me to seek shelter beneath the
boughs of a wide-spread chestnut-tree; and there, for the space of an
hour, I remained perfectly dry, though the big drops were falling all
around. Soon a continuous beating, as if of the fall of substances from
a considerable height on the ground, attracted my attention,--tap, tap,
tap. The sound told me that something was falling bigger and heavier
than the rain-drops; but the long grass prevented me at first seeing
what it was. A slight search, however, showed me that the tree beneath
which I stood was actually letting fall a shower of nuts. These nuts
were large and fully ripened. The breeze became slightly stronger, and
the fruit shower from the trees increased so much, that a soft muffled
sound rang through the whole wood. It was literally raining food. Some
millions of nuts must have fallen that day in the Val Lucerna. I saw the
young peasant girls coming from the chalets and farm-houses, to glean
beneath the boughs; and a short time sufficed to fill their sacks, and
send them back laden with the produce of the chestnut-tree. These nuts
are roasted and eaten as food; and very nutritious food they are. In all
the towns of northern Italy you see persons in the streets roasting them
in braziers over charcoal fires, and selling them to the people, to whom
they form no very inconsiderable part of their food. I have oftener than
once, on a long ride, breakfasted on them, with the help of a cluster of
grapes, or a few apples. This was the manna of the Waldenses. And how
often have the persecuted Vaudois, when driven from their homes, and
compelled to seek refuge in those high altitudes where the vine does not
grow, subsisted for days and weeks upon the produce of the
chestnut-tree! I could not but admire in this the wise arrangement of
Him who had prepared these valleys as the future abode of his Church.
Not only had He taught the earth to yield her corn, and the hills wine,
but even the skies bread. Bread was rained around their caves and
hiding-places, plenteous as the manna of old; and the Vaudois, like the
Israelites, had but to gather and eat.

I came also to the conclusion, that the land which the Lord had given to
the Waldenses was a "large" as well as a "good" land. It is only of late
that the Vaudois have been restricted to the three valleys I have named;
but even taking their country as at present defined, its superficial
area is by no means so inconsiderable as it is apt to be a