novel and wonderful prospect. As we sit on this cool terrace, under the
shady mulberry trees, and look far beyond the richly-wooded mountain we
have scaled on our way, we gradually make out some details of the fast
panorama, one feature after another becoming visible as stars shining
faintly in a misty heaven. Villages and little towns past counting, each
with its conspicuous spire, break the monotony of the enormous plain.
Here and there, miles away, a curl of white vapour indicates the passage
of some railway train, whilst in this upper stillness sweet sounds of
church bells reach us from hamlets close underneath the convent. Nothing
can be more solid, fresher, or more brilliant than the rich beech- and
pine-woods running sheer from our airy eminence to the level world below,
nothing more visionary, slumberous, or dimmer than that wide expanse
teeming, as we know, with busy human life, yet flat and motionless as a
picture.

[Illustration]

On clear nights the electric lights of the railway station at Strasburg
are seen from this point; but far more attractive than the prospects from
St. Odile is its prehistoric wall. Before the wall, however, came the
dinner, which deserves mention. It was Friday, so in company of priests,
nuns, monks and divers pious pilgrims, with a sprinkling of fashionable
ladies from Strasburg, and tourists generally, we sat down to a very fair
_menu_ for a fast-day, to wit: rice-soup, turnips and potatoes,
eggs, perch, macaroni-cheese, custard pudding, gruyere cheese, and fair
vin ordinaire. Two shillings was charged per head, and I must say people
got their money's worth, for appetites seem keen in these parts. The
mother-superior, a kindly old woman, evidently belonging to the working
class, bustled about and shook hands with each of her guests. After
dinner we were shown the bedrooms, which are very clean; for board and