not an inch too broad
for the operation, or it floats for a moment over the dizzy edge while
a train of mule transport blunders by. The unruly imagination of man's
heart (which is "only evil continually") speculates upon what would be
the consequences of one good bump from the wheel of a mule cart. Down
below, the trees that one sees through a wisp of cloud look far too
small and spiky and scattered to hold out much hope for a fallen man
of letters. And at the high positions they are too used to the
vertical life to understand the secret feelings of the visitor from
the horizontal. General Bompiani, whose writings are well known to all
English students of military matters, showed me the Gibraltar he is
making of a great mountain system east of the Adige.

"Let me show you," he said, and flung himself on to the edge of the
precipice into exactly the position of a lady riding side-saddle. "You
will find it more comfortable to sit down."

But anxious as I am abroad not to discredit my country by unseemly
exhibitions I felt unequal to such gymnastics without a proper rehearsal
at a lower level. I seated myself carefully at a yard (perhaps it was a
couple of yards) from the edge, advanced on my trousers without dignity
to the verge, and so with an effort thrust my legs over to dangle in the
crystalline air.

"That," proceeded General Bompiani, pointing with a giddy flourish of
his riding whip, "is Monte Tomba."

I swayed and half-extended my hand towards him. But he was still
there--sitting, so to speak, on the half of himself.... I was astonished
that he did not disappear abruptly during his exposition....

2

The fighting man in the Dolomites has been perhaps the most wonderful
of all these separate campaigns. I went up by automobile as far as the
clambering new road goes up the flanks of Tofana No. 2; thence for a
time by mule along the flank of Tofana No. 1, and thence on foot to the
vestiges of the famous Castelletto.

The aspect of these mountains is particularly grim and wicked; they are
worn old mountains, they tower overhead in enormous vertical cliffs
of sallow grey, with the square jointings and occasional clefts and
gullies, their summits are toothed and jagged; the path ascends and
passes round the side of the mountain upon loose screes, which descend
steeply to a lower wall of precipices. In the distance rise other harsh
and desolate-looking mountain masses, with shining occasional scars
of old snow