astic, starched with the Vandyke frill, ejaculate in aspirated gutturals the gentle admonitions of the Code of life and peace. Though the ancient custom of saluting all Strangers of any appearance still prevails at Zurich; yet such was the sternness of religious reformation, that the most formal Prigs, who make a parade of uncovering themselves in the street, do not scruple to sit before the Minister with their hats on, at church; and so little are the rules of common civility regarded in the house of prayer, that it happened to us more than once to be displaced, without apology, after we had taken our seats on public benches. The virtues at Zurich are probably of the more substantial cast, since Lavater used to say that he had never had occa sion to pronounce a sermon against immorality. A day or two ago we hired a clumsy Swiss chariot, comfortably lined with blue cloth, and drove, slowly, through clouds of dust, for the weather had long been hot and dry, to see the celebrated falls of the Rhine, near Schaffhausen. The river is here several hundred feet wide, and pours itself with thundering impetuosity over a ledge of broken rocks, forty or fifty feet high. In time of floods the water sometimes rises twenty or thirty feet, and the current then exhibits a rumbling torrent of terrific sublimity. We crossed the river in a boat, a little below the fall, admiring the rainbow in its spray; spray; and ascended to the castle of Lauffen, whose mouldering walls overhang the cataract-keep time to its tremulous undulation—and reverberate its eternal roar. Finding we might lodge at the castle, where it is customary to entertain Visitors, we rambled about among the rocks till night; and afterwards amused ourselves in the museum, with looking over an interesting collection of Swiss views, the production of a Family of genius, which inhabits this congenial scite. The Father sketches from nature, and his Daughters colour the designs. The fall of Lauffen is particularly interesting by moon-light. We were told that when the Emperor Joseph was there he he arose at midnight to contemplate the effect. It was flattering to tread in imperial footsteps. We also got up an hour or two before day-light, and ran half dressed to a little summer house which overlooks the raging torrent: but here we were impatient to be nearer, and, half running, half tumbling, down the rough descent, we mounted with all the eagerness of curiosity a wooden station that has been erected in the very spray of the cataract, directly over the boiling foam, that rises, perpetually, in swelling surges, from the roaring gulph. Here the sweeping torrent seems continually advancing, without ever drawing nearer, and its monotonous roar grows louder and louder to the listening ear.-But fair and softly-The fall of Lauffen, with all its terrors, is no more than a water-spout to the |