Voices,
ascending to his ear, recalled him to the actual situation of things.
A train of mules were climbing the last acclivity where the path takes the
broken precipitous appearance of a flight of steps. The light was still
sufficient to distinguish the forms and general appearance of the
travellers. Sigismund immediately recognized them to be the bailiff of
Vevey and his attendants, for whose arrival the formal proceedings of the
examination had alone been stayed.
"A fair evening, Herr Sigismund, and a happy meeting," cried Peterchen, so
soon as his weary mule, which frequently halted under its unwieldy
burthen, had brought him within hearing. "Little did I think to see thee
again so quickly, and less still to lay eyes on this holy convent; for
though the traveller might have returned in thy person nothing short of a
miracle--" Here the bailiff winked, for he was one of those Protestants
whose faith was most manifested in these side-hits at the opinions and
practices of Rome,--"Nothing but a miracle, I say, and that too a miracle
of some saint whose bones have been drying these ten thousand years, until
every morsel of our weak flesh has fairly disappeared, could bring down
old St.
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