These brief--too brief--views of the superb Rain-Creator or Cloud-King, as the Wakonju fondly termed their mist-shrouded mountains, fill the gazer with a feeling as though a glimpse of celestial splendour was obtained. While it lasted, I have observed the rapt faces of whites and blacks set fixed and uplifted in speechless wonder towards that upper region of cold brightness and perfect peace, so high above mortal reach, so holily tranquil and restful, of such immaculate and stainless purity, that thought and desire of expression were altogether too deep for utterance. What stranger contrast could there be than our own nether world of torrid temperature, eternally green sappy plants, and never-fading luxuriance and verdure, with its savagery and war-alarms, and deep stains of blood-red sin, to that lofty mountain king, clad in its pure white raiment of snow, surrounded by myriads of dark mountains, low as bending worshippers before the throne of a monarch, on whose cold white face were inscribed “Infinity and Everlasting!” These moments of supreme feeling are memorable for the utter abstraction of the mind from all that is sordid and ignoble, and its utter absorption in the presence of unreachable loftiness, indescribable majesty, and constraining it not only to reverentially admire, but to adore in silence, the image of the Eternal. Never can a man be so fit for Heaven as during such moments, for however scornful and insolent he may have been at other times, he now has become as a little child, filled with wonder and reverence before what he has conceived to be sublime and Divine. We had been strangers for many months to the indulgence of any thought of this character. Our senses, between the hours of sleeping and waking, had been occupied by the imperious and imminent necessities of each hour, which required unrelaxing vigilance and forethought. It is true we had been touched with the view from the mount called Pisgah of that universal extent of forest, spreading out on all sides but one, to many hundreds of miles; we had been elated into hysteria when, after five months’ immurement in the depths of forest wilds, we once again trod upon green grass, and enjoyed open and unlimited views of our surroundings--luxuriant vales, varying hill-forms on all sides, rolling plains over which the long spring grass seemed to race and leap in gladness before the cooling gale; we had admired the broad sweep and the silvered face of Lake Albert, and enjoyed a period of intense rejoicing when we knew we had reached, after infinite trials, the bourne and limit of our journeyings; but the desire and involuntary act of worship were never provoked, nor the emotions stirred so deeply, as when we suddenly looked up and beheld the skyey crests and snowy breasts of Ruwenzori uplifted into an inaccessible altitude, so like what our conceptions might be of a celestial castle, with dominating battlement, and leagues upon leagues of unscaleable walls. CHAPTER XXXI.