When we arrived at the North side of the mountain we dismissed our mules, and had recourse to our Alpian chairs and chairmen. The chairs are constructed in the simplest manner, and perfectly answer the purpose for which they are intended. The chairmen are strong-made, nervous, little fellows. One of them was betrothed to a girl at Lanebourg, and was to be married that evening. I could not, in conscience, permit him to have any part in carrying me, but directly appointed him to Jack’s chair. The young fellow presented us all with ribbons, which we wore in our hats in honour of the bride. “Are you very fond of your mistress, friend,” said I? “Il faut que je l’aime beaucoup,” answered he, “puisque, pauvre garçon comme me voila, je donne trente livres au prêtre pour nous marier.” To tax matrimony, and oblige the people who _beget and maintain_ children to pay to those who _maintain_ none, seems bad policy; and it is surprising that a prince who attends so minutely, as his Sardinian Majesty, to the welfare of his subjects, does not remedy so great an abuse. As our carriers jogged zig-zag, according to the course of the road, down the mountain, they laughed and sung all the way. “How comes it,” said I to the D——, “that chairmen are generally merrier than those they carry? To hear these fellows without seeing them, one would imagine that _we_ had the laborious part, while _they_ sat at their ease.” “True,” answered he; “and the same person might conclude, on hearing the bridegroom sing so cheerfully, that we were just going to be married and not he.” We arrived in a short time at the Inn at Lanebourg, nothing having surprised me so much in the passage of this mountain, the difficulty and danger of which has been greatly exaggerated by travellers, as the facility with which we achieved it.