III.
In clear weather I have often climbed the mountain before sunrise. During the night, the mist of the Gave, accumulated in the gorges, has filled them to overflowing; under foot there is a sea of clouds, and overhead a dome of tender blue radiant with morning splendor; everything else has disappeared; nothing is to be seen but the luminous azure of heaven and the dazzling satin of the clouds; nature wears her vesture of purity. The eye glides with pleasure over the softly rounded forms of the aerial mass.
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In its bosom the crests stand forth like promontories; the mountain tops that it bathes rise like an archipelago of rocks; it buries itself in the jagged gulfs, and waves slowly around the peaks that it gains. The harshness of the bald crests heightens the grace of its ravishing whiteness. But it evaporates as it rises; already the landscapes of the depths appear under a transparent twilight; the middle of the valley discovers itself. There remains of the floating sea only a white girdle, which trails along the declivities; it becomes torn, and the shreds hang for a moment to the tops of the trees; the last tufts take flight, and the Gave, struck by the sun glitters around the mountain like a necklace of diamonds.