various imposing points of view to a spectator traversing the public walks which embellish the outskirts. But the streets are narrow and dirty-the piazzas more convenient for a season of rain than prepossessing to the stranger's eye-and the castle, formerly the residence of the Dukes of Savoy, though it serves by its venerable tower and gateways to remind us of the past importance of this little capital, retains nothing in its interior arrangements at all worthy of its present use as a palace belonging to the King of Sardinia.

July 19.-Our road on leaving Chambery lay through a wide and fertile valley, intervening between the two chains of the Beauges and the Grenier. The position of Montmélian is very singular-it stands at the foot of a steep rock, and its buildings are confined within a small space. On a stupendous eminence stands the citadel; naturally so strong, and so formidable from its command of the mountain passes, as formerly to have obtained for this small town the appellation of one of the keys of Savoy, it being very near to the frontiers of Dauphiny. The Isere, in a broad and rapid stream, flows past it, forming many islands, small and large. From the parapets of a bridge (partly of stone, partly of wood) thrown over this river, we beheld some of the grandest of scenery:

"Above me are the Alps

"The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls

"Have pinnacled in the clouds their snowy scalps,

"And thron'd eternity in icy halls

"Of cold sublimity."

The sun was just appearing over them in all the splendour of a cloudless morning, as we gazed at

the magnificent spectacle. At that fresh and invigorating hour, the Savoyards of both sexes were going to their labour-in general they are a stout active racecivil even to extreme respectfulness of deportmentthough for the most part exhibiting the squalid signs of poverty-their habitations wretched-and the goitres* horribly disfiguring many of them. Little waggons,

suited to mountainous paths, drawn by oxen and cows, and usually laden with hay or green clover, constitute almost the only kind of vehicle that we meet with in these districts. Now and then a ruined castle crowning the height of some beetling cliff; and lower down some modern seignorial seats occasionally discover themselves. The first range of hills on our left is, decked with pastures and foliage: the fruits of agricultural labour are plainly visible at so high an elevation as from eight hundred to a thousand feet above the level of the river. Lifting up our eyes towards these farms in the air, we are puzzled to imagine how the people can get there to use the spade, and sow with grain their allotted patches of productive soil. The valley of the Isere, besides being rich in meadows and corn fields, is beautifully wooded. The main road is excellent; and vegetative richness re

• Goitres is a name given to those guttural tumours and excrescences, which are more abundant in some districts of the Valais, and also in the vallies of Savoy and Piedmont than perhaps in any other part of the globe. Mr. Coxe in his judicious remarks on this subject, after rejecting the notion that snow water occasions these swellings and wens on the throat, gives it as his opinion, founded on his own observations and on positive facts, that the primary cause of goitres is to be traced to "the springs which supply drink to the natives, being impregnated with a calcareous matter, called in Switzerland tuf."-See Travels in Switzerland, vol. 1, letter 35, p. 398.

H

warding the husbandman's toil, gives to these regions a rural freshness unimpaired either by the sun's hot reflexion or by the wintry influence of the surrounding summits.

Hemp, flax, Indian corn, oats, potatoes, clover, and rye are grown in abundance; and the state of the crops was such as to promise these poor folks the blessings of a plentiful harvest. A line of hills, which in England we should consider of prodigious height, and which are justly entitled to the name of mountains, we see covered with all these varieties of produce, and enriched with plantations of chesnut, beech, walnuts, and oaks; whilst beyond and far above them rises another range that exhibits the dazzling whiteness of its glacier canopies.After passing through the hamlet of Maltaverne, and crossing the rivulet Gelon, our road suddenly changes from a north-easterly to a south-easterly direction, and we find ourselves coasting the left bank of the Arc, whose impetuous current of melted snow now rushes in foam among rocks and shallows; now rolls in eddying waves along the deeper passages of its frightful channel: Decursu rapido de montibus altis

Dat sonitum spumosi.

Aiguebelle is situated on this important tributary to the Isere, and at the very base of the mountains, two chains of which, meeting there, reduce the valley to the narrow limits of a pass, through which alone we are to find our intended entrance into Italy. The town consists of one broad street, and has a respectable appearance, especially as compared with the wretched places we traversed this morning. The cards of the innkeepers here

bear a double address; on one side in the language of Italy, and on the other in that of France. The inhabitants all speak remarkably good French, and they have a patois of their own besides. It is singular that we meet with less annoyance from beggars in this poor country than assailed us in the rich one we have so lately quitted. Mendicants there are in Savoy, but they are pitiable and inoffensive. In France they are impudent and disgusting. About two miles south-east of Aiguebelle we cross the Arc over a bridge of stone, called Pont d'Argent, in face of perpendicular rocks of vast height, at the foot of which is the village of Argentine. Here the features of the Alps, into whose very heart we are now penetrating by the valley of Maurienne, become a perfect climax of terrible sublimity. The surrounding scenery changes in a wonderful manner, and always with an effect so rapidly produced, and so complete in its result as to excite in the mind of the beholder the most lively emotions of surprise and gratification. The road is a raised causeway, subject apparently to injury from the inundations of the river. That horrible deformity, the goitrous excrescence on the neck makes an augmented display. In reference to this peculiar affliction (the scourge of Savoy and the Valais) Shakspeare in his play of the Tempest makes Gonzalo say to the King of Naples,

"Who would believe that there were mountaineers

“Dewlapp'd like bulls; whose throats had hanging at them "Wallets of flesh?"

Such revolting spectacles, however, answering at least to the latter part of this apparently exaggerated description, do indeed pain the eye and grieve the very soul of the

traveller as he journies in these parts. The women seem to be yet more severely affected by it than the men. One middle-aged female, in particular we noticed, as having a wen covering the whole front of her neck, of several pounds weight.*

As seen from our line of march through this tremendous pass, the different villages, with their churches and cabins, look like the dwellings of pigmies, hung in midair. In some places the road is scarcely of sufficient width for two carriages abreast, with impending rocks threatening on our left hand, and a naked precipice on our right. Presently the defile opens; the mountains again widely separate from each other, and a valley presents itself which, as well as every fertile spot however high its situation, the Savoyard cultivates with industry and success.

At nine o'clock A. M. the sun's rays were melting the snows on the peak of an adjacent mountain to our right, the steam of which ascended in a cloud, whilst the water was running down to increase the tide of the Arc, here confined within very steep banks, scarcely thirty feet across. At a lone inn, called Grande Maison we stopped to breakfast. The repast set before us though simple was good, but our hostess omitted not to charge à la Française. Of her honesty and attention, however, truth and justice suggest that the following trait should be

*Mr. Coxe says 66 during my expedition through the Vallais and other parts of Switzerland, I noticed some goitres of all proportions, from the size of a walnut to almost the bigness of a peck loaf. These tumours when they increase to a considerable magnitude, check respiration, and render those who are afflicted with them exceedingly indolent and languid." -Letters on Switzerland, v. 1, p. 407.