XCV. A RIDE ACROSS PARNASSUS.—We left the new village of Delphi, which stands a little to the south-west of the ancient sanctuary, shortly after eight o’clock, and at once struck up the mountain-side at the back of the village. The path for a good way is the same as that to the Corycian cave. It climbs the bare rocky face of the mountain in a series of zigzags, from which as we rose higher and higher a wide prospect opened up behind us to the Gulf of Corinth and the distant mountains of Peloponnese. On reaching the top of this long and steep declivity we found ourselves on the edge of an expanse of comparatively level though broken ground, sparsely wooded with pines, beyond which soared the upper slopes of Parnassus, its summit lightly capped with snow. The high plateau on which we now stood is bounded on the north by an outlying spur of Parnassus, clothed with pine-forest, in the southern face of which is the Corycian cave. Instead of crossing the tableland in the direction of the cave, we skirted its south-western corner, keeping the wooded mountain on our right. The path continued to wind for hours along grey rocky slopes where pines grew more or less thickly. On either hand rose sombre mountains of the same general character—grey and rocky with patches of pine-forest on their sides. Now and then a little moss relieved with its verdure the barrenness of the rocks, and a stony glade through which we passed was speckled with pale purple crocuses. On these heights the air felt chilly, for the season was late October, and a little snow—the first of autumn—had fallen in the night, just touching with white the peaks of Parnassus and the high Locrian mountains in the west. The morning had been bright when we left Delphi, but as the day wore on the sky became overcast, its cold and lowering aspect harmonising well with the wild and desolate scenery through which we rode. The jingling of the mule-bells and the cries of the muleteers were almost the only sounds that broke the silence, though once in the forest to the right we heard the clapper-like note of a pelican, and once in an open glade we passed some woodmen hewing pine-logs. In time, the path beginning to descend, the rocks gave place to earthy slopes; a little pale thin grass and some withered ferns grew in the glades; the sun shone out between the clouds, and as we descended into the warmer lowlands it seemed as if we were pursuing the departing summer.