given a compactness to the Austrian dominions which they before wanted, and has cut off a frequent cause of wars and civil dissensions; so that this empire has rather been a gainer by the exchange. Its possessions, in point of extent and value of territory, rank among the most considerable under an European potentate, and their population is fully proportional. By the latest estimates the inhabitants of the whole, exclusive of the Venetian territory, amount to a little more than twenty millions. Of these many are among the bravest and most robust nations of Europe; and no modern military establishment, till the late prodigious exertions of the French, could vie with the Austrian in the number and excellence of the troops.

The revenues are considerable; but the total want of naval power, and a degree of narrowness in the system of government, are unfavourable to commercial prosperity, on which modern wealth so much depends. The weight of Austria in the European scale cannot fail to be great; and though powerfully checked by France on one side, and Russia and Prussia on another, she has full scope for future aggrandizement on the side of Turkey.

SWITZERLAND.

IN all ages of the world it has been seen that certain small states have secured to themselves a place in the catalogue of nations by their eminence in arts or arms, or by peculiar circumstances of their policy, which they could not have claimed from the extent or opulence of their territory. In modern Europe Switzerland is a remarkable example of this fact. Possessed of a small and rugged tract of country, without foreign commerce, with little distinction from science, art, or literature, the Swiss have made themselves known and respected chiefly by their spirited acquisition and resolute defence of independence and civil liberty.

The ancient Helvetia, on account of its position with respect to the Rhine, was by the Romans reckoned a part of Gaul. Modern Switzerland, with the country of the Grisons, in language and manners may rather be considered as appertaining to Germany. Its chief political connections have been with the house of Austria, from the tyrannical dominion of which it broke off when it asserted its independence. Nature befriended this country in its claim to a separate existence; for though its boundaries on the German side are not precisely defined by natural limits, yet on the whole it possesses a stronglymarked local character, being a region overspread with mountainous ridges, presenting formidable barriers against an invader, and calculated to breed a hardy race of people, suited to the defence of their "rocky ramparts."

Switzerland, including under this denomination the country of the Grisons, and all the dependant districts of both, is bounded on the north and north-east by Germany, on the south and south-east by Italy, on the west by France. It lies chiefly between latitudes 45° 50′ and 47° 40'. Its extent from north to south is about 130 English miles, from east to west, about 200.

The face of country within this compass is by no means uniform; for the northern and western parts have considerable level tracts, while the southern and eastern, comprehendin the greater portion of the whole, consist almost entirely of branches of the Alps, with the interposition of narrow valleys. The celebrated mountainous chain which constitutes the Alps properly so called, extends in a wide semicircle round the northern boundary of Italy, from the gulf of Genoa to the Adriatic. The Swiss Alps are the northern part of this chain. They run for the most part in parallel ridges from south-east to north-west, interrupted in various places, and sending off shoots in different directions. In some parts they rise to very lofty summits, though not equal to the highest of Savoy. They are throughout of a rocky nature, commonly naked and spiry about the summit, with a middle girdle of green pasture, and clothed at the base with woods of fir. From a distance they seem to form detached pyramids, but on approach they are seen to be composed of ridges, of which some parts are more elevated than others. Even the interjacent valleys are often very high ground, and bear the rugged mountainous character. An extensive chain of hills, which, though they would elsewhere be regarded as lofty, are tame and humble compared to the Alps, is the Jura forming part of the fence to Switzerland on the French border.

