It has been remarked as curious that the Age of Revolution at Geneva was also the Golden Age—if not of Genevan literature, which has never really had any Golden Age, at least of Genevan science, which was of world-wide renown. The explanation probably is that these Genevan revolutions, over which the Genevan historians have spilt such a quantity of ink, were not such very important matters after all. So far as one can make out, the graver of them were hardly more grave than the Peterloo massacre, while the less grave hardly attain to the gravity of the Bloody Sunday Riots. A man of letters who took part in one of them on the losing side might suffer unpleasant consequences. He might have his writings burnt by the common hangman, as BÉrenger’s were; he might be driven into exile, as were de Lolme, who went to London, where he wrote his famous work on the British Constitution, and d’Ivernois, who went to Paris and became one of the most pungent critics of republican administration and finance. Such things might happen, and in many cases did. But there were no such violent or such continual disturbances as need take up the whole of a literary man’s time, or prevent him from getting on with his work.

The period, at any rate, is one in which notable names meet us at every turn. There were exiled Genevans, like de Lolme, holding their own in foreign political and intellectual circles; there were emigrant Genevan pastors holding aloft the lamps of culture and piety in many cities of England, France, Russia, Germany, and Denmark; there were Genevans, like FranÇois Lefort, holding the highest offices in the service of foreign rulers; and there were numbers of Genevans at Geneva of whom the cultivated grand tourist wrote in the tone of a disciple writing of his master. One cannot glance at the history of the period without lighting upon names of note in almost all departments of endeavour. The period is that of de Saussure, Bourrit, the de Lucs, the two Hubers, great authorities respectively on bees and birds; Le Sage, who was one of Gibbon’s rivals for the heart of Mademoiselle Suzanne Curchod; Senebier, the librarian who wrote the first literary history of Geneva; St. Ours and Arlaud, the painters; Charles Bonnet, the entomologist; BÉrenger and Picot, the historians; Tronchin, the physician; Trembley and Jallabert, the mathematicians; Dentan, minister and Alpine explorer; Pictet, the editor of the BibliothÈque Universelle, still the leading Swiss literary review; and Odier, who taught Geneva the virtue of vaccination.

It is obviously impossible to dwell at length upon the careers of all these eminent men. As well might one attempt, in a survey on the same scale of English literature, to discuss in detail the careers of all the celebrities of the age of Anne. One can do little more than remark that the list is marvellously strong for a town of some 30,000 inhabitants, and that many of the names included in it are not only eminent, but interesting. Jean AndrÉ de Luc, for example, has a double claim upon our attention as the inventor of the hygrometer and as the pioneer of the snow-peaks. He climbed the Buet as early as 1770, and wrote an account of his adventures on its summit and its slopes which has the true charm of Arcadian simplicity. He came to England, was appointed reader to Queen Charlotte, and lived in the enjoyment of that office, and in the gratifying knowledge that Her Majesty kept his presentation hygrometer in her private apartments, to the venerable age of ninety.

Bourrit is another interesting character—being, in fact, the spiritual ancestor of the modern Alpine Clubman. By profession he was Precentor of the Cathedral; but his heart was in the mountains. In the summer he climbed them, and in the winter he wrote books about them. One of his books was translated into English; and the list of subscribers, published with the translation, shows that the public which Bourrit addressed included Edmund Burke, Sir Joseph Banks, Bartolozzi, Fanny Burney, Angelica Kauffman, David Garrick, Sir Joshua Reynolds, George Augustus Selwyn, Jonas Hanway, and Dr. Johnson. His writings earned him the honourable title of Historian (or Historiographer) of the Alps. Men of science wrote him letters; princes engaged upon the grand tour called to see him; princesses sent him presents as tokens of their admiration and regard for the man who had taught them how the contemplation of mountain scenery might exalt the sentiments of the human mind.

Tronchin, too, is interesting; he was the first physician who recognized the therapeutic use of fresh air and exercise, hygienic boots, and open windows. And so is Charles Bonnet, who was not afraid to stand up for orthodoxy against Voltaire; and so is Mallet, who travelled as far as Lapland. But space forbids any long examination of their achievements. The most that one can do is to illustrate the epoch by narrating the events of one career; and the career selected must of necessity be that of the man of whom his contemporaries always spoke, with the reverence of hero-worshippers, as ‘the illustrious de Saussure.’