Father Johann Rudolf Meyer, Citizen of Aarau: A Memorial

So strong, so lasting was the impression that this encounter had made upon his heart, which was open to all feelings of noble humanity. He also sometimes smiled when he remembered the admiration with which the world-removed mountain shepherds regarded him, as they could not comprehend what he was seeking in their solitudes, unless he were perhaps a butcher or a Strahlenhändler trader of mineral crystals 3) In the Swiss high mountains, especially in Uri, Strahl means the same as crystal.. For travels in Switzerland were still very unusual at that time, although Altmann, Scheuchzer, Gruner, and a few Frenchmen and Englishmen had already provided some account of the wonders of the glacier mountains. It was reserved for him to be the first to shed light on the connection between these mountain ranges. But he did not foresee that at the time; instead, full of quite different hopes, he wandered from the heights of his native mountains beyond the Rhine toward the Lower Elbe, where the fame of Hamburg and the old Hanseatic cities lured him; toward Potsdam, to see the greatest king of his century,