The snow, hail and wind have as yet known no intermission; the bad air arrives under the door and the icy wind in at the window. On account of the horses, whom eight posts like those we have travelled to-day must necessarily have fatigued, we shall remain to-morrow. Were the weather fair the situation of the inn would be lovely; but when the torrents of rain dash as now against windows which will not close, and the wind waves the thin muslin to and fro, and the cold of these lantern-like rooms resists even such fires as I have made, the inn at Lanslebourg is the very perfection of wretchedness.
Still rain and wind, but with glimpses of pale sunshine which predict finer weather. The bad air prevented sleep, and the blast which sung round my head, whirling away the flimsy curtains, bestowed a cold on my chest, which shall not however detain me. The horses have passed the day in the luxury of rolling, and enjoyment of the mountain hay, of which the pastures near this produce the sweetest in the world.
Left early, for the clouds, though they threatened, dropped no rain, and took the road to Modane, the descent as far as Formignone being rapid, skirting the Arc and its pine-forests, the cold head of Mont Cenis towering behind. The weather grew milder and the scenery more lovely; larch and other trees not evergreen appearing beneath the masses of dark fir, and red and yellow with the tints of autumn, have a richness in their hues I never saw equalled elsewhere.
Verney, where Walpole's dog perished, is a beautifully situated village. The pine-forests, which the wolves inhabited of yore, have retreated since that time, and now clothe only the mountain on the left, before which the little church whose bell was tolling for mass, and whither the country people were hastening in their holiday clothes, stands on its green mound alone.
Ere arriving at Modane, we passed the superb fort of Lesseillon, which tier above tier crowns crag above crag, with its batteries ready to sweep road and valley. The range of cliffs to the right among which it rises are wild and bare. In the depths of the gorge under it, the Arc, narrowed to a streamlet, cuts its passage between walls of rock; the stone arch of the Pont du Diable spanning the chasm, and nearer the fort a frailer wooden bridge flung with yet more hardihood. The mountain to the left, at whose base was our road, hanging over the savage defile, was clothed with a forest, and dashing down, or trickling to our feet, cascade and torrent wound among the roots of fir and larch, or bounded over their branches. The only neighbour of the fortress is a wretched village; it must be a melancholy garrison: for some time it made a fine object in the background with the snows of Mont Cenis and his companions.