free gift of one hundred days' indulgence each, from a snuffy old priest who had got in at Annemasse, could succeed in raising them. But at the inn a blazing fire, a good dinner, and Mr. King's engrossing book of travels, contented us for that night, and next day the fine weather set in and remained. And what a paradise we enjoyed! If there are days on which the heavens seem brought down to the earth,' it was surely those. We seldom made very long excursions; we often started walking without an idea in the world as to whither we were going; and yet we always in the end found ourselves at some foaming cascade, glacier, or point of view. Sometimes we spent whole days on the mountain, fragrant with aromatic scents, without meeting even a peasant in our wanderings. Only the scattered sheep and goats occasionally came up and rubbed their noses affectionately against Often close under the eternal silences' of the glaciers, we gazed up to where

us.

For a great sign the icy stair doth go
Between the heights to heaven,

and it seemed almost sacrilege to break the stillness. Even the poets have not broken silence before Mont Blanc quite successfully. Coleridge has, perhaps, come nearest to the grandeur of his theme in the 'Hymn before Sunrise,' but he, too, is inadequate.

You can make no 'grand ascents,' of course, in May; but you will be unwise if you do not make friends with a guide or two— they are the pick of the peasants, and all the Savoyard peasants are worth knowing. They are much pleasanter than the Swiss of the Rhone valley; and, indeed, the first thing that strikes one on passing over the Tête Noire to Martigny is the curt grunt-or, oftener, stony glare-that takes the place of the pleasant 'Bon voyage' on the French side of the pass. It is wonderful, too, how simple and unspoiled the Chamonix people still are, considering the demoralising tendency of the tourist crowd. In May, before the season' sets in, they all seem unaffectedly glad to see you, and have plenty of time to talk about themselves. Our chief friend was one Séraphin Simond, of the village of La Tour: he is considered a man of property, for he keeps three cows. As a gentleman of property should be, Simond is a decided Conservative. He would have driven our Savoyard-Yankee friend of the diligence to utter despair, for to Simond every custom of the country was 'as the law of the Medes and Persians, which altereth not.' Walking one day up the valley, en route for the Flégère, we wondered why

every cow or goat pasturing in the meadows required a special attendant-either man, woman, or child-set apart for its own use; no animal being ever seen without its caretaker. We remarked to Simond that this seemed rather a waste of time and energy. C'est bien possible!' gravely replied the owner of three cows; mais'-and this refrain constantly came'c'est une habitude du pays. Simond was never surprised by anything we said; he listened respectfully, but always remained of his own opinion. However, this particular instance of apparent waste of time is no doubt due to the communal system. The peasant pays so much per cow for the right of common pasturage; therefore his object is that his cow should get as much as possible from the common land and not feed on his own, nor, of course, trespass on his neighbour's. And tending cows is not by any means such waste of time as would appear, for we discovered that you can do three things at a time-mend stockings, carry a load of wood, and tend a cow. Many women knitted beside their cow; one we saw reading a book. Often small children are told off to tend cows and goats, and a pretty handful they seem to find them. At Martigny once we saw a lame old man whose cow was just like a pet dog, turning round to be patted, and even sniffing at his coat-pockets for bread. Although we embarked on no very arduous excursions, Simond expressed great admiration of the powers of walking displayed by 'Madame.' One day, as we were crossing the Mer de Glace from Montanvert, he exclaimed approvingly, Madame grimpe comme un chamois.' Madame felt flattered at this till she remembered that all the guides always said as much, on principle, to everybody. Like the children of Heine's ballad, they have probably

Made the very same speeches
To many an old cat since.

Simond and another guide, Bertrand, accompanied us to the Jardin one cloudless day. Bertrand, a tall, silent young fellow, also pretended to be lost in amazement at Madame's walking. 'Yes, Monsieur and Madame ought certainly to ascend Mont Blanc,' said Simond. Madame would do it capitally.' This seemed to require confirmation. Bertrand was appealed to. He grinned, then spoke gravely, 'Two good guides,' he said, 'can safely take anyone-any old gentleman or lady-up Mont Blanc.' This was not so flattering. It is a mere nothing of an expedition,' added Simond. 'It may affect Madame unpleasantly at first; she will

be a little sick-le mal de montagne-that is all; or she may turn a little black in the face. But we will get her up to the top nicely.'

'Certainement, car Madame a de bonnes jambes,' concluded Bertrand earnestly-and critically.

À propos of the ascent of Mont Blanc, Simond pointed out to us a fine house with green shutters, situated high up the valley, near Argentière. This, he said, was inhabited by the well-known English lady who had married her guide after an ascent of Mont Blanc in mid-winter. Jean Charlet, the husband, was 'un pauvre garçon,' added Simond, and she was très riche. Jean had been her guide for fourteen years, and they were both middle-agednearly forty-when they married, and that was now about ten or twelve years ago. Had they ever ascended Mont Blanc since?' we asked. Non, jamais. Elle fait le ménage, elle élève ses deux garçons; c'est une personne très convenable.' 'Are they happy?' we inquired. 'Yes, very,' Simond asseverated. 'She must have been very strong, to have gone up in winter.' 'Oui, c'est une dame très forte, très robuste; elle a de bonnes jambes.' Bertrand no doubt imagined when he delivered the critical opinion above mentioned that all English ladies were built on the same pattern.

