The Argosy — page 314: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

296 Lhe Baths of Gastein. more fora stretch of country over which it may roam with freedom. Perhaps as a last resource it looks upwards and gazes out into space, but there it has nothing to rest upon; nothing but the dazzling blue, which seems to recede, the more you try to fathom its limits. In spite of its wild beauty, I caught myself many a time dwelling upon the moment when I should turn my back upon Gastein, and Jaunch out once more into the world. No doubt centuries ago, before it was known as a watering place, the primitive inhabitants of the valley must have thought it the end of creation, if they thought about such things at all. Such it verily appears to be, and is undoubtedly, as far as the globe can be said to have an end. A mile beyond Wild-bad-Gastein is Béckstein, and here the end comes. It consists of a few houses picturesquely jotted about, and a church, imposing for so small a place: a building of white stone, sur- mounted by a dome, that if it could take a walk hand in hand down Fleet Street, with that of St. Paul’s, the two might pass muster for the extremes of giant and dwarf. It stands out in pleasant contrast with the background of green mountains: one of the latter a mountain of gold that for many years was worked and yielded a rich return. For three months in the year the people of Bockstein are deprived of the sun. On the first of February, Candlemas Eve, they all assemble in church, and at nine o’clock, during the ceremony, the first ray of the sun shoots down through .a small window let in at the right spot in the roof for that purpose.. This the people are taught to consider a miracle. The first time I walked to Bockstein I paid the.church a visit, and found the interior somewhat glittering; the dome covered with gaudy paintings in which smart colours and a rather indelicate display of legs attracted the attention. On coming out I caught sight of a path by the mountain-side that séemed to promise a pleasant and short cut home. Pleasant it proved, but far from short. It led by the side of the nver, which here is extremely narrow and of no depth: and goes rushing over stones and tiny rocks with a loud murmuring sound that gives it the effect of a small troubled sea. The path was a series of rough undulations, and by the time the end was in sight, I found my- self knocked up with the unwonted exertion. As fate would have it, I met the doctor close to his villa, who soon discovered that for once his injunctions had been disregarded. “Wrong,” he cried; “very wrong. If you despise my counsels, I will have nothing to do with you.” ‘‘T had no idea it was so far,” was all I could urge by way of excuse. ‘The beauty of the day, the attractions of the walk, would lure anyone on insensibly. But the air possesses something fatal to exertion.” ‘For that reason I forbid it,” he replied. ‘‘ Besides, the baths are trying to the strength, and if you will persist in, taxing. it during COMIC OOOKS. EO —_)