We began our descent, now, by the most remarkable road I have ever seen.  It wound its corkscrew curves down the face of the colossal precipice—­a narrow way, with always the solid rock wall at one elbow, and perpendicular nothingness at the other.  We met an everlasting procession of guides, porters, mules, litters, and tourists climbing up this steep and muddy path, and there was no room to spare when you had to pass a tolerably fat mule.  I always took the inside, when I heard or saw the mule coming, and flattened myself against the wall.  I preferred the inside, of course, but I should have had to take it anyhow, because the mule prefers the outside.  A mule’s preference—­on a precipice—­is a thing to be respected.  Well, his choice is always the outside.  His life is mostly devoted to carrying bulky panniers and packages which rest against his body—­therefore he is habituated to taking the outside edge of mountain paths, to keep his bundles from rubbing against rocks or banks on the other.  When he goes into the passenger business he absurdly clings to his old habit, and keeps one leg of his passenger always dangling over the great deeps of the lower world while that passenger’s heart is in the highlands, so to speak.  More than once I saw a mule’s hind foot cave over the outer edge and send earth and rubbish into the bottom abyss; and I noticed that upon these occasions the rider, whether male or female, looked tolerably unwell.

There was one place where an eighteen-inch breadth of light masonry had been added to the verge of the path, and as there was a very sharp turn here, a panel of fencing had been set up there at some time, as a protection.  This panel was old and gray and feeble, and the light masonry had been loosened by recent rains.  A young American girl came along on a mule, and in making the turn the mule’s hind foot caved all the loose masonry and one of the fence-posts overboard; the mule gave a violent lurch inboard to save himself, and succeeded in the effort, but that girl turned as white as the snows of Mont Blanc for a moment.

The path was simply a groove cut into the face of the precipice; there was a four-foot breadth of solid rock under the traveler, and four-foot breadth of solid rock just above his head, like the roof of a narrow porch; he could look out from this gallery and see a sheer summitless and bottomless wall of rock before him, across a gorge or crack a biscuit’s toss in width —­but he could not see the bottom of his own precipice unless he lay down and projected his nose over the edge.  I did not do this, because I did not wish to soil my clothes.