SPRING IN THE ALPS 27 



feast whenever the spirit dictates in the heat 

 of the day, when the call of the Cuckoo is echoing 

 through the pine forests and the Robin-like note 

 of the Redstart comes cheerfully from some rustic 

 fence or heap of stones, or in the cool of the evening, 

 when the Blackbird is singing amid the golden 

 showers of the wild Laburnum, the Ghost Moth 

 is performing its strange, giddy dance over the 

 Anemones, Geraniums, and Grasses, and the lovely 

 Glacier des Grands is rosy tinted with the ' after- 

 glow. One can pass the sunny days in luxurious 

 dreaming ' on one's back in a bed of Rhododendrons ' 

 for the Rhododendron is here dreaming until the 

 dinner-bell breaks in upon one's reveries, and calls 

 one to a repast more mortal and substantial. 



But dreaming of what ? Dreaming of the flowers, 

 and of beyond the flowers ? For the effect of their 

 beauty is to translate one far above their beauty. 

 Material as they are, unsentimental as is their 

 existence, they render one doubly immaterial and 

 doubly sentimental. 



But dreaming of what ? Dreaming of the time 

 when the cattle will be here, eating off this crop 

 of Alpine loveliness ? Perhaps. For, with June, 

 the day will soon arrive when the cattle-bells will 

 chime in all their fascinating discord over these 



