'Tis liberty alone, that gives the flow'r
Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume;
And we are weeds without it. All constraint,
Except what wisdom lays on evil men,
Is evil, hurts the faculties, impedes
Their progress in the road of science; blinds
The eyesight of discov'ry; and begets
In those that suffer it a sordid mind
Bestial, a meagre intellect, unfit

To be the tenant of man's noble form.

COWPER'S Winter Morning Walk.

PREFACE.

In the following pages I have mentioned the time of departure from and arrival at different places, together with the names of hotels at which we stayed, thinking that this might facilitate the movements of some future tourists, by showing them what may be done even by ladies with perfect safety and comparative ease. The route, which I think is an admirable one, was drawn out by Dr. C. who accompanied us, and who was no stranger to many parts of Switzerland.

The friend to whom the letters are written was my tutor more than forty-one years ago, and to whom I am under great obligations for directing my studies, strengthening my convictions in the truths of revelation, and exciting in me a love of literature before I entered the College at Homerton.

To those who may think that the poetical quotations are too numerous, I beg to say, I do not wish to see the imagination quenched in the rising generation, neither do I wish that wondrous faculty to be fed with strange fire. Much of the literature

-if literature it may be called-that is now provided for the public, is, alas! destructive of taste and of virtue.

High Wycombe, December, 1858.

***In consequence of circumstances over which the printer had no control, the printing of this little work was delayed until the present year.

My dear Friend and Brother,

It is now many months since I conceived the plan of sending you in the form of epistolary correspondence an account of my tour in Switzerland during the Summer of last year; and fearing that this project, like many other projects of the writer, will come to naught unless I at once commence that which is sure to be to me a labour, I have, despite the heat and various other engagements, prevailed on myself to send you an earnest. Without further introduction, then, and with but one request-namely, that "in every work regard the writer's end,” I shalł commit my bark to the uncertain ocean, hoping for auspicious heavens and the port of peace.

On the 23rd of June (Tuesday), 1857, I and Mrs. Hayden left Wycombe for London, and slept at the Bridge Hotel, Blackfriar's Road. Here we found awaiting our arrival two of our nieces who were to accompany us on a tour which proved to be one of perfect safety and of great gratification. Having parted with some dear friends who came to bid us farewell we retired to rest, but so great was the noise during the whole of the night, from the rattling of wheels over the stones, that my sleep well nigh departed from me.

24th, Wednesday. In the morning we were joined by Dr. Collingwood, and left London by the South-Eastern Railway at 8 45 a.m. for Folkstone, where we arrived in safety, and immediately went on board the steamer for Boulogne. The weather was beautiful and the sea calm, and we watched with peculiar emotions the shores of Old England as they gradually faded