The guide was quite anxious about me; he seemed to consider a lady as
something that must necessarily break in two, or come apart, like a
German doll, if not managed with extremest care; and therefore to see
one bounding through bushes, leaping, and springing, and climbing over
rocks at such a rate, appeared to him the height of desperation.
The good, faithful soul wanted to keep me within orthodox limits, and
felt conscientiously bound to follow me wherever I went, and to offer
me his hand at every turn. I considered, on the whole, that I ought
not to blame him, since guides hold themselves responsible for life
and limb; and any accident to those under their charge is fatal to
their professional honor.
Going down, I held some conversation with him on matters and things in
general, and life in Chamouni in particular. He inquired with great
interest about America; which, throughout Europe, I find the working
classes regard as a kind of star in the west, portending something of
good to themselves. He had a son, he said, settled in America, near
St. Louis.
"And don't you want to go to America?" said I, after hearing him
praise the good land.
"Ah, no," he said, with a smile.
"Why not?" said I; "it is a much easier country to live in."
He gave a look at the circle of mountains around, and said, "I love
Chamouni." The good soul! I was much of his opinion. If I had been
born within sight of glorious Mont Blanc, with its apocalyptic clouds,
and store of visions, not all the fat pork and flat prairies of
Indiana and Ohio could tempt me. No wonder the Swiss die for their
native valleys! I would if I were they. I asked him about education.
He said his children went to a school kept by Catholic sisters, who
taught reading, writing, and Latin. The dialect of Chamouni is a
patois, composed of French and Latin. He said that provision was very
scarce in the winter. I asked how they made their living when there
were no travellers to be guided up Mont Blanc. He had a trade at which
he wrought in winter months, and his wife did tailoring.
I must not forget to say that the day before there had been some
confidential passages between us, which began by his expressing,
interrogatively, the opinion that "mademoiselle was a young lady, he
supposed." When mademoiselle had assured him, on the contrary, that
she was a venerable matron, mother of a thriving family, then followed
a little comparison of notes as to numbers. Madame he ascertained to
have six, and he had four, if my memory serves me, as it generally
does not in matters of figures.
