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University of Illinois
Library at Urbana-
Champaign
BookstacksALPINE
ASCENTS AND ADVENTURES;

OR,

ROCK AND SNOW SKETCHES.LONDON :

GILBERT AND EIYINGTON, PRINTERS,
ST. JOHN'S SQUARE.DESCENT OF THE MATTERHORN.

Frontispiece.

Page 270.ALPINE
ASCENTS AND ADVENTURES;

OR,

ROCK AND SNOW SKETCHES.

BY

H. SCHUTZ WILSON,

member of the alpine club,

author of "studies and romances," etc., etc.

WITH TWO ILLUSTRATIONS, BY MARCUS STONE, A.R.A.,
AND EDWARD WHYMPER.

" I accept the peril.

I choose* to walk high with sublimer dread
Rather than crawl in safety."

George Eliot, Armgart.

SECOND EDITION.

Hontfon:

SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE, & RIVINGTON,

CROWN BUILDINGS, 188, FLEET STREET.

1878.

[All rights reserved.]TO

FREDERICK MORSHEAD, ESQ.

(lyvetete)

THESE

ROCK AND SNOW SKETCHES,

ASSOCIATED IN MY MEMORY
WITH ALWAYS DELIGHTFUL RECOLLECTIONS OF

HIS MOST PLEASANT COMPANIONSHIP

i

ON MANY A TOWER OF ROCK AND SLOPE OF SNOW,
ARE

BY HIS ATTACHED FRIEND,

THE AUTHOR.ckxiA^M 7

CONTENTS.

PAGE

I. An Exalted Horn—the Mischabel Dom i
II. Two Sprigs of Edelweiss-the Jungfrau

and Monte Rosa ....	28

III.	The Alps in Gladness—the Monch Joch

—the Wetterhorn—Mont Blanc . 64

IV.	The Alps in Sadness —the Balmhorn

Accident.....'	. 108

V. Mountaineering with Ladies . . .154
VI. A Protruding Tooth—the Fletschhorn 175
VII. A Fine Pair of Horns—the Weisshorn

and the matterhorn . . . .195

VIII. The Peak of Terror—the Schreckhorn 230
IX. An Ascent of the Matterhorn . .253
X. A Bivouac on the Rothhorn . . . 278PREFACE.

For some years past I have, as an enthusiastic lover
of the Alps, and member of the Alpine Club, gone
every year to Switzerland on a holiday of high
mountaineering. After my return, I have selected
that one (or more) of my ascents which had struck
me most strongly, and have tried to depict the
scenery I had seen ; to describe the adventures I had
met with ; and to express the feelings which contact
with the Alps so strongly excites. Those Alps are
not only poetical in themselves, but are (sometimes)
the cause of poetry in others. My essays were, in
all cases, printed ; the majority found acceptance in
magazines, and one or two were included in my
" Studies and Romances," and " Philip Manning-
ton." The whole are now collected into the present

aX

Preface.

Volume. Wenn ihrs nicht fiihlt, ihr werdets nicht
erjagen. I have felt the beauty and the poetry of
those glorious mountains; and if I succeed in
conveying any strong impression to my readers, it
will be because I have myself been so strongly
impressed by them.

That excitement which is needed by the high-
hearted English character and temperament is
supplied, in part at least, in quiet days in which
there are no noble wars, and but few chances of
stirring adventure, by Alpine climbing. Hence
the irresistible attraction of the fascinating pursuit
of mountaineering to men of fine physique ; to
men of ardent, highly-organized, even of ideal,
natures. The risk involved in first-class Alpine
work is sufficient to lend to climbing the dignity
of danger ; and the poet may rejoice in the results
of the feats which the athlete achieves. The
mountaineer experiences the highest physical and
temperamental joy of which the human frame is
capable. Every nerve is excited, every muscle
exercised in attaining to, and traversing, the
lofty Alpine peaks and passes. If the mountaineerPreface.

xi

be a poet, he feels besides, in his spiritual nature—
and feels almost beyond the power of expression—
that profound thrill of imaginative rapture which is
born of rare and hardly-won contact with some
of the noblest and most sublime scenes which
exist in God's wonderful creation ; and the memory
of such high delight remains a joy and a possession
which lasts throughout, and which ennobles, life.

H. S. W.AN EXALTED HORN.

" Und alle deine hohen Werke
Sind herrlich wie am ersten Tag."—Faust.

ELL, and what shall we do next?" So
asked my friend, Arthur Braybrooke,
as we sat one evening, in the month of
August, 1869, on the bench in front of Seiler's Monte
Rosa Hotel in Zermatt, after having been engaged
for about a fortnight in Alpine work performed in
the Zermatt region.

"What next?" I replied, dreamily letting the
smoke escape in rings and pausing to think.
Behind me was the white hotel, before me the
green hills, dusky in the after-sunset chiaro-scuro
of a fine summer evening. Near our bench stood
groups of peasants, Sesseltrager, mules, guides,
porters. One high object stood out loftily clear in
the bright light which had left the valley—the
object in question being the four peaks of the
Mischabel or Saas Grat range.

B2 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

" What next ? Well, I really hardly know.
Monte Rosa ? Oh, I forgot, you have done that
You A. C. men have done' everything. Really I
don't know what ought to come next; let us ask
Christian."

" Very well/' answered my friend, who also was
quietly smoking, " let us consult Christian ; but stop,
here's my Ball, and I can read him under the lamp.
You call Christian, and Til have a look at Ball."

While my friend was looking for the right page
in Ball's "Guide to the Western Alps," I strolled
lazily into the guides' room of Seiler's Hotel, and
called for our guide, Christian Lauener, who was
engaged by us as chief guide for a specified time.

My friend—surely the best Alpine comrade that
ever man had—was an A. C., and a rather better
climber than myself. He had, I fancy, secret
yearnings after the Matterhorn, but suppressed
them unselfishly, because he thought of danger to
me, and because he knew that that fatal peak had
to my imagination a fascination of great horror.
Indeed, only a night or two before, we had been in
a little room, dim in the bad light of one flaring
candle, and had seen opened a certain wooden box,
which contained a cut and knotted rope, a jagged
sleeve, a stiff Alpine boot. We had further seen a
small book of photographs of poor Michel Croz, of
Whymper, of Hudson, of Hadow, and Lord F.An Exalted Horn.

3

Douglas. We had seen, too, the graves in Zermatt
churchyard, and the box contained the few pathetic
relics of the expedition which led to those. The
boot had covered a foot now blanching in some
undiscovered crevice upon the Matterhorn. The
sleeve had clothed the strong arm of the brave
guide. The rope had been cut from shattered
corpses. Yes ; there is a fascination, a horrible
fascination, about the lonely and deadly peak.
Seeing it every day for many days, hearing con-
stantly some fresh detail of that fearful fatal fall,
the Matterhorn gradually possesses the imagination
as a demoniac mount, instinct with malignant
cruelty and shocking with horrible death. It
wholly oppressed and dominated my morbid
fancies ; and I was not sorry that Arthur did not
propose, as he was half inclined to do, that we
should attempt to ascend to its demon crest.

Christian was easily found, and came at my call
with his usual hearty willingness. Those who have
never seen this great Alpine guide may like to
view him as he advances towards the bench in
front of the hotel. Christian Lauener, perhaps
some thirty-five to forty years old, is rather over six
feet high, very strongly and actively built. He
wears a uniform suit of a sad weather-stained green
hue. His once black Tyrolese hat is crested with
the feathers of the Waldhuhn, and the nails in his
B 24 Alpine Ascents and Advenhtres.

heavy boots clatter upon the round pebbles .of the
pavement in front of the hotel. His manly,
cheery face expresses eloquently honesty, courage,
fidelity, friendliness. He has done every big thing
in the Alps, and has done many for the first time;
some, as for instance the unique Dent Blanche, on
one of the only two occasions on which that most
difficult peak had been ascended. His Red Indian
sagacity is equal to his cheerful trustworthiness.
His step on the glacier is as sure as his heart is
firm and true. To engage Christian is not merely
to " employ" him. You secure the zealous de-
pendable assistance of a friendly man, as worthy
and pleasant as he is competent. I always
fancied that my giant guide presented to the
sense of poet or of painter an ideal of William Tell.
His clear laughing eye is of a light bluish grey;
his weather-beaten features are sunburnt past all
praying for; his light moustache and beard frame
a mouth as firm in danger as it is kindly in repose.
He combines all the highest qualities (and they
are very high ones) of the first-class Swiss guide.

This picturesque and gigantesque figure, then,
saunters slowly up to the bench Qn which my friend,
who has found the place in Ball, is sitting under the
lamp, and joins good-humouredly in our consultation.

"Look here!" cries Arthur, reading from his
guide-book, "Ball'says of the Mischabel range—A n Exalted Horn.

5

how fine it looks there now!"—here Mr. Arthur
began to read, while I looked over his shoulder—
"that 'the Dom is 14,938 feet high '—the highest
thing in Switzerland you know, and very little done ;
that 'the Dom is the highest and steepest con-
tinuous ascent yet made in the Alps ; that thorough
training is requisite for the mountaineers who
would undertake it.' I say, let's do the Mischabel;
very few fellows have done it. Good work and fine
view. Every one has done Monte Rosa. We can
do that afterwards. I am all for the Mischabel.
Christian, what do you say ? What about the
weather ? Shall we try it to-morrow ?"

Christian, screwing up one eye, as a sailor does,
balanced on his feet, looked carefully all round the
sky and hills, and then responded slowly, "Well,
I've never, as it happens, been up the Mischabel
myselfbut I've heard all about it from Anderegg,
who has, and I know the way and the porter at
Randa who went up with your countryman Mr.—
how do you pronounce it ?—Davies.—There's been
a deal of snow lately o' nights, and I should say
that the cone would be -rather heavy; but still I
don't see why we shouldn't try it. We can do
Monte Rosa next. Weather'll do, I think. Not
often done, the Mischabel. You two can do it.
Well, yes ; we may as well try it."

This was confirmatory, and we determined to6 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

try the Mischabel. It appeared that we should
have to start the next morning at about ten, and
drive to Randa. From Randa, which is a village
in the valley between Zermatt and Saint Nicholas,
the ascent was to begin ; and it further appeared that
we should have to bivouac for a night in the open,
on a shelf of rock on the side of the mountain,
said to be some 7000 feet above Randa. Christian
undertook to provide the rugs, the trap, and the
second guide—who turned out to be a first-rate
fellow—and said he would find porters at Randa.
M. and Madame Seiler, the most friendly and sym-
pathizing of hosts and hostesses, engaged to attend
to the commissariat; and everything being thus
arranged, we smoked our final pipe amid joyous
anticipations of a fine new mountain excursion on
the morrow.

One thing only troubled me: a ruck in a
stocking had rubbed a hole in one heel, and had
made a large sore place. What of that? One
can't stop long in the Alps; weather there is
changeable, and perhaps the heel won't hurt on the
Mischabel. Anyhow the die is cast, and to-morrow
" up we go !"

The next morning duly came, ten o'clock
arrived, and with it all our necessaries. At last we
got under weigh from Zermatt. The provisions
were packed, and the rugs were not forgotten.An Exalted Horn.

7

Arthur and myself sat on the front bench ; behind
us were the two swarthy sunburnt guides. They
carried the ice-axes and the ropes. A peasant in a
blue blouse and round grey hat drove the tall well-
fed mule. The narrow road winds along by the banks
of the roaring river, which rages downwards to the
sea, boiling, foaming, and heaping itself up into pas-
sionate waves and whirlpools whenever rocks or
bends endeavour to oppose its furious flow. We are
of course in a valley. On either side rise chains
of mountains. We are so close to those on the
right hand that we see only the bulk of the lower
spurs, and never the peaks; while, separated from
the left-hand range by the width of the river, by
bare spaces of bleaching stony tracts of barrenness,
and by fields, we see an occasional peak, a tract of
snow, or white-ribbed glacier. As the road winds
we lose sight of some of the peaks of the mountains
beyond Zermatt. The Matterhorn disappears;
presently the Petit Mont Cervin is lost sight of;
then Castor and Pollux give place to the Lyskamm:
but still ever present on the left hand is the fairest
peak of all peaks, the clear-soaring, sharp-pointed,
pure-white pinnacle of the magnificent Weisshorn.

On the right we get occasional glimpses of the
Mischabelhorner, the highest peaks of the Saas
Grat range. They are our goal, which seems far
off as we near the base of the enormous mass.8 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

Our springless vehicle bumps along over the stony
road, and our way is accompanied by the ceaseless
roar of the ever-hurrying river, which, apparently too
late for an important appointment, swirls along in
maddest haste. The sun shines bright and hot, and
two hours' driving brings us to the village of Randa.

By the side of the road is one white hotel of
very moderate pretensions. Before this the car
stops: one guide lifts out all our traps, while
Christian looks after the men that he has to engage
as porters. One of these has, as a porter, been up
before; and Christian enters with him into an
eager discussion upon the details of the route. Ill
about an hour we are ready to start, and set off in
procession. As on all occasions, Christian leads;
Arthur and myself walk together; then comes
Joseph, and then the porters. The latter carry on
their backs tall baskets, which contain blankets,
provisions, and a casserole for cooking. The com-
mencement of the ascent is a continuous climb,
steep, but not difficult, the way winding through
pine woods by a mountain stream, and over grass
slopes studded with blocks and masses of rock.
Thin goat-paths are dimly marked, and as we are
in no great hurry we swing gently on, talking and
laughing, while stalwart Lauener breaks into
snatches of cheery song.

We left Randa at about one o'clock: we expectAn Exalted Horn.

9

to reach our dormitory easily by six or seven.
We have two guides and three porters: one of the
latter (two of them are to accompany us only to
the sleeping-place) is a bright-eyed, merry-faced
youngster of some eighteen years, very pleasant to
look upon ; the porter who has been up before is a
strong wiry fellow of a determined aspect; the
third is a good-natured but lumpish young peasant,
who tends cows up the neighbouring hills. The
procession presses forward merrily (I wish my heel
wouldn't throb so), and we indulge in delightful
anticipations and retrospects. Only two difficulties
occur before we reach the rock-work. These are
two moderately troublesome rock couloirs, perpen-
dicular, smooth, high, and devoid of holding points.
But Christian is equal to every emergency. Climb-
ing up somehow first, he hoists up porters, ice-axes,
baskets, and ourselves. Joseph comes last, helped
by the rope; and we begin in the falling light of
the afternoon to climb the final rocks beneath the
sleeping-place, at which we arrive at the predicted
hour of sunset. We find there two flat, narrow
ledges of rock, separated by a hollow abyss which
opens on the infinite. We christen at once one
the dining-room and the other the bedroom. The
ledges are perhaps four feet broad, tolerably flat, and
impended over by great rock boulders. They are
very safe if you don't step over the edge, and prettyI o A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

comfortable if you don't mind a floor of rocky hard-
ness and stony irregularity. We have mounted the
7000 feet. Now, Christian, dinner, dinner, if you
please!

Here we promptly begin our preparations for
cooking. An iron pot, or casserole, is slung upon
three sticks over a fire made of the arbutus wood
which one of our porters has gathered on the way
and carried up for us. The dry branches soon
crackle and smoke, and then the bright flames
begin to dart and leap. As the fire rises it shows
us how the darkness is deepening all around. We
make some soup, which would be poor stuff were it
not for the Liebig lozenges which we put in, and
which improve it as strength improves all character.
The soup is soon ready, and we begin our
welcome meal. The soup is good, and the guides
render justice to Professor Liebig. We have some
cold meat, not very good, and of an indefinite
character, but supposed to be muscular mutton.
We have further some rather sour bread and some
rather hard cheese. We have red wine, nominally
emanating from the region of Bordeaux, and we
have one bottle of English beer. Our champagne
is reserved for the possible event of reaching the
summit. There is further a small brandy-flask in
case of emergencies. Two of the porters now leave
us to return to Randa; and then, grouped roundA n Exalted Horn.	11

the high blazing fire, Arthur, myself, the gigantic
Lauener, the sturdy Joseph, and the sinewy porter,
sit or stretch, and eat. Fatigue and food evolve a
delicious condition of repose, in which the body is
supine while the fancy remains active. Meanwhile
the darkness ever deepens and intensifies. And
then, the "things" being cleared away, and a lantern
stuck upon a little cleft of overhanging rock, there
comes over us that joyous exaltation and excited
repose which find their fittest exponent in a pipe.
Arthur, with an expressive and circular glance,
produces a briar-wood, and blows through it in a
spirit of philosophic testing. " They'll see our fire
from Zermatt," says Lauener, peering out into the
darkness as if he could see that they saw, while he
piles fresh arbutus on the merry blaze. "Ah,
they'll be looking out for us from Seller's," says
Joseph, laying the branches so that they may
soonest add to the flame, which now leaped and
flickered ruddily in a small but brilliant patch of
light redeemed from the darkness which it rendered
more obscure. The pipes are lit, and, in deference
to the cold, we heat some wine, and improvise a kind
of mulled wine grog. Then with the aroma of
tobacco blending with that of the arbutus, ensues
that utterly delicious lethargy of ecstasy which we
have won by the work of the day, and by anticipa-
tions of the work of to-morrow.12 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

We talk ; the guides tell us of former ascents, of
difficulties surmounted, and dangers overcome : the
porter tells us of his own previous ascent of the
Mischabel. All our talk is coloured and toned by
locality; is weird with the spirit of the Alps, and
practical with their vanquished impregnability.
The guides confer eagerly with the porter upon
details of to-morrow's climb. Some one, I think
Arthur, alludes to the terrible Matterhorn accident,
and we all begin, though in somewhat lowered tones,
to discuss the most solemn and imperial crime of
the murderous Matterhorn. This theme throws a
hush upon our talk, and then the guides, who are
altogether German in sentiment, propose a song.
Joseph modestly yields the pas to Christian, who
rises, the firelight setting off his splendid frame
against the background of utter darkness, and be-
gins. And what did he sing ? Perched up on that
high, narrow slab of rock, with the awful depth
below and the wide void around, with the ruddy
light glistening flickeringly upon the black rock
surface above, with the great night encircling the
one spot of light, all feeling and all thought are
serious. He did not sing—not one of us felt
inclined to do so-—of love, or wine, or war, or mirth.
With his great rough storm-beaten voice, Christian
sang a Luther hymn—simple, pious, grand ; reso-
nant with trust in that God who had created all theA n Exalted Horn.

13

wonder and the awe amid which we sat I see the
group now—see it as if it were worthily painted—
while the tones of the great guide's great voice rang
through the solemn stillness and the mighty void.
Joseph sat as if in church, devout and attentive :
the porter, his rough hands clasped before his knees,
followed the rising and the falling of the singer's
tones. Arthur lay upon his side, his face in
shadow thrown by me, as I reclined supine beside
him. Then Joseph, after some pressing, sang
bashfully a plaintive little song of love for a Switzer
home and for his native Alps. The flames sank
down, and the glowing brands only smouldered.
It grew very cold, and when nine o'clock was some-
what past, Christian, announcing that we should
have to start about two in the morning, insisted
upon " bed."

Arthur and myself were to sleep upon the
second shelf of rock, to reach which we had to step
across a void abyss of hollow and fearful depth.
Lauener held the lantern for us, and helped us
across with the handle of an ice-axe. We then lay
down in our clothes and boots, feet to feet, upon
the narrow ledge, and were severally packed up in
rugs by kindly Christian. After many cautions
against moving in the night and so falling over the
edge of the slab, he wishes us a hearty " good-
night," and disappears with the lantern round the14 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

block of rock towards the dining-room. The light
gone, it seemed directly very dark. The rock, too,
on which I lay, was hard, uneven, and knubbly, and
it took some time to find a moderately easy pitch.
I elected at length to lie on my back. I heard
Arthur, who remarked incidentally that it was
" awfully cold," struggling with similar difficulties.
I could not find a soft place for my head, and on
trying to arrange myself got my feet out of the rug.
Comfort out of all question.

" One thing is/' remarked Arthur viciously (he
never liked getting up), " that it can't last for long.
That brute Lauener will have us up in an hour or
two. Confound him ! I know he takes a joy in
waking me, so the sooner we go to sleep the better.
I feel sleepy. How do you get on, old fellow ?
What a beastly place this is ! Oh, that'll do, I'm
more comfortable now. Good night! I hope to
goodness we sha'n't roll out of bed in the night and
fall over that cursed precipice ! Two o'clock, didn't
he say ? I suppose it's ten now. Did you wind up
your watch ? A precious short night—and so good
night! " And therewith exit Mr. Arthur into the
realm of sleep. Happy fellow ! No kindly sleep
came to me. Apart from the discomforts of the
rock, and the sting of the increasing cold, my
imagination was far too excited for sleep.

Near, very near, was the edge of the slab onA n Exalted Horn.	15

which I lay, and I fancied the frightful fall of a
sleeping man down thousands of feet beneath it.
It was intensely still. The faintest thin thread of a
monotone of murmur from the river deep below
could just be discerned when the beating of the
heart did not drown the sound. I looked above.
The sky was brilliantly starry, and it seemed as if
I were lifted up half-way towards Orion and his
peers. The foot of the Kien Glacier was just
visible, ghostly and cold, as it flowed down to the
level of our ledge. Now and then the night air
seemed just to sigh round the rock above, and then
again all was stiller than before. Before me the
wide valley was filled up with a great dusk void of
intense purple gloom ; and opposite, on the valley's
farther side, rose—long, high, and sombre—range
on range of Alps. The splendid Weisshorn,
sharpest of cones and snowiest of peaks, soared
sovereignly from out the kingly row. I was now
lying on a level with his glacier, which from the
valley seems shrunk up to his top, but which, as I
reclined and looked upon it, appeared an awful ex-
panse of crevasse-seamed ghastly whiteness. Now
and then the silence was shattered for an instant by
a sharp crack of the neighbouring glacier labouring
stubbornly against the riving frost. I could just see
the horrent peak of the fatal Matterhorn : I could
just suppose where Zermatt slept in the valley far16 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

below. Seen from such a height as that on
which I lay sleepless, the lofty mountain ledge, the
starry heavens above, the broad dark depth beneath,
the grand old mountains all around, made up such
a picture and filled up such a night as one sees and
knows but once in life. Meanwhile Arthur slept.
I tried to do so, but found it vain. Useless to pull
up the rug and to close the eyes, with a view to
exclude surroundings which, once gazed upon, were
seen more intensely when the eyes themselves
were shut. No ; no sleep for me that night on the
ledge of the Mischabel.

At length I heard a muffled stir in the dining-
room, and then, as I listened attentively, heard the
click of a match. Soon, with a dim lantern in his
hand, appeared Christian round the abyss. He
found me wide awake, but my friend very much
the contrary ; and some little time and no little
trouble were consumed in waking Arthur. It was
dark and cold and cheerless, and we were cross,
sullen, and silent. After a joyless, scrappy sort of
sketchy, fragmentary breakfast, we started, some-
thing after 2 a.m., Lauener leading the way with a
lantern which gave a discontented kind of dull, in-
flamed light. The commencement of the work was
rock climbing, going pretty straight upward over
black, cold, slippery rock surface. No one spoke,
and we scrambled along silently and morosely.A n Exalted Horn.	17

It was rather troublesome work, and after about
half an hour of it Christian called a halt, and said
that we must wait " for a little more grey in the
light." Presently that stony, wan glare of coming
morning began to spread slowly through the air; the
lantern was put out, and on we went again. More
rock-work ; then neve; then a long, steep, lateral
moraine, frozen hard, and lively with loose blocks
of rock which rattled fiercely down past us, and
had to be carefully avoided. Grey, grim light
always increasing; a sting of steel-cold air made
colder by whiffs of morning wind, until, at about
six, we reached the great glacier, and halted under
the lee of a block of rock for breakfast. Very cold
now, and the wind much stronger. No sun yet.
One foot amongst the party found to be frost-bitten,
but restored to animation by rubbing with snow
and brandy. This breakfast consisted of the
muscular mutton, very hard and tough, red wine,
bread. After that a pipe, and then, bitterly cold
as it still was, we all thawed and began to laugh
and chat gaily as of yore. But, oh happiness! as
we, having put on spectacles and mittens, were
being roped in line to start, out darted a keen ray
of sunlight, and our joy was full. Lauener led ; I
followed next on the rope; then came the other
guide, next Arthur, and lastly the porter. The
guides and the porter carried little bags of cowskin,

C18 A Ipiue Ascents arid Adventures.

and we knew that the porter bore the champagne,
sacred to the far-off summit And so we wound,
and crunched, and slipped, and toiled along;
crossing some crevasses and avoiding others. The
sun was hot, but the wind was high ; and when we
came into a deep basin surrounded by high peaks,
we looked up from our well and saw a sky of a
dark, streaky indigo hue. Next came some more
rocks, and then snow slopes and levels. The snow
was sometimes very deep, and began to soften in
the sun. Guides wonderfully intelligent in choos-
ing the route, and porter useful in suggestions born
of his former ascent. No view yet, except great
snow wastes blackened by blocks of rock, and high
peaks rising all around. All the scene unspeakably
lonely, desolate, and grand. Arthur and myself
agree that we shall long remember it, and con-
gratulate each other upon such a memorable day.
There is strong feeling of exulting excitement, of
mental alterative, of keen observation, and of
stirred imagination. My heel begins to hurt me
very much, but it will not do to think of that.
Pretend to myself that I don't feel it at every step,
and so go on.

The foot of the summit—of the true summit—
that of the real Dom, or Grabenhorn. We halt
and sit down, and look up. There, too, are the
other three out of the four peaks of the Saas GratA n Exalted Horn.	19

—the Taschhorn, the Gasenriedhorn, and the other
anonymous peak, the unnamed Mischabel No. 3.
But our peak interests us most because it is the
one we have to get up. Seen from its foot it is a
beautiful, very steep, very long, rather sharp snow
pyramid, but it is so high and so very steep
that the prospect of climbing it is a little dis-
heartening. It seems utterly too steep to be as-
cended in a straight line. Arthur and myself
speculate together upon the best way up, while an
eager conference is going on between the guides
and porter. The sun becomes very hot, and the
wide snow glare would be blinding were it not for
our neutral-tinted spectacles. Conference of guides
ends, and Christian comes towards us with his
hearty laugh, and says we must start, as the snow
is in a bad state, and the climb will be long and
laborious.

A new arrangement is come to, and we are
roped in two parties: Lauener, myself, and the
porter on one rope. Arthur and Joseph on the
other. We do start, and begin by going straight
upwards. The snow is bad, loose, and deep. It
varies in depth from three inches to three feet, and
beneath it is hard ice.

I follow Christian and tread diligently in his
footsteps, though sometimes the loose snow cracks
and breaks away under the second stepper and
C 220 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

lets him slip backwards. Lauener was right; it is
laborious.

It is also monotonous, the principal objects in
my field of vision being Christian's brownish-black
gaiters, as one sinks into deep and crumbling snow
while the other is lifted out of it. Presently we
leave a straight course, as the gradient becomes too
steep, and begin to zigzag across the slope. Very
hard work, and very tiring. Every now and then
Christian throws out a cheery word of encourage-
ment, and I hear Joseph doing the like somewhere
in the rear. More than an hour at this work with-
out stopping, and I privately long for some excuse
for even a brief respite. There is, perhaps about
half-way up, a rock, and for this Christian to my
great joy makes, and arrived there announces a
breathing halt, or what he terms a Schnaufzeit.
He says that he could not have stopped on the
snow slope. The guides hack out with their ice-
axes a place round the rock, and we all gladly
throw ourselves down to rest. There is a view
now : an ocean of purple peak waves opens before
us, but we cannot stop to look at it, for Christian
says we are late, and that with the snow as it is
we mustn't waste time. On again, and the same
thing again, in the way of weary climbing, for per-
haps another two hours. Just when it seemed as if
going farther was impossible, just when my heelA n Exalted Horn.	21

almost quite crippled me, Joseph announces the
top. Another desperate effort, and then, at last,
at about noon, comes the peak of the Dom.

We throw ourselves down flat on our backs, and
our guides shout and jodel in a way that might
well wake an avalanche. The porter unpacks his
cowskin pocket, and the well-known form of a
champagne bottle appears. We all drink gleefully,
and then finish the bread and cheese, and then
light a pipe. By this time we feel restored, and
begin to look out for the view.

" Leslie Stephen says," remarks Arthur, with
appreciative ecstasy, " that this is the very finest
view in the Alps. Let's see if he is right."

We think he is right.

The view is wonderful, past all whooping; beau-
tiful beyond all description. See—those are the
Italian lakes! What are those mountains with
the huge level of snow spread out below them ?
Those, says Christian, are in Tyrol, and what looks
like snow is really clouds. Those Alps there are
the Dauphine Alps, and that other mountain range
is that of the Appenines. There's the Jura, and
that—can it be ?—yes, it is the Lake of Geneva!
Look at the Oberland Giants : look at the Monte
Rosa range! We seem to be above the Matter-
horn, and are higher than the Weisshorn! You
are, says Christian, on the highest peak in Switzer-22 A Ipine A scents and A dvenfotres.

land, Mont Blanc (there he is—that's him) being
in France, and Monte Rosa partly in Italy. What
a sea, what a crowd of mountains—some snow-
capped, some purple ! What glaciers! What an
awful spread of near purple heavens! It seems
like judging the world only by its greatest men.
We turn round and look on every side. Switzer-
land, Italy, France, and the Tyrol, are all visible
in their glorious ranges of eternal hills. No cloud
above: below there is cloud only on the Tyrol,
and there the peaks soar through it. How wide the
range of vision, how high we are, how hot the
glowing sun, how keen the mountain air! We
recognize peak after peak that we know; we
salute those that we have climbed. Our talk is all
exclamation, our feeling is all ecstasy. What
glorious things there are in this wonderful world of
ours ! What sublimity, what beauty, what wonder!
We are glad, are grateful; we think it is "good to
be here." Thought and feeling are blent in a
tumult of great joy and of awed wonder. As each
separate object strikes us we utter fragmentary
ejaculations of recognition and delight. Shall we
ever be able to remember all that we saw there ?
We think not, but agree that we shall never forget
that scene, that day; that we shall often recall it by
London winter firesides, and shall perhaps never
meet each other without a thought and a mentionA n Exalted Horn.

23

of the great Mischabel-Dom. When we have been
there, as it seems to us, about ten minutes, Lauener,
the inexorable, announces decisively that we must
begin the descent, and hurries us unfeelingly away.
The slope from the peak downwards to the bottom
of the pyramid looks very awful to go down ; and
so we find it. It looks to be an almost sheer
descent. We plunge up to mid-leg in every deep
hole made by a guide's step. We labour and
flounder and slip. One slip, but for Christian,
would have brought us to the bottom without
much waste of time. The snow was often deep
and insecure ; having fallen very recently, it was
dazzlingly white. However, we did at length reach
the bottom of the pyramid in safety, and paused to
rest for a few moments on the brown rocks beneath.

" We are well out of that! " remarked Christian,
with gleeful emphasis. " I didn't at all like the
descent with the snow in such a state. No hold,
and might have been an avalanche with this wind
—a great deal of fresh snow has fallen lately. I
thought at Zermatt that we should find this bit
ugly. Glad we're safely down." Looking forward,
we can trace our previous track by a long winding
line of deep holes in the sun-sparkling snow-wastes.
All once more on one rope, we start on the return
journey. How dark our lonely figures look in
that desolate and dreary expanse! We recross24 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

the snow-field, we again traverse the glacier—on
which I manage to cracJk through into a crevasse,
but am saved by laying my ice-axe across—we
pass, travelling now at a much quicker rate, the
moraine with its slope of falling rocks ; the nevd;
we reclamber down the rocks from which we started
in the morning, and arrive once more at the dining
and bed-rooms.

Here we halt to dine off the remains of our pro-
visions. It is, I think, about four o'clock. We take
a good look at the scene which we may never
again see, we enjoy one after-dinner pipe, and then
start finally for Zermatt. We get down the two
couloirs pretty comfortably, we finish with the
rocks, and find ourselves on steep grass slopes
sprinkled with, grey stones. We come to some
Sennhlitte, and see a cow tied to a musical bell.
Passing the water-worn stones, we reach the pine-
woods at dusk, and do not emerge from them until
it is quite dark, but looking up we catch a glimpse
of the Mischabelhorner all aglow with amethyst
light. We have long ago taken off spectacles and
mittens, and now find that our faces and necks are
fiercely sun-bitten. I am a little stiff, a fact which
makes itself apparent when I have to lift a leg over
a lump of rock. At last come the final meadow
slopes and the lights of Randa. It is about eight
o'clock ; we get a great bowl of Alpine milk there,An Exalted Horn.	25

and find our carriage waiting. We settle with our
porter, and with our two guides mount the welcome
vehicle. It is dark, the road is rough and narrow,
but horse and driver are going home ; and with
shouts and loud crackings of the whip we rattle
and bump along at a good pace. The roaring
river gleams greyly light through the gloom of
night. We look back to try to make out the spot
on which we bivouacked the night before. We
are joyous, excited, triumphant. At length come
wooden houses, then the pebbly stones of Zermatt.
A shout, a final whipcrack, and we pull up in a
blaze of light before the comfortable hotel.

M. and Madame Seiler are waiting with lights.
Our friends come out to welcome us, heads appear
at windows, strangers crowd round the carriage, all
congratulate us on our ascent and safe return. M.
Seiler says he saw us with a glass on the top. They
did see our fire on the bivouac. We order a bottle
of champagne for our guides. A welcome tub, a
change of clothes and boots, and we enter a lighted
room and find a good dinner ready. How we
enjoy it! We have to narrate the particulars of
the climb, and then, after dinner, we adjourn with
our friends to a room in which a wood fire blazes,
and have a cigar and a chat, while our slippered
feet are warm and bright in the merry firelight.
What a sleep afterwards ! what a beatific sleep in26 A Ipine A scents and Adventures.

a good bed in a pleasant room!— the window of
which, by the way, frames a perfect picture of the
deadly Matterhorn. We get to bed at twelve.
At seven next morning I meet Arthur to go to
bathe. Our muscles feel not unpleasantly that
we have done a good bit of work, but my unfortu-
nate heel is rather bad. Returning to breakfast
we see the ever-cheerful Christian with a beaming
morning face; and having happily accomplished
the Mischabel, we again consult upon the basis of
the question with which we started, "Well, and
what shall we do next ?"

In the year following (1870) one was not able
to get to Switzerland, but my heart was with her
summer snows, and I soothed my Sehnsucht with
recollections of the past. How sad it is to gaze on
the unused ice-axe leaning idle against ;the wall!
The other day I turned up accidentally a photo-
graph of the Mischabelhorner, and this sun picture
stirred so vividly the memories of our ascent, that
I yielded to an impulse to record some image of
an excursion which gave us so much delight. Many
like myself were last year excluded from Switzer-
land ; and I fancied that a sketch in which the
Alps and delight should be mingled like snow and
champagne might interest other exiles from Helve-
tia. In spite even of the great war whose echoes,
like thunder rolling among far mountains, reachedAn Exalted Horn.	2 7

us in awful mutterings, there are yet quiet hours
in which the fancy indulges in visions of sights "too
fair to be looked upon but only on holidays." My
little picture is not painted for those Alpine Club
gentlemen whose many triumphs of endurance and
of daring lead them perhaps somewhat to under-
rate all things Alpine except the highest difficulty
and the greatest danger, and who might possibly
scorn the sketch of an ascent which, from a climbing
point of view, may not be quite first-rate. No; it
addresses itself very modestly to those who love
with an imaginative love the majesty and the
mystery of the austere beauty of Switzerland ;
who perchance with Tyndall have recognized upon
the glacier and the peak the full joy of Being in
the highest development of mental and of physical
power; and have felt with Goethe the thrilling
sense that in those noble Alps, in those "earth-
o'ergazing mountains," His high works are glorious
now as they were upon the first day.TWO SPRIGS OF EDELWEISS;

OR, SKETCHES ABOVE THE SNOW-LINE.

" Erst Empfindung, dann Gedanken,

Erst ins Weite, dann zu Schranken,

Aus dem Wilden, hold und mild,

Zeigt sich dir das wahre Bild."—Goethe.

AIN, rain : everywhere rain. Rain on the
glistening deck of the night-packet in the
Channel; rain on the sloppy Calais pier ;
rain through France and Belgium ; rain through
Prussia; rain slanting against the streaming pane of
the railway carriage ; rain dimpling with a thousand
splashy drops the pools of water through which
the railway wheels glide over unseen rails. Rain
everywhere from London to Cologne. But what
matters rain, or any other drawback; for are we
not going to Switzerland ?—going again, for yet
another summer holiday, to the land of the chalet,
the glacier, and the torrent—to the land of the
summer valley and the wintry mountain—to theTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	29

land of the sapin and the chamois—to the land of
health, and joy, and mountaineering ?

What, to a cultured man, are the two great wants
in his holiday ?

Those wants are—alterative and excitement.
Alterative and excitement are best got in Switzer-
land.

The air, the scene, the change, are alteratives;
the climbing is excitement.

Therefore, oh, rain! pour on; we will endure;
for are we not going, this 26th day of July 1871,
to Switzerland, and do we not hope soon to
be—

" On mountain standing,

Up in the air, crowned with the golden sun" ?

It is out of place to " speak tropically " of the
world of winter; but, in the Alpine mountains,
you lead a higher life as you breathe a purer air.
It is the land of exercise, of health, of joy; of
tender grandeur and of austere loveliness. Oh,
the rapture of returning to Switzerland after an
enforced absence from its glories and its joys!
Oh, the memories and anticipations! Descend,
slow rain ! speed on, slow train ! for are we not now
returning to Switzerland, and shall weather damp
our delight, or depress our enthusiasm ? No ! But,
alas ! in Switzerland itself we also find bad weather.

Yes, this year (1871), at least in the months of30 A Ipine Ascents and Advenhires.

July and August, the weather in the Alps was bad.
Perhaps one fine day to three or four bad days;
and the one fine day an uncertain phenomenon.
While at the Schwarenbach Inn it was bitterly
cold, and snow fell heavily. On the Wildstrubel
we were scourged back by terrible storms. On the
Altels we were nearly frozen to death by a snow
and hail storm, driven by a fierce wind. No view
from the summit, but a cold which made it dan-
gerous to rest, and a storm which rendered
difficult to move on the arete.

This year I was alone. Arthur Braybrooke was
no more—as a mountaineer. I had no companion
except my faithful Christian Lauener, who remained
with me from the joyous hour in which I first saw
his tall dark-green figure at Lauterbrunnen to the
sadder hour in which I left him at Martigny. Going
out, I travelled with two great Alpine climbers, but
they were men of frivolous and worldly minds, who
suffered themselves to be led away from Cologne
to go to Ober-Ammergau, to see the Passion Play,
and thus wasted some of the time which ought to
have been all devoted to the Alps. Resisting such
sensual allurements, I went straight on to Switzer-
land, and only saw my friends once, at Chatillon,
the day before a fine morning led them into a bad
day, in their resolute ascent of the south side of the
Matterhorn.

And now, in London, in winter, I sit before theTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	31

fire, and think over the pleasures of the season past.
As I think, memories rise in crowds, and it is
difficult to select the ascents of which I would fain
try to fix some image here.

Before me lie two little torn shreds of faded red
bunting. They formed portions of the remnants of
the flags erected upon the summits of the Jungfrau
and Monte Rosa, and it was Lauener's idea to tear
off a small piece of each to give to me in memory
of our ascents. The stuff is thin and sere as the
sails of the doomstruck ship of the Ancient Mariner,
and the colour is now very faint and wan. Think
how long those flags have waved or drooped, by
night and day, through summer and through winter,
through stillness and through storm, on the lonely
and lofty peaks of those awful summits! As, in the
dim aisles of some old cathedral, high up towards
the misty roof, tattered banners, the trophies of
glorious wars, droop their shredded points, and
wave no more their blazon to the clarion's note—so
these old torn patches of the Jungfrau and Monte
Rosa flags now droop for ever in my London room
—trophies of triumphs over peaks which once were
held to be inaccessible to man. I like to look, at
odd times, on these objective memorials of past
pleasures, and to recall by their help the crests of
rock and snow upon which they and I have stood.
As I gaze, the room in London disappears, and the
still and solemn world of ice and mountain rises32 A Ipine A scents and A dvenhires.

round me. I feel the joy of conquest; I see the
sky, the snow, the scene, the cloud; and the keen
pure air of Alpine mountain-tops blows freshly fair,
and fans the winter fire. These two flag shreds
determine my choice of the ascents which I will now
endeavour to depict.

From the Swarenbach we have passed to the
Jungfrau Hotel, on the iEggischhorn, at which I
am known. The hotel was not veiy full, but there
were among the guests one or two men with Alpine
minds and designs. The first night we had a
snowstorm, and the snow lay round the hotel itself.
We only waited for fine weather in order to attack
the Jungfrau. Christian represented that a second
guide was necessary, and for this purpose I engaged
Johann Fischer1 of the ^Eggischhorn, with whom I
had previously done some work. Fischer is one of
the most rising guides in the Oberland, and will
soon come into the front rank. He is a tall, well-
made, strongly-built man, with a very dark face,
which wears a rather stern expression. He is a
silent man, but very capable of " doing all that is
doable." He is cool, resolute, daring ; and I would
trust him willingly in cases of danger. I liked
Fischer much, and parted with him unwillingly.

At last fine weather. Sending on a porter with

1 Poor Fischer perished in the sad accident on the Courmayeur
side of Mont Blanc, in which Mr. Marshall also lost his^ life.Two Sprigs of Edelweiss.	33

rugs and provisions to the Faulberg hut, at which
we are to sleep, Christian, Fischer, and myself leave
the ^Eggischhorn hotel at about 2 p.m., to saunter
gently up the great Aletsch glacier to the Faulberg.
Guides say it must be fine to-morrow, though, they
add, there is too much freshly-fallen snow about.
The sun is setting as we climb the rocks to our high
sleeping-place; and one side of the glacier is warm
in the last rays of sunlight, while the other is grey
and chill with the dawn of evening. The Faulberg
hut consists of a shelter of rude planking made fast
on to the solid rock. It contains a stove and a
tray of boards, like a manger, on which one can
sleep, or at least lie down on wood and straw.

It is better sleeping in the Faulberg than on the
open rocks on the Mischabel. The thing is rough,
but still it is a shelter. The guides prepare our
dinner, which comprises that curious mountain
delicacy known as " Guides' Soup," a fluid prepara-
tion strongly flavoured with strong Swiss cheese.
I look out meanwhile upon the vast valley of snow,
and watch the rose flush fading on the haughty
peaks. We retire to rest about 9.30, and are to rise
at about one. It was a cold night, but the hut was
reasonably warm. Of course we slept in all our
clothes.

The guides soon slept, but I remained awake,
thinking and fancying, until great Christian up-

D34 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

lifted his sombre height in the dark, struck a light,
and announced the mountain re'veillee. While
coffee was making, I went outside to wash ; and I
must say that an ablution in glacier water at one
o'clock on a freezing morning, high up on the rocks
springing from the top of the Aletsch glacier, is an
awakening thing, and quite makes up for the want
of sleep. Fischer appears with a hood under his
hat; a hood which just leaves the face visible. His
garments are all sad-coloured ; his alpine hat bears
a bent plume, and he looks like a German Lanz-
knecht of the fifteenth century. His dark, strong
face, with its small, light moustache, looks fine from
out the setting of the quaint old-world hood.
Christian wears his usual dark, weather-beaten, green
suit, and has a feather of the Waldhuhn in his hat.
We come out into the cold morning to be roped
together, and to start for the Jungfrau. We descend
the rocks on to the glacier, deep beneath; and I
entertain a secret wish that some painter could
sketch my two picturesque great guides. The
Jungfrau has only been ascended once this year,
says Fischer, who has a special monopoly as guide
to the Snowy Maiden.

We are on the widest, the longest, the grandest
glacier of the Alps. It is about half-past two in
the morning, and the moon is shining brightly from
a deep, night-blue sky. The stars are large andTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	35

brilliant. There is little or no wind, but it is
freezing stiffly, and is very cold. The glacier is
hard as iron, the crevasses are well covered, and
travelling is easy. We therefore go at a great pace,
Christian leading, Johann Fischer coming after me.
The incline is gentle. The moon being behind us,
our three little moving shadows, clear cut in the
sharp moonlight, are projected before us on the
great ribbed plain of frostbound whiteness. Our
footsteps crack upon the frozen snow, and we tramp
along without speaking, but very fast. On our
right, close to us, are lofty, rock-patched mountains/
their sheets of snow silver-blanched in the pale
moonbeams. On the left the mountains are much
farther off, separated from us by the width of the
broad glacier. Behind us, faint and distant, is the
far dim range of Monte Rosa. Before us, and
coming towards us with every step) are the Trug-
berg, the Monch, and the Jungfrau. It is very
still and awful. The moon seems to shine upon a
part of nature too wild, and cold, and stern, for the
life of man. We are but intruders there. The
only sound is that of our crackling footsteps ; and
they seem out of place in that vast and ghostly
desolation. As we near the Trugberg, a bitter
north wind rushes keenly down upon the glacier;
the moon grows wan, and the stars fade from out
the waning night. Then comes very gradually the
D 236 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

chill, hard, cruel blank of coming morning. The
night is dead, and the day is not yet born. The
moonbeams cease from the cold mountain-sides.
The light becomes more and more stony. Such a
daybreak in such a scene is simply terrible. The
mountains are all faint grey ; the snow is grey ; the
light is greyer still. Everything is unspeakably
cold, hopeless, depressing, repellent. One star only
lingers. The wind is fiercer far, and there is no
colour in all the light or landscape. Presently the
eastern sky, seen high above snow ranges, grows
palely amber. Colour grows and spreads like a
blessing or a hope. We begin to climb the Ki'anz-
berg just as the coming day is born. As the day
increases the wind declines. The neve is firm, and
we continue working quickly. About half-way up
we find some rather difficult rock-work, and the
rocks are coated here and there with thin ice.
Snow has fallen in the night. Having surmounted
the rocks, we pause to breakfast. Above us the
snow-slopes look terribly steep; and the summit
can hardly be distinguished from the pale whitish
colour of the morning sky. Breakfast over, we
resume. Fischer now leads, and the pure new snow
becomes somewhat deeper and softer as the sun
shines out. The day will be fine, the guides say ;
and we work on in high spirits. The Bergschrund
has been happily overcome : there is another routeTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	37

more circuitous, though easier, but we are doing
Fischer's straight-up line to the top ; and at length
we arrive at the Roththal-sattel, after conquering a
decidedly difficult snow-slope. The Roththal-sattel
is an "extremely sharp crest of snow" (says Mr.
Ball), "beyond which the eye plunges abruptly
down a precipice 3000 feet in height into the depths
of the Roththal."

