Of all Swiss cities, BERN is most immediately charming. Founded in 1191 by the powerful local Zähringen dynasty, it began life as a fortress town peopled by knights. The growth of the Swiss Confederation in subsequent centuries owed much to the conquests of the warlike Bernese. Crammed onto a steep-sided peninsula in a crook of the fast-flowing River Aare, the city's quiet, cobbled lanes, lined with sandstone arcaded buildings, have changed barely at all in over five hundred years. The hills all around, and the steep banks of the river, are still liberally wooded. It's sometimes hard to remember that this quiet, attractive town of just 130,000 people is the nation's capital.