Rollo in Switzerland Part 9

So Rollo opened the door of his room and went out into what in America would be called the entry, or hall. He found himself in a long corridor paved with stone, and having broad stone staircases leading up and down from it to the different stories. In one place there was a pa.s.sage way which led to a window that seemed to be on the back side of the hotel.

Rollo went there to look out, in order to see what the prospect might be in that direction.

He saw first the gardens and grounds of the hotel, extending for a short distance in the rear of the building, and beyond them he obtained glimpses of a rapidly running stream. The water was very turbid. It boiled and whirled incessantly as it swept swiftly along the channel.

"Ah," said Rollo, "that is the River Aar, I suppose, flowing through Interlachen from one lake to the other. I thought I should see it somewhere here; but I did not know whether it was before the hotels or behind them."

A short distance beyond the stream Rollo saw the lower part of a perpendicular precipice of gray rock. All except the lower part of this precipice was concealed by the fogs and clouds, which seemed to settle down so low upon the landscape in all directions as to conceal almost every thing but the surface of the ground.

"I wonder how high that precipice is," said Rollo to himself.

"I wonder whether I could climb up to the top of it," he continued, still talking to himself, "if I could only find some way to get across the river? There must be some way, I suppose. Perhaps there is a bridge."

Rollo then turned his eye upward to look at the clouds. In one place there seemed to be a break among them, and the fleecy ma.s.ses around the break were slowly moving along. The place where Rollo was looking was about the middle of the sky; that is, about midway between the horizon and the zenith.[5] While Rollo was looking at this break, which seemed, while he looked at it, to brighten up and open more and more, he saw suddenly, to his utter amazement, a large green tree burst into view in the midst of it, and then disappear again a moment afterwards as a fresh ma.s.s of cloudy vapor drifted over. Rollo was perfectly bewildered with astonishment. To see a green tree, clear and distinct in form and bright with the beams of the sun which just at that instant caught upon it, breaking out to view suddenly high up among the clouds of the sky, seemed truly an astonishing spectacle. Rollo had scarcely recovered from the first emotion of his surprise before the clouds parted again, wider than before, and brought into view, first a large ma.s.s of foliage, which formed the termination of a grove of trees; then a portion of a smooth, green field, with a flock of sheep feeding upon it, clinging apparently to the steep slope like flies to a wall; and finally a house, with a little blue smoke curling from the chimney. Rollo was perfectly beside himself with astonishment and delight at this spectacle; and he determined immediately to go and ask his uncle to come and see.

He accordingly left the window and made all haste to his uncle's door.

He knocked. His uncle said, "Come in." Rollo opened the door. His uncle was standing by the window of his room, looking out. This was on the front side of the hotel.

"Uncle George!" said Rollo, "Uncle George! Come and look out with me at the back window. There is a flock of sheep feeding in a green field away up in the sky!"

"Come and look here!" said Mr. George.

So Rollo went to the window where Mr. George was standing, and his astonishment at what he saw was even greater than before. The clouds had separated into great fleecy ma.s.ses and were slowly drifting away, while through the openings that appeared in them there were seen bright and beautiful views of groves, green pasturages, smiling little hamlets and villages, green fields, and here and there dark forests of evergreen trees, with peaks of rocks or steep precipices peeping out among them.

At one place, through an opening or gap in the nearer mountains, there could be seen far back towards the horizon the broad sides and towering peak of a distant summit, which seemed to be wholly formed of vast ma.s.ses of ice and snow, and which glittered with an inexpressible brilliancy under the rays of the morning sun.

"That is the Jungfrau,"[6] said Mr. George.

"That great icy mountain?" said Rollo.

"Yes," said Mr. George.

"Can we get up to the top of it?" asked Rollo.

"No," said Mr. George. "People tried for more than a thousand years to get to the top of the Jungfrau before they could succeed."

"And did they succeed at last?" asked Rollo.

"Yes," replied Mr. George. "You see there is a sort of goatlike animal, called the _chamois_,[7] which the peasants and mountaineers are very fond of hunting. These animals are great climbers, and they get up among the highest peaks and into the most dangerous places; and the hunters, in going into such places after them, become at last very expert in climbing, and sometimes they become ambitious of surpa.s.sing each other, and each one wishes to see how high he can get. So one time, about twenty-five years ago, a party of six of these hunters undertook to get to the top of the Jungfrau, and at last they succeeded. But it was a dreadfully difficult and dangerous operation. It was fifteen miles'

steep climbing."

"Not steep climbing all the way," said Rollo.

