en. Yes, she repents, deeply, bitterly repents, her
fatal blunder. But it will not be her fault, the _Univers_ assures us,
if she have to repent such a blunder a second time. Let us hear the
priests speaking through one of the country papers in France:--"The wars
of religion were not deplorable catastrophes; these great butcheries
renewed the life of France. The incense cast away the smell of the
corpses, and psalms covered the noise of angry shouts. Holy water washed
away all the bloody stains. With the Inquisition, the most beautiful
weather succeeded to storms, and the fires that burned the heretics
shone like supernatural torches." The hand that wrote these lines would
more gladly light the faggot. Let only the present regime in France last
a few years, and the priests will again rejoice in seeing the colour of
heretic blood. There cannot and will not be peace in the world, they
say, till for every Protestant a gibbet or stake has been erected, and
not one man left to carry tidings to posterity that ever there was such
a thing as Protestantism on the earth.

CHAPTER VI.

FROM TURIN TO NOVARA.

At Turin begins Pilgrimage to Rome--Description of
_Diligence_--Dora Susina--Plain of Lombardy--Its Boundaries--Nursed
by the Alps--Lessons taught thereby--The Colina--Inauspicious
Sunset--The Road to Milan--The Po--Its Source--Tributaries and
Function--Evening--Home remembered in a Foreign Land--Inference
thence regarding Futurity--Thunderstorm among the
Alps--Thunderstorm on the Plain of Lombardy--Grandeur of the
Lightning--Enter Novara at Day-break.

I had two objects in view in crossing the Alps. The first was to visit
the land of the Vaudois; the second was to see Rome. The first of these
objects I had accomplished in part; the second remained to be
undertaken.

This plain of Piedmont was the richest my foot had ever trodden; but
often did I turn my eyes wistfully towards the Apennines, which, like a
veil, shut out the Italy of the Romans and the City of the Seven Hills.
At Turin, which the Po so sweetly waters, and over which the snow-clad
hills of the Swiss fling their noble shadows, properly begins my journey
to Rome.

I started in the _diligence_ for Milan about four of the afternoon of
the 21st October. Did you ever, reader, set foot in a _diligence_? It is
a castle mounted on wheels, rising storey upon storey to a fearful
height. It is roomy withal, and has apa