OLD ALPINE JOTTINGS. 447 



Swiss and Germans, and an increasing number of 

 English, congregate. The water contains carbonic acid 

 (the gas of soda water) and a trace of sulphate of iron 

 (copperas) ; this the visitors drink, and in elongated 

 tubs containing it they submerge themselves. A 

 curious effect is produced by the collection and escape 

 of innumerable bubbles of carbonic acid from the skin. 

 Every bubble on detaching itself produces a little twitch, 

 and hence a sort of prickly sensation experienced in the 

 water. The patients at St. Moritz put me in mind of 

 that Eastern prince whose physician induced him to 

 kick a football under the impression that it contained 

 a charm. The sagacious doctor knew that faith has a 

 dynamic power unpossessed by knowledge. Through 

 the agency of this power he stirred the prince to action, 

 caused him to take wholesome exercise, and thus cured 

 him of his ailments. At St. Moritz the water is pro- 

 bably the football — the air and exercise on these windy 

 heights being in most cases the real curative agents. 

 The dining-room of the Kurhaus, when Professor Hirst 

 and I were there, was filled with guests : every window 

 was barred, while down the chilled panes streamed the 

 condensed vapour of respiration. The place and com- 

 pany illustrated the power of habit to modify the 

 human constitution; for it was through habit that 

 these Swiss and German people extracted a pleasurable 

 existence out of an atmosphere which threatened with 

 asphyxia the better-ventilated Englishman. 



There was a general understanding between Hirst 

 and myself that we should this year meet at Pontresina, 

 and without concert as to the day both of us reached 

 the village within the same quarter of an hour. Some 

 theoretic points of glacier motion requiring elucida- 

 tion, we took the necessary instruments with us to the 

 Engadin ; we also carried with us a quantity of other 



