Part 9 (1/2)
OUR hotel here at Martigny, was even more suggestive of romance than the one at Brieg. It had been a monastery, and was an old, yellow-washed structure facing the street, with a rambling garden surrounded by high walls, clinging to it in the rear. Low, dark rooms, with bare, unpainted floors, like the waves of the sea in smoothness, were given to some of our party, while Mrs. K. and I were consigned again, with singular appropriateness, to what had been the chapel. Its windows overlooked the straggling, half-dead trees, and bare, hard-baked earth of the open s.p.a.ce before the door, which was always being crossed by strings of mules ornamented with bright saddle-cloths, and still further with the ubiquitous tourist arrayed in every known costume of the period.
Village girls, too, pa.s.sed under the trees, knitting as they went, and horrible creatures afflicted with the _goitre_--that curse of this region--which we met at every turn now.
To gain the long, low refectory where we dined, or to pa.s.s from one room to another, necessitated crossing the brick-paved cloisters, upon which all the doors of the second story opened. Here a row of columns encircled a narrow, inner court-yard--so narrow as to be nothing more than a slit in the walls, yet wide enough to allow the s.h.i.+mmering sunlight to drop down upon the vines twined around the columns, and light the whole dingy interior into a weird, strange beauty.
We rode out to the Falls of the Sallenches,--one of the mist veils left hanging from many of these Swiss mountains by the water-sprites,--and penetrated the Gorge de Trient upon the shaky gallery that follows its windings; wandered about and beyond the town; stole into an old church, and brought away the memory of a lovely virgin face; and haunted the dingy shops in the vain hope of making a few necessary purchases. These shops were not unlike our New England country stores in their combined odors and confused incapabilities. Behind the counters, or more likely sitting in the doorway with the inevitable blue knitting in hand, were old women, of hard, baked-apple faces, whose ideas of the luxuries of a woman's wardrobe were so far below what we considered its necessaries, that we parted in mutual surprise, to say the least, and without gain on either side.
Sabbath morning, English church service was held in the parlor of one of the hotels; after which a clergyman in gown and bands discoursed from the text, ”And there shall be no more sea,”--a peculiarly comforting hope to some of us.
Monday morning, we mounted the horses and mules waiting in dejected impatience before the door, and started upon the long ride of twenty-two miles to Chamouni by the Tete Noir Pa.s.s. A wide, pleasant avenue, shaded by walnut trees, led out of the town; after which we began to ascend the gently-sloping mountain-sides, pa.s.sing occasional villages, and besieged by beggars and venders of fruit, as usual. Indeed, these beggars are so constant in their attendance and importunity that one forgets to mention them, unless recalling flies and similar swarming annoyances.
The scenery, as we went on, was often grand, always interesting; the sky overcast, but at times the clouds, drifting apart, disclosed peaks or ”needles” so far above the mountains about us as to seem a revelation of heaven. The path was treacherous and rough--skirting precipices, descending in rocky steps or slippery mire, and crossing mountain streams by narrow, insecure bridges. Single file is the invariable rule in all these mountain excursions, and after a time the isolations of this mode of travelling adds to its wearisomeness. Solitude is delightful; but as some one has said, ”How pleasant it is to have a friend near by to whom you may remark, 'How delightful is solitude!'”
As you follow the windings of the narrow, steep path, you have a choice between addressing the back of the one who precedes you, and throwing a remark over your shoulder to those who come after. Involuntarily you fall to studying the curves of the former, and are utterly indifferent to the fact that the latter are probably meditating upon the intricacies of your back hair. Mule-riding is conducive to grace of neither soul nor body; still you know you are not making such a spectacle of yourself as did the woman just pa.s.sed--who twisted about in the saddle as though worked along by rotary motion. Perhaps not.
As you leave the villages to plunge into the woods, the flies swarm like beggars; and it is only when the guides have cut boughs from the trees, which you wave before you, wickedly suggesting palm branches, that you can proceed with tolerable comfort, and without the fear of an unexpected toss in the air, as one kick after another runs down the line.
Each horse or mule has his own slight peculiarities of habit and disposition. I recall one whose inordinate curiosity led him to walk always upon the verge of the precipices, so that the rider's feet overhung the frightful depths. Murray says it is best to allow these animals to choose their own paths. But to hang suspended between heaven and earth at the mercy of a strap and a mule, will shake one's faith, even in Murray.
My horse this day was possessed of the dreamy, melancholy nature of a poet, with the attendant lack of ambition. Every time we wound funereally through a village, he would walk deliberately to the mounting-steps, and wait most suggestively. Indeed, an air of abstraction characterized all his movements; even when, as we approached these villages, raising his head, he would seem to sniff the odors of Araby the Blest; which was a mistake, a delusion of his fancy shared by none of the others of the party. That he was without pride I must confess. No stable did we pa.s.s so poor, none so mean, that he was ashamed to pause and offer to enter with meek obdurateness.
Poetic as was his temperament, his appet.i.tes were developed in a remarkable degree. Once upon a narrow bridge we met two walking haystacks, out from which peered great, blue eyes. If the size of his mouth had corresponded at all to his desires, they would have vanished from sight in a twinkling; as it was, they barely escaped. Whether or not insatiable thirst is an attribute of a poet, I do not know; but each stream which crossed the path,--and the whole country seemed liquidizing,--each drinking-trough beside the way,--and to my excited imagination they seemed to form an unbroken line,--was an irresistible temptation. It was only by shouting, ”Yeep! Yeep!” in staccato chorus, and vigorously applying the palm branches, thus engaging his attention and diverting his thoughts into less watery channels, that we succeeded in making any progress whatever. Under this disciplinary process his nature was at last so far subdued that he would have pa.s.sed the ocean itself without a sigh, I am sure.
