NATURAL SCENES.
No. IIL—A MOUNTAIN.

HERE is something very attractive
in a mountain, and he must be a
stupid boy who has no desire to
climb one. But it is slow and
tring work sometimes—anything
but child’s play. However, let
us throw legs aside, and as we
sit by our own fire let us spread
our thought-wings, and stand on
a few of earth’s peaks, Here is
one, almost in the middle of

France, a mountain shaped like the dome of St. Paul’s
Cathedral, and called Puy de Déme. It is a green
hill, towering up among its bare and rocky brethren,
almost all of whom were once volcanoes. he villages
about are built of lava, which in days gone by flowed
dowh the mountain sides. Here the women sufler
much from great swellings in their throats, which
are sometimes as large as a child’s head.

On the Puy de Déme the great Blaise Pascal, ‘ one
of the sublimest spirits in the world,’ weighed the
air.

A little hut used to stand on the mountain, and it
was set on fire one night by some mischief-loving
people ; and the folks all around were in great fear,
for they thought the Puy de Déme was going to
become a volcano.

From France to Ceylon by the nearest overland
route would be a fatiguing journey, but we can stand
oa Adam’s Peak in a twinkling. It isa holy mountain,
called by the natives ‘The Hill of the Holy Foot,’
because on the top there is a stone with an impression
like a gigantic foot, a foot more than five feet long.
And the simple folk ascend the peak in crowds

 

for the purpose of worshipping the holy foot, which:

they call Buddhiw’s foot. Buddha left his footmark
here when he strode across the ocean into Siam. ‘The
Arabs, knowing nothing of Buddha, changed the
name, and called it Adaim’s foot. The ascent up the
peak is very steep, and the path winds sometimes
over bare, slippery rocks, where the traveller would
be in great difficulties if it were not for strong irons
fastened to the mountain side.

Stepping like Buddha across the Indian Ocean, we
stand on a strange mountain, called by the peculiar
name of Peter Botte. Peter Botte was a bold but
unfortunate man, who climbed a very steep mountain
in the Mauritius, and lost his life in doing it. As he
came down he fell, and was killed, but lives in history
by his achievement. This mountain is no great height,
but it has a remarkable head, placed on a neck, ‘The
head, which is over thirty feet high, overbangs the
neck, and therefore an ascent to the summit is a work
of great hazard. Four adventurous Hnglishmen, who
would not take warning by Peter Botte, managed
one day to scramble to the very top, and there drink
the king’s health.

They slept on the neck, which is a ledge about six
feet wide. At the edge is a most awful precipice.
They kind.ed a fire, and had plenty of brandy (perhaps
too much), and were well wrapped up in coats and
shawls, yet they were too chilly to sleep. In the

 

 

morning they rose from their uncomfortable couch
stiff and hungry, and after climbing once more to the
head they made a hole in the rock, and there left a
flagstaff with the old Union Jack fluttering merrily.
You will be glad to hear they did not meet with the
sad fate of poor Peter Botte.

The highest mountains in our globe are those which
separate India from Thibet, and go by the name of
the Himalayas. For a thousand miles there is a
continuous line of mountain masses. eight miles in
breadth: out of which no less than twenty-eight
peaks soar up to the immense height of twenty thou-
sand feet and more. If you would ascend one of
those snowy pinnacles from the burning plains below
you must first cross a most unhealthy border, twenty
miles in width. It is, in fact, a swamp, caused by
the waters overflowing the river banks. The soil of
this swampy border is covered by a mass of trees,
and grass, and shrubs, where the tiger, and the
elephant, and other animals, find a secure retreat. If
you can cross this girdle without falling a victim to
fever or wild beasts, you will come to smiling valleys,
romantic hill-sides, and noble forests. Still advancing
onwards and upwards, you get among bolder and
more rugged scenes. ‘Ihe sides of the glens are very
steep, sometimes quite naked, and sometimes well
wooded; and the traveller has to be content with
three ropes for a bridge. The towns have to be
perched as best they may. The streets are simply
stairs cut out of the rock; and the houses rise in tiers
one above another.

The pathways into Thibet among the Himalayas
are generally mere tracks by the side of foaming
torrents. Often as you advance every trace of the
path is gone, being swept away by falling rocks and
earth from above. Yet the love of gain and adventure
laughs at dangers and hardships, and goods, placed
on the backs of goats and sheep, are briskly carried
to and fro. Sometimes, where it is impossible to walk
along the mountain-side, posts are driven in, and
branches of trees and earth are spread, so as to form
a trembling foothold for the passenger.

In the Andes a mule is used, a very sure-footed
beast. Often the wayfarer comes to a chasm, several
feet wide, and ever so many hundreds of feet in
depth. Across this the mule will leap, but not until
he has taken every care to insure a sate jump.

‘One day,’ says Major Head, ‘I went by the worst
pass over the Cordillera mountains. The height
above me seemed almost perpendicular, and beneath
it sloped steeply down to a rapid tcrrent, raging far
beneath. The path for seventy yards was only a
few inches broad, and at one particular point it was
washed clean away, while the stones thereabout were
evidently loese.
shoulder; my other leg overhung the precipice ; above
my head were loose stones, which it seemed the slightest
touch would dislodge.’

After the Major and his party were safely over, he
was told by the guide that, to his knowledge, four
hundred mules had fallen at that terrible spot.

oe

On one side the rock brushed my,