Having concluded my repast, I lit a pipe, and, drawing up my
chair to the fire, entered into conversation with mine hostess. "This is your son, I presume?" asked I of the landlady, pointing to my
guide. "No, sir," she replied; "he is only a poor crêtin that I have taken in
out of charity, as the children are fond of him. They say in these parts
that it is lucky to have an idiot in the house, so, having none in my
family, I took in this poor afflicted being; though, as to being lucky,
all the luck which I've known since----"

The hostess suddenly stopped in her conversation, and her face became
locked and rigid without any apparent reason. I looked in the direction of the cripple, and observed his glance fixed
on the hostess. It was a glance which nearly took my breath away. No
wonder the landlady paused in her conversation. It was as if he
possessed the gift of the evil eye. The magnetic influence he had over
her completely closed her mouth. Curious to know whether the landlady was really under a spell, I
resumed. "And this unfortunate, besides being idiotic, is he also deaf and dumb?" The landlady seemed to awake suddenly, as from a dream, and replied,
"Alas! yes, sir; no one has ever heard him utter a sound, or even----"

Here she paused again, and again I noticed the creature's glance fixed
upon her. "It is very strange," I observed, following up the conversation, "for I
myself this evening have discoursed with him by signs, and so far from
being idiotic, I must say that I found him very intelligent." "Ah, yes, sir," she rejoined; "and if you should want a guide to-morrow,
you could not do better than take him. No one knows the mountains here
better than he." "Indeed," I replied; "then he cannot be altogether an idiot." "Well, as to that, sir, I fancy at times he is more knave than fool. Indeed, I cannot quite make him out. He is an odd being. No one
hereabouts knows who his parents were, or how he came in these parts." Again the landlady ceased suddenly, as before, and I noticed again that
the creature's eye was fixed upon her. "What a very mysterious personage," I resumed, affecting not to notice
the magnetic spell the worthy dame appeared to be under. "I am
interested in this odd creature. Tell me more of him." Mine hostess was unable to reply. "Why do you pause?" I asked. "Why do you not answer?" The creature's eye was upon me now, and I experienced a curious
sensation, as if my voice was suddenly taken away from me, that I had no
power to move a limb; in fact, that I was completely in the power of
this horrible imp; but rousing myself, I determined to combat against
this spell, and I succeeded in stammering a few words with the utmost
difficulty. But that fearful eye was again upon me, and my tongue was
completely tied; my limbs grew stiff and paralysed, and so I remained
for some minutes, till the eye was removed. "What can this strange feeling be which has just come over me?" I asked. "I never felt so in all my life before." The crêtin's eye vacillated between me and the dame, as if to forbid
further conversation. Feeling tired, and not caring for further
discourse, as well as glad of an excuse to escape from my friend, whose
mysterious power over myself I had already experienced and therefore
could not deny, I thought I would take rest until the morning, so I
asked for a candle, and was shown into a small chamber with a heap of
straw in one corner of it. I partly undressed, and fell asleep. Thus I reposed till an early hour in the morning, though still dark,
when I was suddenly awakened by a terrific snore. I started up, and
remained in a sitting position. A pause, then again there was a long,
deep-drawn, unmistakable repetition of the same. I fixed my eyes on the
spot whence the sound proceeded, and perceived, as well as the darkness
would permit, a heap upon the floor in the opposite corner of the
apartment. Who could it be? I was about to strike a light to satisfy my curiosity,
though I had but little doubt it was my friend of the previous evening,
when the sleeper, to my surprise, began talking in his sleep; and my
ill-favoured friend, it seemed, was dumb. My hand was arrested in the act of striking a light, as the speaker
began talking loud and fast and in a very peculiar strain. I was curious
to hear more of his conversation; accordingly I refrained at present
from striking a light, as the sound might awaken him, and listened
attentively. I wondered much what could be the subject of the sleeper's dream. I grew
more and more puzzled at his words. It is impossible for me to give you
one hundredth part of his conversation here, even if time permitted;
for his utterance was so rapid that he would have outstripped any
shorthand writer. Some part of his strange colloquy, however, I have retained, as I
fancied that in it I found reference to myself. "Fools!" he cried with vehemence; "I tell you the prize is sure. I have
him in my power, he _cannot_ escape me. Ye who prize blood rather than
gold, make ready the chasm to receive him. He is one of those fools who
delight in danger, and he will follow me. What think ye? He seeks chasms
and grottoes for the insane pleasure of burdening himself with the dross
which we beings of a higher order tread under foot. Crystals, fossils,
shining stones, the ore of different metals, especially gold and such
trumpery, are trifles that his mind (if such it may be called) revels
in. "Do you not believe me, my friends? Ha! ha! I wonder not at your
disbelief; ye whose sublime philosophy is nourished in the peaceful
bowels of the earth, and who are therefore unable to comprehend how
there can exist an order of beings so totally degraded and so
approaching the brute, nay, so far surpassing even the brutes themselves
in the grossness of its appetites, as to yearn for the very stones which
form the pavement and the walls of our subterranean palaces. "Ye, my friends, who never issue from your cells to visit that outer
world, because, forsooth, your eyesight is not formed by nature to
endure the glare which illumines the surface of this globe, how is it
possible that ye should believe that there exist without intelligences
so stunted and depraved? But I tell you, my brothers in philosophy, that
this fool belongs to a race of maniacs, who have long attempted to
invade our peaceful shores, and even succeeded so far as to penetrate
nearly to the roofs of our dwellings--let us be thankful that their
frames are not suited to endure our genial element below--with much
labour, and for the sole purpose of obtaining metal or some such rubbish
out of which they form----

"Tush! I do but waste time in attempting to enumerate the countless uses
to which these madmen turn our paving stones. When ye are more at
leisure, if ye are content, I will relate to you some of the incredible
absurdities of those insects which crawl upon the outward surface of our
globe.