The Swiss are a fine people different languages, different religions, different races. And yet they can live together without territorial disputes. And, of course, without murdering each other.
Their careful way of doing things spreads into some interesting details of living together. Take a very odd one the death of animals on the road.
At this time of the year in Ireland you will notice here a dead young badger, there a dead fox, or a rabbit, perhaps even a hedge hog. In one case, a badger, killed on the middle of a main road, lay there, slowly being pulverised for nearly two weeks until there was nothing left. The Swiss, according to an article in one of their papers, reckon that annually on the 70,000 kilometres of national roads, cantonal roads and others, there are 7,500 accidents involving animals. One to two per cent of the human beings involved are injured or die.
The article explains that each animal has a different reaction to coming into contact with a road.
The hare, it seems, can be petrified. Anyone who comes across a hare at night on an Irish road, will have noticed a regular pattern. The hare runs in front of the lights the same side he has.
And he seems to know nothing other than to keep on that course. If you stop, he may dive into the hedge, but if you keep on going, so will he. That's just one example.
This article urges motorists to slow down when they come to a wood, or to an area where signs show that game may be about.
Slow down and now and then sound the horn. And remember that dusk and dawn light is a time when animals are on the move. Flash your lights up and down.
And remember, an animal running for cover may lose its sense of direction. We hear, in our own country, of passages under roads being built for badgers, animals which may have been padding the same tracks for centuries. The Swiss go farther. This article gives the dimensions needed for both underground and over ground passages for all game. It points out, too, that underground passages are used by frogs, reptiles or one sort and another and small rodents. And, an interesting legal point, if you break suddenly and cause a collision, are you to blame?
In 1989 the Federal high court (Tribunal) acquitted a woman driver who had caused a collision by braking to avoid a fox. "To demand of a driver that he should simply run over animals which appear suddenly in front of him or her is incompatible with the respect which mankind owes to the animal world, respect which is expressed by the duty to maintain the animal world and not to destroy it."
And the documentation centre for the study of game can tell us that in 1994 there were 710 hares 6400 foxes and 1700 badgers killed in their roads.