of books when he was at home,
and he had taken so much pains to improve by practice since he had been
in France and Switzerland that he could now get along in a short and
simple conversation very well.

While our party had been coming up the mountain, the weather, though
perfectly clear and serene in the morning, had become somewhat overcast.
Misty clouds were to be seen here and there floating along the sides or
resting on the summits of the mountains. At length, while Rollo was in
the midst of the English lesson which he was giving to the guide, his
attention was arrested, just as they were emerging from the border of a
little thicket of stunted evergreens, by what seemed to be a prolonged
clap of thunder. It came apparently out of a mass of clouds and vapor
which Rollo saw moving majestically in the southern sky.

"Thunder!" exclaimed Rollo, looking alarmed. "There's thunder!"

"No," said Henry; "an avalanche."

The sound rolled and reverberated in the sky for a considerable time
like a prolonged peal of thunder. Rollo thought that Henry must be
mistaken in supposing it an avalanche.

At this moment Rollo, looking round, saw Mr. George coming up, on his
horse, at a turn of the path a little way behind them.

"Henry," said Mr. George, "there is a thunder shower coming up; we must
hasten on."

"No," said Henry; "that was an avalanche."

"An avalanche?" exclaimed Mr. George. "Why, the sound came out of the
middle of the sky."

"It was an avalanche," said the guide, "from the Jungfrau. See!" he
added, pointing up into the sky.

Mr. George and Rollo both looked in the direction where Henry pointed,
and there they saw a vast rocky precipice peering out through a break in
the clouds high up in the sky. An immense snow bank was reposing upon
its summit. The glittering whiteness of this snow contrasted strongly
with the sombre gray of the clouds through which, as through an opening
in a curtain, it was seen.

Presently another break in the clouds, and then another, occurred; at
each of which towering rocks or great perpendicular walls of glittering
ice and snow came into view.

"The Jungfrau," said the guide.

Mr. George and Rollo gazed at this spectacle for some minutes in
silence, when at length Rollo said,--

"Why, uncle George! the sky is all full of rocks and ice!"

"It is indeed!" said Mr. George.

It was rather fortunate than otherwise that the landscape was obscured
with clouds when Mr. George and