Now begins the passage " along one of the
longest and sharpest aretes of frozen snow to be
found in the Alps." No false step is permissible
here.

Along this razor-edged ridge, with precipices on
either hand, we proceed slowly and cautiously;
holding with the axe on one side of the edge, while
we stamp or cut steps on the other side.

We are moving one at a time. Christian leads
again, and we have often to cut steps in the snow.
No looking round while this work is going on. We
reach safely the foot of the straight-up slope
(which scarcely slopes at all) leading to the summit.
It is in fact a more or less snow-covered ice wall,
or spire, or pyramid. It lies to the south, and as
when we ascended the wind had been for some time
blowing from the north, the pyramid was not so
thick in snow as were the slopes. Here we pause
and look upwards. A few steps in the frozen neve
are trodden in, and then we come to ice. The ice-38 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

axe swings round and the sparkling crystals fly.
We begin the last ascent. You must take care here
how you manage the rope. It is about 750 feet
high, and is so sheer up that your breast almost
touches the snow when your feet are in the steps*
Up we go carefully and steadily. It seems to last a
long time, but while I am hoping that it won't last
much longer, my wrist is grasped by Lauener, and
he welcomes me to the summit of the Jungfrau.

The summit is a small ridge of frozen snow,
about as broad as a saddle, and falling sheer away
on both sides like a very, very steep roof. Across
this ridge we all sit down, having first smoothed
the edge with the axe, with our feet hanging down
on either side. Interlachen is on the north side, and
the Aletsch glacier on the south. The day is superb,
sunny, fairly warm, and wind-still. You cannot lie
down, you must sit across your snow saddle, and
you had better sit pretty firmly. The depth to the
north is most impressive. The guides jodel down to
Lauterbrunnen ; and we drink our bottle of cham-
pagne. I light my pipe, and we sit astride this lofty
crest to look upon the view that we have won.

The first feeling you have is that of being very
high up. You seem lifted half-way to the near
sky. Mentally also you are very near the heavens.
The literal height is about 13,800 feet. The sense
of triumph, the joy of conquest, the delight ofTHE SUMMIT OF THE JUNGFRAU.

Page 38.Two Sprigs of Edelweiss.	39

being actually on the very summit of the renowned
Jungfrau ; the glory of the scene around—all things
combine to raise you to a very ecstatic state
of feeling. The sunny air is light, keen, exhilarat-
ing, and the great sky arch above around you, is
half awful in its immensity. It is found to be a
little after 9 a.m., and we have consequently plenty
of time. Let us look round. At this moment
Byron's lines, in which he sings of the "never-
trodden" snows of the Jungfrau, flashed across my
memory. His description implies a prophecy, and
as, sitting upon the summit, I thought of the
splendid lines, I gloried in falsifying his prediction.
If Shakspeare, looking merely from the cliffs at
Dover, could feel how dizzy it was to cast one's
eyes below, what would he have felt had he sat, as
I was sitting, astride of the supreme crest of the
"soaring Jungfrau"? If the fishermen that he
saw from Dover cliffs appeared like mice, to what
would he have compared the little dots of figures
that we saw below in Lauterbrunnen ?

One distinctive feature of the view from the
Jungfrau is, that it comprehends men and human
habitations to an extent which no other peak view
can surpass. Two miles below is Interlachen, clearly
risible, like a toy heap of houses—that Interlachen
from which I had so often gazed with longing and
delight upon the noble peak on which at last I sat.40 A lpine Ascents and Adventures.

To the left, and nearer to you, is the scattered
village and deep valley of mountain-shadowed
Lauterbrunnen.

Lauterbrunnen is Lauener's home, and he looks
out eagerly for his cottage, and fancies that he can
distinguish his wife. The nearest peak is the
round snowy top of the Silberhorn. Seen from
Miirren, the Silberhorn appears to be higher than
the Jungfrau, but as we sit we see that it is hun-
dreds of feet beneath us. The Jungfrau is one of
the northernmost range of the Alps, and the view
northward is therefore all green and purple, includ-
ing forest, city, lake, and fading away afar off into
Baden and Bavaria. The Jungfrau range looks
northward over Germany, as the Monte Rosa range
looks southward over Italy. Close to you are the
giants of the Oberland, the Schreckhorn, the Eiger,
the Monch, the Finsteraarhorn. Splendour of God,
what a name that is ! " The Dark Eagle Peak,"—
was ever mountain yet so grandly named ? The
Wetterhorn, the Bliimlisalp, and all the peaks of
that great pointed billowy sea, are there to right
and left. Italy is shut out from the view by the great
Monte Rosa range, but that is plainly visible beyond
the long Aletsch glacier. There is the Matterhorn,
there the Weisshorn, and that is the Mischabel
Dom. Altels, too, is seen, and the Aletschhorn is
very near. To the north all is greenness; to theTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	41

south, to east, and to west, all is snow and rock
and mountain : on the one hand the world of sunny-
greenery, on the other the Alpine wintry world of
ice and snow and peak. We had a superb day, and
a view yet more superb. As one cannot linger long
on the topmost pinnacles of "thoughts almost
beyond the reaches of our souls," so one cannot
remain very long on the loftiest mountain-peaks:
one is soon driven downward to the world in which
our life of every day is possible. A long hour gone,
Christian stood up to his full height, and after a
loud parting Jodel, gave the word for the descent.
The standing up on the summit's ridge was nervous
work.

I have sometimes regretted that the sea is not
visible from the great Alpine peaks. It seemed to
me, as an Englishman, the one thing wanting to
make the prospect perfect. Perhaps, however,
" great nature is more wise than Iand the ocean
would introduce an element of unrest which would
disturb the profound and awful stillness of the
deathly world of perpetual snow and of thick-
!ribbed ice.

The descent of the last slope of the Jungfrau is
clearly worse than its ascent. You must look down.
Beneath you is the arete, thin, long, and narrow, in
which two precipices cease in a bevelled edge.
One moves while two hold fast with foot and ice-42 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

axe. Each footstep demands the very greatest
care. " That's all right! glad we're well down
that," exclaims Christian, in a tone of relief, as we
reach the arete. We find the fresh snow softer and
rather deep on the bad slopes. We are wading
about mid-leg through it, while the sun is burning
fiercely on the glaring and glittering snow. Spec-
tacles are indispensable, and you know well how
your face is being scorched and riven. On the
half-way rocks we rest and consume the remainder
of our provisions, which on the ascent had been
left there. Lying in lazy joy basking upon the
hot rocks, I had around me a perfect bit of ice
world, with slopes and basins of dazzling snow, the
mountain walls on both sides, and the broad glacier
below. Returning over the glacier was weary work.
You rolled along over soft and slippery snow, and
it seemed a very long way in the hot afternoon
from the Kranzberg to the hut on the Faulberg.

At the Faulberg we discussed the question of
stopping there that night and starting for another
excursion next morning, but the guides were certain
that the next day would be bad, and eventually we
decided to return to the ^Eggischhorn Hotel. After
a long rest at the Faulberg, we left it about 4 p.m.,
and wound down the wide, greyish-white, much-
crevassed and deeply-chasmed glacier to the
Marjelen See—that lone Arctic lake in the middleTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	43

qf Europe. The waters in the lake have subsided,
leaving a path in the middle, over which we pass,
as through a Red Sea, dry-shod. The steep climb
upwards on the other side of the melancholy lake
was very tiring and tiresome. As the light faded,
grey rocks and dark lightning-smitten pines
assumed weird and fantastic forms, half-human,
sometimes, in a grotesque and demoniac sense, like
Gustave Dor6's suggestions of an inanimate object
blending into an unearthly apparition of infra-
human humanity. "Will the hotel never come?"
I asked the guides, and really it seems as if that
hostelry had been removed by enchantment.
Darker and darker grows the gloom of night, and
more and more weary to the tired mountaineer
becomes the never-ending, winding track. "Noch
eine gute Stunde," says the downright Fischer,
when appealed to for a charitable prophecy of
nearness, and the cruelly accurate man is right.
At length we come upon the heights above the
hotel—and there it is, an emblem of all that is
comfortable and much desired. Our voices awake
the deep bay of the great hound, who knows
Fischer well, and the two guides begin that shrill
wild Jodel which announces the traveller's return.

One more last zigzag winding path, and we
stand in the little open space before the door.
Friendly Mr. Wellig heads a shout of welcome, and44 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

we stalk clattering into the stone passage, amid
a crowd of guests who want to see men returning
from the Jungfrau.

It is about 9 p.m., and Mr. Wellig hurries out to
order a good dinner-supper for me. Ladies want
prettily to know "what the Jungfrau is like?"
Young fellows, with an eye to a possible attempt,
cross-examine you about difficulties and time occu-
pied, and your dinner is neither lonely nor without
conversation.

I go out afterwards to share a bottle (say two
bottles) of the wine they love, the wine of the
foaming snow, with Christian and with Fischer.
Wellig joins us, and all the young and rising
Alpinehood of the hotel looks on with deferential
interest at the two great guides, as they narrate
experiences and talk of the climb of the day.
Meanwhile the weather outside becomes threaten-
ing; no moon is visible behind the lowering clouds.
To-morrow will be bad, they all agree; but what
matters that? To-day has been fine, and to-day
we have done the Jungfrau.

Now, with imagined wing, and with motion of no
less celerity than that of thought, our scene changes
from the ^Eggischhorn Hotel to the Riffelberg
Hotel; both high and lonely mountain inns. In
our flight we pass over the Rhone valley and
sternly familiar Zermatt, in which we have foundTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	45

the usual hearty welcome from Mr. and Madame
Seiler.

The Monte Rosa peak is considered, the
weather being what it is, the most attainable of the
high mountains. The Matterhorn and Weisshorn
are too thickly muffled with fatal snow, and we
wait at the Riffelberg for a fine day for Monte
Rosa. I have engaged, at Zermatt, Peter Knubel
as assistant-guide. Peter has almost a monopoly
now of the Matterhorn, and is only waiting for fine
weather to fasten over the dangerous part of the
north side certain chains which he has already
transported to the cabane. Knubel is a first-rate
man, quiet, modest, cheerful, and thoroughly trust-
worthy. He it was who prevented a fatal accident
on the Lyskamm. Two travellers were crossing
the Lyskamm, with two guides, of whom Peter was
the chief. When on the arete one traveller
slipped—slipped in a way which would have been
fatal to all, had not Peter, who was last on the
rope, thrown himself backward over to the other
side of the arete, and succeeded in holding the
three who were sliding to destruction. Peter
Knubel is, compared with mighty Christian, not a
tall man. He has something of the look 01 a sailor,
and is good-humoured and polite. He gets on
very well with Lauener, and I feel highly satisfied
at the prospect of doing Monte Rosa with two such46 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

guides. Meanwhile the weather continues uncer-
tain, and snow falls in the mountains every night.
The Riffelberg Hotel is, however, a most pleasant
sojourn, and I find there one of the great early-
climbers—one of those men who, compared to us of
a later generation, are what Columbus is compared
with a Cunard captain. One of the party in the
slip on the Lyskamm is also staying at the
Riffelberg, which is full of the usual Alpine guests
of various nationalities.

At last the Monte Rosa morning comes. Take
a picture of the awakening for a mountain climb.
It is the solitary hotel at the Riffelberg, a bleak
but massive edifice, half Hospice, half Alpine
hostelry. I have gone to bed, after looking out of
doors at the last moment, and anxiously consulting
the guides about the weather, at, say, 9.30 to 10
o'clock. Knowing that one can but have a few
hours' rest, it is of course impossible to sleep for
some time. When you go to bed at ten, expect-
ing to be called at one, the mind is so eagerly bent
upon sleeping, that sleep is impossible. After
getting up once to look out of window, and seeing
the dark stillness of a starlight night brooding over
all the wide range of the huge and snowy hills, I
return to bed, and at last fall asleep. When one
does get sleep under such circumstances, the
quality of it is intense. At the very moment atTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.

47

which, as it seems, one has just succeeded in sliding
down the slope of sleep, there comes the rude
awakening. A heavy hand shakes your shoulder,
a noise is heard, and as you emerge slowly and
unwillingly from the realm of dreams, you blink at
a dull red light. The light is a coarse, flaring
candle, from which a deep, hushed voice seems to
proceed. More awake, you become cognizant of
the large and dusky figure of the giant guide, as
the light falls Rembrandt-wise upon the dark,
weather-beaten face and lined features of the awful
form. You become aware that he is stating most
positively, in a hoarse, fierce whisper, that it is one
o'clock, and that you must get up at once. He
draws attention to the boots which he has brought
with him, having greased them properly, and he
indicates your waiting garments with a ferocious
gesture. The aspect of his face is not cruel, but
very determined. He snuffs the candle and waits,
looking at you with cold resolve. You parley with
hirn, animated by some feeble hope that he may
relax his vigilance, and that you will gain a little
more bed. Your mind is crossed by a wild desire
to get him out of the room by duplicity; and
then, after locking the door, to return to bed, to
defy him and have your sleep out. A practical
psychologist, he knows the current of your un-
holy thought, and while remarking coolly that he48 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

thinks the weather will do, he drags the clothes
off you slowly from head to foot. This demoniac
piece of tyranny settles the question decisively. You
cannot help jumping briskly out of bed, and he
rewards himself for his grimly brutal treatment by
relaxing into a satisfied, slow smile. Seeing you
thus far thoroughly awakened, he consents to
withdraw, leaving you the candle, and stating, as
his tall six feet are framed in the doorway, that
breakfast will be ready in ten minutes. Shivering
and sulky, you proceed to get up. How dark it
is! The candle seems a blur of inflamed glare in
the dim, chi^y room.

The bedrooms at the Riffelberg are most depress-
ing when seen under such aspects. They resemble
a prison-cell with a cross of ship's cabin. The
windows are deeply set and small, with thickest
sashes ; the walls are bare and bleakly stony; the
bed is a mere square box of simple deal wood.
Cheered by these inspiriting surroundings, you
proceed with your toilette. How cold the water
is!—not clearly cold, like glacier-water, but damply
cold with the essence of darkness and of wet
chilliness felt by a flaring candle at one in the
morning. You soon dress; you look out sleepily
for your ice-spectacles and gloves; you put on
your hat; you grasp the faithful ice-axe, and issue
.forth. You carry your heavy boots in your hand,Two Sprigs of Edelweiss.	49

intending to put them on downstairs, in order to
avoid disturbing the happy sleepers in the hotel;
though a healthy spirit of vengeance would ob-
viously dictate that you should arouse the sleepers
from slumbers which you cannot share. The stairs
and passages are of dark-grey stone, as are the
prison-like walls. You have not been able to
button on your gaiters, and so, carrying the candle,
your boots, your plaid, your ice-axe, and your
gaiters in your hands, you roll in a half-awake
manner down the cold staircase and enter the salle
a manger.

The long table of the host has not yet been
arranged for the day. It suggests last night—
this night, by Jove!—and reminiscences of the last
dinner consumed coldly furnish forth your cheerless
breakfast, while the long room is dimly illuminated
by one other candle beside the one that you con-
tribute ; while the windows frame squares of dulb
blackness, in which a few sparse stars are faintly
shining. A waiter is there, leaning lazily against
the wall, and he looks, as you feel resentfully,
sleepier than even you do. You yawn, and your
eyes feel as if they were drawn and kept open by
some annoying feat of magic. You can't eat at
first; you begin with a drink of hot coffee, and
then slowly chew some very stale bread and some
curiously cold meat. One nasty little bit of jelly

E50 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

quivers impishly on the dish, and you cast him
aside with indignation. The honey seems sticky
and coagulated. You loathe the breakfast, and
yet eat, because you think you must. You have a
private and torturous conviction that you are an
infernal fool, and that a wise man would be in bed
sleeping blissfully, so as to arise blithely to a cheer-
ful and comfortable breakfast. Thinking and feel-
ing thus discontentedly, and glaring angrily at the
angry candle, which burns as if it too would
prefer being asleep, your two guides enter, and
you wake up sufficiently to give them the time of
day not too gruffly. Your boots become attached
to you, and Christian buttons on your gaiters as
you sit, while Peter is busy packing the loathsome-
looking provisions for your excursion. All is
ready: tip the waiter (who will be in bed, the
beast, before you are well out of the house), light
your pipe, grasp your ice-axe, and stride out into
the great void of darkness and of night.

Crossing the threshold, we mechanically fall into
line. Christian goes first, I follow, and Peter
Knubel follows me. So much snow has lately
fallen that the Matterhorn is very white, and its
huge form is sharply defined against the dark sky,
while one large star stands like a ball of light rest-
ing upon the rearing crest. We know that a gen-
tleman, accompanied by Christian Aimer, is mindedTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	51

to try the Matterhorn to-day from the north side,
and the guides agree that with so much snow on
the mountain he cannot succeed. We wind along
the narrow path over grass slopes, until, under
the shadow of the purply black Riffelhorn, we turn
to the left. The wind, which for many previous
days had been from the north, is found to have
shifted to the south, and the morning is warm and
languid. Now and then a faint breath of air is
felt upon your face, but it is generally wind-still and
very calm. The night is softly dark. The stars do
not shine brightly, and there is no moon. We
have now got upon a thin thread of way running
deviously along the side of the steep cliffs which
descend to the Gorner glacier. This very narrow
way is sometimes blocked by rocks, and in the
dense darkness is sometimes difficult to find. At
length we descend sharply over great lumps of
rock and stone on to the glacier itself. Arrived
there, we find it too dark to venture to cross the
crevasse-seamed glacier, and we sit down on great
stones to wait for a little more light. Opposite to
us on the other side of the wide glacier is the long
range of mountains seen from the Gorner Grat,
extending from the Breithorn to Monte Rosa. The
peaks of the range seem very huge, and are oJ
a ghostly whitish-grey hue. Very dark and very
warm ; and I hear the guides talking together de-
E 252 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

spondently about the probably bad condition of the
snow that we shall have to encounter upon Monte
Rosa. Presently a little light comes, and we start
across the glacier. It is still so dark that it is
difficult to avoid humps and holes, but at last we
reach the other side, and by that time there is a
faint wan light of morning. The stars have faded
out, but there is no glimpse or promise of sun.
The morning is still and dull, but some light
clouds are seen to be travelling rapidly above the
peak of Monte Rosa, and the guides say, " There
is wind enough up there."

We reach, over perpetual rockwork, the point
known as Auf der Platte, and there halt to break-
fast. Auf der Platte consists of a flat Stonehenge
of huge rock boulders. There is a large pool of
water in one hollow, and glacier streams wind and
flow murmuring down hill between the crevices of
rock. Below us lies the glacier we have crossed ;
around us are all the noble hills of the Zermatt
range, and above us soar the peaks of Monte
Rosa itself. Ah, who would not have got up at
any hour to be here now ? One feels how wicked
were all those rebellious feelings against rising in
the dark at one in the morning. In one, and around,
is the full life of full day and of high action.

We leave Auf der Platte, and get upon the
s>now of the long slopes that lead upwards. WeTwo Sp rigs of Edelweiss.	53

find the snow bad. When first you tread upon it,
it seems to support the foot for a second, but just
as your weight rests upon the surface, that cracks
in, and lets your foot through into a deep jagged
hole of rotten snow.

It is very hard work. We make a brief halt on
the Obige Platte, and, while resting there, out
comes the summer sun ! Where we are the wind
is south ; but the thin white clouds driving along
so fast high up across the blue sky are coming
from the east and north, and Knubel remarks that
it won't be so very warm on the top. The snow
gets worse and worse, softer and deeper. The rays
of the sun, now burning as it does burn upon snow
mountain sides, added to the previous warmth of
the night, have rendered the snow very bad, and
unfortunately so much snow has fallen lately that
it is unusually deep. First Christian leads and
then Peter. We wallow in soft rotten snow above
our knees, and sometimes almost up to the waist.
It is terrible work, and even the guides are glad to
rest. Hour after hour of this work goes on until
we come to the last long steep slope leading to the
arete. This slope is found to be in a worse state
than anything that preceded it.

Once, as Christian, nearly up to the waist in snow,
pauses for a moment, he says, wit;h a portentous
head-shake, " A very little more of such snow as54 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

this, and the ascent would be impossible ! " The
guides seem tired, and I overhear a patois whisper
about having perhaps to turn back. Knubel talks
to Lauener about a possible avalanche, and they,
of their own accord, take another rest. On we go,
and the trudging becomes tremendous labour; until,
at last, Peter cries, " Courage ! one effort more,
and we are on the arete ! "

How the prospect of a goal picks you up ! The
effort is made, and we pause at the commencement
of the arete. Here we dine, lying down on some
rocks on the Italian side. By the way, I wish
heartily that some competent member of the
Alpine Club would direct his benevolent attention
to the subject of the food to be consumed by the
mountaineer on high excursions. At present the
food issued for that purpose by hotels seems to be
the most inedible and unenjoyable provender
that could be devised for such occasions. We
have cold mutton—tough, dry, stringy, tasteless;
we have coarse Emmenthaler cheese, and singu-
larly dry bread. Now the mouth is apt to get dry
after such a climb as we have just had, and the
food ought to be moist and palatable. With diffi-
culty and disgust we chew wearily the dry-as-dust
provisions we have, and I determine to serve
climbing humanity by bringing this momentous
subject forcibly before the Alpine authorities. WeTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	55

have a bottle of Valais red wine, and we reserve
one bottle of champagne for the peak. As we lie
on the rock dining, we look down a dizzy vertical
height, and watch the delicate silvery white of the
great Lyskamm as a filmy vapour of fine clouds
sweeps airily between us and it. One or two snow-
birds whirl with a creaking cry about the snow-
covered rock wall beneath us. But no time must
be lost; it is late, and we have the terrible arete of
Monte Rosa still before us. We leave our ice-axes
on the rocks, and start for the crowning labour of
the day.

We now began carefully to ascend the long, final
arete, Christian leading. The arete slopes steeply
upwards. It is a knife-edge of frozen snow, with
fearful depths on either side, and out of this edge
rise huge blocks and bulks of sharp or round or
saw-edged rocks, over which you have to climb,
descending from them again and again on to the
ridge of snow. We found a tolerably strong wind,
and we found also that the rocks were coated with
fresh snow, and covered with a varnish of thin ice.
On one hand a nearly vertical wall descends to the
Monte Rosa glacier, while on the other a snow
slope of perilous incline falls away deep, deep down
to the Gornerhorn glacier. This ridge of hard
snow between the rock masses is often literally
as sharp as a knife-edge. We move slowly, one at56 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

a time. We have discarded spectacles, and I find
it impossible to hold on with worsted gloves. I
take them off, and get, in consequence, two fingers
frost-bitten; but still without gloves I can hold on
the ice-covered rocks, and with gloves I cannot
I find it best to look only from one step to the
next. I totally disregard the view. Scarcely a
word is spoken, as it is a place which tests steadi-
ness and endurance to the very utmost; and yet
in such a climb consists the most joyous excite-
ment of the Alps. After rather more than two
hours of this real climbing, we reach the high rock
—smooth, slippery, and ice shining—of the final
cheminee. Christian swarms up it vigorously, and
we follow successfully. Suddenly, while climbing
and struggling, looking only to my footsteps,
Christian seizes my hand and cries, " Herr, you are
on the Allerhochsten Spitze of Monte Rosa!"
And so we have really done it, and are actually on
the very top of the second mountain in Europe.
We are about 15,300 feet high. The top of Monte
Rosa is not very large. It is of rock (mica schist,
says geology), and we find there a little flag, once
red, which bore on its ground the white federal
cross of Switzerland. The guides jodel and whoop
in their poignant, strident voices: Peter Knubel,
with a cheery smile, produces a bottle with a silver
neck. We sit down, and the champagne foamsTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	57

into the cup of horn. How good it is! Who ever
really tasted champagne except on the far moun-
tain top ? One bottle, as Christian points out, is
little for three persons; but then, as he adds, you
cannot carry much up here. After a glass apiece
we eke out the remainder with snow; and then I
light my pipe—the same pipe that I smoked on
the Jungfrau—and we rest to enjoy the view.
What a feeling of triumph and of ecstasy one has at
such a moment! How the mind becomes enlarged
by the genius of the place ! By the way, this
peak is cold, and the wind seems to be getting up.
Sometimes the sun shines bright and clear, and the
view is momentarily perfect; then, flying fast be-
fore a driving wind, thinnest clouds rush for a
moment between us and the Italian side. We get
our view by snatches. As you gaze, a filmy wrack
wreathes round and upwards. That speeds swiftly
by, and brightness returns. What a view it is
from Monte Rosa ! The guides seem particularly
bent uppn making me see Milan; but I cannot really
discern more than a faint purple smear. Tyrol is
misty, and the Jura dim. Close around are the
other lower peaks of Monte Rosa—the Nord End,
the Signal-Kuppe, the Zumstein Spitze, the Parrot
Spitze. The Lyskamm is a noble object to the
south. The edged outline of snow mountains,
when light is behind them, is translucent as are58 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

the edges of alabaster when a lamp shines through
it. The top of the Twins is quite translucent at
this moment. The eye plunges in a direct line of
10,000 feet downwards to the Val d'Anzasca, lying
at out feet. Italy stretches in sun-hazy splendour
far below. The vastness of the panorama of
mountains is almost oppressive. All the Oberland
is visible to the north in its giant range. " There's
ourfriendthejungfrau!" exclaims Christian. There
is Mont Blanc—there the Matterhorn, the Weiss-
horn, the Dent Blanche. All wide and white, with
purest snow contrasted with the dark of rocks, is
the great view. Snow and ice on glacier, on moun-
tain, on slope and peak. All round is glory. No-
thing is visible that is not grand. Above, the
deep blue heavens are overswept in parts with
frayed streaks of white, wind-driven cloud. And
we are so high up! The view has not so much
green in it as has the Jungfrau view. Italy sug-
gests colour, but, otherwise, near and far surround-
ings are white with the terrible beauty of the deso-
lately sublime. And all is still—so still!

A simoom of impalpable fine cloud dust sweeps
by to the south, throwing a thin silver veil over the
glorious white bulk of the Lyskamm. It is about
one o'clock. All round, to north and south, near
and far, below and around, to east and west,
magnificent in mass, in form, in colour, are theTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	59

glories of the peak ocean and the glacier valley of
the great and silent Alpine ice-world. To see such
a sight for the first time is ecstasy : when you see
it oftener, rapture is softened into the deeper fulness
of mellow knowledge. Some call such landscapes
sterile; but such persons fail to see that the wild
and lofty snow-world is fertile with the sublimity of
the noble loveliness of some of the highest works of
God. And now the wind upon our peak is rising
fast; the cold begins to pierce, the hour is late, and
the way back is long. Christian, always the herald
of the inexorable, insists upon instant departure,
and is strongly seconded by Peter. One lingering,
parting glance, and we start. The descent of the
long arete is almost worse than the ascent, and the
wind was strong; but without one false step we
reached the rocks beneath, and rejoined our ice-
axes. The descent of the long steep snow-slopes was
nearly as laborious as the upward climb had been.
The afternoon sun was shining hotly, and the
snow was distressingly soft and deep. No glissade
was even possible; we tried a plaid glissade, but only
drove up before us waves and heaps of hissing snow.

We recrossed the wide glacier, down which a
thousand runlets of glacier water rushed and gurgled,
and we reached the other side just as the sadness
of twilight fell and deepened. Night soon came,
warm, still, and with a deep velvety darkness, across6o Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

which the lightning flashed. We saw a light in the
cabane of the north side of the Matterhorn : we knew
who was there, and my guides prophesied again,
and were right, that the party would be beaten
back the next day. The darksome way along the
cliffs seemed very long; the Riffelhorn again
showed duskily huge, as we wound round its base,
until at length we saw from afar off the solitary
hotel, with all its small deep windows alive with
cheery light. Approaching it, Christian and Peter
begin to jodel; and we hear dogs barking, and see
figures flitting about before the door. Coming out
of the dense darkness of the night into the warm
light streaming from the hospitable doorway, we
find ourselves in the centre of a group of friends
and hotel guests, and have to answer a thousand
questions about our long, laborious climb. It is
past nine o'clock, and we have been working since
I a.m. " I thought the snow would have been too
heavy for you/' says a veteran of the Alpine Club ;
" but come in, old fellow, and have some dinner—
I've ordered some to be kept ready. 1 knew you
couldn't get back until very late. The snow must
have been awful up there! " The guides state that
it was one of the most laborious ascents they had
ever made. One kindly lady had grown alarmed at
the long time we were out. Hearing of the bad
state of the snow, and seeing the lightning flash,Two Sprigs of Edelweiss.

61

she had become nervously afraid that we had been
lost; and she told me how the sound of our far-off
Jodels had cheered her. After a change, and after
ordering champagne for my guides, I come down
to dinner. It is the same room which looked so
blank and cheerless in the morning, but which now
seems an ideal of light and warmth and comfort.
Talking cheerily, I dine with effusion, and we light
the cigars of mellow rapture. Looking out before
we turn in, we find the weather bad. The lightning
has ceased, there is a chilly wind, the mists are
covering the lonely hills, and out of mist comes
snow upon the peaks. "No' man will do anything
to-morrow upon the high peaks," observes Peter
sententiously; and we go in with a sense of comfort.
The house always seems more valuable when the
night outside is bad. And so I have done Monte
Rosa !—a thing long dreamed of, long desired, and
I may sleep in peace. No dusky apparition to-
morrow morning at I a.m. No,—a sound, sweet,
well-earned sleep, which shall last till seven, and
then give you back, refreshed and well, to another
day of Alpine life and joy.

I had two fingers frost-bitten—a consequence
of clinging to ice-covered rocks on Monte Rosa.
Going down to Zermatt, we found the Matterhorn
party, which had been driven back by weather;
and we sat down at Zermatt, waiting in the hope of62 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

better weather, in order ourselves to attack the north
side of the Matterhorn. There was, however, so
much snow on the north side that foot and hand hold
upon the rocks would have been impracticable ; and
Christian and Knubel pronounced an attempt hope-
less. The weather continued bad, and I lost
patience. We therefore crossed the Theodule in
very disagreeable weather, and went to Courmayeur,
in order to reach Chamounix by the Col du Geant.
On the Col I lost my ice-axe (the gift of one of
the best fellows on earth), which will never again
be seen by man until the crevasses shall give up
their dead. We also started a flock of ptarmigan,
and saw two chamois. When on the Tschingel a
small herd of chamois crossed our path within easy
range ; but we had, of course, no rifle with us.
The peculiarity of this singular little animal seems
to be that it can only exist where there is nothing to
eat. It is this curious fact which renders the pretty
creature so interesting to the natural philosopher.
Ah! talking of chamois, how sad that parting for
a whole year from the Alps, and turning back from
mountains to cities and to plains! You are in such
fine training when you leave off work that you
could do anything: and yet a sad day came at
Martigny, on which I bade farewell to Christian,
and hurried home to exchange the ice-axe for the
sword, and mountain-climbing for the HampshireTwo Sprigs of Edelweiss.	63

campaign. One does the work in summer, and
paints the picture of it in winter. Memory and
anticipation blend as I sit in London, by a sea-coal
fire, and sketch the " summer snows " to which I
owe so much and great delight.

And so farewell—a long farewell—farewell, for a
long year—to Switzerland. The first visit to the
Alps has the intoxication of bridal joys ; later
visits, when familiarity has deepened love, have the
profounder delight of happy marriage. Wonder
may be less, but the sense of glory, the enjoyment
of intimacy, if calmer, are yet greater joys. Come,
swallow, come ! and bring next summer and its
Alpine trip. I await with impatience and anticipate
with longing. Till that summer hour comes,
farewell, O Switzerland! thou high and pure
Romola of nations; farewell—and au revoir !EISLEBEN.

PART I.

THE ALPS IN GLADNESS.

" Mont Blanc is the Monarch of Mountains,

They crown'd him long ago
On a throne of rocks, in a robe of clouds,

With a diadem of snow."—Byron.

"Far, far above, piercing the infinite sky,

Mont Blanc appears—still, snowy, and serene—

Its subject mountains their unearthly forms

Pile round it, ice and rock.
# # # # * # #

Thou hast a voice, great mountain,
*	*	*	* not understood

By all, but which the wise, and great, and good,

Interpret, or make felt, or deeply feel."—Shelley.

NOTHER year has brought its August, and
once more we start for our holiday in the
playground of Europe. Again we are
bound for Switzerland, and our fancy revels in
images of snow-peaks standing out in clearest
loveliness against the blue and sunny sky.

Each year, when about to start, one regards withThe Alps in Gladness.

65

stronger repugnance the prospect of the long, dreary-
foreign railway journey between London and the
Alps. To attain to your joy you must make a
passage of sorrow. The many dreary hours of
slow sitting in overcrowded continental railway
carriages are anticipated with a shudder. True,
you are rewarded when the journeying is over ; but
the journey itself is a horror. If you travel by way
of Basel, you come to your first great joy at that
point near Berne, from which you see the gigantic
white group of Oberland giants crowding together
and soaring to the sun. If you travel to Geneva or
Lausanne, rapture commences as you catch your
first glimpse of azure lake and of the white bulk of
far Mont Blanc.

In the year 1872 we selected the route by
Lausanne, and the depression of the dreary trajet
fell off us as we reached the Hotel Gibbon.

What weather in the Alps ?—that is the first
question. Look at the lake : "shower and storm
and blast" swell and gloom its wide surface and its
lowering cloud canopy. A wide streak of blanched
water contrasts with a dark and stormy wave
region which hurries on, with mist crowding behind
it, and with dusky clouds driving above it, to
trouble the calm breadth. The wind sighs, the
pines wave, the vines tremble, and then, over all,
the blinding rain spreads its chilly shroud.

F66 AIpine Ascents and Adventures.

The opposite shore is washed out of sight. No
suggestion of the existence of Mont Blanc.

Looking towards Bouveret, when the storm lifts,
we see through a rain-thick atmosphere the high
hills deeply misted in dim snow. Every five
minutes there is a fierce blast of cold rain. The
dark leaves shake down spray of waters as the
gusty wind tumbles and troubles the sodden trees.
There is no glimpse, no prospect of sun. Nothing
can be more depressing or more hopeless.

We ask if this weather has been going on for
any time ?

" Well, yes, for some time; but it was fine in
June." We dare not inquire what the chances of
a change for the better are : we ourselves know too
well. Sanguine Marks, spoiled child of fortune,
observes that he has never, in the worst years he
has known, left Switzerland without having done
some work, and that we shall manage to do some-
thing yet this year. He has, by the way, prepared
a magnificent and extensive programme of pro-
jected ascents—a programme which could only be
carried out in uninterrupted fine weather, and
which, alas ! never was or could be carried out in
its integrity in 1872.

That year I had the good fortune to be again
associated with two first-rate fellows and first-class
mountaineers—Marks and Lyvetete. The latter is,The A Ips in Gladness	67

certainly, the first mountaineer of his time, and
Marks is also excellent. Lyvetete was first con-
verted to the true faith by seeing, some sixteen
years ago, Albert Smith's show of Mont Blanc.
That exhibition turned the steps of the born moun-
taineer to those mountains on which, since, he has
so often planted the foot of a conqueror.

As the playfulness of Alpine intimacy deepened
between us, the "little language" began to lisp, and
we all acquired sportive noms des Alpes; such names
being, according to original human custom, con-
ferred as an expression of characteristics. Lyvetete,
who to supremacy in climbing adds the greatest
consideration for others, and the truest modesty,
was christened the " Great and Clement Prince,"
and he soon learned to answer to his name. Marks,
whose figure excels in grandeur most mountains, and
who is full of the high spirits natural to such a
magnificent physique, was termed—in deference,
partly, to his romantic but pronounced political
proclivities—the "Great Liberal Party;"—and,
inspired by a title so soothing and appropriate, he
began to develope a quite transcendent talent
for making " cup." I do not mean merely making
cup on the flat; no, other men, at Wimbledon and
elsewhere, can do that. I mean making cup on
the mountain: carrying with you a leathern com-
pressible " boat," lemon, sugar, cura<2oa, and then,
F 268 A Ipine A scents and A dventure.a .

when halting by water in the desert of rock or
glacier, making cup with red wine and snow ; cup
which nowhere else would taste so well or could be
so much appreciated. I have before, in a previous
paper, unburdened my mind upon the necessity of
moist and eatable provender for the mountaineer.
I had made Marks a convert to my views ; and
from this simple circumstance has originated one of
the great problems of modern history.

Long will the historian be perplexed by the
problem (which is I believe quite insoluble) whether
chance or wit led Marks to the great discovery of
" chicken jam." Certain at least it is that, at
Grindelwald, he bounded one day from out the
interior recesses of the Adler and produced a pot
of the composition which will render his name
immortal. He had evolved " chicken jam ! "—a
form of sustenance which answers the highest
requirements of the mountaineer. It is sold in pots,
and looks like shaving paste ; but it is soft, moist,
succulent, and can be eaten with pleasure and with
profit, either spread on bread or consumed in its
own naked excellency.

The "Great Liberal Party" was of an invin-
cible cheerfulness, and of a richly playful humour.
It can, when provoked, repeat a great gobbet of
Cicero; but we take care not to provoke him. He
can also do the trial scene in ' Pickwick' veryThe Alps in Gladness.

69

naturally,—"Four distinct cats, sir, I pledge you
my honour,"—and is, generally, a very desirable
and delightful comrade.

My name, inspired by an effort to symbolize my
tender and retiring nature, was the " Gentle Little
Fawn." All these names became shortened to
initials—as the G. C. P., the G. L. F., the G. L. P. ;
and we found these abbreviations of the greatest
use and comfort. Both Marks and Lyvetete were
men so sweet and sure of nature that none of the
little worries of travelling ever ruffled their tempers.
We co-operated in joy, and we severed in sorrow.
Their Gentle Little Fawn rejoices in this opportunity
of recording his humble sense of their many merits
and delightful companionship.

There are, it may be here remarked, two leading
types of Alpine mountaineer; types which we will
consider for a moment as represented respectively
by Hawley Scrowger and by Norman Franklin.

Let us begin with Scrowger. He is a muscular
phenomenon, and a mental dwarf. His main object
is, to quote his own slang (slang applied to God's
Alps!) to "bag a peak;" and his scarcely secondary
aim is to complete his ascent and descent in the
fewest possible number of hours. He is silent when
not surly. He has no ideas. The mountains are
not connected in his mind with wonder, awe, delight.
His ascents are not adulterated by wit, geniality,70 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

poetry. He spares speech to save wind. His
climbing is a mere match against time. He does
not in the least care for a view; it is indifferent to
him whether the day be beautiful or dull, so long as
he can attain to a summit. He prefers, however,
the snow in good condition in order that he may
work fast, but he does not object to mist which blots
out all view and any beauty. He is not boastful,
except through an affected modesty which pre-
tends that he never found difficulty. He is asked,
for instance, how he found the Schauderhorn ?
" Schauderhorn ?" he replies, " oh ! a nice walk."
"Did you have a fine view?" "View, no; didn't
get any view, and didn't want any ; but I'll tell you
what we did, we did the Schauderhorn half an
hour under Tupgill's time." Scrowger is a climbing
machine, which, when duly wound up, will dis-
charge an excellent piece of mechanical perform-
ance.

There are dolls which contain machinery in
their insides ; machinery which, when set going by
the application of a key behind, will impel the
doll to perform certain mechanical functions; and
Hawley Scrowger climbs, when wound up, in a like
mechanical fashion. He is disliked by guides, and
is not liked by comrades—unless, indeed, Scrowger I.
is accompanied by Scrowger II., in which case there
is sympathy of a certain rude sort. Scrowger'sThe Alps in Gladness.

71

conversation is, naturally enough, limited by the
limits of Scrowger s ideas. He is as incapable of
inspiration as is an air-cushion with a large slit in
it. He is curt and ungenial with his guides, whom
he regards as necessary and overpaid evils. He
tends to oppose them, and to scorn their experienced
sagacity ; he sneers at the use of the rope, and, until
taught by one or two mishaps, he probably objects
to put it on. He thinks himself quite equal to a
guide, and is always ready to sneer at them and to
thwart them. Hence one of the great charms of
Alpine work, the beautiful relation between the true
mountaineer and those noble fellows, the high-class
Swiss guides, is destroyed in Scrowger's case.
"The Hollenhorn," says Scrowger, "is an impostor.
We found him out." " But did you not find the rock
work difficult ?" "Difficult ? oh, no ! not difficult;
rather good work in one or two places. I never
found any mountain difficult." And yet, if you
happen to climb with Scrowger, you find that he is
in difficulties in difficult places, as other men are.
You notice that he is as much dependent upon the
help of guides as other mountaineers are ; and you
feel the incongruity between his work upon the hills
and his self-laudatory self-depreciation on the flat.
Scrowger is only benefited in his physical organiza-
tion by the noble Alps.

Norman Franklin, on the other hand, is a very72 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

different man. It is pleasant to turn from a con-
templation of Scrowger, and to let the mind admit
theimage of Franklin. Full of beautiful enthusiasms,
of vivid and hearty delight, of the "blessedness of
perfect manhood, causing mind and soul and body
to work together with a harmony and strength un-
qualified by infirmity or ennui," it seems to you as if
he were the man that God had made for the Alps
while He had made the glorious hills for him.
Towards his comrades he evolves wit, poetry, good
temper, cheerful exhilaration.

The true mountaineer should unite, by the con-
necting link of poetry, the geologist beneath his
feet with the astronomer above his head. This,
Norman Franklin does. He enjoys worthily the
manly exercise of climbing, and the divine scenery
in which he works. Beloved by his guides, in
sympathy v/ith suitable comrades, the ideal moun-
taineer is a noble product of a lofty and
ennobling pursuit. He climbs, not as a machine,
but as a man. He probably works well and
pluckily; but, as he works for noble enjoyment, he
does not care exclusively for making an ascent in
a notably short time. Wherever there is wonder
or glory to be seen, he will stop to enjoy. He
will not start on an expedition when there is no
chance of a view. He does not care to have merely
" done" a mountain; to have added one moreThe Alps in Gladness.

73

name to a list. The difference between Hawley
Scrowger and Norman Franklin is the difference
that exists between a prize-fighter and a Sidney.

To return, however, to our campaign of 1872.

Ceaseless rain washed us from Lausanne to
Brieg. A comparatively fine day took us up to the
well-known old Jungfrau Hotel on the ^Eggisch-
horn; which, alas! is no longer kept by Wellig. As
it was fine, we pushed on the same night to the
Faulberg hut, and passed once more over the great
Aletsch glacier. Once more—for all of us had
rested there before—once more we looked out from
that high rock perch upon the crimson day dying
out upon the white ice-waste, and upon the quiet
surrounding snow hills. Once more we cooked the
wild mountain supper, with the dark figures of
great guides moving to and fro around the rough
wood fire. Once more we smoked together the
mountaineer's sacred evening pipe; and once again
we lay down to rest—not, in all cases, to sleep—
upon the wooden boards of the hard and heartless
Faulberg.

Christian Lauener was to join me at Grindelwald;
and Melchior Anderegg, the first and greatest of
his noble fraternity, was now our guide in chief.
At 3.30 a.m. we were fairly off, and were tramp-
ing in the well-remembered roped line along the
glacier. The stars still lingered. The morning74 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

was fair, but dull and windstill, and we hoped for
a fine day. It was our first mountain expedition
of the year. Oh ! what a joy it is to feel, for the
first time in the year, the glacier beneath your
foot, the rope round your waist, and the ice-axe in
your hand! We looked towards the noble Jung-
frau, which we had all ascended ; and, with our
talk a mixture of reminiscence and anticipation,
we turned off to the right towards our goal—the
Monch Joch. For a time all went well. We
mounted the steep snow slopes, and wound our
troublous way successfully through the difficult
seracs. Suddenly all was changed. A thick mist
settled slowly down. We could not see the length
of the rope before us. It was very cold. Through
the darkness came Melchior's warning voice, as he
instructed his unseen rear-guard where and how to
cross some sharp ice-ridge across a yawning chasm.
Then, though the mist remained, came snow and
hail and wind. It was about 8 o'clock. The cold
became intense; and, with collars turned up, and
handkerchiefs tied round the hat, and under the
chin, we toiled on. When you reach the Col, there
is but one point at which you can hit it, in order to
commence the descent. If you miss that you get
upon a cornice and into danger. We could not see ;
we could scarcely hear; and we could tell that
Melchior was not certain that he could hit the Col.The A Ips in Gladness.

75

Presently, he called a halt, and we knew that he
Relieved he was on the top. Then came a con-
sultation between guides and travellers. Melchior
said he dared not go forward and could not go
back. " If the mist would only lift for an instant
I could see!" anxiously exclaimed our guide.
But it did not lift, and there we were, at that great
altitude, nearly frozen to death. We could tramp
up and down a little ridge of snow, and were
obliged to move about in order to keep the life in
us. The brandy flasks were produced. The
weather got worse and worse ; the cold became
really terrible ; and, when two such hours had passed
away on this summit, it seemed to me to be a mat-
ter of indifference whether we could or could not
get up or down. I thought of ballads about chil-
dren lost and perishing in the snow ; but we talked
cheerfully together, and trusted to Melchior, who
kept his eyes fixed upon the spot at which he
thought the Col must be, and looked out nervously
for any momentary lifting of the mist.

It came at last! For one brief instant the dim
dun darkness shrivelled up, and Melchior saw the
Col! With a wild cry, he shouted to us to follow
him, and rushed, at a tremendous pace, up and over
a sharp ridge of snow. He plunged rapidly down
the steep snow slopes on the other side, and we all
followed on the rope. We were rushing downward76 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

Into darkness over steepness of fresh snow, winding
round great holes, and crossing many troublesome
chasms. The light became better. We could see,
gigantic in the mystery of mist, the dark forms of
mighty Oberland mountains, their chocolate-
coloured slopes streaked with white, fresh snow, like
foam streaming down the steeps of ocean waves.
They looked unnaturally gigantesque. The snow
and hail continued; the cold wind blew still; but
we were going, and going fast, and could see better.
Light filmy wreaths of impalpable fine mist swept
by us and over us at a prodigious pace ; and at last
we came to the rocks above the Monch Hiitte.

