Page:The Poetry of Architecture.djvu/47

Rh and are rendered ornamental by grotesque carving. Every canton has its own window. That of Uri, with its diamond wood-work at the bottom, is, perhaps, one of the richest. (See Fig. 5.) The galleries are generally rendered ornamental by a great deal of labour bestowed upon their wood-work. This is best executed in the canton of Berne. The door is always 6 or 7 feet from the ground, and occasionally much more, that it may be accessible in snow; and it is reached by an oblique gallery, leading up to a horizontal one, as shown in Fig. 4. The base of the cottage is formed of stone, generally white-washed. The chimneys must have a chapter to themselves: they are splendid examples of utility combined with ornament.

Such are the chief characteristics of the Swiss cottage, separately considered. I must now take notice of its effect in scenery.

When one has been wandering for a whole morning through a valley of perfect silence, where everything around, which is motionless, is colossal, and everything which has motion resistless; where the strength and the glory of nature are principally developed in the very forces which feed upon her majesty; and where, in the midst of mightiness, which seems imperishable, all that is indeed eternal is the influence of desolation; one is apt to be surprised, and by no means agreeably, to find, crouched behind some projecting rock, a piece of architecture which is neat in the extreme, though in the midst of wildness,