far as we were concerned, there was an end. We waited here till the
second snow fell, hardened, and formed its sleighing crust.

Then we went, for some society to Henry, over to the mountain village of
Bergsdorf, which strings itself along the hillside above the River Inn.

Bergsdorf is no more than a village in itself, but, being the chief
place of its neighbourhood, it supports enough municipal and other
dignitaries to set up an Imperial Court. Never was such wisdom--never
such pompous solemnity. The Burgomeister of Bergsdorf was a great
elephant of a man. He went abroad radiating self-importance. He
perspired wisdom on the coldest day. The other officials imitated the
Burgomeister in so far as their corporeal condition allowed. The _curé_
only was excepted. He was a thin, spare man with an ascetic face and a
great talent for languages. One day during service he asked a mother to
carry out a crying child, making the request in eight languages. Yet the
mother failed to understand till the limping old apparator led her out
by the arm.

There is no doubt that the humours of Bergsdorf lightened our spirits
and cheered our waiting; for it is my experience that a young man is
easily amused with new, bright, and stirring things even when he is in
love.

And what amused us most was that excellent sport--now well known to the
world, but then practised only in the mountain villages--the species of
adventure which has come to be called "tobogganing." I fell heir in a
mysterious fashion to a genuine Canadian toboggan, curled and
buffalo-robed at the front, flat all the way beneath; and upon this,
with Henry on one of the ordinary sleds with runners of steel, we spent