Part 15 (1/2)

It also was a little ”city of the dead.” There was no living thing in the streets, and neither sound nor light in the houses. The fountain made a melancholy gurgle, one or two loosened window-shutters creaked harshly in the wind, and banged against the objects which limited their oscillations. The Hotel de l'Union, so bright and gay in summer, was nailed up and forsaken; and the cross in front of it, stretching its snow-laden arms into the dim air, was the type of desolation. We rang the bell at the Hotel Royal, but the bay of a watch-dog resounding through the house was long our only reply. The bell appeared powerless to wake the sleepers, and its sound mingled dismally with that of the wind howling through the deserted pa.s.sages. The noise of my boot-heel, exerted long on the front door, was at length effective; it was unbarred, and the physical heat of a good stove soon added itself to the warmth of the welcome with which my hostess greeted me.

December 26th.--The snow fell heavily, at frequent intervals, throughout the entire day. Dense clouds draped all the mountains, and there was not the least prospect of my being able to see across the Mer de Glace. I walked out alone in the dim light, and afterwards traversed the streets before going to bed. They were quite forsaken. Cold and sullen the Arve rolled under its wooden bridge, while the snow fell at intervals with heavy shock from the roofs of the houses, the partial echoes from the surfaces of the granules combining to render the sound loud and hollow.

Thus were the concerns of this little hamlet changed and fas.h.i.+oned by the obliquity of the earth's axis, the chain of dependence which runs throughout creation, linking the roll of a planet alike with the interests of marmots and of men.

[Sidenote: ASCENT OF THE MOUNTAIN. 1859.]

[Sidenote: SNOW ON THE PINES. 1859.]

Tuesday, 27th December.--I rose at six o'clock, having arranged with my men to start at seven, if the weather at all permitted. Edouard Simond, my old a.s.sistant of 1857, and Joseph Tairraz were the guides of the party; the porters were Edouard Balmat, Joseph Simond (fils d'Auguste), Francois Rava.n.a.l, and another. They came at the time appointed; it was snowing heavily, and we agreed to wait till eight o'clock and then decide. They returned at eight, and finding them disposed to try the ascent to the Montanvert, it was not my place to baulk them. Through the valley the work was easy, as the snow had been partially beaten down, but we soon pa.s.sed the habitable limits, and had to break ground for ourselves. Three of my men had tried to reach the Montanvert by _la Filia_ on the previous Thursday, but their experience of the route had been such as to deter them from trying it again. We now chose the ordinary route, breasting the slope until we reached the cl.u.s.ter of chalets, under the projecting eave of one of which the men halted and applied ”pattens” to their feet. These consisted of planks about sixteen inches long and ten wide, which were firmly strapped to the feet. My first impression was that they were worse than useless, for though they sank less deeply than the unarmed feet, on being raised they carried with them a larger amount of snow, which, with the leverage of the leg, appeared to necessitate an enormous waste of force. I stated this emphatically, but the men adhered to their pattens, and before I reached the Montanvert I had reason to commend their practice as preferable to my theory. I was however guided by the latter, and wore no pattens. The general depth of the snow along the track was over three feet; the footmarks of the men were usually rigid enough to bear my weight, but in many cases I went through the crust which their pressure had produced, and sank suddenly in the ma.s.s. The snow became softer as we ascended, and my immersions more frequent, but the work was pure enjoyment, and the scene one of extreme beauty. The previous night's snow had descended through a perfectly still atmosphere, and had loaded all the branches of the pines; the long arms of the trees drooped under the weight, and presented at their extremities the appearance of enormous talons turned downwards. Some of the smaller and thicker trees were almost entirely covered, and a.s.sumed grotesque and beautiful forms; the upper part of one in particular resembled a huge white parrot with folded wings and drooping head, the slumber of the bird harmonizing with the torpor of surrounding nature. I have given a sketch of it in Fig. 13.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 13. Snow on the Pines.]

[Sidenote: SOUND OF BREAKING SNOW. 1859.]

Previous to reaching the half-way spring, where the peasant girls offer strawberries to travellers in summer, we crossed two large couloirs filled with the debris of avalanches which had fallen the night before.

Between these was a ridge forty or fifty yards wide on which the snow was very deep, the slope of the mountain also adding a component to the fair thickness of the snow. My shoulder grazed the top of the embankment to my right as I crossed the ridge, and once or twice I found myself waist deep in a vertical shaft from which it required a considerable effort to escape. Suddenly we heard a deep sound resembling the dull report of a distant gun, and at the same moment the snow above us broke across, forming a fissure parallel to our line of march. The layer of snow had been in a state of strain, which our crossing brought to a crisis: it gave way, but having thus relieved itself it did not descend.

