ad disappeared one
by one, weary with the excursions of the day, until no one was left in
the grand salon but one English traveller playing silently at backgammon
with his wife, his innumerable daughters, in brown-holland aprons with
bibs, engaged in copying notices of an approaching evangelical service,
and a young Swede sitting before the fireplace, in which was a good fire
of blazing logs. The latter was pale, hollow-cheeked, and gazed at the
flame with a gloomy air as he drank his grog of kirsch and seltzer.
From time to time some belated traveller crossed the salon, with soaked
gaiters and streaming mackintosh, looked at the great barometer hanging
to the wall, tapped it, consulted the mercury as to the weather of the
following day, and went off to bed in consternation. Not a word;
no other manifestations of life than the crackling of the fire, the
pattering on the panes, and the angry roll of the Arve under the arches
of its wooden bridge, a few yards distant from the hotel.

Suddenly the door of the salon opened, a porter in a silver-laced coat
came in, carrying valises and rugs, with four shivering Alpinists behind
him, dazzled by the sudden change from icy darkness into warmth and
light.

"_Boudiou!_ what weather!.."

"Something to eat, _zou!_"

"Warm the beds, _que!_"

They all talked at once from the depths of their mufflers and ear-pads,
and it was hard to know which to obey, when a short stout man, whom the
others called "_presidain_" enforced silence by shouting more loudly
than they.

"In the first place, give me the visitors' book," he ordered. Turning it
over with a numbed hand, he read aloud the names of all who had been at
the hotel for the last week: "'Doctor Schwanthaler and madame.' Again!..
'Astier-Rehu of the French Academy... '" He deciphered thus two or three
pages, turning pale when he thought he saw the name he was in search
of. Then, at the end, flinging the book on the table with a laugh of
triumph, the squat man made a boyish gambol quite extraordinary in one
of his bulky shape: "He is not here, _ve!_ he has n't come... And yet
he must have stopped here if he had... Done for! Coste-calde...
lagadigadeou!.. quick! to our suppers, children!.. "And the worthy
Tartarin, having bowed to the ladies, marched to the dining-room,
followed by the famished and tumultuous delegation.

Ah, yes! the delegation, all of them, even Bravida himself... Is it
possible? come now!.. But--just think wha