These rocks, always rather nasty, we found
covered with fresh hail and snow hard frozen.
They were decidedly difficult to descend, and occu-
pied us nearly an hour. The Monch Hiitte stood
open, and was full of ice and rain and snow; damp,
sloppy, semi-frozen, cheerless. Here we halted for
ten minutes, and Marks produced a flask of
Cura9oa, secreted about his person (with a view to
cup), which he nobly offered to general acceptance.
On again !—still downward, over snow slopes and
through seracs. The weather had now settled into
dark, heavy rain, and we were wetted through
and through. The grass slopes, when we reached
them, were very slippery; and as we leaped the
chasms in crossing the glacier, with all its streamsThe Alps in Gladness.

77

swollen to fury, the lightning flashed and the
thunder growled. About 5 o'clock we reached the
Beregg Chalet. The floods being out we could
not descend to Grindelwald, and so, wet through,
with but few provisions left, with cold within the
hut and storm without, we had perforce to stop for
the night at the Beregg.

At the Beregg we found a very agreeable young
lady, who, with her brother, was weatherbound in
the hut ; but we did not find dry clothes. One of
the party borrowed a short, thick, brown petticoat
of a peasant girl, and above the equator he wore a
rough blanket. We all dined together on the few
articles procurable, but we discarded evening dress
for dinner. The rain descended in a flood ; the path
was blocked by torrents, which brought down
showers of large stones, and Melchior declared that
it was impossible to move that night; so there we sat
in cheerful misery, thinking of the comfortable hotel,
of a good dinner, and a real bed. We, nevertheless,
enjoyed the evening, and wreathed laughter curled
in the damp air with the wreaths from joyous pipes.

We slept on the floor of the hut. We had little
comfort, but great merriment. The next morning
we succeeded in reaching Grindelwald, and put up
at the old Adler. Not one of us had taken
cold upon the Monch Joch. At Grindelwald Chris-
tian Lauener met me, and we then determined to78 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

try the Wetterhorn—the Peak of Storms ; but we
had to wait for days before we could attack the
mountain. The weather continued to be very bad ;
but we managed every day a stiff walk over low
passes : for instance, from Grindelwald to Lauter-
brunnen and over the Wengern Alp back again.
We did the Faulhorn and every little thing in the
neighbourhood.

At last, on August 14, there was better weather,
and we resolved, in spite of snow and avalanches,, to
try the Wetterhorn. At 2 p.m. we started from
Grindelwald, intending to sleep at the Gleckstein
hut. There was a Fohn wind, which is always
untrustworthy, but the sun was shining on the grass
slopes by which the ascent begins. The grass cutters
were at work as we strolled up the steep meadows,
and the walnut-trees made patches of shade on the
flowery green. The shining brown roofs of Chalets
and of Sennhiitten looked like tortoises lying strewn
about. Leaving the grass, we crossed the upper
snow of the glacier, and then began to traverse the
Enge, a long, narrow and rugged little path winding
along the side of high cliffs. The Enge achieved,
we reached the Platte.

Just where the Enge ends, a goatherd, living
solitarily as Robinson Crusoe, and looking some-
what like that involuntary disciple of Zimmermann,
has hollowed out for himself a cave in the steepThe Alps in Gladness.	79

face of the high cliff, and there lives, with a faithful
dog, and with sundry goats. His goats yield milk.
From Grindelwald, at night, you sometimes see a
light high up in the hills, which proceeds from the
cave of the recluse. He liked our visit; and seemed
to like his strange, lonely life. Man is a manysided
being, and can accommodate himself to singular
circumstances.

Now comes the Platte. Fancy very steep and
high cliffs of limestone, reaching down to a cre-
vasse-seamed glacier far below; and fancy having
to pass, high up, across the face of this long high
wall of limestone, which, when we were there, was
slippery with wet. Some chamois-hunters have cut
roughly a few occasional notches, for foothold, in
the stone ; and, but for these slight and rude helps,
the passage would be very nearly impracticable. It
is nasty going even as things are, and it is impossible
to walk fast. The Platte overcome, you reach two
long, shaky ladders, like those on the south side of
the Matterhorn, over the worst places on straight-up
rocks ; and when the ladders cease, which they do
so soon as the rock slopes, there are occasional iron
pins driven into the rock, which give a hold for the
hands. Next comes a slope of rough coarse grass,
gemmed with Edelweiss, and then loose rocks and
stones ; until at last you reach the elevated little
plateau on which stands the Gleckstein hut.8o Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

We attained to our dormitory about 7 p.m. The
sun was shining somewhere, but where we were
there was only cheerless shade and damp chilliness.
The hut, so called, is pretty high up, but the
summit of the Wetterhorn looked far off, and very
high above us. Its sunless snow looked also very
cold. Around you are pools of water, and of half-
congealed, half-melted snow. Everything about the
Gleckstein looked bleak, cheerless, sodden. Blocks
of rock, with splashes of yellow moss upon their
dark, weatherbeaten grey masses, are lumbered
about. Patches of snow abound. Against a great
rock-lump are piled up, loosely, loose stones ; and
when these are considered attentively, the mind
recognizes a resemblance to an indigent Irish pig-
stye. That is the hut. Round the low opening is
mud. The floor, or rather ground of the pig-stye,
is deep mud of half-frozen snow. A few rude planks
slope down from the back of the edifice to the floor,
and on these the mountaineer who can, may sleep.
Through the chinks in the roof and sides come air,
and grey cold light. The Gleckstein is a very
inferior Faulberg, and its surroundings, as we saw
them, on a dull, colourless evening, were as depress-
ing as the interior. The more cheerless a place is,
the more need for dinner, and Christian Lauener
and Melchior Anderegg, fine mountain cooks both,
set busily to work to prepare that meal. AgainstThe A Ips in Gladness.	81

the hut lean our ice-axes ; coils of rope are strewn
about; cow-skin wallets of provisions are there.
We get a sort of wash, and change our flannel
shirts, the walk up to the Gleckstein having been
rather hot work ; and by the time we have finished
our toilets, the dinner is ready also. W hatjolly
things those mountain dinners are ! A few stones
are laid down as a flooring, to keep our feet off the
wet mud ; we sit on the boards, with large clasp
knives ready, and the merry meal begins. The two
great guides and our porter share with us. The
little gleam of fire looks supernaturally cheerful in
the low grey cairn, which soon becomes lively with
laughter. The red wine seems good to us; the
cheese is very bearable ; and the cold meat would
be really very nice—to a wild beast.

Dinner over, we come out into the open with
plaids wrapped round us to have a pipe. No one
would stop in the pigstye a moment longer than is
necessary. The evening is very cold ; the day is
quite gone, and there is a dull, grey duskiness over
near and far. One or two stars are just appearing
through high clouds. There is no wind, but every
now and then comes a low, sad sough of wafted cold.
Opposite to us, soars the mighty bulk of the
Schreckhorn. A valley, glacier spread at the top,
stretches between us and the grim giant. He is the
hugest of a mighty range, and our great block of

G82 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

Wetterhorner confronts him with a worthy majesty.
We can just see, far below, some of the lights of
Grindelwald, and we can fancy the lighted rooms,
and the many guests in the Adler; but rising mist
soon blots Grindelwald out of view. The glacier
looks very grey ; the peaks are grimly white ; the
night is murkily dark.

Suddenly, from behind the Schreckhorn's solemn
bulk, a far-blazing meteor darts across the sky of
night. The portent resembles somewhat a shower
of comets. It trails across a great arc of heaven,
and then slowly wanes and fades. We watch it
with an awed delight. Seen from the Gleckstein,
when on your road to the Wetterhorn, amid the
silence of night round that lonely height, such an
apparition has a quite peculiar effect. Superstitious
fancy thinks of the strange cross seen in the sky by
Whymper after the Matterhorn accident, and asks,
if such a meteor, seen before an ascent, can portend
a mishap ?

We leave that question unanswered, as we stand
looking at the place where the weird meteor shone.

When the terrible sky-wonder disappears, a
moon, herself unseen, sheds an argent glory on
the far snow summits of the Schreckhorn and the
Wetterhorn—a glory which resembles the phos-
phorescent foam upon a silver tropic wave. It is
very cold now, and it looks like snow. MelchiorThe A Ips in Gladness.

83

and Christian are gazing carefully all over the
night, and we know that they are speculating upon
the weather. They think that it may—that it will
—be fine to-morrow ; but expect fresh snow in the
nig.ht. They suggest a little mulled red wine and
turning in. We agree to both proposals, and are
soon endeavouring to lie down to rest in the wretched
hovel. The boards are too short; there is not room
enough for us all. It is very hard—but, no matter !
The Great Liberal Party will soon be snoring ; the
guides will sleep : Lyvetete and myself will lie as
quietly as we can, but we expect no sleep—and are
not disappointed.

At 2.30, Christian and Melchior are softly astir.

A match clicks; a watch is referred to; a
hurried consultation takes place in whispers, and
the solemn and difficult rite of awakening Marks is
gone through by us all.

The morning is found to be so very dark that
Melchior says we cannot start just yet. He then
sets about preparing coffee, and we go out to wash.
A strange feeling, by the way, is that of coming in
the dark morning into the air out of so strange a
sleeping place! All things seem unreal, and you
are chilly, sleepy, silent. Coffee ready! Come
along. Then a little pipe, while ropes and provi-
sions are arranged. Then, at last, the start. Still
dark : but on high flames whitely the Wetterhorn's
G 284 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

far peak, and with that goal before us we commence
with energy the first darkling scramble over loose,
sharp, irregular rocks and stones—all resting on a
plane which slopes upwards. The morning was
not cheerful or promising, but the guides aver it
will come right; and after an hour or two the sun
did shine.

When the waste stone crop, which is rather
extensive, is done with, there comes a snow basin,
and at the beginning of this great bowl we stopped
under a black rock to breakfast. Here the morn-
ing changed its character, and did honour to the
predictions of the guides. The sky became beauti-
fully blue, the sun shone out brilliantly, and a merry
wind began to blow. When we started again, the
white fresh snow was dazzling in its shining purity.
It was beautiful to the eye, though rather bad for
going. To the basin succeed steep snow slopes,
tending very much upwards, and as we mount we
see before us, going straight up, a long thin ridge
of very difficult-looking rock work. Here Melchior
renews his previous caution about falling stones—a
caution which was presently justified by the result.
We were all on one rope. On this long rock climb
every step is difficult, and most steps are dangerous.
It is a long bit of work, too, and consists mainly in
passing over the sharp points and edges and hollows
of a rock arete of aiguilles and boulders. A fallThe Alps in Gladness.

85

would be fatal, and yet a slip would be easy. The
sun was very powerful and we had no trouble from
ice, as that was melted for us ; but then, the work
was very hot. A shower of large stones was dis-
lodged in a couloir by the leading man, and a stone
of about the size of a man's head, bounding cheer-
fully down, struck me on the knee and hit the man
behind me on the chest. However, though we had
at times to crawl along lying down or sitting, we
conquered those troublesome rocks, and found more
steep snow work, until at last we stood at the foot
of that " beautifully sharp snow pyramid which is so
conspicuous in most of the views of the Bernese
Alps." The last part of the ascent is almost per-
pendicular. There are perhaps 800 feet of it, and as
you follow in the ice steps which Melchior and Chris-
tian cut, you find your chest leaning against the hard
snow. This last bit is, as Mr. Ball says, " extremely
steep," and the slope " increases to 58° towards the
summitwhich summit consists of a " perilously
sharp crest of frozen snow/' and is not unlike the
crest of the Jungfrau. One'by one we attained the
final eminence, which was hardly large enough to
hold us all.1 Climbing carefully up the perpen-

1 "It is when balanced on this ridge—sitting astride of the
knife-edge on which one can hardly stand without giddiness—that
one fully appreciates an Alpine precipice. Behind you the snow-
slope sinks with perilous steepness towards the wilderness of rock86 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

dicuJar wall, it suddenly ceased ; your wrist was
grasped by Melchior—and you stood upon the ulti-
mate peak of the great Wetterhorn.

Near you, are the sister peaks of the Rosenhorn
and the Mittelhorn. The Wellhorn is not far off.
The Wettereismeer spreads below you. Just oppo-
site is the noble Schreckhorn, and all his mighty
peers.

Close above is a darkly, deeply blue sky. Sun-
kissed snow sparkles, in plains, on peaks, down
slopes, in basins, all around. Tender shadows
soften, in places, the glare of whiteness. The soft
dark of rocks sets off by contrast the unspeakable
purity of mountain snow. There is not room on
the summit to sit down, nor can we wait there long,
because the keen wind is so unbearably cold that,
despite the sun, we feel blanched and frozen
through. "Well, old fellow, here we are on the
Wetterhorn!" says Marks' cheery voice, issuing
through chattering teeth; and we feel, despite the
cold, that sympathetic glow which animates men
who have conquered a great peak together. Lyve-
tete has been here once before, and he tells us how

and glacier through which the ascent has lain. But in front the ice
sinks with even greater steepness, for a few feet or yards. Then it
curves over and disappears, and the next thing that the eye catches
is the meadow-land of Grindelwald, some 9000 feet below."—
Leslie Stephen.The A Ips in Gladness.

87

warm it was here, where now it is so cold, on the day
of that former ascent. Melchior and Christian de-
cide that we are not to eat or drink on the summit,
but are to take a look at the view, and then get out of
that terrible wind as speedily as maybe. We shall
feed and rest under the lee of the rocks below. The
hour is 9.15 a.m. We stand quite close together
in a little dark group, the rope trailing upon the
seldom trodden snow.

The day is beautifully clear, and the view is very
glorious. I have been on peaks from which the
view is, as I think, finer; but comparison is almost
an outrage when a view is so fine as this is. Beneath
us is the Great Scheideck, and all the green slopes
and meadows near Grindelwald.

The Wettereismeer lies wide to the east, and the
Upper Grindelwald glacier stretches in crevassed
and ridgy slopes to the south and the west. Between
our peak and the summit of the near Wellhorn ex-
tends the long depression of the upper Schwarzwald
glacier. Many a peak that is famous in story rises
round that amphitheatre of snowy hills ; the Eiger
rears its long, sharp crest, the Monch its buttress-
like bulk, and the Jungfrau soars in stateliest grace
and majesty ; but the dominant Horn in all the
wide great scene is the sumptuous Schreckhorn.

But Christian evidently wants his champagne,
for he keeps urging our departure. The cold is so88 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

intense that we are what he calls vemiinftig—that
is, we are willing to do what he wants. I don't
think we were a quarter of an hour on the top ;
and, although we left the view unwillingly, we
gladly quitted the lofty platform exposed so
terribly to such a wind.

Going down is a little difficult. The lightest
goes first. One moves at a time. You have to
descend with your face to the wall and to take
care. The ice steps seem very small; the long
descent is somewhat sheer, and a slip of one man
would bring down the whole party. Melchior
comes after me; Christian, the tallest and strongest
man amongst us, is the last to descend. We move
slowly. All right! That is safely done.

The rock is reached. It throws a shadow on
the sun-bright whiteness, and here we are sheltered
from the wind. Oh joy! what a happy time that
is when you sit and loll upon warm rock and see
the provisions produced, while the " foaming grape
of Eastern France" pants to be let out of its dome-
shaped prison. The sun shines, the snow is bril-
liant, the sky is azure, and the food is good.
Marks produces his speciality of chicken jam.
<9, cite gioja !

A happy group—not an unpicturesque one
either—reclines on this sunny rock for a quiet
hour of intense enjoyment. We eat, and drink,The Alps in Gladness.	89

and smoke, and chat, and look around, above, be-
low us. It is so pleasant that it seems a sin to
move ; but move we must, and move, at last, we do.

The descent of those nasty rock ridges was
almost worse than the ascent. In descending, we
were roped in two parties. Lyvetete and Marks
went splendidly, and I managed as best I could.
Then came the slopes below the long bad rock
ridge ; then came the wide glacier basin, with its
deep snow softened by the sun. Then again the
loose large stones, of a torrid tawny colour in the
blaze of heat; and here Marks resolved, there be-
ing good water about, to make a Cup. Melchior
gets ice and water; Christian produces lemons
and wine, and we halt again for this " conducive
luxury." Then on. We reach the dirty Gleck-
stein and leave it, not unwillingly. We descend
the dark iron rock, holding on by the iron pins,
till we reach the shaky ladders. "Only one at
a time," cried Melk; "the ladder is not very safe."
We recross the difficult Platte; we obtain some
milk from the goatherd ; we tread safely the thin
thread of jagged path along the Enge ; we return
in the sun of afternoon over the steep grass slopes ;
we wind along the rough and dirty path to Grin-
delwald ; we call out as we pass to Nanny to get
ready cold baths; we take a change of clothes to
the bath-house; and then, bathed and freshly clad,90 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

we are ready for dinner at the Adler:—and our
future lives are richer for the memory of an ascent
of the Wetterhorn.

You look always at a peak with quite other eyes
after you have once stood upon its crest.

We shall never, I think, again gaze upon the
Stormpeak without a kindly thought of the joyous
day of our joint ascent.

Bad weather still; and in bad weather we once
more attained to the mountaineer s true home—
Zermatt. Marks had a rich and varied programme
for this region, including the Dent Blanche, Matter-
horn, the Morning, Rympfischhorn, and others; we
had Melchior Anderegg, and Christian Lauener
with us, but out of so many projects not one was
realized. We remained with M. Seiler a week,
but during that period we never once saw the whole
of the Matterhorn. White patches only peered
through cloud. The Monte Rosa range was quite
invisible. There was rain every day, and snow
fell in the mountains every night. The weather
was hopeless. We did little walks, and lounged
discontentedly about the old hotel. We telegraphed
to Chamounix to ask what weather they had there,
and getting a not too discouraging reply, we re-
solved to start for a region in which work might
be done. We left Zermatt with heavy hearts and
in heavier rain.The A Ips in Gladness.

9i

A splendid congregation of great climbers and
cultured men was collected at Zermatt while we
were there, and there was no want of good society.

Hawley Scrowger and Norman Franklin, by the
way, were both there.

The bell rings, the scene changes, and the curtain
is drawn up, revealing the wrell-known prospect, as
seen from Couttet's H6tel, of the great range of
Mont Blanc.

What weather ? well, bad or doubtful; but never-
theless, better than the Zermatt weather. Some
hope too, of at least occasional fine days inserted
between bad ones. That is about the best we can
look for.

Marks and Lyvetete are very much bent upon
doing the Aiguille Verte> and are also minded to
" do Blank," i.e,9 to ascend Mont Blanc. Christian
has left us, and we are alone with Melchior and his
brother Peter.

At Couttet's we found two Alpine friends. One
was Columbus Fitz-Loftus—a great early dis-
coverer.

He does not climb now; not that he cannot, but
because his laurels grow so thickly that he dare
not shake them. His hearty laugh was our first
welcome to Chamounix, as he left a bouquet of
young ladies to greet us. With him was young
Redwall, the Antinous of climbers. As a cham-92 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

pagne bottle has to be taperingly elongated, in
order that it may restrain the effervescing joy of
its contents, so nature has found it necessary to
confer on Redwall a form of graceful length, in
order that its tapering outline may compress the
genial joviality of his overflowing high spirits. In
bad weather it is a double blessing to find two
such delightful fellows in a Swiss hotel.

Well, Marks' attempt on the Verte was a failure,
owing to bad weather, and we determined to "do
Blank." We left Couttet's at I o'clock for the
Grands Mulets. The path mounts at first, and
rather steeply, through a pine wood. Then you
reach the hut hotel at the Pierre Pointue, and
Melchior (Christian is not with us) procures there
certain provisions. After leaving the Pierre
Pointue you get upon moraine and glacier, and
meet with one or two rather difficult places. The
Glacier des Bossons is very much crevassed, and
we put on the rope. As we pass the base of the
Aiguille dti Midi, Melchior enjoins the greatest
possible speed, because volleys of large stones
are often discharged with great force across the
track.

On the glacier there are some seracs, and many
crevasses of unusual width. Here we met with
darkness, which preceded a heavy hailstorm and
sharp rain ; but the weather cleared up at 6 o'clock,The A Ips in Gladness.

93

at which hour we reached the dark clump of
aiguille-shaded rocks which are so well known
under the name of the Grands Mulets.

While on the Glacier des Bossons I thought of two
pictures hanging in my room in London of De
Saussure's ascent in 1787. What quaint figures
they are! They had no ropes and no ice-axes.
They walked in red or green coats, or in clerical
black vestments, wore wigs, and held long poles in
their hands. What an army of guides and porters
they carried with them!—though in this respect
they hardly surpassed Albert Smith, of whose
narrative we thought with some amusement. We
were three, with but one guide and two porters, and
our costume was of modern Alpine simplicity.
The sun was shining as we mounted to the little
cabane perched upon the great rocks, and the sunset
view from the Grands Mulets is very fine. Melchior
and his brother prepared dinner while we changed
our shirts, and he prophesied, though guardedly, a
fine day for to-morrow. After dinner we came out
into the open; and so soon as it was dark enough,
the Great Liberal Party ignited magnesium wire for
the delight of our friends at Couttet's.

We knew that they, sitting in the garden, then
takia^ their after-dinner smoke, would look out for
our lights so high up in the night and darkness. We
stood, a little dark, shifting group of figures, round94 Alpine Ascents and Advenhires.

the intense flame of the magnesium wire, which
pierced vividly into the wide surrounding dusk of
early night. Presently Chamounix answered.
Columbus burned Bengal lights in the garden at
Couttet's and the answering signals made the gloom
splendid.

Then we turned in, as Melchior announced that
he might call us at about I o'clock. The sunset
was fine—and full of colour.

I could not sleep, and I rose in the night and
walked alone out of the cabane. It was freezing
sharply, and icicles dropped from the hut; but the
scene in that still hour was utterly glorious.
Behind the long irregular range of purple hills
flared a dull red sky, against which each peak and
jag stood sharply out. Mists curled up the deep
valley.

A moon, just entering upon its last quarter, threw
a still, silver glory on white Mont Blanc, the Bosse,
the Dome du Goutey and on all the immense snow
realm and ice world around the solitary hut.

The Grands Mulets cast a huge mass of deep
shadow round its massive bulk. There was no
sound but the faintest murmur of some far-off
cascade, and, now and then, the low hum of some
movement in the glacier. The place was so high,
so strange, so lonely, that, seen by that wan moon
and by those trembling stars, and standing quiteThe Alps in Gladness.	95

alone to gaze, my vigil remains a memory and a
picture.

We were called at 1.30. Marks was awakened
with the usual difficulty, but, once awake, he was
very lively, considering the hour. Breakfast by dim,
flaring candles, and, somehow, great delay before
we started. It must have been quite 3 o'clock when
we were fairly off.

We descended the rocks in deepest shadow, and
got upon the snow, which emitted a faint light
through heavy shade. Very cold, and the snow
fairly good at first. Melchior led straight up the
arete. You could hardly see the steps of the man
before you, as we mounted in the shadow, but we
presently crossed a sharp shade line, and came upon
softly moonlit snow. On and on, without a stop,
until, having passed the Petit Plateau, we saw the
sun rise from the Grand Plateau. The new day
glowing into life, through colour, born out of
desolation in that drear death-waste, is singularly
wonderful and glorious. It is not like a day-break,
fine as that may be, seen in cities or on the flat, or
even at sea. It catches you so high up, and is so
silent. It awakens no sign of life, no songs of birds.
All around is stern and awful grandeur.

On the Grand Plateau it was so cold that we
kicked our frozen feet against the axes for warmth.
Cold as it was, the snow here was already very bad ;g6 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

loose, light, deep, and freshly fallen. Some of the
crevasses, too, were troublesome. We breakfasted,
but were glad to move on as soon as possible. The
characteristics of the ascent of Mont Blanc are
hugeness and vastness. Everything is on a grander
scale than on any other mountain. "After all,
Blanc is the noblest peak!" cries Lyvetete, who
has done every Alpine mountain. He had been up
Mont Blanc before. Any objections to Mont
Blanc, as an ascent, proceed rather from Hawley
Scrowger than from Norman Franklin.

The view from the Grand Plateau is majestic.
On the right is the great round Dome du Goute, the
Aiguille du Goute, and the Bosse du Dromadaire.
On the left is the Corridor and the Mont Maudit.
Before you is the highest peak of Mont Blanc, and
the ancien passage, which to-day we cannot try
because of the danger of avalanches. " Look at
the Bosse," cries Melk, " see what a wind there is
up there !" and so, in spite of the preference of
Marks and Lyvetete for the shorter route, we must
adopt the more circuitous way. We mount the
Corridor, commencing with a long and steep ravine
filled now with deep, loose snow. The G. C. P. is
going with the ecstatic alacrity of a chamois on his
wedding day; though this part of the work is
laborious and fatiguing. We look at the place
where the fatal Hamel accident happened. OnThe Alps in Gladness.

97

Mont Blanc you see the sites of several fatal mishaps.
At the top of the Corridor we first see Italy, Monte
Rosa, and the Matterhorn. Behind us is a sea of
peaks, the tops only visible. Here we meet with a
terrible wind. Look at the Mur de la Cote ! The
snow is blowing away from it in a fine simoom. We
reach it, and begin to walk across the face of a con-,
vex wall, or slope, of snow and ice—" Wie Fliegen
auf einer Wand "—like flies on a wall, says Melchior.
The wind has blown away all the light lying snow,
and the sun is shining dimly on dull green ice. We
have to cut steps all round the Mur de la Cote, and
it is a beautiful sight to watch Melchior moving
with his free, firm step, and cutting notches with
deft blows of the untiring axe. As you traverse the
face of the Mur> and look below, you realize the
result of a possible fall. Hurrah ! the Rockers
Rouges, and now we stand at the foot of the Calotte,
the last climb before the summit; and here we
have to stop, because our Chamounix man is quite
exhausted. Melchior doctors him.

I may remark that not one of us had felt anything
of inconvenience or of exhaustion. Across the
Calotte, broad bands of dark ice glistening in the
sun, wind-swept and bare, looked annoying. Again
the axe flashes and the sparkles fly. The slope is
long, but now we see the 'top !—and, putting on a
spurt, we rush up the last incline. The labour is

H98 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

achieved, and we stand, just before n o'clock, on
the very top of this heaven-kissing hill. Yes, we
have done the 15,800 feet climb, and we stand
actually on the rounded snowy summit of the
monarch of mountains—of great Mont Blanc !

A perfect day for a view. The brightest of suns
over-head; the finest of air around; but a wind cold,
cruel, and intense.

And the view ? Well, it is the noblest of all
views from any mountain. Surely the view from
Mont Blanc is the grandest sight on earth.

We stand together, an awe-struck, yet delighted,
group ; and Melk says the telescopes at Chamounix
are watching us. On the top of Mont Blanc there
is no sense of rivalry from any other peak ; everyv
thing lies below you. You seem to see every peak,
every pass ; all the mountain ranges of Switzerland,
the Tyrol, France, Italy. Before you, below you,
behind you, on all sides—with nothing anywhere
to intercept the prospect—you see that sublime
ocean, fold after fold, range behind range, of mighty
mountains. And you are so high up—you cannot
be higher in Europe. Myriads of peaks are white,
their eternal snows sun-smitten into brilliancy, or
softened into tenderest shadow. Many have that
rare velvety richness of colour composed of violet,
of indigo, of purple, and of green ; and behind one
long low ridge, golden clouds, steadfast as if theyThe Alps in Gladness.

99

formed a portion of the range, rest in a splendour
of colour glory.

There are the sharp splinters of spire-like aiguilles,
and there the suaver white hoods of snow summits.

There lies all Italy beneath you—that is, guides
say, the Mediterranean, a dim blue streak, melting
into tender haze of distance. There soars the crested
Tyrol. There spreads France; and there, dimly
suggested, is a suspicion of the land of the conquer-
ing Teuton. Lakes gleam like polished shields.
Plains spread; woods are soft patches of gloom;
cities are dwarfed, by the majesty of nature, to
miniature hints of man. The sight is bewildering !
The glory is so great that only exclamations can
express the rapture which is a feeling too vast to
sunder into words. We identify each peak that
we have conquered ; we recognize every range we
know.

But why attempt to catalogue the immensity of
infinitude ?

The view is grandest as a whole.

We have stood on many a summit, but on none
so high as this. We feel sublimed. In this fine
air, faith is easy. We have attained a spot so rare
in its awful glory that it is kept remote, and is
visitable but by few. Oh, my God ; I thank Thee
that I live! It is worth having a life which may
soar once to the brief, intense gladness of looking
H 2ioo Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

with joy-bright eyes upon a prospect so glorious that
the mind is elevated to nearness to the Great
Creator.

We forget it for a time, but the searching wind
soon recalls us to a feeling of the sensibility of
mortality ; and we descend a little way on the
Italian side, and scoop out a place in the snow in
which to rest, sheltered from the wind, and to eat
our provisions. " Now, Melk, the champagne ! "
and it foams and gurgles into the cup, the only wine
worthy of the place and scene. Still gazing round,
we light the pipe of incense, and begin an hour of
pure and utter joy.

Some mountaineers do not smoke. Lyvetete
does not smoke. Not that he is unworthy of it—
no; far from that. His elevated soul is meet for
tobacco ; but a Spartan—a too Spartan—rigour of
philosophy restrains the man of sacrifice. In spirit
he is with us, and he regards with eyes of tender
melancholy Marks and myself as we fill and ignite.
The Great Liberal Party reclines upon its back;
its legs crossed, and its arms under its head. It
coos to its pipe like a young mother to her firstborn.
Hallo ! we can't have been here an hour yet ? Why
is Melk looking at his watch ? Yes, we have. Up !
shake out the ashes from the bowl: take one last,
lingering, long, fond look around—and, lo ! we have
begun to descend Mont Blanc.The Alps in Gladness.

101

The snow, when we are out of the wind, is terribly-
deep, soft, loose. In the morning we shivered on
the Grand Plateau; in the afternoon we find it almost
unbearably hot. Plunging down steepest slopes
over the knees in fine sun-melted snow, we yet make
a great pace, and by 3 o'clock we are again
at the Grands Mulets, where it is hot enough
now.

A short stoppage to drink lemonade, and to pack
up. Then again over the slippery, crevasse-studded
Glacier des Bossons. Warm work this !

At the Pterre Pointue, the G. L. P. (bless him
for the inspiration !) would make one of his match-
less " cups," and we found it very good. He was
then attacked by hunger, and procured some kind
of cutlet for his refection. He could not wait for
dinner, his appetite was so fine.

On again—rather stiff after the rest at Pierre
—for Mont Blanc is a very long and very laborious
climb.

My little ones wrent romping down short cuts
like kidlings blithe and merry. We reach the woods,
and find the soft purple of twilight shading the
tender greenery. We approach ourselves of Cout-
tet's, and meet a little procession. Then comes the
usual Chamounix nonsense. Three cannons are
fired in honour of the three who have been up
Mont Blanc. They give us great bouquets, which102 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

we give to ladies, and M. Couttet produces a wine of
honour in the pleasing form of pink champagne.
They saw us climbing, and saw us on the top.
Come along !—a bath, a change of clothes, and then
with good appetite to dinner.

Columbus and Antinous thought the snow would
be very bad, and saw the signs of wind on the
Bosse, and on the summit, but knew that we should
have a perfect view. After dinner we sit out in the
garden, smoking, and look up at the Grands
Mulets; all dark and still to-night. No G. L. P.
there with brilliant magnesium wire. We gaze up
at the summit, greying against the darkening sky
of night, as stars come out and seem no higher
than the crest—upon which these feet have stood.
Adieu ! Mont Blanc !

One word about Melchior Anderegg. I think
him the first and greatest of the great Swiss guides.
He is at once the most daring and the least rash
of the noble fraternity. He can go anywhere and
do anything; but he is thoroughly and conscien-
tiously careful. He always pays most attention to
the weakest man on the rope.

Working with such a man as Lyvetete, I re-
quired, and received, the greatest share of his
assistance. His attention to the safety and comfort
of his flock is incessant, and in difficult places he
looks sharply after every member of the party,The Alps in Gladness.	103

including porters. On the peak, or the glacier, he
will not do, or allow to be done, anything that he
thinks imprudent. Meichior,.with his black beard
and brown crimsoned face, looks, superficially,
rather like an Italian; but the honesty and manly
friendliness of the face are quite Swiss. And Mel-
chior is such a gentleman ! Always cheerful, un-
pretentious, unselfish, kindly, zealous, full of self-
respect, and real politeness, you learn to prize
highly the many fine qualities of this true worthy.
I hold him in great respect and liking. In Melk a
fine class of man is developed to its flower and
height; and between him and any man who is
worthy to work with him a warm feeling of regard
and respect will certainly grow up. May I
see his kind, manly face, and hear his pleasant,
cheery voice, soon again upon the glaciers of his
native land !

Mountaineering developes, also, the strongest
feeling of cordial intimacy between comrades who
share together manly work and hardship, difficulty
and danger. I have sought falteringly to photo-
graph the two friends with whom I worked that
year ; but the photograph is, I know, faint, as one
made, not in strong sunlight, but in the rose tint
of the after-glow on flushed and fairy peaks ; made
indeed, in that atmosphere whose home is in the
light of setting suns. They will seem to the reader104 A Ipine A scents and Adventiires.

but as spectral shadows seen upon the Brocken,
but to me they are very real. I hear their
kindly voices; I see their familiar faces ; I recall
their figures, as they rest or climb. Truth
underlies true fiction ; and my shadows are pro-
jected by two splendid fellows and glorious moun-
taineers.

Year by year as one goes to the Alps, the noble
joy of mountaineering increases ; and " delight, if
less bright, is far more deep" than it was in the
early time of first tumultuous rapture. Joy and
sorrow are, however, inextricably mingled in life,
and year by year one looks forward with increas-
ingly melancholy anticipation to the workings of
that

" Time that takes on trust our youth,

Our joys, our all we have,"—

looks forward to the day when age, with stealing
steps, shall change our helmets into hives for bees ;
shall abate our forces and rob us of our first-class
peaks and passes. But the interim, at least, is ours ;
and let us, in the summer of our age, store up
honeyed memories for the winter of our time. Cer-
tain supreme moments of life repay us for the long
monotony of sad and weary years ; and among
these moments are those in which we stand on
Alpine peaks. I record 1872, and look forwardThe Alps in Gladness.	105

eagerly to the August of 1873, and other coming
years.

Switzerland ! What a crowd of pictures and of
images are suggested by the mere name!

First, one thinks of quaint old towns, as Berne,
with its charming fountains ; as Thun, with its
picturesque old towers. Then one thinks of the val-
leys, with many a burnt sienna cottage, and many
a peasant family, sheltered in the quiet valley fold.
Then, fair lakes, hill-surrounded, tree-garlanded3
with their lone bosoms expanded to the sky,
spread before the fancy. One great lake is memo-
rable in connexion with the names of Gibbon,
Byron, Voltaire, Kemble, Rousseau. Again, one re-
members low passes, beginning with zigzag paths,
tending upward under the shade of chestnuts, and
rising until they grow rugged, and until, above
shaggy chasms, you catch a glimpse of " ice far off
on a mountain head." Think, too, of many a walk,
beginning among green Alps, picturesque with
peasants, musical with cow bells, its beauty sublim-
ing into grandeur, as, " faintly flushed and phantom
fair," the slowly rising snowy ranges surge into a
noble background. Think, too, of mountain torrents
boiling and raging swiftly from their glacier cradles
to the immensity of distant ocean ; think of the
waterfalls, cascading downwards from the lofty
cliffs, and falling in a dust of silver spray into wornio6 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

rock basins. Remember the Sapins, .the tender green
meadows, and the awful avalanche. Recall the
colour, the hues of sunset dying out upon the lofty
summits, the starry nights above the silent hills, and
the moonlight reflected in answering purity upon
the saintly chastity of snow. See the calm splendour
of the golden sunlight—and then sweep over the
landscape the lashing rain, the furious blast, the
drift of cloudy gloom. It is a land of, and for, men !
There is something tonic, bracing, nervous, in its
nobleness and loftiness. It lacks somewhat of the
rich and sumptuous colour which, on the southern
side of the Alps, you may find among Italian lakes ;
but their air and character are soft, sensuous, ener-
vating ; health and vigour, both of body and of
mind, dwell in the Switzers' virile land. As
humanity soars upward to an ideal, so this Helvetia
towers upwards to its peaks. They are the giant
glories of the lovely land ; in them culminates its
claim to grandeur. The glaciers are the footstools
to the Throne. "They have been to me," says
Tyndall, " well-springs of life and joy. They have
given me royal pictures and memories which can
never fade. They have raised my enjoyments to a
higher level/' The diadem of the mountain crowd
is great Mont Blanc ; and, among peaks, and on
summits, one feels the true spiritual significance of
nature. The mind, " expanded by the genius of theThe Alps in Gladness.	107

spot," has become elevated until, amidst this im-
mensity and sublimity of grandeur, it feels that
nature is—

Der Gottheit lebendiges Kleid;

and recognizes, in such divine, mysterious wonder
and awful beauty, a Symbol of God.E I S L E B E N.

PART II.

THE ALPS IN SADNESS.

" Two voices are there, one is of the sea,

One of the mountains, each a mighty voice !"—Wordsworth.

" Oh, once the harp of Innisfail

Was strung full high to notes of gladness \

But now it only echoes back
The wail of sadness."

N its proper place in the summer of 1873,
the month of August occurred. It was to
be the month of the year for us ; because
we—that is, the Great Liberal Party, the Great and
Clement Prince, and the Gentle Little Fawn—were,
in virtue of a longstanding compact, to start on the
1st of August for Switzerland, there to complete the
regal mountain programme commenced in 1872, but
not then carried out, in consequence of bad weather.
During two consecutive years the weather in theThe A Ips in Sadness.	109

mountains had been dreadful; and we, therefore,
fondly hoped that 1873 would be fine, would yield
a good harvest, and so make up for the bad pro-
ducts of the preceding years.

Well, these hopes cheered our winter and beauti-
fied our spring—but they were not destined to
ripen into full summer fruition. Moved by the
devil, as I must unavoidably believe, the G. L. P.
suddenly resolved to start for Switzerland, alone,
about the middle of July; and he left orders with
the G. C. P. and myself to meet him at Montreux
on the 3rd August.

Silent, from respect, we listened in sorrow, and—
alas !—with resentment. " Think what training
he'll be in when we join him! It isn't fair,
really,"—so muttered the G. C. P., as we conferred
moodily upon our wrongs. We were awfully bitter
and respectfully savage. In such a frame of mind
dark thoughts are stirred, and the tempter is at
hand.

The conduct of the G. L. P. had placed in our
hands a terribly offensive weapon of revenge. We
smole darkly as we thought of the awful damages
which the law would award to those who had been
deprived, by the wilful and malicious act of such
a creature as the G. L. P., of the comfort, the joy,
the solace of his society.

We resolved then to stab him with his ownno A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

poniard—to hoist him with his own petard : we
determined to revenge ourselves by means of the
Law. We shuddered a little as we contemplated
the awful punishment with which the Perfection of
Human Reason would visit such a culprit, and such
a crime; but we were nerved to our purpose as,
day by day, our lives were saddened by his per-
fidious cruelty. We kept our dark secret very
dark: we plotted to meet him at Montreux with-
out having warned him of our thirst for retribu-
tive justice, or of the impending doom. We
spurned the common course of an ordinary action
at law. We resolved that the punishment of such
a criminal should be exemplary as his offence was
unnatural. We felt ourselves lifted to the calm
elevation of Avengers of Society—we felt that it
was not a merely personal wrong that we had to
redress. We wished that his punishment, like the
execution of Charles I., should be proportionate to
the magnitude of the offence, and to the importance
of the criminal. We thought at first of procuring
a mandamus; but we ultimately decided to apply
to the Attorney-General to issue a nunc dimittis.
That, we felt, would fer him, and firk him, and
ferret him. This terrible legal instrument, put in
force only in the most extreme cases, is, as is well
known, of surest and swiftest efficacy. Our course
of action sternly determined on, we felt better, andThe A Ips in Sadness.

in

we seemed calm—but it was the unnatural calm
which precedes the most demoniac convulsions of
nature.

Meanwhile August approached. Two Winchester
friends were to accompany the G. C. P., and the
G. L. F.; and on the day appointed I went to
Winchester, a gleaner for the Alps. The fair old
Cathedral city, quiet and charming in the beautiful
calm of scholarship, with its noble tower and its
stately elms ; with its College, in which grateful
science still adores her William's sacred shade,
looked peacefully lovely in its rich repose on the
sunny evening on which I visited, to rob it of its
treasures. As a gardener, sent out to cut a bouquet
for his mistress, selects the loveliest earth stars he
can find, so I picked in Winchester its fairest
flowers to bloom on Alpine snows. One is known
to the reader as the Great and Clement Prince; the
other two formed (with myself) a trio of three
M.D.'s—or Meritorious Duffers. We were happily
united in reverencing our chief and master. We
all looked up to our leader, and looked round at
each other. We accorded like perfect music in
simple harmony.

Singularly enough, two of the party were
engaged in the composition of oratorios ; and the
future masterpieces of Elihu and Baalamb will owe
much to the sweet concord of the composers, whoii2 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

lisped in numbers on their tour this year. I do
not flatter; I do not promise idly; but I can,
nevertheless, assure our new companions that, by
diligent attention to business, and by continuing
their present course of conduct, they must, in the
fulness of time (such things cannot be hastily con-
ferred) win initials which characterize---even

as we have done. These two gentlemen were a
priceless addition to our party, and their good
companionship diverted the G. C. P. and the
G. L. F. from brooding over the coming ven-
geance. " Coming"—did I say? Ha! ha! But
no matter,—thereby hangs a tale. Destiny will, I
foresee, play a part in the drama of Revenge.
One of our new companions, by matchless skill
and intelligence in controlling our expenditure,
acquired provisionally—provisionally only—the title
of the Respected Public Purse, or R. P. P.; but this
title may yet be changed.

We started at midnight from Southampton. A
steep ladder, with a lantern at its foot, which threw
a bright patch of light on a space of deck, led
down to our steamer ; while the lofty bow and the
long bowsprit of the great " Mongolia " stretched
grandly above us, and across the dark blue night.
Our "ship was overcrowded. A curious arrange-
ment ot misshapen silkworm trays, placed some-
times two or three abreast, in ordet to economizeThe Alps in Sadness.

ii3

room, and to insure the discomfort of passengers,
were intended to serve as sleeping-places. How-
ever, we had a fair passage. We rushed through
Paris, and took the night train to Geneva. As we
woke in the night train, the faint clearness of early
morning showed us the wide flat plains of France,
the great sky-arch standing out behind the long
rows of poplar-trees shaved, like poodles, into tufts ;
which tufts at the top of the trees suggest electri-
fied heads of decapitated negroes. Then came the
well-known approaches to our own loved Switzer-
land, and its fair Lake. We paused on the placid
shores of Lake Leman, till the " Bonivard " should
start from Geneva to Montreux. As we neared
him we quivered with the fell intensity of our dark
purpose. Alas! alas! we little knew what we
should meet.

As we approached ourselves of Montreux, the
tension of emotion was almost pain. The throbbing
of the beating paddles symbolized our agitation.
The steamer nears the little jetty ; we discern the
terraces of the Hotel des Alpes—we see him !—
our own G. L. P., sitting in an arbour. I thought
the Little Ones would have thrown themselves
overboard, in their eagerness, but I restrained their
creditable ardour. Why does he not come down
to meet us ? Strange ! We land ; we reel to and
fro like drunken men ; we weave the Bacchic dance

IH4 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

of rapture. Suddenly a friend of the Alpine Club
comes down to meet us. "What, have you not
heard?" "Heard what ? " "Why, of the G. L. P.'s
accident at Chamounix?" "Oh, Heaven, no!"
We hear then, to our consternation, that he, the
man who had done fifty mountains, walking with
ladies over grass slopes near Chamounix, had
fallen, while merely leaping a little brook two feet
wide, and had badly twisted the ancle. " Mind, he
can't do any mountains this year," said the kindly
unselfish lay-doctor, who had skilfully set the
ankle, and who, giving up all his own plans and
projects, was accompanying, and soothing and tend-
ing our unfortunate friend.

We found him, bandaged, suffering, with ominous
sticks resting beside him—but ever cheerful—in
the arbour. We were much moved. Our tears
flowed as if we had been in a Turkish bath. " Like
the Coliseum," whispered the G. C. P., "like the
Coliseum, or like a Norman castle, he looks more
glorious in ruin than he did in his time of strength
and splendour." As we retreated from the pre-
sence, I walked aside with the G. C. P. We looked
sadly at each other, and burst into tears. In that
sacred gush of emotion, Justice sheathed her
sword, and we forewent our holy vengeance. I
am sorry for Society,—but really we couldn't help
it. Pity was too strong for justice; and we couldThe Alps in Sadness.	115

only deplore sincerely the accident which had be-
fallen so dear a friend, and which excluded from
the mountains so good a mountaineer. We slept
sorrowfully at Montreux, grievously bitten of
mosquitoes, and left the next day mournfully for
Bouveret, and for the Rhone valley.

At Sierre we met Melchior and Christian. What
a joy it is to meet the guides again after a year of
absence! There stand their dark figures, the
weather-beaten faces lit up with honest pleasure, as
they shake hands with their well-known Herren.
Our first " plan " was, that the G. C. P. and G. L. F.
should ascend the Bliimlis-alp, with Christian and
with Melchior. In royal glee—damped only by
thoughts of the G. L. P.—we started for the
Gemmi, intending to pass to Kandersteg. We
were joyous, frolicsome, happy. My melancholy
temperament was uplifted by the youthful spirits
of the sportive Little Ones, and by the great
rapture of beginning the year's mountaineering.
We had a programme and plans—and splendid
weather. The moon, too, was nearly at the full.
At Leukerbad, Melchior proposed that we should
take the Balmhorn on the way. He had been the
first to ascend it, and he praised it highly as a very
charming second- class mountain, presenting great
variety of work, and yielding a noble view. We
assented. It was only putting off the Bliimlis-alp
I 2116 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

for a day. All of us could attempt the Balmhorn.
My two Winchester friends had Nageli with them
as guide—a good guide, and a very pleasant, intel-
ligent fellow. We were to sleep at the Schwaren-
bach and to start about three in the morning.
All right, Melchior! We will do the Balmhorn.
Tell us about your first ascent of it ?

The height of the Balmhorn is something under
13,000 feet—about, I believe, 12,600; but I have
not a reference at hand, and I neglected to measure
the height in my own way.

Here, I beg leave to interpolate a little bit of
useful science.