Our favourite halting-place on many excursions was a humble little auberge at the hamlet of Les Ouches, where they never had any kind of meat, but always excellent bread, milk, eggs, and red wine. The landlady and her husband were strong, bustling people, who had a good deal of 'custom' in a small way. We noticed once a little heap of something sitting on a high chair at the door. On looking closer we imagined it to be a sickly baby; but it was the couple's only son, and it turned out that he was over twenty. It seemed that he had had a bad fever at nine years old, and in consequence of this he was all wizened and deformed, and sat all day at the door or in the chimney-corner, propped up on tiny crutches; it was a sad sight. The waiter at Chamonix, who was sympathetic and conversational, told us afterwards that the parents were gens de bien,' and that last year, when the 'conscription' came, the father was obliged, according to the regulations, to bring the boy up to be examined 'pour être soldat,' and that le père avait pleuré en l'amenant.'

The story brought tears to our own eyes.

This little inn at Les Ouches was a real comfort, for the one draw

back-if drawback must be confessed to Chamonix in May-was that when on many of our excursions, thirsty and tired, we longed for a refreshing drink, we were apt to find the Alpine inn on which our hopes had long been set all deserted and boarded up for the winter. Most of these high-lying inns do not open until at least the first of June, and only a disconsolate goat or two wandered about their inhospitable doors. But on one occasion, when returning sad and weary, cheated of a meal, from the deserted inn on the Col de Voza, we met an old peasant toiling up the steep hill slope to his poor little châlet, under a heavy crate filled with faggots, we told him how hungry we were, and begged him to direct us to the nearest inn. Instantly he led the way to his poor hut, brought out his rough wooden stools, placing them for us on the grassy Alp outside, and fetched all his provisions. Alas! they were only black bread, and an almost uneatable cheese made from goats' milk. No wine, no milk, did he possess. Je suis honteux,' he said sadly, d'apporter cela pour une dame, mais je suis simple paysan.' We could hardly manage to bite the black bread, but we did our best, so as not to hurt his feelings. He really seemed terribly ashamed to have nothing better to offer us. Poor simple paysan!' alone in his solitary cabin on the faraway Alp with no wife, no child, only a few goats for his companions. Two or three of the common green glazed pots of the valley stood in the windows of his hut, gay with trailing plants. The old peasant was evidently a lover of flowers; perhaps they were the sole brighteners of his solitude.

6

6

But happy, after all, is he who can confess to so few wants! Our Savoyard-Yankee, with all his latest improvements in the way of civilisation, is probably the less happy man of the two. We met him again at Les Ouches, just before leaving. He was still loafing about in his blouse, and apparently teaching the rustics a thing or two, for he was followed about by a crowd of admiring little boys. He seemed less bent than before on coming back to settle in his native valley. He was so disgusted, he said, with the poor way in which they lived, and with the oldworld style of agriculture. But you will wake them up a bit, as you proposed to do,' we remarked a little unkindly. 'Oh, no!' he replied gloomily; it's hopeless. I can't get them to pick up any new notion.' So they will remain 'simples paysans' still. The chance of learning something of these simple peasants is not the least of the charms of Chamonix in May.

ABOUT fifteen years ago Lady Harriette Nicolls wrote to her sister, the governess of Assinololand, a letter, part of which I happen to know ran as follows: George Langley has, as usual, been making himself disagreeable, and has given us no end of annoyance. The last thing he has done is to begin building in the field close to our gate on the Maythorpe road. He has run up a row of four horrid, little, frightful houses with windows in the shape of hearts and diamonds, &c., and he is advertising them in the paper as "The Pack." We have quite a view of them from the Elm walk, since the big beech came down, and only last week our Rector was advising Robert to remonstrate with George Langley, as it is such a bad example, and certain to encourage drinking and gambling, and it is most unpleasant for us driving past them to church.'

The houses of which Lady Harriette speaks were indeed erected by Mr. Langley with some chuckling over the probable disapproval of the sanctimonious uncle by whom he considered himself to have been cheated in a business transaction; but they really are not such undesirable dwellings as her ladyship's epithets would lead the reader to suppose. On the contrary, they are, I should say, rather favourable specimens of their kind, that, namely, which is patronised by the numerous class whom fortune has provided with neither poverty nor riches. Situated on a quiet country road, nearly a mile from Densleigh village, The Pack is within a stone's-throw of the shady plantations which skirt the Nicolls's small park, and being surrounded by pleasant, lonely pasture lands, it surveys an unsophisticatedly green and rural prospect not often associated with villa residences. But the most distinctive features of The Pack are those from which it derives its name. This designates collectively four decidedly ornate stucco edifices, separated from one another by intervals of some ten feet, which allow them to rank as 'detached,' and called individually Heart Lodge, Diamond Mount, Spade Villa, and Club House, in appropriate allusion to their respective doors, windows, gates, and porches, which are quaintly fashioned into the characters of the Devil's books. Mr. Langley must have been