ross dreary moors, glad enough were we to observe, in
the less thinly scattered cottages, indications of a town.

The clouds had been gathering ominously during the latter half of our
long day of travel,--and as the sun set blood-red behind a heavy bank of
vapor, it cast lurid reflections on large bodies of dense mist, which
sailed heavily athwart the crests of the mountains, with low, ragged,
trailing edges, that were too surely the precursors of a storm. Just
before the orb finally disappeared, its slant rays streamed through some
dark purple bars on the horizon's verge, and for an instant tinged the
opposite distant mountains with strange supernatural hues. The Blorenge
and the Sugar Loaf glowed like huge carbuncles, while the pale green
light which bathed their bases gleamed faintly like a setting of
aqua-marina. My artist companion incontinently fell into professional
raptures, and raved of "effect," and "Turner," and "Ruskin," heedless of
my advice that he had better hasten onward, lest night should overtake
us in that wild region, where sheep-tracks, scarcely visible even by
daylight, were our sole guides. At length, however, I managed to
start him, and on we stalked, the decreasing twilight and the distant
reverberations of thunder among the mountains hastening our steps, until
they became almost a trot.

But soon the trot declined once more into a walk, and a slow one
too,--for we entered a gloomy pass or gorge, whose rocky walls on either
side effectually excluded what little light yet lingered in the sky.
Cautiously picking our way, we slowly travelled on, until at length
we became sensible of a faint red flush in the narrow strip of sky
overhead. It seemed as though the sun had just wheeled back to give a
forgotten message to some starry-night-watcher,--or so my companion
intimated. But, unfortunately for his theory, the dull red glare
above us, which every moment deepened in intensity, was evidently
the reflection of earthly, not heavenly fire. I had seen too many
conflagrations to doubt that for an instant. Presently a dull, confused
sound fell on our ears, and at a sudden turn round an angle of our
mountain road we stood speechless as we gazed on a spectacle which
Milton might have conceived and Martin painted.

"Far other light than that of day there shone
Upon the wanderers entering Padalon,"

murmured the artist, as he gazed on the strange scene. And strange
indeed was it to our startled eyes.