Several times during the ascent the same phenomenon occurred. Once, while engaged upon a very steep slope, one of the men cried out to the leader, ”_Arretez!_” Immediately in front of the latter the snow had given way, forming a zigzag fissure across the slope. We all paused, expecting to see an avalanche descend. Tairraz was in front; he struck the snow with his baton to loosen it, but seeing it indisposed to descend he advanced cautiously across it, and was followed by the others. I brought up the rear. The steepness of the mountain side at this place, and the absence of any object to which one might cling, would have rendered a descent with the snow in the last degree perilous, and we all felt more at ease when a safe footing was secured at the further side of the incline.

At the spring, which showed a little water, the men paused to have a morsel of bread. The wind had changed, the air was clearing, and our hopes brightening. As we ascended the atmosphere went through some extraordinary mutations. Clouds at first gathered round the Aiguille and Dome du Gouter, casting the lower slopes of the mountain into intense gloom. After a little time all this cleared away, and the beams of the sun striking detached pieces of the slopes and summits produced an extraordinary effect. The Aiguille and Dome were most singularly illumined, and to the extreme left rose the white conical hump of the Dromedary, from which a long streamer of snow-dust was carried southward by the wind. The Aiguille du Dru, which had been completely mantled during the earlier part of the day, now threw off its cloak of vapour and rose in most solemn majesty before us; half of its granite cone was warmly illuminated, and half in shadow. The wind was high in the upper regions, and, catching the dry snow which rested on the asperities and ledges of the Aiguille, shook it out like a vast banner in the air. The changes of the atmosphere, and the grandeur which they by turns revealed and concealed, deprived the ascent of all weariness. We were usually flanked right and left by pines, but once between the fountain and the Montanvert we had to cross a wide unsheltered portion of the mountain which was quite covered with the snow of recent avalanches. This was lumpy and far more coherent than the undisturbed snow. We took advantage of this, and climbed zigzag over the avalanches for three-quarters of an hour, thus reaching the opposite pines at a point considerably higher than the path. This, though not the least dangerous, was the least fatiguing part of the ascent.

[Sidenote: COLOUR OF SNOW. 1859.]

I frequently examined the colour of the snow: though fresh, its blue tint was by no means so p.r.o.nounced as I have seen it on other occasions; still it was beautiful. The colour is, no doubt, due to the optical reverberations which occur within a fissure or cavity formed in the snow. The light is sent from side to side, each time plunging a little way into the ma.s.s; and being ejected from it by reflection, it thus undergoes a sifting process, and finally reaches the eye as blue light.

The presence of any object which cuts off this cross-fire of the light destroys the colour. I made conical apertures in the snow, in some cases three feet deep, a foot wide at the mouth, and tapering down to the width of my baton. When the latter was placed along the axis of such a cone, the blue light which had previously filled the cavity disappeared; on the withdrawal of the baton it was followed by the light, and thus by moving the staff up and down its motions were followed by the alternate appearance and extinction of the light. I have said that the holes made in the snow seemed filled with a blue light, and it certainly appeared as if the air contained in the cavities had itself been coloured, and thereby rendered visible, the vision plunging into it as into a blue medium. Another fact is perhaps worth notice: snow rarely lies so smooth as not to present little asperities at its surface; little ridges or hillocks, with little hollows between them. Such small hollows resemble, in some degree, the cavities which I made in the snow, and from them, in the present instance, a delicate light was sent to the eye, faintly tinted with the pure blue of the snow-crystals. In comparison with the spots thus illuminated, the little protuberances were gray. The portions most exposed to the light seemed least illuminated, and their defect in this respect made them appear as if a light-brown dust had been strewn over them.

[Sidenote: THE MONTANVERT IN WINTER. 1859.]

After five hours and a half of hard work we reached the Montanvert. I had often seen it with pleasure. Often, having spent the day alone amid the _seracs_ of the Col du Geant, on turning the promontory of Trelaporte on my way home, the sight of the little mansion has gladdened me, and given me vigour to scamper down the glacier, knowing that pleasant faces and wholesome fare were awaiting me. This day, also, the sight of it was most welcome, despite its desolation. The wind had swept round the auberge, and carried away its snow-b.u.t.tresses, piling the ma.s.s thus displaced against the adjacent sheds, to the roofs of which one might step from the surface of the snow. The floor of the little chateau in which I lodged in 1857 was covered with snow, and on it were the fresh footmarks of a little animal--a marmot might have made such marks, had not the marmots been all asleep--what the creature was I do not know.

[Sidenote: CRYSTAL CURTAIN. 1859.]

