on her head, full of articles for the family meal, which she distributes with wonderful accuracy at every house.

But before long everyone is out again. Carriages, and horses, and donkeys are put into requisition, and a rushing stream of people throngs the street, bent on a jaunt to some point of attraction. Thus a morning is passed in pleasant idleness in some beautiful park, and by the side of some crystal mountain stream. Picturesque groups of trees, fantastic rocks, blooming meadows, and smooth paths are soon peopled with promenaders.

Between five and six, another bell-ringing calls the public home to dinner. An excursion to the Mamelon Verte is all, when dinner is over, that the approach of night will allow; and there is no evening amusement at Cauterets. Gambling-rooms and casinos, balls and concerts are here unknown. With their early rising, their bathing, their walking and riding parties, the guests here are too much fatigued to want any evening employment; and unless some distressed artist, or some wandering charlatan, ventures on a soirée extraordinaire, there is nothing to be seen or done. The Mamelon Verte runs parallel with the park, and being more free from trees than any other place, it offers a dry evening walk and is consequently the scene where all the most extravagant toilettes are displayed.

Long before the full-dressed crowd rises from the dinner-table, about a score of poor girls have placed some hundreds of chairs and foot stools in rows, for the use of which, according to their size and comfortable appearance, they ask from one to three sous apiece.

CHAPTER III.

THE YOUNG STILT-DANCER.

THE awakening of nature in a beautiful and elevated mountain spot has always in it something of the sublime; and the morning hours of Cauterets are ever the most enjoyable.

Uninfluenced by clouds, the forms of the near and distant points of the chain show themselves clearly against the deep blue sky. The sun greets the early riser with its brightest rays, and the strengthening mountain air imparts new life and vigour. But this serene aspect does not often last long here. The clouds rise, and the sun is soon hidden. Heavy mists sink down, and obscure the valley below.

It is rather discouraging to see such a sight in the beginning of August, and not to be able to leave the house without an umbrella to protect one from a kind of Scotch mist, which thickens the air with its myriads of minute drops. Such afternoons always lay the invalids under

strict arrest. The jugglers, the mountebanks, and the thousand and one artists who beset the High Street of Cauterets, are then welcome sources of amusement.

Quite against my wont, I allowed myself one day to be attracted to the window by the twanging sound of a Spanish instrument unknown to my ear, accompanied by the regular beat of a tambourine; but when, instead of the expected picturesquely-clad figure of a young montanes, I saw a tipsy-looking fellow in a worn-out French uniform, my illusion was dispelled, and I resolved not to be so cheated again.

One unusually foggy afternoon, however, I heard a fine-toned violin at a little distance, and gradually the notes became louder and louder, and I could not keep my resolution. I stepped out into the balcony and beheld an elegant youth dancing on stilts, joking with the bystanders and playing on his violin, along the road which leads to the Rue Richelieu.

Through my opera-glass I watched every motion of this strange apparition. I knew not whether most to admire the masterly manner in which the young artist used his instrument, the aplomb with which he managed to execute the most astonishing tours de force on his stilts, or the act and skill with which he distributed his jokes to the spectators. For I was not the only admirer of his fine playing, nor the only trembling witness of his dangerous gymnastics. Everyone in the street and in the balconies gave him his undivided attention, and everyone encouraged him with some mark of applause.

The young artist must have been about thirteen.or fourteen years of age. He had fine features, light hair, and a bright complexion. He wore close-fitting boots, black velvet pantaloons and jacket, a white piqué waistcoat, and a bright yellow scarf round his neck; on his head he had an embroidered Raphael cap.

The whole of his dress was good, indeed handsome, and his entire appearance was so little like that of a mountebank, that had I not seen him take the money which was thrown to him, I should have supposed his exhibition to be rather the freak of a young gentleman than anything else.

The little I had read of the inhabitants of the Landes had greatly interested me. Everyone knows that, on account of the depth of snow, the use of stilts is there universal; and from the extraordinary skill with which the young violinist used them, I concluded him to be of Basque origin, and thought he might be able to tell me much that was interesting of his country.

This notion recurred to my mind all the day, and when the landlady brought me my evening meal, I inquired if she knew anything of the stilt-dancer who had laid such strong hold of my fancy.

"Oh yes, Madame," replied Marie, with evident sympathy, "the

pauvre petit causes quite a sensation here. He is very clever, and, moreover, a very good youth."

"Do you know him well then?"

"Only, Madame, from seeing him here the two last seasons. And I have heard say that he makes a great deal of money, and is the entire support of his family."

"And where does his family reside ?"

"I believe either in Pau, Bayonne, or Bordeaux, for, so far as I know, the youth is a Basque, and you know, Madame, they all use stilts."

A loud cry for the much-in-request Marie ended our conversation for that time, but the next afternoon I again heard the violin which announced the wished-for return of the young Basque. No sooner was the first note heard, than a rush was made after him. It struck me that he stepped along more carefully than the day before, and that his dancing, as well as his playing, was more masterly.

With the closest scrutiny, I could discover in him nothing of that frivolity which is so much the characteristic of this class of men. But what most excited my wonder was that nearly all his airs were the choicest melodies selected from Rossini's and Mozart's operas. Sometimes after playing one subject from "Semiramide," "The Barber of Seville," "Don Giovanni," or "Figaro," with much skill and intelligence, he would dash into a waltz by Strauss, Labitzki, or some other German composer, which would afford him an opportunity of displaying some tours de force with his stilts.

