s gazed untired on that glorious panorama of glistering
heights from the towering cones of the Eiger and the Moench to the
crowding precipices of the Ebenen-fluen and the Silberhorn. Deep below
them, in the valley, "like handfuls of pearl in a goblet of emerald,"
the quiet chalets clustered over their pastures of vivid grass, and gave
that touch of human interest which alone was wanting to complete the
loveliness of the scene.

Every step brought them some new object to gaze upon with loving
admiration; now the gaunt spurs of some noble pine that had thrust his
gnarled roots into the crevices of rock to look down in safety on the
torrent roaring far below him, and now the track of a chamois, or the
bright black eyes of some little marmot peering from his burrow on the
side of a sunny bank, and whistling a quick alarm to his comrades at
their play.

"What an extraordinary howl," said Cyril, laughing, as the guide whooped
back a sort of jodel in answer to a salute from the other side of the
valley.

"It's very harmonious--is it not?" said Violet.

"Yes, that's one of the varieties of the Ranz des Vaches," said Kennedy.

"And why do they shout at each other in that way?"

"Because the mountains are lonely, Cyril, and the shepherds don't see
human faces too often; so men begin to feel like brothers, and are glad
to greet each other in these silent hills."

"Did you hear how the mountain echoed back his cry?" said Eva; "it
sounded like a band of elves mocking at him."

"Yes, you'll hear something finer directly; the guide told me he was
going to borrow an alpen-horn at one of these chalets, and then you'll
discover for the first time what echo can do."

In a few minutes the guide appeared with the horn, and blew. Heavens!
what a melody of replications! How in the hollows of the hills every
harsh tone died away, and all the softer notes flowed to and fro in
tenderest music, and fainted in distant reverberations more and more
exquisite, more and more exquisitely low. Can it be a mere echo of
those rude blasts? It seemed as though some choir of spirits had caught
each tone as it came from the peasant's horn, and had deified it there
among the clouds, and had repeated it over and over with divinest
variations, to show man how crabbed were the sounds which he produced,
and yet how ravishing they might one day become, when to the symphony of
silver strings they rang out amid the seraph harps and choral harmonies
of