At the end of the herd marches the bull, with his compact body, little pointed horns, curly hair, and, if he is of a wicked temper, a plate of iron over his eyes. Then comes the train of dairy-girls and cow-herds, who tend the cows in the summer pasturages, with wagons loaded with the implements of their calling, the milking-stool, peculiarly constructed pails, and the wooden vessels in which milk is carried up and down the precipices to the chalet.[88] When different droves meet, it is almost sure to happen that the two queens defy each other to single combat. The herdsmen themselves promote these struggles, and are very proud of the victory of their own queen cow. The herds begin by browsing on the grass at the foot of the mountain, and then gradually, as the snow disappears and is replaced by a fresh carpet of verdure, they go higher, mounting insensibly till in the month of August they reach the summit of the Alp. Then in September they descend slowly and by degrees, as they went up. On their way up the mountain, if the start be made too early in the spring, the water may be found high, and the herd stops at the edge of the torrent, afraid to cross. The chief herdsman seeks the parsonage, knocks at the door, and explains to the curé the critical situation of the herd, and begs his prayers and blessings. “Il faut que vous nous disiez une messe Pour que nous puissions passer.” The shepherd leads a more solitary and perilous life in the mountains than the herdsman, living on polenta and cheese, and for drink, water or skimmed milk; and a little hay spread on a plank serves for a bed. The highest and steepest parts of the Alps are apportioned to the grazing of sheep and goats. Indeed, sometimes the sheep are carried up one by one on men’s backs, and left there till the end of the summer, when they are carried down, considerably fattened, in the same fashion. Here the shepherd passes months, his only companions besides his flock are the chamois,[89] who, in the moonlight, cross the snow-fields, the glacier, or bound over the crevices and come to pasture on the grassy slopes; and the snow-partridge, or white hen, and the _laemmergeier_, or bearded vulture, a bird whose size surpasses that of the eagle,[90] and who circles around these peaks as he watches for his prey, and, by a sharp blow of his wing, to precipitate into the chasm any animal he can take unawares and defenceless. Alas! for the poor shepherd belated in a snow-storm, seeking vainly to recover the lost track; when the wind seems like some cruel demon, buffeting, blinding, maddening, as along ways rendered unfamiliar by the drifts he plunges, helpless, hopeless; fainter and more faint, until at last there comes the awful moment when he can fight no longer, and he sinks powerless down, down into the soft and fatal depths; the drift sweeps over him,--he is lost as surely as “some strong swimmer in his agony” who sinks in mid-Atlantic among the boiling surge.