With the approach of evening all is changed. A mountain will
suddenly intercept the sun; a shadow fall upon the valley; in ten
minutes the thermometer will drop as many degrees; the peaks that are
no longer shone upon dwindle into ghosts; and meanwhile, overhead, if
the weather be rightly characteristic of the place, the sky fades
towards night through a surprising key of colours. The latest gold
leaps from the last mountain. Soon, perhaps, the moon shall rise,
and in her gentler light the valley shall be mellowed and misted, and
here and there a wisp of silver cloud upon a hilltop, and here and
there a warmly glowing window in a house, between fire and starlight,
kind and homely in the fields of snow.
But the valley is not seated so high among the clouds to be eternally
exempt from changes. The clouds gather, black as ink; the wind
bursts rudely in; day after day the mists drive overhead, the snow-
flakes flutter down in blinding disarray; daily the mail comes in
later from the top of the pass; people peer through their windows and
foresee no end but an entire seclusion from Europe, and death by
gradual dry-rot, each in his indifferent inn; and when at last the
storm goes, and the sun comes again, behold a world of unpolluted
snow, glossy like fur, bright like daylight, a joy to wallowing dogs
and cheerful to the souls of men.
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