d no longer dread our cruel enemy, and I cling with delight to the
oracular voice. Though strange, it will be sweet to mark the growth of your
little boy, and the development of Clara's young heart. In the midst of a
desert world, we are everything to them; and, if we live, it must be our
task to make this new mode of life happy to them. At present this is easy,
for their childish ideas do not wander into futurity, and the stinging
craving for sympathy, and all of love of which our nature is susceptible,
is not yet awake within them: we cannot guess what will happen then, when
nature asserts her indefeasible and sacred powers; but, long before that
time, we may all be cold, as he who lies in yonder tomb of ice. We need
only provide for the present, and endeavour to fill with pleasant images
the inexperienced fancy of your lovely niece. The scenes which now surround
us, vast and sublime as they are, are not such as can best contribute to
this work. Nature is here like our fortunes, grand, but too destructive,
bare, and rude, to be able to afford delight to her young imagination. Let
us descend to the sunny plains of Italy. Winter will soon be here, to
clothe this wilderness in double desolation; but we will cross the bleak
hill-tops, and lead her to scenes of fertility and beauty, where her path
will be adorned with flowers, and the cheery atmosphere inspire pleasure
and hope."

In pursuance of this plan we quitted Chamounix on the following day. We had
no cause to hasten our steps; no event was transacted beyond our actual
sphere to enchain our resolves, so we yielded to every idle whim, and
deemed our time well spent, when we could behold the passage of the hours
without dismay. We loitered along the lovely Vale of Servox; passed long
hours on the bridge, which, crossing the ravine of Arve, commands a
prospect of its pine-clothed depths, and the snowy mountains that wall it
in. We rambled through romantic Switzerland; till, fear of coming winter
leading us forward, the first days of October found us in the valley of La
Maurienne, which leads to Cenis. I cannot explain the reluctance we felt at
leaving this land of mountains; perhaps it was, that we regarded the Alps
as boundaries between our former and our future state of existence, and so
clung fondly to what of old we had loved. Perhaps, because we had now so
few impulses urging to a choice between two modes of action, we were
pleased to preserve the existence of one,