The Glaciers of the Alps Part 5

[Sidenote: THE JARDIN. 1857.]

THE JARDIN.

(9.)

[Sidenote: A RESERVOIR OF ICE. 1857.]

On the 4th of August, with a view of commencing a series of observations on the inclinations of the Mer de Glace and its tributaries, we had our theodolite transported to the _Jardin_, which, as is well known, lies like an island in the middle of the Glacier du Talefre. We reached the place by the usual route, and found some tourists reposing on the soft green sward which covers the lower portion, and to which, and the flowers which spangle it, the place owes its name. Towards the summit of the Jardin, a rock jutted forward, apparently the very apex of the place, or at least hiding by its prominence everything that might exist behind it; leaving our guide with the instrument, we aimed at this, and soon left the gra.s.s and flowers behind us. Stepping amid broken fragments of rock, along slopes of granite, with fat felspar crystals which gave the boots a hold, and crossing at intervals patches of snow, which continued still to challenge the summer heat, I at length found myself upon the peak referred to; and, although it was not the highest, the unimpeded view which it commanded induced me to get astride it. The Jardin was completely encircled by the ice of the glacier, and this was held in a mountain basin, which was bounded all round by a grand and cliffy rim. The outline of the dark brown crags--a deeply serrated and irregular line--was forcibly drawn against the blue heaven, and still more strongly against some white and fleecy clouds which lay here and there behind it; while detached spears and pillars of rock, sculptured by frost and lightning, stood like a kind of defaced statuary along the ridge. All round the basin the snow reared itself like a b.u.t.tress against the precipitous cliffs, being streaked and fluted by the descent of blocks from the summits. This mighty tub is the collector of one of the tributaries of the Mer de Glace. According to Professor Forbes, its greatest diameter is 4200 yards, and out of it the half-formed ice is squeezed through a precipitous gorge about 700 yards wide, forming there the ice cascade of the Talefre. Bounded on one side by the Grande Jora.s.se, and on the other by Mont Mallet, the princ.i.p.al tributary of the Glacier de Lechaud lay white and pure upon the mountain slope. Round further to the right we had the vast plateau whence the Glacier du Geant is fed, fenced on the left by the Aiguille du Geant and the Aiguille Noire, and on the right by the Monts Maudits and Mont Blanc. The scene was a truly majestic one. The mighty Aiguilles piercing the sea of air, the soft white clouds floating here and there behind them; the shining snow with its striped faults and precipices; the deep blue firmament overhead; the peals of avalanches and the sound of water;--all conspired to render the scene glorious, and our enjoyment of it deep.

A voice from above hailed me as I moved from my perch; it was my friend, who had found a lodgment upon the edge of a rock which was quite detached from the Jardin, being the first to lift its head in opposition to the descending _neve_. Making a detour round a steep concave slope of the glacier, I reached the flat summit of the rock. The end of a ridge of ice ab.u.t.ted against it, which was split and bent by the pressure so as to form a kind of arch. I cut steps in the ice, and ascended until I got beneath the azure roof. Innumerable little rills of pellucid water descended from it. Some came straight down, clear for a time, and apparently motionless, rapidly tapering at first, and more slowly afterwards, until, at the point of maximum contraction, they resolved themselves into strings of liquid pearls which pattered against the ice floor underneath. Others again, owing to the directions of the little streamlets of which they were const.i.tuted, formed spiral figures of great beauty: one liquid vein wound itself round another, forming a spiral protuberance, and owing to the centrifugal motion thus imparted, the vein, at its place of rupture, scattered itself laterally in little liquid spherules.[A] Even at this great elevation the structure of the ice was fairly developed, not with the sharpness to be observed lower down, but still perfectly decided. Blue bands crossed the ridge of ice to which I have referred, at right angles to the direction of the pressure.

[Sidenote: MORAINES OF THE TALeFRE. 1857.]

I descended, and found my friend beneath an overhanging rock.

