The
proper equivalent of pleasure is pain, which is also a form of
education.
Not satisfied with Milan, Mrs. Kuhn insisted on invading the
enemy's country, and the carriage was chartered for Innsbruck by
way of the Stelvio Pass. The Valtellina, as the carriage drove up
it, showed war. Garibaldi's Cacciatori were the only visible
inhabitants. No one could say whether the pass was open, but in
any case no carriage had yet crossed. At the inns the handsome
young officers in command of the detachments were delighted to
accept invitations to dinner and to talk all the evening of their
battles to the charming patriot who sparkled with interest and
flattery, but not one of them knew whether their enemies, the
abhorred Austrian Jagers, would let the travellers through their
lines. As a rule, gaiety was not the character failing in any
party that Mrs. Kuhn belonged to, but when at last, after
climbing what was said to be the finest carriage-pass in Europe,
the carriage turned the last shoulder, where the glacier of the
Ortler Spitze tumbled its huge mass down upon the road, even Mrs.
Kuhn gasped when she was driven directly up to the barricade and
stopped by the double line of sentries stretching on either side
up the mountains, till the flash of the gun barrels was lost in
the flash of the snow. For accidental education the picture had
its value.
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