My life : a record of events and opinions - Wallace-online.org

styleṀy own lecture was mainly devoted to a sketch—304 MY LIFElecture, or conversazione. Mr. Le Gallienne gave avery interesting lecture on "English Minor Poets,"reading selections from their works to illustrate theirof the chief great advances of science during thecentury, but I added to it a kind of set-off in discoverieswhich had been rejected and errors whichhad been upheld, referring to phrenology as one ofthe first class, and vaccination as one of the second.There were, of course, in such a place as Davos, manydoctors among the audience, and they signified theirdisapproval in the usual way ;but I assured themthat some of them would certainly live to see thetime when the whole medical profession wouldacknowledge vaccination to be a great delusion.Although Davos has no grand alpine sceneryimmediately around it, there are many delightfulwalks through woods full of flowers and ferns, alpinemeadows with gentians and primulas, and stonypasses from which the snow had just retreated. Onthe Strela pass, about eight thousand feet, I foundsome charming little alpines I had not seen before,among them the very dwarf Viola alpina, growingamong stones, the leaves hardly visible and the comparativelylarge flat flowers of a very deep blue-purple,with a large orange-yellow eye.On leaving Davos, I made my way across toAdelboden, where my wife and daughter, with somefriends, were staying. This is surrounded with finealpine peaks and snow-fields, and though the weatherwas unsettled we spent a pleasant week hereprobably the last visit I shall make to ever-delightfulSwitzerland—the sanatorium and alpine garden ofoverworked Encrlishmen.