Part 25 (1/2)

”Just so, and therefore you shan't have it. But you must admit that the opinion of a good guide is worth something. Now, I heard Antoine Grennon the other day laying down some unquestionable principles to the Professor--”

”What! lecturing the Professor?” interrupted Lewis, ”how very presumptuous.”

”He said,” continued the Doctor, ”that the dangers connected with the ascent of these Swiss mountains are _real_, and, unless properly provided against, may become terrible, if not fatal. He instanced your own tendency to go roving about among the glaciers _alone_. With a comrade or a guide attached to you by a rope there is no danger worth speaking of, but it must be as clear to you as it is to me that it when out on the mountains alone, you step on a snow-covered creva.s.se and break through, your instant death is inevitable.”

”Yes, but,” objected Lewis, with that unwillingness to be convinced which is one of the chief characteristics of youth, ”I always walk, when _alone_ on the glaciers, with the utmost caution, sounding the snow in front of me with the long handle of my axe at every step as I go.”

”If the guides do not find this always a sufficient protection for themselves, by what amazing power of self-sufficiency do you persuade yourself that it is sufficient for _you_?” demanded Lawrence.

”Your question suffices, Doctor,” said Lewis, laughing; ”go on with your lecture, I'm all attention and, and humility.”

”Not my lecture,” retorted Lawrence, ”the guide's. He was very strong, I a.s.sure you, on the subject of men going on the high glaciers _without a rope_, or, which comes to the same thing, _alone_, and he was not less severe on those who are so foolhardy, or so ignorant, as to cross steep slopes of ice on new-fallen snow. Nothing is easier, the new snow affording such good foothold, as you told us the other day when describing your adventures under the cliffs of Monte Rosa, and yet nothing is more dangerous, says Antoine, for if the snow were to slip, as it is very apt to do, you would be smothered in it, or swept into a creva.s.se by it. Lives are lost in the Alps _every year_, I am told, owing to indifference to these two points. The guides say--and their opinions are corroborated by men of science and Alpine experience--that it is dangerous to meddle with any slope exceeding 30 degrees for several days after a heavy fall, and yet it is certain that slopes exceeding this angle are traversed annually by travellers who are ignorant, or reckless, or both. Did you not say that the slope which you crossed the other day was a steeper angle than this, and the snow on it not more than twenty-four hours' old?”

”Guilty!” exclaimed Lewis, with a sigh.

”I condemn you, then,” said Lawrence, with a smile, ”to a continuation of this lecture, and, be a.s.sured, the punishment is much lighter than you deserve. Listen:--There are three unavoidable dangers in Alpine climbing--”

”Please don't be long on each head,” pleaded Lewis, throwing himself back in his bed, while his friend placed the point of each finger of his right hand on a corresponding point of the left, and crossed his legs.

”I won't. I shall be brief--brief as your life is likely to be if you don't attend to me. The three dangers are, as I have said, unavoidable; but two of them may be guarded against; the other cannot. First, there is danger from _falling rocks_. This danger may be styled positive. It hangs over the head like the sword of Damocles. There is no avoiding it except by not climbing at all, for boulders and ice-blocks are perched here, and there, and everywhere, and no one can tell the moment when they shall fall. Secondly, there is danger from creva.s.ses--the danger of tumbling into one when crossing a bridge of snow, and the danger of breaking through a crust of snow which conceals one. This may be called a negative danger. It is reduced to almost nothing if you are tied to your comrade by a rope, and if the leader sounds with his staff as he walks along; but it changes from a negative to a positive danger to the man who is so mad as to go out _alone_. Thirdly, there is danger from new snow on steep slopes, which is positive if you step on it when recently fallen, and when the slope is very steep; but is negative when you allow sufficient time for it to harden. While, however, it is certain that many deaths occur from these three dangers being neglected, it is equally true that the largest number of accidents which occur in the Alps arise chiefly from momentary indiscretions, from false steps, the result of carelessness or self-confidence, and from men attempting to do what is beyond their powers. Men who are too old for such fatigue, and men who, though young, are not sufficiently strong, usually come to grief. I close my lecture with a quotation from the writings of a celebrated mountaineer--`In all cases the man rather than the mountain is at fault.'”

”There is truth in what you say,” observed Lewis, rising, with a yawn.

”Nay, but,” returned his friend, seriously, ”your mother, who is made very anxious by your reckless expeditions, begged me to impress these truths on you. Will you promise me, like a good fellow, to consider them?”

”I promise,” said Lewis, becoming serious in his turn, and taking his friend's hand; ”but you must not expect sudden perfection to be exemplified in me.--Come, let's go have a talk with Le Croix about his projected expedition after the chamois.”

Up in the mountains now,--above some of the clouds undoubtedly, almost 'mong the stars, as Gillie put it,--Lewis wanders in company with Baptist Le Croix, half-forgetful of his promise to Lawrence. Below them lies a world of hills and valleys; above towers a fairy-land of ice, cliff, and cloud. No human habitation is near. The only indications of man's existence are so faint, and so far off in the plains below, that houses are barely visible, and villages look like toys. A sea of cloud floats beneath them, and it is only through gaps in this sea that the terrestrial world is seen. Piercing through it are the more prominent of the Alpine peaks--the dark tremendous obelisk of the Matterhorn towering in one direction, the not less tremendous and far grander head of Mont Blanc looming in another. The sun s.h.i.+nes brightly over all, piercing and rendering semi-transparent some of the clouds, gilding the edges and deepening the shadows of others.

”Do you see anything, Le Croix?” asked Lewis, as he reclined on a narrow ledge of rock recovering breath after a fatiguing climb, while his comrade peered intently through a telescope into the recesses of a dark mountain gorge that lay a little below them.

For some moments the hunter made no reply. Presently he closed the gla.s.s, and, with an air of satisfaction, said, ”Chamois!”

”Where?” asked Lewis, rising eagerly and taking the gla.s.s.

Le Croix carefully pointed out the spot but no effort on the part of the inexperienced youth could bring anything resembling the light and graceful form of a chamois into the field of vision.

”Never mind, Le Croix,” he said, quickly returning the gla.s.s and picking up his rifle; ”come along, let's have at them.”

”Softly,” returned the hunter; ”we must get well to leeward of them before we can venture to approach.”

”Lead where you will; you'll find me a quiet and unquestioning follower.”

The hunter at once turned, and, descending the mountain by a precipice which was so steep that they had in some places to drop from ledge to ledge, at last gained a position where the light air, that floated but scarce moved the clouds, came direct from the spot where the chamois lay. He then turned and made straight towards them. As they advanced the ground became more rugged and precipitous, so that their progress was unavoidably slow, and rendered more so by the necessity that lay on them of approaching their game without noise.

When they had reached a spot where a sheer precipice appeared to render further progress impossible, the hunter stopped and said in a low tone, ”Look, they are too far off; a bullet could not reach them.”

Lewis craned his neck over the cliff, and saw the chamois grazing quietly on a small patch of green that lay among brown rocks below.

”What's to be done?” he asked anxiously. ”Couldn't we try a long shot?”