfast and dine, as elsewhere; they eat two dinners per day, one at eleven, and one at six. And the banks of the Seine are picturesque. There are melons, plums, and figs to be eaten; there are churches and stained-glass windows to be beheld. When October came, all we had seen

of Brittany was the Rock of Cancale (honoured of epicures), from the summit of St. Michael's Mount; nor have we seen more of it up to the present day. It is best, therefore, to rush straight to your intended object. Remember the copy, 'Delays are dangerous.' Fancy yourself a queen's messenger until you get where you want to go.

Another advantage of rapid and economical locomotion is, that the pleasure of distant travel is thrown open to a multitude of persons to whom it was hermetically closed before. Moreover, many people who could well afford more than sufficient sums of money, could not afford anything like sufficient time. But other persons besides those with two or three thousand a year and an indefinite extent of leisure may now enjoy the exhilarating influence of Alpine air and scenery. The Jura range, the Swiss Lakes, the Bernese Oberland, nay Italy itself, are no longer secluded behind the formidable barrier, impassable to most, which is raised by having to look at your horses' tails for five or six long weary days. The upper and wealthier class of English are already a nation of travellers; so are another class, often not wealthy, but frugal and good managers, who reside abroad for longer or shorter periods. With the present economy in the times of transit, the middle classes, professional and business people, might likewise be travellers, if they would only regulate their incomes and their general outlay so as to leave some margin for travelling expenses. If they will spend their last farthing-they often say they must, and have not the courage to say they will not-in keeping up appearances to the utmost in matters of dress, equipage, and establishment, barely making two ends meet while striving to pass for greater folks than they are, they must necessarily debar themselves from the mind-enlarging, soul-elevating, body-strengthening pleasures of travel. But what an incomplete existence, to pass out of life without ever beholding a snowy peak, a natural cascade, an alpine lake, a self-sown forest hanging on

crags where man never set foot, and with the clouds entangled in the fir-tree tops! Surely, the sight of a mountain chain will compensate for a little less household show; an annual trip to the rocky hills, with their brawling streams and their bracing gales, will make some amends for the absence of a footinan from your entrance-hall.

What will be the eventual results of the new system of travelling, no one can predict as yet. The changes to be brought about are manifold, and are only at their commencement. One curious consequence is the starting into life of mushroom localities that attain full growth, or at least considerable development, in the interval between two editions of Bradshaw.' The latent germs of towns that have lain dormant on the ground ever since the fall of the Roman Empire, sprout suddenly, make vigorous shoots, and burst into blossoms of glass roofs and painted walls. Take Culoz, for instance, which figures in small capitals in Time-tables and Indicateurs for the Mediterranean line. Where is Culoz, and what? Search for it in Guy's Geography,' in 'Brooks's Gazetteer,' in the maps of the Useful Knowledge Society, in Chambers's Educational Atlas;' you may as well look for a watering-place in the map of the moon. But I have Culoz on a map, in a Guide to Savoy,' published since its annexation to France. It is the point where the line from Maçon to Chambery (and thence to the foot of Mount Cenis, on the high road to Turin) branches off to the left, to go to Geneva. Culoz is a little town, a handful of houses, just enough to keep a mayor and a notary amongst them, lying in a nook behind a rocky mountain, about a quarter of an hour away from the station. Hundreds and thousands pass the station without seeing, or suspecting the town. But the name, Culoz, has sprung at one bound out of oblivion into notoriety; and the town and the station may one day, perhaps, effect a junction of continuity.

Olten, again, may be found on old good maps of Switzerland, such as Keller's; but it is not the Olten of

1864. Olten, now, is the point of meeting of the railways from Neuchatel and Solothurn, from Thun and Berne, from Freyburg and Berne, from Lucerne, from Zurich and Aarau, and from France and Basel. Olten boasts some of the best-managed refreshment-rooms in Europe; and close to the station is a capital boarding-house and hotel, Von Arx's, where the weary traveller may rest and restore himself with every comfort, at moderate prices.

