t had found the pension--a
pretty stone villa overlooking the lake, under the boughs of tall
walnut-trees, on the level of a high terrace. Laurel and holly hemmed it
in on one side, and southward spread a pleasant garden full of roses and
imperfectly ripening fig-trees. In the rear the vineyards climbed the
mountains in irregular breadths to the belt of walnuts, beyond which
were only forests and pastures. I heard the roar of the torrent that
foamed down the steep; the fountain plashed under the group of laurels
at the kitchen door; the roses dripped all round the house; and the lake
lapped its shores below. Decidedly there was a sense of wet.

The house, which had an Italian outside covered with jasmine and
wistarias, confessed the North within. There was a huge hall stove, not
yet heated, but on the hearth of the pleasant salon an acceptable fire
of little logs was purring. Beside it sat a lady reading, and at a table
her daughter was painting flowers. A little Italian, a very little
English, a good deal of French, helped me to understand that
mademoiselle the landlady was momentarily absent, that the season was
exceptionally bad, and that these ladies were glad of the sunshine which
we were apparently bringing with us. They spoke with those Suissesse
voices, which are the sweetest and most softly modulated voices in the
world, whether they come from the throat of peasant or of lady, and can
make a transaction in eggs and butter in the market-place as musical as
chanted verse. To the last these voices remained a delight, and the
memory of them made most Italian women's voices a pang when we heard
them afterwards.

V

At first we were the only people in the house besides these Swiss ladies
and their son and brother, but later there came two ladies from
Strasburg, and with them our circle was complete at the table and around
the evening lamp in the drawing-room. I am bound to say for the circle,
outside of ourselves, that it was a cultivated and even intellectual
company, with traits that provoked unusual sympathy and interest. But
those friendly people are quite their own property, and I have no
intention of compelling them to an involuntary celebrity in these pages,
much as I should like to impart their quality to my narrative. In the
Strasbourgeoises we encountered again that pathos of an insulted and
down-trodden nationality which had cast its melancholy over our Venice
of Austrian days. German by name and by o