A NIGHT WALK OVER THE FINSTERMÜNTZ-THE TYROL. What a scene! Mountains that in the fading, light look black and forbidding, and whose monstrous masses come striding_forward, like Titans startled from slumber. Beneath-far, far beneath their sheer precipitous side, a valley and green meadows, and tiny hamlets clustering round their little churches, whose | spires, sheathed in metal scales, gleam with dragon-like hues of green and gold. That valley's peaceful aspect contrasts strangely with the Alpine wildness above; and still more strangely with the deafening, unceasing, tumultuous roar of a river, whose breadth indeed, and flow of water raise it above the appellation of a mere mountain torrent, but whose boiling and thundering waves dash (as only a mountain torrent's can) through, over, and under the black round boulders and jagged rocks, that fret and madden, though they cannot check, the stream's unwearied might. It is the stream and valley of the Inn! And never did Nature, in her wildest, fiercest mood, more grandly enhance the power of man-the strength of his much counselling mind, the victory of his, much-enduring, toilsome hand! For see! up the side of this dark mass of firs and limestone, hanging midway between the roar of the Inn, and the unheard complainings of the summit's lonely pines, tracking the trackless, scaling the inaccessible, winds in graceful curves a road-amighty road! no slender mountain track, precarious and half-defined, nor yet the broader mule-path, safe though rugged; but a road | broad and commodious, hard and smooth as the best high-road in Europe, finished and level as is the road of the most conscientious "trust" in England. How victoriously it sweeps upward in those stupendous windings! yet how gradual and inviting the ascent! The fall is so finely graduated that the brave team of the diligence continue their trot unslackened, as they leave the valley and ascend the mountain side; and the tourist, who having left the diligence behind at the last stage is doing the pass on foot, tramps on with a buoyant exultation at so promising an introduction to the great Finstermüntz. By a road like this we ascend mountains without climbing them; precipitous cliffs are turned into mere "rising ground," Nature's wall-like barriers into an inclined plane. On, then, the tourist tramps. It is six o'clock, but his object is to reach the summit of the pass before dark; for thence may be seen the Ortler Spitz, "that giant of the Rhotian Alps"-a peak which they say combines something of the commanding abruptness of the Matterhorn with the snowy radiance of Mont Blanc or the Jungfrau. His time is short; but the inspiration of the scene, the anticipation of the coming view, and, above all, the increasing keenness of the air, seem to fill him with new powers, and he promises himself that he can do the Pass at a "spurt." He winds swiftly, then, up the road's great curves. But already the gathering clouds are closing up the view; the great peak will probably be invisible even should he reach the top of the Pass in time. And, besides, there are sights on the road that arrest his attention, and, in spite of himself, bring him ever and anon to a halt. For now and then the road is so marvellously supported on its terraces of masonry that it is hard not to step for a moment into the casementlike apertures made at intervals in the parapet; and then, hanging as it were in mid-air, to gaze down into the very stream itself, striving to measure with the eye the depth, or watching some mountain bird which darts from a crevice far below. Next the traveller passes through a tunnel or gallery, which resounds hideously with the din of some unseen torrent; but whether from beneath or from above he knows not, for little can be seen in the dim light admitted by the narrow openings which face the valley; he shivers in the dank and darkling vault, which seems to tremble and re-echo with the dash of the hidden waters. From this he emerges, and breathes more freely in the glad daylight; when suddenly he seems to be brought, if not into the actual presence, yet into the haunt and demesne of an awful being that has'ts lair hard by this mountain road-a lurking monster, who sometimes descends from his unseen fastness with appalling roar and desolating rush; for see this great cleft or hollow, which forms a deep track or cutting down the mountain-side, and passes beneath the road, which spans it with a deep arch: it is a track made for the especial accommodation of avalanches, which at certain times of the year descend in this direction, and which, careering down this hollow, pass under the road instead of across it. It grows darker; and soon a wild, graceful figure, seen abruptly on a projecting eminence, looks like the demon of the dark Finstermüntz transformed, in some sudden caprice, into the freest and most lovely of the denizens of his rocks. There it stands, the shy, wanton chamois, ready, as the traveller approaches, to leap away with a reckless bound, and disappear! But no, it stands motionless, still as an image; for an image it is, a carved figure placed there to commemmorate some mountaineering exploit. Darker still! the traveller now conjectures rather than perceives the character of the scenery he is passing through. And now the road takes an abrupt turn to the left; he can just see that it enters a deep narrow gorge, which here opens into the larger valley, and along the bottom of, which a torrent