snow-banks glittered to the stars. Our souls would
fain have stayed to drink these marvels of the moon-world, but our
limbs refused. The magic of movement was upon us, and eight minutes
swallowed the varying impressions of two musical miles. The village
lights drew near and nearer, then the sombre village huts, and soon
the speed grew less, and soon we glided to our rest into the sleeping
village street.

V

It was just past midnight. The moon had fallen to the western horns.
Orion's belt lay bar-like on the opening of the pass, and Sirius shot
flame on the Seehorn. A more crystalline night, more full of fulgent
stars, was never seen, stars everywhere, but mostly scattered in large
sparkles on the snow. Big Christian went in front, tugging toboggans
by their strings, as Gulliver, in some old woodcut, drew the fleets
of Lilliput. Through the brown wood-chalets of Selfrangr, up to the
undulating meadows, where the snow slept pure and crisp, he led us.
There we sat awhile and drank the clear air, cooled to zero, but
innocent and mild as mother Nature's milk. Then in an instant, down,
down through the hamlet, with its chalets, stables, pumps, and logs,
the slumbrous hamlet, where one dog barked, and darkness dwelt upon
the path of ice, down with the tempest of a dreadful speed, that
shot each rider upward in the air, and made the frame of the toboggan
tremble--down over hillocks of hard frozen snow, dashing and bounding,
to the river and the bridge. No bones were broken, though the race was
thrice renewed, and men were spilt upon the roadside by some furious
plunge. This amusement has the charm of peril and the unforeseen. In
no wise else can colder, keener air be drunken at such furious speed.
The joy, too, of the engine-driver and the steeplechaser is upon us.
Alas, that it should be so short! If only roads were better made for
the purpose, there would be no end to it; for the toboggan cannot lose
his wind. But the good thing fails at last, and from the silence of
the moon we pass into the silence of the fields of sleep.

VI

The new stable is a huge wooden building, with raftered lofts to stow
the hay, and stalls for many cows and horses. It stands snugly in an
angle of the pine-wood, bordering upon the great horse-meadow. Here
at night the air is warm and tepid with the breath of kine. Returning
from my forest walk, I spy one window yellow in the moonlight with a
lamp. I lift the latch. The hound knows me, and doe