. And then I also
often saw that there was blue color below the ice and thought it was
stones, or soil and pasture-land, and then come the woods, and they go
down farther and farther, and there are some boulders in them too, and
then come meadows that are already green, and then the green
leafy-woods, and then our meadow-lands and fields in the valley of
Gschaid. Do you see now, Sanna, as we are at the ice we shall go down
over the blue color, and through the forests in which are the boulders,
and then over the pasture-land, and through the green leafy-forests, and
then we shall be in the valley of Gschaid and easily find our way to the
village."

"Yes, Conrad," said the girl.

The children now entered upon the glacier where it was accessible. They
were like wee little pricks wandering among the huge masses.

As they were peering in under the overhanging slabs, moved as it were by
an instinct to seek some shelter, they arrived at a trench, broad and
deeply furrowed, which came right out of the ice. It looked like the bed
of some torrent now dried up and everywhere covered with fresh snow. At
the spot where it emerged from the ice there yawned a vault of ice
beautifully arched above it. The children continued in the trench and,
entering the vault, went in farther and farther. It was quite dry and
there was smooth ice under their feet. All the cavern, however, was
blue, bluer than anything else in the world, more profoundly and more
beautifully blue than the sky, as blue as azure glass through which a
bright glow is diffused. There were more or less heavy flutings, icicles
hung down pointed and tufted, and the passage led inward still farther,
they knew not how far; but they did not go on. It would also have been
pleasant to stay in this grotto, it was warm and no snow could come in;
but it was so fearfully blue that the children took fright and ran out
again. They went on a while in the trench and then clambered over its
side.

They passed along the ice, as far as it was possible to edge through
that chaos of fragments and boulders.

"We shall now have to pass over this, and then we shall run down away
from the ice," said Conrad.

"Yes," said Sanna and clung to him.

From the ice they took a direction downward over the snow which was to
lead them into the valley. But they were not to get far. Another river
of ice traversed the soft snow like a gigantic wall bulging up and
towering aloft and, as it were, reaching