at intervals. There are not many busier spots than Chamouni at early
morning in the height of the season.

Our friends soon left the tumult and confusion behind them, and were
skirting the pleasant meadows outside of the town. Passing by the way of
the English church, they crossed to the opposite bank of the Arve, and
in a few minutes gained the hamlet lying at the foot of Montanvert. Then
the guide took the bridle of Miss Ruth's mule and the ascent began. The
road stretches up the mountain in a succession of zigzags with sharp
turns. Here and there the path is quarried out of the begrudging solid
rock; in places the terrace is several yards wide and well wooded, but
for the most part it is a barren shelf with a shaggy wall rising
abruptly on one hand and a steep slope descending on the other. Higher
up, these slopes become quite respectable precipices. A dozen turns,
which were accomplished in unbroken silence, brought the party to an
altitude of several hundred feet above the level.

"I--I don't know that I wholly like it," said Miss Ruth, holding on to
the pommel of her saddle and looking down into the valley, checkered
with fields and criss-crossed with shining rivulets. "Why do the mules
persist in walking on the very edge?"

"That is a trick they get from carrying panniers. You are supposed to be
a pannier, and the careful animal doesn't want to brush you off against
the rocks. See this creature of mine; he has that hind hoof slipping
over the precipice all the while. But he'll not slip; he's as sure-
footed as a chamois, and has no more taste for tumbling off the cliff
than you have. These mules are wonderfully intelligent. Observe how
cautiously they will put foot on a loose stone, feeling all around it."