ith ball,
chipped and notched, and carved with odd names. By the time you have
reached it, Pierre has told you it was set on the spot where, many a
long year ago, the Marquis de Chavannes was found, deluged in blood and
quite dead; he had been pierced through the heart by a treacherous
rival, who had joined his hunting party, and who basely took advantage
of a moment when, in ardent pursuit of the grisly boar, De Chavannes was
utterly unsuspicious of his evil intentions.

A little further on is another cross, at the entrance of a deep, dark
gorge: What does that cross mean? "That one is called La Croix
Mordienne, Monsieur; at its foot our forefathers knelt to recommend
their souls to God, before they ventured their lives in the dangers of
Les Grand Ravins, where too many had been greeted by the bullet or the
dagger." The granite steps of this cross--this cross which was erected
for worship--are worn deep by the knees of suppliants for protection
against the cruelty of their fellow-men; and it is even a more
melancholy monument of the ferocity of those times, than the one which
records the assassination of the unsuspecting Marquis de Chavannes.

Pursue your way, and, crossing a wild and marshy heath, you notice a
lonely house surrounded by thorny broom, the aspect of which is
forbidding, though it is gaily painted. Surely, you think, it can only
be the gloomy tales with which my guide has beguiled this morning's
walk, that make one suspect there is a history connected with that
house; and you ask him its name. "That is Chanty, Monsieur; that was
once an inn. The landlord was a frightful character, even for his own
times. When the doomed traveller halted at his door to seek shelter from
the storm, or to refresh himself and steed the better to encounter the
scorching heat, the villain drugged his wine, and, at nightfall,
following him into the forest, despatched and robbed his then helpless
victim. Or perhaps he would detain him with stirring tales of forest
life, till he found himself too late prudently to go further that night;
and, on his guard against every person but the right, ordering a bed of
his treacherous host, would fall into that slumber from which the
miscreant took safe means to prevent his ever awaking. When, after many
years of impunity in the commission of these fearful crimes, the
officers of justice were at last set upon him, and his house was
searched, in the cellar were found fifteen headless skeleto