e five
legions camped all round it and almost within view--Salomon and Joani to
the north, Castanet and Roland to the south; and when Julien had
finished his famous work, the devastation of the High Cevennes, which
lasted all through October and November, 1703, and during which four
hundred and sixty villages and hamlets were, with fire and pickaxe,
utterly subverted, a man standing on this eminence would have looked
forth upon a silent, smokeless, and dispeopled land. Time and man's
activity have now repaired these ruins; Cassagnas is once more roofed
and sending up domestic smoke; and in the chestnut gardens, in low and
leafy corners, many a prosperous farmer returns, when the day's work is
done, to his children and bright hearth. And still it was perhaps the
wildest view of all my journey. Peak upon peak, chain upon chain of
hills ran surging southward, channeled and sculptured by the winter
streams, feathered from head to foot with chestnuts, and here and there
breaking out into a coronal of cliffs. The sun, which was still far from
setting, sent a drift of misty gold across the hill-tops, but the
valleys were already plunged in a profound and quiet shadow.

A very old shepherd, hobbling on a pair of sticks, and wearing a black
cap of liberty, as if in honour of his nearness to the grave, directed
me to the road for St. Germain de Calberte. There was something solemn
in the isolation of this infirm and ancient creature. Where he dwelt,
how he got upon this high ridge, or how he proposed to get down again,
were more than I could fancy. Not far off upon my right was the famous
Plan de Font Morte, where Poul with his Armenian sabre slashed down the
Camisards of Seguier. This, methought, might be some Rip van Winkle of
the war, who had lost his comrades, fleeing before Poul, and wandered
ever since upon the mountains. It might be news to him that Cavalier had
surrendered, or Roland had fallen fighting with his back against an
olive. And while I was thus working on my fancy, I heard him hailing in
broken tones, and saw him waving me to come back with one of his two
sticks. I had already got some way past him; but, leaving Modestine once
more, retraced my steps.

Alas, it was a very commonplace affair. The old gentleman had forgot to
ask the pedlar what he sold, and wished to remedy this neglect.

I told him sternly, "Nothing."

"Nothing?" cried he.

I repeated "Nothing," and made off.

It's odd to think of, but pe