inhabitants have fled. All this is unnatural. I have traveled in Switzerland: Switzerland is a country of mountains; however, nothing was lacking there! and I had trout to eat, do you hear?"

Mary-Ann tried to calm her mother, but the good woman could not and would not listen. Dimitri explained to her as fully as she would permit him, that the inhabitants of the village were nearly all charcoal-burners, and that their business very often took them into the mountains. In any case, the time was not lost: it was not later than eight o'clock, and they were sure to find within ten minutes' walk an inhabited house where breakfast would be all prepared.