It is not probable that, for some time to come, the means of transport from London to Switzerland will be easier or speedier than they are at present. There is the choice between express and omnibus trains; and that is all. It is a question of expense. But in Switzerland itself the facilities for rambling hither and thither are constantly increasing. Everywhere, the railway skirting the lake is superseding the steamer which rode on its bosom, and which every now and then, if it did not sink to the bottom, caused other lakefaring craft to sink. On the Lake of Neuchatel alone, the summer of '63 saw seven steamers less than there were in '60. An always inconvenient, often unpleasant, and sometimes dangerous mode of transit is thus exchanged for one that is quite the contrary. Carriage roads take the place of what were only bridle-paths; economical diligences, open to the commonalty, run where expensive posting once held the monopoly. In all sorts of places, little wooden hotels, organized in conformity with the tariff of a franc per bed per night, if down in the valley, somewhat dearer if up amongst the peaks, are starting up, holding their own, and yielding satisfactory profits. Competition, and the growing consciousness that over-exaction tells badly in the long run, are reducing the prices of guides, innkeepers, and other travelling necessaries. The presence of a crowd of middle-class tourists has called forth, and led to the discovery of, a sufficient number of middleclass hosts. The demand for Cheap Switzerland' has raised a supply.

There are now three lines of railway completed and open from Paris

to Switzerland.

First, to Geneva,

by Macon and Culoz; secondly, to Basel, by Vesoul and Mulhouse; thirdly, to Neuchatel, by Dijon and Pontarlier. We will follow the last, as the shortest, cheapest, and most striking way of entering Helvetian territory. The descent from Pontarlier, down the Val de Travers, to Neuchatel, is indescribably magnificent. Weather permitting, there is a theatrical succession of mountain scenery ending with a climax-picture of the town and lake in the foreground, the Simmen Thal mountains in the middle distance, with the snowy Jungfrau at the back of all, which renders theatres poor trumpery. What it is, may be guessed from the following trait.

The first time I travelled on the line, soon after passing the French frontier, the conductor of the train entered our carriage with a smiling face, and seated himself as one of the company. Thinking that we were favoured with his presence for business purposes merely, I tendered my ticket to be snipped or inspected.

Oh, no; I don't want that,' he gaily observed. I like to come in, to watch and see what travellers think of the Val de Travers. You are coming to it soon. Sit on that side, to the right of the carriage as you face the engine. On this side, where I am, you would see nothing -which some people seem to like best, for they very often shut their eyes.'

'Either very cool, or very sympathetic and obliging! thought I to myself. A capital specimen of Swiss independence.' Even where we were, there was much to admire, and I could not help expressing my admiration.

'Oh! this is nothing,' said the volunteer showman. Wait till you come to the Val de Travers. Look at that narrow opening between the hills.'

We, the occupants of that railway carriage, grouped ourselves round the right-hand window, as we were bid, in a social little semicircle, as if we had been in the private box of a theatre. As we advanced, the mountain portal opened wide, and

we followed the outline of the lefthand buttress, hanging, somehow, not far from its summit. First we saw great masses of mist boiling up, as if from some great subterranean caldron; and then, a verdant valley seemed to have been suddenly excavated beneath us out of the bowels of the earth. We looked down into a beautiful abyss; but still it was an abyss. It was as if the ground had suddenly sunk down under our feet, like an enormous pitfall, with trees, rivers, roads, human dwellings, and everything else standing upon it, leaving us trembling on the very edge of terra firma. Far and deep below you see a busy village. It is just such a view as a hawk would have when he hovers over the cottage in which his quarry has taken refuge in despair. Like him, you dart down towards it with a curvilinear course, which resembles the descending sweep of a bird from the skies. The inclination of the railroad, as it hangs on the brow of the mountain and glides across its face, is fearful to behold, when you can behold it.

'Oh dear! oh dear!' groaned one of our party. This is dreadful! It is most lovely, certainly, if you will; but if I had known what it was like, I could never have ventured here-no, that I could not. Do tell me, pray, when will this frightful part of the line come to an end?'

Our ticket-taking cicerone was in such high glee that he nearly jumped out of his uniform. He feasted on the combined expression of wonder, delight, alarm, and pleased surprise, that was stamped on every passenger's countenance.

'There is no end of it at present, he said. You will have ever so much more. I hope you are not tired yet of going in and out of tunnels. But you should have seen the railway while it was making. At first there was not foothold on the face of the cliff. The engineers were obliged to be held by ropes tied round their waists; they were hauled up and down by means of a windlass. But I must go; for here's a station.'

And such a station! It's just an