Switzerland

The Traveller's Guide through Switzerland: in four parts (1820) by Johann Gottfried Ebel, Daniel Wall

It is almost impossible to view the wonders of nature, as exhibited in the wild and romantic country of Switzerland, without feeling an unusual elevation of mind towards the great Author of nature. It is on the summits of the Alps that nature keeps the eternal reservoirs of that element which fertilizes the immense lands of Europe: thousands of torrents and of rivers escape from that sea of snow and of ice that covers the Alps; and either by night or by day, either in winter or in summer, roll their beneficent streams to join the Black Sea and the Mediterranean the Adriatic and the Ocean and every where to diffuse abundance and riches.

Switzerland the most elevated country in Europe, wherein the most majestic continental rivers their source, combines or unites, within its circumscribed limits, the soil and productions both of the north and south. There, in the space of seven or eight hours, you run over the different climates prevailing in other parts between 80 and 40 degrees of latitude: one single day's excursion is sufficient to bring the traveller into the frozen regions of the Spitzberg, and to make him feel the scorching heat of Senegal; to enable him to gather in one place the lichen of Iceland, and in another the opuntia of the West Indies; to hear sometimes the roaring of the Lavanges, so destructive in the midst of the dreadful silence of nature, and sometimes the chirping of the Sicilian grass hopper.