Page:Once a Week, Series 1, Volume II Dec 1859 to June 1860.pdf/408

 28, 1860.] martial spirit, and if we can but catch it at its red heat, and form it into an institution, the rest may be safely left to its own intrinsic charms. Practical details come awkwardly from an unprofessional pen; but surely there are no towns, and but few villages, wanting in some war-veteran who would gladly shoulder his walking-stick and instruct the youth of his neighbourhood in the rudiments of his old profession.

If we were to go so far as to advocate the regular military training of our lads, their early enrolment into bands, and their instruction in the use of the rifle, we should most probably injure a good cause by over zeal. But we will not deny that we regard such a development as probable and desirable, and we are prepared to show that it is not without good precedent. With the exception of America there is no nation which owes more to the individual skill of its citizens in the use of the rifle than Switzerland. The respect which a true Swiss has for that weapon dates from his youth. He puts aside his holidays to public exhibition of his skill in its use, and devotes many a leisure hour to private practice with it. By the borders of his lakes—behind the wooden village-houses—in the thick soft pasturage at the foot of the hills in which the dun cows browse, fetlock deep, you catch sight of his rifle-target; indeed, his chief social fault is, that he is a little too prone to the use of his favourite weapon in his Cantonal disputes, and that he is not always content to wait for the blue or white coat, against which he may sooner or later legitimately level it.

Steaming down the lakes of Zurich in the autumn of 1858, we were attracted, soon after passing Rapperschwyl, by the distant smoke of musketry and the glistening of bayonets on the far shore. The steamer’s course was at once directed towards it, the engines were stopped, and as we stood off the shore, crew and passengers leant over the bulwark, and with equal interest watched the progress of the mimic fight. We were yet too far off to recognise the combatants with any distinctness, but we could see the plan of the battle, and that its chief fury raged about an old stone tower at the top of a little hill of vineyards, that sprung up abruptly from the lake’s edge. This tower was evidently the key of the enemy’s position, while their right rested upon the vineyard wall, their left upon a little knoll of trees. The whole line came into engagement as we looked on, and while the wings had enough to do to hold their own, the one gun which formed the whole artillery in action, was brought to bear upon the tower. The spit, spit of the skirmishers’ rifles, the roll of the platoon firing, the heavy boom of the one gun, were plainly audible, until in time the wings seemed to waver, they fell back, and the whole line advanced at a run, their bayonets flashing out brightly in the sunshine. At this juncture we steamed away, leaving the defenders of the old tower making a last obstinate but, no doubt, ineffectual resistance.

Sipping our coffee in the salle à manger of the Belle Vue Hotel on the very margin of Zurich’s fair waters, on the evening of that same day, we were attracted by the glare of many lights, and the sound of many voices without. Making our way into the open air, we found the blue lake lit up by several blazing rafts of flame, while the streets and quays were bordered with cressets of fire; and, at intervals, handfuls of rockets were thrown up into the clear sky as though to taunt the noble comet then in its glorious zenith, into a more grand and beautiful display. Attaching ourselves to an obliging bourgeois—“grossier comme un Zurichois,” say the guide-books; but who believes them?—we are told that these festive preparations are intended to welcome home the warriors we had seen fighting on the lake’s border.

“They are disembarking, just now,” says our companion, and we hurry over the bridge and along the quays to meet them. Quite a crowd, for a continental city, is waiting on the wide Platz, and along the line by which they must pass. They are some time forming under the green acacia trees, but at last the drums roll out a brisk march, the bayonets are seen glistening through the murky air, and forward they march. And then these warriors prove to be the boys of Zurich and the neighbourhood, from sixteen years of age down perhaps to ten—dressed in a neat pretty uniform, armed with a rifle, proportioned to the bearer’s strength and age, and each wearing a sprig of green in his shako—who have been out for a day’s play on the lake’s border. Play, you will say, with a very deep and practical purpose in it; remembering, as they very likely do, how often in the French revolutionary wars this home of theirs was taken, squeezed, and flung away, by the various combatants.

It is evident that the lads are weary and foot-sore, but they bear themselves manfully, the boy officers, with their little swords drawn, tripping along the line, and dressing up the ranks briskly. As they march along, quays, bridges, and streets, are illumined with blue and crimson lights, which throw a picturesque glare upon the quaint German houses and the old towers of the cathedral in which Erasmus’s preaching helped to secure the freedom of thought and action for which these lads of Zurich may some day have to fight. At the Stadthaus the young troops halt, more coloured lights are burnt, a few words are addressed to them from one of the windows, their arms are grounded on the stone pavement with a crash, and the weary Kadetten disperse to their homes. That it is not altogether an English sight is the reflection which occurs most readily to the English mind; but we have since thought that if our battles are as likely as theirs to be fought upon home ground, the sooner such a sight becomes familiar among us the better.

The adoption of such pastime in England, would not be without its attendant difficulties, but we can scarcely think them serious, far less insurmountable. Brighton would, no doubt, look aghast at Dr. Swych, if that worthy pedagogue should propose to lead out for a few summer days’ martial training upon the Downs, those young gentlemen whose exercise in dreary file has so often excited our sympathy and, it is to be feared, contempt. But we feel sure that Dr. Swych’s young gentlemen would gain immensely, if only by becoming English boys for one week in the