A delightful place in which to pass a lazy hour or so is the narrow promontory of Chastè, which stretches half a mile into the lake in front of Sils Baselgia. Couched in springy undergrowth amid larch-clad rocks and patches of beflowered meadow, we are filled with a great content; the eye is satisfied with seeing and the ear with hearing; the ripples lap against the craggy shore, streams hum in the great mountain that rises like a wall beyond the streak of water, birds twitter amid the whispering leaves, the earth seems flooded with a vast, satisfying murmur that Overtakes Far thought with music that it makes. A rock at the end is inscribed to Friedrich Nietzsche, the apostle of unbridled individualism, himself so {24} helpless in the cruel grip of idiosyncrasy, who frequently sought to cool life's fitful fever in this lovely spot. The charming path runs along the right shore of the lake past the picturesque hamlet of Isola, slumbering on its green promontory by the rush and roar of the tumultuous Fedoz. As the path approaches it along the cliff its lichen-gilt stone roofs, nestling close together, form a delightful mass of rich colour. These slices of mica-schist that render roofs such a pleasing feature in the Engadine are mostly quarried in the neighbouring Val Fex. Behind Isola the Fedoz descends in a fine fall, bringing material for the delta that bids fair one day to cut the lake in two. In the village is an interesting old tavern, formerly a country seat of the Vertimati; the fittings and furniture are quite a study in woodwork. A little farther on is a block of breccia inscribed to the memory of Thomas Henry Huxley, who spent many summers at Maloja. Then, at the head of the lake, we pass some fine ice-smoothed rocks and ice-borne boulders, and arrive at the pleasant space between the lake and the descent towards Italy that goes by the name of Maloja, a name that strictly belongs to its western edge, the nearest approach to a terminal pass that the truncated valley of the Inn presents. [Illustration: VAL FEX.] Unfortunately for the first impression of Maloja, the most salient object is the huge bulk of the {25} Kursaal, grotesquely incongruous with its surroundings. Behind it are the golf links, bristling with attractive difficulties and deceptions. Above them is the English church, so light and graceful a little structure that it would be captious to object that though it be Swiss it is not Engadine, and on a hillock opposite the Roman Catholic church. In the grounds of the Hôtel Belvedere are impressive records of ice action, including some fine glacier-cauldrons. It is a pleasant walk along the romantic ravine of the Ordlegna and by the Lago di Cavloccio to the Forno club hut. A digression on the right soon after starting leads to the little Lago di Bitabergo (shown on the cover) amid rocks and sombre forests, a beautiful and sequestered spot.