“Well, yes,” she answered; “the flat plains of France would assuredly have proved too harsh a contrast. Now you will still have mountains, besides so many other matters that must deeply interest you.” These reflections having restored us to good‐humor, we fully enjoyed the approach to Lucerne, as the train wound round the wooded hills alongside the green Reuss, rushing on in full‐grown vigor from the lake, and past the mediæval walls and towers that still guard the sturdy old town. The sun was setting as we entered the station, just as happened a few nights previously when we drove into Interlachen; but in other respects everything was different. Here, the train was rapidly emptied of its hundreds of Northerners, still brimful of their city ways, or ill at ease in some faultless Alpine costume fresh from a London shop; while there, though one could detect many season‐loungers, effort at display was not thought of, especially amongst tourists, for dress and such externals had long since lost their importance in the wear and tear of real mountaineering. And what a noise and bustle and clatter steam, and everything belonging to it, entails! Enough to drive one wild, after many weeks of leisurely excursion habits—the tinkling bells of the steamboats waiting at the pier to carry off impatient tourists to fifty different destinations, the crowd of omnibuses, the jostling of porters, and, to complete the trouble, the announcement that no rooms could be had at the Schweizerhof or Lucernerhof, or various other _hofs_; although we had telegraphed from Berne, and expected to find all ready. If we would try, it was said, at the Beau Rivage—the hotel furthest off—there was just a chance. Worn out by the noise and fuss, we two begged to walk, the remainder of our party offering to drive on in a carriage without delay, in order to secure any vacant places there might be before the omnibus and its load of new‐comers should reach the hotel.