182 THE ADIRONDACK. 



beauty came back on me with strange power. The 

 gloomy gorge and savage precipice, or the sudden 

 storm, seem to excite the surface only of one's feelings, 

 while the sweet vale, with its cottages and herds and 

 evening bells, blends itself in with our very thoughts 

 and emotions, forming a part of our after existence. 

 Such a scene sinks away into the heart like a gentle 

 rain into the earth, while a rougher, nay, sublimer 

 one, comes and goes like a sudden shower. I do not 

 know how it is that the gentler influence should be 

 the deeper and more lasting, but so it is. The still 

 small voice of nature is more impressive than her 

 loudest thunder. Of all the scenery in the Alps, and 

 there is no grander on the earth, nothing is so 

 plainly daguerreotyped on my heart as two or three 

 lovely valleys I saw. Those heaven-piercing sum- 

 mits, and precipices of ice, and terrific gorges, and 

 fearful passes, are like grand but indistinct visions 

 on my memory, while those vales, with their carpets 

 of greensward, and murmuring rivulets, and perfect 

 repose, have become a part of my life. In moments 

 of high excitement or turbulent grief they rise before 

 me with their gentle aspect and quiet beauty, hushing 



