THE BLUE SKY 



67 



Jungfrau and they go there to watch, perhaps 

 days at a time, for its appearance, when they 

 might see the same pink glow upon their own 

 skies at home almost any summer evening. It 

 is not necessary for one to go beyond the door- 

 yard to see beauty. The open sky will reveal 

 more varied lights and colors than anyone could 

 schedule or tabulate or talk about in a lifetime. 

 Seen from our valleys, instead of being a 

 monotonous blue roof above us, it is, perhaps, 

 the most changeable transparency that human 

 eyes have ever looked at or looked through. 



But while this variety is true of any one patch 

 of sky, it does not follow that all blue skies 

 are alike, even in their variety. Atmosphere, 

 upon which so much responsibility for light and 

 color has been thrown, is the potent cause of 

 many different skies over many different lands. 

 In dry countries, where there is much dust in 

 the air, the blue is often a pale turquoise, or if 

 there is great heat, then it is pinkish, or rose- 

 hued. One hears much in tourists* descrip- 

 tions of "the deep blue sky of Italy," but if 

 they mean by that a, pure blue sky, their descrip- 

 tions are not accurate. It is oftener pale lilac, 

 rose-hued, or saffron-tinted, and not to be com- 

 pared in intensity and purity of blue to the skies 



