n
the granite itself. But, at last, we gave up Italy in despair,
retreated through the tunnel one morning, and an hour after mid-day
were careering in a carriage along the Rhone valley--with jingling of
bells and much cracking of a harmless whip--upwards on a drive of
seven hours to the Rhone glacier, to the hotel called "Gletsch,"
staking all on the last chance of a change in the weather.

We passed the enclosed meadow near Brieg, whence three days later the
splendidly daring South-American aviator started on his flight across
the Alps, only to die after victory--a hero, whose courage and fatal
triumph were worthy of a better cause. After some hours, passing many
a black-timbered mountain village--the houses of which, set on stone
piles, are the direct descendants of the pile-supported lake dwellings
of the Stone Age on the shores of the Lake of Neuchatel--we came to
the upper and narrower part of the valley. The road ascended by
zig-zags through pine forests, in which the large blue gentian, with
flowers and leaves in double rows on a gracefully bowed stem, were
abundant. In open places the barberry, with its dense clusters of
crimson fruit, was so abundant as actually to colour the landscape,
whilst a huge yellow mullen nearly as big as a hollyhock, and bright
Alpine "pinks," were there in profusion. Before the night fell, a
long, furry animal, twice the size of a squirrel, and of dark brown
colour, crossed the road with a characteristic undulating movement, a
few feet in front of our carriage. It was a pine-marten, the largest
of the weasel and pole-cat tribe, still to be found in our own north
country. It must not be confused with the paler beech-marten of Anne
of Brittany, which often takes up its abode in the roofs of Breton
houses, according to my own experience in Dinard and the
neighbourhood. Night fell, and our horses were still toiling up the
mountain road. Impenetrable chasms lay below, and vast precipices
above us. We crossed a bridge, and seemed in the darkness to plunge
into the sheer rock itself, and, though thrilled with a delightful
sense of mystery and awe, were feeling a little anxiety at the
prospect of another hour among these gloomy, intangible dangers, when
we rounded a projecting rock, and suddenly a brilliant constellation
burst into view in the sky. It was the electric outfit of the
Belvedere Hotel, 7,500 feet above the sea, and far up more than a
thousand feet above us and the glacier's sno