Page:The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton.djvu/157

Rh travelling life. At last we arrived at the Chapeau, and descended the same mountain as yesterday.

The next day we proposed ascending the Glacier du Boisson, and reascending Mont Blanc for a few hours; but some of our party were anxious to get home, so we ordered some rackety vehicles for Argentières next morning, and there the strong betook themselves to their legs and alpenstocks, and the weak to mules. We strolled gaily along, making wreaths of wild flowers for our hats, singing the Ranz des Vaches and all that, though still in Savoy, and we mounted the Col de Balme. This is one of the darkest and sublimest views imaginable. On one side you look down the valley of Chamounix and the Savoy Mountains; the Col seems like a high barrier with one hut on it. On the other side you look over the Bernese Alps, and you see a spectacle not of everyday occurrence. Turn to Switzerland, all is sunshiny, bright, and gay; turn to Savoy, a thunder-storm is rolling along the valley beneath, and you stand there on the Col in winter, in snow, shivering, hail, wind, and sleet driving in your face. You see on one side, half a mile below, autumn; on the other spring, with buttercups, daisies and all sorts of wild flowers, and forsooth the cuckoo; and at the bottom of both valleys is summer, bright or stormy. At this place the ruffian who keeps the hut makes you pay twenty-eight francs for a slice of ham, and you come out rather amused at the people who are swearing on that account. Some delicate ladies are in semi-hysterics at the storm, or the black, frowning spot on which we find ourselves, and are rushing about,