The road ascends.  From the distance comes a dull noise, the roaring of a torrent.  We cross a little cluster of trees, and on issuing from it the superb amphitheater of glaciers shows itself anew, overlooked by one white point glittering like an opal.  On the hill a thousand little lights show me that I am at last at Pontresina.  I thought I should never have arrived there; nowhere does night deceive more than in the mountains; in proportion as you advance toward a point, it seems to retreat from you.

Soon the black fantastic lines of the houses show through the darkness.  I enter a narrow street, formed of great gloomy buildings, their fronts like a convent or prison.  The hamlet is transformed into a little town of hotels, very comfortable, very elegant, very dear, but very stupid and very vulgar, with their laced porter in an admiral’s hat, and their whiskered waiters, who have the air of Anglican ministers.  Oh! how I detest them, and flee them, those hotels where the painter, or the tourist who arrives on foot, knapsack on his back and staff in hand, his trousers tucked into his leggings, his flask slung over his shoulder, and his hat awry, is received with less courtesy than a lackey.

Besides those hotels, some of which are veritable palaces, and where the ladies are almost bound to change their dress three times a day, there is a hotel of the second and third class; and there is the old inn; the comfortable, hospitable, patriarchal inn, with its Gothic signboard....

On leaving the village I was again in the open mountain.  In the distance the road penetrated into the valley, rising always.  The moon had risen.  She stood out sharply cut in a cloudless sky, and stars sparkling everywhere in profusion; not like nails of gold, but sown broadcast like a flying dust, a dust of carbuncles and diamonds.  To the right, in the depths of the amphitheater of the mountains, an immense glacier looked like a frozen cascade; and above, a perfectly white peak rose draped in snow, like some legendary king in his mantle of silver.

Bending under my knapsack, and dragging my feet, I arrive at last at the hotel, where I am received, in the kindest manner in the world, by the two mistresses of the establishment, two sisters of open, benevolent countenance and of sweet expression.

And the poor little traveler who arrives, his bag on his back and without bustle, who has sent neither letter nor telegram to announce his arrival, is the object of the kindest and most delicate attentions; his clothes are brushed, he gets water for his refreshment, and is then conducted to a table bountifully spread, in a dining-room fragrant with good cookery and bouquets of flowers....

Beyond Campfer, its houses surrounding a third little lake, we come suddenly on a scene of extraordinary animation.  All the cosmopolitan society of St. Moritz is there, sauntering, walking, running, in mountain parties, on afternoon excursions.  The favorite one is the walk to the pretty lake of Campfer, with its shady margin, its resting places hidden among the branches, its chalet-restaurant, from the terrace of which one overlooks the whole valley; and it would be difficult to find near St. Moritz a more interesting spot.