236 STRANGE THOUGHTS. 



being. Then, again, I saw before me the forms 

 and figures of many I had left some a few hours, 

 some a few weeks before. Was I to see them again 

 or not? The question again and again repeated 

 itself, and the oftener, perhaps, from a feeling of 

 presumption I experienced, in even whispering to 

 myself that I decidedly should. ' Si on glisse, on 

 est perdu !' How horribly forcible and true did 

 these words now appear, on what a slender thread 

 was life held ! A trifling deviation in the position 

 of a foot, and it was over. I had but to make one 

 single step in advance, and I was in another state 

 of existence. Such were a few of the mental feel- 

 ings which suggested themselves, but others of a 

 physical nature occurred. I had eaten nothing 

 since leaving the old convent in which I had spent 

 the preceding night, and the keen air on the moun- 

 tains had so sharpened my appetite, that by the 

 time I had reached the summit we had just quitted 

 I felt not only a good deal exhausted but extremely 

 hungry. But hunger, thirst, and fatigue, followed 

 me not on the ledge. A feast would have had no 

 charm, and miles upon a level road would have 

 been as nothing. Every sense seemed absorbed in 

 getting to the end ; and yet, in the midst of this 

 unenviable position, a trifling incident occurred, 

 which actually for the time gave rise to something 

 of a pleasurable sensation. About midway I espied, 