"No," said Mr. George, "I suppose not all the way. There must have been some up-and-down work, and some perhaps tolerably level, for the first ten miles; but the last five must have been a perpetual scramble among rocks and ice and over vast drifts of snow, with immense avalanches thundering down the mountain sides all around them."

"I wish I could go and see them," said Rollo.

"You can go," replied Mr. George. "There is a most excellent chance to see the face of the Jungfrau very near; for there is another mountain this side of it, with a narrow valley between. This other mountain is called the Wengern Alp. It is about two thirds the height of the Jungfrau, and is so near it that from the top of it, or near the top, you can see the whole side of the Jungfrau rising right before you and filling half the sky, and you can see and hear the avalanches thundering down the sides of it all day long."

Rollo was quite excited at this account, and was very eager to set off as soon as possible to go up the Wengern Alp.

"How do we get there?" asked he.

"You see this great gap in the near mountains," said Mr. George, pointing.

"Yes," said Rollo.

"That gap," continued Mr. George, "is the mouth of a valley. I have been studying it out this morning in my guide book. There is a good carriage road leading up this valley. It is called the valley of the Lutschine, because that is the name of the river which comes down through it. In going up this valley for the first two or three miles we are going directly towards the Jungfrau."

"Yes," said Rollo. "That I can see very plainly."

This was indeed very obvious; for the Jungfrau, from the windows of the hotel, was seen through the great gap in the near mountains which Mr.

George had pointed out as the mouth of the valley of the Lutschine. In fact, had it not been for that gap in the near mountains, the great snow-covered summit could not have been seen from the hotels at all.

"We go up that valley," continued Mr. George, "about three miles, and then we come to a fork in it; that is, to a place where the valley divides into two branches, one turning off to the right and the other to the left. Directly ahead there is an enormous precipice, I don't know how many thousand feet high, of bare rock.

"One of these branch valleys," continued Mr. George, "leads up to one side of the Wengern Alp and the Jungfrau, and the other to the other side. We may take the right-hand valley and go up five or six miles to Lauterbrunnen, or we may take the left-hand branch and go up to Grindelwald. Which way do you think we had better go?"

"I do not know," said Rollo. "Can we get up to the Wengern Alp from either valley?"

"Yes," said Mr. George. "We can go up from one of these valleys, and then, after stopping as long as we choose on the Alp, we can continue our journey and so come down into the other, and thus see them both. One of the valleys is famous for two great glaciers that descend into it.

The other is famous for immense waterfalls that come down over the precipices at the sides."

"Let us go first and see the waterfalls," said Rollo.

"Well," said Mr. George, "we will. We shall have to turn to the right in that case and go to Lauterbrunnen. When we get to Lauterbrunnen we shall have to leave our carriage and take horses to go up to the Wengern Alp.

The way is by a steep path, formed in zigzags, right up the sides of the mountains."

"How far is it?" asked Rollo.

"I don't know precisely," said Mr. George; "but it is a good many miles.

It takes, at any rate, several hours to go up. We can stop at the Wengern Alp as long as we please and look at the Jungfrau and the avalanches, and after that go on down into the valley of Grindelwald on the other side, and so come home."

"But how can we get our carriage?" asked Rollo.

"O, they send the carriage back, I believe," said Mr. George, "from Lauterbrunnen to the great precipice at the fork of the valley."

Mr. George, having thus finished his account of the topography of the route to the Wengern Alp, went away from the window and returned to the table where he had been employed in writing some letters just before Rollo had come in. Rollo was left at the window. He leaned his arms upon the sill, and, looking down to the area below, amused himself with observing what was going on there.

There were several persons standing or sitting upon the piazza.

Presently he heard the sound of wheels. A carriage came driving up towards the door. A postilion was riding upon one of the horses. There were two servants sitting on the box; and there was a seat behind, where another servant and the lady's maid were sitting. The carriage stopped, the door was opened, and a lady and gentleman with two boys, all dressed like travellers, got out, and were ushered into the house with great civility by the landlord. The baggage was taken off and carried in, and then the carriage was driven away round the corner.

This was an English n.o.bleman and his family, who were making the tour of Switzerland, and were going to spend a few days at Interlachen on the way.

As soon as the bustle produced by this arrival had subsided, Rollo's attention was attracted by a very sweet musical sound which seemed to be produced by something coming along the road.

"What can that be, I wonder?" said he to himself.

Then in a little louder tone, but without turning round,--

"Uncle George, here is some music coming. What do you think it is?"