Little Rivers [51]
brim and a high crown,
smaller at the top than at the base. It looks a little like the
traditional head-gear of the Pilgrim Fathers, exaggerated. There
is a solemnity about it which is fatal to feminine beauty.
I went by the post-waggon, with two slow horses and ten passengers,
fifteen miles up the Iselthal, to Windisch-Matrei, a village whose
early history is lost in the mist of antiquity, and whose streets
are pervaded with odours which must have originated at the same
time with the village. One wishes that they also might have shared
the fate of its early history. But it is not fair to expect too
much of a small place, and Windisch-Matrei has certainly a
beautiful situation and a good inn. There I took my guide--a wiry
and companionable little man, whose occupation in the lower world
was that of a maker and merchant of hats--and set out for the
Pragerhutte, a shelter on the side of the Gross-Venediger.
The path led under the walls of the old Castle of Weissenstein, and
then in steep curves up the cliff which blocks the head of the
valley, and along a cut in the face of the rock, into the steep,
narrow Tauernthal, which divides the Glockner group from the
Venediger. How entirely different it was from the region of the
Dolomites! There the variety of colour was endless and the change
incessant; here it was all green grass and trees and black rocks,
with glimpses of snow. There the highest mountains were in sight
constantly; here they could only be seen from certain points in the
valley. There the streams played but a small part in the
landscape; here they were prominent, the main river raging and
foaming through the gorge below, while a score of waterfalls leaped
from the cliffs on either side and dashed down to join it.
The peasants, men, women and children, were cutting the grass in
the perpendicular fields; the woodmen were trimming and felling the
trees in the fir-forests; the cattle-tenders were driving their
cows along the stony path, or herding them far up on the hillsides.
It was a lonely scene, and yet a busy one; and all along the road
was written the history of the perils and hardships of the life
which now seemed so peaceful and picturesque under the summer
sunlight.
These heavy crosses, each covered with a narrow, pointed roof and
decorated with a rude picture, standing beside the path, or on the
bridge, or near the mill--what do they mean? They mark the place
where a human life has been lost, or where some poor peasant has
been delivered from a great peril, and has set up a memorial of his
gratitude.
Stop, traveller, as you pass by, and look at the pictures. They
have little more of art than a child's drawing on a slate; but they
will teach you what it means to earn a living in these mountains.
They tell of the danger that lurks on the steep slopes of grass,
where the mowers have to go down with ropes around their waists,
and in the beds of the streams where the floods sweep through in
the spring, and in the forests where the great trees fall and crush
men like flies, and on the icy bridges where a slip is fatal, and
on the high passes where the winter snowstorm blinds the eyes and
benumbs the limbs of the traveller, and under the cliffs from which
avalanches slide and rocks roll. They show you men and women
falling from waggons, and swept away by waters, and overwhelmed in
land-slips. In the corner of the picture you may see a peasant
with the black cross above his head--that means death. Or perhaps
it is deliverance that the tablet commemorates--and then you will
see the miller kneeling beside his mill with a flood rushing down
upon it, or a peasant kneeling in his harvest-field under an
inky-black cloud, or a landlord beside his inn in flames, or a
mother praying beside her sick children; and above appears an
angel, or a saint, or the Virgin with her Child.
Read the inscriptions, too,
smaller at the top than at the base. It looks a little like the
traditional head-gear of the Pilgrim Fathers, exaggerated. There
is a solemnity about it which is fatal to feminine beauty.
I went by the post-waggon, with two slow horses and ten passengers,
fifteen miles up the Iselthal, to Windisch-Matrei, a village whose
early history is lost in the mist of antiquity, and whose streets
are pervaded with odours which must have originated at the same
time with the village. One wishes that they also might have shared
the fate of its early history. But it is not fair to expect too
much of a small place, and Windisch-Matrei has certainly a
beautiful situation and a good inn. There I took my guide--a wiry
and companionable little man, whose occupation in the lower world
was that of a maker and merchant of hats--and set out for the
Pragerhutte, a shelter on the side of the Gross-Venediger.
The path led under the walls of the old Castle of Weissenstein, and
then in steep curves up the cliff which blocks the head of the
valley, and along a cut in the face of the rock, into the steep,
narrow Tauernthal, which divides the Glockner group from the
Venediger. How entirely different it was from the region of the
Dolomites! There the variety of colour was endless and the change
incessant; here it was all green grass and trees and black rocks,
with glimpses of snow. There the highest mountains were in sight
constantly; here they could only be seen from certain points in the
valley. There the streams played but a small part in the
landscape; here they were prominent, the main river raging and
foaming through the gorge below, while a score of waterfalls leaped
from the cliffs on either side and dashed down to join it.
The peasants, men, women and children, were cutting the grass in
the perpendicular fields; the woodmen were trimming and felling the
trees in the fir-forests; the cattle-tenders were driving their
cows along the stony path, or herding them far up on the hillsides.
It was a lonely scene, and yet a busy one; and all along the road
was written the history of the perils and hardships of the life
which now seemed so peaceful and picturesque under the summer
sunlight.
These heavy crosses, each covered with a narrow, pointed roof and
decorated with a rude picture, standing beside the path, or on the
bridge, or near the mill--what do they mean? They mark the place
where a human life has been lost, or where some poor peasant has
been delivered from a great peril, and has set up a memorial of his
gratitude.
Stop, traveller, as you pass by, and look at the pictures. They
have little more of art than a child's drawing on a slate; but they
will teach you what it means to earn a living in these mountains.
They tell of the danger that lurks on the steep slopes of grass,
where the mowers have to go down with ropes around their waists,
and in the beds of the streams where the floods sweep through in
the spring, and in the forests where the great trees fall and crush
men like flies, and on the icy bridges where a slip is fatal, and
on the high passes where the winter snowstorm blinds the eyes and
benumbs the limbs of the traveller, and under the cliffs from which
avalanches slide and rocks roll. They show you men and women
falling from waggons, and swept away by waters, and overwhelmed in
land-slips. In the corner of the picture you may see a peasant
with the black cross above his head--that means death. Or perhaps
it is deliverance that the tablet commemorates--and then you will
see the miller kneeling beside his mill with a flood rushing down
upon it, or a peasant kneeling in his harvest-field under an
inky-black cloud, or a landlord beside his inn in flames, or a
mother praying beside her sick children; and above appears an
angel, or a saint, or the Virgin with her Child.
Read the inscriptions, too,