t was _Pere
Pascal_, by whom we were shewn every mark of politeness and attention,
which a man of the world could give, but administered with all that
humility and meekness, so becoming a man who had renounced it. He put us
in possession of a good room, with good beds; and as it was near night,
and very cold, he ordered a brazier of red-hot embers into our
apartment; and having sent for the cook of the strangers' kitchen, (for
there are four public kitchens) and ordered him to obey our commands, he
retired to evening _vespers_; after which he made us a short visit, and
continued to do so, two or three times every day, while we staid.
Indeed, I began to fear we staid too long, and told him so; but he
assured me the apartment was ours for a month or two, if we pleased.
During our stay, he admitted me into his apartments, and filled my box
with delicious Spanish snuff, and shewed us every attention we would
wish, and much more than, as _unrecommended_ strangers, we could expect.
All the poor who come here are fed gratis for three days, and all the
sick received in the hospital. Sometimes, on particular festivals, seven
thousand arrive in one day; but people of condition pay a reasonable
price for what they eat. There was before our apartment a long covered
gallery; and tho' we were in a deep recess of the rocks, which projected
wide and high on our right and left, we had in front a most extensive
view of the _world below_, and the more distant Mediterranean Sea. It
was a moon-light night; and, in spite of the cold, it was impossible to
be shut out of the enchanting lights and shades which her silver beams
reflected on the rude rocks above, beneath, and on all sides of
us.--Every thing was as still as death, till the sonorous convent bell
warned the Monks to midnight prayer. At two o'clock, we heard some of
the tinkling bells of the hermits' cells above give notice, that they
too were going to their devotion at the appointed hour: after which I
retired to my bed; but my mind was too much awakened to permit me to
sleep; I was impatient for the return of day-light, that I might proceed
still higher; for, miser like, tho' my _coffers were too full_, I
coveted more; and accordingly, after breakfast, we eagerly set our feet
to the first _round_ of the _hermit's ladder_; it was a stone one
indeed, but stood in all places dreadfully steep, and in many almost
perpendicular. After mounting up a vast chasm in the rock, yet full of
tre