At length, however, they came to something which specially attracted their attention. It was a small room, which the guide said was an ancient torturing room. There was a large wooden post in the centre of the room, extending from the floor to the vault above. The post was worn and blackened by time and decay, and there were various hooks, and staples, and pulleys attached to it at different heights, which the guide said were used for securing the prisoners to the post, when they were to be tortured. The post itself was burned in many places, as if by hot irons.
The boys saw another place in a room beyond, which was in some respects still more dreadful than this. It was a place where there was an opening in the floor, near the wall of the room, that looked like a trap door. There was the beginning of a stone stair leading down. A small railing was built round the opening, as if to keep people from falling in. The boys all crowded round the railing, and looked down.
They saw that the stair only went down three steps, and then it came to a sudden end, and all below was a dark and dismal pit, which seemed bottomless. On looking more intently, however, they could at length see a glimmer of light, and hear the rippling of the waves of the lake, at a great depth below. The guide said that this was one of the oubliettes, that is, a place where men could be destroyed secretly, and in such a manner that no one should ever know what became of them. They were conducted to this door, and directed to go down. It was dark, so that they could only see the first steps of the stair. They would suppose, however, that the stair was continued, and that it would lead them down to some room, where they were to go. So they would walk on carefully, feeling for the steps of the stair; but after the third there would be no more, and they would fall down to a great depth on ragged rocks, and be killed. To make it certain that they would be killed by the fall, there were sharp blades, like the ends of scythes, fixed in the rock, far below, to cut them in pieces as they fell.
It seems these tyrants, hateful and merciless as they were, did not wish, or perhaps did not dare, to destroy the souls as well as the bodies of their victims, and so they contrived it that the last act which the poor wretch should perform before going down into this dreadful pit should be an act of devotion. To this end there was made a little niche in the wall, just over the trap door, and there was placed there an image of the Virgin Mary, who is worshipped in Catholic countries as divine. The prisoner was invited to kiss this image as he passed by, just as he began to descend the stair. Thus the very last moment of his life would be spent in performing an act of devotion, and thus, as they supposed, his soul would be saved. What a strange combination is this of superstition and tyranny!
After seeing all these things, the boys returned towards the entrance of the castle. They met several parties of ladies and gentlemen coming in; and just as they got to the door again, the carriage containing Mr. and Mrs. Holiday drove up. So Rollo bade the teacher and all the boys good by, after accompanying them a few minutes, as they walked along the road towards the place where they were to go. By this time his father and mother had descended from their carriage, and were ready to go in. So Rollo joined them, and went through the castle again, and saw all the places a second time.
When they came out, and were getting into the carriage, Mr. Holiday said that it was a very interesting place.
"Yes," said Mrs. Holiday; "and we have seen all that Byron speaks of in his poem, except the little island. Where is the little island?"
Mr. Holiday pointed out over the water of the lake, where a group of three tall trees seemed to be growing directly out of the water, only that there was a little wall around them below. They looked like three flowers growing in a flower pot set in the water.
"Yes," said Mrs. Holiday, "that must certainly be it. It corresponds exactly." So she repeated the following lines from Byron's poem, which describes the island in the language of one of the prisoners, who saw it from his dungeon window,
"And then there was a little isle,
Which in my very face did smile-
The only one in view;
A small green isle, it seemed no more,
Scarce broader than my dungeon floor;
But in it there were three tall trees,
And o'er it blew the mountain breeze,
And by it there were waters flowing,
And on it there were young flowers growing,
Of gentle breath and hue."
"That's pretty poetry," said Rollo.
"Very pretty indeed," said his father.
The horse now began to trot along the road. The little island continued in view for a while, and then disappeared, and afterwards came into view again, as the road went turning and winding around, following the indentations of the shore.
At length, after a short but very pleasant ride, the party arrived safely at the inn again at Villeneuve.
CHAPTER XIII. PLAN FORMED.
The reason why the Lake of Geneva is of a crescent form is, that that is the shape of the space in the bottom of the valley which it fills. There are two ranges of mountains running in a curved direction almost parallel to each other, and the space between them, for a certain distance, is filled with water, owing to the spreading out of the waters of the Rhone in flowing through. Thus the lake is produced by the valley, and takes its form from it.
The valley does not come to an end when you reach the head of the lake, but continues for more than a hundred miles beyond, the two mountain ranges continuing to border it all that distance, and the River Rhone to flow through the centre of it. Thus at Villeneuve you look in one direction, and you have a winding valley filled with water, extending for fifty miles, to Geneva; while in the other direction, the same valley-though now the floor of it is a green and fertile plain-continues, with the same stupendous walls of mountain bordering the sides of it, for a hundred miles or more, to the sources of the Rhone.
There is another thing that is very curious in respect to this valley, and that is, that the floor of it is as flat, and smooth, and level, almost, where it is formed of land, as where it is formed of water.
Geologists suppose that the reason why the bottom of the valley, when it consists of land, is so perfectly level, is because the land has been formed by deposits from the river, in the course of a long succession of ages. Of course the river could never build the land any higher, in any part, than it rises itself in the highest inundations. Indeed, land formed by river deposits is almost always nearly level, and the surface of it is but little raised above the ordinary level of the stream, and never above that of the highest inundations.
It must, however, by no means be supposed that because the surface of the valley above the head of the lake is flat and level, that it is on that account monotonous and uninteresting. Indeed, it is quite the reverse. It forms one of the richest and most enchanting landscapes that can be conceived. It is abundantly shaded with trees, some planted in avenues along the roadside, some bearing fruit in orchards and gardens, and some standing in picturesque groups about the houses, or in pretty groves by the margin of the fields. The land is laid out in a very charming manner, in gardens, orchards, meadows, and fields of corn and grain, with no fences to separate them either from each other or from the road; so that in walking along the public highway you seem to walk in one of the broad alleys of an immense and most beautiful garden.
Besides all these beauties of the scene itself, the pleasure of walking through it is greatly increased by the number and variety of groups and figures of peasant girls and boys, and women and men, that you meet coming along the road, or see working in the fields, all dressed in the pretty Swiss costume, and each performing some curious operation, which is either in itself, or in the manner of performing it, entirely different from what is seen in any other land.