Then When
All Three - The River, The Road, And The Railway - - Have Got Over The
Great Step, A New Level Of The Valley Opens.
This is the way the road
comes into the south, and as I passed down to the lower valley, though
it was darkening into evening, something melted out of the mountain
air, there was content and warmth in the growing things, and I found
it was a place for vineyards.
So, before it was yet dark, I came into
Faido, and there I slept, having at last, after so many adventures,
crossed the threshold and occupied Italy.
Next day before sunrise I went out, and all the valley was adorned and
tremulous with the films of morning.
Now all of you who have hitherto followed the story of this great
journey, put out of your minds the Alps and the passes and the
snows - postpone even for a moment the influence of the happy dawn and
of that South into which I had entered, and consider only this truth,
that I found myself just out of Faido on this blessed date of God with
eight francs and forty centimes for my viaticum and temporal provision
wherewith to accomplish the good work of my pilgrimage.
Now when you consider that coffee and bread was twopence and a penny
for the maid, you may say without lying that I had left behind me the
escarpment of the Alps and stood upon the downward slopes of the first
Italian stream and at the summit of the entry road with _eight francs
ten centimes_ in my pocket - my body hearty and my spirit light, for
the arriving sun shot glory into the sky.
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