Page:The poetical works of Matthew Arnold, 1897.djvu/539

Rh which, for those spirits who feel his attraction, is very interesting: its title is Libres Méditations d'un Solitaire Inconnu.

Behind are the abandoned baths.

The Baths of Leuk. This poem was conceived, and partly composed, in the valley going down from the foot of the Gemmi Pass towards the Rhone.

Glion? Ah! twenty years, it cuts.

Probably all who know the Vevey end of the Lake of Geneva will recollect Glion, the mountain village above the Castle of Chillon. Glion now has hotels, pensions, and villas; but twenty years ago it was hardly more than the huts of Avant opposite to it,—huts through which goes that beautiful path over the Col de Jaman, followed by so many foot-travellers on their way from Vevey to the Simmenthal and Thun.

The gentian-flowered pass, its crown.

See Note 15.

And walls where Byron came.

Montbovon. See Byron's Journal, in his "Works," vol. iii. p. 258. The river Saane becomes the Sarine below Montbovon.

"Ailred of Rievaulx, and several other writers, assert that Sebert, king of the East Saxons and nephew of Ethelbert, founded the Abbey of Westminster very early in the seventh century.

"Sulcardus, who lived in the time of William the Conqueror, gives a minute account of the miracle supposed to have been worked at the consecration of the Abbey.

"The church had been prepared against the next day for dedication. On the night preceding, St. Peter appeared on