Our first sketching excursion was to the Perte du Rhone, and, while Ruskin was drawing some mountain forms beyond the river, he asked me to draw some huts near by,—­not picturesque cottages, thatched roofs and lichen-stained walls, but shanties, such as the Irish laborers on our railways build by the roadside, of deal boards on end, irregular and careless without being picturesque, and too closely associated with pigsty construction, in my mind, to be worth drawing.  When Ruskin came back I had made a careless and slipshod five minutes’ sketch, not worth the paper it was on, as to me were not the originals.  Ruskin was angry, and he had a right to be; for at least I should have found it enough that he wanted it done, to make me do my best on it, but I did not think of it in that light.  We drove back towards Geneva in silence,—­he moody and I sullen,—­and halfway there he broke out, saying that the fact that he wanted the drawing done ought to have been enough to make me do it.  I replied that I could see no interest in the subject, which to me only suggested fever and discomfort, and wretched habitations for human beings.  We relapsed into silence, and for another mile nothing was said, when Ruskin broke out with, “You were right, Stillman, about those cottages; your way of looking at them was nobler than mine, and now, for the first time in my life, I understand how anybody can live in America.”

We went to Bonneville to hunt out the point of view of a Turner drawing which Ruskin liked, but, needless to say, though we ransacked the neighborhood for views, we never found Turner’s; and then we went on to St. Martin, the little village opposite Sallanches, on the Arve.  For a subalpine landscape with Mont Blanc in the distance, this is the most attractive bit of the Alpine country I know, with picturesque detail and pleasant climbing up to 7000 feet.  The view of Mont Blanc, too, is certainly the finest from below which can be found.  In fine weather the mountain is hidden to the summit by clouds which clear away at sunset, and from the little and picturesque bridge over the Arve we saw the huge dome come out, and glow in the sunlight, when we were all in shadow.  It was to me new and startling, this huge rosy orb, which at its first appearance suggests a huger moon rising above the clouds, until, slowly, the clouds below melt away, and the mountain stands disclosed to its base.  If anything in the Alps can be called truly picturesque, it is the view of the Aiguille de Varens which overhangs the village of St. Martin, with the quaint and lichenous church and cemetery in the foreground, and I made a large drawing of it from the bridge, intending to return and work it up after Ruskin had left me.  The little inn of the village was the most comfortable auberge I was ever in, and its landlord the kindest and most hospitable of hosts.  Twenty years later I went back to the locality, hoping to find something of the old time; but there was only a deserted hostel, the weeds growing over the courtyard, and the sealed and mouldy doors and windows witnessing ancient desertion.