in the world is the ice-rink, fashioned by the skill of Herr Caspar
Badrutt on a high raised terrace, commanding the valley of the Inn and
the ponderous bulwarks of Bernina. The silhouettes of skaters, defined
against that landscape of pure white, passed to and fro beneath a
cloudless sky. Ladies sat and worked or read on seats upon the ice.
Not a breath of wind was astir, and warm beneficent sunlight flooded
the immeasurable air. Only, as the day declined, some iridescent films
overspread the west; and just above Maloja the apparition of a
mock sun--a well-defined circle of opaline light, broken at regular
intervals by four globes--seemed to portend a change of weather. This
forecast fortunately proved delusive. We drove back to Samaden across
the silent snow, enjoying those delicate tints of rose and violet and
saffron which shed enchantment for one hour over the white monotony of
Alpine winter.

At half-past eight next morning, the sun was rising from behind Pitz
Languard, as we crossed the Inn and drove through Pontresina in the
glorious light, with all its huge hotels quite empty and none but a
few country-folk abroad. Those who only know the Engadine in summer
have little conception of its beauty. Winter softens the hard details
of bare rock, and rounds the melancholy grassless mountain flanks,
suspending icicles to every ledge and spangling the curved surfaces
of snow with crystals. The landscape gains in purity, and, what sounds
unbelievable, in tenderness. Nor does it lose in grandeur. Looking
up the valley of the Morteratsch that morning, the glaciers were
distinguishable in hues of green and sapphire through their veil of
snow; and the highest peaks soared in a transparency of amethystine
light beneath a blue sky traced with filaments of windy cloud. Some
storm must have disturbed the atmosphere in Italy, for fan-shaped
mists frothed out around the sun, and curled themselves above the