Page:Selected letters of Mendelssohn 1894.djvu/94

80 path or the least trace of human labour. Now and again one heard the avalanches on the Jungfrau; otherwise all was quiet, and not a tree near us. But in the middle of all this silence and solitude, on reaching the top of a little grassy hill, we suddenly came in sight of a great crowd of people standing in a circle, all talking and laughing and calling to one another. All were dressed in their finery, with flowers in their hats; there were many girls among them. Two tables with butts of wine were in the middle—all round the vast stillness and the awful mountains. It was curious that while climbing I could think of nothing but the rocks and stones, or else the snow and the track we had to follow; but from the moment I saw the people all that went out of my mind, and I thought only of them and their jovial festival. It was delightful there; the broad green meadow far above the clouds served for a stage. Straight in front the snow mountains lifted themselves in the sky, the mighty spire of the Eiger, with the Schreckhorn, the Wetterhorn and all the rest, away to the Blumlisalp. In the misty depth below lay the Lauterbrunnen valley looking quite small, and down there we could see all the route we had been the day before with its waterfalls marked like threads, the houses just little points, and the trees showing like tufts of grass. Behind, one now and then caught a glimpse of the Lake of Thun through the dimness. Among the crowd of good, stalwart, hearty peasants it was all leaping and singing, drinking and laughing. I saw the leaping for the first time with great interest. When it was over,