HOTEL MONOPOL & METROPOLE 
LUZERN						Thursday, Aug. 1, 1912

My Dear Mother,
	The last time I wrote you was Sunday noon from Chamonix. That day I went out to the Glacier des Blossons, 
a huge field of ice that comes down straight from the foot of Mt. Blanc - ice and snow and very tough hard ice. 
I walked across it and into a grotto artificially made in its side. The light shining thru the blue ice gave an 
effect not unlike the Blue Grotto at Capri that I wrote you of. Then back to the hotel down the mountain side - a 
good hard walk. Then I went to Geneva which is beautifully situated at one end of the lake. There is a fine monument 
to Rousstan, and there is too the house John Calvin lived in, and reformation hall with relics of him, and besides 
all this there are band and concert halls and very tempting shops - jewelry and watches and lovely carvings - so 
many beautiful things and yet so much trash. 
	On Monday I took the boat from there down Lake Leman (Lake of Geneva) to Montreux and went out to the Castle 
of Chillon stuck up in medieval fashion on the hillside, and now being restored and down level with the water 
in a cold dark long hall with only little slits for windows, was Bonnivard's prison. The pillars to which he 
was chained and his path (so called) worn in the stone floor. 
	Then back and the same afternoon to Interlaken situated between Lake Thun and Lake Brienz. It is here that you 
get the grand view of the snow covered Jungfrau. Went up to the Schridegg Platte and got the most magnificent 
view I've had in all my life. The Bernese Alps all stretched out to the one side, and over on the other the 
two lakes - that looked like patches of green emerald paint - so smooth they were.
	And finally here to Luccone to see the lion - a huge thing and quite impressive carved out of the hillside and 
at its foot a dark pool. The lion you hear is to the memory of the Swiss that fell in Paris at the Quilleries. 
What a thing to commemorate degenerate mercenaries with whom I've no patience.
The town here is most attractive on the lovely lake of the fona forest states, and mountains all around. Shops 
with beautiful things and concerts by La Scala Orchestra from Milan that are wonderful. I'm leaving in about ten 
minutes for Munich and mail [with] my friend Bill. Am wonderfully well as I trust you are.
						Devotedly, Donald