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But it was augmented and rendered sublime by the mighty Alps, whose white and shining pyramids and domes towered above all, as belonging to another earth, the habitations of another race of beings. I passed the bridge of Pelissier, where the ravine, which the river forms, opened before me, and I began to ascend the mountain that overhangs it. Soon after, I entered the valley of Chamounix.
I rode on a mule to Montanvert, and thence on foot over the Mer de Glace, clambered up the steep mountain side to Chapeau, went down to the crystal Grotto and rode from there back to Chamounix. The ride up in the early hours of the morning was perfect, the mountain air so light; the mists parted; the pine-trees round the fresh mountain path exhaled a penetrating fragrance.
Pancras after the same journey into Switzerland a year or two ago. His head was plastered and bandaged, and he, poor fellow, looked a sorry pickle after the burglary and attempted murder, but was it not a splendid subject for a sermon when he found himself at Chamounix and able to preach! And did he not profit by the unusual opportunity!
It was like the gilt ornamentation on a velvet pall. When I returned from Chamounix to Geneva, the proprietor of the hotel was standing in the doorway and shouted to me: "The whole of the French army, with the Emperor, has been taken prisoner at Sedan!" "Impossible!" I exclaimed.
Then I spurred on my animal, striving so to forget the world, my fears, and more than all, myself or, in a more desperate fashion, I alighted and threw myself on the grass, weighed down by horror and despair. At length I arrived at the village of Chamounix. Exhaustion succeeded to the extreme fatigue both of body and of mind which I had endured.
"Truly, on a fine day, Josef," was the smiling answer. "I told monsieur that a guxe was blowing up from the south; so did Karl; but he would not hearken. Ma foi! I am not to blame." Barth, on his dignity, introduced a few words of French picked up from the Chamounix men. He fancied they would awe Stampa, and prove incidentally how wide was his own experience. The old guide only laughed.
We visited the wondrous cave and the little cabinets of natural history, where the curiosities are disposed in the same manner as in the collections at Servox and Chamounix. The latter name made me tremble when pronounced by Henry, and I hastened to quit Matlock, with which that terrible scene was thus associated.
Early in June, all sailed for England together, and at last, in the middle of July, all found themselves in Switzerland, at Prangins, Chamounix, and Zermatt. On July 22 they drove across the Furka Pass and went down by rail to Lucerne.
And there, where the torrent splits up into a score of insignificant streams, we grounded and crawled to dry land and sat down and laughed. "Yes, we could do it we could laugh. Is that not bathos? But Fidèle and I have a theory that laughter is the chief earnest of immortality. "To dry land I have said. Mon Dieu! the torrent was no wetter. It rains in the Chamounix valley.
Challoner, who, with her family, had travelled a great deal, and was quite accustomed to hurricanes and other inconveniences caused by the unaccommodating behaviour of the elements. "I don't think I ever saw anything like it, John dear, even that storm we saw at Chamounix was not any better than this."
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