Some mountaineers are morbidly anxious to as-
certain, by personal experiment, the exact height
of the mountain upon which they stand. They
distrust the Federal map, and scorn existing
measurements. To serve their private ends, they
carry, sometimes, an implement which superficially
resembles a watch, and which is called (I believe)
an aneroid. I myself never possessed one of these
amusing instruments. When I have desired to
ascertain, accurately, the altitude of my mountain,
I have had recourse to the following system, which
I here record for the benefit of mountaineers
generally. The plan which I recommend is this:—
extend a cobweb from the head of your ice-axe
(your compass would do as well) to the star Argol,The Alps in Sadness.

ii 7

in the constellation Taurus ; this will give you the
parallax. Then multiply the square of the distance
by its own inverse ratio, and you get the mean de-
clension from the right latitude of East Greenwich.
. Care must be taken, while you are multiplying,
that the cobweb does not break. Glacial disturb-
ance and personal equation must be scrupulously
allowed for; and, if you have taken all the steps
correctly, the hypothenuse of the angles will give
you infallibly the exact elevation of the mountain.
I consider my system to be more simple and
scientific than the ordinary plan ; and it is with a
modest pride that I introduce my discovery to the
notice of the scientific world. There it will, I know,
be carefully and impartially considered; and 1
anticipate for it (allowing for a little natural
jealousy) the recognition which it merits. I have
always, I may add, been of opinion that Alpine
climbing tends strongly to develope one's scientific
proclivities. I can thankfully record that I have
found it to be so in my own case.

We slept, after a merry dinner, at the rude
little Schwarenbach inn ; and were called, early, for
the first time in the year, in the well-remembered
Alpine way, the next morning. I looked with the
interest of memory at my sleepy friends, at the
dark huge guides; and I consumed, with melan-
choly pleasure, the cheerless, uneatable breakfast8118 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

" As of old, the curlews call." The Schwarenbach
awakening recalled many a previous experience;
and I liked it. All ready!—no—some one has, of
course, forgotten something. Every one sullen and
disinclined to help the unfortunate. Great delay in
consequence. Some sulkiness and much silence
the prevailing characteristics. The R. P. P. and
G. L. F. light pipes, and some one laughs. Then
good-humour returns, and we start cheerfully, though
not noisily. The day is August the 6th, 1873.

After following the path for a little time, the
dark group, led by Melchior, turns off abruptly to
the right. On our left is the cold bulk of my old
friend Altels (which hides the Balmhorn from the
Schwarenbach), and Christian reminds me of our
stormy ascent. To the right is the dark block of
the rocky Rinderhorn. We begin to traverse a
cascade of fallen and frozen rock boulders; loose,
sharp, insecure—annoying. These last for some
time. Passing the first lateral moraine, you get
upon the hard, frozen glacier—our first glacier of
the year, remember!—and it is joy to all of us to
crunch and ring over its iron ridgy1 surface. Old
joys return to thought. Can it be a whole year
since I trod a glacier ? G. C. P. smiles as he walks
springily across the steelly ice. It is early yet, and
is rather cold; but the day will be splendid.
Christian and Melchior agree about that, and NageliThe Alps in Sadness.

119

confirms them with effusion. We miss the G. L. P.
We repeat his sayings, and recall his cheerful ways;
and so, chatting and laughing, we attain to the
seracs.

Seracs are always a little difficult, especially
when you traverse a thin, wavy snow-ridge, with
crevasses on either side of the sharp edge; but we
overcame those on the Balmhorn successfully.
Next came rather long and rather steep slopes of
nevt. The sun had not yet risen, and the snow was
grey in the cold light of early morning. It was
also very hard ; and, so soon as the slope became
somewhat straight up, we had to cut little notches,
for steps, with the ice-axes. The place was too
steep for talking, but we were going well, and, in
fair time, we attained to the long rock arete—and
there we found the sun! This arite, though
somewhat long, is, by comparison—for instance
with that on the Wetterhorn—easy. Where the
rocks end we halted to refresh, and to bask. The
view was already fine, and the morning was super-
lative. Here M.D. No. 2 became very unwell.
He had for some time been going in difficulty owing
to an attack of neuralgia; and we had to leave
him on a nice place on the rocks, under the care of
Nageli, while the reduced party went on to the
summit.

A short snow level; then snow slopes, growing120 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

steeper as we got upon the edge of an arete below
the summit. There it is—there is the top !—and
on we go merrily. More step-cutting here. We
work fast, but when we get to the top, we find that
it is not the top. There are two tops. The true
top is masked by a false top. We are on the latter,
and see before us a longish descent, and then a
longer upward climb. Melchior laughs, and asks
us which top it is to be ? The question is, of
course, merely playful; and after a short rest of
disappointment, on we go. Melchior states, by the
way, that he had led us up by exactly the same
line of ascent as that which he had adopted when
first he scaled the Balmhorn with Mr. Horace
Walker. This fine guide had hit the best route on
the first occasion.

A last struggle, and a stoppage. We are on
the summit of the Balmhorn; and we sit down on
sparkling snow in a merry group, to refresh, to
smoke, and to enjoy the view.

The G. L. P., who, in addition to his unique
talent for making "cup," is, generally, a magnificent
caterer, being unhappily absent, I had wished to
bring forward the G. C. P., and had entrusted to him
the task of selecting provisions. The result was
miserable failure ; and I openly arraign him at the
bar of history for his sadly imperfect performance
of this important duty. The food we had wasThe A Ips in Sadness.

121

wretched. The Control Department could not
have done worse for us. He had even forgotten
the champagne!—but Christian, who well knew
my ways and wants, had privily remedied this cruel
oversight; and we had a bottle—thanks to him,
and not to the G. C. P.—for our summit. There
was no chicken jam, no honey, no butter ; but there
were the mowzled blobs, mumbled by a toothless
old lion, of ragged, tough, indescribable bad meat;
there was sour bread as dry as the desert; there
was cheese as coarse as burlesque acting. In
short, there was everything that is detestable, and
nothing that is desirable in the way of mountain
food. A vote of censure, and a motion of want of
future confidence, were rapidly carried; and, with
looks of disgust at the G. C. P., we moodily chewed
our uneatable provender. He, seemed hopefully
penitent. Should I give him another chance ?—I
thought. Alas ! I was not fated to have another
chance to give ! We look but a little way into
futurity, and I did not foresee what was to come
that day. Whymper writes of the bivouac of the
night before the fatal Matterhorn accident,—
" The cliffs above echoed with our laughter, for we
were happy that night in camp, and feared no evil."
t feared no evil. I was happy, and even hilarious,
on the sun-bright, snowy summit of the Balmhorn.

I have seen the Alps under many aspects. I122 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

have looked from peaks upon wildly working storm,
on snow, and hail, and mist, and tempest; I have
seen the dull grey of lowering cloud-forms; and I
have felt wind, and cold, and wet; I have also
seen sun and splendour; but I never stood upon
any summit on a day so perfect in its glory as
that upon which I looked around me from the
Balmhorn.

It was the first ascent, too, of the year; and I
projected many more. Little did I then think that
the Balmhorn was to be^my Pisgah of 1873, the
point from which I should gaze upon a Promised
Land which yet I should never enter!

However, the evil has not yet arrived. Let us
glance round from the snow perch upon which we
sit in joy.

There is not a cloud in all the heaven. The utter
calm is sumptuous in its light and colour, in its
splendour and its glory. There is not the love-sigh
of a zephyr; there is not a suggestion of even heat
mist; there is not a suspicion of chill. Aerial dis-
tance, of course, there is; but the sky above is blue
and tender, and the sun shines over all with an in-
tensity of clear, brilliant force which uplifts every-
thing into an influence of divinely regal joy. The
Alps look happy, kindly. Such a scene is so far
removed from our life of every day, from all
familiar experience, is so unreal in its goldenlyThe A Ips in Sadness.

123

Arctic romance, that the place becomes an ideal
and existence a phantasm. Close to us, on the left,
is the sharp point of Altels ; next to him, but far-
ther off, is the proud, sullen bulk of the dark-
striped Bietschhorn. The G. C. P. hums " King
Stephen was a worthy peer," as he gazes, with
eyes of knowledge, upon the loose, crumbling rocks
of its wearisome arete.

To the extreme right, far behind the Rinderhorn,
is our grand white old friend, Mont Blanc.
Between the Bietschhorn and Mont Blanc stretches
the whole range of the Pennines. The rocky
Rothhorn—G. C. P. looks at it with speculation in
his eyes—seems to be craning over viciously as if
he were shaking off some one from his crest;
Matterhorn looks like the one malicious dark tooth
of a gigantesque Cyclops. The Gabelhorn is
standing upright, at attention. The Twins look
like two plump pretty little children, kneeling down
in smooth white night-caps to say their prayers.
The fair Weisshorn stands loftily apart, as the
White Doe of Rylstone would among a herd of
ordinary deer. The Dent Blanche, which this
year I had meant to do, soars superb. Oh, Dent
Blanche! Dent Blanche! "by the measure of my
grief, I leave thy greatness to be guessed." Back-
ward on our left is a glimpse of the dark Ober-
land, with a suggestion of the Jungfrau,124 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

Finsteraarhorn, Schreckhorn, Monch, Eiger, and
others of that stately band of chieftains. But how
catalogue ? Why give a mere list of the forms and
points which compose the "lofty line" of the
noble Pennine sweep ? After distinguishing the
great heroes of history, the mind, awed by the
grandeur of the whole, begins to lump the vastness
of mass and of detail. As I gaze, with eye sweep-
ing slowly round from right to left, I cease, in my
own thought, to name or number mountains. The
grand impress of the huge multitude, of the totality
of such a scene, sinks into the deeply stirred, re-
ceptive imagination, which is divinely distended
with a capacity for loftiest delight. Sun-flushed
and flooded stand the silent hills, all basking in the
radiant smile of God. Just below us, in front, are
some low green hills, sheltering a bright, soft, little
silver stream-threaded mountain valley; their
grassy-green is glorious with the blaze of sunshine,
and their gentle hollows are dusk with purple
velvet.

Such is a faint, weak, word suggestion of the fair
scene upon which three happy friends gazed in that
happy hour from the Balmhorn. Over everything
was that broad outpouring of the godlike golden
splendour of that stainless summer sun. All was
peace ; the giant mountains were robbed of the idea
of terror: their cold snows were warm with heavenlyThe Alps in Sadness.	125

love. Grandeur—a grandeur that never leaves
them—was visible to the inner eye ; but the spec-
tacle was that of the noble Alps in their most
perfect beauty. We lolled and looked, and smoked,
and chatted. The snow on our own summit
sparkled gaily in the glad sunshine. Melchior and
Christian agreed that they had never seen a clearer
view in the Alps. " Was not the Balmhorn worth
doing ? " asked Melchior triumphantly. He went
on—" Look there—just there—behind that third
peak to the left; you can just see a bit of the
Bliimlis-alp. You two will get to Kandersteg
to-morrow, and the next morning will do him!—
after that to Zermatt for the Dent Blanche and the
Matterhorn. But come ; we must go from here.
That gentleman down there on the rocks will be
getting impatient."

We finish our pipes, stand up, and take that long
last look round which precedes quitting such a scene
The sun is dazzling, as we turn round to start
With a sigh, we sort ourselves into our places on
the rope, and then moving footsteps crush the soft
snow upon the cross-marked peak.

We then began the descent of the Balmhorn.
Our party consisted of the Public Purse, the G. C. P.,
and myself; the guides were Melchior and Christian.
Melchior was last on the rope ; I was the last but
one. Christian was immediately in front of me.126 A Ipine A scents and A dventures*

We were descending a steep and sunny snow-slope,
treading near, and a little below, a sharpish arete-
like edge of snow. All went happily. The snow
was in fair order, and we were going pretty fast.
Each man, of course, trod in the steps of the man
who preceded him ; and the line of steps was a
little lower down than the line of steps by which
we had ascended. I was talking to Melchior when,
quite suddenly, the snow steps below me gave way
as if they had been of tissue paper, and, in an
instant, I fell through backwards.

According to regulation, all the occurrences of
my past life should. I believe, have presented them-
selves to my mind in a vivid flash ; while a succinct
summary of the Pelagian controversy, with all the
arguments pro and cony ought to have neatly
exhausted itself in my intellect.

Nothing of the kind occurred. The moment that
I fell, I knew, instantaneously, by Alpine instinct,
the manner of thing into which I was falling. I just
managed to glance downwards, and as the swift mind
took in the keen knowledge of a great crevasse, I
struck heavily upon a jutting crag of ice, ten or twelve
feet down, and found that I was lying upon it in a
curiously doubled-up fashion, with Melchior by and
half upon me. I then looked down below—a grisly
glance! For hundreds of feet beneath us descended
the dimly white void, and cold bluish depths of aThe Alps in Sadness.	127

great ice crevasse. It was a crevasse of the worst
sort, one of those that "hide their guilty front with
innocent snow," its wide mouth, yawning for de-
struction, being concealed by a treacherous white
mask of fresh fallen snow. Our fall—both fell at
the same instant—had been arrested, just at the
limits of the rope, by a projecting spur of hard sharp
ice.

Looking upward, so soon as I could do so for the
blinding snow and ice which fell with us, I saw a
tolerably wide opening to the great abyss, and,
behind that, the far and dark blue sky. On both
sides were dark, smooth, glazed walls of ice, up
which we should have to climb, somehow. I had
fallen head downwards, and one leg was curiously
twisted and doubled under the body.

It is, by the way, a very startling sensation, when
the ground on which you tread unexpectedly caves
in, and you fall swiftly, through darkness, until you
are suddenly stopped by the sharp shock of a heavy
blow from iron ice.

"How are you, Melchior—all right?" I asked, so
soon as I had thoroughly finished my fall. " All
right, Herr," responded the superincumbent guide ;
"but you must get up. We must make haste out of
this. This bit of ice won't hold us for a moment;
and when it goes we shall both be hanging on the
rope. Make haste!" I saw him looking down while128 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

he spoke. Utterly convinced by Melk's reasonings,
which entirely coincided with my own impressions,
I scrambled hastily on to my feet, and attempted
desperately to scratch up the ten feet of smooth,
shining, glassy, heartless ice-wall. Melchior put a
hand under one of my feet, and shouted loudly to
Christian. We could not see anything of our com-
panions, but we knew that they would do all that
was right. Christian heard. The rope tautened,
and I struggled furiously up the green, slippery
smoothness. I got one hand on to the edge;
Christian, lying on his face, crawled cautiously
towards it, and gripped it in his sinewy grasp. Up
I got—into the blessed daylight!—and turned
round to help Melchior. I made another on the
rope, and we had then power enough to pull up
one man, even with his whole weight depending on
the rope. Just as I began to haul, the lump of ice
on which we had stood dropped away with a sharp,
sudden crack, and fell, bellowing, booming, crashing,
and thundering into the sullenly reverberating
hollows of deep and cruel crevasse. Now—a good
pull, all!—and up comes dark Melchior out of the
mouth of the abyss, and stands amongst us, a living
man. The others were all lying on their faces on
the slope, with ice-axes driven deep into the neve,
and holding fast to rope and ground. It was
pleasant to see their faces again, as they uprose toThe AIps in Sadness.	129

their feet and greeted those who had returned to
daylight and the upper air. Shaking ourselves free
from snow, we fell into our places, and laughingly
resumed the steeply downward march.

Strange!—I can't walk. Left leg is all right, and
works as usual ; but through the knee of the other
darts a sharpest shoot of keen pain, and it seems to
refuse its office. I had to call a halt, the pain was
so intense. The leg cannot be broken, we think,
as, if it were, I could not move it at all. Below
us is the rock aretey and there we can rest and
examine the knee ; but down to those rocks, dark
and sun-burnished, lying deep below us, we must
go. Nerving myself for work through pain, I go
down the steep shelve of snow, and at last reach
the rocks. Selecting a smooth slab, I lie down upon
it, and a surgical committee of laymen proceeds to
inspect the injury. Nothing broken, so far as we
can detect; but,apart from that, everything wrong,
as I feel. Melchior fills a handkerchief with snow,
and ties it round the knee. He then suggests some
champagne and snow, and I find this well-known
mixture very good indeed.

I must get down, and without help, somehow.
We start again. We traverse the arete of burning
rocks, and begin to descend the long slopes of neve.
On these you must tread heel downwards in the
deep steps, and this mode of progress hurt me very

K130 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

much. Will is a great thing. I determined,
knowing that I must get down, to do so without
troubling others, and I kept the pace, and the
peace, and restrained all groanings and howlings.
I hardly know now how I did it; but without a
hand I threaded the seracs, descended the moraine
and the glacier, and attained to the cascade of
broken rock-lumps, which forms so pleasing a ter-
mination to this descent. On the grass slopes
above the Schwarenbach we rested for a pipe. The
afternoon was calm and sunny. So soon as we
got upon anything like level ground, I could not
walk without help; and supported by Melk, and
by the G. C. P., I hobbled, dead lame, into the inn.
We had occupied about five hours in the descent.
I had worked, after the fall, in really frightful pain;
and even now, I can hardly understand how I
managed, by sheer force of will, to keep my place
on the rope during the whole of such a descent
from a mountain.

After a sleepless night, I woke (this is an Irishism)
at the Schwarenbach. I was in hideous pain, and
as I could scarcely stand, I did not go up the
Bliimlis-alp with the G. C. P. I went down instead
to Leukerbad, the guides carrying me in a chaise-a-
porteurs. My Little Ones walked by the litter of
the unfortunate, and beguiled the way with story
and with song. I had often watched these chaises-The A Ips in Sadness.	131

a-porteurs and their contents with some amusement.
I then little thought that I should ever become
the inmate of a TragsesseL A few days before, I had
met one of these machines carrying a gaunt lady
of mature age. Her head was surmounted by a
round dead-leaf coloured hat, tied on with broad
brown strings. The brim sloped downwards all
round, forming a head-gear, sensible, perhaps, but
certainly ugly. Her face, which expressed care
and anxiety, was gemmed with large dark spec-
tacles, the glasses of which went round the corners.
The nose, round and reddish, the mouth like a
wooden O, formed two dark dots in the face, which
was turned sideways towards us as she passed.
Brown gloves, with fingers of superfluous length,
clasped the ends of the handrails; and bulgy cloth
boots, with the toes pointing outwards, swayed to
and fro upon the little ledge for the feet. The
whole costume was plain, limp, and dead in colour.
The apparition had struck me as possessing a
resemblance to those libellous images of Guy
Fawkes which, boy-supported, traverse the streets
of London on the 5th of November of each year.
I had smiled as the ripely meagre lady had been
shaken along in passing ; and yet here was I, also
a suggestion of the Gunpowder Plot hero, being
carried, lame and damaged, down the steep ways
of the Gemmi to the Baths of Leuk. Arrived
K 2132 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

there, a doctor was at once sent for. The knee
was so swollen that he could not examine
damages, so he ordered me to bed, and sent in a
kind of hospital attendant who was to apply leeches
at once. Drink, pretty creatures, drink ! Then
came the diagnosis—to wit, a severe contusion and
strain of right knee, piece of bone knocked in,
tendon dislocated, ligaments broken, &c., &c.
Remedies—bandages, certain medicaments ; Time
and Rest I like that! Time, when you have
only a month for the Alps : Rest, when you want
to climb them !

Well, there I was, laid up in the hotel at Leuker-
bad, and likely to remain there, as I was assured,
for some time. So soon as I heard this, I insisted
peremptorily, upon sending away my Little Ones.
They, in their kindliness, would gladly have re-
mained to cheer the sad hours of their crippled
Fawn; but the weather was magnificent, the
mountains were in first-rate order, and I simply
could not bear the idea that they should sacrifice or
inj ure their Alpine holiday. I therefore drove them
from me. They went unwillingly. Where," as an
M.D. plaintively asked, " where, amid the Fauna
of the Alps, should they find another Fawn ?"
They started sorrowfully; for they were pained
to see me lying helplessly there in weary suffering;
but they went, and I began that life which bringsThe Alps in Sadness.

133

into prominence the fact that you are alone. I
missed them very much. Their innocent gambols
amused, their artless prattle diverted me from the
burden of sad thoughts ; but it would have been
selfish to have wished to detain them, and I saw
the door close after them as they went away, in
health, to Alpine life and joy.

I knew no one in the hotel, and could not, of
course, as I could not move, make acquaintances.
The host, out of consideration for my condition, had
been kind enough to give me a little room on the
ground floor: and this little deep and narrow
room was, for a time, to be my prison and my
world.

It was a room with blank, patternless walls, that
gave it the character of a white-washed cell. It
had in one corner a little bed, and it contained a
faded red sofa. It faced the sun of day, and, there-
fore, had outside blinds to exclude the glare and
heat. The weather was splendid—sun-bright, still,
but very hot.

I had no friend or companions; I had no books.
The feeling of being alone began to grow intense.
How I missed the familiar laces and the pleasant
voices of those who—not without pitying thoughts
of my sick-room—were then entering upon moun-
tain joys! I thought of them intensely, and re-
called all the pleasant incidents of the outward134 tyine A scents and A. dventures.

journey; I thought, sadly, of the interrupted pro-
jects for our joint work. The G. C. P. had gone
to do the Rothhorn; the M.D.'s would rejoin him
after that feat should have been performed.
Melchior, Christian, Nageli, were with them. I
thought of all the group of figures, and then I felt
again very much alone. The images of the ascents
I should have made tortured my morbid thought.
I was in pain ; irritable, feverish, and alone. Then
began a time of sick fancies. The ceiling was
crossed and seamed by wavy lines, resembling,
somewhat, rivers on a map. These caught my
wandering attention, and, as I lay and watched
them, I remembered how once, when a school-boy,
I had been ill, kept apart in a small white room,
and had then traced out Niles and Mississippis on
that ceiling. The creeping hours of slow Time
were registered by the sun, who, as he declined to
his setting, marked his progress on the dial wall
by slowly crawling shadows. I watched these sun-
shadows through many a solitary, weary hour ; and
of the sun and of the shadows were born again sick
fancies.

This room was exposed to a plague of flies. At
first they maddened me, but, like Baron Trenck
with the spiders in his dungeon, I learned to sport
whimsically with my fly visitors. I tried experi-
ments to see how long I could bear, without mov-The Alps in Sadness.

135

ing, a fly crawling down my nose ; and I improved,
with practice, in the valuable power of bearing this
nerve-irritating performance.

I thought, frequently, with a kind of stealthy
torture, upon former Alpine ascents ; and then,
again, I fancied, with sharp pain, what I might
have done this year but for the accident which
chained me down in this hated, hot, lonely, weary,
sick-room at Leukerbad. I derived no particular
comfort from reflecting that the thing might have
been worse. That which was fevered me with sick
fancies.

I could just see through my window a patch of
wavy outline of low limestone hills. When night
came, I could see a cluster of bright stars above
the dark and shadowy range. I could see, too, the
soft sheen of moonlight in the quiet sky; and, at
times, when a stray breeze went wandering by, I
could hear a rustle of leaves in the limes. There
was a seat under my window. In the cool of
evening people came and sat on it, and talked. I
heard much nonsense in various tongues. When
they talked more annoyingly than usual—amusing
persons seemed never to come there—I thought
how, if I could move, I should like to empty a jug
of water out of window over them. Sick fancies—
sick fancies!

Rhymes floated, like music from iEolian harps,136 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

fitfully through my brain. The lines came
once—

* * 44 When my light is low,

When the blood creeps, and the nerves prick
And tingle; and the heart is sick,

And all the wheels of Being slow,"

and the fine passage struck me as deeply, uncom-
fortably true.

I did not sleep o' nights, owing to pain; and I
learnt to watch for the first faint flushings of the <
coming day, lighting up with tints of colour the
wan grey of the stony wall of my cell. I
thought, of course, a great deal of literature.
Shakespeare's creatures, and Scott's characters,
came in a spectral troop ; but I saw them, as it
were, through blood-coloured glass. I was in a
fever, and in misery. All sorts and conditions of
authors and of books flitted in to visit and to worry.
I thought of old days upon the wide, great sea; of
many adventures, and of many incidents; but
nothing brought me calm or joy through those
long, long, lonely hours. Imogen and Di Vernon
came there once or twice, but I thought them
less gracious than of yore. Sick fancies—sick
fancies!

A wretched time ; a weary, woeful time.

My doctor came three times a day. My nurse
came every three or four hours to put on fresh ice-The A Ips in Sadness.

137

bandages; and he brought me the spare diet to
which I was reduced. What an incident, in such
days as mine were, is the clatter of a plate, the
clink of a spoon, when the meal, which breaks, at
least, monotony, comes in.

Gradually I began to grow intimate with my
nurse, old Joseph.

He was a man of about sixty, of a peasant type
and build. He was tall and gaunt. He had a
large, long, furrowed face; no beard or moustache ;
closely cropped iron-grey hair, and small, deeply-
set grey eyes. He was slightly marked with the
small-pox; his hard features were very irregular,
and his aspect was not, at first sight, prepossessing;
but I thought that, when I could see them, I could
detect worth and kindliness in the little eyes, and
honesty in the rough voice. We soon became great
friends.

He used to sit in my room in the twilight, and
in the soft, dark, starry night, until the doctor paid
his last visit at about ten, and during these hours
I had long talks with old Joseph.

Joseph was about sixty, a widower, who did not
purpose, as he remarked modestly, to marry again.
He had five children, the eldest now porter at a
well-known hotel. He described the loss of his
wife as a heavy sorrow to him. He had been born
in Leukerbad, and had always lived there. He had138 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

a little property, and was a small farmer, having
also been a smith. He, was not at all rich, but was
quite contented :—" Oh yes, thank God, there are
many worse off than I am!" He was always selected
by the doctor as an attendant upon the sick ; and,
during the winter, when there was no doctor in
Leukerbad, he was often called in to help when
illness occurred. " It is not everybody that can
nurse," said Joseph, with quiet complacency; "it
is a gift that must be born with people, and it is
born with me ; I like it" He told me what the
place was like in winter, and described the poorer
life in Leukerbad. "If any one is taken ill here,"
said Joseph, "we all help. We take it in turns to
nurse and watch. If any one has a loss, his neigh-
bours help as they can. If a journeyman falls ill
here, and is without a penny, he need not fear.
People will lodge him, and feed him and nurse him,
as best they may, until he can go further. Of
course they will." Some of Joseph's remarks
about women were quaint; and the man had a
deep simple piety in his honest nature. " People
tell me," quoth Joseph sententiously, "about
Nature, and about Nature having made all our
mountains; but I tell them, Nature may be all
very well, but that, somehow, there's God behind
Nature." " Gehorsam" remarked Joseph solemnly,
" obedience is one of the best things in life.The Alps in Sadness.

139

People ought to obey those who know better than
they do; just as I obey the doctor. They are
much happier when they do so, and society gets on
much better."

In speaking of women Joseph rose to a calm
elevation of dogmatism : he said, for instance, " A
woman is never happy, or useful either, unless she
is well kept under by some one that knows better
than she does. Give them too much of their own
way, and women are generally at some mischief or
other, making themselves or other people unhappy.
I've always noticed that. I made my poor wife
useful and happy too. In fact, I made her what
she was. Poor thing !"

So this simple theologian and moralist argued ;
and his talk, after I had grown to know him, and to
gain his confidence—which I soon did—interested me
through my otherwise lonely twilights inLeukerbad.
I can see his heavy figure now, sitting by the window,
with hands clasped upon his knees, as he turned
his rough, lined, honest old face towards the sick
Herr, lying in the white bed in the shadowy
corner.

At last I could not bear Leukerbad and solitary
confinement any longer. My cell became literally
unendurable; as life lost its savour, the very
tobacco lost all flavour. How long did I lie there ?
I do not at all know. Such periods are not to be140 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

measured by hours 01* by days. By true time I
may have lain there a year, but the actual time was,
probably, rather less. I was becoming light-headed
from lonely misery, and I determined to get some-
how to Zermatt, where I knew that I should find
friends. I was told that I could not possibly
move; but I knew that, to will, all things are pos-
sible. I overcame all opposition, and at five, one
fine joyous morning, I found myself, surgically
bandaged, with a store of iodine and lead, and with
a plank on which to rest the injured leg, driving
gaily away from Leukerbad. " Bring forth my
fiery, untamed one-horse chay !" " Hurrah, hurrah
for the road ! " Joseph wanted to accompany me
to Zermatt, but I would not take the old man so
far away from home. He insisted, however, on
accompanying me, gratis, to the Rhone valley, to
see how I got on, and appeared attired for the
purpose in his Sunday clothes. His gaunt figure
was covered with a long black coat, and a yellow
waistcoat, both much too large; and he wore a
hard, heavy, very tall black hat—I hardly knew
him. On, coachman, merrily! crack the whip, and
drive fast down the winding road, overlooking the
Dead Sea Valley of the Rhone, and Sion's
picturesque and heavy mediaeval tower. Gently
through the stony streets of the village, where it is
defended that one trots under pain of several francs.The Alps in Sadness.

141

Past the dusty vineyards, and the white-walled
farms. Here is the valley—stop at Turtmann for
a bait—on again, bravely and merrily,—and here is
Visp, and we halt for lunch.

"Good-bye, Joseph! Yes—you can easily get
back by the diligence, I know. I am all the better
for the move, old boy! Thank you, old Joseph,
thank you! No—the Herr won't forget you.
Good-bye—God bless you ! " And so I parted, in
all human kindliness, from my worthy, rough-
looking old nurse ; and, thank God! I have quitted
Leukerbad—I hope never again to see the hated
place!

Zermatt! dear old Zermatt! There I am again.
And here are friends. " Never alone appear the
Immortals." There is the agile grace o 1 Antinous
Redwall; there the manlier majesty of Columbus
Fitz-Loftus; and there are my own G. C. P. and
my two M.D.'s. I am received with acclaim of
kindly welcome and sympathy. Sick fancies cease,
and, apart from my special damage, I feel better
the moment I am once again among friends. The
Seilers are very kind to me. By the way, it was
fortunate that the accident happened to me instead
of to Melchior. Such an injury would have wholly
stopped a guide, during his harvest-time, from
bread-winning.

I find that the G. C. P. has, working with Melk142 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

and with Christian, crossed the Rothhorn, from the
Zinal hut to Seller's Hotel, in Zermatt, in nine
hours—a performance with which I am more than
satisfied.

I am not a theologian ; but if I were I should, I
think, gently complain of Providence for not having
provided mountains sufficiently difficult to give
trouble to the G. C. P.

The weather is quite ideal in its steadfast fine-
ness. It is, I am told, leap-year with the chamois.
The mountains generally, and especially the
Matterhorn, are, says Melchior, easier than he had
ever known them—and I am a cripple !

I still entertain sanguine hopes of managing to
do, somehow, the Dent Blanche and Matterhorn.
The G. L. P. arrives, much improved ; and the two
invalids, accompanied by the G. L. D., go up
together, on horses, to the Riffel; where we find
Antinous, Columbus, and a host of friends.

One morning I was shocked by a discovery
accidentally made in connexion with Antinous.
His young and plastic mind, misled by false ideals,
had actually opened itself to Scrowger ideas in
connexion with mountains.

Fortunately I was at hand ; and by adopting
promptly the necessary means, I, Philippa-like,
sucked the poison from the wound, and cured him.
It was beautiful to see him, when he realized theThe Alps in Sadness.	143

danger and disgrace which he had thoughtlessly
risked, hanging his graceful head like that of a tall
tiger-lily overweighted with dew. Thank heaven,
he was saved ! He returned ingenuously to the
true and noble faith of Norman Franklin.

Antinous, Columbus, the G. L. D. (or Good Lay
Doctor), the G. L. P., and the G. L. F., formed a
pleasant little coterie, supplemented by outsiders.
One little gentleman, a pimply, wheezy creature,
with a thin, shrill voice, an entire outsider, attached
himself pertinaciously to me. There was a singular
and horrible little neatness about this little man.
He was one of those men of science who clarify
ignorance into precision. He must have had a kind
heart, because he was so fond of himself. He was,
in his usual great-coat, like a lump of ice in a
blanket. His ideas trickled out slowly, like a
weakly spring in a sandy soil; and the small flow
was nearly soaked up by the dust. He was so tidy
that he would have liked to sweep the snow on the
mountains every morning with a carpet-broom.
If he had met an archangel he would have tried
to smooth the creature's plumes with a hat-
brush.

There was the usual group of tourists in puggrees,
looking like undertakers at the funeral of an infant,
and suggesting Wimbledon and the row of targets
which resemble a series of aces of clubs. There was144 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

a little love affair, much opposed by elders, pro-
gressing secretly under my eyes. I did all I could
—didn't I, Bonnibel ? Do you remember how your
soft grey eyes looked " thanks" to me when I
arranged that little party to the glacier ? Do you
remember how I quieted the hesitation of the elders
with my Alpine assurance of safety ; and how you
went, with proper guides and guardianship—and
with Charles—on to the glacier, and enjoyed your-
self so much ? Charles went " funnily," did he ?
Ah, missy, you shall relish him more in the lover
than in the mountaineer.

Type of the transient in human life, the guests at
the hotel shift and change every day. Men may
come, and men may go ; but the ebb and flow of
guests go on for ever—during the season. Every
day parties come, and parties go ; there are de-
partures and arrivals. Acquaintances leave, stran-
gers arrive—a rapidly shifting population of hurried
tourists. Our little party remains together for
some time; we become ancients of the days.
Antinous and Columbus remain at the Riffel when
we depart.

The Riffel Hotel is 8000 feet high, and the air is
keen and strong—tonic with the cold of glaciers,
strong from the embrace of mountains. Columbus
was the king of the hostelry, and put his own
cheerfulness and spirit into everything. Oh, whatThe Alps in Sadness.	145

merry evenings we had in his corner room ! The
G. L. P. and myself hopped about piteously, like
two sparrows. Antinous wanted to do Rothhorn
and the Morning pass; the G. C. P. contemplated
the Matterhorn; and around the two invalids
seethed the stir of full Alpine enterprise. Ah, it
is bitter to a mountaineer to be compelled to sit,
crippled, at the foot of a hill, which he otherwise
could and would ascend, and to see other men
going up it! My special list for 1873 had been
Dent Blanche, Aiguille Verte, Matterhorn, Shreck-
horn ; and all this programme shrivelled up into the
Balmhorn ! As the philoprogenitive feelings of a
parent are much concentrated upon an only child,
so I linger lovingly over my one peak for 1873 ;
but I found mountains unbearable when I could
only look and long, and could not climb them. I
could not look at happiness through other—
mountaineers'—eyes; and, when the G. L. P.
announced his intention of going home, I resolved
to leave the Riffel with him. The two lame ones
rode down together. I had had, for the first time,
an experience of the Alps as seen through my own
inner sadness.

As you sit before the Riffel Hotel you have, on
both sides, royal ranges of the mightiest mountains;
but the jewel of the bracelet is the most distinctive
of all mountains—the unique Matterhorn. This

L146 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

rare peak does not form a portion of any group or
range. It stands wholly alone. Its base is
muffled with a stand of glacier and of snow, from
out of which it soars ; but its quaint and awful
form narrows up to its roof-shelving point in
wholly solitary grandeur. No other mountain
exercises a fascination so gloomy and so powerful
over the imagination. One never tires of gazing
at it. Coming out into the open air in the morning*
one looks, first and long, at the Matterhorn; going in
at night one looks, last and long, at the mystery of its
awful form standing duskily out, a deeper darkness
on the ebon wings of night. Sometimes a cloud
streams outward from its summit, as if the mountain
were a volcano. It is not, perhaps, the most difficult
of mountains to climb ; but no mountain looks so
hopelessly steep and inaccessible. It is easy to
understand how, for long years, superstition and
terror exaggerated its dangers, and deterred men
from its horrent summit. I never see the Matter-
horn without thinking with admiration of the
deadly persistence with which Whymper pursued
its peak, through years of danger, of discourage-
ment, of difficulties which would have daunted
most men, until, amid triumph blent with sorrow,
his foot was the first to press the summit which had
so long defied so many. Whymper's perseverance
was patient as a vendetta, determined as a Destiny.The Alps in Sadness.	147

In spite of the dangers of the mountain itself—
dangers great in fact, if exaggerated in fancy; in
spite of the terrors and treachery of guides; in
spite of a serious fall, Whymper, with most
resolute English pluck, went on, year after year,
trying the dreaded Matterhorn, first on one side,
and then on the other, until, at last, he knew the
rapture of victory. All honour to the first as-
cender of the great spectre mount!

The Alpine club has done a notable piece of
work, has performed a great achievement, in human
history. Consider only the light in which the Alps
were regarded by men before the Alpine Conquis-
tadores had vanquished them. Consider the way
in which those mountains are alluded to in litera-
ture before the Alpine Club made its first great
ascents. Look at the snow mountains, and, wiping
off from your mind the knowledge of what has been
done, try to realize to your own thought the light
in which you would regard them. They appear to
be awful, inaccessible, impregnable. Pointed peaks
soar loftily into the lowered heavens; chasms
yawn ; ridges intimidate; precipices frown; ice-
walls threaten; avalanches scourge. It would
seem quite impossible to climb them; the very
idea of ascending to those awful summits is surely
one of terror,—a terror from which the human
mind recoils. The first conquerors are indeed to
L 2148 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

be ranked with the first heroes of ocean discovery.
Columbus, Sebastian Cabot, Gama, are paralleled
by our Leslie Stephen, or Whymper. He who
gazed over a newly discovered ocean, standing

" Silent, upon a peak of Darien,"

felt not a deeper ecstasy than those who stood, for
the first time, gazing from the peaks, say, of the
Schreckhorn or the Matterhorn. "Perils/' says
Humboldt, "perils always exalt the poetry of life;"
and, to spirits of heroic daring, to spirits exalted
with the romance of adventure, there must have
been almost the same charm in conquering the
Alps that there was to the early maritime disco-
verers in sailing unknown seas to add new lands to
human knowledge. Ghostly Adamastor, the giant
and terrible apparition of the Cape of Storms,
blending his huge and awful shape with the whirl-
ing grey of the cloudy storm wreath which spanned
the space between the sea and sky, tried to daunt
the mariner;—and the early mountaineers had to
encounter those spectral spirits of the mountains
which sought to intimidate the first explorers.
As I have before said, the difference between those
early mountaineers and the men, their followers of
to-day, is like the difference between Columbus
and a Cunard Captain. The sea now presents the
same difficulties and dangers as it then presented;The Alps in Sadness.	149

but now we are familiar with them, the route is
known, the mariner is well practised and confident,
the ship is safer. Neither ignorance or supersti-
tion deter us now upon the ocean path. So with
the great mountains. Rocks, aretes, snow-slopes,
ice-walls, crevasses, precipices, are as difficult and
as dangerous now as they were when they first were
overcome ; but the route is known, the tools are
better, the great guides are familiar with the track.

Yes ; the first great climbers performed a great
and daring feat. Those awful and lofty parts of
nature, on which the foot of man had never trodden,
were by them shown to be accessible. They con-
quered, for humanity, terrible physical difficulties,
which had, for ages, been held insuperable ; and
they made the Alps subject to humanity. It was
a gain for mankind. Man, the king of created
things, had long been shut out from the ice-world
of peak and glacier. Those men conquered them
for man. An added sense of power was bestowed
upon the human mind when the first dauntless
mountaineers became lords of the hitherto uncon-
querable Alps. Humanity might be prouder when
those weird summits were brought into dominion
under man.

Zermatt once more. The G. L. P., still tended
by the Good Lay Doctor, leaves us for England.
G. C. P. wants to get to Chamounix to do my150 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

Aiguille Verte. My two brother M.D.'s yearn for
the Capua of Leman, and sigh for the flesh-pots of
Monnet. I accompany them to the lovely lake of
luxury. I tried in vain to find a doctor who would
enable me to do the Matterhorn. With a last
glance of sad despair, I turned my back upon the
mountains.

We begin in what we end. We commenced our
campaign at Geneva, and we conclude it on the
same lake. Once more the sharp prow clove
through the pellucid sapphire water. Where is
water anywhere so limpid as in Lake Leman ?
By the way, why do not water painters paint their
water wet ? On one side are the smiling green
vineyards, studded with white houses; on the
other are those picturesque hills of Savoy upon
which Gibbon so often looked. Over everything
is the loveliest of light and the softest of shade.
The sun shines brightly, and the glad air is light.
Fan-like, the watercourses—stern scars graved by
the savage winters down the green hill-sides—ray
outwards to the water's brink and brim. We
are soothed by the soft peace of the blue placid
waters.

One day the Good Lay Doctor, who returns to
us, takes us fishing. We cross the wide lake, and
the boat turns up the mouth of the little river
opposite Montreux. Where are we ? Why this is,The Alps in Sadness.	151

surely, a bit of our own old Thames!—here are reeds,
rushes, coots, alders, willows. The resemblance is
really surprising! Yet, towards evening all idea
of strong resemblance ceases. Look at the colour
on those evening hills ! Mont Velan glows in rose,
in orange and in purple hues. That is not Thames-
like. We rowed back, through the pale, purple
evening, across the lake, and saw the sullen lights
of Chillon sinking deep into the trembling water
stirred by the languid pulses of the oar.

At last comes the final dispersion of return. The
M.D.'s go to Vienna. I travel home with my G. C.
P., and we taste our first grouse as we dine together
in London.

I had this year, as in former years, been singularly
fortunate in my Alpine comrades. The G. L. P.,
bar his accident, remained unchanged. The G. C.
P., supreme in the mountain craft, the surest and
swiftest foot on ice or rock, was the same modest,
kindly, genial gentleman, always unselfish, cheerful,
courteous. My two brother M.D.'s are great
friends of his, and are worthy of him. Like to
like. In the cordial companionship of the Alps
manly friendship deepens and intensifies. Friends
who have been together once, want to go again
together to the land of glacier and of peak ; and in
1874 I hope to make up for the disaster and de-
privation of 1873.152 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

Some men are created with an inborn love of
those mighty, swan-plumaged mountains ; which,,
indeed, are known of their own. This latent innate
love, long dormant, lying hidden deeply in the'
nature, like Humboldt's youthful yearning towards
the tropics, is at length wedded by opportunity to
knowledge, and longing ripens into enthusiasm.
The fairy and the genie show the sleeping Badoura
to the vision of Camaralzaman, and the desire is
awakened which leads in time to happy union.
Then ensues a life-long and a death-deep love.
The Alps have, for their born worshipper, that
magic of charm which thrills us in the one, the only
woman, that we are created to adore. Does
familiarity lessen love ? Do repeated year by year
visits lower, in our constant eyes, the glory of
those majestic hills? I answer boldly—no! I
aver that knowledge deepens reverence, and inten-
sifies affection. How their colossal calm rebukes
and represses the restlessness even of him, the
victim of disaster, that yearns to climb them, but
that cannot try. It is one of their many grand quali-
ties to shame with their steadfast silence and enduring
peace the fret and fever of our little lives. We
catch from them something of their Godlike repose,
somewhat of their august and solemn grandeur.
Our lives are ennobled by their majesty, and forti-
fied by their stately beauty. They, they, the causeThe Alps in Sadness.

153

of my sorrow of this year—they teach me patience
under my affliction. They say, with their own grand
soundless voices, " Wait! wait another year ! We
shall wait, in our awful stillness, and in our ever-
lasting snows, for you—and beyond you." They
smile a stern adieu, softened by the rose-flush of
sunset upon their unchanging world of wonders, as
they whisper hope, and lift their "star-y-pointing
pyramids" to those kindly heavens which will
surely permit the mountain lover to climb next
year again unto their crests. Oh, Alps, farewell—
till then!MOUNTAINEERING WITH
LADIES.

"But when I see thee meek, and kind, and tender,

Heavens ! how desperately do I adore
Thy winning graces ! To be thy defender

I hotly burn—to be a Calidcre—

A very Red-cross Knight."—Keats.

NE afternoon, in the month of August, 1874,
I crossed a pass, and arrived in Zermatt.
Just as I reached the Monte-Rosa Hotel,
I met my old friend Fitzwalker Scoresby, who had
come down from the Dent Blanche. During table
d'hote we were separated, but the exchange of a
nod across the noisy table made it understood that
we should meet after dinner in the club-room of
Zermatt.

This club-room requires a word of description.
Opposite to Seiler's Hotel, separated from it by a
waste of large pebble-stones, is a long low wall,
surmounted by a broad flat coping-stone. This
street and this wall compose the Alpine club-room ;Mountaineering with Ladies. 155

and many a high and many a new mountain
expedition has been planned in this al-fresco club.
Empty cars, that ply between St. Nicholas and
Zermatt, are left with upraised shafts in the open
street; guides, porters, drivers, are sprinkled about
in chatty or silent groups ; and you may generally
see a knot of Alpine-Club men swinging their heels
against ,the low wall of the Zermatt club-room.

After dinner Fitzwalker Scoresby and I enter the
club-room, where we both perch ourselves on the
wall. After telling each other what peaks and
passes we had respectively done, after describing to
each other the weather we had had, Scoresby
slipped into a mood of introspective contemplation.
He has been mountaineering zealously for some
dozen years, and has done a great deal of first-class
work.

We gazed at the passing groups, looked upwards
at the clouds gathering round the Mischabel peaks,
drummed our heels, and smoked with quiet but
intense enjoyment.

At length Scoresby said, "Do you know, I've
had this year a new sort of experience. It's a very
unholy and heterodox feeling. I half hesitate to
tell you, for fear you should misjudge me."

" Go on, and fear not," I replied. " You are sure
of comprehension, and will find sympathy—if you
deserve it."156 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

"Well, then," said Scoresby, with an effort, "I
will confess that I detect in myself a growing re-
pugnance to getting up at one, two, or three in the
morning, in the dark and cold, to do mountains.
There !"

"Bad, very bad; an unhealthy symptom. You
are getting tired of the Alps, Scoresby ?"

"No, I am not!" cried Scoresby, with indignant
vehemence. " Nothing of the kind. The Alps are
like Shakespeare: the more you know of them,
the longer you study them, the deeper is your
love, the truer is your reverence. You're quite
wrong there. Excitement may be less, but
enthusiasm is more. No, Fawn, I love the Alps
better now than I did in the first year that I
climbed. Tired of the Alps, indeed! That's
nonsense."

" Don't be so warm, my dear fellow. I spoke
hastily, unadvisedly. But let me know what you
really do mean."

