The day after we reached Chamouny, Monseigneur the bishop arrived there on one of his rare pilgrimages into these wild valleys.Nearly all the way down from Geneva, we had seen signs of his coming, in preparations as for the celebration of a great victory.I did not know at first but the Atlantic cable had been laid; or rather that the decorations were on account of the news of it reaching this region.It was a holiday for all classes; and everybody lent a hand to the preparations.First, the little church where the confirmations were to take place was trimmed within and without; and an arch of green spanned the gateway.At Les Pres, the women were sweeping the road, and the men were setting small evergreen-trees on each side.The peasants were in their best clothes; and in front of their wretched hovels were tables set out with flowers.So cheerful and eager were they about the bishop, that they forgot to beg as we passed: the whole valley was in a fever of expectation.At one hamlet on the mulepath over the Tete Noire, where the bishop was that day expected, and the women were sweeping away all dust and litter from the road, I removed my hat, and gravely thanked them for their thoughtful preparation for our coming.But they only stared a little, as if we were not worthy to be even forerunners of Monseigneur.
I do not care to write here how serious a drawback to the pleasures of this region are its inhabitants.You get the impression that half of them are beggars.The other half are watching for a chance to prey upon you in other ways.I heard of a woman in the Zermatt Valley who refused pay for a glass of milk; but I did not have time to verify the report.Besides the beggars, who may or may not be horrid-looking creatures, there are the grinning Cretins, the old women with skins of parchment and the goitre, and even young children with the loathsome appendage, the most wretched and filthy hovels, and the dirtiest, ugliest people in them.The poor women are the beasts of burden.They often lead, mowing in the hayfield; they carry heavy baskets on their backs; they balance on their heads and carry large washtubs full of water.The more appropriate load of one was a cradle with a baby in it, which seemed not at all to fear falling.When one sees how the women are treated, he does not wonder that there are so many deformed, hideous children.I think the pretty girl has yet to be born in Switzerland.
This is not much about the Alps? Ah, well, the Alps are there.Go read your guide-book, and find out what your emotions are.As Isaid, everybody goes to Chamouny.Is it not enough to sit at your window, and watch the clouds when they lift from the Mont Blanc range, disclosing splendor after splendor, from the Aiguille de Goute to the Aiguille Verte,--white needles which pierce the air for twelve thousand feet, until, jubilate! the round summit of the monarch himself is visible, and the vast expanse of white snow-fields, the whiteness of which is rather of heaven than of earth, dazzles the eyes, even at so great a distance? Everybody who is patient and waits in the cold and inhospitable-looking valley of the Chamouny long enough, sees Mont Blanc; but every one does not see a sunset of the royal order.The clouds breaking up and clearing, after days of bad weather, showed us height after height, and peak after peak, now wreathing the summits, now settling below or hanging in patches on the sides, and again soaring above, until we had the whole range lying, far and brilliant, in the evening light.The clouds took on gorgeous colors, at length, and soon the snow caught the hue, and whole fields were rosy pink, while uplifted peaks glowed red, as with internal fire.Only Mont Blanc, afar off, remained purely white, in a kind of regal inaccessibility.And, afterward, one star came out over it, and a bright light shone from the hut on the Grand Mulets, a rock in the waste of snow, where a Frenchman was passing the night on his way to the summit.
Shall I describe the passage of the Tete Noire? My friend, it is twenty-four miles, a road somewhat hilly, with splendid views of Mont Blanc in the morning, and of the Bernese Oberland range in the afternoon, when you descend into Martigny,--a hot place in the dusty Rhone Valley, which has a comfortable hotel, with a pleasant garden, in which you sit after dinner and let the mosquitoes eat you.
THE MAN WHO SPEAKS ENGLISH
It was eleven o'clock at night when we reached Sion, a dirty little town at the end of the Rhone Valley Railway, and got into the omnibus for the hotel; and it was also dark and rainy.They speak German in this part of Switzerland, or what is called German.There were two very pleasant Americans, who spoke American, going on in the diligence at half-past five in the morning, on their way over the Simplex.One of them was accustomed to speak good, broad English very distinctly to all races; and he seemed to expect that he must be understood if he repeated his observations in a louder tone, as he always did.I think he would force all this country to speak English in two months.We all desired to secure places in the diligence, which was likely to be full, as is usually the case when a railway discharges itself into a postroad.
We were scarcely in the omnibus, when the gentleman said to the conductor:
"I want two places in the coupe of the diligence in the morning.Can I have them? ""Yah" replied the good-natured German, who did n't understand a word.
