“Yes, herr; there are plenty who come here, and think they know in a day all that it has taken me more than twenty years to learn.”
He led the way back to the basket, and busily spread their homely dinner on a smooth block of stone, Saxe vowing that he had never eaten such bread and cheese before.
When the meal was ended, and the basket once more placed on the mule’s back, Dale looked inquiringly at the guide.
“Over yonder, herr,” he said, pointing at the wall of rock away to their left.
“But we can’t get up there with the mule,” cried Saxe: “we’re not flies.”
“Wait and see, herr,” replied Melchior. “We shall mount yonder, and then go right over the col between those two peaks. There is the valley on the other side that we are seeking, and there we must rest for the night.”
“Then the sooner we start the better,” said Dale, “for the day is getting on.”
“Yes, herr; and the mists come down into the col where the snow lies. Are you ready?”
The answer was in the affirmative, and the guide started straight for the wall of rock, which still looked quite impassable as they drew near, till Melchior turned sharply round into a cleft, which looked as if a huge piece had been cut down from the mountain, and left guile separate and still standing.
Up this cleft they mounted steadily, till, to Saxe’s surprise, he found himself high above the mighty wall which shut in the valley, and only now, as it were, at the foot of the mountains, which rose up fold beyond fold, apparently endless, and for the most part snow-capped, with snow lying deeply in the hollows, and filling up the narrow col or depression between the peaks where they were to pass.