Mont Antonius, which may be deemed a part of the Schrekhorn, at the northern extremity
of which stand the immense glaciers of Grindelweld, which extend considerably
above the valley of the Rhône. Having here crossed this torrent, I perceived, nearly
contiguous to its channel, a hill, which gradually rises towards the north, apparently
composed of a species of pudding-stone of great coherency, with a cement composed of
silex or siliceous matter, consequently capable of effervescing with acids. These
stones, which lie in thick strata, appear similar to those which constitute the isolated
rocks noticed in the neighbourhood of Lausanne. The valley then contracts so considerably,
that in many parts there is scarcely sufficient room for the course of the
Rhône, and the road, which on that account has been hewn in the main rock, that still
continues lamellated, containing quartz and mica.
On the other side of this defile there prevails, throughout, a very conspicuous disorder
and confusion in the strata, form, and structure of the mountains that bound the
valley j and, at the same time, their species are so varied, that it would be impossible to
give a minute description of them. I shall therefore confine myself to observing, that
the schistus is most predominant, with strata invariably forming deep zig-zags ; whereas,
in other parts, that same specics of stone forms lofty mountains, divided from their summits,
with their bases covered by fragments and immense loose blocks of rock, on which
grow a few shrubs and stunted trees. But what seems more strongly to evince the
remote period of time at which this convulsion of nature may have happened, is
the vegetable stratum of earth, ten inches thick, which now covers the greatest part
of these stones : yet, advancing more towards the east, the cavities that exist between
those huge schisti and micaceous rocks are every-where filled with sand, pebbles, and
different fragments belonging to the primirive mountains, and also covered over by a
thick stratum of earth, which forms some most excellent meadow-land,—another very
forcible proof of the works of the sea at its sudden retreat.
This kind of disorder, so visible in the arrangement of the lateral mountains, evidently
continues to the neighbourhood of Lax, a village included in the Dizains of
GomS} and then stretches, not only to the hill on which this small place stands, but
towards the town of Niderwalde, nine miles distant, where the mountains are in
general composed of similar spccies of stone, and the same kind of fragments, except a
few, of micaceous compound rock. The country is here again so extremely elevated,
that trees are scarce, exhibiting only a few stunted cherry, plum, and other trees.
thinly scattered; though, nevertheless, at some little distance from BIsingen, the valley
contracts anew, and vegetation, of course, becomes more animated. The road
then continues beautiful, passing through meadows and forests, intersected by fields
of hemp and rye, as far as Munster, the capita! of Corns, twenty-seven miles from