Previous - Next

hundred details which struck me with all the force of novelty; but I must
not stay to do so.

When we had got past the village the fog rose, and revealed magnificent
views of the snowy mountains and their nearer abutments, while in front I
could now and again catch glimpses of the great plains which I had
surveyed on the preceding evening. The country was highly cultivated,
every ledge being planted with chestnuts, walnuts, and apple-trees from
which the apples were now gathering. Goats were abundant; also a kind of
small black cattle, in the marshes near the river, which was now fast
widening, and running between larger flats from which the hills receded
more and more. I saw a few sheep with rounded noses and enormous tails.
Dogs were there in plenty, and very English; but I saw no cats, nor
indeed are these creatures known, their place being supplied by a sort of
small terrier.

In about four hours of walking from the time we started, and after
passing two or three more villages, we came upon a considerable town, and
my guides made many attempts to make me understand something, but I
gathered no inkling of their meaning, except that I need be under no
apprehension of danger. I will spare the reader any description of the
town, and would only bid him think of Domodossola or Faido. Suffice it
that I found myself taken before the chief magistrate, and by his orders
was placed in an apartment with two other people, who were the first I
had seen looking anything but well and handsome. In fact, one of them
was plainly very much out of health, and coughed violently from time to
time in spite of manifest efforts to suppress it. The other looked pale
and ill but he was marvellously self-contained, and it was impossible to
say what was the matter with him. Both of them appeared astonished at
seeing one who was evidently a stranger, but they were too ill to come up
to me, and form conclusions concerning me. These two were first called
out; and in about a quarter of an hour I was made to follow them, which I
did in some fear, and with much curiosity.

The chief magistrate was a venerable-looking man, with white hair and
beard and a face of great sagacity. He looked me all over for about five
minutes, letting his eyes wander from the crown of my head to the soles
of my feet, up and down, and down and up; neither did his mind seem in
the least clearer when he had done looking than when he began. He at
length asked me a single short question, which I supposed meant "Who are
you?" I answered in English quite composedly as though he would
understand me, and endeavoured to be my very most natural self as well as
I could. He appeared more and more puzzled, and then retired, returning
with two others much like himself. Then they took me into an inner room,
and the two fresh arrivals stripped me, while the chief looked on. They
felt my pulse, they looked at my tongue, they listened at my chest, they

Previous - Next