framed in fleecy, flying clouds, greeted our thoughtful eyes and spoke of God to our hushed souls. Except beside the dying bed of my beloved I have never felt the veil so thin between me and the world ineffable—supernal. What was it like? Let no pen less lofty than that of Milton, less atune with nature’s purest mood than that of Wordsworth, hope to “express unblamed” the awful and ethereal beauty of what we saw. “Earth with her thousand voices praises God,” sang the great heart of Coleridge, from the vale of Chamouni, but here, the divine chorus includes both earth and heaven, for El Capitan rears his head into the sky, Sentinel, Cathedral Rocks and sky-climbing clouds rest while the symphony of eighteen waterfalls rounds out the diapason. “The rolling year is full of Thee, Forth in the gentle spring Thy beauty walks, Thy tenderness and love.” These tuneful words of Thompson’s “Seasons” express the milder mood of nature, but who can fitly tell of the condensed impressions about God made by a valley only six miles long, one mile wide, and half a mile high, wherein every form of solemn, majestic and pastoral beauty are combined. A holy awe rested upon us, and tears were in all eyes. At last the sacred silence was broken by a rich voice, beloved by me for many a year, as Mrs. Dr. Bentley lead the “_Gloria in Excelsis_,” in which the jubilant soprano harmonized with the melodious bass of humanity’s united utterance of praise. “O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker,” these inspired words leaped to our lips, and we found that beyond all poets was the fitness of dear old words, our mothers taught us from the book of God, in this supreme moment of our experience. “The Lord is in his holy temple, let all the earth keep silence before Him,” “What is man that Thou art mindful of him,” “Stand in awe and sin not:” these were the first words that came to us, and I believe we shall be better men and women always for that vision of eternity from which the curtain of mystery was for a moment drawn aside. We learned afterward that as our coaches rolled on into the valley a third rounded “Inspiration Point,” and Judge ⸺ of Sydney, Ohio, a dear old gentleman, rose to his feet, clasped his hands as if in prayer, and exclaimed “Mercy! mercy! Have I lived seventy-six years that I might see this glory! _God made it all!_” and he lifted up his voice and wept. Such a scene as that is once for a life time. We saw the valley from an hundred points of view afterward, we waved our good-bye to it a week later from this very point, but the first remains the unmatched view—its like will never greet our eyes again—not in this world. As we sped onward into the valley one of us said: “I never felt before such pity for the blind.” THE HOSPITALITIES OF NATURE. BY THE REV. HUGH MACMILLAN, D.D., LL.D., F.R.S.E.