III.

Difficulties always lessen after a decision. I casually question a
doughty Colonel, who has been an indefatigable traveler; he has twice
girdled the earth, and has many times cross-hatched Spain; he has not
been to the Pyrenees, but heartily urges the trip. He assures me that
the banditti there have become, he believes, comparatively few; that
they now rarely slit their captives' ears, and that present quotations
for ransoms, so he hears, are ruling very low, much lower than at any
previous epoch. Thus comforted, we interview other traveled friends; but
our goal is to all an unvisited district. We find no kindly Old
Travelers returned from Pyrenees soil, to counsel us, advise us, and
inflict well-meant and inordinate itineraries upon us. At least, then,
we are not alone in our ignorance; it is evident that our knowledge of
the region is not blamably less than that of others, and that the
Pyrenees are in literal fact a land untrodden by Americans.

Questions of accessibility now arise. It seems a far cry from Paris to
the doors of Spain. The Pyrenees are not on the way to Italy, as are the
Alps. They are not on the way around the world, as are the Mountains of
Lebanon and the Sierras. They are not strictly on the way even to Spain.
But we consider. Our country men are streaming to Europe, quick-eyed for
unhackneyed routes, throwing over the continent new and endless
net-works of silver trails. They travel three full days to reach the
Norway fjords, and five in addition to see the high noon of midnight.
They journey a day and night to Berlin, and forty-two hours
consecutively after, without wayside interest, to visit the City of the
Great Czar; if they persevere toward the Kremlin, and around by