In the bosom of the Alpine region are formed numerous lakes, the reservoirs of the waters collected from the atmosphere by the attraction of the mountains. These are clear and deep; and, by the contrast of their smooth bright surface with the rude rocks and gloomy woods with which they are usually environed, afford scenes of exquisite beauty and picturesque effect. The most considerable of the lakes are those of Constance, on the borders of Germany, the most extensive of all; of Geneva, called the Leman lake, the next in size, and the first in fame, spread out between Switzerland and Savoy, in a rich country distant from the Alps; part of the lakes of Locarno and Lugano, which rather belong to Italy; the lakes of Zurich, Lucerne, Thun, Brientz, and Neufchatel, chiefly embosomed in the mountains. There are many more which would excite notice in a country less fertile in the beauties of nature. The glaciers,

or ice valleys, subjacent to some of the highest summits, and affording the resemblance of an agitated sea suddenly fixed by: the power of frost, may be ranked among the watery reservoirs of this country. An icy crust clothes some of the loftiest pinnacles, and descends their sides, giving the appearance of eternal snow; while the fresh accumulations of winter's snows lodging in the cavities, afford perpetual supplies to summer rills and

torrents.

says,

Of the springs of his native country the illustrious Haller "I never recollect out of Switzerland to have seen those limpid and truly crystalline waters which gush, unpolluted by any earth, strained through the pure flints of our rocks." From these, and the sources above mentioned, rivers are generated for the supply of a great portion of Europe. The Rhine has its principal head in a glacier among the Alps of the Grisons: this infant stream is joined by two others springing from the Swiss Alps; after which it takes its course along the eastern side of the Grison country, till it mingles its waters with those of the lake of Constance. It issues again from the western side of that lake, and, coasting the northern border of Switzerland, at length leaves the country at Basil, and turns into Germany. During its course through these regions it never lays aside a kind of savage character, leaping down cataracts, and hurrying through rapids, so as to be little fitted for the purposes of navigation.

The Rhone, rising not far from one of the Swiss sources of the Rhine, takes an opposite direction, and, flowing in a western course through the rich valley of the Valais, pours its waters into the Leman lake. Soon after its outlet at the opposite end of the lake, it changes its country, and becomes a French river.

The springs of the Aar, a river confined to Switzerland, are among its loftiest central Alps. In its course it passes through the lakes of Brientz and Thun, and then, washing the city of Bern, takes a winding way to unite with the Rhine on the northern border of Switzerland. The Reuss from the lake of Lucerne, and the Limmat from that of Zurich, join it before it is lost in the Rhine. The Inn, a considerable tributary to the Danube; and the Adda, which swells the stream of the Po, both

rise in the Grison country. Thus the Helvetian waters are conveyed to the German sea, the Mediterranean, the Adriatic, and the Euxine.

Although no country in Europe affords more in its scenery to delight and astonish the lover of nature than Switzerland, yet it is in many respects unfavourable to the comfort and enjoyment of the settled inhabitant. Its climate is extremely unequal, and subject to sudden and violent changes. A region of lofty mountains is necessarily a nursery of storms and tempests; and the general elevation of the land exposes it to rigorous cold and protracted winter, contrasted with the summer heat of a southern latitude, often locally augmented by the reverberation of the solar rays, and the stagnation of air in narrow inclosed valleys. The soil of the Alpine tracts is stony and meagre, and the plains and dales among the hills are generally boggy. There are, indeed, in the lower and more level parts of the country, tracts of fertile land, adapted to every agricultural purpose; but, for the most part, valuable products are obtained only at the expense of great exertions of skill and labour.

Switzerland in general is a country of pasturage; its most elevated plains affording food to the herds of cattle during the midst of summer, while the lower meadows yield plentiful crops of excellent hay. The natural products of the vegetable kingdom in this country are remarkably numerous and varied, and its wild and medicinal plants are supposed to possess a superior degree of virtue and fragrance. The Flora, or vegetable catalogue, of Switzerland, is one of the most copious in Europe; for, while the highest summits produce the plants of Lapland or Spitzbergen, the sheltered vales give birth to those of Spain and Italy. So near to each other in some parts are these different sites, that Haller has given an instance where, within half a day's journey, the botanist may gather the natives of countries from the 40th to the 80th degree of latitude. The cultivated vegetables partake of the variety consequent upon these diversities of climate. Barley is grown to the very edge of the glaciers ; the other grains successively in the lower and warmer spots: fruits of the choicest kind, even to the pomegranate and lemon, come to perfection on the southern side of the mountains to