thunders down, to pour its waters into the Inn below. So dark and forbidding is this wild gorge, that he pauses for a moment, and casts a lingering gaze up and down the more open valley, which, by contrast with the narrower ravine, seems almost light and inviting. In a moment, however, he pursues his journey, and winds onward, hemmed in by towering rocks, and overhung by shadowy trees. litary dominion; like her, a mighty road-maker. It is an easy transition, from the modern Francis Josephs or Leopolds to the mediæval Fredericks and Othos; from medieval Othos and Henries to classic Antonines or the Julian line to the days when, whatever track or mountain path pursued the line of this broad Austrian road, it was not bordered by these frequent shrines, with their rude carvings and paintings, where the solemn struggles with the grotesque, the painful with the fantastic-when, instead of the picturesque yet civilized Tyrol-hunter, the skin-clad Genauni wandered over these rocks. Yes, perhaps down this very pass the fierce Rhætian tribes, wielding that double-headed battleaxe, the origin of which so much puzzled the Roman laureate, poured with a shrill higbland yell on the legionaries of young Drusus and his stern brother; like Claverhouse and his wild clansmen, sweeping down the gorge of Killecrankie, and dashing with brandished clay. more upon the levelled pikes of the startled Royalists. seeing around no shape or motion but grey, flitting cloud, and vague masses of shadow, he passes into a phase of thought further, far further removed from present realities than even those old days of Roman warfare. In vain his eyes strive to pierce the gloom which surrounds him; overhead, indeed, the air, though full of cloud and mist, still seems to retain somewhat of grey, uncertain light; but darkness fills the road and mountain-side. In front, behind, on either hand, is darkness, or, if not darkness, looming, shapeless shadows, more bewildering than sheer darkness itself. The unseen forest. trees groan and rustle above the traveller, the torrent roars hoarsely below. It is now full night; louder and louder grows the roar of the torrent, and a white foaming mass of water gleams through the darkness, for the stream here falls in a deep broken cataract, at the head of which the road turns sharply, and apparently crosses the stream. But when on the point of entering this turning the traveller stops short: the road seems to run full into the side of the mountain itself; or what is that which looms in front of him, tall and phantom-like, as if the road abruptly entered some dreadful portal, some "all-hope abandon" prison threshold? He advances, But, as the traveller wends on and upstep by step, and, as it were, feeling his way. Awards, hearing no sounds of human life, huge porch and massive gate, the muzzle of a cannon, and suddenly on the left, a deep guttural voice utters a loud challenge. The voice comes from a sentry-box, which holds a tall, cloaked figure, with musket and fixed bayonet. Still somewhat perplexed, the traveller asks the way to Nauders. The sentry silently extends his arm, and the stranger perceives that the road, having crossed the stream, makes another quick bend to the left, and, passing the face of the fort (for an Austrian fort it is) continues its upward course. He tramps on, with a new train of thought, set in motion by the apparition of this mountain fortress thus suddenly confronting him in the heart of the wild Tyrol highlands in the gloom of the deepening night. The Austrian soldier's deep challenge still rings in his ear some Teuton peasant, perhaps, from the banks of the Main, or some sturdy Zechian from the corn-lands of the Donau. Poor fellow does he think of a "Dacian mother far away, as he keeps his dark and lonely watch? A mere "clod" perhaps, a rude boor, manufactured into the martial whitecoated grenadier; yet what dignity, what military grandeur invests that simple peasant as he stands on guard at the gates of the lonely fortress! He is part of a vast system, of a power held to be mighty-one simple fellow, but one of half a million-the representative of the Kaiser, of the prince who, from the imperial halls of Schönbrunn rules, with his hundred legions, alike the pastures of Styria, the moors and valleys of Transylvania, the Illyrian bays, and these wild Tyrol-hills and forests. "Austria"-yes, at least the "shade of what was great"-remains with her. Thus, on the lonely, dark road, has the cloaked sentry recalled the traveller from the mountain road to the modern Cæsar; from the murky night-gloom to the holy Roman Empire-to the modern successor of that potent shade of the past; like her, a mi And now, one sense being, as it were, negatived and deposed for the time being from its natural authority and operation, another awakes into a keener activity than its wont. The blind night presents a blank to the eye, but the hearing seems quickened to a restless, sensitive acuteness. Something more than wind-buffeted trees or rushing water seems to speak in the muffled roar, the fitful sighs and broken mur murs that fill the air. On still the tourist tramps; but whither is the smooth, gently-rising road leading him? Still onward and upwardcan he have passed Nauders in the darkness, or has he taken some wrong turning? Is he winding up the Stelvio instead of the Finstermüntz all this time, or who knows where? Onward still. His footfall sounds firm and even on the smooth, solid road; but