"Well, I'll go on," said Scoresby, "though you
don't deserve it, Fawn ; but having begun my con-
fession, I'll even make a clean breast of it.
Give me a light—thanks ! What I really do mean
is this : I love the glorious Alps as well, nay better
than ever; but I fancy that I begin to feel a cer-
tain weariness of the mechanism, of the routine, of
the mechanical part of mountaineering. You areMountaineering with Ladies. 157

such an enthusiast that you will hardly understand
me, eh ?"

"Yes, I do ; be comforted," I replied. " I see the
course of things, Scoresby : Ascension, culmination,
declension. And so from hour to hour we ripe and
ripe, and then we rot and rot; and thereby hangs
a tale. The very noblest human pursuits, say
writing or painting, are carried out through a cer-
tain mechanical process, which may in time
become wearisome, unless—"

" That'll do," interrupted my unhappy friend.
"You are better than I expected. To proceed. I
no longer like early rising ; I feel guides a certain
tie ; and I find one moraine as hateful as another;
one snow slope seems to me to resemble another
snow slope ; one ice-wall is like unto another ice-
wall ; and one difficult passage of rock-work differs
not essentially in glory from another difficult rock-
bit."

" I understand—more fully than you think for.
But now the court will be happy to hear you on
the guide point."

" I always work with Christian, as you know.
He is first-rate. I secure him from year to year
for a certain month or so ; but half a dozen other
fellows would be glad to get him. Well, then, you
see, I feel bound to be always hard at work, in
order that when we separate I may have to pay158 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

Christian so many hundred francs with a view to
acting fairly towards him—to paying him as much
as any other fellow would. You see that, Fawn ?"

" Thoroughly, Scoresby, and I am with you there.
We work on the same disagreeable principle. The
generous and ardent Lyvetete is always saying,—
4 Oh, to-day we must go up this, or that, for
Melchior's sake!' and I go; but don't always
quite like it. Sometimes I should like a day's
rest; sometimes I am in the contemplative, and not
the active, mood : but whatever the mood, whatever
the state of mind or muscles, work hard we must,
and do, unless the weather be too bad. I agree
with you in disliking the present system, and I
admit that I at times feel guides a tie—I don't
mean the men, but the system."

44 The worst of it is," observed Scoresby medita-
tively, " that anything which presses upon you as a
distasteful obligation becomes an object of dislike.
But to resume. I pass over that certain, or uncer-
tain, sameness in glacier and on rock, and I return
to my main grievance—that confounded early
rising! What an old dismal story it seems to be
the first time that you do it in the season ! This
year it happened to me first at the Montanvert
hovel. When we turned in, the pines looked out
ghostlily from the cold grey mist, and I composed
myself to try to sleep for a few hours, on a mise-Mountaineering with Ladies. 159

rable bed, in one of those gruesome squalid tanks
of red pinewood. Well, at two, heavy boots echoed
about the dismal passage ; a hollow knocking is
performed at my reverberating door, and a mis-
creant of a shock-headed porter stumps in with a
candle bearing a three-inch wick, and tells me, with
a raucously malicious voice emanating from out a
fiendish grin, that I must get up, and that break-
fast—you know that breakfast, Fawn !—is nearly
ready. I get up in a towering ill-temper, prin-
cipally with myself for being such a blessed fool,
and go to breakfast Oh, that meal! Well, never
mind that I issue. The great stars are all
throbbing, as if they had been let down nearer to
the earth—as they have been, or so it would appear
from the weather afterwards—and the moon shines
palely upon half the glacier, and on the hills that
skirt the lighted half. The half we have to traverse
is in deep cold shadow, and we start with a bestial
lantern looking like the inflamed single eye of a
Cyclops, and cross the Ponts in the dark. I tell
you, I was savage ! "

" Didn't you think of what was to come
after?"

" No ; I never, now, think of that until it comes.
I remember the time when I used thoroughly to
enjoy those gettings-up for their own sake—I
believe that you, Fawn, enjoy them now—and the] 6o Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

fact that I am losing my love for them proves that
the mechanism of climbing—I repeat the phrase-
begins to pall upon me."

"Think," pursued Scoresby, waxing eloquent,
" of the wretchedness of being wrenched out of your
jading rest, or turbulent unrest, in the dead waste
and middle of the rudely-fractured night, to emerge
drearily into cold darkness and depressing desola-
tion ! O Fawn, it gets too horrible ! "

" I look upon such trials, Scoresby, as parts of a
great whole. I own to a temporary dislike of the
mere rising and starting—I did not feel that once ;
but the after-day, when the sun comes out, when
you are surmounting snow or scaling rocks, or
triumphing on a peak with a pipe and with cham-
pagne, even yet repay me for the hateful ' rise/ I
certainly no longer enjoy the turning out for its
own sake."

" Have you had many night-breaking horrors
this year ? " asked Scoresby.

" Y-e-es, pretty well. Besides rising in hotels and
from huts, I have bivouacked on the Weisshorn and
the Rothhorn, and have passed a night of heavy
snow and howling storm in that cold grey cairn on
the Matterhorn." *

"That will do," responded Scoresby, with content.
u You have had so much recent experience that
you must have some sympathy. To sum up: IMountaineering with Ladies. 161

complain of the tie of guides—you agree; I
represent a certain sameness in working—and you
consider that that is overpaid by subsequent joys.
There we do not quite concur. I inveigh against
the atrocious early rising—and you point a sacred
finger upwards. It is clear that I am, and that you
are not, outgrowing the ecstasies of the mechanical
working. Now I want to know what I am to do to
renew my mountain youth."

" I'll tell you presently. Meanwhile I remark
that I am, perhaps, kept unnaturally young by
climbing with Lyvetete. . His ardour equals his
excellence. It may be, indeed, that his excellence
arises in part from his ardour; for certain it is that
he would never willingly rest a day, and that his
youthful enthusiasm for all parts of the great
whole remains quite undimmed. Possibly a sort of
mountain venesection keeps my by-flown youth in
perpetual renewal."

" Maybe," said Scoresby sullenly. " I work with
Humper, as you know,, and he is worse than I am,
a good deal. I think he does me harm."

" Bear in mind, my dear Scoresby/' said I
solemnly, " to what end your words point. You
indicate the end of all things—the absolute aban-
donment of mountaineering. The day on which
we turn our ice-axes with their faces to the wall
will have all the inexpressible pathos of the moment

M16 2 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

in which Sir Joshua Reynolds laid down his brush
for the last time. Let us take the labour and the
monotony in conjunction with the glory and the
joy. Let us not admit a crack within the lute ; let
us guard against that morbidezza of mind which
would rob us a moment before Time's time of our
blessed mountain delights ! "

"I know, of course," responded Scoresby, still
morosely, " that our will is more or less ours ; but
still—However, you said that you had some plan
for renewing my lost mountaineering youth and
freshness. What is that ?—let me hear what that
is!"

" I am about to unfold my plan ; but I must ask
if you are prepared to listen to a graphic narra-
tive."

"Yes, certainly: pro—ceed. Your story in—
ter—ests me." Thus Scoresby, with interjaculations.
The fact is, he is lighting another pipe. Good
fellow, Scoresby ; but he has his faults.

" Stop ! I bar ! " cries the shameless Alpist; " I
want to suggest one other point. I insist upon
alterative as a necessary condition of Alpine mental
delight Thus, when I am in cities—say London—
I yearn for the wild stern solitude of high moun-
tain regions; when I have been, say, a month in
those barren, austere, noble worlds, I long softly
for streets, picture-galleries, theatres, cathedrals,Mountaineering with Ladies. 163

houses—for, I am sorry to say, good dinners, good
beds, carpets, and, in short, for all the comforts of
custom.

4t ' Tower'd cities please us then,

And the busy hum of men.'

I am not a Sybarite, but I do then desire, as an
alterative—as an alterative merely—the accustomed
life of great cities. I look favourably upon even
Italian lakes as a change from snow mountains.
But I interrupt you. Let me hear about your
Medea's bath for renewing my waning, though still
vigorous, Alpine youth."

"I won't answer that last outrage, Scoresby,"
said I pettishly. " I will simply propound my
invention, which consists, in fact, in looking at
happiness through other eyes."

" Looking at happiness through—What the
deuce do you mean, Fawn ?"

" I am about to tell you. I mean, looking at
Alpine joys through brighter, purer, fresher eyes
than ours—I mean women's eyes. I speak from
experience—this year's experience.''

" Go on ; your story becomes thrilling. I won't
interrupt—while this pipe lasts. I know there is
something behind your superficially absurd idea.
Just like you. Oh, you ideologist! "

" Consider for a moment the alterative of taking
M 2164 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

ladies on to glaciers. In scenes so familiar to us,
but fresh wonder-land to them, they soothe us with
their finer fancies, touch us with their lighter
thought."

" Do they ? " asked Scoresby, with an interroga-
tive sneer. A good fellow, but he has his faults,
has Scoresby.

" Here, take the tobacco-pouch, in order that
you may not interrupt. Like an express train,
I want a long run and few stoppages."

" Start, then, Fawn ! The line is clear, and I am
all attention. I really am curious, you know; no
nonsense."

" This year we were at Couttet's, at Chamounix.
At dinner I had the good fortune to sit next to
a very charming young lady, cultured, natural,
sweet-natured. In the course of conversation it
appeared that she had a strong secret ideal, a
suppressed longing—a longing which she never
dreamed of being able to gratify; and this latent
longing was, to go up to the Grands Mulets, and to
see something—seeing that something closely—of
the great and wonderful ice-world. After dinner,
my friend and myself consulted together, and the
result was that we placed the whole resources of our
establishment at Miranda's disposal. We offered to
accompany her to the Grands Mulets, and to let her
have the help of our guides, Melchior and PeterMountaineering with Ladies. 165

Anderegg. At first she could not believe that the
offer could be real—she could not realize the fact
that her hidden ideal yearning was about to be
realized. Incredulity, however, soon yielded to
rapturous conviction ; and you should have seen,
Scoresby, the almost boundless delight with which
she grasped the joy of the unexpected pleasure. It
is not often in life that our hidden desires are sud-
denly realized for us. It did me good to see such
keen, fresh, healthy ecstasy."

" I daresay. I should have liked to have seen
that."

"A willing assent was soon obtained from her
guardian ; and our young lady was told that she
must be up at three next morning. She gladly
promised ; and at half-past 3 a.m. we sat down to
a breakfast, by candlelight, in the salon. The
morning was still, dark, warm, and rather cloudy.
By four we were fairly off, and were soon traversing
in the dark the pine-woods at the beginning of the
track. We presently got light enough to see by,
and in three hours we reached the Pierre-Pointue
hut. We had had an hour of rather heavy rain
and hail, and we were pretty wet; though, luckily^
Miranda had been well protected by a waterproof
cloak. At the Pierre-Pointue we gave her an
hour's rest and a second breakfast, and we dried
ourselves as well as we could. We started again,16 6 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

and got to the beginning of the Glacier des Bossons,
where, to our lady's singular contentment, she was
regularly roped in orthodox mountaineer fashion.
She was placed next to the great Melchior, who
arranged two short loops of rope, one of which he
held, while one of us had hold of the rear-loop. I
lent her my snow-gaiters. And now you must fancy
this fresh, impressionable, idealizing nature treading
for the first time a great glacier."

" I do fancy that," said Scoresby ; " and I like
the fancy. I wish I could have back again the
feelings with which I first trod a glacier ! "

" Her feelings were more intense than yours,
depend upon it. She had never hoped to attain to
such a glory. Everything was new, and grand,
and wonderful to her. She was full of quiet, modest
rapture. She observed everything, and enjoyed
unaffectedly. It was a joy to see her joy. I was
looking into happiness through other eyes."

" Ah, now I see! But go on, old fellow."

" Melchior, I think, considers that ladies are
rather out of place on a glacier ; but our Miranda
was so sweet, so docile, so very grateful to him for
all his kindly care, that the great guide relaxed
his theories in her favour, and became gently
chivalrous towards a creature so modest, so happy,
so good-humoured. We took the greatest care of
her safety and comfort. We went at her pace, andMountaineering with Ladies. 167

helped her as much as possible. She went very
cheerfully, and pluckily, and delightedly. As we
passed under the base of the Aiguille du Midi, an
avalanche descended just above us. We were
quite safe ; but the hissing, smoking, rushing body
of snow and ice came down near to us ; and you
can imagine the awed delight with which our fair
friend regarded this grand Alpine spectacle. I never
knew that glacier so troublesome, or the crevasses
in such bad order. The day was cloudy, and rain
threatened always, and now and then fell. There
are this year two great ladders over bad places on
the glacier—one lying flatly down across a wide
deep chasm, and the other standing pretty straight
up over a narrow, very deep abyss. When I went
up Mont Blanc there were no ladders."

" None when I was there last/' observed Scoresby

" The seracs were somewhat difficult too ; and
we had, of course, to jump crevasses, and to leap
across chasms. The snow-slopes were long, and
the snow was only moderately good; but still our
fair and pleasant companion went ever cheerfully on,
and, with Melchior's good help and our little assist-
ance, she surmounted all the difficulties very
bravely and well. At last the dark rocks of the
Grands Mulets rose steeply out of the white snow
wastes ; and Miranda's wonder was greatly excited
by the huge ice pinnacles below to the left, which,168 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

a little darker only than the light-grey sky, towered
up from out the wide glacier surface. Courage!
one effort more; this is the last slope. And
now we leave the snow, and stand really upon the
rocks of the actual Grands Mulets ! "

" How long did you take getting her there ?"

" Oh, about five hours' and a half actual walk-
ing. She went well, and Melchior cut such good
steps. At the Grands Mulets we had leisure to
observe the wonder-world, and our pocket-book
was soon being filled with happy details. Before
her were those vast snow-fields, seamed with many
a giant chasm and crevasse. Opposite were the
Aiguille du Goute, and, a little to the left, the
Dome du Goute, the Bosse, and then, wonder of
wonders ! the actual calotte of great Mont Blanc.
We pointed out everything to her, and she enjoyed
all unspeakably, with fresh intelligent ecstasy.
She found out how enormous the difference was
between gazing upward from Chamounix and look-
ing closely from the Grands Mulets rocks upon the
vast snow world of plain, and slope, and mountain.
We had brought up for her a pot of Fortnum and
Mason's jugged hare, and Melchior prepared a
very nice little repast. We had plenty of cham-
pagne ; and when all was ready, we went into the
hut and had a most enjoyable lunch. We afterwards
brought out a chair for her, and then we sat byMountaineering with Ladies. 169

her, taking tobacco, and telling her all that we
thought would interest her about glacier, and snow-
slope, and mountain peak. We kept her there two
good hours, in order that she might get a thorough
rest; and when Melchior announced that, if she
wanted to be down at Chamounix by table-cThotey
we had better start, she sighed for the first time on
that, to her, most memorable day."

" How did you get her down ?"

" Oh, pretty well, I think. Melchior was behind
her, and took great care. The slopes were a little
steep and soft, and she did not, of course, know
how to tread ; but Melchior had cautioned her
that she would have at least a dozen falls, and that
not one of them would matter; so that she was
not afraid. She went very well. We managed
the ladders, the crevasses, the ice, and reached
Pierre-Pointue, where we rested her for another
hour, and made her a claret-cup."

" A real claret-cup ? "

"Yes; and a very good one: cura^oa, lemon,
and plenty of ice., It was really very good. Then
all difficulties were over, and we came easily down
to Couttet's, getting there about six.

" Our young lady (who had been out fourteen
hours) was simply radiant with triumph and
delight; and it was a sight to see her rush into her
uncle's arms, and try to tell him something of her170 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

happiness. I know I had enjoyed the expedition
immensely; better, perhaps, than I might have
enjoyed, looking into Alpine happiness only through
my own eyes. I had done that often enough, but
I had never before seen the Alps through the fresh,
pure, emotional enthusiasm of a woman's mind."

"I think it worth consideration whether one.
may not re-live one's Alpine youth by taking
young ladies—I mean nice intelligent ones—on to
glaciers. It's quite an invention of yours, Fawn.
Was that a solitary instance ? If you have any
other case, I shall be happy to hear it"

" I have another case, and you shall hear it
Now you must move with me from Chamounix
to this place, to Zermatt. By the way, Scoresby,
did you ever ascend that Gorner glacier from the
foot, through the seracs, to, say, the Riffelhorn ?"

" No, I never did ; but I believe those seracs are
troublesome."

" They are. When I first arrived here this year,
a friend of mine, a Winchester man, was stopping
at Seiler's with his sister."

" Was she also a delightful young lady ?" asked
Scoresby. " I like to know that at the beginning,
because, if the heroine be really nice, I take so
much more interest in the story."

" Then you may take interest in it. In this case
we were again most fortunate, and had once moreMountaineering with Ladies. 171

a most charming companion on an expedition,
Sylvia, as I will call her, also desired ardently an
ice excursion, and we arranged to take her up the
Gorner glacier, through the seracs, then to turn off
by the Riffelhorn, to visit the Riffel Hotel, ana so
to return to Zermatt. A programme duly carried
out. Melchior and Peter accompanied us, and we
were a larger party than we had been on the pre-
vious occasion. Lyvetete was with us, and he, as
the best mountaineer amongst us, was told off by
Melchior to attend specially upon our protegee.
The day was not fine. On the way to the glacier,
passing over grass slopes, we had to take refuge in
a cow-hut during rain. When we were well on the
ice, it began to snow, and kept on snowing till we
reached the Riffel. The air was damp, chilly, de-
pressing ; but then our young lady saw a glacier in
weather of which mountaineers see a good deal.
The first part of the glacier is easy, and presents
that surface texture which M. Loppd paints so well.
Our young lady was full of bright, eager interest in
all she saw. Her graceful gaiety was charming,
and she went very well. Presently we attained to
the seracs. You know those huge piled-up pin-
nacles and ridges of ice and snow, with wide and
deep chasms of bluish terror. With an enthusiasm
modest but intense, Sylvia regarded those strange
portents of a glacial world. The seracs are always17 2 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

fantastic, but never grotesque; there is too much
of awe and grandeur, and even horror, around them
to admit of a strain of the grotesque. Precipices of
fifty to a hundred feet tower, and huge cliffs are
strangely broken up and distorted ; there are high
hills of sharp-edged arete to scale, and slopes of
steepness to descend.

" Melchior rushed up impossible precipices of
sharpest knife-edged ice like a bird, in order to
find a good passage for his lady; and Sylvia sur-
mounted some really rather difficult ice-work. I
could see that she looked with wonder and surprise
upon this revelation of the strange weird ice-world.
It snowed all the time, but we were a very merry
party ; and when Melchior had conducted us safely
through the wild tangle of seracs to the edge of the
glacier, we had a very effervescent bottle of cham-
pagne. The grass and rock slopes under the
Riffelhorn are steep and hard to climb, but our
young lady went gallantly and well. We reached
the Riffel, and were welcomed by the boisterous
shouts of Columbus Fitz-Loftus and Antinous
Redwall. We had a capital lunch, and, when the
snow ceased, we descended comfortably to Zermatt,
having completed my second glacier excursion with
ladies. I enjoyed both expeditions extremely : I
was not thinking while working directly of my own
sensations, of my own delight; but I was watchingMountaineering with Ladies. 173

the reflection of a fresher, keener, more newly-found
rapture of surprise and great joy on the part of a most
intelligent and well-educated young lady. To her,
the near sight of the wonders and the terrors of the
great glacier was a high mental joy—a joy coming
from the region outside hope. To a man it is easy
(if he can do the work) to see the high Alps ; but
to a woman - such things seem, and often are,
unattainable, unless chance provide an opportunity
of being taken into the wild wonder-land. And
yet some women long intensely, if stealthily, to see
these glorious sights ; their natures contain a sup-
pressed dreamy romance of imaginative yearning
towards the eternal hills.

" Women often walk surprisingly well, because
mental and nervous excitement uplift them above
the unwonted labour. This fact is a part of their
fine organization, which qualifies them to enjoy
highly and holily. I like to see the human eye
dilate with wonder and great joy ; I like to watch
the silent raptures which indicate a receptive mind,
a distended imagination. In short, I joyed in the
joy of the two young ladies that I had the pleasure
of accompanying this year to the Grands Mulets
and up the Gorner glacier. I say to you, Scoresby,
go and do likewise; get an Alpine alterative;
renew your waning mountain youth ; perform the
mechanism of climbing with newer joy, because174 -A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

you may be the means of procuring for a lady a
rare delight, to which she could not otherwise
attain. There, I began with a narrative and I have
finished with a lecture ; but I did want to show you
the great pleasure that may be obtained with ladies
in the Alps."

Scoresby was silent for some time, but, was evi-
dently thoughtful. At length he said,—

" What delights of memory your two fair friends
have acquired ! They won't forget those expedi-
tions easily. The rectory and the deanery will
often hear of them. I really think that I,—next
year, you know—"

Next year! When it comes, with its happy
Alpine time, may other mountaineers find out how
pleasant it is to look at happiness through other
eyes ! may it, in short, be a good year both for
mountaineers and for other happy and charming
LADIES IN THE ALPS!A PROTRUDING TOOTH:

BETWEEN SAAS AND SIMPLON.

" Und immer wieder zog die Reihe der glanzenden Eisgebirge das
Aug' und die Seele an sich. Man giebt da gern jede Pratension ans
Unendliche auf, da man nicht einmal mit dem Endlichen im
Anschauen und Gedanken fertig werden kann. . . . Das Erhabene
giebt der Seele die schone Ruhe, sie wird ganz dadurch ausgefiillt,
flihlt sich so gross als sie seyn kann."—Goethe.

T often happens to a mountaineer to be
asked, by persons who love but do not
know the high Alps, what the mountains
are like, and how ascents are made. At such
times, one wishes that the friends who ask so
eagerly for descriptions could be put in possession
of some magician's glass, which would enable them
to see you at work in climbing or resting upon
a summit. Modern science has, however, done
away with the old mirror of the Eastern enchanter
or the mediaeval magician. Such charming adjuncts
to imaginative vision belong, indeed, to the fairy-
land of gramarye in which the naive youth of176 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

men and of mankind lives; nor can we hope that
in our day any wise Cornelius will supply a glass
which should show Geraldine to Surrey. Art can,
nevertheless, still do somewhat, and literature now
affords, perhaps, the best means of lending a magic
glass to inquirers. It can seize ideal fact in its
graphic grip, and present a picture through words
which shall have power to raise a tolerably vivid
image in the minds of those who long for and who
love high Alps, but who yet can never accomplish
an actual ascent, or see the great mountains in
their sacred and secret solitudes. So many persons
now know something about high Alps, especially
as seen from below, that a mountaineer may hope
to lift them with him to the far-off lofty peak, and
to present a word-picture which, however imper-
fect, may yet aid imagination to realize something
of the labour of the climb, and to conceive to
some extent the glory attained as the result of
labour.

On Monday, the 25th of August, 1874, at 3 a.m.
punctually, we were called by Melchior Anderegg,
and responded with the unwilling alacrity of prac-
tised mountaineers; men who detest all such un-
naturally early rising, and yet are willing to get
up at any hour in order to ascend a good moun-
tain. After the well-known dreary ascent morning
breakfast by the dull flaring of long-wicked can-A Protruding Tooth.	177

dies, we emerged from the hotel at Saas, in order
to look about us while the guides were getting
ready.

The morning was very still and rather warm;
but was heavy with mist, though now and then the
wan stony glare which indicated the coming of
daybreak' gleamed chillingly in the faint east,
through the darkling shroud of departing night.
The quiet white hotel looked deathlike in its trance
of sleep. The little brook before the house plapped
along with a sleepy murmur of singing sound,
while the great hills opposite and up the valley
were but dimly suggested through folding haze.

Lyvetete, eager to set out, was moving restlessly
about, while Marks and myself were content to
gaze at the prospect until Melchior should give the
order to start.

Soon the great guide appeared, followed by his
brother, Peter Anderegg, and we actually started
at 4 a.m. Melchior thought well of our chances
of a fine day, but came prepared with a large lan-
tern, which he proposed to light so soon as we
should have got clear of Saas.

Directly behind the hotel you begin to ascend,
and, in ten minutes, you are on long grass slopes
traversed by gurgling channels of water-courses.
The grass was wet with heavy dew and with cloud
moisture as we ascended the steep meadows, and

N178 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

Melchior soon lit his lantern for the guidance of his
silent morning party.

We were bound for the Fletschhorn, or Tusk-
peak—a tooth-like mountain, which rises sharply-
some 13,200 feet between Saas and the road of the
Simplon, and which commands, as Melchior assured
us, a very distinctive and most magnificent view,
as it is exceptionally well situated for a fine pro-
spect over Italy. As we rose, we found the mist
denser than it had been in the valley. In the
windless early morning it rested sluggishly upon the
breast of the bare hill. The moony vapour rolling
round King Melchior made of the guide's dark figure
the amorphous phantom of a cloudy giant, and, when
he pressed on ahead, he would have been swallowed
up in the folds of the wet mist, but for the sullen
glare of his guiding lantern. The morning suggested
October among Highland hills, and this idea was
strengthened as we began to tread our way between
great pine-trees, each showing ghost-like through
the dim, damp, grey cloud vapour. Leaving the
slopes, we attained to a rugged way, bordering a
swiftly-running stream. But for the mist it was
now daylight, and Melchior here extinguished the
lantern, hiding it in a block of rock, which he marked
by a small cairn. Soon we saw a cluster of chalets
perched high up on this steep slope, and learnt
that these were the Sennhiitten of the Trift Alp.A Protruding Tooth.	179

We passed rapidly between these cow-shelters in
the still early morning, and nodded to two human
faces which regarded us with surprised interest
from out a half-shut door. It was now day—grey,
calm, and warm.

A few wreaths of vapour still lingered lazily, but
Melchior again announced confidently a fine day.
Grass and trees exist at an unusual altitude on this
ascent, and just as they cease you get a noble
prospect of the jagged Rossbodenhorn, of our own
stately Fletschhorn, and of the white Weissmies
on the right of the great group. When you turn
round, you see, across the valley of Saas, the huge
Mischabel range rising up mistily behind. From
this moment all is rapture. A glad day is opening
in the royal Alps, and we feel no depression as we
enter upon the desolate waste of the barren
moraine, and leap from one frozen rock boulder to>
another across the torrent which separates slope
from moraine. Where the moraine terminates we
halt for the second breakfast. By this time every
one is thoroughly awake, and the talk, the laugh-
ter, and the jest begin. After breakfast, just one
little pipe, and then we prepare for the real work
of climbing. The mists have faded away, the sun
darts out brilliantly, and a fresh keen wind begins
to stir and creep. The sun is hot, but the air is
cold. All the better, says Melchior,, for the view..

N 2180 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

The wind is from the north, and the day will be
unusually fine and clear. Hurrah !

From this point a very long steep rock arete
runs in a wavy line almost up to the far top of our
mountain. On either side of the arete is glacier.
Sometimes the rocks sink down nearly to the snow;
at other places the arete is high above the crevassed
and upwards-sloping fields of whiteness. Occasion-
ally the rocks are tolerably broad ; but generally
the long ridge is rather narrow. " The rocks look
good, don't they, Melchior ?" " Well, yes ; pretty
good," replies our guide ; " but they get steeper as
you get up, and the last slope is very steep. They
are loose too, as you'll soon find. That which
looks from here like snow is all ice round the top,
so that I shall stick to the rocks all the way up as
much as possible." Good, Melchior, as you like ;
and now for the long rock arete.

The rocks are very loose, as we soon find.
Nearly every block rolls away under our feet, and
we start half a dozen other large stones at every
step. It is laborious work, and we toil on at it for
a long time, until Melchior calls a momentary halt
just under the final wall, which looks decidedly
worse than anything which had preceded it.
Tilted upwards as it is, it looks bad, but not very
long. " How long will that bit take us, Melchior ?"
" Eine gute Stunde% a long hour, Herr," respondsA Protruding Tooth.	181

Melchior, who never deceives as to distance. It
strikes me, as we clamber up this last difficulty—
'which does take us a good hour—that the coming
down will be worse than the ascent; but I keep
this opinion to myself. We have a rough scramble
and see close by us the shining sunlit ice, which
glistens as we near the top. One more effort, and
lo, at twelve o'clock, after eight hours' stiffish work,
we are on the summit of our peak. The top is
small, and is of rock. There is just room for five,
and two little hollows make a couple of pretty
comfortable arm-chairs for those who do not mind
their legs dangling over the dizzy edge.

The first feeling when you attain a summit is one
of deserved rest; the next is one of eager ecstasy.
Forgetting the long labour of eight hours, you
fancy that you must be a bird to have got up where
you are. Above you is the infinite sky, around and
below you is the wide glorious prospect, and
beneath your feet is the proud summit of a lofty
Alpine peak. You dally with the wind and scorn
the sun. The azure air of the immense blue sky-
arch is golden with splendid sunlight, and the sun-
beams are reflected dazzlingly from the enormous
expanse of wide surrounding .snow. The air is
tremulous with keenest light; the bare blue sky,
" stripped to its depths by the awakening north/' is
intensely clear and vivid in its purity of hue, despite18 2 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

the force of colour which the heavens ever wear on
the rare occasions on which we are uplifted closely
to them. But the wind is strong and very cold.
Bleak is our sun-smitten rock aerie. There is,
however, comfort in this coldness, because without
it the view would not be so perfect, especially over
rarely-seen Italy.

We will take a good hour for repose and rapture,
for champagne and for pipes. High peaks are
difficult to reach, and their summits seldom
attained. When you look around, your gaze is
level only with those highest peaks which raise
themselves far above the valley and the plain.
Rarer still is a day so clear. " Finest prospect over
Italy that I ever saw," says Melchior; therefore we
will linger, and recline, and gaze, and enjoy.

Close to us on our right is the pure-white bulk of
our well-named friend, the Weissmies. The sun
shines fiercely on the glistening mass of his cold
snows. Just to the right of the near Weissmies,
but far, far away behind him, is the Grand Paradis
and the Graian group. Next comes the majestic
cluster of great Monte Rosa ; behind him, again,
stand the Lysskamm and the range extending to
the Breithorn. A mere point of the Matterhorn all
but covers a suggestion of Mont Blanc ; and the
smooth Allalein slopes suavely beside the rounded
Alphubel. The Strahlhorn and the sharp Rymp-A Protruding Tooth.	183

fischhorn are both visible ; and then towers the
superb range of the great Mischabelhorner and of
the finely-outlined Balferinhorn. The eye next
sweeps along the summits of the Weisshorn and of
the Brunegghorn, and then passes over a series of
brown aiguilles, until it rests on the whole magnifi-
cent range of the distant Oberland, including the
seven-and-twenty famous mountains which extend
between the Diablerets and the Galenstock. Next
comes the Todti district and the Orteler group,
with the Pizzo Bernina, the Piz Rosegg, and the
Disgrazia. The Dolomites follow, with all the
peaks of Tyrol, and then the eye exchanges sun-
bright snow for purple colour, and rests on Italy.

Even there it is cloudless, although a faint haze
of heat and of aerial distance sleeps softly around
the extremest dim remoteness. In Italy, lake
alternates with mountain, and the shining gleam of
far broad waters lowers the jagged masses of the
wavy hills. There is Lago Maggiore, there Lugano;
those are the Apennines ; that is the Gorge of
Gondo, that Pallanza, and you can—yes, you can-
see the white blocks of houses on Isola Bella. Italy
seems to lie lower, to be more widely spread out,
than Switzerland ; but then Switzerland is seen
only through its giant mountains. Of all the many
glaciers that the view includes, the noble Aletsch is
the greatest and the grandest. The ever sullen184 Alpine Ascents and Adventtires.

Bietschhorn is distinctive in his livery of dark
stripes. You sit aloof in the centre, and have the
mountains standing, nearer or farther from you, all
around. Towards the south there is one steadfast
roll of golden cumulus clouds. The prevailing
tone of the prospect is white—the whiteness of
immense tracts and almost countless mountains of
snow ; but, even apart from Italy, there is much
colour in the prospect. The deep violet of the sky
shines in some places upon darkly ruddy rocks.
Velvety purples and greens are strewn widely about.
In other spots the sun pales the rocks into a faint
light brown, which contrasts exquisitely with a pale
delicate blue in the adjacent heavens. There is
the Fee Alp and other green Alps ; there are also
threading torrents, and shadow-holding valley
chasms. The mind resolves totality into detail,
and the imagination restores detail into totality.
When first you look from an Alpine peak you
cannot analyze ; the overpowering glory annihilates
all faculty of distinguishing: but after you have
gazed from many a summit you gain the power of
seeing and of enjoying both in detail and in mass.
And this is gain, not loss. It does not imply a
diminution of enthusiasm ; it means only that the
mind has grown larger and therefore calmer, and
can combine ecstasy with analysis.

While we were basking on the top, MelchiorA Protruding Tooth.	185

emitted a remark which, coming from such a man,
was very striking, and deserves record. He said
suddenly, " And now, gentlemen, tell me frankly—
is not such a day on such a mountain, with such a
view, better than scrambling with difficulty and
in danger, perhaps in bad weather, up the face
of the Dent Blanche ?—a thing merely difficult to
do, which yields very little good even when
successfully done."

Here was the first mountaineer of any day, a
man who can with ease do anything, rebuking, with
a question, those amateurs who rank the physical
above the mental, who yearn after the barren
reputation of having achieved mere difficulty, and
who, as a just penal consequence, are led to overlook
the highest and purest mental mountaineering joys.
The remark was striking. May it have its due
weight and influence!

But how, by a catalogue of peaks, aiguilles, ice or
snow masses, raise in the mind of a reader an
adequate image of the scene we saw ? It is im-
possible. I can only suggest the gigantic combina-
tion, seen from such a pointed altitude, of mass,
form, colour, air ; and can only essay to produce a
reflected conception of the impression made upon
me by the grandeur, glory, sublimity, of the rare
revelation of such an Alpine prospect as stretches
all around the delighted mountaineer who has18 6 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

attained to and gazes from the small and towering
peak of the nobly-placed Fletschhorn.

Imagination must piece out my imperfect sug-
gestion, and the reader who would try to see what
I then saw must bring with him the seeing eye
of fancy and of faith.

Too soon the time for returning came. We had
spent more than an hour upon the summit, and we
quitted it with extreme unwillingness. A finer
view there can hardly be, and a clearer day could
never be hoped for. A summit is left so reluctantly
because life affords so few opportunities of standing
on ideal elevations. The thing is an allegory as
well as a fact. The mind lingeringly quits a height
from which it can overlook a world. One's whole
nature is elevated, sublimed, when one is raised so
high above the level of the life of the ordinary years.

The first steeple of rock down which we
had to come was decidedly troublesome, and
needed care. We had, between the upper block
of rock and the main arete, to cross along
the face of a high, steep slope of hard ice. Mel-
chior ran up above us to the very edge of the
sharp ice arete, and I can see now his dark figure
standing out against the far-off blue of the sunny
sky, as he held on firmly above our heads in order
to hold us in case of a slip, while we, led by the
skilful Lyvetete, cut steps and passed across theA Protruding Tooth.	187

hard and slippery slope. The arete itself regained,
we found that the descent of those rocks occupied
as much time as the ascent, the stones being so
terribly loose and insecure that foothold was pre-
carious and tumbles frequent. The chill and shade
of early afternoon spread over the desolate
waste of the dreary bleak moraine, and the cold
glacier torrent helped to make a welcome claret-
cup. Next came the soft sweet evening music of
the dulcet cow-bells, and these bells in Switzerland
announce the approach to the haunts of men as well
as of cows. At the Trift Alp the cows had re-
turned from the pastures to the huts, and we
enjoyed the mountaineer's luxury of a bowl of fresh
Swiss milk.

When you return from a mountain in the after-
noon, it often strikes you that the way, which was
traversed in the obscurity and enthusiasm of morn-
ing, without thinking of labour, is very long ; and
as we came back from the Fletschhorn it seemed to
us that we had passed over a great deal of ground
that morning. In the dim light, more than twi-
light, round the rugged path which wound through
the gloomy pine-wood, we saw between the trunks
and beneath the branches the low round moon, a
calm orb of silver flame. We lost her as in dark-
ness we reached the last grass slopes, down which
we ran. We reached the old hotel; and then came18 8 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

a bath, a change, and a merry dinner at about
8 p.m., which repast was brightened by the pre-
sence of ladies curious to hear about our delightful
ascent of the Fletschhorn—the " protruding tooth,"
as its name implies, which rears itself so loftily
on that most beautiful site between the Simplon
and fair Saas.

We had had the finest weather experienced for any
ascent during the month of August last. Only on
the beautiful Col du Tour had we a day that could
compare with the one on which we did the Fletsch-
horn. Fine days were very rare in the past year's
August. On the Lake of Geneva I saw the singu-
lar spectacle of a really rough sea and of a sea-sick
crowd of passengers on board the " Bonivard." On
other peaks we had dreadful weather, no views,
great hardship, and greater danger.

On one occasion during the season I saw the
rare and memorable spectacle of the unspeakably
beautiful Alpengluth, or Alpine glow. The sun
had set, the chill light of evening was just be-
ginning to render cold and stern the whiteness of
snow and the darkness of rocks, when I was de-
scending a pass, walking and talking with Mel-
chior Anderegg. Suddenly we both stopped. That
magic mystery of colour-light glowed on the snow
and flushed upon the rocks. The warm red-rose
tint suffused air and light, and all things stoodA Protruding Tooth.

189

idealized in the unearthly witchery of fairy hues
and tones. This phenomenon is only rarely seen,
but when it does occur it is one of the loveliest
phases of Nature streaming love upon her Alps.
It faded slowly out of earth and sky, and we re-
sumed our walk with a blank sense of the cessation
of an enchantment. It was as if ravishing music
ceased, and left the dull air void and empty of
charm. An illusion died away, and rock-horn and
snow-peak looked forlorn, heartless, repellent. " I
think I have only once before seen the Alpengluth
so beautiful as that," said Melchior thoughtfully.
The great guide has a true susceptibility to the
wonders of Nature and to the glories of his Alpine
world. He sighed as the vision was withdrawn,
and his mind avenged itself for its sense of loss by
swinging onwards at a tremendous pace. We
walked away from the spot with eyes bent upon
the ground.

I saw too, last year, another splendid and dis-
tinctive sight, which lives vividly in my moun-
taineers memory. I mean a solitary piece of
rock-climbing by Melchior Anderegg, which for
danger and for difficulty, for courage and for skill,
has scarcely, I should think, ever been equalled, has
certainly never been surpassed, by man. We started
to cross from the Montanvert to Courmayeur by the
newly-discovered Col des Hirondelles. At the top190 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

of the Lechaud glacier is a lofty and precipitous
wall of smooth limestone rock, which has, however,
one weak point, one couloir by which, if there be
good snow in it, the summit of the hopeless-look-
ing rock wall may be attained. When we arrived
at the top of the glacier we found this couloir bare
of snow, and we found further, to our dismay, that
the huge Bergschrund had so increased and
widened, and had so fallen away from the rocks,
that the attempt seemed to be impracticable.
Melchior, after sweeping the whole range carefully
with his eagle eye of practised insight, pronounced
the ascent impossible, and said that we must
abandon the idea. I knew, from his tone, that
this was so; but that irrepressibly ardent moun-
taineer, Lyvetete, could not readily consent to turn
back from an expedition in fine weather, and he
began to argue the question of possibility by other
routes. It is probable that he dropped some in-
cautious word which stung the amour-propre of the
first and greatest of Swiss guides. Melchior said
positively, that to try an ascent by the one prac-
ticable couloir was wholly out of the question, and
that he would not allow of any attempt.

"Now," added Melchior, "as you think that
another route may be found, I will go alone and
try. I won't have any one with me ; wait. If the
thing can be done at all, it must be by thoseA Protrttding Tooth.	191

smooth rock slabs to the left I don't believe that
it can be done; but I will show you whether it can or
cannot. Unrope me, and wait here till I come back."

We were sitting on frozen snow, just on the
narrow brink of the great Bergschrund, and above
a long steep slope of hard neve, which descended
from our seat to the glacier. How differently
Melchior works when he is climbing alone! At
what a pace he goes ! I never before so fully
realized his immense superiority to the best amateur
mountaineer. No one—except one or two of the
best guides—could have worked with him as he
performed that daring, pique-stung feat. He dis-
appeared somewhere into the huge Schrund. He
appeared next, climbing up a sheer straight-up
wall of ice, thinly covered by snow. It was so steep
that he could not swing the axe; he could only
peg the point in with his chest; yet up he went,
and rapidly too. Beneath him was the terrible
depth of the huge chasm of the giant Bergschrund.
After about a hundred feet of this work, he got on
to the smooth large slabs of limestone rock, which
shelved sideways. I watched him with delight at
his working, with dread of his danger. My pipe
went out as I gazed with all my eyes. Even Peter
Anderegg, his stolid brother, was anxious, and
looked on with all the emotion of which he is
capable.192 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

Melchior proceeded, sometimes extended flat upon
his face over sideway sloping slabs with hardly a
crack or a projection visible. He had got so far off
that his recumbent, slowly-moving figure had become
very small. Presently we saw him stop, and grope
about blindly with hands and feet " He can't get
farther," cried Peter, " and I only hope that he can
get back." We saw that he just raised his head,
and was looking carefully up and round him. Then
he turned on his back, and descended a little way,
with great difficulty, in that position. "A nasty
place that," said Peter in great excitement. " I am
afraid that he can't get back." Here the brother
freed himself from the rope, in order, if necessary,
to start to help Melchior. We watched again, and
I felt a terrible tension of the nerves as I saw a man
in such a dangerous position. He moved very
slowly, creeping on from point to point with out-
stretched legs and hands, which clutched after every
crack and fissure. He turned again upon his
face, and seemed to move better. " He'll do it
now," cried Peter. " He's safe now, I think."
Gradually the small dark figure of a man got lower
and lower. At last he returned to the snow, let
himself down that very carefully, and again dis-
appeared. In a moment he emerged close by us,
and advanced coolly with his quick firm step. " If
any Herr likes to try that? said Melchior calmly,A Protruding Tooth.	193

looking rather particularly at Lyvetete, " he must
go alone ; I won't go with him. There is one place
at which I thought that I could neither get forward
nor backward, and there are other places higher up
that are probably as bad. No ; no one will get up
the Col des Hirondelles to-day, and the sooner you
see that the better. But we can try the Aiguille
Verte to-morrow, if you like."

Great Goethe says—and he is speaking, be it
remembered, expressly of the Alps—that even a
mean man, who is placed in immediate contact with
great events, acquires thereby a certain nobility
more than is native to him ; that singular traces of
very great occurrences remain permanently a part
of the life of even such a man, who is never tired of
relating his experiences, and who has, in every
sense, gained a treasure which enriches his whole
life. And so it is, adds Goethe, with the man who
has seen and has become intimate with such great
wonders of Nature as the high Alps. If he desire
to retain the impression made by them upon him,
he must know how to connect it with the thoughts
and feelings which have been germinated by it in
him; he will then certainly have attained a stock
of glorious memories with which he can ennoble the
flat level of every-day living, and will have spread
through his whole life and being an added strain of
higher flavour and feeling.

O194 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

I had discovered the truth contained in this pas-
sage before I knew the passage itself. I can
confirm its truth from experience. Age cannot
wither, custom cannot stale the glories of those
sublime mountains, or the ideal images and im-
pressions with which they ennoble our whole after-
lives.A FINE PAIR OF

being

THE WEISSHORN AND THE

HORNS;

MATTERHORN.

" And I will get me to some far-off land,

Where higher mountains under heaven stand
And touch the blue at rising of the stars,

Whose song they hear where no rough mingling mars
The great clear voices."—Jubal. George Eliot.

O one can regret more than myself the
variable weather which afflicts that
otherwise delightful chain of mountains
(the Alps), or the necessity of speaking about it."

I quite agree with the eminent mountaineer to
whose acute intellect we owe the above pregnant
observation. My own experience in the Alps
(especially in 1874) entirely confirms his views ;
and I regret the necessity of speaking about bad
weather as a prelude to the present narrative. The
two places on earth on which tempests are most
undesirable and most inconvenient are the ocean and
O 2] g6 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

the mountain ; and yet both ocean and mountain
lift up their " mighty voices," sometimes even to
hoarseness, in weather which is a nuisance and a
danger. In the Alps you can, generally speaking,
reckon only upon instability ; and the month of
August, 1874, was one of the worst months that I
remember. The former half was indefensibly, was
persistently bad ; the latter half was rather better,
but still you never could rely upon a fine day, and,
if you got one, it had been preceded by a time of
rain in the valley, snow upon the peak. Fine days
—nay, even two fine days consecutively—did occur;
but you had to snatch at a day if you wanted to
ascend a high peak, and, in the prevailing uncer-
tainty, you were liable to snatch the wrong day,
and to find yourself high up in execrably bad
weather. This happened to us more than once ;
nor were other mountaineers always more fortunate.
As they say in commercial circles, " this month
was remarkable for the number and the magnitude
of its failures." There were, indeed, in August,
1874, many Alpine failures of good mountaineers
and first-rate guides ;—failures attributable solely to
the weather. There was also, as a rule, so much
fresh, bad snow upon the high hills that first-class
peaks were unusually difficult and dangerous. Two
such failures which fell to my share I now propose
to chronicle. They were failures made under theA Fine Pair of Horns.	197

leadership of the best Swiss guide, Melchior
Anderegg ; and one happened to me when ac-
companied by the first amateur mountaineer of his
time, Lyvetete. I feel regret, certainly ; but no
self-reproach.—"These are our failures!" said
Brummel's valet, as the artist descended the stairs
with creased white cravats, in starchy limpness,
over his arm ; but his words (if I read his sentiment
aright) did not indicate depression, sorrow, shame.
He had also brilliant successes to record,—successes
which, perhaps, were all the greater in consequence
of occasional failure. My failures were, as I well
know, the result of causes over which I had no
manner of control. They were weather failures.
" Nothing differs so much as the same mountain
on different days," says that great mountain au-
thority, Mr. Leslie Stephen. A mountain may
easily be conquered one day, which is invincible on
the next. Nothing is more impossible than an
ascent of certain peaks in certain weather ; and I
found myself on the splendid Weisshorn and on
the terrible Matterhorn in weather which kept
their actual summits for itself. " Failure after long
perseverance is," says Dorothea of Middlemarch,
" much grander than never to have had a striving
good enough to be called a failureand my
strivings were good, though, in these two instances,
Fate was more than man.198 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

But now let us hurry on to Setter's Monte Rosa
Hotel, at Zermatt ; let us hope that we are about
to snatch a fine day, and let us start at once for the
Weisshorn.

