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Rising quickly from behind the ridge, 12,000 horsemen rode in two vast masses against a weak point in the opposing lines. They were led by the King of Naples with all his wonted dash. Panting up the muddy slopes opposite, they sabred the gunners, enveloped the Russian squares, and the three allied sovereigns themselves had to beat a hasty retreat to avoid capture.
In those days, and till comparatively recent times, the country was densely wooded. Even now, traces of its earlier condition are to be found in the old oak copses and irregular belts of timber that yet survive upon its slopes, and the hollow-trunked trees that shade so many of its pastures. The forests have departed, but some old customs of their shades remain.
He heard the soft rush of running water. In the center of the canyon wound heavy lines of bright-green foliage, bordering a rocky brook. The air was close, warm, and sweet with perfume of flowers. The walls were low and shelving, and soon lost that rounded appearance peculiar to the wind-worn slopes above.
Here the track or gully bed narrowed to a width of not more than a hundred feet, while the steep slopes of the kloof on either side were clothed with scattered bushes and finger-like euphorbias which grew among stones.
Far off as lie the regions of the Saskatchewan from the Atlantic seaboard, on which that wave is thrown, remote as are the fertile glades which fringe the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, still that wave of human life is destined to reach those beautiful solitudes, and to convert the wild luxuriance of their now useless vegetation into all the requirements of civilized existence.
Let the reader try to imagine a wide plateau, dotted with trees and bushes, on one of the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, where that mighty range begins to slide into union with the great prairies. It commands a view of mingled woodland and rolling plain, diversified by river and lake, extending to a horizon so faint and far away as to suggest the idea of illimitable space.
"We may as well strike across, until we come onto the edge of the pass, somewhere above the fort; find a place where we can descend easily, and then lie down and sleep, till it is time to make our attempt." In another hour, they were looking down on the road, a mile or so above the fort. The slopes here were gradual, and could be descended without the least difficulty, even in the dark. "There!
We had several times disturbed antelopes during the early portion of the march, and we had just ascended from the rugged slopes of the valley, when we observed a troop of about a hundred baboons, who were gathering gum arabic from the mimosas; upon seeing us, they immediately waddled off.
This is the tale I have heard a thousand times. There was in France, it skills not where, a vale quiet as a summer Sabbath day. The vines hung ripe-clustered in wide and pleasant vineyards. The olives rustled grey on the slopes. The bell swung in the monastery tower. The cottage in the dell was safe as the château on the hill.
Here we have the snow lying in patches on the ground around us, and a fine rushing mountain stream fed by the many springs and rivulets from the mountain slopes, the Alpine range on our left beautifully timbered with fir forests. Now come another series of sparkling streams, flowing through the alluvial deposits carried down from the mountains, and so on to Casa No. 69.
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