that seems now his only hold on the familiar world of sense and earthly life. That hard, solid road his feet are pressing, seems his only connection with things mundane. His feet are on the handiwork of men; but shadowy night wraps his head, and in his ear are sounds strange and unfamiliar, and voices hard to interpret. Onward still. Is he, in truth, walking quietly up to Nauders, as duly informed by the handbooks? Or is he penetrating deeper and deeper into some wild realm in the heart of the lonely Finstermüntz, some region not mentioned, or to be mentioned, in the handbooks? Are not these Tyrol ranges German enough to swarm with elf, gnome, goblin, demon, nightwitch, or whatever weird tribes people the Hartz Mountains or muster to a centenary Walpurgis ? Onward still he tramps, still winding up the endless ascent. Suddenly, as he for a moment pauses and turns, a thrill passes through him. High over his head a pitch-black spot appears in the grey expanse of mist. It approaches; it grows larger; it passes on-silent, shadowy, mysterious. Is it some vast bird, sailing slowly over the gloomy pass? With a creeping awe, vague but irresistible, he watches it with straining eyes, as, with a rapid, dreadful gliding, it mounts, seeking a vertical position, from which as it were to swoop downwards with some fell attempt. Abruptly it halts. At the upper end its dim vanishing outline assumes a form and image bold and defined. Then from its lower end it grows less and less, and in a moment disappears while at the same instant the lonely gazer understands the ocular illusion which the black mountain and the driving scud have combined to practise on him. The driving mist has for a moment opened; the side of the mountain, black as Erebus by contrast with the grey-white cloud, has looked forth upon him through the window-like gap, which, passing upwards, as the mist itself sped on, showed a moving spot of black mountain side, till (moving still upwards) it reached the summit, and, for a moment the traveller saw the very head, the murky scalp-like top of the great Finstermüntz, hanging awfully above him. It seemed a strange vision, that momentary revelation of the black giant, dark and silent as a phantom, but a thousand times more colossal than the Brocken's spectre. Yet in the solid fixedness of its huge bulk (though its vastness had been rather suggested than displayed) there seemed something that soothed and stilled the unearthly phantasy which was more and more swaying the traveller's thoughts. This, at least, was no fleeting shadowy spiritform, but one of the steadfast earth-born brood of everlasting mountains, beneath whose shadow he is walking, as in the shadow of a mighty unseen friend, true lord of the wild hill-region, suzerain and protector alike of mountain-born gnome and mountain-loving tourist. So onward again, and upward still, with unwearied step! And, see, lights are glimmering far a-head! This must be Nauders at last. Quick steps and gay voices approach, and the white coats of soldiers going down to the fort below. As with a deep Teutonic "Good night" they pass the tourist, the last flickering shadow of his night-fancies scours away. The mountain-dream has already withdrawn darkling from his conscious thoughts, to return into them vivid and life-like months hence. THE STORY OF A CARPET. BY ALICE B. HAVEN. Mrs. Lambert tied the strings of her new spring bonnet in a careful bow, and thought how very becoming it was. A plain straw, to be sure, trimmed with blue ribbons, but it was her colour, blue, and the fresh blonde border, and the sprays of forget-me-not and lily-of-the-valley which were half-hidden away in it, shaded her face delicately, and betrayed at a glance the quiet good taste of the wearer. So did the well-preserved silk which she wore, with its fine lines of brown and white, and the shawl that she folded so neatly and threw over it, turning half-away around at her chamber glass several times, to 66 But be sure that the poiut fell exactly in the centre. It was only "a Stella"-and we own that Stellas are very common"-but its folds were as soft and pure as if it had been a cashmere, and possibly it was considerably fresher, having had much less wear and fewer owners than most India shawls that come to our market! the secret of Mrs. Lambert's good looks, after all, was the pleasant errand on which she was bound. She looked in at the parlour clock as she came down-stairs, to be sure of the time, for her husband was an exceedingly punctual man, as became a bookkeeper in Sturgis & Co.'s large establishment, where everything was conducted in the most exact routine, and he was to leave the office at four precisely, to meet her at the ferry. They lived in E- because a salary of three hundred a year would not admit of a house in town, unless they resigned themselves to extremely close quarters in an obscure or crowded street, while in E, for the same rent, they had a neat cottage with a garden plot, and not even the annoyance of a thin party wall, which, anywhere in the city, would give them, lour door. The next day, the work of re-decorathe benefit of the children's quarrels, or practice of the scales, or the domestic squabbles of the elders, next door. Some of Mrs. Lambert's town friends groaned over the ferry, whenever they put themselves so far out of the way as to call on her but as Mr. Lambert, who had a daily experience, did not mind it, his wife, whose home duties admitted of but one