A CENTRAL AFRICAN MOUNTAIN VIEW. 437 



of the Punjab for nearly a year; and it was evening when 

 they first suddenly burst upon my sight from the summit of 

 the pass. They were still seven days' march distant, beyond 

 the intervening ridges. So blue, so utterly boundless did thev 

 appear, that they might have been mistaken for the ocean, 

 had not the silvery windings of the Tani showed them to 

 be terra firma. I halted to enjoy the prospect that my fancy 

 presented to me as something like a substantial emblem of 

 infinity." * 



In our own time, it has been our privilege to behold 

 many such sublime panoramas ; the recollection of 

 which still remains present to the mind with unfading 

 distinctness, affording a keen and ever-present sense 

 of enjoyment. Speaking of such a place seen amid 

 the wilds of Central Africa a recent traveller writes : 



" It is wonderful what an effect getting to the top of a 

 hill has on one's spirits and thoughts. I love to go alone 

 on some mountain and look down from a great height. One 

 seems more or less to leave all the littleness of one's nature 

 in the valley below. With the wide view and pure fresh 

 breeze, one's thoughts and ideas seem to expand, and become 

 elevated to be freer and better." f 



Nevertheless the ascent of high mountains is by no 

 means a thing that always repays the cost and labour 

 of the attempt. Should conditions prove favourable the 

 scenery is of course ' magnificent : but mist and cloud 

 are so apt to settle upon the higher slopes of lofty 

 ranges, that when the mountaineer succeeds in getting 

 there, there may be little or nothing to see. Frequent 

 disappointments occur in this way, as clouds often form 



* Travels in Kashmir, Ladak, etc., in 1838 9, by Godfrey H. Vigne, 

 1842, Vol. i., p. 193. 



y Emin Pasha and the Rebellion at the Equator, by A. J. Monteney 

 Jephson, p. 295. 



