84 STALKS ABROAD 



An hour later we stood on the summit of a 

 great encircling wall of rock which seemed to hem 

 the valley in on three sides. For a while we stood 

 looking out across the vast open space spread like 

 a map before us. Then Henry nudged me. Quite 

 three miles away on a rocky spur, snow-covered, but 

 with a few dotted fir trees showing darkly against 

 it, lay four goats. The big white billy who stood 

 on guard beneath one of these firs almost hid the 

 nanny from view ; but two younger goats stood 

 out plainly half way down the spur. 



Very far off a distant range of mountains broke 

 the horizon, their summits white and glistering. 

 Cut off from these by long-drawn cloudy streamers, 

 which trailed laggard up the valley, great blue- 

 green abysses yawned, crested with pines whose 

 spiky tops, even at that distance, showed hard and 

 sharp against the background of mist. It was 

 these wonderful pines which gave the great hollows 

 in the hills their vivid colour, and made one think 

 that he was looking down into some sea pool whose 

 depths had never yet been fathomed. Closer at hand 

 a whole hillside had been swept bare by some forgotten 

 fire, and on its shroud of white the late sun threw 

 from each blackened pine stem a line, so black and 

 distinct that save for the angle it was hard to tell 

 substance from shadow, or the phantom forest from 

 that which gave it birth. At the foot of this 

 slope lay a little mountain burn, silent in its long 

 winter's sleep, yet twisting its course in and out 



