At Lyons there was a scene of indescribable confusion.
Out of the hold
a man with a rope and hook was hauling baggage up a smooth board.
Three hundred people were sorting their goods without checks. Porters
were shouldering immense loads, four or five heavy trunks at once,
corded together, and stalking off Atlantean. Hatboxes, bandboxes, and
valises burst like a meteoric shower out of a crater. "_A moi, a
moi!_" was the cry, from old men, young women, soldiers,
shopkeepers, and _pretres_, scuffling and shoving together.
Careless at once of grammar and of grace, I pulled and shouted with
the best, till at length our plunder was caught, corded and poised on
an herculean neck. We followed in the wake, H. trembling lest the cord
should break, and we experience a pre-Alpine avalanche. At length,
however, we breathed more freely in rooms _au quatrieme of Hotel de
l'Univers_.
After dinner we drove to the cathedral. It was St. John's eve. "At
twelve o'clock to-night," said H., "the spirits of all who are to die
this year will appear to any who will go alone into the dark cathedral
and summon them"! We were charmed with the interior. Twilight hid all
the dirt, cobwebs, and tawdry tinsel; softened the outlines, and gave
to the immense arches, columns, and stained windows a strange and
thrilling beauty. The distant tapers, seeming remoter than reality,
the kneeling crowds, the heavy vesper chime, all combined to realize,
H. said, her dreams of romance more perfectly than ever before.
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