I am sure
he was an excellent person, and might have been trusted with any
number of skins, branded or unbranded. It is nearly a hundred
years ago since that little gray marmot's skin was tanned in the
Val Sesia; but the wretch will not lie quiet in his grave; he
walks, and has haunted me once a month or so any time this ten
years past. I will see if I cannot lay him by prevailing on him to
haunt some one or other of my readers.
CHAPTER XX - Sanctuary on Monte Bisbino
But to return to S. Cristoforo. In the Middle Ages there was a
certain duke who held this part of the country and was notorious
for his exactions. One Christmas eve when he and his whole
household had assembled to their devotions, the people rose up
against them and murdered them inside the church. After this
tragedy, the church was desecrated, though monuments have been put
up on the outside walls even in recent years. There is a fine bit
of early religious sculpture over the door, and the traces of a
fresco of Christ walking upon the water, also very early.
Returning to the road by a path of a couple of hundred yards, we
descended to cross the river, and then ascended again to Morbio
Superiore. The view from the piazza in front of the church is very
fine, extending over the whole Mendrisiotto, and reaching as far as
Varese and the Lago Maggiore. Below is Morbio Inferiore, a place
of singular beauty. A couple of Italian friends were with us, one
of them Signor Spartaco Vela, son of Professor Vela. He called us
into the church and showed us a beautiful altar-piece - a Madonna
with saints on either side, apparently moved from some earlier
church, and, as we all agreed, a very fine work, though we could
form no idea who the artist was.
From Morbio Superiore the ascent is steep, and it will take half-
an-hour or more to reach the level bit of road close to Sagno.
This, again, commands the most exquisite views, especially over
Como, through the trunks of the trees. Then comes Sagno itself,
the last village of the Canton Ticino and close to the Italian
frontier. There is no inn with sleeping accommodation here, but if
there was, Sagno would be a very good place to stay at. They say
that some of its inhabitants sometimes smuggle a pound or two of
tobacco across the Italian frontier, hiding it in the fern close to
the boundary, and whisking it over the line on a dark night, but I
know not what truth there is in the allegation; the people struck
me as being above the average in respect of good looks and good
breeding - and the average in those parts is a very high one.
