manage his point as he could; - and, for mine, I walked directly
into the house.

The family consisted of an old grey-headed man and his wife, with
five or six sons and sons-in-law, and their several wives, and a

joyous genealogy out of them.
They were all sitting down together to their lentil-soup; a large

wheaten loaf was in the middle of the table; and a flagon of wine
at each end of it promised joy through the stages of the repast: -

'twas a feast of love.
The old man rose up to meet me, and with a respectful cordiality

would have me sit down at the table; my heart was set down the
moment I enter'd the room; so I sat down at once like a son of the

family; and to invest myself in the character as speedily as I
could, I instantly borrowed the old man's knife, and taking up the

loaf, cut myself a heartyluncheon; and, as I did it, I saw a
testimony in every eye, not only of an honest welcome, but of a

welcome mix'd with thanks that I had not seem'd to doubt it.
Was it this? or tell me, Nature, what else it was that made this

morsel so sweet, - and to what magic I owe it, that the draught I
took of their flagon was so delicious with it, that they remain

upon my palate to this hour?
If the supper was to my taste, - the grace which followed it was

much more so.
THE GRACE.

When supper was over, the old man gave a knock upon the table with
the haft of his knife, to bid them prepare for the dance: the

moment the signal was given, the women and girls ran altogether
into a back apartment to tie up their hair, - and the young men to

the door to wash their faces, and change their sabots; and in three
minutes every soul was ready upon a little esplanade before the

house to begin. - The old man and his wife came out last, and
placing me betwixt them, sat down upon a sofa of turf by the door.

The old man had some fifty years ago been no mean performer upon
the vielle, - and at the age he was then of, touch'd it well enough

for the purpose. His wife sung now and then a little to the tune,
- then intermitted, - and join'd her old man again, as their

children and grand-children danced before them.
It was not till the middle of the second dance, when, from some

pauses in the movements, wherein they all seemed to look up, I
fancied I could distinguish an elevation of spirit different from

that which is the cause or the effect of simple jollity. In a
word, I thought I beheld Religion mixing in the dance: - but, as I

had never seen her so engaged, I should have look'd upon it now as
one of the illusions of an imagination which is eternally

misleading me, had not the old man, as soon as the dance ended,
said, that this was their constant way; and that all his life long

he had made it a rule, after supper was over, to call out his
family to dance and rejoice; believing, he said, that a cheerful

and contented mind was the best sort of thanks to heaven that an
illiterate peasant could pay, -

Or a learned prelate either, said I.
THE CASE OF DELICACY.

When you have gained the top of Mount Taurira, you run presently
down to Lyons: - adieu, then, to all rapid movements! 'Tis a

journey of caution; and it fares better with sentiments, not to be
in a hurry with them; so I contracted with a voiturin to take his

time with a couple of mules, and convoy me in my own chaise safe to
Turin, through Savoy.

Poor, patient, quiet, honest people! fear not: your poverty, the
treasury of your simple virtues, will not be envied you by the

world, nor will your valleys be invaded by it. - Nature! in the
midst of thy disorders, thou art still friendly to the scantiness

thou hast created: with all thy great works about thee, little hast
thou left to give, either to the scythe or to the sickle; - but to

that little thou grantest safety and protection; and sweet are the
dwellings which stand so shelter'd.

Let the way-worn traveller vent his complaints upon the sudden
turns and dangers of your roads, - your rocks, - your precipices; -

the difficulties of getting up, - the horrors of getting down, -
mountains impracticable, - and cataracts, which roll down great

stones from their summits, and block his road up. - The peasants
had been all day at work in removing a fragment of this kind

between St. Michael and Madane; and, by the time my voiturin got to
the place, it wanted full two hours of completing before a passage

could any how be gain'd: there was nothing but to wait with
patience; - 'twas a wet and tempestuous night; so that by the

delay, and that together, the voiturin found himself obliged to put
up five miles short of his stage at a little decent kind of an inn

by the roadside.
I forthwith took possession of my bedchamber - got a good fire -

order'd supper; and was thanking heaven it was no worse, when a
voiture arrived with a lady in it and her servant maid.

As there was no other bed-chamber in the house, the hostess, -
without much nicety, led them into mine, telling them, as she

usher'd them in, that there was nobody in it but an English
gentleman; - that there were two good beds in it, and a closet

within the room which held another. The accent in which she spoke
of this third bed, did not say much for it; - however, she said

there were three beds and but three people, and she durst say, the
gentleman would do anything to accommodate matters. - I left not

the lady a moment to make a conjecture about it - so instantly made
a declaration that I would do anything in my power.

As this did not amount to an absolutesurrender of my bed-chamber,
I still felt myself so much the proprietor, as to have a right to

do the honours of it; - so I desired the lady to sit down, -
pressed her into the warmest seat, - called for more wood, -

desired the hostess to enlarge the plan of the supper, and to
favour us with the very best wine.

The lady had scarce warm'd herself five minutes at the fire, before
she began to turn her head back, and give a look at the beds; and

the oftener she cast her eyes that way, the more they return'd
perplexd; - I felt for her - and for myself: for in a few minutes,

what by her looks, and the case itself, I found myself as much
embarrassed as it was possible the lady could be herself.

That the beds we were to lie in were in one and the same room, was
enough simply by itself to have excited all this; - but the

position of them, for they stood parallel, and so very close to
each other as only to allow space for a small wicker chair betwixt

them, rendered the affair still more oppressive to us; - they were
fixed up moreover near the fire; and the projection of the chimney

on one side, and a large beam which cross'd the room on the other,
formed a kind of recess for them that was no way favourable to the

nicety of our sensations: - if anything could have added to it, it
was that the two beds were both of them so very small, as to cut us

off from every idea of the lady and the maid lying together; which
in either of them, could it have been feasible, my lying beside

them, though a thing not to be wish'd, yet there was nothing in it
so terrible which the imagination might not have pass'd over

without torment.
As for the little room within, it offer'd little or no consolation

to us: 'twas a damp, cold closet, with a half dismantled window-
shutter, and with a window which had neither glass nor oil paper in

it to keep out the tempest of the night. I did not endeavour to
stifle my cough when the lady gave a peep into it; so it reduced

the case in course to this alternative - That the lady should
sacrifice her health to her feelings, and take up with the closet

herself, and abandon the bed next mine to her maid, - or that the
girl should take the closet, &c., &c.

The lady was a Piedmontese of about thirty, with a glow of health
in her cheeks. The maid was a Lyonoise of twenty, and as brisk and