Perhaps Latin would have made a more likely _melange_ than German, and to give it him in three dimensions would not have been a bad plan.

The route for the glaciere runs straight up the face of the hill along which the railway has been constructed; and as we passed through woods of beech and fir, with fresh green glades rolling down below our feet, or emerged from the woods to cross large undulating expanses of meadow-land, we were almost inclined to believe that we had never done so lovely a walk.

The scenery through which we passed was thoroughly that of the lower districts of the Alps, with nothing Jurane in its character, and the elevation finally achieved was not very great: indeed, at a short distance from the glaciere, we passed a collection of very neat chalets, with gardens and garden-flowers, one of the chalets rejoicing in countless beehives, with three or four 'ekes' apiece.

Up to the time of reaching this little village, which seemed to be called Sagnette, our path had been that which leads to _La Brevine_, the highest valley in the canton; but now we turned off abruptly up the steeper face on the left hand, and in a very few minutes came upon a dry wilderness of rock and grass, which we at once recognised as 'glaciere country;' and when I told our guide that we must be near the place, he replied by pointing to the trees round the mouth of the pit.
Shortly after we first left Couvet, a gaunt elderly female, with a one-bullock char, had joined our party, and tried to bully us into giving up the cave and going instead to a neighbouring summit, whence she promised us a view of unrivalled extent and beauty.

She told us that there was nothing to be seen in the glaciere, and that it was a place where people lost their lives.