In the application of her own principles, Nature often transcends the human imagination; her acts are bolder than our predictions. It is thus with the motion of glaciers; it was thus at the Montanvert on the day now referred to. The floors, even where the windows appeared well closed, were covered with a thin layer of fine snow; and some of the mattresses in the bedrooms were coated to the depth of half an inch with this fine powder. Given a c.h.i.n.k through which the finest dust can pa.s.s, dry snow appears competent to make its way through the same fissure. It had also been beaten against the windows, and clung there like a ribbed drapery. In one case an effect so singular was exhibited, that I doubted my eyes when I first saw it. In front of a large pane of gla.s.s, and quite detached from it, save at its upper edge, was a festooned curtain formed entirely of minute ice-crystals. It appeared to be as fine as muslin; the ease of its curves and the depth of its folds being such as could not be excelled by the intentional arrangement of ordinary gauze.

The frost-figures on some of the window-panes were also of the most extraordinary character: in some cases they extended over large s.p.a.ces, and presented the appearance which we often observe in London; but on other panes they occurred in detached cl.u.s.ters, or in single flowers, these grouping themselves together to form miniature bouquets of inimitable beauty. I placed my warm hand against a pane which was covered by the crystallization, and melted the frostwork which clung to it. I then withdrew my hand and looked at the film of liquid through a pocket-lens. The gla.s.s cooled by contact with the air, and after a time the film commenced to move at one of its edges; atom closed with atom, and the motion ran in living lines through the pellicle, until finally the entire film presented the beauty and delicacy of an organism. The connexion between such objects and what we are accustomed to call the feelings may not be manifest, but it is nevertheless true that, besides appealing to the pure intellect of man, these exquisite productions can also gladden his heart and moisten his eyes.

[Sidenote: THE MER DE GLACE IN WINTER. 1859.]

The glacier excited the admiration of us all: not as in summer, shrunk and sullied like a spent reptile, steaming under the influence of the sun; its frozen muscles were compact, strength and beauty were a.s.sociated in its aspect. At some places it was pure and smooth; at others frozen fins arose from it, high, steep, and sharply crested. Down the opposite mountain side arrested streams set themselves erect in successive terraces, the fronts of which were fluted pillars of ice.

There was no sound of water; even the Nant Blanc, which gushes from a spring, and which some describe as permanent throughout the winter, showed no trace of existence. From the Montanvert to Trelaporte the Mer de Glace was all in shadow; but the sunbeams pouring down the corridor of the Geant ruled a beam of light across the glacier at its upper portion, smote the base of the Aiguille du Moine, and flooded the mountain with glory to its crest. At the opposite side of the valley was the Aiguille du Dru, with a banneret of snow streaming from its mighty cone. The Grande Jora.s.se, and the range of summits between it and the Aiguille du Geant, were all in view, and the Charmoz raised its precipitous cliffs to the right, and pierced with its splinter-like pinnacles the clear cold air. As the night drew on, the mountains seemed to close in upon us; and on looking out before retiring to rest, a scene so solemn had never before presented itself to my eyes or affected my imagination.

[Sidenote: THE FIRST NIGHT. 1859.]

My men occupied the afternoon of the day of our arrival in making a preliminary essay upon the glacier while I prepared my instruments. To the person whom I intended to fix my stations, three others were attached by sound ropes of considerable length. Hidden creva.s.ses we knew were to be encountered, and we had made due preparation for them.

Throughout the afternoon the weather remained fine, and at night the stars shone out, but still with a feeble l.u.s.tre. I could notice a turbidity gathering in the air over the range of the Brevent, which seemed disposed to extend itself towards us. At night I placed a chair in the middle of the snow, at some distance from the house, and laid on it a registering thermometer. A bountiful fire of pine logs was made in the _salle a manger_; a mattress was placed with its foot towards the fire, its middle line bisecting the right angle in which the fireplace stood; this being found by experiment to be the position in which the draughts from the door and from the windows most effectually neutralized each other. In this region of calms I lay down, and covering myself with blankets and duvets, listened to the crackling of the logs, and watched their ruddy flicker upon the walls, until I fell asleep.

The wind rose during the night, and shook the windows: one pane in particular seemed set in unison to the gusts, and responded to them by a loud and melodious vibration. I rose and wedged it round with _sous_ and penny pieces, and thus quenched its untimely music.

December 28th.--We were up before the dawn. Tairraz put my fire in order, and I then rose. The temperature of the room at a distance of eight feet from the fire was two degrees of Centigrade below zero; the lowest temperature outside was eleven degrees of Centigrade below zero,--not at all an excessive cold. The clouds indeed had, during the night, thrown vast diaphragms across the sky, and thus prevented the escape of the earth's heat into s.p.a.ce.