Leaving Sir Humphry occupied with fishing, I followed the course of the Traun for about a mile and a half up a fine narrow valley to the Töplitz Lake, from which issues no longer a broad and deep river, such as it flows from the Traun-See, but a little brawling brook eight to ten yards wide. The Töplitz-See is a small lake, of a wild and gloomy character; its banks are so precipitous that it is impossible to go round it, as I was told by the fishermen of the Gründtl-See, and above these banks nothing is to be seen but vast and sombre pine forests. There was a small canoe, hollowed out of the trunk of a fir-tree, lying at the water's edge, but there being no oar or paddle in it I could make no use of it, and accordingly returned to Sir Humphry. On a second visit to the Gründtl-See, I again went on to the Töplitz Lake, having been told by the fisherman that beyond it, and only a few hundred yards distant from it, lay another lake, the Kammer-See, from which the Traun took its rise, but that to reach this lake it was necessary to row across the Töplitz-See; I therefore took an oar with me, but upon arriving at the lake, I was sadly disappointed at finding the canoe no longer there, nor could I imagine who could have taken it away, for there was not in the surrounding scene the slightest vestige of a human being. I however climbed up the rocks, and attempted to pass round the lake, but was soon obliged to desist, having twice nearly slipped over the edge of the rock, a precipice of many hundred feet above the lake, into the water, upwards of a thousand feet in depth. When I returned with my unused oar to the fisherman, he told me that the canoe had probably been taken by some peasants, who lived in a summer hut at the other end of the Töplitz-See. This fisherman appeared to be a man of considerable information; he was well acquainted with the various fish which inhabit the alpine waters, and amongst other things he told us that the _Ombre Chevalier_, a fish of rare occurrence, was to be met in the Lambach-See and in the Upper Oden-See, two small lakes in the middle of the snowy Alps, at a very great elevation above the Gründtl-See. Sir Humphry much wished to visit these lakes, but was immediately deterred by the account which the fisherman gave us of the roads to them. The Gründtl Lake is famous for its trout and fine char, immense quantities of which are yearly sent to Vienna, potted. Another of our trips was to the Lower Oden-See, about four miles on the other side of Aussee. This is a small lake, very different in character from the Gründtl-See and Töplitz-See: the shores, though not exactly flat, are formed of slightly varied hills covered with wood. Sir Humphry had excellent sport, and caught a great many small trout in the little stream which flows from this lake. [Illustration: From nature _by J. J. Tobin_ ISCHL]