We had, first and last, killed about three score of them; and had it been day-light, we had killed many more. The field of battle being thus cleared, we made forward again, for we had still near a league to go; we heard the ravenous creatures howl and yell in the woods as we went, several times; and sometimes we fancied we saw some of them, but the snow dazzling our eyes, we were not certain; so in about an hour more we came to the town, where we were to lodge, which we found in a terrible fright and all in arms; for it seems that the night before the wolves and some bears had broken in to the village, and put them in a terrible fright; and they were obliged to keep guard night and day, but especially in the night, to preserve their cattle, and indeed their people.
The next morning our guide was so ill, and his limbs so swelled with the rankling of his two wounds, that he could go no further; so we were obliged to take a new guide there, and go to Toulouse, where we found a warm climate, a fruitful, pleasant country, and no snow, no wolves, or anything like them; but when we told our story at Toulouse, they told us it was nothing but what was ordinary in the great forest at the foot of the mountains, especially when the snow lay on the ground; but they inquired much what kind of a guide we had gotten, that would venture to bring us that way in such a severe season, and told us it was wonderful we were not all devoured. When we told them how we placed ourselves and the horses in the middle, they blamed us exceedingly, and told us it was fifty to one but we had all been destroyed; for it was the sight of the horses that made the wolves so furious, seeing their prey, and that at other times they are really afraid of a gun; but they being excessive hungry, and raging on that account, the eagerness to come at the horses had made them senseless of danger, and that if we had not by the continued fire, and at last by the strategem of the train of powder, mastered them, it had been great odds but that we had been torn to pieces; whereas had we been content to have sat still on horseback, and fired as horsemen, they would not have taken the horses so much for their own, when men were on their backs, as otherwise; and withal they told us, that at last, if we had stood altogether, and left our horses, they would have been so eager to have devoured them, that we might have come off safe, especially having our firearms in our hands, and being so many in number.
For my part, I was never so sensible of danger in my life; for seeing above three hundred devils come roaring and open-mouthed to devour us, and having nothing to shelter us or retreat to, I gave myself over for lost; and as it was, I believe I shall never care to cross those mountains again; I think I would rather go a thousand leagues by sea, though I were sure to meet with a storm once a week.
I have nothing uncommon to take notice of in my passage through France; nothing but what other travellers have given an account of with much more advantage than I can. I travelled from Toulouse to Paris, and without any considerable stay came to Calais, and landed safe at Dover the fourteenth of January, after having had a severe cold season to travel in.
I was now come to the centre of my travels, and had in a little time all my new discovered estate safe about me, the bills of exchange, which I brought with me, having been very currently paid.
My principal guide and privy counsellor was my good ancient widow, who, in gratitude for the money I had sent her, thought no pains too much, or care too great, to employ with me; and I trusted her so entirely with everything, that I was perfectly easy as to the security of my effects; and indeed I was very happy from my beginning, and now to the end, in the unspotted integrity of this good gentlewoman.