The Crystal Hunters Part 3

"Which we are not doing now," said Dale quietly. "But very few people come up here."

"Very few, but those who have cows or goats up on the green alps."

"And you think this is one of the grandest and wildest valleys you know?"

"It is small," said the guide, "but it is the most solitary, and leads into the wildest parts. See: in a short time we shall reach the glacier, and then always ice, snow, and rock too steep for the snow to stand, and beyond that the eternal silence of the never-ending winter."

Two hours' climb more than walk, with the sun coming down with scorching power; but in spite of the labour, no weariness a.s.sailing the travellers, for the air seemed to give new life and strength at every breath they drew. But now, in place of the view being more grand, as they climbed higher the valley grew narrow, the scarped rocks on either side towered aloft and shut out the snowy peaks, and at last their path led them amongst a dense forest of pines, through whose summits the wind sighed and the roaring torrent's sound was diminished to a murmur.

This proved to be a harder climb than any they had yet undertaken, the slope being very steep, and the way enc.u.mbered by ma.s.ses of rock which had fallen from above and become wedged in among the pine trunks.

"Tired, Saxe?" said Dale, after a time.

"I don't know, sir. That is, my legs are tired, but I'm not so upward.

I want to go on."

"In half an hour we shall be through," said Melchior; "then there are no more trees--only a green matt, with a chalet and goats and cows."

"That means milk," said Saxe eagerly.

"Yes, and bread and cheese," said Melchior, smiling.

"Then I'm not tired. I'm sure of it now, sir," said Saxe merrily; and the next half-hour was pa.s.sed in a steady tramp, the guide leading as surely as if he had pa.s.sed all his days in that gloomy patch of forest, never hesitating for a moment, but winding in and out to avoid the innumerable blocks which must have lain there before the pines had sprung up and grown for perhaps a hundred years.

Then there was bright daylight ahead, and in a few more strides the last trees were pa.s.sed, and they came out suddenly in an amphitheatre of bare rocks, almost elliptical, but coming together at the head, and bending away like a comma turned upside down.

At the moment they stepped on to the green stunted pasture, dotted with flowers, the roar of the torrent came up from a gash in the rocks far below, and to right and left, from at least three hundred feet up, the waters of no less than five streams glided softly over the rocks, and fell slowly in silvery foam, to form so many tributaries of the torrent far below.

The effect of those falls was wonderful, and for the first few minutes it seemed as if the water had just awakened at its various sources, and was in no hurry to join the mad, impetuous stream below, so slowly it dropped, turning into spray, which grew more and more misty as it descended, while every now and then a jet as of silver rockets shot over from the top, head and tail being exactly defined, but of course in water instead of sparks.

"Will this do, Saxe?" said Dale, smiling.

"Do! Oh, come on. I want to get close up to those falls."

"Aren't you tired?"

"Tired!" cried Saxe. "What fellow could feel tired in a place like this!"

CHAPTER THREE.

FURTHER IDEAS OF MAGNITUDE.

The guide had already started off, and for the next half-hour he led them on and upward, gradually ascending a rocky eminence which stood like a vast tower in the middle of the amphitheatre.

Every now and then he stopped to hold out his ice-axe handle to help Saxe; but the latter disdained all aid, and contented himself with planting his feet in the same spots as the guide, till all at once the man stopped.

It was the top of the eminence; and as Saxe reached Melchior's side he paused there, breathless with exertion and wonder, gazing now along the curved part of the comma, which had been hidden for the last hour.

Right and left were the silvery veil-like cascades: down below them some five hundred feet the little river roared and boomed, and the junction of the silvery water of the falls with the grey milky, churned-up foam of the torrent was plainly seen in two cases. But the sight which enchained Saxe's attention was the head of the valley up which they had toiled, filled by what at the first glance seemed to be a huge cascade descending and flowing along the ravine before him, but which soon resolved itself into the first glacier--a wonderfully beautiful frozen river, rugged, wild and vast, but singularly free from the fallen stones and earth which usually rob these wonders of their beauty, and looking now in the bright sunshine dazzling in its purity of white, shaded by rift, crack and hollow, where the compressed snow was of the most delicate sapphire tint.

"Is that a glacier?" said Saxe, after gazing at it for a few minutes.

"Yes, lad, that's a glacier, and a better example than one generally sees, because it is so particularly clean. Glaciers are generally pretty old and dirty-looking in the lower parts."

The guide rested upon his ice-axe, with his eyes half-closed, apparently watching the effect the glacier had upon the visitors; Dale gazed at it contemplatively, as if it were the wrinkled face of an old friend; and Saxe stared wonderingly, for it was so different to anything he had pictured in his own mind.

"Well, what do you think of it?" said Dale, at last.

"Don't quite know, sir," said Saxe, sitting down, drawing up his knees to rest his chin, and throwing his arms about his legs. "It wants looking at. But I'm beginning to understand now. That's the upper part of the river which runs down the valley, only up here it is always frozen. Seems rum, though, for the sun's regularly blistering my neck."

"You have something of the idea, but you are not quite right, Saxe,"

replied Dale. "That is the upper part of the river, and yet it is not, because it is a distinct river. You speak of it as if the river up here had become frozen. Now, it is frozen because it has never been otherwise."

"Must have been water once, or else it couldn't have run down that narrow valley."

"It has never been anything but ice, Saxe," said Dale, smiling; "and yet it has run down the valley like that."

"Ice can't flow, because it is solid," said Saxe dogmatically.

"Ice can flow, because it is elastic as well as solid."

"Mr Dale!"

"Proof, boy. Haven't you seen it bend when thin, and people have been on it skating?"

"Oh! ah! I'd forgotten that."

"Well, this ice is sufficiently elastic to flow very slowly, forced down by its own weight and that of the hundreds of thousands of tons behind."

"Oh, I say, Mr Dale--gently!" cried Saxe.

"Well, then, millions of tons, boy. I am not exaggerating. You do not understand the vastness of these places. That glacier you are looking at is only one of the outlets of a huge reservoir of ice and snow, extending up there in the mountains for miles. It is forced down, as you see, bending into the irregularities of the valley where they are not too great; but when the depths are extensive the ice cracks right across."

"With a noise like a gun, sometimes," interpolated the guide, who was listening intently.

"And I know, like that," cried Saxe, pointing to a deep-looking jagged rift, extending right across the ice-torrent: "that makes a creva.s.se."

"Quite correct," said Dale.

"But stop a moment," cried Saxe: "this is all solid-looking blue ice.

It's snow that falls on the tops of the mountains."

"Yes; snow at a certain height, while lower that snow becomes rain."

"Well, then, this valley we are looking at ought to be snow, not ice."