Sometimes an appearance more terrifying to the uninitiated is seen. The traveler in Germany may hear strange myths of specters that frequent the mountains. It was long said that spirits dwelt on the summit of the Matterhorn. Gigantic phantoms roamed the Harz Mountains. One of the best known of all these apparitions is the famous “Specter of the Brocken.” The wanderer on the lonely height at sunrise may see upon a neighboring summit a gigantic shadowy figure, moving about, and mimicking every motion of the traveler. Of course, it is but his shadow on a neighboring fog-bank; but the solution remained a mystery long enough to terrify many a simple peasant into needless invocations of the saints. But similar appearances are occasionally observable in many localities. The Spaniard Ulloa records that on the mountain Pambamarca, in Peru, he saw his shadow on the cloud surrounded by three complete circular rainbows. The same peculiarity has been frequently noticed elsewhere, but never on so grand a scale. We find no peculiar myths concerning halos in general, it being generally considered that they announce the approach of rain; and the fog-bank is of no especial danger save to the seaman, or the traveler overtaken and blinded by one in mountain fastnesses; though their depressing influence has led one writer to exclaim: “Fly, fly, profane fogs! fly hence far away, Taint not the pure springs of the springing day With your dull influence; it is for you To sit and scowl upon night’s heavy brow.” And the fog, though not ornamental--unless we except that dry haze, the Indian summer--may be useful in preventing a frost, or in keeping a parched earth from drying too rapidly. But for this last, all the world prefers the rain, and sings with Longfellow: [Illustration: SPECTER OF THE BROCKEN.] “How beautiful is the rain! After the dust and heat, In the broad and fiery street, In the narrow lane, How beautiful is the rain! How it clatters along the roofs Like the tramp of hoofs! How it gushes and struggles out, From the throat of the overflowing spout, Across the window pane it pours and pours, And swift and wide, With a muddy tide, Like a river, down the gutter roars The rain, the welcome rain.” Not always welcome; for we find the same poet moaning: “The day is cold, and dark, and dreary, It rains, and the rain is never weary.” And certainly, the farmer who looks through the driving rain at his ruined crops has little sentiment left to expend upon its beauty. But the world over, after a rain every feature of a landscape stands out with singular clearness; the haze commonly prevalent has for the nonce disappeared.