They were misshapen, wretched-looking creatures, with yellowcomplexions; and on their necks were dark, ugly lumps of flesh,hanging down like bags. They were called cretins. They draggedthemselves along painfully, and stared at the strangers with vacanteyes. The women looked more dreadful than the men. Poor Rudy! werethese the sort of people he should see at his new home?
  III. THE UNCLE
  Rudy arrived at last at his uncle's house, and was thankful tofind the people like those he had been accustomed to see. There wasonly one cretin amongst them, a poor idiot boy, one of thoseunfortunate beings who, in their neglected conditions, go from houseto house, and are received and taken care of in different families,for a month or two at a time.
  Poor Saperli had just arrived at his uncle's house when Rudy came.The uncle was an experienced hunter; he also followed the trade of acooper; his wife was a lively little person, with a face like abird, eyes like those of an eagle, and a long, hairy throat.Everything was new to Rudy- the fashion of the dress, the manners, theemployments, and even the language; but the latter his childish earwould soon learn. He saw also that there was more wealth here, whencompared with his former home at his grandfather's. The rooms werelarger, the walls were adorned with the horns of the chamois, andbrightly polished guns. Over the door hung a painting of the VirginMary, fresh alpine roses and a burning lamp stood near it. Rudy'suncle was, as we have said, one of the most noted chamois hunters inthe whole district, and also one of the best guides. Rudy soonbecame the pet of the house; but there was another pet, an oldhound, blind and lazy, who would never more follow the hunt, well ashe had once done so. But his former good qualities were not forgotten,and therefore the animal was kept in the family and treated with everyindulgence. Rudy stroked the old hound, but he did not like strangers,and Rudy was as yet a stranger; he did not, however, long remain so,he soon endeared himself to every heart, and became like one of thefamily.
  "We are not very badly off, here in the canton Valais," said hisuncle one day; "we have the chamois, they do not die so fast as thewild goats, and it is certainly much better here now than in formertimes. How highly the old times have been spoken of, but ours isbetter. The bag has been opened, and a current of air now blowsthrough our once confined valley. Something better always makes itsappearance when old, worn-out things fail."
  When his uncle became communicative, he would relate stories ofhis youthful days, and farther back still of the warlike times inwhich his father had lived. Valais was then, as he expressed it,only a closed-up bag, quite full of sick people, miserable cretins;but the French soldiers came, and they were capital doctors, they soonkilled the disease and the sick people, too. The French people knewhow to fight in more ways than one, and the girls knew how toconquer too; and when he said this the uncle nodded at his wife, whowas a French woman by birth, and laughed. The French could also dobattle on the stones. "It was they who cut a road out of the solidrock over the Simplon- such a road, that I need only say to a child ofthree years old, 'Go down to Italy, you have only to keep in thehigh road,' and the child will soon arrive in Italy, if he followed mydirections."
  Then the uncle sang a French song, and cried, "Hurrah! long liveNapoleon Buonaparte." This was the first time Rudy had ever heard ofFrance, or of Lyons, that great city on the Rhone where his unclehad once lived. His uncle said that Rudy, in a very few years, wouldbecome a clever hunter, he had quite a talent for it; he taught theboy to hold a gun properly, and to load and fire it. In the huntingseason he took him to the hills, and made him drink the warm bloodof the chamois, which is said to prevent the hunter from becominggiddy; he taught him to know the time when, from the differentmountains, the avalanche is likely to fall, namely, at noontide orin the evening, from the effects of the sun's rays; he made himobserve the movements of the chamois when he gave a leap, so that hemight fall firmly and lightly on his feet. He told him that when onthe fissures of the rocks he could find no place for his feet, he mustsupport himself on his elbows, and cling with his legs, and evenlean firmly with his back, for this could be done when necessary. Hetold him also that the chamois are very cunning, they placelookers-out on the watch; but the hunter must be more cunning thanthey are, and find them out by the scent.
  One day, when Rudy went out hunting with his uncle, he hung a coatand hat on an alpine staff, and the chamois mistook it for a man, asthey generally do. The mountain path was narrow here; indeed it wasscarcely a path at all, only a kind of shelf, close to the yawningabyss. The snow that lay upon it was partially thawed, and thestones crumbled beneath the feet. Every fragment of stone broken offstruck the sides of the rock in its fall, till it rolled into thedepths beneath, and sunk to rest. Upon this shelf Rudy's uncle laidhimself down, and crept forward. At about a hundred paces behind himstood Rudy, upon the highest point of the rock, watching a greatvulture hovering in the air; with a single stroke of his wing the birdmight easily cast the creeping hunter into the abyss beneath, and makehim his prey. Rudy's uncle had eyes for nothing but the chamois,who, with its young kid, had just appeared round the edge of the rock.So Rudy kept his eyes fixed on the bird, he knew well what the greatcreature wanted; therefore he stood in readiness to discharge hisgun at the proper moment. Suddenly the chamois made a spring, andhis uncle fired and struck the animal with the deadly bullet; whilethe young kid rushed away, as if for a long life he had beenaccustomed to danger and practised flight. The large bird, alarmedat the report of the gun, wheeled off in another direction, and Rudy'suncle was saved from danger, of which he knew nothing till he was toldof it by the boy.
  While they were both in pleasant mood, wending their wayhomewards, and the uncle whistling the tune of a song he had learnt inhis young days, they suddenly heard a peculiar sound which seemed tocome from the top of the mountain. They looked up, and saw above them,on the over-hanging rock, the snow-covering heave and lift itself as apiece of linen stretched on the ground to dry raises itself when thewind creeps under it. Smooth as polished marble slabs, the waves ofsnow cracked and loosened themselves, and then suddenly, with therumbling noise of distant thunder, fell like a foaming cataract intothe abyss. An avalanche had fallen, not upon Rudy and his uncle, butvery near them. Alas, a great deal too near!