And this fair creation--this hope upon a death bed--this image of love
unchilled and immortal--how I wanted to know it by name!
[Illustration: _of a tiny plant with a single flowering stem and two
simple circular leaves._]
Today, at the summit house of the mountain, I opened an herbarium, and
there were three inches of name as hopeless and unpronounceable as the
German of our guides, piled up on my little flower. I shut the
herbarium.
This morning we started early from Grindelwald--that is, by eight
o'clock. An unclouded, clear, breezy morning, the air full of the
sounds of cascades, and of the little bells of the herds. As we began
to wind upward into that delectable region which forms the first stage
of ascent, I said to C., "The more of beautiful scenery I see, the
more I appreciate the wonderful poetry of the Pilgrim's Progress." The
meadows by the River of Life, the Delectable Mountains, the land of
Beulah, how often have I thought of them! From this we went off upon
painting, and then upon music, the freshness of the mountain air
inspiring our way. At last, while we were riding in the very lap of a
rolling field full of grass and flowers, the sharp blue and white
crystals of the glacier rose at once before us.
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