weekly journey to town, did not think it worth while to grieve over it; besides, in her heart, she did not think it at all disagreeable. "My dear child,” Mrs. Stark was accustomed to say, in the patronizing manner she always used towards her young friend, "it is very good and amiable in you to say that you don't mind, and to put up with such a banishment. | You are a pattern little wife, and all your acquaintances give you the credit of it. Alfred Lambert wouldn't find many women who would allow him to have his own way in everything, and nobody else would have given up the chances you had for such a humdrum life"from which delicate little compliment any unprejudiced stranger would naturally infer that Mrs. Lambert had thrown herself away, originally, on a self-willed, exacting domestic tyrant, and perpetually repeated the sacrifice, as occasion required. They had been married four years now, three of them at housekeeping, and all through the winter Mrs. Lambert had been annoyed by the dulness that naturally creeps over a plainlyfurnished room, when the first freshness is worn off, and the most careful dusting and rubbing will not restore it. If they could only have a new carpet, that would go a great way; the one now in wear had been chosen originally more for its enduring quality than its beauty, and though there was not a thin place in it, time and wear had not improved its appearance. Mrs. Lambert began to plan, in her own mind, how she could fit it to the chambers with the least waste, before she drew her husband's attention to the faded strip between the front windows, and pictured the improvement new paper and paint-if their landlord could be induced to apply them- and a carpet of more lively colours and graceful pattern would effect. Strange to say, Mr. Lambert came into the measure immediately. He liked to have his surroundings bright and fresh quite as well as his wife, and always insisted that it had a great effect on a person's disposition, whether they were so, or suffered to fall into dull dilapidation. He had secretly meditated the addition of a pretty book-case to their household plenishing; volumes accumulated so fast that it was almost necessary; but he could wait awhile, and Jenny should certainly have her carpet; moreover, he would use his best interest with the landlord, and thought it more than probable he would consent, for Mr. Green must know that it would benefit his property, and what such quiet, punc tual tenants were worth. "Good-by, old carpet," Mrs. Lambert said, with an involuntary nod, as she closed the par ting was to commence, and she was on her way to choose their part of it-the carpet. It is by no means an original consideration, or one altogether unfamiliar to our pen, that happiness is far more equally distributed than people generally imagine. The poor woman, who has toiled, and saved, and even stinted herself in food to purchase the stove that is to keep her children from the suffering of the winter and facilitate her humble labours as a laundress, is far happier than the elegantly clad lady, who brushes past her in the street, as she hurries along on her cheerful errand, and who looks with a glance of pity on the threadbare shawl and faded hood, wondering "what such people can find in life to help them to support it." Mrs. Lambert, simply dressed, the busy housewife of a home where only one servant could be afforded, and who had worked hard all the morning to take her holiday with an easy mind, carried with her a heart full of cheerful thankful. ness for her lot in life, and a keen enjoyment of the expected purchase and possession, that Mrs. Sturgis, the wife of her husband's em ployer, removing for a season to a long-coveted country-house, with an army of "men-servants and maid-servants," might have envied. How gaily she chatted, as she hung on her husband's arm, going up the High-street, knowing very well, from his admiring glances and an occa sional affectionate pressure of his arm, that he thought the spring bonnet very becoming, too! An incessant little flow of household chat, and lively comments on passers-by, and possibly indiscreet references to her happiness-Mrs. Stark would have considered them so—and a declaration now and then that she should have all that heart could wish, when she had seen the last of painters and paper-hangers, and they were once more settled again. "You are not going in here, surely?"-and her bright eyes looked at her husband questioningly as he stopped at a large establishment in the best part of the town. "And why not?" asked Mr. Lambert, whose ideas of economy, not less strict than his wife's, had a different foundation. "But it's so fashionable; we can't afford their prices. I heard Mrs. Stark say that they had the largest assortment in town." "We might as well have the benefit of it, then. If we go to some little place, with a small busi ness, it holds to reason that they cannot afford so good an article at as reasonable a price. Besides, I know one of the salesmen here, a very friendly fellow. Hastings, our cashier, reminded me of it; he has been making some purchases of him lately." Mr. Lambert very prudently did not allow his wife so much as a glance at the gorgeous fabrics unrolled in the main saloon, and hurried her over velvets in which her feet sank as she crossed them, and past medallions as worthy of study for their exquisite colouring and design as any 'flower-piece" on the Academy walls. Mr. Johnson, the