Behold us, then, en route for the Weisshorn. The
party consisted of Lyvetete, the two M.D.'s from
Winchester, and myself; the four guides being
Melchior Anderegg, Knubel,1 Imboden, and Nageli.
We meant to sleep high up, some two hours above
the Schallenberg huts, on the rocks ; and we took
with us a tent, the property of a friend, also a
member of the Alpine club, who was then in the
Caucasus, and had placed it, for the use of friends,
at Melchior's disposal. We had also three porters
—one of them was one of the young Taugwalders,
who carried the tent; while one of the other two
porters was specially retained to carry up wood, to
be cut out of the pine forests on our road, for the
purposes of the evening bivouac.

The day was fair, but there had been previously
several days of bad weather. Melchior told me
pHvately that he expected to find too much fresh
snow on the top of the mountain, and hardly hoped
that we should succeed: he urged us to wait two
or three days, when, he said, if the weather con-
tinued fine, the ascent would be easy. Our M.D.'s

1 This poor fellow was killed in the terrible accident on the
Lyskamm in 1877.A Fine Pair of Horns.	199

were, however, about to leave Switzerland for the
Italian Lakes, and could not postpone their attempt
upon the Weisshorn. Melchior's opinion greatly
shook my faith in our success ; but, succeed or fail,
the expedition was likely to be a fine one, and we,
therefore, started. We left Zermatt for Randa in
carriages, at about twelve.

Arrived at Randa, the joyous procession started.
Just below the piebald village, which consists of a
few very dark, burnt sienna chalets, a white church,
and two white but rudimentary hotels, you cross a
rough wooden bridge, and get on to the other side
of the raging, roaring Vispbach ; you then pass
through a cluster of huts, and begin to ascend
gently over suavely-sloping zig-zag paths, through
a pine wood.

Before and above, whenever you catch a sight of
it for trees, shut in between the V-shaped slopes of
high hills, is the great, grey Schallenberg glacier,
scarred and seamed with the stern wrinkles of many
a savage crevasse, and stretching up to the lofty
horizon : the snowy pyramid of the great Weiss-
horn itself lies back behind hill and glacier, and
you attain a great altitude before you catch a
glimpse of the far-off white cone that you propose
to ascend. You pass next a herd of cows, each
cow attached to a most musical bell, and you find
two or three Sennhiitten, planted on a tolerably200 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

level slope of green pasturage. Above these huts
the way becomes much more steep and rugged;
you bear away to the right of the hills, and find it
pretty warm work before you attain, at something
after six p.m., to the sleeping-place on the rocks.

Here you find overhanging blocks of great rocks
springing from the side of the mountain, and
beneath them a fairly roomy slab or ledge of
ground. The place resembles somewhat the sleep-
ing-place on the Mischabel Dom. So soon as we
arrived we set to work to put up our tent; but,
while levelling ground and digging up stones with
our ice-axes, we were suddenly overtaken by a
heavy storm of rain, snow, and hail. This discon-
certing performance on the part of the elements was
distinctly annoying. The ground became wet; we
became wet; plaids and rugs, and everything
became disagreeably wet; and our prospects of a
pleasant night were materially injured. However,
the storm ceased ; we erected a cooking-place with
pieces of loose rock, and the guides began to pre-
pare dinner, while we gazed round upon the view
from our lofty sleeping-quarters.

Opposite to us, on the left, with the wide
Schallenberg glacier between, was the dark and
frowning Mettelhorn.

The Weisshorn itself was hidden from our view.

As you gaze, the grandeur of the prospectA Fine Pair of Horns.

20I

becomes aggrandized in co-relation with the mind,
exalted by the genius of the spot.

We are high up on one side of the valley of St.
Nikolas. Below, the unseen Vispbach roars and
raves. On the other side, wide away from you,
great, bare, green valley hills, one threaded by a
winding, snowy torrent, spread up until they are
lost in the mighty mountains. Between the green
pine-studded hills and the snow-capped giants
stretches many a glacier. The valley and the lower
slopes are all, like our perch itself, in shadow, but
the evening sun shines brilliantly on the whole
magnificent range, from the Breithorn to Monte
Rosa, on the sharp Rympfischhorn, and on the
rounded Alphubel. The splendid peaks of the lofty
Mischabel range, all flooded with the glory of the
light, soar up magnificently on the left of the
valley opposite. A mighty amphitheatre, a majestic
void surrounds you ; and these great spaces are shut
in and backed up, all round, by one of the noblest
peak and glacier groups in the world.

The storm once ended, all was calm and fair, and
we sat, gazing with delight upon the noble scene,
until Melchior warned us that the cooking was
nearly done.

Then we turned our eyes away from distance,
and from grandeur, and made our glances small to
look upon our own near slab.202 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

King Melchior, who, like the eagle, is lord
above, lord of Herren as of guides, wore an orange
handkerchief round his hat, and crimson shirt
sleeves helped out the colour of his dark, black
bearded, nobly-modelled face. Nageli, in a kind
of Templar cap, with a long hanging point, the head-
gear composed of broad red and yellow stripes, had
improvised a kind of apron, and, as chief cook,
bent his quaint Algerian face over the crackling
fire, as he stirred and cooked with many a gibe and
joke. He is the jester and the Touchstone of guides.

Imboden, with shaven face and slight moustache,
with light grey eyes, and a look of spare, square,
cheerful keenness, peers out of a sad-coloured hood,
and helps Nageli. Knubel, sturdy, strong, and
solid, looks like a massive mountaineer, and roars
merrily at every one of Nageli's many jests. The
porters stand round the fire, proud to be of service
to such great guides ; and we, the four Herren,
summoned by Melchior's welcome call, having put
on Templar and other picturesque caps, sit round
the fire, wThich, amid the falling light, begins to flare
ruddily against a background of softly-deepening
darkness.

How good those bivouac meals are ! How good
our supper is ! The red wine has the flavour of
Chateau Margaux, and the soup would electrify
any school of cookery. We all, guides and portersA Fine Pair of Horns.

203

included, dine well,—and then comes the sweetest
morsel of the night. More wood is heaped on to
the high blazing fire ; a lantern is hung against the
gleaming rock behind, and we all gather round the
merry warmth and light. Around us on the other
side is void space, measureless, even by the fancy,
in the mystery of night and darkness ; but close at
hand is a little ledge, vivid with fire, and vital with
kindly human companionship and manly comrade-
ship. We all draw round ; some sit; some lie
recumbent; two stand. Faces are lighted up, and
darkly shadowed, by the flickering leaps of the
magic firelight, and then one voice interrogates
aright the spirit of the hour, and calls for
"tobacco !"

We all smoke. Even Lyvetete, the Spartan
G. C. P., is swept away by entrainement, and asks me
to lend him a pipe. Hooray! The air is still,
though murkily dusky; mists are rising from the
deep-down valley, and thin blue clouds are wafted
upwards from the gleaming pipe-bowls. We all
smoke ; and, for a time, there is silence. I hear
from far below the monotonous roaring of the un-
seen river. Beatific vision! happy hour! How
vividly that picturesque bivouac, with its wild
scenery and wilder figures, is present even now to
my mind's eye, to my charmed memory.

Presently, talking, jesting, and merry laughter204 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

begin. The grim sullen rocks above echoed back
a merriment in which they could not share. Then the
guides sang ; first one or two solos, and afterwards
a Swiss chorus executed by the whole body. No
tavern songs these; no vulgar music, coarsely
shouted, amid inebriation and dissipation, at a
flaring music-hall. No ; the music was sweet and
serious, and was worthy of the noble Weisshorn,
who, himself unseen, was " perhaps in silence wish-
ing joy." The fire no longer flamed; it only
gently glowed. The darkness was intense, the
cold, keen, and feathery mists were creeping slowly
over the dead glacier's ghastly face, when, as
Imboden, the best singer, finished a pathetic little
Switzer song, dark Melchior, the ruler of gods and
men, rose in his energy, and called aloud, " To bed!"

Instant uprising and dispersion: with dark
figures moving slowly about the dying fire. Mel-
chior had arranged the sleeping-places of every
guide and porter, and I followed him as he walked
apart to take his last look at the darkly mysterious
night.

" Well, Melchior ?"

" I don't know, Herr, about to-morrow ; but to-
night we shall have wind, and plenty of it."

There was no moon ; but, as I looked up, many
a constellation, half ehidden by the hills, half
obscured by mist, was shiningly suggested.A Fine Paw of Horns.

205

Our tent would hold two very comfortably, three
moderately comfortably, and four very uncomfort-
ably. We were five in the tent, and were not
comfortable. Before twelve we found that we were
all awake, and M.D. major proposed that we
should give up the farce of " playing at being
asleep," and have a pipe. Carried, and carried out.
At this time the wind was roaring violently.
Melchior's prophecy occurred to my mind, and I
" bitterly thought of the morrow.''

The wind increased in force ; and we heard a
guide's voice saying that " that tent would very
soon be blown down to Randa." We consequently
got up, at about two, and found the wind too strong,
and the weather too bad, for a start. Bivouac
breakfasts are generally cheerless and chilly, and
this one formed no exception to the rule. Owing
to storm, the start was delayed until nearly five—a
serious hindrance, because we knew that, if we
reached the summit, it would take us ten hours to
get there.

The morning was unpromising. It was dark and
cold, and heavy mist-wreaths were driving rapidly
before a fierce gale. We traversed the moraine,
and got upon the great glacier, which is very
extensive and very difficult. Its slopes are steep
and long. We crossed a fragile and dangerous ice-
bridge, extended over a mighty chasm ; we cut2o6 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

our way down narrow and entangled abysses, until
at length we attained to the foot of the high rock
ridge. The morning was then calmer, and cloud had
thinned into vapour. A gauzy veil hung over all
the mountains, and, as we ascended, I noticed with
wonder the silvery enchanted gleam of white snow
peaks, shining delicately through fast-rising drifts
of half-transparent, greyish mist-wracks. The
bases were hidden ; peaks or slopes were revealed,
and then veiled, in most exquisite mystery of aerial
cloud-magic. Thus suggested, and then half-
shrouded, there was an unearthly appearance of
supernatural immensity about the mighty hills
which strangely touched the imagination.

At the foot of the high rocks, which run beneath
the arete and cease before you stand below the
summit, we had a Weisshorn shower of great fall-
ing stones ; but, owing to the watchfulness of the
guides, no one was hit.

Still no sun ; but, on the whole, the day, though
dull and depressing, had rather improved. We
could not see the summit, but could see the clouds
which gathered thickly round it. No chance of
any view from the top !

From the end of the long and difficult ridge of
rocks, you ascend to the snow arite, just before the
final peak, by one or two couloirs, which, when the
snow is in good order, are fairly practicable. On ourA Fine Pair of Horns.

207

day, they were full of fresh, loose snow, and it was
easy to see that the expedition was at an end.
The face of the great guide is very expressive—to
those who know him.

" Those couloirs won't do at all," said Melchior.
" I thought it would be so. All that great quantity
of snow is fresh fallen, and quite loose and inse-
cure." Here he thought for a time, looking with
his practised eye of keen insight at the steep, long
couloirs. " One man, with two guides, might get
up one of them. I shouldn't much like to try, but
I won't say that that would be wholly impossible,
though this caravan can't even attempt to get up ;
but if any man got up, he must stop all night on
the peak. An hour later, when the day is a little
warmer, no man could come down that snow.
One man would start an avalanche, and bring all
that snow down ; and you see where an avalanche
from the top of the Weisshorn would go to! "
His voice so far had been argumentative and ex-
planatory, but his tone became quite firm and
decided as, looking at Lyvetete, he continued,
" Gentlemen, you must turn back. I'm sorry for
it, but I told you at Zermatt that you ought to
wait a day or two. The mountain is not in a fit
state. I won't go on. It is too dangerous. We
must go back,—and the sooner the better, I
say."2o8 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

Men don't accept defeat cheerfully or gracefully.
We sat down moodily and indecisively. I was
least disappointed, because Melchior had prepared
me for failure. In proportion to the strength of
my belief in him had been the weakness of my
belief in ultimate success. Lyvetete went farthest,
and turned back most unwillingly. We all knew
that further progress was impossible, and that
Melchior was quite right. Suddenly the minds
turned round, like ships influenced by rudders ; we
all stood up and the retreat had silently begun.
Arrived at the bivouac rocks, a large eagle, the
Lammergeier of the Alps, poised on wide-spread
wings, wheeled slowly just above us. Oh, for a
rifle then ! " He smells our food," say the guides.
We shouted—the great pinions beat the air, and
then, with a long slide down the wind, he sailed
slowly away across the valley.

As you look from a height upon a rushing river
torrent, its quick, hurrying waves and mad whirl-
pools and eddies, all look like curdled, motionless
wrinkles of thick, grey sand. I noticed this strange
effect as we descended.

We reached the milk chalets just as the last low
beams of spnlight slanted upon the yellow green
of mountain grass. Huge boulders of grey rock,
moss covered and lichen stained, lay strewn about;
above and below were pine woods, and the friendly-A Fine Pair of Horns.	209

faced cows rang their bells around us. The cow-
herd brought a mighty bowl of Swiss milk, which
we emptied with avidity. Then, in the mellow
calm of that grass slope, pleasant to the eye long
hardened upon moraine, and snow, and iron rocks,
we smoked one peaceful pipe of mild regret.
Around, all was softly bright with the last rays of a
sinking sun ; above, all was grey, and cold, and
cloudy. We felt like the Lotus-eaters, weary with
climbing up the climbing wave.

Then the larger M.D. spoke, with quiet, almost
hopeful resignation, " Well, I don't so much regret
our failure, now. All clouds round the top, no
viewbesides, it couldn't be done. We've had
a jolly bivouac, and a most enjoyable day. We've
seen the whole way up the Weisshorn ; and when
we do him next—in finer weather—why, we really
will do him. Eh ?"

The orator expressed the sentiment of the meet-
ing ; though Lyvetete, after a defeat, remains
darkly inscrutable and compressedly silent.

We reached Randa, and ultimately Zermatt. We
had had a pleasant day and real hard work. Mr.
Ball says that the ascent of the Weisshorn " may
be counted amongst the most difficult and labo-
rious that have been yet achieved." We had not
attained quite to the height of his 14,813 feet; but
we had had some little difficulty in doing what we

P2 to Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

did, and we had seen the whole mountain. Better
luck, or finer weather, next time we try !

Shortly after, a day came on which I started for
the Matterhorn. To ascend this mountain had
been with me the desire of years. The lonely and
terrible peak had long exercised a peculiar fascina-
tion over my imagination. How often had I gazed
upon him, with longing and with awe, as his solitary
cone soared statelily from out his blanched stand-
point of wide-surrounding glaciers. And then he
has about him the dark horror of a tragedy. Other
mountains, as Mont Blanc, have, as I well know,
been far more fatal ; but no mountain ever has
had—and had, too, upon the occasion of his first
ascent—so terrible an accident; an accident which
yet chills the blood, and thrills the nerves, and
haunts the dreaming sleep.

I started, then, with the quiet zeal,

" Which all the passion of a life can steal,

For force to work with

and I anticipated no disappointment, for, although
the weather had been unfavourable for days, yet,
at last, a fine morning had come, and I started
with Melchior and with Peter Anderegg; and
Melchior uttered no whisper of a warning which
could presage possible failure.

I had no friend with me. I went off alone, withA Fine Pair of Horns.

211

the two guides, and with a young Taugwalder, as
porter, to the hut

We started a little after ten. The day was
sultry and sunbright. The Matterhorn is a good
way off from Zermatt; and we walked in a leisurely
way, over upward-sloping meadows, through patches
of shady woods, and attained to the great, wide,
stony moraine at nearly 12.30.

Here we halted for lunch. Seated on a great
flat stone, we smoked a pipe before proceeding, and
just then the sun disappeared, clouds began to form,
and a shrill wind whistled over the width of the
moraine.

Melchior looked carefully round. "The wind
has changed, Herr," observed the watchful guide.

Nothing more was said. We resumed our way,
walking at a much quicker pace. Melchior looked
round at the weather rather more than I quite
liked ; but I was so bent upon success that I
dared not ask him any questions, and we strode
rapidly arxl silently along our dreary path, now
darkening over with a mist-compelling, chilly wind.
All round us was desolation ; vegetation and life
had wholly ceased. No crops, but waste widths of
bare stones and barren moraine, grow near the
sombre, gloomy mass of the adamantine Horn.

You approach the great, grim mountain by a
sort of nearly level passage, leading from the
P 2212 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

Hornli to the foot of the rocks, which resembles
the drawbridge over which you pass to a fortress.
As we neared the mighty rock cone, the sun and
sunlight had quite vanished ; and a rising wind,
whistling shrilly and coldly, chilled the imagination,
and surrounded the huge mountain with an atmo-
sphere of awe and dread. It towers and tapers up
straight before you; broad and massive at the
base, but narrowing sharply to its pointed peak.
It looks darkly hostile and grimly repellent,—" A
force which is not we? The Northland mythology,
which is based upon the impersonation of the visible
workings of nature, would have symbolized the
Matterhorn as a Jotun,—and a very dangerous
Jotun, too. But we are fast nearing the weird
mountain. The east side, facing the Furge-gletscher,
" looks, and is, completely unassailable the side
facing Zermatt, which rises from out the Matter-
horn glacier, seems to be, but is not, inaccessibility
itself. The edge, which divides the east and north-
east sides, looks as if it Were hopelessly steep and
sharp. The peak must have been held to be an almost
impossible thing until joy and sorrow, triumph and
mourning, had blended in its first sad glad ascent

You leave the rock ridges, and cross a stretch of
snow. You are then fairly on the mountain itself,
near the edge of the two sides, and you begin at
once to climb. All progress is upward hence-A Fine Pair of Horns.

213

forth, and soon begins to be somewhat laborious.
The first noteworthy object is the site of the
bivouac, at which the first party spent the night of
the 13th July, 1865. It is low on the mountain,
but is otherwise well chosen. There is a sort of
hollow formed by sheltering rocks, and before this
is a small level place on which Mr. Whympers
tent was erected. As you pause for a moment to
look at this memorable little spot, all the associa-
tions of that most terrible first ascent strike the
mind with vivid force. The party of eight, the
four travellers, " Croz, old Peter, and his two sons,"
are full of high spirits and of ardent anticipation.
They sketch, they bask in the sun, they chat and
sport. The cliffs above " echoed back their laugh-
ter and their songs." They were glad and merry,
with a merriment that seems almost shocking as
we think of what the morrow brought forth.

Onward and upward. The way grows ever
steeper and more difficult. We keep mainly on
the crest of the ridge, but are sometimes on the
Riffel, sometimes on the Zermatt side of the edge.
Once we descend from rocks on to a steep slope of
hard, frozen snow, which runs just under the rocks,
and descends very sharply on to the deep-down
Furge glacier far below, which glacier is, at the end
of the slope, seamed with chasms and studded with
crevasses. Here Melchior cuts steps and cautions214 ^ tp'me A scents and A dventures.

us about falling stones. We regain the rocks,
which begin to present very tough passages, and,
after about three hours of this hard work, attain to
the difficult bit below the cabane.

Here we find a chain over the mauvais pas, of
which chain even Melchior knew nothing. I learned
its history later.

Mr. Whymper had been for the second time on the
mountain two or three days before I was on it.
At the hut he found certain chains, which it was
intended "some day" to fasten over the difficult
places ; and he and his guides fixed one chain over
the bad part (now worse than it used to be) below
the hut. Mr. Whymper tells me that the route now
adopted is more difficult than the one followed on
the occasion of the first ascent. He says in his book,
" Sometimes Hudson led, sometimes myself." Over
the route now followed, which keeps much closer
to the sharp edge of the face, a guide has to lead.

Over this tough bit Melchior, disdaining the
chain, but extended on his face, goes steadily up-
ward. So soon as he has achieved it, and is firm,
I follow ; and Peter and Taugwalder come after
me. " This is the hut," cries Melchior.

I had come upon it unawares ; nor is there much
in the rude lump of loose grey stones to indicate to
the unexpectant eye even the most rough and tem-
porary of human refuges.A Fine Pair of Horns.

215

It is five o'clock, and we have attained, " with toil
of heart, and knees, and hands," an altitude of
12,526 feet. The hut is perched on the very edge
of the rock ridge. You reach the cairn shelter
from behind, and you pass round a very narrow
border, or ledge, of rock, on its left side, and stand
before the entrance. The right side is built against
tall rock—rock which soars straight and high and
smoothly up. The hut is plastered on against the
sheer face of lofty rock cliffs, and, being on the
sharp crest itself, has remarkably little space around
it. You must be careful where you step, as you
might very easily step overboard, and find out
your false step on the glacier lying so deeply there
below. To make a false step here would be about
equivalent to stepping out of the car of a balloon
high up in the air. The dark slate-grey stones, of
which the hut is rudely constructed, are piled
loosely together ; and there has been, 01 course, no
attempt to fill up the interstices with mortar or
other cohesive substance. The roof slopes down
from the high rock rising so loftily above it, and
the door, when I was there, had been torn from its
hinges, and lay, in melancholy abandonment, on the
ground. Effete as a door, it might, as Melchior
pointed out, be of use as a table, and to this pur-
pose we devoted it. A little spring of water
gushes or trickles from the near rock, and snow216 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

stretches up closely to the rocks just in front of the
cabane. •

The view from it is fine. You have directly and
deeply below you the wide glacier and the huge
snow-fields, sunless when I was there, which stretch
away towards the Gorner-gletscher. You see the
Theodule, the Furgen glacier; and you have next
the near Breithorn, the Twins, the Lyskamm, and
many-peaked Monte Rosa. You see the green
slopes on which stands the white speck which is
the Riffel Hotel, and get a suggestion of that great
amphitheatre of giant mountains which surround th'6
Riffel. The prospect, seen towards evening, and
without a ray of sunlight, was desolately sublime.
The grey of the dull sky chilled and deadened the
colder, deathlier grey of snow-waste and of snow-
peak. All was huge and far, and very, very still ;
force, miraculous, stupendous, was everywhere ; but
it seemed a world in which life had not yet been
created. It was too vast, too cold, too stern, for
human habitation.

At the moment which I am now describing, the
wind had ceased, and the impression of the most
profound calm over all the scene was singularly
striking. The sky was of one uniform grey tint,
and a universal curtain of low, equable, stagnant
cloud spread widely over all the heavens.

The next thing was to examine what was beforeA Fine Pair of Horns.	21 7

us and above us. I wanted to see the morrow's
climb—the way up from the hut to the summit.
For this purpose I ascended with Melchior to a
rocky height, a little way above the cabane, which
commanded a full view of the remainder of our
task. The top is so foreshortened, from the point
on which we stood, that it looked very near. Fore-
shortened as it was, it seemed to be only an hour's
climb. The portion just above the hut is, perhaps,
the easiest part of the mountain. Melchior pointed
out the route towards the shoulder, which appeared
comparatively easy. The angle of the mountain
is about 40°; and " it is very unusual to find so
steep a gradient maintained continuously as the
general angle of a great mountain slope." We
next used a glass, and surveyed carefully the fatal
spot where the accident happened. The thin
bleached rope, fixed on that occasion by Mr.
Whymper, was distinctly visible, and looked
mournfully suggestive.

" That's the place—exactly there," said Mel-
chior, in a low voice, pointing carefully, " where
the slip happened."

At this moment, a dun cloud seemed to grow out
of and round the very peak of the Matterhorn.
Above the site of the great accident all seemed good.
The snow did not appear to be bad, and it seemed
as if you would get upon the snow-slope directly.218 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

" How long will it take us to-morrow to the top,
Melchior? " I asked cheerfully.

" Well, Herr, we must reckon upon three good
hours—drei starke Stunden—if the weather holds
good."

" If the weather holds good, Melchior ? Why, it
will certainly be good, won't it ? Think how fine
the morning was ! "

"Well, Herr—I—I hope so." Here Melchior
gazed carefully and slowly all around, as guides and
sailors do.

" We must hope for the best—but I don't know.
Now let us go down to the hut, and cook some
supper."

We descended. The place on which the hut is
built is a bad one ; but Melchior pointed out that
there are not many places on the ridge of the
Matterhorn on which a hut can be built at all.

Out Liebig ! Out Fortnum and Mason ! Come,
supper, come! We erected a cooking-place of
grey stones just before the doorway of the hut, and
lit a fire of wood which we had brought up with us.
The wood soon crackled and leapt into lively
flame. The casserole was slung across it, and the
guides were busy cooking. I smoked a pipe, looked
on, and assisted with sympathy. Suddenly I felt
it very cold. I fetched a plaid out of the hut, and
wrapped it round me. Looking round, in conse-A Fine Pair of Horns.	219

quence of some suggestion of darkness, I saw that
the clouds were boiling and seething, and rising
with incredible swiftness, apparently from the
glacier below. That and all beneath was wholly
blotted out. The clouds rose like sudden mists
from the Niffelheim, and the darkness deepened.
The little fire burned blazingly in dense, whitish-
grey fog. Next came great flakes of snow, and an
intenser cold. Melchior looked round, but said
nothing. Peter, going for water, found the little
spring frozen up, and had to fetch snow from the
rocks below. The snow increased, and soon fell
heavily. Soughs of coming wind wailed in
melancholy music round the reverberating rocks.

" Will you go into the hut ?—better there,"
observed Melchior. " Come; the soup is ready,
and that, at least, is hot! "

A certain depression, owing to the change in the
weather, clogged our labouring spirits, but we had
a tolerably merry supper nevertheless. - We placed
a lighted candle in the doorless hut, and that
looked warm and ruddy. Outside, the darkness,
the cold increased, the snow descended, and the
coming wind began to mourn.

Once there was a lull. At about half-past eight,
Melchior asked me to come out. The clouds were
thinner, and the mists were lighter. We could just
see the Riffel, like a lamp through a fog. Then220 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

the Hero on the Matterhorn burned magnesium
wire, to show Leander, standing six-feet-two in the
Riffel, where he was. Round the doorway of the
hut, in the keen blue gleam and glare of the
burning wire, stood the dark guides and myself.
They see it at the Riffel! Look !—they are burn-
ing something ! And then swept again around us
the driving clouds, all darker than before ; then the
snow began to fall faster, and to freeze as it fell;
then a mightier wind arose, and began to howl in
its wrath ;—then commenced a storm upon the
Matterhorn ;—and the storm-fiend and the Jotun
wrestled in a deadly grip. We turned into the hut,
made some red wine hot, and smoked, as we
chatted and listened to the ever-increasing storm
without.

No man spoke about the weather. I laid down
my pipe for a moment on the rock, and it was
blown away like a feather into the grey void of
cloud-storm. The floor of the hut is uneven ice,
masked with straw. Between every stone whistles
in the piercing icy wind. The cold is cruel. Go
out of the hut for a moment, and you return
covered, face and all, with frozen snow. The storm
is augmenting its violence. We anticipate a
pleasant night. The light is put out, and in the
darkness the cold seems more terrible than before.
Pull your plaid well over your face ; don't noticeA Fine Pair of Horns.

221

how the wind, through every chink, stirs your hair,
and lie quietly,—to let others sleep. Good night!

Of course, I did not sleep. I never do in
mountain huts or bivouacs. At first, the chief
thing audible was the sleeping of the other inmates
of the cabane, who were not kept awake by any
superabundant activity of the imagination. The
Matterhorn is, par excellence, the mountain on which
the imaginative faculty is most strongly stirred ;
and I lay awake, recalling the long history of the
siege laid to the mountain, and of the dreadful
details of the accident There is a sympathy of
unrest between storm without and the excited
mind within so high a shelter on the dreadful
Matterhorn. Cold co-operated with imagination
to keep me awake. The hut became a temple of
frost,—a cave of the winds. The tempest increased
terribly ; and, when the night had slowly shrivelled
up to three in the morning, the wind was roaring
like a thousand cannons.

At three, Melchior, moved by some hidden spring
of instinct, awoke. The arrangement had been
that we should start at four, and the great guide
can always wake at any hour that duty may
dictate. I saw a match struck,—hear it I could
not,—and I saw Melchior get quietly up, and issue
noiselessly from the hut In a short time he
returned, covered with snow, and bringing with222 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

him, as he pushed aside our rough substitute for a
door, a blast of Arctic fury and severity. He
crawled towards me, to put his lips to my ear, and
shouted to me to lie still, as there could be no idea
of getting up yet We waited, tumbling about
in our straw. Presently he woke Peter and the
porter, and told them to light a fire. They went
out, and I lay still until four.

Then I got up, determined to see for myself, and
issued forth. I found thickest mist and clouds,
damp, cold, heavy snow falling, and a violent wind
rushing and roaring savagely about. The snow
around the doorway was deep, and all that could
be seen looked white. Some red wine was made
hot, and we managed a kind of joyless breakfast in
the bleak hut. Then came the question, of what to
do ? Melchior was silent; but I know his ex-
pression so well that I began secretly to abandon
hope. I did not want to turn back, but still I
should never think of urging Melchior An&eregg
to go further forward than he might think right.
" Would you like to try to go on a little way ? "
asked Melchior. "Yes, I should," I answered;
and we roped and started. I knew that he would
turn back if he thought it dangerous to proceed,
and I did not want to propose to abandon the
ascent. I gathered from his- mariner that he had
no hope of the top, but I could not bear the ideaA Fine Pair of Horns.	223

of returning until he should say that going further
was impracticable.

^Vs the snow fell, it froze ; and there was little or
no discernible foot or hand hold on the icy rocks.
The cold was bitter ; the mist swallowed up every
idea of any view, and the wind was terrible. The
going was very difficult, and Melchior, who knew
how much I wanted to attain the summit, was
evidently unwilling to give the word for retreating,
and yet was equally disinclined to go forward.
Oh, that Matterhorn is combative and choleric !
His passionate, proud temper always leads him to
seek a conflict with the elements.

At length my guide waited until I came up to
him on a block of bad rock, and then said, " It is
impossible to go on. We must turn back. I
could not stand, in this wind, to cut steps on that
last slope, and up to the top is now all hard ice.
Herr, we must give up the Matterhorn to-day, and
we must return and do it in finer weather. The
going down, now, will be difficult enough, I can
tell you ! " He looked at me, and I looked at him.
I was terribly disappointed, and yet I well knew
that he was wise and right in his decision. After
a moment of inner struggle, I turned round ; Mel-
chior nodded, and Peter, who had anticipated the
result, began the descent. One moved, while two
held, and the coming down was much more diffi-224 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

cult and dangerous than the ascent had been. You
could not see where you were going. In short, it
was very, very difficult.

The weary, dreary cabane again, looking coldly,
greyly heartless and inhospitable. The porter
found asleep inside. Some short time occupied in
packing and eating, and then, with a sad and jaded
feeling, we turned downwards at, perhaps, 7.30
a.m., from the unachieved peak.

The bit under the cabane was very bad, but Mr.
Whymper's friendly chain helped much. The
farther we got, the worse were the ice-covered
rocks. There are two or three hundred feet under
the hut which are bad, and Melk had no one above
him to hold the rope. Still, no single slip occurred.

On the glacier all our tracks of yesterday were
obliterated, and Peter cut fresh steps in the hard
ice. While passing this steep, downward slope of
ice, Melchior called out loudly to take care ; and,
as he spoke, down came a cannonade of stones.
One of these struck Peter, and knocked him out
of the steps. It then bounded, in one huge leap,
into the thickly whirling mist which shrouded all
below. The little spot on which, at any particular
moment, we were, seemed for the time to be a
small space hung high in air, and surrounded by
gathering walls of cloud.

I do not wish to describe, I merely intend toA Fine Pair of Horns.	225

suggest, our troublesome and difficult descent.
The mists through which we moved were never still,
but were always agitated and troubled by a raging
wind, which blew at times a perfect hurricane, and
then, exhausted by its own violence, sank for a
short time into a mere gale. The wind, as it blew
away one flying drift of misty cloud, blew up
another swirling wreck of vapour to succeed it, so
that the view was never clear, and the whole trajet
was troubled and disturbed by darkness and by
storm. The snow froze directly it fell. The
rocks, shining with ice, were only occasionally
patched with whiteness. The snow which the wind
blew off was detained by the frost in a coating of
slipperiness ; and it cost us great labour and care
to descend in safety. At length we reached the
site of the original bivouac, and halted there for a
rest and breakfast. We huddled together under
the shelter of the rocks, and freed ourselves with
clasp-knives from the snow which had frozen thickly
upon us. " We could have gone up to the top and
have come down with much less trouble than this
» descent has cost us, in fine weather," said Mel-
chior ; " but courage ! we will do him together yet
—-on some fine day !" Here we drank the bottle
of champagne which, alas ! had been intended for
the summit, and after breakfast we took a beatific
pipe. The difficulties were nearly over. Melchior

Q226 A Ipine A scents and A dventitres.

led straight across the snow stretch, and we re-
gained the rocks, which were easier on the other
side. The light became better, the wind blew
less furiously, and the snow fell more gently.
What if we had waited to try an ascent at a later
hour ? Horrible doubt! We attained the draw-
bridge, and saw before us the dark Hornli. Hav-
ing passed this, we were out of the storm; and
when we reached the moraine, we were in a dull
day of faint level grey, and could see the moun-
tains. Dent Blanche had some cloud about him,
but had had, as Melchior explained, no storm like
ours.

Looking back, the Matterhorn itself was in-
visible, " wrapt in dense cloud from base to cope
but Melchior said that the storm was ceasing on
his upper part. What if we had waited, and had
gone on later ? Everything about that solitary
and unique peak is grand and terrible. He can
do a storm with which the storms on no other
mountain may compare; he can be wrestling
madly with the storm demons while all other peaks
are free. When a cloud comes near him, he clasps
it in his dark stony arms, and struggles with it
in sublime fury. He clothes his mane with thunder,
and laughs in demoniac joy as the storm-wind
rages vainly round his awful crest. " There's
matter in't, indeed, if he be angry." There isA Fine Pair of Horns.	227

never anything petty, spiteful, little about him.
The giant Jotun is always grand, and fierce, and
awful. Gazing back upon the storm-shrouded
shape, we saw that he alone amongst the mountains
had passed a night of fellest warring with all the
storm fiends; and as we strode along, with a
sense of relief, through gentler scenes, and in a
softened air, I felt that my life was, at least, richer
for the memory of the grandeur of a night of
storm upon the sublime Matterhorn.

Pausing at the huts on the Matterjoch for a great
drink of milk, we soon reach Zermatt. It was
something between one and two o'clock. As I
emerged from my bath, the rain began, and the
evening in the valley was chilly and wet. The
Matterhorn, sulky after his recent passionate
outburst, was vaguely suggested through a shroud
of drizzling rain.

" But sunwards, lo you !—how it towers sheer up,
a world of mountains, the diadem and centre of
the mountain region ! A hundred and a hundred
savage peaks, in the last light of day, all glowing,
of gold and amethyst, like giant spirits of the
wilderness ; there in their silence, in their solitude,
even as on the night when Noah's deluge first
dried ! Beautiful, nay solemn, was the sudden
aspect to our wanderer. He gazed over those
stupendous masses with wonder, almost with long-
Q 2228 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

ing desire ; never till this hour had he known
Nature—that she was One, that she was his Mother,
and Divine. And as the ruddy glow was fading into
clearness in the sky, and the sun had now departed,
a murmur of Eternity and Immensity, of Death
and Life, stole through his soul ; and he felt as if
Death and Life were one, as if the Earth were not
dead, as if the Spirit of the Earth had its throne in
that splendour, and his own spirit were therewith
holding Communion."

Thus Teufelsdrockh, in almost inspired strain of
sacred Hebrew prophet; and we, too, in whom a
love of these lonely and mighty Alps has become
a profound and steadfast passion, we can in our
very heart of hearts echo his noble words of trans-
cendental rapture. For ours has been no light
love, burning out in feverish, hasty frenzy, and de-
clining into dull satiety. No !—year after year, as
we go again up unto them to worship, we feel that
we love our Alps well and worthily, and with an
ever-deepening and a life-long love. These moun-
tains at once excite and satisfy an ideal in our
souls, which holds kin with the divine in nature.
They, outside us, become a power within us.
Words can but weakly express—can, indeed, only
suggest the feelings which these glorious hills ex-
cite ; for,—

" Saying aught, we leave a world unsaid."A Fine Pair of Horns.	229

Types of bygone epochs in the long development
of progressive creation are the slowly-flowing
masses of great glaciers ; emblems of power, ma-
jesty, terror, of most solemn and sacred beauty, are
the sky-cleaving, heaven-soaring peaks of this
sacred constellation of huge Alpine heights,
Thought and emotion blend inextricably as we
gaze and climb upon them. As they near heaven,
the mountains become clothed in purity, and the
highest ranges wear ever the white garment of
perpetual snow. We that have stood upon their
loftiest summits, and have seen, in silent awe and
wonder, the mysteries of their remote recesses, we
have, perhaps, of all men, the most intense sense
of the scarcely hidden presence of near Deity.
We know how near these sublimely-beautiful
mountains are to heaven, and we thrill at the
contact with a sacrament of Creation.THE PEAK OF TERROR.

" Mountains were not new to him ; but rarely are mountains seen
in such combined majesty and grace as here. . . . Often also could I
see the black tempest marching in anger through the distance: round
some Schreckhorn, as yet grim-blue, would the eddying vapour
gather, and there tumultuously eddy, and flow down like a mad
■witch's hair; till, after a space, it vanished, and, in the clear
sunbeam, your Schreckhorn stood smiling grim-white, for the vapour
had held snow. . . . What is Nature? Ha! why do I not name
thee God ? . . . O heavens, is it in very deed, HE, then, that ever
speaks through thee ; that lives and loves in thee; that lives and
loves in me?"—Carlyle.

VERY year, when starting for the annual
holiday of Alpine adventure, one travels
with a stock of plans and projects, which
include the ascent of certain peaks and the crossing
of certain passes. Every year one quits the Alps
leaving certain of these purposed expeditions un-
achieved.

It may be that the man with whom you are
working has done the particular peak, and does not
want to do it again ; but it also may be—and thisThe Peak of Terror.

231

latter is the most frequent cause of shortcoming—
that bad weather compels you to forego an attempt.
Certain it is that, every year, an uncompleted
balance of projected work has to be carried over to
the year following ; and this enforced postponement
is not wholly without a good side. It is, no doubt,
irritating at the time to be forced to omit a desired
and desirable peak, or to pass over a longed-for
pass, but then, when the next year comes, you con-
template such deferred ascents with the heightened
anticipation arising from a long courtship and
suppressed expectation. The yearning is greater,
the resolve is stronger, in consequence of the
previous disappointment.

One of the mountains on my deferred list for
1875 was the mighty Schreckhorn, and when the
Alpine harvest-time came this year I was firmly
minded, with the quiet ardour of a pent-up desire,
to attempt the charming monster.

The Shreckhorn is 13,394 feet high. It stands
practically alone. The Mettelhorn is, indeed,
rather near it, but then that is a comparatively
insignificant mountain. The Wellhorn and Wetter-
horner groups rise to the north of the Schreckhorn,
while on the other side rises the great range of the
Oberland giants.

All around its base sweep wide, huge glaciers.
It is the steepest and the stiffest, and is one of the232 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

longest and most laborious climbs in the Alps.
Mr. Ball tells us that the " ascent of the Schreck-
horn is one of the most laborious hitherto effected,
and can be undertaken only by practised cragsmen."
He adds, " It is well known to all travellers that
the peak is one of the boldest and most forbidding
in aspect among the summits of the Alps. On
three sides the rocks are so steep as to be almost
completely bare of snow ; the north slope towards
the Lauteraar Joch alone shows a long slope of
snow lying at the highest possible angle, and in
such condition that the slightest disturbance is apt
to cause avalanches." Mr. Leslie Stephen calls the
Schreckhorn, and justly so calls it, "the grimmest
fiend of the Oberland." The Lesser Schreckhorn,
which is ninety-one feet lower than the actual
summit, had been ascended, but the all-conquering
Leslie Stephen was (in 1861) the first to attain to
the highest peak of the true Schreckhorn. I own
that I envy him that first ascent. A sultan with a
well-stocked harem is too much engrossed by the
general to heed the unit, and Mr. Stephen has made
so many first ascents that he may perhaps half
forget that of the Schreckhorn ; but I still admire
and even half envy his success, and it was for me
an object of ambition to follow where he had led.

Our party of 1875 consisted firstly of our head
and chief, Lyvetete, in whose aspiring footstepsThe Peak of Terror.

follows eagerly the young and ardent disciple,
Magnus Gower, and for a time we were associated
with the two M.D/s, Bramshill and Falconer,
though they ultimately quitted us to hunt after
newer fancies. Our standing guides were Melchior
Anderegg and Christian Lauener, with power to
add to their number by taking local guides when
necessary.

The Alps do not seem to grow older; they
attained early a state of perfection, and they do not
change or decline from that The same with
Lyvetete. The years roll on, but he seems to
become with every year younger and more enthu-
siastic as a mountaineer. Indeed, if such a thing
were possible—but it is not, because you cannot
exceed the superlative—he might almost be thought
to improve as a climber. He is the loved and
honoured, great and clement prince of our little
party ; great in respect of his superiority, clement
in respect of his considerate treatment of weaker
brethren. And then how strangely sweet his
mystic Alpine smile!—unchanging, uncanny, in-
scrutable, it expresses subtly his complex Alpine
joy. The tendency of many great mountaineers is,
in unconscious imitation of Mr. Frederick Vokes, to
elevate the legs above the head, to rank mechanism
in climbing above mind in mountaineering.
Not so with Lyvetete; he retains, despite his234 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

excellence on hill and gletscher, the greater part of
his noble, native mentality ; - and he developed this
year a superior and conscientious intelligence in
connexion with the commissariat No day is too
long, no mountain is too hard for him ; and even a
defeat (owing to bad weather) affects but tempo-
rarily his gay and genial sweetness.

How paternal was the fond, approving smile
with which this year he rewarded the zealous efforts
of his ardent and worthy disciple, Magnus Gower,
to keep up with him ! Melchior is as proud of
Lyvetete as Lyvetete is proud of Gower, and our
happy little party lived and worked in the sweetest
concord, shaking out joyously for ever a musical
melody, as it were even of Swiss cow-bells.

The August of 1875 brought a great deal of bad
weather to the Alps. It was even worse than that
of 1874. We were to begin real work this season
at Courmayeur, but the rain was there before us,
and lasted after it had driven us away. We wanted
to do the Grand Combin, the Grandes Jorasses, and
Mont Blanc from Courmayeur; but the mountains
were all too dangerous and difficult—the heavy
snows were glissading down in avalanches, and
Melchior would not allow us to try any one of our
Courmayeur loves. We had to console ourselves
with Italian fruits, and with a daily low pass and
thorough wetting. At last we reached Grindelwald,The Peak of Terror.

235

which is the starting-point for the Schreckhorn, and
Lyvetete, Magnus Gower, and myself agreed to
snatch the first fine day for an ascent of the dark
Peak of Terror. Taking a wet training walk over
the Scheideck, Lyvetete met young Altamont
Hillyer, of Oxford, and invited him to join our
expedition. He gladly agreed, and the eager party
was—or seemed to be—arranged.

I say seemed, because, at the last moment, our
plans were changed. A rumour reached us that
another party was going to sleep at the Kastenstein,
and knowing that any addition of numbers to our
expedition would overcrowd the cave, Lyvetete
proposed to me that I should take Hillyer up the
Schreckhorn, while he and Magnus Gower went off
to do the Eiger Joch. The guides were to be
divided ; Lyvetete was to have Melchior, and I was
to take Christian. These great masters were to be
supplemented by local talent as second guides.
All this was arranged, and the two parties prepared
to start separately. The Kastenstein rock cave is
five or six hours distant from Grindelwald, and,
after an early lunch, Hillyer and myself started,
with Lauener, Kauffmann, and a porter, for the
burrow. We walked in the hot sun of afternoon
along the well-known path by the Lower Grindel-
wald glacier, descended upon the glacier itself by
the ladders below the Beregg hut, crossed the236 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

glacier, and passed the Zasenhorn. Here we had
to recross the glacier through the seracs, and, as we
traversed hump and hollow, we saw before us, high
up on the other side, the Kastenstein block of dark
rock. The seracs proved troublesome ; the way
was hard to hit; and we spent a good hour among
them. The light was failing as we toiled up the
steep rough way that leads to the cave. At last
we reached it, and surveyed a great pile of massive
rocks, under one of which is the dark, low, irregu-
larly shaped hollow, in which we were to sleep.
The place might be the cavernous home of a wild
beast or of a small ogre. A rude cooking-place is
improvised just outside the burrow, and our guides
were soon busy with mountain cookery. Then
came the dinner, the song and jest, and then the
vesper pipe. Hillyer and myself, joyous with the
hopes of the morrow, reclined among guides and
porters, anticipated the Schreckhorn, and enjoyed
the noble Kastenstein view. Christian and Kauff-
mann soothed us with prophecies of fine weather,
and we had a happy bivouac evening.

The great range of noble peaks standing opposite
to the Kastenstein across the broad width of the
chill glacier are all duskily, dimly, whitish-grey in
the cold shadow of the falling night; when, sud-
denly, there slowly steals a silver flame along the
.sharp topmost crest of the mighty Eiger, andThe Peak of Terror.

237

moonlight shimmers on his snowy height The
cold pure argent light broadens and descends. It
next lights up the bulkier summit of the Monch,
and then gleams upon the pallid snows of the far,
fair Jungfrau. Then it passes on to the Viescher-
horner, and shines brightly upon the rounded
Ochsenhorn's white peak. The superb Finster-
aarhorn, last of the long row which commences
with the Eiger, catches in his turn that chaste light
which suggests no hint of heat The glory broadens
and deepens slowly along the whole sky-line of
those magnificent mountains, until the full moon
herself swims upward into the pale blue heavens,
from behind the towering chain, and then their
high sides of snow and deep hollows of glacier are
bathed whitely in the shining radiance. The Unter-
Grindelwald glacier itself, stretching away broadly
beneath us, looks like a gigantesque drawing in
Indian ink, as, in the moonlight, the heights and
hollows of serac and of crevasse contrast so strangely,
strongly, dark with white. The silver flood creeps
upward over wastes of stone up our bare hill-side
until it reaches to our very feet, and until the huge
rock boulders which shelter the Kastenstein refuge
grow tenderly bright in the silent rays of the palely
blanching moon. All around is hushed and huge ;
awful, and yet so lovely. Moonlight streams on
snow as faith gleams upon a saintly soul. The238 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

heavenly light is reflected, in answering beauty, by
the pure thing on which it calmly shines.

