Picturesque Tour through the Oberland; index
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INTERLACKEN.
Interlacken, or Interlachen, so named from its situation between the two lakes (interlacus) of Thun and Brienz, is not above half a mile distant from Unterseen. The origin of this place was a convent of Augustine monks, founded in the year 1133 by Selinger of Oberhofen, the possessions of which were rapidly augmented by valuable donations, till they became the property of the state, on the adoption of the Reformation in 1528 by the canton of Berne, which had been appointed protector of this convent by the emperor Henry VI. in 1198. At a later period, a nunnery also was founded at Interlacken. Here the sister of William of Scharnachthal was about to take the veil: the inmates of both convents had assembled to witness the ceremony, which was attended likewise by a handsome young man, named Güntschi, of Interlacken. The lady beheld him, and preferring an earthly to a heavenly bridegroom, made him an offer of her hand in the presence of the whole assembly; he accepted it, and they were married on the spot. The dissolute manners of the monks and nuns of Interlacken, and the relaxation of discipline in those institutions, proved a subject of great scandal. The senate of Berne complained to the pope and the emperor of these disorders, which the Bishop of Lausanne endeavoured, but in vain, to correct.
These monks were, moreover, at different times suspected of having excited the people of the Oberland to insurrection against the government of Berne, or secretly fomenting their discontents. At the period of the Reformation in particular, when religious innovations had inflamed the minds of the peasantry, and led them to hope for the abolition of tithes and all public contributions, these animosities had assumed so violent and so dangerous a character, that <41> they must have produced the most disastrous consequences, but for the energy displayed by the people of Berne, and the strong attachment manifested for them, under these circumstances, by the towns of Thun and Unterseen.
Since the suppression of the convents at the Reformation, Interlacken has been the residence of a bailiff; and a number of indigent persons have been supported in the monastic buildings.
The people of Interlacken have always been distinguished for bravery. At the siege of Hericourt, in upper Burgundy, in 1474, the Interlackeners proposed to storm the town, and insisted on having the foremost place in the assault. In 1798, they displayed similar proofs of intrepidity.
The climate of this town and its environs, owing to their situation, is extremely mild and agreeable: as early as the month of February, the meadows are covered with flowers; and here are to be seen the largest and most beautiful walnut-trees in all Switzerland.
Interlacken lies on the south bank of the Aar, about a mile distant from
the lake of Brienz. Our view exhibits that river near its efflux from the
lake. 
The
valley, which opens to the left of the place, leads first to Zweylütschinen,
where the White and the Black Lütschinen mingle their torrents: there
it branches out into two valleys, one of which, running eastward, terminates
at the glaciers of Grindenwald; while the other, striking off due south, conducts
to Lauterbrunn.
The village seen near the opening of the valley of Zweylütschinen, is called G'steig or Gesteig: it is surrounded by beautiful orchards, and its walnut-trees are remarkably flourishing. The mountain, which rises to the left of G'steig, and the lower part of which only <42> is visible, is the Breitlauinen-Alp; its southern declivity is called Iselten-Alp. Mention is made of the Iselt-wald in the deeds of donations made to the chapter of Our Lady at Interlacken by the emperors, in 1133, 1146, and 1183. To the right of the valley of Zweylütschinen runs a chain, the extremity of which has been already mentioned under the denomination of the Suleck; and in the distance appears the majestic form of the Jungfrau. Though the impression produced by it is somewhat weakened by the enormous masses which present themselves on all sides to the view of the spectator, still it is very evident that these masses, how prodigious soever they may appear, are far inferior to the Jungfrau: but if the curious traveller would form a correct notion of its gigantic dimensions, let him ascend the nearest mountains, that seem to vie with it in elevation, and from their summits he will behold it towering majestically far above those peaks, which in the valley he was disposed to consider its equals.
Behind the steeple of Interlacken is seen a conical and wooded hill, which is the Ruggen: it conceals the entrance of a rugged valley, called the Saxetenthal, which runs between the Suleck and the Abendberg. From this valley descends a torrent, which, uniting at G'steig with the Lütschinen, throws itself with that river into the lake of Brienz, at a little distance from that place. It is lucky for the inhabitants of this isthmus that these torrents appease their fury, and deposit the matters which they carry along in the bosom of the lake, instead of joining the Aar in the plain of Interlaken, as the Kander did in that of Thun, before the formation of the channel which conducts it into the lake. But for this fortunate direction of the bed of the Lütschinen, the same disastrous effects as are experienced from the inundations of the Linth, by the inhabitants of its banks, in the cantons of Glaris, St. Gall, and Zurich, would have been felt in the valley of Unterseen, and would probably long since have converted this delicious Tempe into a pestilential morass. <43> At the extremity of the valley of Saxeten, rises the Schwalmern, a much more lofty mountain than the Morgenberghorn and the Suleck, and which parts the streams of the Kander and Lutschinen. In the rear of this mountain are seen the summits of one of the glaciers of the valley of Lauterbrunn, near the G'spaltenhorn and the Buttlosa, probably the Schilthorn and the Ausserhundshorn. Quite to the right, a mountain of the chain of the Niesen is perceived in the distance.
