120 MOUNTAINS. 



through the St. Gothard and the Mont Cenis, 

 which lias surmounted tlie Rocky Mountains and 

 the Sierra Nevada, wliich has annihilated tlie 

 Pyrenees, and begins now to pierce even the un- 

 broken ridge of the .- ^c, — the iron road has 

 laid open to us everywu^re the mountain valleys, 

 at the same time that it has made us forget the 

 obstacles to locomotion once flung so widely by 

 the hand of Nature across the face of the great 

 continents. Everybody now has seen, if not moun- 

 tains, at least considerable hills and eminences, 

 and has learnt to look upon them no longer as 

 merely rough and forbidding, but as reservoirs of 

 fresh air for poisoned lungs, and pure stretches 

 of untrodden turf for feet wearied with the hard 

 and cramping pavement of cities. Scotland has 

 become the playground of Britain, while Switzer- 

 land has developed into the playground of Europe. 

 Instead of the very name ''mountain" conjuring 

 up before our minds notliing but pictures of dan- 

 ger and discomfort, it now conjures up before us 

 endless ideas of healthy enjoyment — of delightful 

 scrambles among rock and heather, of glorious 

 and expansive views over lake and lowland, of 

 breezy picnics among solitary summitb, of rare 

 flowers and beautiful ferns that cling lovingly to 

 the weathered crannies of their native rocks. The 

 eighteenth century did not greatly love walking; 

 it preferred to drive in its own chariot, or to stick 