After Marie's assurance that he was the only support of his family, it appeared to me strange that he took so little pains to increase his gains by those means of solicitude which are usual with his class. One would rather have supposed that he danced and played for his own amusement, for really he took quite a childish delight in his work, and in the opportunity it afforded him of joking with those around him. He received what was offered to him, but he did so with such an air of shame that at one time, when he was just opposite my balcony, I could not make up my mind to throw him a piece of money. But afterwards, as I heard him playing in the next street, the feeling came across me that I ought to do more for this poor boy than for a common street performer. I therefore waited with some impatience for the time when my attendant came up with my dinner, and as soon as she appeared I told her that she must manage to secure me an interview with the youth.

"Now, Marie, have you executed my commission?" said I, when she appeared in the morning with my breakfast.

"Pardon me, dear lady," she replied; "your order quite slipped my memory. However, I know where the young lad lives, and I will run

thither at once, and I only hope he may not be gone away to some

other place."

At the risk of losing my bath, I determined to wait a quarter of an hour, and I stood at the house door till she came back.

“Well,” cried I, as she reappeared, "have you found him?”

"Ah, Madame," she said, with an air of sorrow, "you know not what a misfortune has happened to the poor boy! He has been robbed, and it has caused him so much concern, that in his anxiety of mind he has left the place. I have since seen a coachman who drives daily to Luz, and he has promised that, if he sees the young man, he will send him hither immediately."

"And where should he see him," said a chairman, who had heard our conversation, and who seemed to know something on the subject, "I saw the boy three quarters of an hour ago, running up the hill with his stilts on his back, and he must be in Pierrefitte by this time."

He told me he knew that the boy lived with his family at Barège, and that from the frequent communication there was with that place, nothing would be easier than to get him back to Cauterets; but this scarcely lessened my regret at having missed him so foolishly.

In the hope that when I returned in the evening he would be there, I amused myself in the afternoon with visiting the northern group of the Cauterets springs.

The large establishment at the foot of the mountain Perrante is the chief and the best arranged amongst them. It was built in 1844 and its walls are of grey marble. A fine flight of steps ascend to its peristyle, leading into an entrance hall; one half of the bathing rooms which open into this hall are supplied from the Source de Cæsar, the other from the Source Espagnol; the former owing its name to the usual traditional visit of Cæsar, and the latter to the more probable presence of the Queen of Arragon.

The other establishments of Bruzaud, Rieumizet, Viewe Cæsar, Pause Viewe, and Pausenouvame all lie at the foot of the same mountain, La Perrante, at various distances from each other. The Source Rieumizet is divided only by a gently rising meadow from the park gates, but the very considerable height on which the other springs lie, and the steep and stony path which lead up to them, make it not very tempting to trust oneself to the care of a chairman or the back of

an ass.

Few bathing places possess a richer store of rides and drives than Cauterets, but there is an absence of such walks as characterise the German springs. In the same degree in which the beauties of nature here are grander and rarer, are the paths leading to the most interesting points beset with difficulties from their steepness and roughness.

The visit I then made to La Grange de la Reine was so entirely of

this character, that I never should have accomplished it without a donkey's aid.

When you have left the elevated establishment at Pausevieux behind you, by walking over rising meadows and through small thickets you reach by a serpentine mountain path the summit of Lesey. There you find a half ruined cottage, which has been invested since the year 1807 with a kind of historical celebrity, inasmuch as the Queen Hortense on her way from Luz, was here overtaken by a terrible storm and was obliged to pass a night on this spot in a miserable barn. A white marble slab is still seen over the door of the cottage, which once bore the inscription of Grange de la Reine, placed there by the authorities of Cauterets to commemorate the event; but it is now no longer visible, the letters having been half covered by a layer of mortar.

From a group of rocks a little above this queenly cot, a very splendid view over Cauterets and its smiling vale lies at one's feet. On one side rises the inaccessible Pequere with its sparsely covered sides and its fir-crowned top; the obtuse-angled summit of the cloudy Hourmig closes on the left, the open country towards Cambesque, while on the right is seen the deep defile of the vale of Argeles leading to Pierrefitte, as far as the old Tower of Lourdes.

The little tour I made to La Grange de la Reine may be accomplished easily in two hours. Pleasant too, though I found it, it did not quite distract my thoughts from the young Basque, and on my return to the hotel my first inquiry of mine hostess was if anything had been heard of him.

"You see," said I to her, in the evening, when all her work of teaservice being over, she was usually full of talk, "two days have gone by and still the boy does not appear, though had he received my invitation, he might have been here long since."

"I think so too," answered the concierge, "and if you are determined to see him, Madame, I think the only way is to apply direct to the Commissioner of Police at Barège, by means of a letter, and he who of course knows the little stilt-dancer, will certainly send him hither at your request."

Although I was very desirous of learning more of the youth, I did not much like to follow this advice, thinking that an application through such a channel might make him suspicious, and thus throw more difficulty in the way of my wish to inquire into the necessities of his family. "No Marie," said I, "I do not like to do that, but you might write."

"But, Madame," interrupted the concierge, "I can neither read nor write."

"Well then, I will write in your name, for I don't like myself to appear as making any police application."