Part 51 (1/2)
”Yes, up there now. I have often known men ascend mountains on what seemed to be glorious days, and there was only a fine filmy veil to be seen floating round the higher parts--just enough to hide them perhaps for an hour together; but when they came down to the little hotel in the valley, they had a long tale to tell us of having been frostbitten while clinging to the snow slopes and ice-covered rocks, not daring to venture up or down on account of the tremendous, tempestuous wind blowing.”
”I say, look here!” cried Saxe, pointing to another peak from which lovely, silvery streamers of cloud spread out: ”you don't mean to say that there's bad weather up there now?”
”Indeed, but I do; and if you asked Melchior he would--”
”Hi! Melk!” cried Saxe, as the man came slowly up after them, ”what sort of weather is it up there now?”
”Terrible, herr,” replied the man, shading his eyes. ”The snow must be falling heavily, and a wind raging fierce enough to tear any man from his hold.”
”Well!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Saxe, ”I am puzzled. Why, the weather looks glorious--like summer!”
”But you forget that if you only go high enough up it is eternal winter.
The tops of those mountains are in the midst of never-failing snow, which is gradually compressed into ice and--”
”Would the herr like to go to the foot of the glacier and examine the ice grotto?”
”We did do that in the other valley.”
”But this is a larger cave, herr; and besides, it is the entrance to the one where I journeyed down.”
”Can't you settle yourself for a quiet day, Melchior?” said Dale, smiling.
”No, herr; I do not seem to be earning my money. It will be a very easy walk, and we can take the lanthorn and another candle; besides, it is quite fresh. I do not think any one has ever been in it but me.”
”What do you say, Saxe?”
”That I should like to go,” cried the lad eagerly; for half a day of comparative inaction had been sufficient to weary him, surrounded as he was by such a region of enchantment, where, turn which way he would, there was some temptation to explore.
”I am in the minority,” said Dale, smiling; ”but I mean to have my own way. No: I shall keep to my previous arrangements. To-day we will rest. To-morrow, if the weather is good, I'm going up to the bare face of that mountain on the other side of the glacier.”
”The Bergstock,” said Melchior. ”Yes, it is one of the places I mean to take you to, herr; for the gletscher winds round behind it, and I hope you will find what you want there.”
”I'm not half so eager to find crystals now, Melk,” said Saxe that evening, as he sat beside the guide, glad that the day of inaction was at an end.
”Why so?” asked Melchior.
”Because we don't find any, I suppose.”
”But when we do the young herr will be as eager as ever.”
”Oh!”
”Is the young herr in pain?”
”No: only when I move. My arms are so stiff. I say, don't you feel a bit sore from your work yesterday?”
”Oh yes, herr,” said the guide, smiling; ”but the best way to ease pains like those is not to think about them.”
”I dare say it is,” grumbled Saxe; ”but it seems to me that it would be easier to bear the pain. I couldn't forget a thing that's always reminding you that you are sore. But there, I am glad it's to-night. I shall go to roost in good time, so as to get a fine long sleep.”
Saxe kept his word, and he slept soundly, only waking once when the mule uttered one of its peculiar squeals. But no one was sufficiently alarmed to get up, and the incident was forgotten next morning, when one of many days of an uneventful nature commenced, during which the party made excursions in different directions: into the ice grotto; across the glacier to the Bergstock; up to first one and then another snowfield, and among magnificent views in all directions, and under endless atmospheric changes such as gave constant variety to the surroundings.