The gulf that
divides you from the distant mountain seems like a huge bite taken
bodily out of the world by some voracious god; far away rise snow peaks
such as were not dreamt of in your Swiss tour; the bottomless valley at
your feet is misty and gloomy with blackness, streaked with mist, while
the peaks above shoot gladly to the sun and catch his broadside rays
like majestic white standards. Between you, as you stand leaning
cautiously against the hill behind you, and the wonderful background far
away in front, floats a strange vision, scarcely moving, but yet not
still. A great golden shield sails steadily in vast circles, sending
back the sunlight in every tint of burnished glow. The golden eagle of
the Himalayas hangs in mid-air, a sheet of polished metal to the eye,
pausing sometimes in the full blaze of reflection, as ages ago the sun
and the moon stood still in the valley of Ajalon; too magnificent for
description, as he is too dazzling to look at. The whole scene, if no
greater name can be given to it, is on a scale so Titanic in its massive
length and breadth and depth, that you stand utterly trembling and weak
and foolish as you look for the first time. You have never seen such
masses of the world before.
It was in such a spot as this that, nearly at noon on the appointed day,
my dooly-bearers set me down and warned me I was at my journey's end.
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