Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. I.djvu/31

Rh encouraging and rewarding the industrious. She made herself acquainted with every subject on which she gave commands; she even spun with her own hands her husband's clothing, and they treasure up to this day, in Payerne, the saddle upon which she sat and spun, as she rode through the country. She established many estates in the country (metairies), of which she herself was the mistress. She also built strong castles, which still remain and bear her name; and when Rudolph, tired of war, returned home, she induced him to unite with her in laboring for the culture of the country, and the administration of justice.”

“The Princes in those days,” continues Vulleimin, “had not as yet their fixed residences. They went from place to place, now dwelling in Lausanne, now in Payerne; now on the shores of the Lake of Thun, and they might be found, like the ancient judges of Israel, holding their seats of judgment in the open fields, beneath the shadow of a large oak. It is with reason that Queen Bertha is regarded as the origin of our earliest liberties (franchises); with reason that she is regarded as the mother of our population. A humble-minded woman, she still teaches to all future generations the virtues of the olden time. The people still believe that they see her upon the Vaud-Skaberg, holding in her hand an urn full of treasures, which she pours out over the country;” and the time in which Queen Bertha, at once motherly-mistress and Queen, spun the King's clothing, lives in the memory of the people as their country's golden age. “The good old time,” is equivalent, in Swiss phraseology,