the first emotion of astonishment has subsided, how delightful
is it to observe each several part which makes up this sublime whole!
That mass of hills, which presents its graceful declivity covered
with flocks of sheep whose bleatings resound through the meadows;
that large clear lake, which reflects from its level surface sunbeams
gently curved; those valleys, rich in verdure, which compose by their
various outlines points of perspective which contract in the distance
of the landscape! Here rises a bare steep mountain laden with the
accumulated snow of ages; its icy head rests among the clouds,
repelling the genial rays of the moon and the fervid heat of the
dog-star: there a chain of cultivated hills spreads before the
delighted eye; their green pastures are enlivened by flocks, and
their golden corn waves in the wind: yet climates so different as
those are only separated by a cool, narrow valley. Behold that
foaming torrent rushing from a perpendicular height! Its rapid waves
dash among the rocks, and shoot even beyond their limits. Divided by
the rapidity of its course and the depth of the abyss where it falls,
it changes into a grey moving veil; and, at length scattered into
humid atoms, it shines with the tints of the rainbow, and, suspended
over the valley, refreshes it with plenteous dew. The traveller
beholds with astonishment rivers flowing towards the sky, and issuing
from one cloud, hide themselves in the grey veil of another.

'Those desert places uncheered by the rays of the sun, those frozen
abysses deprived of all verdure, hide beneath their sterile sands
invaluable treasures, which defy the rigour of the seasons and all
the injuries of time! 'Tis in dark and marshy recesses, upon the damp
grottos, that crystal rocks are formed. Thus splendour is diffused
through their melancholy vaults, and their shadowy depths gutter with
the colours of the rainbow. O Nature, how various are thy operations,
how infinite thy fertility!'

We cannot agree with Frey[1] that 'these few strophes may serve as
sufficient proof that Haller's poetry is still, even among the mass
of Alpine poetry, unsurpassed for intense power of direct vision, and
easily makes one forget its partial lack of flexibility of diction.'

The truth is, flexibility is entirely lacking; but the lines do
express the taste for open-air life among the great sublimities and
with simple people. The poem is not romantic but idyllic, with a
touch of the e