I leave the remnants of my feast for the foxes and magpies to quarrel over, and feel prepared to put forth a vigorous effort to reach the causse.  I work my way up by the clefts of the rocks, hanging on to the tough box, and getting thoroughly asperged by the dew that has not yet dried upon it.  I have not ascended fifty feet in this manner before I am as wet as if I had been walking in a thunderstorm.  I creep along ledges, now to the right and now to the left, and presently I am only about twenty-five feet from the top of the rock that prevents me from attaining my object.  It is pleasanter to look up than to look down, for, being no climber of mountain peaks, I do not enjoy the sensation of clinging to the side of a precipice like a caterpillar to a leaf.  Now comes the real trial.  The rest of the rock above me is quite bare of vegetation.  By making four or five steps upwards to the left, then to the right, a spot can be reached where the trouble will be over; but some of these steps need a considerable stretch of leg, and the eye cannot measure the distance with certainty.  Time is on the wing, and the days are short.  I am strongly tempted to make the essay, but doubt holds me back.  What if I, were to get half-way, and were unable to go on or to retreat?  What if I were to slip and roll down the rocks?  If I were not killed outright, who would be likely to come to my aid in such a solitude?  The ravens would have ample time to pick my bones before those interested in my existence would know what had happened to me.  I resolve that I will not give the birds of ill omen a chance of so rare a meal.  In descending, the cold showers from the box bushes add to my humiliation and discomfiture.

Keeping on the side of the hill, I went farther up the valley, seeking a place where I could with better chance of success make another attack upon the difficulties of this rocky wall.  I found what I wanted at no great distance, the only objection to the spot being the dense growth of shrubs laden with moisture.  It was almost like wading through a stream.  At length the line of high rocks was passed, and I was upon land that, notwithstanding its steepness and the multitude of stones with which it was strewn, had undergone some cultivation.  That wine had not long since been grown here was evident from the numerous stumps of vines which had been killed by the phylloxera.  A few lingering flowers of hawkweed relieved the monotony of the dreary waste.  But if, while looking before me, the scene was saddening, in looking back there was a sublime and soul-lifting picture which the forces of Nature had been painting unmolested for ages.  I can do no more than suggest to the imagination the combined effect of those fantastic rocks rising from the foaming torrent to the drifting, tinted clouds; buttresses and bastions of the ancient earth laid bare in the mysterious night of the inconceivable past, some black and gloomy as the walls of a feudal moat, others yellow like ochre; others, again, sun-bleached almost to whiteness, yet streaked with ruddy veins—­all flashed here and there with burning oak and maple, or sprinkled with the purple blood of the dogwood’s dying leaves.