September 27 Sunday – On the Rhone River below Bourg St. Andéol, Sam wrote on Sept. 28 of this day’s trip and of Bourg St.Andeol:

Livy darling, I didn’t write yesterday [Sept. 27]. We left La Voulte in a driving storm of cold rain — couldn’t write in it — & at 1 p.m., when we were not thinking of stopping, we saw a picturesque & mighty ruin on a high hill back of a village, & I was seized with a desire to explore it; so we landed at once & set out with rubbers & umbrella, sending the boat ahead to St. Andéol, & we spent 3 hours clambering about those cloudy heights among those worn & vast & idiotic ruins of a castle built by two crusaders 650 years ago. The work of these asses was full of interest, & we had a good time inspecting, examining & scrutinizing it. All the hills on both sides of the Rhone have peaks & precipices, & each has its gray & wasted pile of mouldy walls & broken towers. The Romans displaced the Gauls, the Visigoths displaced the Romans, the Saracens displaced the Visigoths, the Christians displaced the Saracens, & it was these pious animals who built these strange lairs & cut each other’s throats in the name & for the glory of God, & robbed & burned & slew in peace & war; & the pauper & the slave built churches, & the credit of it went to the Bishop who racked the money out of them. These are pathetic shores, & they make one despise the human race.

We came down in an hour by rail, but I couldn’t get your telegram till this morning, for it was Sunday & they had shut up the post office to go to the circus. I went, too. It was all one family — parents & 5 children — performing in the open air to 200 of these enchanted villagers, who contributed coppers when called on. It was a most gay & strange & pathetic show [MTLP 2: 553-4].

In Ouchy, Livy finished a letter to Sam she began the day before, Sept. 26:

Good morning darling: We have got a rainy morning and it makes me wonder if you will not think about giving up your trip and returning to us. It seems as if we had chosen the very worst time for you to take this trip. We love you, love you.A letter from Charley this morning from London saying he had rec’d all our letters, yours too [The Twainian Jan-Feb 1977 p.2].