the rod, the feathery swish of the line,
the sight of the rising fish--it all brings back a hundred woodland
memories, and thoughts of good fishing comrades, some far away across
the sea, and, perhaps, even now sitting around the forest camp-fire in
Maine or Canada, and some with whom we shall keep company no more until
we cross the greater ocean into that happy country whither they have
preceded us.

V.

Instead of going straight down the valley by the high road, a drive
of an hour, to the railway in the Pusterthal, I walked up over the
mountains to the east, across the Platzwiesen, and so down through
the Pragserthal. In one arm of the deep fir-clad vale are the Baths of
Alt-Prags, famous for having cured the Countess of Gorz of a violent
rheumatism in the fifteenth century. It is an antiquated establishment,
and the guests, who were walking about in the fields or drinking
their coffee in the balcony, had a fifteenth century look about
them--venerable but slightly ruinous. But perhaps that was merely a
rheumatic result.

All the waggons in the place were engaged. It is strange what an
aggravating effect this state of affairs has upon a pedestrian who is
bent upon riding. I did not recover my delight in the scenery until I
had walked about five miles farther, and sat down on the grass, beside a
beautiful spring, to eat my lunch.

What is there in a little physical rest that has such magic to restore
the sense of pleasure? A few moments ago nothing pleased you--the bloom
was gone from the peach; but now it has come back again--you wonder and
admire. Thus cheerful and contented I trudged up the right arm of the
valley to the Baths of Neu-Prags, less venerable, but apparently more
popular than Alt-Prags, and on beyond them, through the woods, to the
superb Pragser-Wildsee, a lake whose still waters, now blue as sapphire
under the clear sky, and now green as emerald under gray clouds, sleep
encircled by mighty precipices. Could anything be a greater contrast
with Venice? There the canals alive with gondolas, and the open harbour
bright with many-coloured sails; here, the hidden lake, silent and
lifeless, save when

"A leaping fish
Sends through the tarn a lonely cheer."

Tired, and a little foot-sore, after nine hours' walking, I came into
the big railway hotel at Toblach that night. There I met my friends
again, and parted from them and the Dolomites the next day, with
regre