He had to tell his story all over again.
CHAPTER VII.
INNSBRUCK.
PICTURE to yourself an old cathedral-town in the midst of a valley about three miles across, hemmed in by magnificent mountains six to eight thousand feet high, from whose summits the wolves are said to look down into the very streets. The city stands on a deep, impetuous river—the Inn; and hence its name, Innsbruck, or Inn's Bridge.
This city is but of moderate extent; but few towns of its size contain, in the modern part, better and handsomer buildings; and its suburbs are remarkable for cleanliness and elegance. The old part of the city is picturesque enough: there you may see tumble-down old houses nodding with age, having rickety outside staircases leading to old, rickety wooden galleries or balconies; crumbling walls kept together with old timbers nailed outside in various quaint fashions; upper floors overhanging lower ones, and supported with rows of carved brackets, or by poles imbedded in the pavement below; antique gables, fantastically decorated, with grotesque heads on the spouts between them.
Many of these antiquated streets have low arcades, which afford capital shelter to women who sell fruit, cakes, cheeses, sausages, and get through a great deal of gossip. The shops are homely and primitive, with very few outward allurements to attract customers. They are mostly in the "general" line, and deal indifferently in groceries, medicines, straw-hats, coarse thread, ready-made garments, and old rags and bottles.
In these dwellings a great many generations have been born and brought up; have eaten, drunk, slept, talked over the news of the day, thought the world was coming to an end because of some matter which the next generation thought infinitely unimportant and succeeding generations have forgotten altogether;—marketed, made good bargains, bad bargains, grown poor, grown well-to-do in the world, fallen sick, got well again, gone to weddings and funerals, gone to church at six o'clock in the morning, made friends, made enemies, been disappointed in friends, lived down the slanders of enemies, found life a very hard battle, sometimes won it, sometimes not, resolved never to be deceived again, or to do a wrong or foolish thing any more, found that cheerfulness is a salve for many reverses, and contentment a great set-off against straitened means, remembered how much better everything was in their young days, grown old before they were aware of it, ailed a little, dropped aside and out of sight, except of the priest, doctor, and one or two old friends,—in short, been, and done, and felt, and enjoyed, and suffered, just like the rest of the world.