Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories

To DR. EGBERT GUERNSEY.
DEAR DOCTOR:
I can never expect adequately to repay you for your many valuable services to me and mine. Nevertheless, in recognition of what you have been to us, allow me to dedicate this unpretentious volume to you. I shall have more respect for my little stories if in some way they are associated with your name .
Very sincerely yours ,
HJALMAR H. BOYESEN.
NEW YORK, January , 1881.
CONTENTS

Mr. Julius Hahn and his son Fritz were on a summer journey in the Tyrol. They had started from Mayrhofen early in the afternoon, on two meek-eyed, spiritless farm horses, and they intended to reach Ginzling before night-fall.
There was a great blaze of splendor hidden somewhere behind the western mountain-tops; broad bars of fiery light were climbing the sky, and the châlets and the Alpine meadows shone in a soft crimson illumination. The Zemmbach, which is of a choleric temperament, was seething and brawling in its rocky bed, and now and then sent up a fierce gust of spray, which blew like an icy shower-bath, into the faces of the travellers.
Ach, welch verfluchtes Wetter! cried Mr. Hahn fretfully, wiping off the streaming perspiration. I'll be blasted if you catch me going to the Tyrol again for the sake of being fashionable!
But the scenery, father, the scenery! exclaimed Fritz, pointing toward a great, sun-flushed peak, which rose in majestic isolation toward the north.