The poor organist went home and was immediately taken down with severe illness, and a few days afterward eluded his attendants and flew along the streets to the cathedral, from which the people soon heard tones of the organ issuing majestic and ravishing but unspeakably sad.  As soon as the wife knew of her husband’s absence, she went to the cathedral.  Her husband was in his old place, his hands upon the keys, as if in the act of playing, his head bent forward and drooping.  He was dead!

From Berne the road climbs a hill immediately on leaving the gates of the city, and passes between rows of trees, with a gentle slope on either hand, covered with a soft fresh green and smooth as the finest lawn.  The glimpses of the city through the trees, with the windings of the Aar, were extremely interesting.  But a far nobler scene was unfolded to the south, where an immense chain of Alps appeared like the boundaries of some new world, to which their fearful precipices, glittering peaks, and summits of untrodden snow for ever barred the approach of man.  The purity of the atmosphere gave them peculiar distinctness of outline, while the beams of the setting sun gilded their lofty brightness, that seemed to have more of heaven in it than earth.  Oh! if natural scenes can appear so lovely, what must that purity and lustre be of which they are only the shadowy emblems?

We slept, and set out again at an early hour.  Our route lay through the finest portion of Switzerland.  The land is chiefly pasturage, and the meadows are extremely rich.  Traversing a rocky pass, we came to the castle of Kluss.  Issuing from the pass we entered a smiling valley, the hills gently rising to the right, clothed with forests of fir; while on the left, rocks towered to an amazing altitude.  On the summit of what seemed to be an inaccessible crag, perched the ruins of Falkenstein, and a few miles on, those of Wallenberg.

Soon after stopping to lunch, we came in sight of the Rhine, with the dark woods of the Black Forest forming a background, and also the frontier of the Austrian territory.  Weary and still delighted with the day, I was glad to hear the guides exclaim that Basle was before us.  The Rhine divides the city into two parts.  Crossing the bridge, we proceeded at once to the University.  Bonnevard was there, and in the society of my friend I forgot for the time every other consideration.

It was two weeks before I left, and in that time I had learned many things, attending lectures with my friend, and enjoying the society of some of the most illustrious names in literature and science.