CHAP, x.] ALPINE TRAVELS, 1843. 297 



several of his old friends visited him the same evening, 

 he exerted himself so far, that they did not observe any- 

 thing amiss : when they had left him, however, he became 

 much worse ; and when his anxious wife succeeded in 

 ing a doctor sent for, his malady was pronounced to 

 ic fever, complicated by severe pulmonary inflam- 

 mation, and slight hopes were held out of his recovery. 

 never left him night or day, but for ten days he did 

 not recognize her. It was a long and anxious time how 

 long, those of our readers only who have passed througli 

 <uc\\ a trial, can say. At last the crisis came, and the 

 doctor wa- of opinion that he would not live through the 

 night. She >p- -nt that painful night like all the rest 

 alone with him, and in the morning could thank God that 

 he still lived, but it was many days before she could 

 ize the faet tlia t he was recovering. The fever lingered 

 about him still, and at last, about the middle of August, 

 truing for the cool breath of the glaciers came upon 

 him, and he told the doctor that he felt he could never 

 \vcll unless he left the Rhinelaod, and travelled at all 

 hazards to the Alps. 



The doctor stood aghast at the idea, and his prophe- 

 cies of evil seemed likely to be fulfilled, for during the 

 sl\v journey from the Rhine to the valley of the Rhone, 

 Forbes's health did not improve. But once at Bex, with 

 within si^ht, and his old friends De Charpentier 

 g to talk to about them, his life and 

 6 to him a^-iin : and he was, for the time, 

 If -.^etching the blocks of Monthly, 

 1 no less charmed with them/ he writes, * than last 

 year' planning how much work he was still justified in 

 MM- change of plan necessitated by his 

 illness, and a inning with Charpentier as energetically 



On th- 4th of September they crossed the Col de 

 me, and some time before reaching Chamounix they 

 met by a crowd of guides and iVicndly people of tin- 

 anxious to welcome ' M..n>ii m I 



; show him that hi- kindly, Denial manners and 



