Beneath them, as they went, the great plain of Lombardy opened to their view,—that glorious expanse of wood and waving corn, with towns and villages dotting the surface; while directly below, at their very feet, as it were, stretched the Lake of Como, its wooded banks reflected in the waveless water. What a scene of beauty was that fair lake, with its leafy promontories, its palaces, and its Alpine background, all basking under the deep blue of an Italian sky; while perfumes of orange groves, of acacias and magnolias, rose like an incense in the air, and floated upwards!
Even the hard nature of the wild Hungarian—the rude dweller beside the dark-rolling Danube or the rapid Theiss—could not survey the scene unmoved; and, dismounting from their saddles, the hussars moved stealthily along, as if invading the precincts of some charmed region. Frank was in no haste to leave so picturesque a spot, and resolved to halt for the night beneath the shade of some tall chestnut-trees, where they had sought shelter from the noonday sun. Como was at his feet, straight down beneath him was the wooded promontory of Bellagio, and in the distance rose the Swiss Alps, now tinged with the violet hue of sunset Never was there a scene less likely to suggest thoughts of war or conflict If the eye turned from the dark woods of the Brianza to the calm surface of the lake, everything wore the same aspect of peaceful security. Figures could be seen seated or walking on the terraces of the villas; gorgeously decked gondolas stole over the bay, their gold-embroidered ensigns trailing lazily in the water. Equipages and troops of horsemen wound their way along the leafy lanes; not a sight nor sound that did not portend ease and enjoyment.
With all Frank's ardor for adventure, he was not sorry at all this. His orders to fall back, in case he saw signs of a formidable movement, were too peremptory to be disobeyed, and he would have turned away with great reluctance from a picture so temptingly inviting. Now there was no need to think of this. The great dome of the Milan Cathedral showed on the horizon that he was not thirty miles from the Austrian headquarters, while all around and about him vouched for perfect quiet and tranquillity.
Tempted by a bright moonlight and the delicious freshness of the night, he determined to push on as far as Lecco, where he could halt for the day, and by another night-march reach Milan. Descending slowly, they gained the plain before midnight, and now found themselves on that narrow strip of road which, escarped from the rock, tracks the margin of the lake for miles. Here Frank learned from a peasant that Lecco was much too distant to reach before daybreak, and determined to halt at Varenna, only a few miles off.
This man was the only one they had come up with for several hours, and both Frank and Ravitzky remarked the alarm and terror he exhibited as he suddenly found himself in the midst of them.
“Our cloth here,” said the cadet, bitterly, “is so allied to thoughts of tyranny and cruelty, one is not to wonder at the terror of that poor peasant.”
“He said Varenna was about five miles off,” said Frank, who did not like the spirit of the last remark, and wished to change the topic.
“Scarcely so much; but that as the road was newly mended, we should be obliged to walk our cattle.”
“Did you remark the fellow while we were talking,—how his eye wandered over our party? I could almost swear that I saw him counting our numbers.”
“I did not notice that,” said the cadet, with an almost sneering tone. “I saw that the poor fellow looked stealthily about from side to side, and seemed most impatient to be off.”