The mist was darkening,the rain was thickening,the trees were dotted about like spots of faint shadow,the division-lines which mapped out the fields were all getting blurred together,and the lonely farm-house where the dog-cart had been left,loomed spectral in the grey light like the last human dwelling at the end of the habitable world.Was this a sight worth climbing to see?Surely -surely not!
Up again -for the top of Carrock is not reached yet.The land-lord,just as good-tempered and obliging as he was at the bottom of the mountain.Mr.Goodchild brighter in the eyes and rosier in the face than ever;full of cheerful remarks and apt quotations;and walking with a springiness of step wonderful to behold.Mr.Idle,farther and farther in the rear,with the water squeaking in the toes of his boots,with his two-guinea shooting-jacket clinging damply to his aching sides,with his overcoat so full of rain,and standing out so pyramidically stiff,in consequence,from his shoulders downwards,that he felt as if he was walking in a gigantic extinguisher -the despairing spirit within him representing but too aptly the candle that had just been put out.
Up and up and up again,till a ridge is reached and the outer edge of the mist on the summit of Carrock is darkly and drizzingly near.
Is this the top?No,nothing like the top.It is an aggravating peculiarity of all mountains,that,although they have only one top when they are seen (as they ought always to be seen)from below,they turn out to have a perfect eruption of false tops whenever the traveller is sufficiently ill-advised to go out of his way for the purpose of ascending them.Carrock is but a trumpery little mountain of fifteen hundred feet,and it presumes to have false tops,and even precipices,as if it were Mont Blanc.No matter;Goodchild enjoys it,and will go on;and Idle,who is afraid of being left behind by himself,must follow.On entering the edge of the mist,the landlord stops,and says he hopes that it will not get any thicker.It is twenty years since he last ascended Carrock,and it is barely possible,if the mist increases,that the party may be lost on the mountain.Goodchild hears this dreadful intimation,and is not in the least impressed by it.He marches for the top that is never to be found,as if he was the Wandering Jew,bound to go on for ever,in defiance of everything.The landlord faithfully accompanies him.The two,to the dim eye of Idle,far below,look in the exaggerative mist,like a pair of friendly giants,mounting the steps of some invisible castle together.Up and up,and then down a little,and then up,and then along a strip of level ground,and then up again.The wind,a wind unknown in the happy valley,blows keen and strong;the rain-mist gets impenetrable;a dreary little cairn of stones appears.The landlord adds one to the heap,first walking all round the cairn as if he were about to perform an incantation,then dropping the stone on to the top of the heap with the gesture of a magician adding an ingredient to a cauldron in full bubble.Goodchild sits down by the cairn as if it was his study-table at home;Idle,drenched and panting,stands up with his back to the wind,ascertains distinctly that this is the top at last,looks round with all the little curiosity that is left in him,and gets,in return,a magnificent view of -Nothing!
The effect of this sublime spectacle on the minds of the exploring party is a little injured by the nature of the direct conclusion to which the sight of it points -the said conclusion being that the mountain mist has actually gathered round them,as the landlord feared it would.It now becomes imperatively necessary to settle the exact situation of the farm-house in the valley at which the dog-cart has been left,before the travellers attempt to descend.
While the landlord is endeavouring to make this discovery in his own way,Mr.Goodchild plunges his hand under his wet coat,draws out a little red morocco-case,opens it,and displays to the view of his companions a neat pocket-compass.The north is found,the point at which the farm-house is situated is settled,and the descent begins.After a little downward walking,Idle (behind as usual)sees his fellow-travellers turn aside sharply -tries to follow them -loses them in the mist -is shouted after,waited for,recovered -and then finds that a halt has been ordered,partly on his account,partly for the purpose of again consulting the compass.