To some it might compare but ill with the luxuriant splendour that is of the vernal season; but to me there was a wondrously impressive charm about that solemn, silent, virginal expanse of snow, expressionless as the Sphinx, and imposing and majestic by virtue of that very lack of expression.

From Fabriano, at our feet, was spread to the east, the broad plain that lies twixt the Esino and the Masone, as far as Mount Comero, which, in the distance, lifted its round shoulder from the haze of sea.

To the west the country lay under the same winding-sheet of snow as far as eye might range, to the towers of distant Perugia, to the Lake Trasimeno--a silver sheen that broke the white monotony--to Etruscan Cortona, perched like an eyrie on its mountain top, and to the line of Tuscan hills, like heavy, low-lying clouds upon the blue horizon.
Lost was I in the contemplation of that scene when a cry, succeeded by a volley of horrid blasphemy, drew my attention of a sudden to my companions.

They stood grouped together, and their eyes were on the road by which we had scaled those heights.

Their first expression of loud astonishment had been succeeded by an utter silence.