322 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



and the room and the groups there when we entered, 

 were all that a painter could desire. As usual the ceil- 

 ing and walls were of panelling, quite dark from smoke 

 and age. At a table a young peasant was sitting 

 playing the cithern, and in a corner, near the large 

 green stove, their faces gleaming in the nickering blaze 

 coming from a hearth close by, sat Pepi with his pipe, 

 while beside him wife and daughter were busy with 

 their spinning-wheels. Bare-legged boys were lying 

 around listening to the music, and one of them every 

 now and then would throw some pine-chips on the fire to 

 make a merry flame ; and then the light illumined the 

 whole nearer group from head to foot, spinning-wheels 

 and all. A ruddy flash would play too for a moment 

 round the form of him at the table, and even put the 

 shadows in the further nooks and corners into confu- 

 sion. But Pepi himself deserves a particular description. 

 He had on an old jacket torn and patched, and round 

 his brown throat a kerchief was loosely knotted. His 

 leathern breeches reached only to above the knees, which 

 were bare, for the thick ribbed stockings came no 

 higher than the calf. The old cap could cover but half 

 of the wild hair that straggled from beneath it, thickly 

 intermingled with" grey, like his beard and bushy mou- 

 stache. It looked snug in that dark, low-ceilinged 

 room ; for there is something cheerful in firelight, and 

 the glare and the skipping shadows, which no other 

 illumination can give ; and then too the low humming 

 of the wheels and the plaintive tones of the cithern, 

 each seeming like an accompaniment to the other, so 

 well did they harmonize, fell gratefully on the ear, and 

 gave that indescribable something which carries with it 

 a sweet feeling of " home." 



Pepi's wife wanted him sadly to put on another joppe 



