pursued by some frolicsome gale which we do not see, or resting softly
in the dells, whose throbbing soothes itself to stillness in the
grateful shade. And still, midway between heaven and earth, snatched up
from the turmoil of the one into the unspeakable calm of the other, a
great peace and rest sink into our souls. All around lies the earth,
shining and silent as the sky, rippling in little swells of light,
breaking into luminous points, rising into shapely shafts, spreading in
limpid, molten silver, and all bathed, transmuted, glorified, with
ineffable light, and sacred with eternal silence.

A bubble of home-life adheres to this stern peak. Determination and
perseverance have built two stone cottages, rough and squat, where you
may, if you have no mercy, eat a fine dinner that has been wearily
dragged over eight miles of hillocky, rutty roads, and up eight miles
of mountain; and drink without any compunction clear, cold water that
the clouds have distilled without any trouble, and the rocks have
bottled up in excellent refrigerators and furnish at the shortest
notice and on the most reasonable terms, except in very dry weather.
Or if a drought drinks up the supply in the natural wells, there is the
Lake of the Clouds, humid and dark below, where you may see--I do not
know--the angels ascending and descending. The angels of the summit
are generally armed with a huge hoop, which supports their brace of
buckets as they step cautiously over the cragged rock fragments. If
you are ambitious to scale the very highest height, you can easily
mount the roof of the most frivolously named Tip-top House, and change
your horizon a fraction. If you are gregarious and crave society, you
can generally find it in multifarious developments. Hither come
artists with sketch-books and greedy eyes. Hither come photographers
with instruments, and photograph us all, men, mountains, and rocks.
Young ladies come, and find, after all their trouble, that "there is
nothing but scenery," and sit and read novels. Haud ignota loquor.
Young men come, alight from their carriages, enter the house, balance
themselves on two legs of their chairs, smoke a cigar, eat a dinner,
and record against their names, "Mount Washington is a humbug,"--which
is quite conclusive as concerning the man, if not concerning the
mountain. There is one man in whose fate I feel a lively curiosity.
As we were completing our descent, twisted, frowzy, blown to shreds,