236 THE LIFE OF JJMES J). FORBES. [c HAI-. 



lie was full of vigour, Iris foot planted firmly, his eye 

 ever keen, and Iris whole tone ana air that of a thorough 

 mountaineer. 



* Soon, too soon, we reached Saltzburg ; and as I was 

 shortly due in England, he persuaded me to leave him 

 to his more detailed examination of the Berchtesgaden, 

 urging me, however, in words which he repeated in a 

 letter written from Windisch-Matrei, to return home as 

 soon as possible, "because then I shall expect you the 

 sooner in our old-fashioned capital, and welcome my dear 

 friend all the sooner to my old-fashioned house." And 

 thus we parted, to meet again in Scotland/ 



After the departure of his friend, Forbes, having com- 

 forted himself by a series of tough magnetic observations, 

 proceeded to visit the ancient springs of Wildbad Ga- 

 stein ; and having completed the circuit of the Gross 

 Glockner by crossing the beautiful pass of Malnitz, the 

 Matrayer Jock, and the Vclber-Tauern Col, he arrived at 

 Innspruck, and soon passed on to Trafoi and the Stelvio. 



Journal, AH<J>I*I :Wth. 



C I meant to have crossed from the Saltzburg country 

 by the Velber-Tauern ; bur. the morning being very bad, 

 I remained patiently at Windisch-Matrei all day, in the 

 afternoon walking up the great lateral valley of the Is. 1- 

 Thal, a well-cultivated and well-peopled, but most remote 

 spot. A stranger was a real lion ; and even at Windisch- 

 Matrei, the chef-lieu of a district, my visit was a wonder. 

 The apparition of an Englishman (Lord Auckland) in 

 1819, and of another in 1832, were still fresh in the 

 recollection of mine host. . . . Next day I started for 

 my Col, on a promising morning, with a guide who also 

 promised fair, and had been strongly recommended ; but 

 his request for a morning draught of brandy did not 

 augur well. Very well he went, however, as far as the 

 Tauernhaus, or inn at the foot of the Col, which required 

 fully three hours to cross, and afforded some fine scenery. 

 But as we ascended his pace slackened, and he soon 

 became quite as incapable as my drunken guide of last 



