I remember, in the neighbourhood of Dresden, discovering a picturesque and narrow valley leading down towards the Elbe.

The winding roadway ran beside a mountain torrent, which for a mile or so fretted and foamed over rocks and boulders between wood-covered banks.

I followed it enchanted until, turning a corner, I suddenly came across a gang of eighty or a hundred workmen.

They were busy tidying up that valley, and making that stream respectable.

All the stones that were impeding the course of the water they were carefully picking out and carting away.