friendly salesman, kindly left his usual post in the midst of these costly importations, and acknowledging the introduction to Mrs. Lambert with a bow that did credit to his daily association with some of the most elegant women in the city who were numbered among the customers of the firm-prepared to unroll the ingrains for which they had inquired. "Not quite such a small pattern, though it's very neat," suggested Mrs. Lambert, feeling that she was giving a great deal of unnecessary trouble. "Your chamber is large, then," said Mr. John son. "Oh, it's not a chamber carpet we are looking for." "I beg your pardon for taking up your time in showing you these goods; it did not occur to me that ingrain was used for anything else. I'm afraid we have not a very good assortment of larger patterns, for that reason. Even for dining-rooms we generally sell three-plys; this would do well for a dining-room, oak and green. Here, Taylor, match this pattern. There, that has quite the air of a dining-room carpet at first glance." "Then I don't think we will have it, Johnson," said Mr. Lambert, speaking out frankly. "We are very plain people, and happen to want it for our parlour." Mrs. Lambert noticed and felt the slightest shrug of Mr Johnson's shoulders. He did not mean the least incivility; it was a habit he had when finding himself mistaken; but she interpreted it differently, and even looked at the porter to see if he used any less alacrity in waiting on people who used only ingrain on their parlours, but the man's stolid indifference reassured her. "Here is something new;" and Mr. Johnson touched a roll of crimson and green. But the contrast was too glaring; and the next, the stiff geometrical figure, was objectionable. As he acknowledged, there was not much choice in the larger patterns. "If you really want a good article now, I should advise a tapestry." And Mr. Johnson fell into an attitude, leaning one hand on an upright bale, and adjusting his hair lightly with the other. "They wear twice as long; and the styles this year are all copied from the Brussels; on the floor you would scarcely know one from the other." "How high do they come?" inquired Mr. Laubert, prudently. "Will they turn?" queried his wife. Mr. Johnson did not know as to their turning qualities; he was not enough of a housekeeper, and he smiled to display at once his fine teeth and his amiable heart. "A poor, unfortunate bachelor like himself bad to be content with such crumbs of information as he could gather from the ladies. How high?"-and here he jerked a roll to the floor-"from three shillings to four and six; here was a very good thing at four shillings." It was just what they had expected to give; but if there was really a choice, Mr. Lambert rapidly made up his mind that a few shillings should not stand in the way; that would be just the difference in the forty yards they required for the long parlour, two rooms in one, with only an arch between, Mr. Johnson agreed with him that it was the most sensible way of viewing things-and he had remarked as much to Hastings, their mutual friend, a day or two before. 66 By the way, what a charming woman Mrs. Hastings is!" he added. "I must certainly accept her very kind invitation, and call there when they get settled. Do you visit, Mrs. Lambert?" "No; but she knew Mrs. Hastings very well, that is, they had a mutual friend, Mrs. Stark, and she always felt acquainted through hearing so much of her. She is very stylish, is she not?" "Oh, immensely so! dresses in the most elegant manner. There are very few ladies in the town-and I believe some of the very bes people do us the honour of selecting their carpets here-who can at all compare with her. Yes, there's a beauty-that shade of crimson is so fashionable this year; that's the very piece Mrs. Hastings chose her own bed-room carpet from. She said it matched the window curtains exactly, I remember, and would look well with mahogany furniture." Mrs. Lambert could not be induced to give the crimson a second look. The undefined annoyance with which she always listened to Mrs. Stark's praises of the lady came back stronger than ever. She was sure her parlours should never be carpeted with what was only suited to Mrs. Hastings' bed-room! She did not think the crimson was in good taste, it was too glaring. Mr. Lambert looked up at the almost pettish tone in which this was said. The sky-lighted room was rapidly getting dark; perhaps it was a shadow, and not a frown, that had settled on the face so bright with anticipation half an hour before. But it did not pass away; and, in the end, selecting the long-coveted carpet devolved chiefly on him. Mrs. Lambert grew more and more absent-minded. and black? oh, certainly, if he liked; anything." "Green "But I want you to be suited, Jenny." "Yes, that's the point, after all, to have the ladies suited." Mr. Johnson's stereotyped business compli ment to the sex passed unheeded. "Oh, there is the very thing for the paper we have selected-blue and fawn; there is blue and gold in the border, you know! Is that as good a quality as the other? and we might have the shades with a scroll of blue and gold. Oh, I forgot; the new shades were to be a surprise!" The surprise-for she had really desired them, but thought she must wait another year-reawakened Mrs. Lambert's interest for the time. Mr. Johnson was delighted at the fortunate coincidence in colour. "If he were going to recommend one piece above another, for weight |