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two waiting-maids: which strong body of inconvenience was accommodated

elsewhere under the same roof. The party that had overtaken them, and

followed in their train, consisted of only three members: one lady and

two gentlemen. The third party, which had ascended from the valley

on the Italian side of the Pass, and had arrived first, were four in

number: a plethoric, hungry, and silent German tutor in spectacles, on

a tour with three young men, his pupils, all plethoric, hungry, and

silent, and all in spectacles.

These three groups sat round the fire eyeing each other drily, and

waiting for supper. Only one among them, one of the gentlemen belonging

to the party of three, made advances towards conversation. Throwing out

his lines for the Chief of the important tribe, while addressing himself

to his own companions, he remarked, in a tone of voice which included

all the company if they chose to be included, that it had been a long

day, and that he felt for the ladies. That he feared one of the

young ladies was not a strong or accustomed traveller, and had been

over-fatigued two or three hours ago. That he had observed, from his

station in the rear, that she sat her mule as if she were exhausted.

That he had, twice or thrice afterwards, done himself the honour of

inquiring of one of the guides, when he fell behind, how the lady did.

That he had been enchanted to learn that she had recovered her spirits,

and that it had been but a passing discomfort. That he trusted (by this

time he had secured the eyes of the Chief, and addressed him) he might

be permitted to express his hope that she was now none the worse, and

that she would not regret having made the journey.

'My daughter, I am obliged to you, sir,' returned the Chief, 'is quite

restored, and has been greatly interested.'

'New to mountains, perhaps?' said the insinuating traveller.

'New to--ha--to mountains,' said the Chief.

'But you are familiar with them, sir?' the insinuating traveller

assumed.

'I am--hum--tolerably familiar. Not of late years. Not of late years,'

replied the Chief, with a flourish of his hand.

The insinuating traveller, acknowledging the flourish with an

inclination of his head, passed from the Chief to the second young lady,

who had not yet been referred to otherwise than as one of the ladies in

whose behalf he felt so sensitive an interest.

He hoped she was not incommoded by the fatigues of the day.

'Incommoded, certainly,' returned the young lady, 'but not tired.'

The insinuating traveller complimented her on the justice of the

distinction. It was what he had meant to say. Every lady must doubtless

be incommoded by having to do with that proverbially unaccommodating

animal, the mule.

'We have had, of course,' said the young lady, who was rather reserved

and haughty, 'to leave the carriages and fourgon at Martigny. And the

impossibility of bringing anything that one wants to this inaccessible

place, and the necessity of leaving every comfort behind, is not

convenient.'

'A savage place indeed,' said the insinuating traveller.

The elderly lady, who was a model of accurate dressing, and whose manner

was perfect, considered as a piece of machinery, here interposed a

remark in a low soft voice.

'But, like other inconvenient places,' she observed, 'it must be seen.

As a place much spoken of, it is necessary to see it.'

'O! I have not the least objection to seeing it, I assure you, Mrs

General,' returned the other, carelessly.

'You, madam,' said the insinuating traveller, 'have visited this spot

before?' 'Yes,' returned Mrs General. 'I have been here before. Let me

commend you, my dear,' to the former young lady, 'to shade your face

from the hot wood, after exposure to the mountain air and snow. You,

too, my dear,' to the other and younger lady, who immediately did so;

while the former merely said, 'Thank you, Mrs General, I am Perfectly

comfortable, and prefer remaining as I am.'

The brother, who had left his chair to open a piano that stood in

the room, and who had whistled into it and shut it up again, now came

strolling back to the fire with his glass in his eye. He was dressed in

the very fullest and completest travelling trim. The world seemed hardly

large enough to yield him an amount of travel proportionate to his

equipment.

'These fellows are an immense time with supper,' he drawled. 'I wonder

what they'll give us! Has anybody any idea?'

'Not roast man, I believe,' replied the voice of the second gentleman of

the party of three.

'I suppose not. What d'ye mean?' he inquired.

'That, as you are not to be served for the general supper, perhaps you

will do us the favour of not cooking yourself at the general fire,'

returned the other.

The young gentleman who was standing in an easy attitude on the hearth,

cocking his glass at the company, with his back to the blaze and his

coat tucked under his arms, something as if he were Of the Poultry

species and were trussed for roasting, lost countenance at this

reply; he seemed about to demand further explanation, when it was

discovered--through all eyes turning on the speaker--that the lady with

him, who was young and beautiful, had not heard what had passed through

having fainted with her head upon his shoulder.

'I think,' said the gentleman in a subdued tone, 'I had best carry

her straight to her room. Will you call to some one to bring a light?'

addressing his companion, 'and to show the way? In this strange rambling

place I don't know that I could find it.'

'Pray, let me call my maid,' cried the taller of the young ladies.

'Pray, let me put this water to her lips,' said the shorter, who had not

spoken yet.

Each doing what she suggested, there was no want of assistance. Indeed,

when the two maids came in (escorted by the courier, lest any one should

strike them dumb by addressing a foreign language to them on the road),

there was a prospect of too much assistance. Seeing this, and saying as

much in a few words to the slighter and younger of the two ladies,

the gentleman put his wife's arm over his shoulder, lifted her up, and

carried her away.

His friend, being left alone with the other visitors, walked slowly up

and down the room without coming to the fire again, pulling his black

moustache in a contemplative manner, as if he felt himself committed

to the late retort. While the subject of it was breathing injury in a

corner, the Chief loftily addressed this gentleman.

'Your friend, sir,' said he, 'is--ha--is a little impatient; and, in

his impatience, is not perhaps fully sensible of what he owes

to--hum--to--but we will waive that, we will waive that. Your friend is

a little impatient, sir.'

