superb panorama of hill and
valley and far-stretching plain, robed in a haze of its own tierce
breath, through which a silver network of rivers could be faintly
discerned in the crescent light. Uprising from this blue interminable
distance, the first crumplings of the foothills showed like purple
velvet, and from these again the giant Himalayas--the "home of the
greater gods"--sprang aloft, in a medley of lovely lines and hues, till
they reached the uttermost north where the hoar head of Nanga Parbat
soared twenty-five thousand feet into the blue.

Quita motioned her companion to another rock, a little distance behind
her own.

"Sit down there, and recover your lost breath," she commanded, gently.
"I would rather not talk for the present, if you don't mind. It would
jar somehow. I daresay you understand what I mean."

He was many leagues removed from understanding: but he obeyed in
silence, wondering at himself, no less than at her. And straightway
Quita forgot all about him, in the mere rapture of looking, and of
feeling in every fibre the incommunicable thrill of dawn.

A passionate nobility, freedom, and power breathed from the wide scene.
Already a pearly glimmer pulsed along the east; already the mountains
were awake and aware. Peak beyond peak, range beyond range, a shadowy
pageant of purple and grey, they swept upwards to the far horizon,
where the still wonder of the snows shone pale and pure against the
dovelike tones of the sky. Away across the valley, where night still
brooded, Kalatope ridge, serrated and majestic of outline, made a
massive incident of shadow amid the tenderer tints around. The great
hushed world seemed holding its breath in expectation of a miracle--the
unconsidered miracle of dawn.

A Himalayan dawn is brief, as it is beautiful. One after one, the
snow-peaks passed from the pallor of death to the glow of life. Then,
sudden as an inspiration, the full splendour of morning broke, sublime
as the eternity from which it came. Rapier-like shafts of light
pierced the purple lengths of shadows that engulfed the valley.
Threading their way through fir and deodar and pine, they flung all
their radiant length across a rock-studded carpet of fir-needles and
moss, and rested, like a caress, upon Quita's face and figure.

At last, with a long breath of satisfaction, she forced her sun-dazzled
eyes and mind back to earth; only to discover that Garth had risen and
was standing at her side