e should come the
next day and continue in it, with the custodian of the cave, who
for his breakfast and dinner, and what else we pleased, offered to
accompany us. We were early at Oliero on the following morning, and
found our friend in waiting; he mounted beside our driver, and we rode
up the Brenta to the town of Valstagna where our journey by wheels
ended, and where we were to take mules for the mountain ascent. Our
guide, Count Giovanni Bonato (for I may as well give him his title,
though at this stage of our progress we did not know into what
patrician care we had fallen), had already told us what the charge
for mules would be, but it was necessary to go through the ceremony of
bargain with the muleteer before taking the beasts. Their owner was a
Cimbrian, with a broad sheepish face, and a heavy, awkward accent of
Italian which at once more marked his northern race, and made us feel
comparatively secure from plunder in his hands. He had come down from
the mountain top the night before, bringing three mules laden with
charcoal, and he had waited for us till the morning. His beasts were
furnished with comfortable pads, covered with linen, to ride upon, and
with halters instead of bridles, and we were prayed to let them have
their heads in the ascent, and not to try to guide them.

The elegant leisure of Valstagna (and in an Italian town nearly the
whole population is elegantly at leisure) turned out to witness the
departure of our expedition; the pretty little blonde wife of our
inn-keeper, who was to get dinner ready against our return, held up
her baby to wish us _boun viaggio_, and waved us adieu with the infant
as with a handkerchief; the chickens and children scattered to right
and left before our advance; and with Count Giovanni going splendidly
ahead on foot, and the Cimbrian bringing up the rear, we struck on
the broad rocky valley between the heights, and presently began the
ascent. It was a lovely morning; the sun was on the heads of the
hills, and the shadows clothed them like robes to their feet; and
I should be glad to feel here and now the sweetness, freshness,
and purity of the mountain air, that seemed to bathe our souls in a
childlike delight of life. A noisy brook gurgled through the valley;
the birds sang from the trees; the Alps rose, crest on crest, around
us; and soft before us, among the bald peaks showed the wooded
height where the Cimbrian village of Fozza stood, with a white chapel
gleamin