Everywhere in the Tyrol, especially in the gloaming, whether in Alpine meadow or arable land of the valley, such weird companies may be seen. Bands of Indians, societies of cowled monks, ancient Italians fleeing from a buried city, wandering Israelites,--such and many others are the shapes which these drying sheaves of corn, hay or clover assume, all combining to act as one vast funeral procession of the summer that is no more. [Illustration: A PROCESSION.] In the afternoon a different company from these natural objects in the distance came to occupy our minds for the time being. Gradually the up stairs sitting-room, which we had foolishly perhaps imagined reserved for our party of nine, became invaded by priests in long coats down to their heels and muddy top-boots. We, the new-comers from the mountains, now learnt that this was the daily occurrence, and really the most unpleasant feature of the house, where the landlord and landlady remained as sleepy and unimpressionable as ever. We were soon, in fact, obliged to vacate the room, driven out not only by the fumes of bad tobacco, but by the unsatisfactory stare which was leveled at each intruder. The kellnerin, generally a slow, incommunicative mortal, now passed, from cellar to sitting-room in a flutter of excitement, her tongue, otherwise dormant, moving like a mill-clapper in the enlivening society of her spiritual fathers. These were the shepherds of the different adjoining parishes, whose custom it was to derive mental and corporeal comfort in sipping their acid wine and smoking their cheap tobacco in company. There might not have been any great harm in it, but nevertheless it seemed an apparent falling away from the singularly bright example which a good man, born only ten minutes from the Elephant, in the village of Mühlen, had once set them.