Indeed, this is the peculiar virtue of walking to a far place, and
especially of walking there in a straight line, that one gets these
visions of the world from hill-tops.

When I call up for myself this great march I see it all mapped out in
landscapes, each of which I caught from some mountain, and each of
which joins on to that before and to that after it, till I can piece
together the whole road. The view here from the Hill of Archettes, the
view from the Ballon d'Alsace, from Glovelier Hill, from the
Weissenstein, from the Brienzer Grat, from the Grimsel, from above
Bellinzona, from the Princi-pessa, from Tizzano, from the ridge of the
Apennines, from the Wall of Siena, from San Quirico, from Radicofani,
from San Lorenzo, from Monte-fiascone, from above Viterbo, from
Roncigleone, and at last from that lift in the Via Cassia, whence one
suddenly perceives the City. They unroll themselves all in their order
till I can see Europe, and Rome shining at the end.

But you who go in railways are necessarily shut up in long valleys and
even sometimes by the walls of the earth. Even those who bicycle or
drive see these sights but rarely and with no consecution, since roads
also avoid climbing save where they are forced to it, as over certain
passes. It is only by following the straight line onwards that any one
can pass from ridge to ridge and have this full picture of the way he
has been.

So much for views. I clambered down the hill to Archettes and saw,
almost the first house, a swinging board 'At the sign of the Trout of
the Vosges', and as it was now evening I turned in there to dine.