'It may be so, sir,' returned the other. 'But having had the honour of

making that gentleman's acquaintance at the hotel at Geneva, where we

and much good company met some time ago, and having had the honour

of exchanging company and conversation with that gentleman on several

subsequent excursions, I can hear nothing--no, not even from one of your

appearance and station, sir--detrimental to that gentleman.'

'You are in no danger, sir, of hearing any such thing from me. In

remarking that your friend has shown impatience, I say no such thing. I

make that remark, because it is not to be doubted that my son, being by

birth and by--ha--by education a--hum--a gentleman, would have readily

adapted himself to any obligingly expressed wish on the subject of the

fire being equally accessible to the whole of the present circle. Which,

in principle, I--ha--for all are--hum--equal on these occasions--I

consider right.'

'Good,' was the reply. 'And there it ends! I am your son's obedient

servant. I beg your son to receive the assurance of my profound

consideration. And now, sir, I may admit, freely admit, that my friend

is sometimes of a sarcastic temper.'

'The lady is your friend's wife, sir?'

'The lady is my friend's wife, sir.' 'She is very handsome.'

'Sir, she is peerless. They are still in the first year of their

marriage. They are still partly on a marriage, and partly on an

artistic, tour.'

'Your friend is an artist, sir?'

The gentleman replied by kissing the fingers of his right hand, and

wafting the kiss the length of his arm towards Heaven. As who should

say, I devote him to the celestial Powers as an immortal artist!

'But he is a man of family,' he added. 'His connections are of the best.

He is more than an artist: he is highly connected. He may, in effect,

have repudiated his connections, proudly, impatiently, sarcastically (I

make the concession of both words); but he has them. Sparks that have

been struck out during our intercourse have shown me this.'

'Well! I hope,' said the lofty gentleman, with the air of finally

disposing of the subject, 'that the lady's indisposition may be only

temporary.'

'Sir, I hope so.'

'Mere fatigue, I dare say.'

'Not altogether mere fatigue, sir, for her mule stumbled to-day, and

she fell from the saddle. She fell lightly, and was up again without

assistance, and rode from us laughing; but she complained towards

evening of a slight bruise in the side. She spoke of it more than once,

as we followed your party up the mountain.'

The head of the large retinue, who was gracious but not familiar,

appeared by this time to think that he had condescended more than

enough. He said no more, and there was silence for some quarter of an

hour until supper appeared.

With the supper came one of the young Fathers (there seemed to be no

old Fathers) to take the head of the table. It was like the supper of

an ordinary Swiss hotel, and good red wine grown by the convent in more

genial air was not wanting. The artist traveller calmly came and took

his place at table when the rest sat down, with no apparent sense upon

him of his late skirmish with the completely dressed traveller.

'Pray,' he inquired of the host, over his soup, 'has your convent many

of its famous dogs now?'

'Monsieur, it has three.'

'I saw three in the gallery below. Doubtless the three in question.' The

host, a slender, bright-eyed, dark young man of polite manners, whose

garment was a black gown with strips of white crossed over it like

braces, and who no more resembled the conventional breed of Saint

Bernard monks than he resembled the conventional breed of Saint Bernard

dogs, replied, doubtless those were the three in question.

'And I think,' said the artist traveller, 'I have seen one of them

before.'

It was possible. He was a dog sufficiently well known. Monsieur might

have easily seen him in the valley or somewhere on the lake, when he

(the dog) had gone down with one of the order to solicit aid for the

convent.

'Which is done in its regular season of the year, I think?'

Monsieur was right.

'And never without a dog. The dog is very important.' Again Monsieur was

right. The dog was very important. People were justly interested in the

dog. As one of the dogs celebrated everywhere, Ma'amselle would observe.

Ma'amselle was a little slow to observe it, as though she were not yet

well accustomed to the French tongue. Mrs General, however, observed it

for her.

'Ask him if he has saved many lives?' said, in his native English, the

young man who had been put out of countenance.

The host needed no translation of the question. He promptly replied in

French, 'No. Not this one.'

'Why not?' the same gentleman asked.

'Pardon,' returned the host composedly, 'give him the opportunity and

he will do it without doubt. For example, I am well convinced,' smiling

sedately, as he cut up the dish of veal to be handed round, on the young

man who had been put out of countenance, 'that if you, Monsieur, would

give him the opportunity, he would hasten with great ardour to fulfil

his duty.'

The artist traveller laughed. The insinuating traveller (who evinced

a provident anxiety to get his full share of the supper), wiping some

drops of wine from his moustache with a piece of bread, joined the

conversation.

'It is becoming late in the year, my Father,' said he, 'for

tourist-travellers, is it not?'

'Yes, it is late. Yet two or three weeks, at most, and we shall be left

to the winter snows.' 'And then,' said the insinuating traveller, 'for

the scratching dogs and the buried children, according to the pictures!'

'Pardon,' said the host, not quite understanding the allusion. 'How,

then the scratching dogs and the buried children according to the

pictures?'

The artist traveller struck in again before an answer could be given.

'Don't you know,' he coldly inquired across the table of his companion,

'that none but smugglers come this way in the winter or can have any

possible business this way?'

'Holy blue! No; never heard of it.'

'So it is, I believe. And as they know the signs of the weather

tolerably well, they don't give much employment to the dogs--who have

consequently died out rather--though this house of entertainment is

conveniently situated for themselves. Their young families, I am told,

they usually leave at home. But it's a grand idea!' cried the artist

traveller, unexpectedly rising into a tone of enthusiasm. 'It's a

sublime idea. It's the finest idea in the world, and brings tears into

a man's eyes, by Jupiter!' He then went on eating his veal with great

composure.

There was enough of mocking inconsistency at the bottom of this speech