There was a rest of an hour at the Tête Noir inn at noon, shut in by the firs, and rocks, and mountains, then we went on to Argentière, where we gladly exchanged the horses and mules for some low, open carts with a couple of villagers in blue blouses for drivers. In these we accomplished the remaining three or four miles, and made a triumphal entry into Chamouni.
It was late in the afternoon when we crawled up the narrow, thronged street to the Hôtel Royal, from which the English, French, and American flags were flying. The clouds had dropped lower and lower, until a fine mist was beginning to deepen into rain, and the guides and tourists detained in the village fairly jostled each other at the intersection of the two principal streets, which seemed to form the village Exchange. The mire of the streets was thickly stamped with hoof-prints and the marks from the nails that stud the shoe-soles of the mountain climbers. Line after line of doleful looking objects, which might prove Egyptian mummies when unwrapped, were being lifted from still more sorry looking beasts before the door of the hotel, and assaying to mount the steps, with a stiffness and angularity of movement in which we all sympathized.
Indeed, after dinner, when a bright fire was lighted in the long _salon_ where the various parties gathered to read, write, look over stereoscopic views, or chat among themselves, it was amusing, as well as pitiable to observe the abortive attempts at ease and flexibility as these individuals crossed the polished floor, to hear the groans smothered to sighs as they resumed their seats. "Mules!" whispered the girls, nudging each other, and mindful of the delight which misery is said to find in company.
All the next day the rain dripped down upon the village from the heavy clouds that hid the mountains. Everybody improved the opportunity to write letters, or yawned over the books scattered about the _salon_. Among them was a well-thumbed copy of "Artemus Ward, His Book." At the foot of each page the local allusions of the jokes were explained, I remember. Out in the street, umbrellas were dodging about from one shop to another. These rainy days, though a loss to the guides, are harvest times for the shopkeepers. Photographs and stereoscopic views of the mountains, the glaciers, and daring climbers hanging on by their eyelids, abound here, with any amount of wood and chamois (?) horn carving and crystal ornaments. Speaking of chamois-horn, if you expect to see in Switzerland--as you do in geographies--chamois perched upon every crag, preparatory to bounding from peak to peak, you will be grievously disappointed. Not a chamois will greet your eyes. We passed--I have forgotten where--a pen in which, by paying a certain sum, we might look upon a veritable live chamois; but we had no desire to see the incarnation of liberty thus degraded.