In an upper room we found the chamber of torture, in which was a wooden column, to which prisoners were put to the _question_, chained, and tormented with fire, or drawn and stretched with rings and pulleys; and in another room a trap-door is open, and a spiral stone staircase leads downward,—the prisoner, unconscious of what was before him, steps down three steps into the darkness, and the fourth is eighty feet below, where he is dashed to pieces on the rocks. Yet in this castle, and near to these horrid places, are the bed-chambers and parlors and dining-rooms of dukes and duchesses, men and women like ourselves, who could eat, drink, and be merry under the same roof with all this cruelty and misery. And this is at the head of the Lake of Geneva. Within ten minutes’ walk is the Hotel Byron, one of the best places to stop at in all Europe. It is in the centre of a semi-circular sweep of beetling crags, and snow-peaked mountains, and wine-growing hill-sides; it looks away down the lake, and not another house, not a sound disturbs its deep tranquillity, while nature, history, poetry, and art invite us to repose. Leaving Chillon in the morning _by rail_ gave us a new idea of the way that Switzerland is now explored by tourists. When I was here, a dozen years ago, it was to be seen only by footing it through the passes, or riding on horseback, with now and then a lift in the _diligence_, or antiquated stage-coach. Now railroads have been made to connect so many of the principal places and points of interest, that only the younger and more vigorous of travellers strike out into the mountain fastnesses, and toil over the hills where as yet no roads have been made. I inquired of the porter this morning how to get across from Martigny to the Vale of Chamouny. “You takes von leetel hoss,” he said, from which I knew that the ponies still do the work through that finest of all the day’s rides in Switzerland. There are hundreds of interesting tours yet to be made where no rail or coach will ever intrude, and no other locomotive, unless Professor Andrews makes his air-ship a success: in which case it would be admirably adapted to travel in this country. One of the last places in the world I should have thought practicable for a railroad is the border of this lake, and yet here it is entering the valley where the Rhone empties, and so extending to Martigny and to Sion. [Illustration: THE LAKE AND CITY OF GENEVA.]