“After a slight and short dinner we visited the Chateau de Clarens; an English woman has rented it recently (it was not let when I saw it first); the roses are gone with their summer; the family out, but the servants desired us to walk over the interior of the mansion.  Saw on the table of the saloon Blair’s Sermons and somebody else’s (I forget who’s) sermons, and a set of noisy children.  Saw all worth seeing, and then descended to the ‘Bosquet de Julie,’ &c. &c.; our guide full of Rousseau, whom he is eternally confounding with St. Preux, and mixing the man and the book.  Went again as far as Chillon to revisit the little torrent from the hill behind it.  Sunset reflected in the lake.  Have to get up at five to-morrow to cross the mountains on horseback; carriage to be sent round; lodged at my old cottage—­hospitable and comfortable; tired with a longish ride on the colt, and the subsequent jolting of the char-a-banc, and my scramble in the hot sun.

“Mem.  The corporal who showed the wonders of Chillon was as drunk as Blucher, and (to my mind) as great a man; he was deaf also, and thinking every one else so, roared out the legends of the castle so fearfully that H. got out of humour.  However, we saw things from the gallows to the dungeons (the potence and the cachots), and returned to Clarens with more freedom than belonged to the fifteenth century.

“September 19.

“Rose at five.  Crossed the mountains to Montbovon on horseback, and on mules, and, by dint of scrambling, on foot also; the whole route beautiful as a dream, and now to me almost as indistinct.  I am so tired;—­for though healthy, I have not the strength I possessed but a few years ago.  At Montbovon we breakfasted; afterwards, on a steep ascent dismounted; tumbled down; cut a finger open; the baggage also got loose and fell down a ravine, till stopped by a large tree; recovered baggage; horse tired and drooping; mounted mule.  At the approach of the summit of Dent Jument[111] dismounted again with Hobhouse and all the party.  Arrived at a lake in the very bosom of the mountains; left our quadrupeds with a shepherd, and ascended farther; came to some snow in patches, upon which my forehead’s perspiration fell like rain, making the same dints as in a sieve; the chill of the wind and the snow turned me giddy, but I scrambled on and upwards.  Hobhouse went to the highest pinnacle; I did not, but paused within a few yards (at an opening of the cliff).  In coming down, the guide tumbled three times; I fell a laughing, and tumbled too—­the descent luckily soft, though steep and slippery:  Hobhouse also fell, but nobody hurt.  The whole of the mountains superb.  A shepherd on a very steep and high cliff playing upon his pipe; very different from Arcadia, where I saw the pastors with a long musket instead of a crook, and pistols in their girdles.  Our Swiss shepherd’s pipe was sweet, and his tune agreeable.  I saw a cow strayed; am told that they often break their necks on and over the crags.  Descended to Montbovon; pretty scraggy village, with a wild river and a wooden bridge.  Hobhouse went to fish—­caught one.  Our carriage not come; our horses, mules, &c. knocked up; ourselves fatigued; but so much the better—­I shall sleep.