r, some twenty-six
miles distant from Abries; and as it was necessary that we should walk
the distance, the greater part of the road being merely a track,
scarcely practicable for mules, we were up betimes in the morning, and
on our way. The sun had scarcely risen above the horizon. The mist
was still hanging along the mountain-sides, and the stillness of the
scene was only broken by the murmur of the Guil running in its rocky
bed below. Passing through the hamlet of Monta, where the French
douane has its last frontier station, we began the ascent; and soon,
as the sun rose and the mists cleared away, we saw the profile of the
mountain up which we were climbing cast boldly upon the range behind
us on the further side of the valley. A little beyond the ravine of
the Combe de la Croix, along the summit of which the road winds, we
reached the last house within the French frontier--a hospice, not very
inviting in appearance, for the accommodation of travellers. A little
further is the Col, and passing a stone block carved with the
fleur-de-lis and cross of Savoy, we crossed the frontier of France and
entered Italy.

On turning a shoulder of the mountain, we looked down upon the head of
the valley of the Pelice, a grand and savage scene. The majestic,
snow-capped Monte Viso towers up on the right, at the head of the
valley, amidst an assemblage of other great mountain masses. From its
foot seems to steal the river Pelice, now a quiet rivulet, though in
winter a raging torrent. Right in front, lower down the valley, is the
rocky defile of Mirabouc, a singularly savage gorge, seemingly rent
asunder by some tremendous convulsion of nature; beyond and over which
extends the valley of the Pelice, expanding into that of the Po, and
in the remote distance the plains of Piedmont; while immediately
beneath our feet, as it were, but far below, lies a considerable
breadth of green pasture, the Bergerie of Pra, enclosed on all sides
by the mountains over which we look.

The descent from the Col down into the Pra is very difficult, in some
places almost precipitous--far more abrupt than on the French side,
where the incline up to the summit is comparatively easy.

The zigzag descends from one rock to another, along the face of a
shelving slope, by a succession of notches (from which the footpath is
not inappropriately termed _La Coche_) affording a very insecure
footing for the few mules which occasionally cross the pass. Dr. Gilly
c