descents into a land tossed into numberless hills and torn up into such
deep valleys that it seemed to him to be a symbol of God's anger in a
moment of great provocation. Or maybe, he said to himself, these valleys
are the ruts of the celestial chariot that passed this way to take
Elijah up to heaven? Or maybe ... His mind was wandering, and--forgetful
of the subject of his meditation--he looked round and could see little
else but strange shapes of cliffs and boulders, rocks and lofty scarps
enwrapped in mist so thick that he fell to thinking whence came the
fume? For rocks are breathless, he said, and there are only rocks here,
only rocks and patches of earth in which the peasants sow patches of
barley. At that moment his mule slid in the slime of the path to within
a few inches of a precipice, and Joseph uttered a cry before the gulf
which startled a few rain-drenched crows that went away cawing, making
the silence more melancholy than before. A few more inches, Joseph
thought, and we should have been over, though a mule has never been
known to walk or to slide over a precipice. A moment after, his mule was
climbing up a heap of rubble; and when they were at the top Joseph
looked over the misted gulf, thinking that if the animal had crossed his
legs mule and rider would both be at the bottom of a ravine by now. And
the crows that my cry startled, he said, would soon return, scenting
blood. He rode on, thinking of the three crows, and when he returned to
himself the mule was about to pass under a projecting rock, regardless,
he thought, of the man on his back, but the sagacious animal had taken
his rider's height into his consideration, so it seemed, for at least
three inches were to spare between Joseph's head and the rock. Nor did
the mule's sagacity end here; for finding no trace of the path on the
other side he started to climb the steep hill as a goat might,
frightening Joseph into a tug or two at the bridle, to which the mule
gave no heed but continued the ascent with conviction and after a little
circuit among intricate rocks turned down the hill again and slid into