among his menagerie, that we sent the horses on
to Breglio, and complied with his eager desire of entertaining us at his
cabaret, if a hut the size of a tea-caddy, without another human
habitation visible for four miles, could be so called. He produced, to
our surprise, bread, milk, cheese, fresh curd, eggs, fruit, and
preserves, all clean and neatly served, and was equally surprised at our
giving him two francs a head, which tender he at first remonstrated
against with great naivete as too extravagant. The trouble which he had
taken in fetching most of these articles from a distance of five miles
appeared not to enter into this honest fellow's calculation. The French
were encamped in some force on the Col de Brouais at the time of the
session of the Comtat of Nice and of Savoy by the king of Sardinia in
1796. It was, also, about four years previous to our visit, infested by
a band of robbers, to whom its lofty situation afforded great
facilities: these were, however, swept off and conveyed to the galleys
by the exertions of the mountain patrole, of whom our host was one, and
the whole of the country is now perfectly safe and undisturbed. After
contemplating for a short time the principal summit of the Col de Tende,
which from this point appears at its full height, we dived into the
intervening valley of Breglio by a rapid descent, like the road into a
mine. The trout stream, which runs past this place in its way to
Vintimiglia, is such as would cause a traveller fond of fishing, to
regret the want of his rod and tackle. After leaving Breglio we ascended
the course of this river till it narrowed into a defile between two
rocks; on entering which the town of Saorgio appears, after a mile or
two, piled on the top and shelving side of the precipice to the right in
a singular manner. The architect who planned it must have taken his idea
from a colony of swallows' nests in a sand-rock, for it seems hardly
possible to get to or from it without wings: to judge of it from the
road, there is no room or footing for streets; a man might jump down the
chimney of his neighbour's house, or be dashed to pieces on its roof, by
leaping from his own ground floor; and the fall of a house in the upper
tier would probably open a clear downward passage to the valley. A
traveller desirous of making a sketch of what is an unique thing in its
way, would do well to get three hours start of his carriage from
Breglio,[56] and scramble among the hei