With the first glimpse of moonlight on these
mighty hills the songs ceased, and we gazed in
silence upon the magic Alpine vision. Work, how-
ever, often calls men away from dreams of beauty
and delight; and as we were to get up at two or
three next morning to do the Schreckhorn, a short
night only was before us. Some time between ten
and eleven Christian touched me on the shoulder,
looked expressively at his watch, and pointed to
the interior of our cavern shelter. I sighed, and
had just one more half-pipe before I could tear
myself from the silver splendour of the scene. In
the low, rock-roofed burrow hay is thinly spread
over a hard uneven rock bottom, and on this wild
couch you compose yourself to sleep—if sleep you
can. Soon the candle was extinguished, and huge
amorphous forms slumbered near me, while the
white moonshine stole in, in little flakes, through
chinks in the rock, and dreamland slept around the
lonely Kastenstein.

At three in the dim chill morning we were called
(not necessarily awakened) by Christian. We
wrestled grimly with the stiff hard boots, and
with the tough, unlovely breakfast. There being
then light enough, we left the cave at 4 a.m.,
and were silently en route for the high andThe Peak of Terror.

239

distant Schreckhorn. You begin the ascent by a
descent. The way lies downwards over great
blocks of stone, sprinkled thickly upon coarse
grass. It is rough walking. You descend nearly
to the glacier, and then get on to snow slopes and
begin to ascend. The slope soon narrows into a
couloir, or gully, between rocks. It is long and
very steep. The snow being quite hard in the early
morning, and the foothold consequently slight, this
steep, straight-up ascent is decidedly laborious.
No prospect of the summit. The view is cut off
above you by rocks, which seem to stand across
the top of our snow gully. I am on the rope
next to Christian, who does not cut any steps or
notches. The hard snow is so very steep that you
have to put the foot down sideways, and it costs
great muscular exertion to maintain your foothold.
Still up you go. Where ways are steep you rise
rapidly, and, as we attain to the rocks so long seen
above us, we find that many a peak, heretofore
hidden by the Eiger and Finsteraarhorn range,
soars up and swims into our ken. Deep below us
is the Strahleck pass, and we see on the broad
white snow a little black creeping line which
means travellers. We count five men, and know
that Peter Anderegg, an old friend of mine, is their
leading guide. Suddenly the line stops, and they
evidently see us. They are probably shouting,240 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

though we cannot hear them, and two of them
wave hats. We respond ; and Christian and
Kauffmann emit terrific Jodels. Then they turn
and go onward, and we turn and go upward. Two
ships on the ocean have met and greeted.

We cross our rocks to the right, and then sit
down to another breakfast As we begin the me&l
the sun darts out and changes the whole aspect
and character of the scene. It is a brilliant, deep-
coloured, stinging sun—that sun, indeed, which
comes between days of bad weather. Before us lies a
huge sloping snow-basin, which comprises a mighty
Bergschrund, together with crevasses and abysses.
The sun shines dazzlingly upon the smooth and
sparkling snow. " That snow won't be hard when
we come down !" says Christian, with an ominous
shake of the head, as we finish breakfast and again
prepare to start.

We thread our way successfully through crevasse
and abyss, and pass round the great hollow of
the terrible Bergschrund. By this time the sun has
become very hot, and the snow is getting already
very soft There is a great depth of loose, fresh
snow too ; and I think with some dismay of the
descent The sky above is cloudless, and is of a
dark, deep, purply blue ; almost, indeed, of the
Titian hue, though our heavens are shining with
fierce sunlight. At every step fresh peaks areThe Peak of Terror.

241

growing up behind us, to the south ; and before us
is the height and bulk of our own mountain, though
we can catch as yet no glimpse of the summit

The Bergschrund passed, we stand at the foot of
three rock ridges, which tend upwards, while be-
tween each rock ridge a narrow snow couloir tends
downwards. The ridge on the left is connected
with the massive darkness of the Mettelhorn ; the
one on the right has, as we can just see, more snow
beyond it, and leans towards the Abschwung; the
one in the middle seems to go directly up, and this
is the ridge which Christian elects for our ascent.
On either side are thin gullies of snow, of amazing
length and steepness, while our ridge is so steep that
you can see but a very little way up it. Indeed the
Schreckhorn throughout is constructed in the ex-
tremity of the perpendicular style of mountain
architecture. Later in the day, as Christian points
out, the snow in the couloirs will be in an avalanche
state. It is, in fact, swept so clean and smooth by
constant avalanches. Not alone the steepness of
the slope on which it rests, but swift descending
torrents of snow—torrents which, owing to the
weather, must have been quite unusually frequent
lately—keep the surface of these long and narrow
gullies so unwrinkled.

And now we are fairly on our rock ridge, with
hours of hard and difficult work before us. You

R242 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

are too busy to look round. Every step wants care.
Often you are stretched out on your face on the
surface of the rocks, groping with hands and feet
for any little crack or fissure that will serve for
hold. Sometimes we found little patches of snow
melting in the sun and covering ice. Still we
worked steadily on, mounting rapidly, until, during
a moment's halt, Christian pointed out the Sattel
straight above us, and the low knob of the Gross
Lauteraarhorn just visible to the right. A Kamm
or arete of rocks, with snow patches between their
masses, runs between this Horn and the Schreck-
horn, which, to our left, is still invisible. This
Kamm, though narrow, somewhat dangerous, and
rather difficult, is not very steep, and is, as Chris-
tian assures us, by no means the worst part of the
mountain. It requires care and nerve. Two hours
more will do it, Christian? Courage!—the work
is hard, but the goal is near ; and we press on
cheerfully.

As we mounted, nearing the Sattel and the
Kamm, a sudden great cry came from our leader,
Christian, who, calling hurriedly upon us to do
likewise, threw himself flat upon his face on the
rocks. The cause was soon apparent An avalanche
of large stones and loose rocks, loosened by the
heat, came flying through the air from somewhere
near the top. Some touched the snow gully, andThe Peak of Terror.

243

then bounded in huge leaps downwards to the
Bergschrund. It was like being exposed to a
battery of artillery. I had watched many of these
cannon-balls with a sort of morbid interest; when,
suddenly, a stormful shower was directed full upon
our rocks. One of these large stones hit me on
the side of the head and stunned me. Luckily, I
must have been struck by the flat side of the stone,
because such a blow with the edge of such a missile,
flying with such velocity, would certainly have
killed me. Poor Gertsch, the guide, had been
killed shortly before on the Wetterhorn by a stone
descending in a similar manner, which struck him
with its sharp edge. When I recovered conscious-
ness I found that the rope which attached me to
Lauener had been severed within three inches of
my waist as cleanly as the shears of Atropos would
cut the thread of a life.

This was an annoying though a dramatic incident
I had thought that our ridge was out of the way
of a Schreckhorn cannonade, but it appeared that
our selection of rocks was placed advantageously
to serve as an artillery target, and that I had been
chosen by Fate as the bull's-eye. I remained about
an hour unconscious. During that period the
subsequent proceedings interested me no more.
When I returned dreamily to myself, I found a
piece of ice resting upon a large lump raised upon
R 2244 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

my dazed and dizzy head, and saw a rather anxious
group gathered round the wounded fawn. Christian
proffered his brandy-flask and then re-attached
the rope. Though in a very shaken condition, I
was yet able to go, and we resumed our march,
walking fast in order to get out of the way of the
hill artillery. Once on the Sattel we were beyond
that danger, and went more slowly. The final
summit to our left was distinctly visible and seemed
very near. We had done with ascent and with
the perpendicular. It only remained to traverse
with care the final ar£te. This is comparatively
level, consisting of thin and sharp rock edges, with
great depths below on either hand, and with patches
of snow between the blocks of rock. These upper
rocks glowed with heat from the near and fervid
sun. My accident had lost a good deal of time,
and it was noon as we neared the last arete.
The rounded double top of the Schreckhorn is
raised but little above the Kamm, and you get the
view as well from the top of the Sattel as you do
from the peak itself, so that the topmost knob
offers no surprise in the way of prospect.

You pass the exact spot at which Mr. Elliott's
sad and fatal accident happened, and find that the
terrible slip occurred at a place which is by no
means the worst or most dangerous on the Kamm.

My head was aching and throbbing painfully,The Peak of Terror.

245

and now and then a feeling of irresistible dizziness
came over me. Once I had to stop and lie down
upon the rock, and oh ! how good were rest, cham-
pagne, and the final pipe !

One end of the Kamm is crowned by the real
summit, which is composed of two rounded rock
peaks, of different heights ; and at the other end of
the Kamm is the Gross Lauteraarhorn, which is
some ninety feet lower than the real top.

You might ingeniously poison your enjoyment
of Alpine hills and glaciers by persistently obtrud-
ing upon the mind the fact that those in the Hima-
layas are certainly bigger and possibly grander.
The tendency to undue comparison always indi-
cates a deficiency of the true critical faculty ;
criticism being in essence the science of enjoying
the noble and the beautiful through comprehension,
and I hold it a kind of treason to compare too
curiously the comparative glory of views from
different Alpine peaks ; but still I am bound to
confess that other mountains command, as I think,
finer views than that obtained by mounting the
peak, or Kamm, of the Schreckhorn. It may be,
however, that the singing in my battered head
rendered me somewhat deaf to the music of the
spheres ; it may be that eyes tending to close from
a soporific stunning saw less keenly than usual the
wonders and the splendours which Alpine altitude246 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

reveals: but still the fact remains that I have, as I
fancy, seen even sublimer views from other peaks.
However, the Schreckhorn view remains magnifi-
cent in glory.

I had often seen the Schreckhorn from other
peaks—as, for instance, from the near Wetter-
horn ; and now I was looking on the Wetterhorn
and on many another peak from the Schreckhorn.
You are perched in the centre of a world of snow,
of glacier, of rock, of mountain ocean. Huge fields
of pallid glacier, fissured and furrowed by crevasses
which fleck with little shadows the white expanse,
stretch away far to the north, on which side—the
Wetterhorn side—long smooth sweeps of steep
avalanche snow descend frightfully to the Lauteraar
glacier. There is nothing green, nothing soft in
the whole view. All is purely Alpine ; desolately
sublime. Round the foot of the mountain ray out
four mighty glaciers, the birthplaces of river and
of ice-stream. Around you, on high, stand the
huge peaks of the stern and solemn Oberland.
From these you are divided by immensities of
space, and yet they all look near and clear. The
colour which pervades the scene is the dark brown
of sombre rock and the glittering whiteness of
eternal snow and thick ribbed ice. As you rest
and smoke (even when a lump of ice is secured to
a swimming head), the vastness and the glory ofThe Peak of Terror.

247

the scene which spreads and soars around your
dread aerie sink into the mind, and imagination is
uplifted high as the heaven-kissing hill on which
you recline, from which you gaze. But it grows
late ; and Christian begins to urge departure. All
that has been won with so much difficulty can be
occupied and enjoyed only for a fleeting hour.

From the Schreckhorn there is no suggestion of
ornamental gardening. Art is not—and all is
Nature—Nature in her wildest grandeur and in her
silent immensities. The handful of men on the
mountain alone suggest humanity. The view
descent-wards from the Sattel is appalling, and in
this light it presented itself to Hillyer.

The mountain which you have to descend looks
terribly long and steep. The stones are still falling
from the top ; sometimes in two or threes, some-
times in showers; while there is at times an
inexplicable lull in the cannonade. Owing to these
stones we cannot descend where we came up. We
have to cut steps across pure ice, just under the
Sattel, in order to attain to another ridge of rocks
which runs down nearer to the Gross Lauteraarhorn.
Christian says that the new ridge will be much
more difficult than the old one. As you gaze
downwards, the rocks, about five feet below you,
bulge out, and below that you see nothing until
you crane over and catch a glimpse of the Berg-248 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

schrund level far, far below. The mountain is
divided into two parts by the plain of the great
Bergschrund. The guides were emphatic in their
injunctions to take care. Kauffmann led down,
and Christian was the last on the rope. Our new
ridge was decidedly worse than the former one,
and our progress was slow. Very often one only
could move while the others held ; seldom could
you stand upright, and several places were dis-
tressingly difficult. This ridge occupied a good deal
of time. Below it a steep snow slope leads on to the
comparatively level plain which surrounds the great
Bergschrund, the crevasses, and the hollows. The
sun was blazing fiercely, and the snow was soft,
and loose, and deep. We surmounted all our diffi-
culties and regained our tracks of the morning ; but
the late afternoon sun was shining as we stood on
the top of the last long snow gullies in the steep
couloirs. In these the snow would not hold at all.
It slipped with us at every step, and the footsteps
of the first man on the rope were useless to his
followers. The narrow gully was far too steep, and
the snow was far too deep for glissading. We got
on slowly, and with labour and difficulty. On
paper one can descend rapidly, but on the actual
Schreckhorn not so quickly, and the light had
failed us before we had done with the snow.

At last!—It was dusk as we quitted the longThe Peak of Terror t

249

tiresome couloir work and turned off to the right,
over the rough rocks which lead up to the Kasten-
stein. The change of work was pleasant, though
going uphill again was rather objectionable.
Stumbling along in the dark, we see a light in the
shades above us, and become aware of a watchful
porter standing before the welcome cave. In a few
minutes we are there—it seems like coming home!
—and we gladly sit down before the cooking-place.
Lauener advises us, as it is dark, to spend a second
night in our burrow; he says that he does not like
crossing the seracs of the glacier at night, and that
we should arrive very late in Grindelwald. We
gladly assent; the merry fire blazes, and we cook
the provisions that are left. Yesterday we thought
that we had brought with us too great a stock ; to-
day we feel the truth of the French saying " Le su-
perflu, chose tres-necessaire." The first thing we get
is a good soup, and we have, luckily, a bottle of
champagne left. As we recline before the fire, and
smoke, the moon again leaps forth as it had done
the night before. Where else could we have such
a view ? Again, in bright and dark, in dazzling
whiteness and in dusky hollow shadows, the wide
glacier surface spreads out coldly, purely, under the
serene and splendid moonlight. Again our peak
row stands revealed in silver flame. Again the
blanching light steals broadly upward to our250 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

cavernous shelter ; and once more we feel the magic
of such a scene in such a light.

To tired men, who have been working so many
hours on the Schreckhorn, the hay in the Kasten-
stein hides the rock beneath ;—

"The art of our necessities is strong,

That can make vile things precious."

We sleep an intense and dreamless sleep. Early
we wake. The morning is fine, though clouds are
gathering for bad weather, and we recross the
seracs, redescend the glacier, and reach Grindel-
wald, with our minds full of the sublime impressions
left by laborious intimacy with the great grim
Schreckhorn.

Amongst the many joys which we owe to the
Alps must be reckoned the development of a
distinct and noble thirst. Thirst itself is not
perhaps exactly a joy ; but then the longing is
assuaged with such peculiar delight. I think grate-
fully of many a glacier rill and mountain spring, of
many a bowl of Swiss milk, of many a bottle of
Swiss champagne. The crystal stream, leaping
brightly downwards over sombre iron rocks, the
liquid ivory filling the milkherd's pleasant pail, are
rendered by intensity of thirst active and delicious
luxuries. It is worth while to be so thirsty in order
to enjoy such divine draughts. Walking one day,The Peak of Terror.

251

under dull leaden clouds which discharged heavy
rain, from the Col Ferrex to Courmayeur, I was
struck with the appearance of the moraine next to
the glacier of the Dolent. There was something
unspeakably sad and desolate in the colourless
rubbish slope. It seemed to my fancy as if the last
day had dawned : as if the destruction of the world
had commenced by turning to drear waste this one
melancholy spot which had already lost love and
life and hope in the pathos of final destruction.
Moraines are always weary wastes, but this par-
ticular one—seen under joyless cloud and darkening
rain—expressed a more terrible suggestion of the
extinction of creation, of a worn-out world turning
into dust and ashes, than any other moraine that I
have ever seen before or since has done. The
weird place was past all life, and had outlived all
hope.

The mountaineer may say, with Armgart,—•

"I accept the peril.

I choose to walk high with sublimer dread

Rather than crawl in safety."

To strive upwards, through labour and danger, to
such sublime results has in it something ennobling.
Every time that I- attain to one of these Alpine
altitudes I feel more deeply the grandeur of such
temporary elevation above the level of the earth ; I252 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

recognize more fully the glory of being uplifted to
rank with the crests and summits of such loftypeers—
I say peers, boastful though the word may sound—
because one is, if the work be done in the right spirit,
for the time at least etherealized, sublimed to the sky-
piercing, heaven-nearing loftiness of these majestic
mountains. Such a climb produces in the mind a
temporary grandeur, like that caused by reading a
noble poem or seeing a great actor ; and mountain,
poem, acting, all leave behind them permanent
results. During an Alpine season, like that even of
1875, h°w much was seen, and thought, and felt,
and done ! How many incidents occurred, what
heights of joy were reached, what intensity of
emotion was felt; and yet—type of human history
—so many experiences shrink up into this brief and
fleeting record of the deep impression made on
memory by a very memorable day passed upon the
mighty PEAK OF TERROR !

AN ASCENT OF THE MATTER-
HORN.

" Strong passion's daring sees not aught to dare.

It was his thought he saw : the presence fair
Of unachieved achievement, of high task."—yubal.

R. WHYMPER says of the victims of the
first glorious but fatal ascent of the
Matterhorn that they were left, when first
the bodies were found, (t buried in snow at the
base of the grandest cliff of the most majestic
mountain of the Alps/' Not only is the Matter-
horn the most majestic mountain in the Alps,
but it is, for aught that I could ever learn by
tale or history, the most unique and splendid
mountain in the world. It is as distinctive
amongst mountains as Shakespeare is amongst
poets. It is not, of course, the highest or the
largest; but no drawing or description of those
that are higher or larger conveys the same idea of
such a splendid, heaven-soaring cone, rising up loftily,254 -A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

abruptly, and alone, from out such a wide, waste
basis of all-surrounding snow-fields. Other moun-
tains are near enough to contrast, but not to com-
pare with this grand and solitary peak, upon
whose wizard heights there are no slopes, but only
precipices. Though streaked with snow or ice, he
is yet wholly rock ; iron, adamantine, inexorable.
Snow rests permanently on but few places of his
grim and savage steepness, and the magic form and
shape express subtly, but admirably, the charac-
teristics, and even the character, of the stern and
deadly mountain. Like Mary Queen of Scots, the
Matterhorn, though irresistible in attraction, may
yet be fatal to fascinated lovers. In his art expres-
sion he is tragic as Mrs. Siddons was. He is the
Iago of mountains ; seeming honest, but capable of
ruthless villainy. Nay, it may even be whispered
here that the Matterhorn is not incapable of
murder.

It is hard to divest the mountain of a distinct
personality and a malignant character. He has a
temper and a demoniac will. Consider only what
he did when he found himself no longer able to
preserve his haunted summit from the foot of
man. His resentment led him then to terrible,
to most tragic lengths; and he will yet again,
unless I misread, his disposition, seek revenge
for the indignity of repeated ascents by bringingAn Ascent of the Matter horn. 255

about some other catastrophe which shall revive
in the minds of men his sinister and demoniac
reputation.

Imagination ofttimes delights to disport itself
in airy realms lying outside of and above the
closely fenced preserves of reason and of logic.
In that fantastic kingdom

" Where nothing is, but all things seem,"

it is impossible to dissever the conception of the
Matterhorn from the idea of an infra-human and
most mysterious being. It will not present itself
to the excited fancy as a merely dead thing, as a
block of rock without volition or feeling. The life
that imagination attributes to its awful mass is
inscrutable and occult. That life touches our life
at the mystic point at which the human touches the
demoniac. Old local superstition made its haunted
cliffs the home of demons. The Wandering Jew
and the spirits of the damned were supposed to
reside amid its invincible and inaccessible precipices.
A ruined city, the residence of demons and of
fallen spirits, was popularly believed to exist upon
the ghastly summit; and the weird impression
which its terrible form made upon the human
mind engendered legend, dread, and horror. The
Matterhorn owes solely to himself the dark beliefs
which he himself has created.256 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

I saw this year the magic mount under two very
remarkable and strongly contrasted aspects. On
one most splendid day, the perfection of summer
glory, I was descending from the Riffel to Zermatt.
The time was afternoon. , There is one point in the
descent from which there is a singularly fine view
of the Matterhorn, and at this point we stopped to
gaze at the imperial giant.

" The sky was blue as the summer sea,

The depths were cloudless overhead,

The air was calm as it could be."

The skies quivered with excess of light, were
tremulous with intensity of heat. The still and
shining air was flooded with the fervid brilliancy
of cloudless sun-radiance ; and the very blue of the
heavens was suffused with golden splendour. The
huge, soaring cone was softened into a faint, hazy,
violet shape and form. Its substance was not even
hard or well defined. Its pale delicate tone and
outline sank into the luminous azure air-ocean
which wholly surrounded and half absorbed it. A
little darker only than the burning, sun-steeped sky
behind it, the Matterhorn seemed to be almost im-
palpable. No longer harsh and iron-like, it pre-
sented a shimmering vision of softest bulk and of
tenderest colour, lovely beyond expression. Its
usual aspect was changed almost past recognition :An Ascent of the Matter horn. 257

and the contrast was most striking. It seemed
gentle and almost loving. It did not stand clearly
out from the gleaming light and hue which spread
about its ever-noble mass. No marks, or lines, or
scars were visible, as they usually are, upon the
deeply worn face. The aspect of age, which has
endured so much, had disappeared ; and the moun-
tain seemed to be restored to the smoothness of
early youth. All detail had melted into the soft
flush of faintest aerial purple hues ; and the moun-
tain had mixed and blended with the gorgeous
heavens. It had merged itself into the subtly subdu-
ing elements of air. It was an atmospheric wonder
and a colour charm. The shade upon the northern
face was only a tone deeper in hue ; and the changed
mountain had become sublimated, glorified, by a
divine and love warm witchery of colour and of light

This rare sight I saw three days before I made
the ascent; and I saw the mountain under another
but a very different aspect three days after I had
descended from his proud crest.

It was night—still, dark night—at Zermatt. A
few stars shone dimly in the great dusk void ; and
from behind the Mischabel-Horner broad, vivid
flashes of sheet lightning, intense but instantaneous,
streamed swiftly vanishing flames of pale light upon
the valley. I strolled a little way above Seller's
Hotel, to that point from which the Matterhorn is

S258 Alpine Ascents and Adventures

first and is clearly seen. The mountain itself was
dimly visible—its weird form a deeper gloom upon
the deep gloom of night. Suddenly came a
brilliant flash of light, and the spectral shape
gleamed for a brief instant distinctly in intense and
ghastly whiteness. There was at the time a great
deal of snow on the mountain ; and it was wonder-
ful to see how clearly its blue blanched cone stood
out, for a magic second, from the ebon obscurity and
the mystery of heavy night It appeared, indeed,
not as if the Matterhorn were shone upon by
lightning from outside, but as if he were irradiated,
lit up, by light proceeding from within. He
vanished wholly into darkness, and then burst out
again suddenly into the strange life of wondrous
light. Nothing else, no other object, made such
use of the electric gleaming; and the huge moun-
tain flashed out of sight, and then reappeared as
by magic, flaming whitely, revealed to wondering
sight like sympathetic ink made visible by light-
ning. It seemed as if the mountain itself gave out
electric fire. In nothing that he does is the
Matterhorn altogether like other mountains. The
Matterhorn is indeed—

" As the greatest only are,

In his simplicity sublime."

And yet the term " sublime," so well merited in soAn A scent of the Matter horn, 259

many respects, is so far inapplicable that the crime-
stained mountain suggests the demoniac as well as
the divine, has a touch of Milton's Satan as well
as a suggestion of his archangel. Had Byron
known the Matterhorn, it would have been the
mountain for Manfred, instead of those pale cliffs
of the snowy Jungfrau, on which, as we learn from
the chamois-hunter, there grew a shrub, while a
chalet was attainable " within an hour." No shrubs
or chalets on our wild, bare Matterhorn ! What
home could poet find, or feign, so fit for the three
Destinies, or for Nemesis, as is that marvellous and
romantic peak ? Why did Mephistopheles prefer
for the demon revel of the Walpurgis night the
Harzgebirge to the Matterhorn ? Did he simply
wish to flatter German national feeling ?—or is it
that the Pferdefuss, the horse-hoof foot, could not
have held safely on the Matterhorn ? Fancy a fatal
accident to Mephisto on this dangerous mountain !

In the first half of the August of 1876 we had
singularly fine weather ; in the latter half the worst
weather that I ever remember in the Alps.

My old love returned ;—

" Our hopes like towering falcons aim
At objects in an airy height

and I resolved once more to attempt the Matterhorn.
I fixed upon the 15th of August for the ascent.

S 2260 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

could not get Melchior Anderegg, because his first
master, G. C. P., Lyvetete, the best mountaineer of
the day, wanted Melchior for another expedition ;
but I engaged Moser and Joseph Taugwalder, both
of Zermatt. All other guides are at a great disadvan-
tage when brought into comparison with the peerless
Melchior, but I had every reason to be satisfied
with my two men. Moser is very steady, strong,
careful; while young Joseph (the nephew of old
Peter Taugwalder) will ripen into an excellent
guide.

About 10 a.m. we set off from the Monte Rosa
Hotel. A porter was to go with us as far as the
hut. The morning was brilliant, but was burningly
hot with that stinging heat which forbodes bad
weather. We strolled gently up the zigzags till we
came to the end of the trees, where the guides and
porter stopped to cut wood. I went on alone,
winding up the paths, crossing the rough meadows
where the bright waters rush down babbling to the
sun through vivid green of grass, until I reached
the little lonely Schwarzsee chapel, just below the
Hornli, where I waited for the others.

Guides on the Matterhorn are far more grave and
earnest than they are on any other mountain.
They feel that they are undertaking a serious and a
dangerous task, and are more silent than usual.
Roman Catholic guides cross themselves devoutlyAn Ascent of the Matter horn. 261

at the little chapel. At that point a certain gravity
of manner and of speech, which is contagious, begins
to spread through a Matterhorn party.

Leaving the black lake, you cross a wide stony
waste, and traverse a dull dust and slate-coloured
moraine. Just here a hush came over the sunny
light, and a gentle sigh breathed through the quiet
air. We had had fine weather for so long, that
weather wisdom was something off its guard. Some
people, when the sun is shining, never conceive the
possibility of bad weather. We were not so unwise,
but we wholly failed to realize the storm that was
in store. We did not foresee that the weather
would change from fine to worst while we were on
our mountain. After the moraine comes a rugged
rock ridge of about a mile and a half in length,
which extends between the Hornli and the moun-
tain itself. As you pass along this natural bridge
the great peak is always full in view. It was in
shadow as we approached it. The sombre cone,
huge, massive, threatening, upreared its awful
crags and precipices before our earnest gaze. A
level stretch of snow is next passed ; you meet
tough rock directly you have crossed the snow, and
you are then fairly upon the great mountain. On
its precipitous crags you find scanty, narrow ledges
of a few inches only in width, and these ledges run
steeply up the face, or the edge, of the main wall262 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

of rock. Soon you reach a high snow-gully, or
what is ordinarily a snow-gully, running up and
into the side of the mountain ; but this gully, when
we passed up it, was, owing to the long dry weather,
no longer a snow slope, but a kind of hanging
glacier of sheer ice. It cost us time and trouble to
cut steps up its smooth, hard steepness. You pass
again to the haunted cliffs ; and at this point we
saw thin greyish white filmy wreaths of mist steal
up from the Furge glacier and from the enormous
snowfields beyond it. It appeared as if the cold
glacier surface steamed with heat. Soon came
sharp hail ; then snowy rain and comparative
chilliness. We toiled on over the laborious ascent
with quickened speed ; but we were very wet when
we reached the hut at five. The bad passage just
below the hut was worse than usual. Large stones
had fallen away; the chain had been removed, and
an untrustworthy little rope substituted. Out
of the narrow rough ledge which runs along the
Furge side of the hut a large block of rock had
fallen, leaving a rather ugly chasm to jump over.
Wind and cloud can co-exist upon the Matterhorn.
The first animals in a rushing herd of wild buffaloes
move fast, but there are plenty to succeed them,
and the great mass sweeps steadily on. So with
clouds here : they drive swiftly, but many follow
the first ones, and the supply seems inexhaustible.An A scent of the Matter horn. 263

They whirl, and eddy, and tower round you, and
then cease all at once, as they did when we reached
the hut. It became comparatively fine again as we
began to cook.

The hut itself is a miserable refuge ; but it is
difficult to find any place for a cabane on the Mat-
terhorn, and the present pitch is supposed to be
sheltered against falling stones. One side of the
hut is the bare high rock itself; the other side is
constructed of rude boards. The roof is open to
wind and to water. The floor is of ice, hidden by
a little dirty hay. There is no space outside.
After dark you can scarcely issue forth without a
guide ; and the small patch before the hut falls
away very steeply to the Furge glacier lying deep
below. All round is the hardness of rock and the
coldness of snow. The view from it is grand, but
the place itself seems always insecure, and is
wretchedly uncomfortable. It is a wild and savage
pitch, and is one of those shelters which are only
rendered tolerable by strong necessity.

We had a night of darkness, cold, and snow.
We had intended to start at four, but Moser, rising
at three, found snow and frost, and said that we
must wait. Ultimately, the weather having then
improved, we did start at 7.30. The greater
part of the ascent between the cabane and the
summit has to be scrambled up, and the guides264 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

decided that only one axe should accompany
us.

The shoulder is a wild crag to scale. It has to
be won

" With toil of heart and knees and hands."

That passed, you stand at the foot of the long high
passage which rises up straight above you on the
north-east edge. Down the smooth dark rocks
three chains descend. The surface of the towering
rocks was coated with frozen snow, and every
crack and ledge was full of ice. Availing ourselves
of the useful chains, we climbed carefully and
adhesively up—

" Uno innanzi altro, prendendo la scala
Che per artezza i salitor dispaja.

Ora era, onde '1 salir non volea storpio."

The height of this dark passage is, perhaps, two
hundred feet; and it looks from below very cruel
and dangerous. The day was sullen and gloomy,
threatening and chilly. Hail and snow were in
constant readiness, and the wind blew fiercely,
though now and then it died away, in low sighs, for
a brief space. There is not one comfortable resting-
place between the cabane and the top. On the
shoulder the guides objected to carry anything—
even a bottle of champagne—to the summit; andAn A scent of the Matter horn. 265

we left that, and a few sketchy eatables, on a patch
of uneasy rock upon the shoulder itself. While
climbing the chain cliff, I had a private idea that
Melchior would have hesitated to go beyond the
hut in such weather. Moser and Joseph looked
often and anxiously at the angry heavens. They
muttered evil prophecies and urged haste—with
care. All the way up Moser led; coming down,
Joseph took the lead. Just above the chains-steep
I had a fine glimpse of view over the peak ocean
to the north ; but I could not stop to enjoy it.
The Finsteraarhorn and the Oberland group were
then temporarily distinct.

After quitting the chain scramble you come to a
very steep slope of snow. In our case the freshly
fallen snow was not deep, but it was all but ice;
and a heavy hailstorm came sharply down as we
dommenced the slope. Moser's axe cut the steps,
but the fast falling hail filled up every step as it
was cut. Taugwalder and myself had no axes, but
we managed to pass safely and swiftly up this icy
snow-piece. Then more rock, just thinly covered
with frozen snow and hail ; then more hard snow ;
and, as we tread carefully up this, the white shelving
roof seen so distinctly from Zermatt and from the
Rififel, we see that we are close upon the top. It
comes—at last!—and we find ourselves at 10.30, or
10.35, on one side of a long thin ridge of hard snow,266 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

edged towards the Italian side by an upright little
snow wall of about two feet high. The guides cau-
tion me emphatically against trusting to this wall,
as it is only cornice. Borrowing the axe from
Moser, I drive the stick through it, and the down-
ward slanting hole shows me Italy. We pass
carefully along this narrow snow arete of a top, and
soon reach the very highest point, the real summit
of the Matterhorn. Here we find a staff and a flag
of a dull red colour blowing wildly about. It seems
that young Mr. Seiler had been up here a short
time before, and had erected this memento of his
visit. Moser tears off a small piece of this flag,
and I put it carefully away, intending (an intention
which I carried out) to give the strip to my kind
friend Madame Seiler, at Zermatt. I knew that it
would please her to have it. We also saw a little
wooden tablet bearing the names of the three lucky,
if unwise, gentlemen who—in finest weather—as-
cended without guides, and left this perishable
record of their fortunate feat.

I must here pause to place on record one singular
fact. Mr. Whymper, in his illustrations, and in his
printed and oral descriptions, depicts the top of
the Matterhorn as a rather easy snow slope up
which men could run. Of course it was so when
he first ascended in 1865 ; but now the whole thing
is changed—there is no slope and no breadth. AAn Ascent of the Matter horn. 267

sharp arete, thin and narrow, extends between the
north-east and the north-west points of the ridgy
summit Disintegration, which is going on fast on
the great peak, has been singularly active on the
summit, and we did not even find a place on which
we could sit down. We stood during the whole of
the short time that we remained upon the extreme
highest point.

For it was very cold there. It was freezing
sharply, and the wind was piercingly keen. The
guides urged " haste," and said that the weather
was going to be so very bad that we must hurry
away.

I had, however, not attained that lonely altitude
to turn back without a good look round. I wanted
to photograph the scene upon memory, and would
not move until I had done so. We remained there
only about a quarter of an hour ; but that time,
intensely used, was sufficient for my purpose.

What a height it is ! You are nearly 15,000 feet
high ; there is awful space around, and low, closely
impending heavens above you. The wind that
blows there—and it did blow on that day—is virile,
and bracing, and tonic. You soon feel that you
are not in the valley. A very thin hard ridge is
underneath your feet, and on that terrible north
side there are steep and ghastly depths below.
There is a proud feeling in standing on the very268 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

top of the conquered Matterhorn, and I stamped
my foot upon his head in a triumph which was a
defiance and an outrage. Poetry has the advan-
tage over prose that it can in its pictures select the
highest moments of life, and one such moment is
certainly that in which, when high in air, all that
defeated peak lies down below you. One impres-
sion made upon you is that of the blind, cold, ruth-
less cruelty of the insensate but yet terribly vicious
mountain. There is a chill of terror as one thinks
of that which he has done—of that which he yet
could do.

The first glance is naturally directed downwards
towards Italy. What do I see there ? A line, or
rather broad streaks, of gloomy dun colour blent
with dusky indigo, darker than purple, and inter-
woven with a suggestion of dull gold. No forms of
mountains are distinctly visible ; and lo!—even
while I gaze—dense, dark clouds boil and surge up
swiftly from Italy ; the view is all blotted out, and
thick sulphurous cloud darkness rises, with almost
incredible rapidity, until my view is limited to the
southern shoulder, and I am only intent upon see-
ing the southern route to the top. To the north all
is comparatively clear—clear for a few moments—
and I see well Dent Blanche, Gabelhorn, Rothhorn.
A splash of wan sunlight rests upon the Weisshorn.
The whole Oberland range soars up behind, and isAn Ascent of the Matter horn. 269

momentarily clear. The wind wails louder with a
wild music melancholy as a dirge. The Monte
Rosa chain is dim. The Riffel, and its green slopes,
are barely to be recognized. The Matterhorn and
the Zmutt glaciers, far and directly down below, are
plainly to be seen, but over the Furge is a pale
shroud of rising mist.

So I did not have a "good view" from the
Matterhorn. But that matters little. I have seen
fine unclouded views from many a peak, but to this
peak belong fitly storm and war of elements.
Clouds here do not " pause to repose themselves in
passing by." There is no repose possible on this
wild peak, that loves best an active struggle with
the storm-fiends. " And a mighty tempest shall be
stirred up round about him." Tempest has its own
deep beauty in its fitting home. The mystery of
dread latent force is better felt in such weather.
The mountain is grander in the flying gleams of
strange lights, and fantastic cloud-forms, and
hovering glooms. Silent silver lights rest for a brief
instant on the chill of snow and on the dark of
rock. Storm lends a noble mystery undreamed of
in calm or sunny hours. I rejoice that my short
experience of the summit of the Matterhorn
was one of grandest tempest and of lowering
heavens.

^ut the guides urge departure. I turned unwill-2 70 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

ingly—except for sense of bitter cold—and the
descent began.

Where there is clear knowledge of great danger
steps are not likely to slip, and we all knew the
work before us. Snow began to drive and frost to
harden. Having only one axe, and every step in
the frozen snow being perilous, we turned our faces
to the cold slopes, and went down safer so.
Between your legs you can see where they fell.
We reached the site of the accident, and left it a
little to our left; but I knew well all that happened
there. The rocks were glazed with ice. The first
route was, by the way, as I am told, rather shorter
and somewhat less difficult than the present way ;
but the latter is kept close to the eastern ridge in
order to avoid falling stones.

All this part of the mountain requires the great-
est care, especially when it is as slippery as we
found it. A slip would be fatal, and you see
beneath you clearly enough to what a fall would
lead. Rocks, snow-powdered, stick up every now
and then through snow. The question is frequently
asked " Sind Sie festV' and the answer often comes
" Ziemlich" and then again " Langs am vor warts /"
I know that I was often on places on which I could
not have held any one if a slip had happened. I
was without an axe, and the holding when crossing
smooth, frozen, downward tending rocks was any-An A scent of the Matter horn. 271

thing but secure. However, with our party, not the
slightest slip even once occurred. We descended
slowly but safely. We took heed to every step and
kept the rope always taut. Joseph led well and
heedfully. Up and down, I never once wanted a
hand between the shoulder and the top. The
old thin strand of rope which Mr. Whymper left,
and which still waves mournfully over the sheer
rock, was hidden from us by fresh snow, but
we knew where it was. Snow fell and drove, and
the wind blew in fierce gusts as we passed this por-
tion of the dangerous peak. The view looking
down on all sides to such sheer depths is impressive,
and makes you careful. We attained to the smooth,
straight-down rocks on the eastern edge, over which
the three chains depend. The guides heedfully
hammered at the iron pins which support the
dreary chains. Without help from those chains we
could not have got down, because the rock was
then all thinly covered with fresh ice ; but we did
descend, we reached the shoulder, and paused, in a
lull of wind, for a short rest on that insecure spot
at which we had left our provisions and champagne.
How good that was ! It needed no icing.

The guides again urged haste, and we did not
rest more than ten minutes. From the shoulder to
the hut the way is difficult, and the weather got
worse and worse as we went on. You do not see2J2 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

the hut until you are close upon it; but we crunch
down a snow slope, and there it is. The two axes
which we had left behind stood patiently waiting,
and the snow-surrounded aperture, or doorway,
stood open wide in welcome. We found that it was
just past two o'clock.

We meant to rest there for a short hour, to take
a good meal, and then to descend to Zermatt, cal-
culating upon reaching the hotel about 8 p.m.

We entered, and cooked our simple food. Then
followed a beatific pipe, and we began to collect the
things to be carried down. It had become very
dark in the hut, and the " much worse weather "
which the guides had prophesied was raging outside.
We went out to look. There we saw

" The mists boil up around the glaciers ; clouds
Rose curling fast beneath me, white and sulphury,

Like foam from the roused ocean of deep hell."

We might have asked with Dante,-—-

" Ricorditi, Lettor, se mai nelP alpe
Ti colse nebbia, per la qual' vedessi
Non altrimenti che per pelle talpe

Now, I do recollect mists in the Alps, but I never
saw such darkness. The snow was whirling in
thick flakes, and in spite of that a roaring wind
was raging furiously. Moser shook his head.
" We must wait. We can't go down, especiallyAn Ascent of the Matter horn. 273

over that glacier, in such darkness. I won't take
the responsibility. Herr, we must wait." And
Taugwalder confirmed his leader's statement.

Good ; if we must wait, we must wait; but it is
annoying. We did wait for another hour. It was
then past four, but the weather was growing worse.
It was nearly the latest hour at which we could
start; and a start then, if it had been practicable,
would not have brought us down to Zermatt before
10 p.m. You cannot descend any part of the
Matterhorn in the dark. Presently Moser said,
very decidedly, that he could not and would not go
down, and that we must pass another night in the
hut. An unpleasant necessity ! It was very cold ;
we had two inches of candle, rather scanty pro-
visions, and very little wood. However, one must
accept the inevitable.

I had luckily plenty of good tobacco, and with
that we solaced ourselves during the cold, dark
hours. We lay down to sleep early. Guides sleep
soundly, but not soundlessly ; and I soon knew
when mine were asleep. I lay long awake, listen-
ing to the wind howling and shrieking against the
peak ; and to the occasional roar of masses of great
stones pouring, streaming, bounding down the
steep and smooth east face : but, at length, soothed
perhaps by that roaring lullaby, I too slept.
Awakened by the guides stirring, I found that

T274 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

snow was coming into the hut, and that they
were getting wet. It was very cold. Time and
the hour ride out the roughest night, and dim, chill
morning came at last. We breakfasted on scrappy
remnants, and at eight began to descend. The
weather was better ; cloudy still, but comparatively
windless, and without any snow falling.

We found the glacier very bad. It was all hard
dark ice, here and there powdered with fresh snow ;
and it goes very straightly down. The iron spike
of the ice-axe slid over the iron ice. Taugwalder
led down, and cut steps from below. Those we had
made in ascending were quite lost. It was my
eighth time on this portion of the mountain, but I
had never seen it in so bad a state. I was glad
when we again got on the rocks—bad as they were.
We passed the snow, the long ridge, and the
moraine, and found ourselves on the " level waste,
the rounding grey." We had emerged from cloud-
land and from shadow-realm, and were in a calmer
atmosphere. Near the Hornli and the Schwarzsee
we met with one or two parties making short
excursions from Zermatt. They stared at the
battered, weather-stained men coming off the
Matterhorn, and some stopped us to ask questions
about the wizard mount. Running down the grass
slopes near Zermatt, we met a little procession,
composed chiefly of women. These accosted myAn Ascent of the Matter horn. 275

guides with great emotion, with kisses and warm
hand-shakings. As they spoke very fast, and in
patois, I did not at first understand their meaning;
but Moser soon explained. Between cloud open-
ings we had been seen on the most dangerous part
of the mountain ; and at that moment a small snow
avalanche fell down the northern face. We were
swallowed up in an instant in mist and lost to
sight. They thought that we had fallen, and were
rejoiced to see the two guides return safely. Soon
comes the door of the dear old Monte Rosa Hotel.
Sending Moser on to order a bath, I changed my
garments, and then turned to look upon the Mat-
terhorn victus. He was shrouded in cloud and
storm ; but I knew where he was, and every step
upon him was photographed in memory. It was a
little after one when we reached Zermatt. Madame
Seiler was pleased to receive the strip of her son's
flag ; the hotel soon made up for scant sustenance
by a capital lunch ; and the society of pleasant
friends relieved the mind from that feeling of lone-
liness and awe which the grim and ghastly giant
evokes. The Matterhorn lay behind me—van-
quished !

Often after my ascent I gazed with all the old
wonder, awe, and delight at the great mystic peak;
and my own ascent itself seemed to me half unreal.
I looked back upon it, and it was almost like a
T 2276 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

dream. So inaccessible does the mountain look
that I felt a sort of half doubt of having actually-
stood upon that haughty crest. The fact of an
ascent does not destroy the weird impression made
by the sinister hill. You regard your climb, through
the mist of memory, as you remember a first
dreamy visit to Venice. And yet a climb upon
the Matterhorn yields a profound emotional expe-
rience, which will last out a life, of contact with a
grandly terrible, a frightfully ruthless force of
mystic nature—" a force that is not we" The
inner essence and meaning of the grim, stern
heartless peak, with its deadly antagonism to man,
is expressed through a form of most singular signi-
ficance. An intimate acquaintance with that fierce
and lonely height exalts and developes the sense of
sympathy, the power of will, within us. We have
touched and conquered Nature where she seems
to be impregnable. It is curious to notice the
vastly different impression made by the Matter-
horn upon unimaginative and imaginative natures.
To the boor it is barren ; to the poet it is fertile.
To a climber of the Hawley Scrowger school, a
climber who works with the legs only, and ascends
without heart or brain, without intellect or fancy,
the Matterhorn is simply a more or less difficult
piece of rock-work : to a mountaineer of the Nor-
man Franklin type, the mountaineer who adds theAn Ascent of the Matter horn. 2 77

soul of the poet to the power of the athlete, the
Matterhorn is a sublime if awful revelation of that
which is mysterious and terrible in Nature. To
such a man it is a loadstone mountain, irresistibly
attractive. It is a fascinating fiend—it is, in a word
—the Matterhorn 1A BIVOUAC ON THE ROTHHORN.

"These things seem small and undistinguishable,

Like far-off mountains turned into clouds."

Midsummer Night's Dream.

F Athens be the city of the violet crown,
Zermatt is surely the village of the snowy
coronal. Amongst all the places in the
Alps, it still holds a distinctive characteristic and
possesses a peculiar charm. It is surrounded by a
most noble group of majestic rock and snow giants,
a group second perhaps to no other in the Alps ;
and then it boasts the singular glory of the grandest
of all solitary peaks,—the unique and mystic Mat-
terhorn. Often as he may have been there, the
mountaineer still turns with longing and in love to
Zermatt. I have been there for more consecutive
years than I care to record, but, nevertheless, I find
myself every year, and found myself this year, again
attracted irresistibly to Zermatt. As you sit, with
your back to the locomotive, in a coupe of theA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 2 79

French train, you see, reflected in the mirrors be-
fore you, the scenery that is coming ; and when
you start for Switzerland, you have a visiting pre-
vision of the dear and well-known aspect of the
piebald village, and of its coronal of royal moun-
tains. Science has done much, very much, for the
ease and material comfort of life; but science,
despite its great invention of railways, has scarcely,
I think, improved upon that simple means of loco-
motion described in the Arabian Nights, which
consisted of a small piece of ordinary Eastern
carpet, upon which you took your seat and found
yourself in the same instant transported to the
place to which you wished to go. No, science has
not yet beaten that. The magic of science is out-
done by the magic of imagination ; and travelling
would undoubtedly be greatly improved by a re-
turn to the hitherto unsurpassed system of those
simple pieces of carpet which would appear, like
the angels defined by the theologians of St. Omer,
to have gone from place to place without passing
through the space between. The vanity of modern
science presents the only real difficulty in the way
of returning to the prescientific system ; but as
there seems to be no other objection, we may, I
trust, look for an early return to a mode of travel-
ling which is ideally perfect, and, therefore, far sur-
passes the ordinary railway train.2 8o A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

At present, however, we are restricted to the
hateful necessity of those continental railways on,
which they will, when they can, pack eight persons
in one carriage for a trajet of sixteen or even more
hours. You always arrive in Switzerland jaded
and fevered by the railway journey; but, that
journey accomplished, you emerge into a compara-
tively happy time of steamboat on the, lake, and
carriage on the road, until you reach that happiest
period at which you assume your Alpine boots,
and then take to your feet with a long and joyous
time before you of locomotion solely on your trained,
or training legs. Trains do not conduce to train-
ing ; but walking does ; and real Swiss joy begins
when you reach those passages to peak and pass
which can, happily, only be traversed on foot.

