Page:The Poems and Prose remains of Arthur Hugh Clough, volume 1 (1869).djvu/285

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LONDON.
269

Bergons, whence there is really a fine view of Pic du Midi on the one hand, and Mont Perdu and Brèche de Roland on the other. I send you another Pyrenean fragment:

She fed her cows, the mountain-peaks between.[1]

September I.

The Tennysons arrived at 6.30 yesterday. Tennyson was here, with Arthur Hallam, thirty-one years ago, and really finds great pleasure in the place; they stayed here and at Cauterets. 'Ænone,' he said, was written on the inspiration of the Pyrenees, which stood for Ida.

September 6.

Yesterday we went up the Pic du Midi, which proved fully equal to all expectations, though there was haze over the plain and over the remoter ends of the chain. It is a very complete view of the chain as we saw it, only from the Maladetta to the Pic du Midi d'Ossau; our Pic du Midi lying detached, or only tacked-to by the thin Col de Tourmalet, some way to the north.

Tennyson and ——— have walked on to Cauterets, and I and the family follow in a calèche at two.

Cauterets: September 7.

To-day is heavy brouillard down to the feet, or at any rate ankles, of the hills, and little to be done. I have been out for a walk with A. T. to a sort of island between two waterfalls, with pines on it, of which he retained a recollection from his visit of thirty-one years ago, and which, moreover, furnished a simile to 'The Princess.' He is very fond of this place, evidently, and it is more in the mountains than any other, and so far superior.

  1. Mari Magno: My Tale.