And he proceeds "with a vengeance" to let us know that the spokesman of the above is an artist who had "halted in a deep ravine in the Abruzzi (where, on each side, the cliffs frowned like fiends upon the quailing traveller) to transfer to my portable sketch-book a slight souvenir of the celestial scene. Absorbed in my enthralling occupation, I heeded not the approach of a visitant; it was therefore with surprise, not unmingled with alarm, that I was aroused by a tap upon the shoulders, accompanied by the following sarcastic greeting: "'Is thy maternal parent, young man, aware of thine absence from home?' "'Quite so,' I replied, in a tremulous tone, anxiously glancing round to behold the speaker. "My acquaintance with literature--to say nothing of my constant attendance at the opera--at once convinced me that I was in the hands of a brigand." Had there been "any possible doubt whatever," it would have been instantly dispelled; for after "smiling in demoniacal derision," the disturber of the sketcher said, "deliberately and tranquilly, as he levelled a pistol at my head: "'Thy wealth or thy existence!' "My sole remaining ducat was offered in vain. At the shrill sound of his whistle the crags bristled with bandits, and fifty carbines were pointed at my person. Blue with boiling agony, I made as a last resource the Masonic sign. It succeeded. At another signal every carbine was lowered, and breathless expectation brooded over the heart of its bearer." The bandits, however, were not so easily satisfied; for "a murmur of impatience, mingled with discontent, arose, like the billows of emotion, amongst the troop, and some twenty weapons again kissed with their stocks as many manly shoulders. "'Back, slaves, for your lives!' shouted the infuriated Grabalotti, throwing himself in front of me. 'One moment more, and, by the blood-stained power of the thundering Avalanche, the foremost of you dies!'