The Counts of Gruyère

riply woven of the French, German and Italian races, the Swiss nationdiscovers in its Romand or French strain another triple weave of Celtic-Romand-Burgundian descent.While the high mountainous regions of eastern Switzerland were early scaledand settled by the Germanic tribes, the western were still earlier inhabited bythe ancient Celtic-Helvetians and then civilized and cultivated by the mostluxurious of Roman colonies. Resisting first and then happily minglingwith their Roman conquerors, the Celtic people were transformed into aRomand race, similar in speech and origin to the French. In the heart of thisRomand country was an ancient principality where the essential qualities ofthe beauty loving and imaginative races, Roman and Celtic, expressed them-selves uniquely. A fountain of Celtic song and legend, a centre of chivalryand warlike power, this principality is known only to the outer world by thepastoral product which bears its name "Gruyere."Remarkable in the interest of the unbroken line of its valorous and lov-able princes, and in the precious and enchanting race mixture of its brave,3 ANNA DE KOVENlaughter-loving people, its supreme historical interest lies in its little recordedand astonishing political significance among the independent feudal princi-palities of Europe.When the Teuton barbarians came to devastate the enchanting lovelinessof the templed Roman garden which was Switzerland for three idyllic cen-turies, they stopped at last at the penultimate peaks of the Occidental Alps,at a certain region called aux fenils (ad fines), where a glacial stream rushesacross the narrow valley of the Griesbach, among the southern mountainsof the Bernese Oberland. Thus western or Romand Switzerland preserves acharacter definitely apart from the eastern, and this barrier across the Bernesevalley, unpassed for a thousand years, still divides the German from the Ro-mand speaking peasantry. To the north and west lies Gruyere, greenest ofpastoral countries, uniquely set in a ring of azure heights, where like a lostProvence, the Romand spirit has preserved its eternal youthfulness and charm.Greatly loved by all the Swiss, its annals piously preserved by ancient chroni-clers, this country is German only in its eastern rocky portion; but where thecastle stands and in all the wide valleys which open towards the setting sun, itis of purest Romand speech and character. Here ruled for six hundred yearsa sovereign line of counts whose history, a pastoral epic, is melodious withsong and legend, and glowing with all the pageantry and chivalry of the mid-dle ages. Although skirted by the great Roman roads, and flanked by out-post towers, Gruyere was never romanized, being settled only in its outlyingplains by occasional Gallo-Roman villas, while the interior country, ringedby a barrier of almost inaccessible mountains, was left to the early