There was a rest of an hour at the Tete Noir inn at noon, shut in by the firs, and rocks, and mountains, then we went on to Argentiere, where we gladly exchanged the horses and mules for some low, open carts with a couple of villagers in blue blouses for drivers. In these we accomplished the remaining three or four miles, and made a triumphal entry into Chamouni.
It was late in the afternoon when we crawled up the narrow, thronged street to the Hotel Royal, from which the English, French, and American flags were flying. The clouds had dropped lower and lower, until a fine mist was beginning to deepen into rain, and the guides and tourists detained in the village fairly jostled each other at the intersection of the two princ.i.p.al streets, which seemed to form the village Exchange.
The mire of the streets was thickly stamped with hoof-prints and the marks from the nails that stud the shoe-soles of the mountain climbers.
Line after line of doleful looking objects, which might prove Egyptian mummies when unwrapped, were being lifted from still more sorry looking beasts before the door of the hotel, and a.s.saying to mount the steps, with a stiffness and angularity of movement in which we all sympathized.
Indeed, after dinner, when a bright fire was lighted in the long _salon_ where the various parties gathered to read, write, look over stereoscopic views, or chat among themselves, it was amusing, as well as pitiable to observe the abortive attempts at ease and flexibility as these individuals crossed the polished floor, to hear the groans smothered to sighs as they resumed their seats. ”Mules!” whispered the girls, nudging each other, and mindful of the delight which misery is said to find in company.
All the next day the rain dripped down upon the village from the heavy clouds that hid the mountains. Everybody improved the opportunity to write letters, or yawned over the books scattered about the _salon_.
Among them was a well-thumbed copy of ”Artemus Ward, His Book.” At the foot of each page the local allusions of the jokes were explained, I remember. Out in the street, umbrellas were dodging about from one shop to another. These rainy days, though a loss to the guides, are harvest times for the shopkeepers. Photographs and stereoscopic views of the mountains, the glaciers, and daring climbers hanging on by their eyelids, abound here, with any amount of wood and chamois (?) horn carving and crystal ornaments. Speaking of chamois-horn, if you expect to see in Switzerland--as you do in geographies--chamois perched upon every crag, preparatory to bounding from peak to peak, you will be grievously disappointed. Not a chamois will greet your eyes. We pa.s.sed--I have forgotten where--a pen in which, by paying a certain sum, we might look upon a veritable live chamois; but we had no desire to see the incarnation of liberty thus degraded.
We waited two days for the uplifting of the clouds, making, in the mean time, an excursion up the Montanvert to overlook the Mer de Glace--which is not a sea, but a river of ice, like all the glaciers that have worked themselves down into these valleys. We retired one night with the cloud curtains spread low over our heads; the next morning a voice from outside of our door called, ”Look out of your window.” We sprang up, seized the cord of the shutters, and behold! a new heaven and new earth!
Every vestige of cloud was gone. The mountains were bathed in sunlight, vivid green were the peaks before us, which had never met our gaze until now, while behind the nearest, against the deep blue of the summer sky, rose the three vast white steps which lead heavenward, the highest of which men call Mont Blanc. All that morning, as we descended from the valley of Chamouni to Sallenches, we turned continually to look back; and still, white and beautiful, but growing less in the distance, rose the triple domes.
We had taken a carriage to Sallenches: here we find places in the open diligence for Geneva. We pause in the first village through which we pa.s.s, where a knot of people gathers about a round little old woman. She wears a wide-rimmed hat over her neat frilled cap, and carries another upon her arm. Her waist is dimly defined by the strings of a voluminous ap.r.o.n, and her mind entirely distracted by the cares attendant upon the disposal of a cotton bag, a wicker basket, an old umbrella, and a box, which half a dozen men seize upon with clumsy hands, in good-natured officiousness, and thrust into the baggage compartment, while the women and children press about her, kissing the rough, ruddy cheeks, and uttering what we are sure must be blessings--odds and ends of which float up to us. Evidently the little, old woman is going a journey.
Aided by a dozen rough, helpful hands, she climbs the ladder to her place beside us, with a deprecatory though cheerful ”_Bon jour_” to us all, subsiding into a corner, where she is immediately submerged as her belongings are showered down upon her; last of all a crumpled letter is tossed into her lap.
The driver mounts to his place; she leans over; a perfect gust of blessings, and kisses, and adieus follow us, as with a crack of the whip the horses spring away, and we leave the village far behind.
Suddenly--for we have turned away our faces--the little old woman's hand is plunged into the cotton bag under our feet. We venture to look around. The tears have gone; her face beams like the sun, as she brings out of the depths a couple of eggs. Another dive, and she emerges with a piece of bread. A pinch of salt is added from the basket, and her breakfast is complete. She hospitably offers a share to each of us. We decline; and as a shadow dims the brightness of her face, Katie adds quickly,--
”We have had two breakfasts already.”
The little old woman rolls her round, blue eyes to heaven, with a pious e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n. Such lavish extravagance is beyond her comprehension.