“In a town where the present is so beautiful, we may well let the past be forgotten.”  Enough, we trust, has been written to show that if New Lucerne, the Lucerne of the lake and of the mountains, is lovely beyond description, Old Lucerne has beauties to the full as interesting.  The two, in fact, the old Lucerne and the new—are companion pictures of which neither should be neglected.  This ancient city; these narrow streets with their irregular gabled houses and quaint connecting passages; these rain-washed little squares that have been their whole small world to generation after generation; the old-time atmosphere that is everywhere about to blend the present with the past: such are some of the charms which already attract the tourists, who go roving over Europe.  When the revival we have been describing shall have fully taken place, when the buildings suitable for Façade art-work shall have all or nearly all been decorated Lucerne, as we conceive it, should offer a spectacle unique on the continent; and while drawing to itself even more sightseers than now, will at the same time stir their minds to thought, excite their imagination, and appeal to their memories as long as they live. (pp. 38-9)

(The Revival of the Decorative Arts at Lucerne: Two Walks about the Ancient City of the Wooden Stork’s Nests)