year, and which were no more than so many symptoms of the known rigor of the approaching winter.  The guide himself was evidently disposed to lose no time in explanation, and as the secret excitement stole over all his followers, he no longer had cause to complain of the tardiness of their movements.  Sigismund kept near his sister and Adelheid, having a care that their mules did not lag; while the other males performed the same necessary office for the beasts ridden by the female domestics.  In this manner passed the few sombre minutes which immediately preceded the disappearance of day.  The heavens were no longer visible.  In that direction the eye saw only an endless succession of falling flakes, and it was getting to be difficult to distinguish even the ramparts of rock that bounded the irregular ravine in which they rode.  They were known to be, however, at no great distance from the path, which indeed occasionally brushed their sides.  At other moments they crossed rude, stony, mountain heaths, if such a word can be applied to spots without the symbol or hope of vegetation.  The traces of the beasts that had preceded them, became less and less apparent, though the trickling stream that came down from the glaciers, and along which they had now journeyed-for hours, was occasionally seen, as it was crossed in pursuing their winding way.  Pierre, though still confident that he held the true direction, alone knew that this guide was not longer to be relied on; for, as they drew nearer to the top of the mountains, the torrent gradually lessened both in its force and in the volume of its water, separating into twenty small rills, which came rippling from the vast bodies of snow that lay among the different peaks above.

As yet, there had been no wind.  The guide, as minute after minute passed without bringing any change in this respect, ventured at last to advert to the fact, cheering his companions by giving them reasons to hope that they should yet reach the convent without any serious calamity.  As if in mockery of this opinion, the flakes of snow began to whirl in the air, while the words were on his lips, and a blast came through the ravine, that set the protection of cloaks and mantles at defiance.  Notwithstanding his resolution and experience, the stout-hearted Pierre suffered an exclamation of despair to escape him, and he instantly stopped, in the manner of a man who could no longer conceal the dread that had been collecting in his bosom for the last interminable and weary hour.  Sigismund, as well as most of the men of the party, had dismounted a little previously, with a view to excite warmth by exercise.  The youth had often traversed the mountains, and the cry no sooner reached his ear, than he was at the side of him who uttered it.

“At what distance, are we still from the convent?” he demanded eagerly.

“There is more than a league of steep and stone path to mount, Monsieur le Capitaine;” returned the disconsolate Pierre, in a tone that perhaps said more than his words.