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The Puy de Chopine is a very singular mountain; it is based on a mass of crystalized soil, and appears to start suddenly forth from the centre of a circular crater which environs it: this crater is called the Puy des Gouttes. A line of extinct volcanoes extends far and wide around, stretching out as far as Combronde, each with its dark wide mouth open to the sky: this row of giants is terminated by the Puy de Chalard, and an enormous gulf, called Le Gour de Tazana. This gulf, like the mysterious Lake Pavin, is filled with water; it is of great depth, and from it rush forth numerous rapid cataracts, which roar and foam over the piled-up rocks below. There is one part of this crater which is more profound than the rest; it is where a sort of basin is formed by high and rugged rocks whose broad streaks of orange colour, crimson, yellow, and black, shew that a great volume of flame must once have issued forth from its jaws: in this portion of the gulf the water boils and foams as if the fire, once beneath, was still raging; but on the contrary, this region, which was formerly given up to the dominion of the spirits of heat, is now the abode of those of cold, and on the broad plateau, which extends to some distance round the Gour, many strange and beautiful things are to be seen, produced, as is generally believed, by the subjects of the Ice King, who dwells in one of the caverns of Tazana hard by.

He is not very often seen, but when the traveller observes, above the peak of the mountain of Chalard, a great assemblage of clouds of remarkable forms, with one deep, dark, broad shadow above them all, he may be certain that the Ice King is holding a solemn meeting, and if he mounts to the top, his eyes will be gratified by the wonders he has heard spoken of. There is not much danger now that he will be punished for his curiosity, for the time is gone by when these spirits had power to do harm to mortals; many think that the period will one day return, but it will certainly not occur till all these volcanoes are restored to their original nature, and send forth their hidden flames, as they did in times of yore.

The young widow of the Count de Tazana lived in her castle on the summit of one of the numerous rocky peaks in the neighbourhood of the Gour. The late Count was an aged man, and when the beautiful Clarice was taken out of the convent where she had been educated to be married to him, she had never thought of anything but her prayers, and was bewildered to find herself mistress of great wealth and splendour, and the companion of a man who adored her, and allowed her to have her own way in everything. He was never weary of extolling her beauty, and was so anxious that she should love him, that he was always telling her histories of ladies who had been faithfully attached to knights, and painting to her the joys of a mutual attachment. She was delighted with these stories, and was never weary of hearing them; but the oftener she listened to their details, the more she mused and wished that fate had decreed that her lover had been one of the gay and beautiful young heroes which her husband told of.