ascertained that
useful knowledge might be acquired here.

"Grenchen lies on the frontier towards the canton of Berne, about half
an hour's distance from the Berne village of Lengnau. The Calvanistic
common council of Lengnau inquired of their Roman Catholic Solothurner
neighbours whether, and under what conditions, boys from their place
would be allowed to attend the district school. The answer was, that
their sons would be welcome; the instruction would be given
gratuitously, and that the people of Lengnau would only have to take
care that the scholars should be quiet and orderly. Hence there was an
increase of eight or ten boys from Lengnau; in order to preserve quiet,
one of them had been appointed by the mayor as monitor, and was made
answerable for their discipline; they marched in military order two and
two, and returned home in the same way, and there never was the
slightest quarrel between them and the Grencheners. This example worked
upon the neighbouring places of the canton; scholars came from Staad,
Bettlach, and Selzach, and, later, even from the French Jura. One of
them merits special mention. He was a large strong man, two and thirty
years of age (a year older than I), from the parish of Ely, in Friburg,
a distance of two hours behind the Weissenstein, situated in a wild
lonely country of the Bernese Jura mountains, which he had quitted, in
order to work on the new high road between Solothurn and Grenchen. When
he heard of the district school, he altered his determination; he hired
himself as a servant to a peasant for board and lodging, resigning
salary for the privilege of being able to attend the school. His desire
for knowledge and his iron industry helped him to surmount all
difficulties; he afterwards attended the seminary of education at
Buenchenbuchsee (Berne); then returned to his home, where he became
mayor and teacher; in short, all-in-all. Only one thing Xaver Rais did
not become, that was, father of a family; for he always continued his
studies, and, as he confided to me afterwards, preferred buying books
to a wife. The Grencheners reckon him, up to the present day, as one of
them; and even now, when I go to the place, a message is sent to him;
then he puts on his satchel, lays hold of his staff, and goes over the
mountain with long strides.

"The influx of scholars from the neighbourhood did not fail to have an
effect on the opponents in the place; many boys succeeded in overcoming
the r