106 FIVE DAYS ON MOUNT MANSFIELD. 
the highest angel be as far above the lowest 
man? And yet (how mysteriously sugges- 
tive would the fact be, if only it were new 
to us!) this same light-winged Aphrodite, 
flitting from blossom to blossom in the moun- 
tain breeze, was but a few days ago an ugly, 
crawling thing, close cousin to the borer. 
Since then it has fallen asleep and been 
changed, —a parable, past all doubt, though 
as yet we lack eyes to read it. 
I have spoken hitherto as if I were the 
only sojourner at the summit, but there was 
another man, though I seldom saw him; a 
kind of hermit, living in a little shanty 
under the lee of the Nose. Almost as a 
matter of course he was reputed to be of 
good family and to read Greek, and the fact 
that he now and then received a bank draft 
evidently gave him a respectable standing 
in the eye of the hotel clerk. Something — 
something of a very romantic nature, we 
may be sure —had driven him away from 
the companionship of his fellows, but he 
still found it convenient to be within reach 
of human society. Like all such solitaries, 
he had some half-insane notions. He could 
not sleep indoors, not for a night; it would 
