“Ach, Gott, Fritz, what stuff you can talk!” grumbled his father, sipping his Johannisberger with the air of a connoisseur.  “When I was of your age, Fritz, I had—­hush, what is that?”

Mr. Hahn put down his glass with such an energy that half of the precious contents was spilled.

“Ach, du lieber Gott,” he cried a moment later. “Wie wunderschon!”

From a mighty cliff overhanging the road, about a hundred feet distant, came a long yodling call, peculiar to the Tyrol, sung in a superb ringing baritone.  It soared over the mountain peaks and died away somewhere among the Ingent glaciers.  And just as the last faint note was expiring, a girl’s voice, fresh and clear as a dew-drop, took it up and swelled it and carolled it until, from sheer excess of delight, it broke into a hundred leaping, rolling, and warbling tones, which floated and gambolled away over the highlands, while soft-winged echoes bore them away into the wide distance.

“Father,” said Fritz, who was now lying outstretched on a soft Scotch plaid smoking the most fragrant of weeds; “if you can get those two voices to the ‘Haute Noblesse,’ for the next season it is ten thousand thalers in your pocket; and I shall only charge you ten per cent. for the suggestion.”

“Suggestion, you blockhead!  Why, the thought flashed through my head the very moment I heard the first note.  But hush—­there they are again.”

From the cliff, sung to the air of a Tyrolese folk-song, came this stanza: 

Tell me, Ilka on the hill-top,
While the Alpine breezes blow,
Are thy golden locks as golden
As they were a year ago? 
(Yodle) Hohli-ohli-ohli-ho! 

                Hohli-ohli-ohli-ho!  Hohlio-oh!

The effect of the yodle, in which both the baritone of the cliff and the Alpine soprano united, was so melodious that Mr. Hahn sprang to his feet and swore an ecstatic oath, while Fritz, from sheer admiring abstraction, almost stuck the lighted end of his cigar into his mouth.  The soprano answered: 

Tell me, Hansel in the valley,
While the merry cuckoos crow,
Is thy bristly beard as bristly
As it was a year ago? 
Hohli-ohli-ohli-ho! 
Hohli-ohli-ohli-ho!  Hohli-oh!

The yodling refrain this time was arch, gay—­full of mocking laughter and mirth.  Then the responsive singing continued: 

    Hansel:  Tell me, Ilka on the hill-top,
                    While the crimson glaciers glow,
                    Are thine eyes as blue and beaming
                    As they were a year ago?
    Both:  Hohli-ohli, etc.

    Ilka:  Hansel, Hansel in the valley
                    I will tell you true;
                    If mine eyes are blue and beaming,
                    What is that, I pray, to you?
    Both:  Hohli-ohli, etc.