THE HOSPICE AND MONKS OF THE GREAT ST. BERNARD.

AT the summit of one of the highest passes of Switzerland, and in the very heart of one of its most mountainous districts, stands a group of three bare, rough buildings, exposed to all the ravages of nature, and unprotected from the raging storm. Around them the winds howl with unbridled fury and the thunders roar in awful grandeur. Here the crashing avalanche rolls down the mountain side, bearing with it everything its relentless grasp can fasten on, and here the life-destroying tourmente bewilders and buries in its icy whirl the toiling traveller. Here the ground is covered with snow for nine months out of the twelve, and is hardened by the biting frost during every day of the year. Exposed to all these awful powers of nature, alone in its stately solitariness, the world-renowned hospice of the Great St. Bernard stands. Past it victorious armies have marched, aided in their toil by its hospitality. Through its agency the traveller, overcome by the fatigues of his journey and the difficulties of the pass, has been rescued from what had otherwise proved his grave. In it the poor peasant, travelling with weary foot from the rugged hills of Switzerland to the fertile plains of Italy, has found rest, shelter and food. There the invalid in search of health, the naturalist in search of plants, the tourist in search of pleasure, and every one without exception meets with a hearty welcome. It has sheltered kings and peasants, men at whose very

names the earth has trembled and men whose little selves were almost all their worlds, men renowned in the annals of nations and men unknown to fame. Poets, statesmen, philosophers, rulers, merchants, beggars,-all, without respect to nation, religion or estate, have experienced the liberality, the kindness and the blessing of the monks of St. Bernard. Their monastery is, in the true sense of the word, a hospice, a house where all are welcomed as guests.

The present hospice consists of three buildings, the hospice proper, the Hotel de Saint Louis and the Morgue. The first two of these are large oblong structures, about thirty yards distant from each other, intensely plain in architecture and boasting of nothing beyond strength and power of endurance. The Hotel de Saint Louis, called so in compliment to the kings of France, is used at present as a storehouse, but, in the event of fire or any other mishap taking place at the larger building, could be made use of as a refuge. The Morgue is a much smaller building immediately behind the hospice proper. These three houses stand at the end of a little lake unadorned by any trees. They are quite in keeping with the surrounding scenery, bare, rugged and cold, grand in their very solitude. They are built on the road between the canton of Vallais, in Switzerland, and the Italian town of Aosta, almost on the boundary line between the two countries, and stand 8,200 feet above sea level, almost at the very summit of the Great St. Bernard pass. The hospice is the highest point in Europe inhabited during the whole year. In summer many of the Alpine shepherds and dairymen live at higher elevations, but in winter they have all to descend to the less rigorous climate of the valleys. The cold is most intense, indeed it is said that there is not a day in the year without frost. Its effect on human life is to shorten the usual term of existence by about twenty years. To form any idea of the privations that have to be endured,

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one would require to visit the hospice in the depth of winter. It is one thing to visit it as a tourist in midsummer, another to be carried into it, at the most trying season, as a traveller benumbed and almost dead with cold.

The pass on which the hospice is situated is one which for ages has been the main connection between Switzerland and Italy. It is one famous in the history of the world. Over it armies have been led to victory and to defeat; in crossing it some of the most daring deeds of military prowess have been performed, some of the greatest triumphs of skill and endurance effected against the dead but awful powers of nature. It was by this pass, known then and spoken of by Livy as the Mons Penninus, that Hannibal, early in the Christian era, led his Punic host, to crush the power of Rome; and it was by the same pass, ages afterwards, that the great Napoleon effected. his famous passage of the Alps. The former passage was perhaps the most wonderful exploit of ancient times: the latter, fresh in the memory of men, forms certainly the most daring of modern military triumphs.

The founder of the hospice, as well as the date of its foundation, are involved in considerable obscurity. Its founder was probably Bernard, son of Pepin, to whom Charlemagne entrusted the government of Italy; and the date of its foundation prior to the year 832. At the end of the ninth century the hospice was destroyed and seems to have lost its existence entirely, until the year 962, when it was refounded by Bernard de Menthon, arch-deacon of Aosta. The life of this man was one of peculiar zeal for his church, and one useful in many ways, not least in rooting out the worship of Jupiter and spreading the Christian religion. In the eleventh century the hospice was destroyed by the Saracens, seized, on their departure, by a band of brigands and made by them the rendezvous from which to carry on a system of wholesale plunder and exac

tion. Canute, King of England and Denmark, along with some others, represented to the Pope and French Emperor the system of robbery and murder that was perpetrated and by their aid had the brigands driven out, the hospice repaired and the convent re-established. After this it increased greatly in wealth and importance, kings and pontiffs, rather in opposition to usual custom, contending for the honour of supporting it. In the twelfth century it held possessions as far distant as England and Flanders and, in 1480, when it reached the zenith of its power, was the owner of no fewer than ninety-eight different curés. From this year it began to decline, its possessions gradually dropping away from its authority, until the ownership of the very ground on which it stands became a subject of dispute. A vineyard and a farm are now almost the only sources of revenue in its possession. It has to depend almost entirely for its existence and support on the contributions of charity and the grants of royalty, the former raised in the various cantons, both Protestant and Catholic, and the latter supplied jointly by the French and Italian Governments.

Such is a short account of the history of the St. Bernard Hospice. It is merely an outline and, did space permit, could be filled in and rendered more complete by many particulars no less interesting than instructive.

The main object of the charity is to aid travellers in their journey across the pass, to preserve them from the dangers to which they are exposed and to rescue them if overtaken by any calamity. The number of people crossing the pass, even in the depth of winter, is much larger than would be imagined and the amount of assistance necessary to be given is very considerable. Perhaps at the present day, with the improved roads and increased means of communication between Switzerland and Italy, the hospice is not of so much use as it formerly was. Still it is an institution which does a great deal of good,-a

boon to the weary traveller and the means of saving In addition to their main object-the premany lives. serving of life-the monks do a great deal for the poor on cach side of the pass and thus extend the sphere of their labours among the stationary population of the surrounding country.

In the summer of last year I visited, along with a friend, the hospice of the St. Bernard. One is received by a monk, shewn to a bedroom and supplied with refreshment, if desired. Everything is done by the monks to make their visitors comfortable and no pains spared by them to render every information in their power. The general effect of the interior of the building is a dreary one. Long corridors, paved with stone, lead from one end to the other, affording access on two different floors to the chapel, dormitories and other apartments of the institution. The entrance hall is a handsome one, ornamented with a tablet erected to the memory of the first Napoleon. The salle à manger is the most comfortable-looking room. of all, plain and simply furnished, quite in keeping with the rest of the building. There are bedrooms for seventy or eighty people and accommodation for sheltering about 300. As many as 600 have received assistance in one day. The chapel is a handsome one, containing the usual appointments of the Romish Church, some good pictures and a few statues. The dormitories and apartments of the monks, although open for inspection by strangers if desired, are regarded as more private than the other rooms and consequently are not so much visited. The refectory, kitchen and cellar are among the sights of the place and are well worth a few minutes' attention.

A word as to the monks. We came in contact with only three of them and can judge of the character of their order merely from what we saw of these and from what one is daily learning from others and from books. They seem remark