ere no clouds to reflect
the warm yellow light that hung about the west. But when the night
wrapped us in, the little lakes down below gleamed out like stars.

The crowd that pushed and fairly wedged itself into the _salle a
manger_, when dinner was announced at eight o'clock, was quite beyond
belief or computation. Everybody was tired, hungry, and impatient, after
the ride to the summit. For once, silver was at a discount. One of the
waiters was finally bribed to give us a private room, and slyly edged
our party into a pantry, where he brought us, at immense intervals, a
spoonful of soup and a hot plate apiece, after which, his resources
utterly failing, he acknowledged that he could do no more. The second
_table d'hote_ was served between the hours of ten and eleven at night,
and consisted of numerous courses, with a similarity of flavor,
suggesting one universal saucepan.

It was midnight when we finally gained our rooms, and threw ourselves
upon the uncomfortable beds. The linen was wet, rather than damp. The
only covering consisted of a single blanket, and the _duvet_ or down
pillow, always found upon the foot of continental beds.

We imagined that the sun would appear with the very earliest known worm,
and at least an hour before the most ambitious lark, and dared not close
our eyes, lest they should not open in time to greet him. At last,
however, sleep overpowered our fears. Katie's voice roused us.

"It is three o'clock," she said, "and growing light, and I believe
people are hurrying up the hill."

Profane persons should avoid the Righi; it is a place of terrible
temptation. "Good heavens!" we responded, "what kind of a sun can it be
to rise at such an hour?"

[Illustration: "Frowsy, sleepy, cross, and caring nothing whatever for
the sun, moon, or stars, we stood like a company of Bedlamites, ankle
deep in the wet grass upon the summit." Page 176.]

Our room was upon the ground floor. We pushed open the shutters and
peered out, facing an untimely Gabriel, just raising to his lips an
Alpine horn some six feet in length. Evidently the hour had arrived. We
thrust our feet into our boots, tied our hats under our chins, and ran
out to join a most ridiculous collection of animated scarecrows like
ourselves. Frowsy, sleepy, cross, and caring nothing whatever for the
sun, moon, or stars, we stood like a company of Bedlamites, ankle deep
in the wet grass upon the summit. No sun of irreproachable moral
character