We were now shown into a room where there was a small collection of minerals, and of Roman remains found about the ruins of the temple.  At seven we received a cup of coffee and some bread and butter, after which the prior entered, and invited us to look at the chapel, which is of moderate dimensions, and of plain ornaments.  There is a box attached to a column, with tronc pour les pauvres, and as all the poor in this mountain are those who enjoy the hospitality of the convent, the hint was understood.  We dropped a few francs into the hole, while the prior was looking earnestly the other way, and it then struck us we were at liberty to depart.  The body of Desaix lies in this chapel, and there is a small tablet in it, erected to his memory.

It would be churlish and unreasonable to complain of the fare, in a spot where food is to be had with so much difficulty; and, on that head, I shall merely say, in order that you may understand the fact, that we found the table of St. Bernard very indifferent.  As to the deportment of the monks, certainly, so far as we were concerned, it had none of that warmth and hospitality that travellers have celebrated; but, on the contrary, it struck us both as cold and constrained, strongly reminding me, in particular, of the frigidity of the ordinary American manner.[40] This might be discipline; it might be the consequence of habitual and incessant demands on their attentions and services; it might be accidental; or it might be prejudice against the country from which we came, that was all the stronger for the present excited state of Europe.

[Footnote 40:  The peculiar coldness of our manners, which are too apt to pass suddenly from the repulsive to the familiar, has often been commented on, but can only be appreciated by those who have been accustomed to a different.  Two or three days after the return of the writer from his journey in Europe (which had lasted nearly eight years), a public dinner was given, in New York, to a distinguished naval officer, and he was invited to attend it, as a guest.  Here he met a crowd, one half of whom he knew personally.  Without a single exception, those of his acquaintances who did speak to him (two-thirds did not), addressed him as if they had seen him the week before, and so cold and constrained did every man’s manner seem, that he had great difficulty in persuading himself there was not something wrong.  He could not believe, however, that he was especially invited to be neglected, and he tried to revive his old impressions; but the chill was so thorough, that he found it impossible to sit out the dinner.]

Our mules were ready, and we left the col immediately after breakfast.  A ridge in the rock, just before the convent, is the dividing line for the flow of the waters.  Here a little snow still lay; and there were patches of snow, also, on the northern face of the declivity, the remains of the past winter.