vi MOUNTAINS 235 



sea. Beyond is the range which divides the 

 Valais from Italy. Sweeping round, the 

 vision meets an aggregate of peaks which look 

 as fledglings to their mother towards the 

 mighty Dom. Then come the repellent crags 

 of Mont Cervin ; the ideal of moral savagery, 

 of wild untameable ferocity, mingling involun- 

 tarily with our contemplation of the gloomy 

 pile. Next comes an object, scarcely less 

 grand, conveying, it may be, even a deeper 

 impression of majesty and might than the 

 Matterhorn itself the Weisshorn, perhaps 

 the most splendid object in the Alps. But 

 beauty is associated with its force, and we 

 think of it, not as cruel, but as grand and 

 strong. Further to the right the great 

 Combin lifts up his bare head; other peaks 

 crowd around him ; while at the extremity of 

 the curve round which our gaze has swept 

 rises the sovran crown of Mont Blanc. And 

 now, as day sinks, scrolls of pearly clouds 

 draw themselves around the mountain crests, 

 being wafted from them into the distant air. 

 They are without colour of any kind ; still, by 

 grace of form, and as the embodiment of 



