THE VILLAGE IN THE MOUNTAINS.

M. , a merchant, at the head of one of the first commercial houses in Paris, had occasion to visit the manufactories established in the mountainous tracts of the Departments of the Loire and the Puy de Dome. The road that conducted him back to Lyons traversed a country rich in natural productions, and glowing with all the charms of an advanced and promising spring. The nearer view was unusually diversified; not only by the fantastic forms of mountains, the uncertain course of small and tributary streams, and the varying hues of fields of pasture, corn, vines, and vegetables, but by the combinations and contrasts of nature and of art, and the occupations of rural and commercial industry. Factories and furnaces were seen rising amidst barns and sheep-cotes, peasants were digging, and ploughs gliding amidst forges and foundries; verdant slopes and graceful clumps of trees were scattered amidst the black and ugly mouths of exhausted coal-pits; and the gentle murmur of the stream was subdued by the loud rattle of the loom. Sometimes M. and his friend halted amidst all that is delightful and soothing; and after a short advance, found themselves amidst barrenness, deformity, and confusion. The remoter scenery was not less impressive. Behind them were the rugged mountains of Puy de Dome; the lofty Tarare lifted its majestic head beside them, and far before appeared the brilliant summit of Mont Blanc.