You begin generally with old ways, traversed
often before in bygone years. As you tramp albng
the path—say from Visp to Saas—you see much
that seems almost new ; and then come touches of
half-remembered or well-remembered things, till
the remoteness of. the past, and the strangeness of
the present, become fused into one image. At
Saas, you ascend a mountain, and then feel the
attraction of the passes that lead—to Zermatt.
One of these you cross. You have, by happy
chance, a fine day; and, arriving at the sunny
summit of your pass, you see, on the one side, theA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 281

purple of Italian hill-crowds, the Lago Maggiore
and some other lake, the misty silver windings of
a far, faint river ; while, on the other side, grand,
and stern, and solemn, rise up the many stupen-
dous peaks which soar into the sky round lowly
Zermatt: and then before you stands suddenly—
seen for the first time since a whole year—the
awful form of the grim, terrible Matterhorn. How
well you know him !—yet how fresh is the delight
of gazing, in awed joy, again upon that savage
solitary peak which can never be looked upon
without a thrill! You can easily believe that you
have stood upon the tops of other mountains,
but, so inaccessible does Matterhorn appear to
be, that you half doubt the yet vividly remem-
bered fact that you have actually attained to the
supreme ridge of that shelving white roof which,
foreshortened in the upward perspective of aerial
distance, slopes downwards at such a fearful angle.
He stands apart from other mountains, as, in a
herd of deer, some fierce, terrible old stag is
shunned by the others, and allowed to herd alone.
Hail to thee, once more, O royal, crime-stained
Matterhorn!

Leaving the Gorner glacier, you wind wearily
along the toilsome path which conducts to the
bare bleak Eiffel Hotel; and then you run gaily
down the short cut which descends so summarily282 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

to Zermatt, until in the afternoon you approach
yourself once more of Zermatt itself. You cross
the rude old wooden bridge which, beneath the
tread of your party, trembles and shakes like a jelly
on a steamship's dinner-table. You pass along by
the opaque lightness of the chalkily thick glacier
torrent; the foam on which is scarcely lighter in
consistency or in colour than are the whirling
waves themselves. A year has flown since you last
saw that turbulent torrent, but, springing ever
from its mountain source, it tears along with the
old eager insatiable hurry, to merge its glacier-
born waters in the immensity of ocean. You
pass by the burnt sienna chalets, and by the Hotel
des Alpes ; you cross the other bridge which spans
the turbid stream below the noisy saw-mills ; you
pass the church, with its well-remembered graves ;
you pass the old priest's white house, with its dark
wooden outside staircase, and its humming bee-
hives ; you are on the round pebbles, over which all
day nailed soles are grinding and slipping ; on
your right is the familiar long low wall, and, then,
on your left, stands the dear old Monte Rosa Hotel,
and at the door you find a welcome from kindly,
pleasant Madame Seiler. You are in the moun-
taineers' true home, and are again, as you always
are, at home in Zermatt. Many a face that you
know well is there to greet you. Many a smile,A Bivouac on the Rothkorn.

283

and many a hearty hand-shake welcome you.
Friends are in the hotel : guides and porters are
outside it Porter, waiter, and Zimmermadchen
recognize you gleefully. You get your old room
(say No. 13), and a bath is brought, unasked, as
you change before going down to dinner at the
Monte Rosa table d'hote. You know, too well, all
the pictures on those walls ; the one of the Mat-
terhorn, dwarfed by a gigantic Alpine rose, or
rhododendron, in the foreground; the one of a
chalky, curd-like Monte Rosa, brought into un-
natural proximity with the Schwarzsee Chapel;
the other of an open window, with a flower-pot on
the table, inside, and a near church spire, outside,
at a very considerable distance. The works may
not be, are not, good ; but yet it is pleasant to see
them again. How often have they worried me as I
gazed with mechanical repugnance daily upon them,
during a lengthened stay at the hotel ; and yet,
somehow, to-day, I would not have them absent:
they form a part of the associations of locality.
The bad monuments in Westminster Abbey are
typical of tastes and times gone by. Let them,
and the Monte Rosa pictures, remain!

We go out after dinner, and sit, as of old, on the
flat coping-stone on the top of the wall which runs
along, up to the church, opposite the whitish hotel.
Once more we beat our heels against the stones, as284 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

we light pipes, and begin to make projects for
mountain ascents. Round the door of the building
sit groups of guests and take their after-dinner
coffee. There is much loud talking and some
merry laughter. The voices of women blend with
the laughter and with the talk, and their forms and
colours and tones lend brightness and sweetness'to
the gay little crowd. By us, on the wall, sit great
guides and lowlier porters. Sunset gleams upon
the high peaks of the Mischabel, which outsoar the
shadow of our night, while evening shades begin to
gloom the dusky valley. It is only when you
think about it, and listen for it, that the ear, dulled
by custom, hears the ceaseless roar of the ever-
rushing river. There is a feeling oi peaceful joy
on the first evening of the year in dear old Zermatt.

One guide, who had lost his spectacles while
descending a long sun-stricken snow-slope, is found
to have terribly blood-shot eyes, which begin to
pain him badly. " An Ei for an eye," says the
pathological Rhadamanthus, and a raw egg is
applied to the inflamed optic. The suffering guide
is led away into darkness, where his fellows will
treat him heedfully and kindlily. He will not,
however, be cured for some days. The Mont
Cervin, new and large—it is the most striking
edifice in Zermatt—may be the best hotel for
tourists, but for mountaineers, who haze longA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 285

known Zermatt and its hills, the dear old Monte
Rosa, with its small rooms, dark passages—and
associations—is still the hotel. Those have started
from these rooms who never returned alive to the
hotel; survivors of fatal accidents have returned in
the stunning shock of keenest sorrow. The old
house is rich with death, as an old meerschaum is
coloured by smoking. The Mont Cervin has no
memories, has no past, has no associations,—and
has known no tragedies.

Meanwhile, the ungrateful Commune of Zermatt
has—not without suspicion of priestly instigation—
built a hateful new hotel, with a view of injuring the
greatest benefactor to the place, M. Seiler, and has
planted it on the level meadow between the Visp-
bach and our own Monte Rosa. May this new
enterprise, a monument of envy, hatred, and malice,
do no harm to M. Seiler, and no good to his
enemies !

The mind of the mountaineer may be held, for
the purposes of the argument, to be the " highest
mounted mind" of humanity; but it is with a
feeling of irritated degradation that one has to
admit how terribly this noble creature is dependent
upon weather. The weather of August, 1877, was
variable, with a rapidly recurring tendency to bad.
In the July preceding, nothing but wretched
weather had been known, and when we reached286 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

Zermatt, the higher peaks were as yet unascended.
August opened with a promise of somewhat better
weather; but although a fine day did, in the first half
of the month, sometimes occur, yet two trustworthy
days could scarcely be reckoned upon, and, although
certain peaks were occasionally done, the risk of
bad weather had to be run, and the day snatched
at,—a condition of things which led not unfrequently
to trying or doing mountains in dire weather.
Snow passes, though unusually difficult, were more
easily practicable. Melchior hesitated to ascend
rock mountains.

Every year, when starting for the annual holiday
of Alpine adventure and excitement, one travels
with plans and projects for ascending certain peaks,
for crossing particular passes. Every year one has,
of necessity, to leave a large portion of the pro-
jected work unachieved. In 1877 we were com-
pelled to cut out of our scheme whole districts in
which dwelt certain of our mountain loves, and a
large uncompleted balance of projected work was
unavoidably postponed. It stands over—perhaps—
for another year.

There is a question now opening amongst moun-
taineers as to the pleasure and policy of bivouacking
before ascending a mountain. One eminent moun-
taineer—so eminent, indeed, that I hesitate, finding
him against me, to cite his mighty name—says,A Bivoitac on the Rothhorn. 287

" No policy is worse than that of gaining an hour
in the morning at the expense of a bad night."
He is, however, it may fairly be stated, one of the
earlier, almost pre-historic heroes ; one of those
great discoverers whose day of magnificent work
(including many first ascents) lies mainly in the
past. Glutted with glory, he is now supine ; but I
find it on record that he often slept out in his day
of more brilliant activity. He says, further, " The
comfort with which one can consult safety rather than
glory is the great advantage of a blase state of
mind." His state of mind may now be somewhat
blase\ but he was once fired, in an exceptional
degree, by love of glory. Then he bivouacked ;
now, when blase\ he attacks bivouacs. I love them
still. As a matter of mere economics, one gains,
on an everage, say three or four hours of dark, cold,
dreary work in the very early morning; but the
question is not merely one of economics: it is a
question also of romance and joy. If you sleep in
a bed, it is horrible to turn out at one, two, or
three, in a dark, chilly, cheerless morning. Apart
from the natural unwillingness to get out of a bed
then, you feel such a fool for rising from sweet sleep
to issue forth into the dreary void of dusk to ascend
a mountain which seems, under such depressing
circumstances, to have lost every charm. The
image of the dark, stern guide waking you, with288 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

a dim, flaring, long-wicked candle, is one of
horror. The room looks ghastly ; darkness fills
the windows ; the water is unnaturally chilly ; your
boots are supernaturally stiff and hard ; the break-
fast by candlelight is a cruel and bestial mockery;
you despise yourself; you hate your faithful guide ;
you loathe the whole proceeding : and you are,
possibly, curt and cross towards companions whom,
under happier auspices, you dearly love. Your
whole mental condition is, simply, daemonic. Now
I quite admit that you sleep uncomfortably (if you
sleep at all) at a bivouac on the rocks, or in a
tent; but then how ready you are to turn out and
to start! You are close to your serious work. You
have not to toil, perhaps with a dully glaring
lantern, over wet glass slopes, over rocky boulder
land, over hard moraine, before you get near your
mountain. No, from a bivouac you plunge, at once,
into grave and interesting work ; and you have won,
say, three hours of start. You must sometimes, it
is true, wait for light; but very often you see at
once the cheering spectacle of your peak and goal
before you.

And the joy of the bivouac itself ! The gentle
walk, by daylight melting into sunset, through
splendid scenery ; the sublime views, as evening
deepens into night, from your high aerial perch ; the
merry supper by the leaping firelight, surrounded' A Bivouac 07i the Rothhorn. 289

by the dark figures of picturesque guides; the
songs, and the talk, and the pipes, before you
subside to a rest joyful with the anticipations * of
the morrow! And then the grandeur of the night
closing in around you ! You may have a moon,
shining upon the almost unearthly glories of snow
and rock, of glacier and of peak range. The stars
come out, and come down very near to you. The
clouds rest or drive above you. You are high up
in the silent mystery and remote grandeur of night,
and all about you are scenes and influences un-
familiar, seldom to be seen or felt, uplifting
mind and soul to a sublime and ideal altitude.
Yes, quite apart from the economics, I love a
mountain bivouac, with all its witchery of weird
romance, its strange excitement, and its ecstatic
joys !

This year I met two Alpine Club friends—
Hector Legge and Stratford Avon—at Zermatt.
Both are zealous mountaineers, and, as regards
climbing, are ot nearly equal powers. But it is
curious to notice the difference of the spirit .in
which they work. They are typical men ; illustra-
tions of two widely sundered influences which yet
impel men of antagonistic characters to adopt the
same pursuit. Each has good legs, good wind,
good nerve; but there all similarity totally ceases.
One works as a poet, the other as an athlete.

U290 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

One works with heart and mind, the other only
with his legs and wind.

Both are mountaineers, i. e. masters of the moun-
tain craft At the present time, this distinction
belongs properly only to the older race of climbers,
because, now, a man need no longer be a moun-
taineer in order to ascend a mountain. Formerly,
Alpine men went through a progressive training,
and carefully learned the art and mystery of moun-
taineering while working with great guides. Such
men began with lesser, and less difficult peaks, and
worked gradually up until they became competent
to climb the greatest ones ; and they deserved the
title of mountaineer, and the degree of masters of
their art;—for an art climbing is. Now, lads in
their first season, lads without mountain culture or
competence, lads who pannot really climb, or help
themselves, or know what they ought to do, are
taken up big mountains by certain merely mer-
cenary guides ; but those who are taken, or even
dragged up, by extraneous help, know nothing of
the craft and cunning, of the triumph and the joy,
of a true and trained mountaineer. Hector and
Stratford had gone through long and thorough
training, and were complete masters of the craft.

The great guides will only work with men that
they know, men in whose powers they can trust;
but there are inferior guides who will offer to takeA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 291

strangers and novices—sick persons, women, and
children, who have never been upon rock or ice,—
up the most expensive mountains.

One of my two type friends is imaginative, and
has a deep ideal joy in every phase of the beauty,
terror, danger, of the glorious mountains: the
other has no imagination at all, and cares only for
difficult gymnastic exercise, and for " doing"
mountains in the shortest possible period of time.
They agree pretty well together; although they
frequently dispute. Stratford regards Hector with
a good-humoured, amused mixture of regard and
repugnance ; Hector rather likes Stratford, because
he is such a nice fellow, and can do such good
work, and do it so well; but they are, in essence,
repellent forces, positive and negative poles of the
same noble, or in some cases ignoble pursuit.

They came and sat by me on the old Zermatt
wall. They seldom meet without some little pas-
sage of arms ; and I always listen with amusement.

We were talking about the chances of the
weather; about what we had done ; about that
which we yet might do.

Legge and Stratford soon began to spar. " Its
very funny," said Legge to Stratford, " but some-
how you don't seem to care at all about the time
in which you do a peak."

" You are right, Legge. I do not care in the
U 2292 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

least. I want to see as much, and to enjoy as
greatly as I can."

" I can't understand that nonsense," returned
Legge morosely. " Why, when we did the Geister-
horn together, we might have been an hour, or
even more, quicker than we were, only that you
would stop so long on the top, and then you
loitered once or twice to see things. I admit that
you came fast enough off my favourite peak, the
Eselhorn. You generally seem as if you liked to
waste time."

"I only wish that I had stopped longer, or
lingered more, on the Geisterhorn. If you had not
been there, I should have done so. What is waste
to you is gain to me."

" Ah !" said Legge, with a vicious sigh. " But
come now, I think Rothhorn might go. Mind, I
won't sleep out for it; I shall start at midnight,
with a lantern; I want to try if I can't beat
Tupgill's time. I hate those beastly bivouacs. I
think they waste time."

"Waste time?" cried Stratford,with indignation,
partly real, partly assumed : " Why look at the joy
of a mountain bivouac! I enjoy them immensely,
and I should like to sleep out for the Rothhorn.
But I am afraid the weather is not good enough
for the peak. Even if we can get up, we shall
probably have no view."A Bivouac on the Rolhhorn.

293

"There again!" shouted Hector irritably—
" How you always go on about those bothering
views, What on earth do you want with a view ?
I don't ever want one. If I can get up, and get
down, and do the thing in fast time, that's all I
care about. I don't care a button for any view. I
shall take a newspaper with me up Rothhorn to
read on the top. I wonder at you. You can go so
well, and yet you're always bothering about views,
and all that sort of thing. It's jionsense !"

" Because I am not a merely athletic machine,
my dear Hector. I climb for health, exercise—
and above all, for joy. I want to see and feel all
that I can. I climb with the mind, and not with
the legs only, as you do. Why, if you had a tread-
mill at home, with some Alpine scenery painted
round it, it would serve your purpose almost as
well as the divine mountains themselves."

"That wouldn't, be a bad idea," said literal
Hector musingly; " but you wouldn't get the air
you know. Still, I should like to try it at home
in the winter."

" I advise you, by all means, to try it. I make
you a present of the idea. A treadmill will give
you exercise ; you can make fast time, and what
more do you want ?"

" I want to do Rothhorn without sleeping out
for it; and I want to do it fast. That's what I294 Alpine Ascents and Advenhcres.

want just now. You'd better come with me.
When you like you can work very quickly."

" Yes, but I don't always like. When I get into
those high secret solitudes of the mighty hills, I
want to stop till I have seen all that I can
assimilate. I enjoy with all my being. Remember,
my Hector, that the Lord delighteth not in the
strength of any man's legs ; but that there is joy
among the angels of Heaven at every instance of
pure and high mentality—"

"Mentality be smothered!" replied Hector
fiercely. " I don't know what the word means, and
I don't see how it can be applied to mountains."

" No, you do not; that's the pity of it, Hector.
Now my idea of an ideal, a perfect mountaineer,
would be to put a pair of good legs—say your legs,
Hector—"

" My legs are good," observed Hector, surveying
them with great complacency.

" That is so, vain athlete! But to resume: I
should like to put your legs under Shelley, to give
him your wind, your training; but to leave him his
own brain, his own poet's soul, his own sense of
beauty, his own poetic power of expression, so
that he might record afterwards, in fitting words,
what he would see, as a mountaineer, amidst the
noblest, the grandest scenes on earth."

" I can't see," replied Hector, lighting anotherA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 295

pipe, "what you want with poets on mountains.
Poets are all very well, I daresay, in their proper
place, but that place isn't mountains. They'd
spoil your time on hills ; and, besides, they'd look
round, like you do, at scenery, and then one of them
would be sure to cause a slip some day. What
rubbish you are always talking about poetry and
scenery and that. If you were only cured of all
that stuff, you'd be a thundering good fellow, and a
better mountaineer."

" It were too daring a fantasy," said Stratford,
pursuing his own thread of thought, " to imagine
Shakespeare as a mountaineer ; but if one reverently
dared— "

"Now that is rubbish," cried Hector angrily.
"You know as well as I do that Shakespeare lived
in Henry the Eighth's time, and that's a long while
ago. Fellows didn't do mountains then. Why
there was no Alpine Club then !"

" Hector, my poor Scrowger," said Stratford
compassionately, " your simplicity is impayable "

" Will you come up Rothhorn to-morrow, without
sleeping out ?" demanded Hector. " Shall I go
and tell Christian ? You'd better do it."

"O Hector! Hector!" cried, banteringly, his
half-diverted, half-vexed friend, " I may say of you
as the Times said of dummy torpedoes, ' that every
part is perfect except their heads, which are empty.' "296 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

" Come, I'm not a torpedo," said Hector reflec-
tively ; " though, mind you, they're wonderful
things, for all that. But I say, Stratford, you're
cutting at my head pretty sharp."

" One doesn't select a blunt axe for beheading,"
returned Stratford ; " and I want your present head
off, and another in its place."

" I don't much care what you do to my head, so
long as you don't hurt my legs."

" Ah, Hector ! " said Stratford, with a sigh, as he
jumped down off the wall, " we can't change, and
shan't convert, each other. We must e'en be con-
tent to remain different beings. We must go our
separate ways. But still we may go together up
the Rothhorn, if you will sleep out; for I won't
turn out of bed at midnight I'll go and talk to
Hans about it."

Stratford strolled away across the pebbles;
Hector remained, muttering, " What dashed folly!
I hate that bivouacking. You can never make out
good time if you do it. Still, I should like to do
Rothhorn with Stratford, and if he will bivouac, I
suppose he must. .What an obstinate fellow he is.
Bivouacking is, after all, a beastly nuisance. No,
I won't do it; it's too stupid. Either he shall do
it my way, or I won't go with him."

Here Hector strode after Stratford, and I went
to talk to Lyvetete.A Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 297

I had remained a silent, though an interested
auditor of the colloquy between two men who re-
presented so vividly the most antagonistic types of
mountaineering. Like Le Noir Faineant, I re-
mained a spectator, rather than an actor in the fray,
though ready to interfere if necessary. Stratford,
gathering emotion as he talked, had become, half
in earnest, half in sport, more indignant, and a little
more bitter, as he proceeded with his argument ;
while Hector grew gradually more dogged and
more obstinate. He had, naturally enough, some-
what less power of expression than his more
poetical friend. My sympathies remained wholly
with Stratford Avon. Eventually the two sepa-
rated, and arranged different expeditions. One
went up the Schwarzhorn ; the other started for the
Weisshorn.

I next turned to my own plans. I wanted to go
up that mountain, the Rothhorn, which had formed
the object of their attempt at a combination. I
could not get Melchior Anderegg, because he was
engaged to go up the Nord End with Lyvetete.
By the way, it is a joy to witness the joint working
of the first professional and the first amateur moun-
taineer of the day—Melchior and Lyvetete. The
partnership resembles that between Goethe and
Schiller. Melchior is the mighty master, the Goethe
of the duumvirate ; Lyvetete is the lesser, if more298 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

ardent Schiller, and the younger leg-bard supplies
impulse to the glorious combination.

Failing to obtain great Melchior, I could yet
secure his brother, Peter Anderegg. To Peter I
added Joseph Taugwalder, who, last year, ascended
the Matterhorn with me in very bad weather. We
arranged to start next day. The guides were to
provide a porter, and to order our provisions. I
resolved to bivouac as high up as possible, and,
after consultation with Melchior, we selected a
suitable spot, and borrowed a little tent. I was
going alone with my two guides, and was to have
no friend with me. I looked forward eagerly to
the expedition, though my joy was dashed with
some distrust of the treacherous weather. How-
ever, in August, 1877, it was useless to wait for fine
or trustworthy weather. The risk of difficulty, or
defeat even, had to be encountered. We resolved
to try to snatch a day ; and, with this clear deter-
mination, I went to rest on my first night at the
Monte Rosa.

At Zermatt you are awakened very early in the
morning by the coarse clangour of jangling church
bells ; while at Chamounix you hear the musical
ringing of sweet-toned, melodious cow-bells. In
Switzerland the cow carries usually a more har-
monious belfry than the church possesses.

The metallic spire of the ugly yellow church atA Bivouac on the Rothhorn.

299

Zermatt contained the discord which woke me,
prematurely, next morning.

Sending on the porter with the little tent, which
packed into a very small compass, we started gently
at something after 1 o'clock from Zermatt. When
we set off, the wind was from the north, and we
were hopeful about the chances of fine weather ;
though the sun was very hot, and hot with that
stinging, burning heat which generally indicates
coming bad weather. You begin to ascend just
behind the English church. Alas ! its little grave-
yard already contains the graves of three English-
men, who have fallen victims to the dangers of the
mountains ; while others of our countrymen, killed
also on the mountains, rest in a well-known corner
of the Catholic churchyard.

With a glance at and a thought about the grave
—there was only one when we passed that church-
yard, though there are three now—we began to
wind our way up the steep and rough Trift path, on
which the sun shone hotly down. When we reached
the top of this path, we could descry the porter
only just ahead, and we paused under a great block
of rock for a rest, a view, and a pipe. You are
high up, but have risen in so direct a line, that Zer-
matt seems to be almost straight below you. You
gaze downwards on the roofs of houses, which are
dwarfed to very toys. Little dots of figures move300 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

and stir about. We look down upon their hats,
and they are so fore-shortened, that the people seem
to have no legs ; they look something like ants, as
they pass about with an inexplicable activity. One
or two carriages appear to resemble small mouse
traps. The stateliest edifice in the place, and the
most distinctive, is the new white Mont Cervin
Hotel, which has recently had the honour of harbour-
ing the Emperor of Brazil. Continuing to look
below from our perch, you get a fancy of the way in
which a god (a heathen one of course) would look
down carelessly from a celestial height upon things
and beings mundane. The river, which, seen close,
is always such a vexed and roaring torrent, appeared,
from our uplifted site, to be stagnant in soundless
calm ; lying quiet without motion, sense, or sound.
Starting again, we wind across a level, and then
gently upwards over grass and rock, until we pass
over a suave snow slope, cross a violent glacier
torrent stream, and then, mounting a moraine,
attain to a steep, rugged grass slope, sprinkled over
with great stones. It is a steep on which coarse
grass has managed to grow, unduly high up. Close
above it begins the sterile, dead region of great
ghastly snow fields and slopes, the commencement
of hard work, and high climbing. This spot, called
locally Auf der Fluh, is reached about five, and is
to be our sleeping-place. The first thing that weA Bivouac on the Rothhorn.

301

noticed, and noted with dismay, on our arrival, was
that the wind had changed, and that the false Fohn
had returned.

The next thing is to set up the tent. That is
deftly done, though the guides, hoping vainly for a
return of the north wind, pitched it with its mouth
opening to the Fohn. We hacked out little hollows
for the hips, and we built a cunningly contrived
camp cooking-place of stones. These things done,
and the preparations for supper being set in train,
I went a little apart from the guides, lit a pipe, and
began a long lonely look at the strange grand scene
which surrounded our lofty bivouac.

The wind then was rather high, but hot.

The object which first strikes the eye is the
great broad Morning glacier. Close on our right,
across the dust-coloured moraine, and beyond the
rushing, rock-fretted glacier cataract, lies wide
extended, seamed with many a cruel crevasse-scar,
and tending ever upwards, that huge plain of
tangled neve, and of thick-ribbed ice. We are
high, but there are higher heights all around our
airy pitch. We are in the very centre of a mighty
jagged circle of great and glorious mountains,
rising all about us and soaring skyward with a
majesty unspeakable. The mind, distended by the
genius of the place, grows greater as one gazes on
the splendid scene. Just behind us, though still302 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

far away, is our peak—the Rothhorn. The actual
summit is out of sight—unless that little point of
sombre rock be it—but all up the high-stretching
snow, and along the lofty Grat of stiff rock-work,
the eye can trace the way which we shall have to
tread to-morrow. On our left, i.e., on the left when
looking up to the Rothhorn, the lesser Gabelhorn
and the always dusky Mettelhorn are the most
distinctive peaks; though these are backed up by
many a spire, slope, and summit. On our right,
the chief points are the Rympfischhorn and
Strahlhorn, two stately white hills standing out
clearly in front of many a comrade of name and
fame. Straight before us, across the wide valley
chasm in which Zermatt lies deeply hidden, rises
the mighty mass of some great Pennine giants ;
of which brown rock is the true basis, and cold
blanched snow the superficial accident. The far-
away slopes across the valley which buttresses the
towering majesty either of huge rounded block, of
sky-piercing points, or of fantastic crests, have
patches of soft, velvety duskiness upon their
shadowy green, upright smoothness ; such patches
being, in fact, growths of pine-trees which lean
upwards against the steepness of the bare soil from
which the hardy Sapins spring. Such, in rough
and rugged outline, are the components, so far as
form and shape and situation are concerned, of theA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 303

grand scene upon which, reclining lazily against a
lump of rock, I gazed on that happy evening.
But there are two other constituents of the magic
thrill of charm which is evolved from such a land
and snow scape ;—and these two subtle essences are
—light and colour. The hour approached the
time of the setting of a sinking sun, that sun by
me unseen. The mellow splendour of his latest
light flooded every rock and flushed all the immense
expanse and mass of snow that lay so widely spread
around. Close to the edge of the mountains of the
Monte Rosa chain, the sky was crimsoned with
spiral tufts, and broad stripes, and narrow lines of
vivid flame-coloured cloud ; while the interspaces
were filled up with liquid calm of still, level strata
of dead, faint violet purple hue, those bars edged
again with pale clear green, and the green rendered
more vivid by a few golden, sun-smitten heaps of
full cumulus. All the gorgeous shapes and spreads
of wondrously tinted cloud-land, with its " ardours
of rest and of love," which filled the sky above the
mountain heights, were calm, and steadfast, and
serene; but directly overhead were the wild, torn
whiffs and streaks of a wind-swept wrack of tor-
mented cloudlets.

The aspect of that sumptuous sky of colour-
marvels contained the strange contradiction and
conflict of divine peace and loveliness contrasting304 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

with the fierceness of high-sweeping wind currents,
which told of weather-warfare, toil, and trouble.
Strife and peace were both suggested by the
gorgeous spectacle, which was, indeed, in its
meteorological meaning, the indication of coming
storm, and of dire war in the heavens. For some
time, as I lay gazing there, the winds had taken a
pensive tone, and seemed to be hushed to quiet by
the colour-glory ; but later on came stormful sighs
of rising passion and of coming wrath. Through
heat come hints of cold to come; warmth, even,
conveyed a subtle indication of latent chill; summer
gave a threatening of winter; and the singular
splendour of that magnificent and memorable
sunset was in reality a presage of approaching
tempest. While looking, I was lost in the glory,
and lost to its warning; but slowly the last rose-
flush died from off the greying snow, colour faded
in the tenderly confused sky, and cold shadow sank
upon the darkening earth. The very sun itself had
foretold snow. The shades spread slowly down to
my ethereal elevation, and over all the towering
altitudes above. The roar of the torrent sounded
louder and more angry. A sad curtain of joyless
filmy clouds stole over all the melancholy sky ; the
wind began to moan and shrilly rave ; darkness and
cold descended on our lonely, lofty, bare hillside;
and it was with pleasure that I turned to the flamesA Bivouac on the Rothhorn.

305

then leaping merrily from the cheerful, blazing,
crackling fire of our bivouac.

After the last gleam of light has died out on the
snows of those lofty peaks, there comes a time in
which their aspect causes a shudder to the imagina-
tion. When the light fades, their mystic life seems
to cease, and they become as mountain corpses.
Indeed, such idea of life as we can attach to them
is dependent upon colour and on light, and when
they cease the sublime freezes into the terrible.
They rise so high into the cold darkness of night,
they approach so near to the lowering stars, that
the fancy shrinks back in awe from contemplating
heights on which no human life could then possibly
exist. The shadowy grey—a grey visible even
through darkness—gives an idea of frozen death,
throned and reigning on those pallid, frost-bound,
darkling Arctic pinnacles and pyramids. In the
gloom of mystic night, the mountain tops soar so
highly into the dark void and shadow that the
mind feels a fascination of horror at the mere con-
ception of their gelid iron altitudes, and turns with
joy to human companionship, and to the warmth
of fire, at a lower elevation. Their vast waste
immensity of deathly frost-locked calm lends to
them something of the supernaturally shocking, and
one turns from them with a creeping chill of dread.
Long after their bases are muffled deep in shadow,

X3 o6 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

the light lingers upon their glowing summits ; that
light is swallowed up by grim ebon night;—and
then begins the glory of the bivouac.

At first we saw crowds of bright and trembling
stars, though they seemed too near and twinkled
too restlessly. They portended bad weather, and
the wild winds rose ever and anon in chilly, fitful
wailings. The glacier waste gleamed, ghastly in
the dim shades of night.

All the better and cheerier is our flaming, crack-
ling fire ! The guides are busy, cooking; and we
all pull out rugs and sit or move round the merry
blaze. The firelight dances upon the canvas of our
little tent-shelter, which, fastened down by ropes
tied round large lumps of stone, stands near the
cooking-place. Our site is bare and exposed.
Nothing shelters us from the wind that sweeps
now and then gustily over the cold-faced glacier.
Seen from below, that glacier appears to be but a
comparatively little, fore-shortened patch of white-
ness ; seen close at hand, it is a broad, dread waste,
both wide and high. Those who sojourn only in
the valleys see comparatively little of the real
mountain-world of rock and snow, of glacier,
crevasse, and serac. They can never form in their
own minds a true picture of what that wondrous
region really is. You must be uplifted to close
contact with the silent eloquence of the secretA Bivouac on the Rothhorn.

307

solitudes of mountain heights and mysteries before
you can conceive the wonders and the grandeurs of
nature in the high Alps.

But my guides have changed in appearance, in
sympathy with the change of scene. They wear
thick hooded nightcaps. Their collars are turned up.
They look like Kohler, charcoal-burners, swart sons
of the mine in which the Kobold plays pranks and
the gnome inspires superstitious terrors. Guides
generally appear, even by daylight, somewhat stern
and dark ; but now, as the blaze flickers upon their
weather-scarred features and their sombre forms,
they seem to have acquired a touch of the unearthly.
Still, they are friendly, kindly as ever. At length
the soup is ready. Peter produces two small basins
of very common yellow earthenware, and two very
battered, curiously speckled, old pewter spoons.
One of each is given to me, as Herr, and the
guides use the others. The soup is very hot and
good. Then come tins of preserved meat, and we
pull out our clasp-knives and set to work strenuously.
The meal is gradually finished, and the " things"
are cleared away. More wood is thrown upon the
fire, and they mull some red wine for me. The
guides prefer hot water with Cognac in it. Then,
as the fire leaps and falls, and the water and wine
boil, while the wind rises and the night deepens, I
pass round the tobacco-pouch, and we lie before
x 2308 Alpine Ascents and Adventures.

the fire and smoke. The cold increases. Once,
booking up, I see no stars ; but the gleaming bowl
of the dear old pipe supplies, for the time, the
place of other heavenly bodies,

It is a pleasant hour. There is romance in the
wild scene and in the wild figures. Elias, the huge
young giant of a porter, shakes off his timidity, and
is found to have a small but sweet falsetto voice.
Peter is no song-bird, but Joseph can trill simple
little Switzer songs. They ask me, with great
interest, about the ocean; about countries, like
England, unhappily destitute of snow mountains ;
about monster cannon. I tell them all I know
about such things ; and they tell me, in return,
about their life in winter, when the valleys are
cold and dark, when the stove warms the low
wooden room with small mullioned windows, when
they go out to shoot chamois and to cut wood,
while the hard earth is deeply covered with snow.
Always, at such times, the talk gets round to
mountains, to accidents, to adventures, and to feats ;
and we speak long on subjects so dear to every
true mountaineer.

I feel very happy. Lying on my side and smok-
ing, I enjoy the whole thing. The guides get
fluent and confidential; and there is a sense
amongst us all of true, cordial, human companion-
ship. Besides, there is the work of the morrow ;A Bivouac on the Rothhorn.

309

the chances of weather ; the probability of a good
view from the Rothhorn to be spoken of. The
mulled red wine is delicious ; the others empty their
yellow basin of its hot brandy and water. The
blaze dies out. The little spot of warmth and
light becomes dark and chill. The near grass
and rocks show vaguely once again, and the fire
no longer remains a concentrated glowing pros-
pect. The vast width of the great arch of night
is grandly apparent. We all get up—and the
bivouac proper is at an end. Of course, before
turning in, we look anxiously at the weather. No
stars visible ; clouds gathering fast over the murky
sky; wind rising and blowing in fierce gusts ;
cold considerable. The guides confer in patois. I
know their ways, and feel certain that they distrust
the weather. Porter instructed to fix the tent
firmer. To my inquiries, I am told, somewhat
oracularly, " that it is impossible to say ; that they
hope for a good day ; that it may be fine, or may
be bad." I know all that before. The fact is, that
guides are not good judges of weather. They are
not to be compared with sailors as weather prophets ;
but then it must be conceded that judgment is
easier, when you look over a plain to the horizon,
than it is when the view is so terribly obstructed
by hills.

We turned in. I went to the far end of the tent,3 io A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

the inside of which was swollen by the strong
wind, and lay down in my rug, taking advantage
of the hollow scooped out for the hip. The others
lay down, the Anak of a porter being curled up
next to the entrance, and the light was blown out.
Then came sudden darkness, and the noise of men
shifting about to get into comfortable positions.
Thereupon Peter announced that he thought of get-
ting up at about two—it was then nearly ten—and
he asked me, if I were warm enough. I replied
affirmatively. Then Gute Nacht! echoed through
the tent. The others went noisily into instanta-
neous slumber, and I lay awke.

I like that feeling of sleeping at so hard and
high a perch. The excitement of the unusual and
remote is great. The torrent raved monotonously
below ; the wind roared fitfully around. The dark-
ness became intense, and the cold very perceptible.
I am well used to sleeping in tents, but the sense of
Alpine surroundings, the anticipations of the climb
of the morrow, the idea that one would have to
turn out almost directly—for so it always seems to
me when sleeping out for a peak—the great
strangeness of the situation, all tended to keep me
awake, and I lay, not unhappily, thinking and
fancying both objectively and subjectively.

At length I slept. The moment that I fell asleep
—or so it seemed to me—I heard voices and sawA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 311

dark figures moving about. I thought it was time
to turn out, but was undeceived by a rough
voice saying, " Herr, get up ; the tent is coming
down !" And it did come down. The wind had
increased to a heavy gale, and had got into the
tent opening. The pole which supported the roof,
a bar made in two pieces, which fitted into a socket
in the middle, had collapsed ; and the canvas was
flapping down upon us in ruin. We got up; all
but the porter, who slept with an intensity of
animal profundity which no disaster could disturb.
Joseph stirred Elias up with difficulty, and we
emerged from our tempest-shattered shelter. We
found a dreadful wind, and some rainy snow falling.
The tent was re-erected, and made more secure.
We crept back to our lairs, chilled and dismal.
The storm howled hoarsely; the canvas flapped
and strained; but guides and porter sank again
to sleep. I may have dozed a little; but in due
time, and as a matter of course, I saw Peter sitting
up and striking a match. He consulted his watch,
and then wakened the others. It was nearly three
o'clock, but it looked like night. We all issued
forth, silent and drowsy, and the guides began to
light a fire.

Snow again in drifting showers ; very cold ; very
windy ; and very dark. Not enough light for any
useful purpose. Everything depressing, and joy-312 A Ipine Ascents and Adventures.

less in the extreme, Come! here is some coffee
at last. That, at least, is warm. I drink it, but
find it difficult to eat anything. Bread, dry and
hard; tinned meats, frozen, and unnaturally cold.
Outlook everywhere dreary. Meal finished. Weil,
Peter, how about weather ? Let us glance round.

It was now nearly four, and as light as it ever
would be on such a morning.

Drifts of opaque, whitish grey clouds, pregnant
with snow, were travelling fast behind us, and
obscured the Rothhorn side. The Pennine range
was blurred, dim, and murky. "How it's snowing
up there!" said Joseph to Peter, as they stood
looking at our Rothhorn.

The prospect was a cold, colourless blank and
dampness of chilly snow and storm. The tent was
packed; the rope was prepared ; the ice-axes
grasped in hands numbed, despite woollen mits;
handkerchiefs were tied over hats ; gaiters were
buttoned on ; and we mechanically and silently fell
into line. The porter got ready to descend. The
snow flakes fell around us; the wind chilled us
through and through; resolution was ready; hope
was not dead, though sleeping as deeply as the
porter had done; joy was as absent as was the
sun ;—and so we started :—But here I pause. This
paper does not concern itself with our further pro-A Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 313

ceedings that day. It has nothing to do with
peaks. It confines itself modestly to the middle
distance. It is enough if it have at all succeeded
in depicting our Rothhorn Bivouac. Nevertheless,
despite all the mischances which occurred to us
on this particular occasion, I remained firmly of
Stratford Avon's opinion in favour of the joys of a
mountain bivouac. I have tried both systems
amply, and I think that the bivouac itself, and the
evening spent between arrival and attempt to sleep,
is one of the high joys of the high Alps.

When will the high Alps find a worthy painter ?
Turner, in his good day, would no doubt have been
the man ; but at the period in which he was doing
his best work—and his best work would be needed
for the mountains—it would have been difficult for
him to have found opportunities for attaining the
best positions for the Alpine painter. We have, in
our own day, near texture, the surface of the
glacier, the smear of the moraine, the bluish horror
and hollow of the crevasse, admirably rendered by
a serious student of the mountains; but the task
of adequately representing size and scale and
grandeur seen through aerial distance, the power of
blending breadth of mass with clearness of definition,
seem to me to remain a problem unsolved, almost
untried. Who can paint-—or, rather, has as yet314 ^ Ipirie A scents and A dventures.

succeeded in painting—snow glittering with the
blaze of noontide sunshine, or the clear crimson of
the Alpengluth flooding and flushing the peaks in
the evening just after sunset; or who has yet fully
triumphed over the difficulty of depicting moonlight
on the clear, frozen sparkle of snow at night ? To
mountaineers these effects are well known; by
mountaineers they are deeply loved ; and moun-
taineers still long to find the painter who can, with
the feeling of the poet and the skill of the crafts-
man, render these magical effects. You often hear
certain painters say glibly," Oh, the Alps are quite
unpaintable; can't be painted at all!" That
statement merely means that the men who could
accomplish the noble task have not yet tried it.
*The difficulties are, no doubt, immense: the
triumph would be in proportion; but I hope that
the great painter—and a great painter is needed
for the noble work—will yet be allured to put all
his power into the magnificent subject.

In 1869, Mr. Leighton exhibited a glorious pic-
ture, which I still remember well, of Helios and
Rhodos. In the blue sky, and on the golden cloud,
the radiant sun-god and the white nymph embraced
and kissed in lovely and immortal love. Helios
was absent when Rhodos arose from out the azure
sea ; but he raised its nymph to himself in the
glowing heavens; and there they remain con-A Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 315

joined for ever, to the eye of those who are of
imagination all compact. And so sun and snow—
types, to-day, of fervid brilliancy and of tender
purity—meet high up in the blue air, and the sun-
lit Alps are still emblems of the loving union of
god and nymph. The heavens, flooded with divine
light-glory, still kiss the pure, blanched snows.
That which Mr. Leighton has effected through the
pregnant symbols of mythology remains to be ren-
dered, through idealized realism, by the painter
who can steep his canvas with sunlight, and fuse
that with those unspeakably graceful mountains
which blend austere purity with the seductiveness
of nymph-like charm.

Of all mountains, the Matterhorn is the grandest
and most terrible. Of all mountains, the Weisshorn
is the fairest and most feminine. Rhodope, wife of
Hsemus, King of Thrace, was changed into a moun-
tain because she dared to declare herself more
beautiful than jealous Juno. Fancy ignores
geography, which is, indeed, but a material science ;
and we may well imagine that fair Rhodope was
changed into the Weisshorn. If so, she triumphs
yet over her angry rival; for that mountain
exceeds in beauty almost any goddessexcept,
perhaps, the fairest foam-born one.

What a delight of loving labour remains for the
painter who shall fitly render the perfect form, and316 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

the feminine loveliness of the superlative lady
Weisshorn! And what studies of colour, as of light
and shade, the Alps present! I saw this year, at
Chamounix, one of the subtlest studies of light and
shade that nature could combine. It was a perfect
combination of simple black and white. A dead
sky, steadfast as if no wind would ever again sweep
cloud over its surface, was in tone like a wash of
Indian ink. Against that sky, with soft shadow
spread over dead white, rose the vast bulk of Mont
Blanc. The gradations of tint and distance
between the Calotte, the Bosse, and Dome du Goute\
were finely and tenderly marked by deeper depths
of stagnant shadow.

A sombre, colourless calm rested over the
motionless mountains, and over the apparently
immutable interspaces of gloomy firmament. It
was a picture which a painter could, and should,
have fixed and frozen to permanence. Did space
permit, I could tell, in insufficient words, of many
another wondrous picture in which those enchanted
peaks and silent worlds of everlasting hills flashed
into light, or vanished into gloom. Form, ineffable
in loveliness and matchless in outline, is always
there ; ideal grandeur is never absent; there are
hours in which the magicians, light and colour, rule
with their more than regal sway; there are times
in which black and white reign suavely in levelA Bivouac on the Rotkhorn. 317

harmony; and there are ravings of wild storm,
when force and terror rule the awful realm. One
of nature's noblest picture-galleries is that of the
high Alps.

This year, a sadness hangs around the moun-
taineer's memory, owing to six deaths caused by
fatal accidents among the sometimes deadly moun-
tains.

O the sadness and the terror, the sorrow and the
shock, of those fatal Alpine accidents! Every
mountaineer knows how often he has been near
to the possibility, at least, of one of them ; though
pluck and luck, skill and guides, have prevented
the worst results. A concealed crevasse—a shower
of falling stones—storm and fog on a summit—a
badly cut step on an ice slope—a cornice of over-
hanging snow—an avalanche—a slip of one of a
party, which slip, if not arrested in the first second,
would be disastrous ; all these are ever possible
causes of a swift, sudden passage from the midst of
life to maimed and haggard death. And then the
sharpness of the contrast between the sad event
and the gay spirit of the hour ! I know well, and
every mountaineer knows well, the joyousness of a
mountain morning, the eagerness of expectation,
the exaltation of excitement, the glad talk, the merry
laughter, the ecstasy of feeling which uplifts a party
of mountaineers as the work begins bravely ;—318 A Ipine A scents and A dventures.

and then the change that may come! The contrast
is startling, strange, daemonic ; it is great as. the
activity of eager climbing compared with the
profound tranquillity of those Swiss churchyards
which hold the remains of our English dead, who
have perished on Swiss mountains. Once so full
of life, strength, ardour, those hapless moun-
taineers, at rest for ever, are now

*' Roll'd round in earth's diurnal course
With rocks, and stones, and trees!"

Something of the old romance of mountaineering
is fading out before the rise of the new school of un-
fledged novices who, without judgment, knowledge,
mastery of the craft, do not climb, but are, so soon
as they reach Switzerland, taken, or dragged up
hills, which—in the true mountaineering sense—
they could not ascend. Sometimes such men are
pulled up to the top ; oftentimes they fail. Not
seldom there may be amongst these novices men who,
with time and study, would ripen into good moun-
taineers. Swiss hotels are being multiplied, and
tourists increase j many causes combine to lessen
the romance of earlier times, but, whatever influences
may tend to lower somewhat the rare, old charm
of Swiss mountains, their vital magic remains
wholly indestructible. No number of voyages over
the trackless paths of ocean can vulgarize theA Bivouac on the Rothhorn. 319

mighty sea ; and no number of unidea'd or unideal
tourists—of climbers who cannot climb—can ever
ruin, in the imagination of the true mountaineer,
the wonder, the mystery, the glory, of our still
unspoiled because unspoilable High Alps.LONDON :

GILBERT AND RIVINGTON, PRINTERS,
ST. JOHN'S SQUARE.A Catalogue of American and Foreign Books Published or
v Imported by Messrs. Sampson Low & Co. can
be had 011 application.

Crown Buildings, 188, Fleet Street, London,
October, 1878.

a Xfet of SBoofc*

published by

SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEA RLE, & RIVINGTON.

ALPHABETICAL LIST.

A CLASSIFIED Educational Catalogue of Works pub-

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21

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S A Vtrt vi rl

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