For five hours we rode through passes and defiles--for me they were enchanted hours. Not only was there the novelty of the mountains, but everything here was unlike our home surroundings. The soil and the rocks were a bright red instead of, as in our village, a dazzling white because of the underlying chalk beds. And at home everything was flat and low, it seemed as if nothing there dared lift itself above the dead level and break the uniformity of the plains. Here the dwellings, of reddish hue like the rocks, and built with old gabled ends and ancient turrets, were perched high up on the hill; the peasants were very tanned, and they spoke a language I did not understand; I noticed particularly that the women walked with a free movement of the hips, unknown to the peasants of our country, as they strode along carrying upon their heads sheaves of grain and great shining copper vessels. My whole being vibrated to the charm of the unfamiliar beauty about me, and I was fascinated by the strange aspect of nature. Toward evening we reached the little town that marked the end of our journey. It was situated on the bank of one of those southern rivers that rush noisily over their shallow beds of white pebbles. The place still retained its ancient arched gateway and high, pierced ramparts; the prevailing color of the gothic houses lining its streets was bright red. A little perplexed and agitated our eyes sought for the cousins whose faces were not even known to us through photographs; but since they had been apprised of our coming they would, no doubt, be at the station to meet us. Suddenly we saw approaching us a tall young man, and he had upon his arm a young lady dressed in white muslin. Without the least hesitation we exchanged glances of recognition: we had found each other. At their house, on the ground floor, our uncle and aunt welcomed us; both of them in their old age preserved traces of a once-remarkable beauty. They lived in an ancient house of the time of Louis XIII; it was built in an angle, and was surrounded by those porches that are so frequently seen in small, southern mountain towns. When we entered we found ourselves in a vestibule flagged with pinkish stones and ornamented with a large fountain of burnished copper. A staircase of the same stones, as imposing as a castle staircase, with a curious balustrade of wrought-iron, led to the old-fashioned wainscoted bedrooms on the second floor. And these things evoked a past very different from that I had brooded over upon the Island, at St. Ongeoise, the only past with which I was at this time familiar.