How often should we hard, selfish men, thank God for the weaknesses of women!
VIII.
THE MURDER ON THE ALPS.
And so, with Mr. Pisgah on the road to glory, Mr. Simp on the smooth sea, Mr. Freckle in the debtor's jail, Mr. Risque behind his four-in-hand, and Mr. Lees in the charity grave, let us sit with the two remaining colonists in the cabriolet at Bellinzona; for it is the month of April, and they are to cross the great St. Gothard en route for Paris. Here is the scene: a gloomy stone building for the diligence company; two great yellow diligences, empty and unharnessed in the area before; one other diligence, packed full, with the horses' heads turned northward, and the blue-nosed Swiss clerk calling out the names of passengers; a half-dozen cabriolets looking at each other irresolutely and facing all possible ways; two score of unwashed loungers, in red neck-kerchiefs and velvet jackets, smoking rank, rakish, black cigars; several streets of equal crookedness and filthiness abutting against a grimy church, whence beggars, old women, and priests emerge continually; and far above all, as if suspended in the air, a grim, battlemented castle, a defence, as it seems, against the snowy mountains which march upon Bellinzona from every side to crush its orchards and vineyards and drown it in the marshes of Lago Maggiore.
"Diligenza compito!" cries the clerk, moving toward the waiting cabriolet—"Signore Hugenoto."
"Here!" replies a small, consequential-looking person, reconnoitring the interior of the vehicle.
"Le Signore Plaèdo!"
"Ci," responds a dark, erect gentleman, striding forward and saying, in clear Italian, "Are there no other passengers?"
"None," answered the clerk; "you will have a good time together; please remember the guard!"