Immediately afterwards a peal like that of thunder shook the air, and right in front of us an avalanche darted down the brown cliffs, then along a steep slope of snow which reared itself against the mountain wall, carrying with it the debris of the rocks over which it pa.s.sed, until it finally lay a ma.s.s of sullied rubbish at the base of the incline: the whole surface of the Talefre is thus soiled. Another peal was heard immediately afterwards, but the avalanche which caused it was hidden from us by a rocky promontory. From this same promontory the greater portion of the medial moraine which descends the cascade of the Talefre is derived, forming at first a gracefully winding curve, and afterwards stretching straight to the summit of the fall. In the chasms of the cascade its boulders are engulfed, but the lost moraine is restored below the fall, as if disgorged by the ice which had swallowed it. From the extremity of the Jardin itself a mere driblet of a moraine proceeds, running parallel to the former, and like it disappearing at the summit of the cascade.

[Sidenote: AMONG THE CREVa.s.sES. 1857.]

We afterwards descended towards the cascade, but long before this is attained the most experienced iceman would find himself in difficulty.

Transverse creva.s.ses are formed, which follow each other so speedily as to leave between them mere narrow ridges of ice, along which we moved cautiously, jumping the adjacent fissures, or getting round them, as the case demanded. As we approached the jaws of the gorge, the ridges dwindled to mere plates and wedges, which being bent and broken by the lateral pressure, added to the confusion, and warned us not to advance.

The position was in some measure an exciting one. Our guide had never been here before; we were far from the beaten track, and the riven glacier wore an aspect of treacherous hostility. As at the base of the _seracs_, a subterranean noise sometimes announced the falling of ice-blocks into hollows underneath, the existence of which the resonant concussion of the fallen ma.s.s alone revealed. There was thus a dash of awe mingled with our thoughts; a stirring up of the feelings which troubled the coolness of the intellect. We finally swerved to the right, and by a process the reverse of straightforward reached the Couvercle.

Nightfall found us at the threshold of our hotel.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] The recent hydraulic researches of Professor Magnus furnish some beautiful ill.u.s.trations of this action.

(10.)

[Sidenote: ROUND HAILSTONES. 1857.]

[Sidenote: A DANGEROUS LEAP. 1857.]

On the 5th we were engaged for some time in an important measurement at the Tacul. We afterwards ascended towards the _seracs_, and determined the inclinations of the Glacier du Geant downwards. Dense cloud-ma.s.ses gathered round the points of the Aiguilles, and the thunder bellowed at intervals from the summit of Mont Blanc. As we descended the Mer de Glace the valley in front of us was filled with a cloud of pitchy darkness. Suddenly from side to side this field of gloom was riven by a bar of lightning of intolerable splendour; it was followed by a peal of commensurate grandeur, the echoes of which leaped from cliff to cliff long after the first sound had died away. The discharge seemed to unlock the clouds above us, for they showered their liquid spheres down upon us with a momentum like that of swan-shot: all the way home we were battered by this pellet-like rain. On the 6th the rain continued with scarcely any pause; on the 7th I was engaged all day upon the Glacier du Geant; on the morning of the 8th heavy hail had fallen there, the stones being perfect spheres; the rounded rain-drops had solidified during their descent without sensible change of form. When this hail was squeezed together, it exactly resembled a ma.s.s of oolitic limestone which I had picked up in 1853 near Blankenburg in the Hartz. Mr. Hirst and myself were engaged together this day taking the inclinations: he struck his theodolite at the Angle, and went home accompanied by Simond, and the evening being extremely serene, I pursued my way down the centre of the glacier towards the Echelets. The creva.s.ses as I advanced became more deep and frequent, the ridges of ice between them becoming gradually narrower. They were very fine, their downward faces being clear cut, perfectly vertical, and in many cases beautifully veined.

Vast plates of ice moreover often stood out midway between the walls of the chasms, as if cloven from the glacier and afterwards set on edge.

The place was certainly one calculated to test the skill and nerve of an iceman; and as the day drooped, and the shadow in the valley deepened, a feeling approaching to awe took possession of me. My route was an exaggerated zigzag; right and left amid the chasms wherever a hope of progress opened; and here I made the experience which I have often repeated since, and laid to heart as regards intellectual work also, that enormous difficulties may be overcome when they are attacked in earnest. Sometimes I found myself so hedged in by fissures that escape seemed absolutely impossible; but close and resolute examination so often revealed a means of exit, that I felt in all its force the brave verity of the remark of Mirabeau, that the word "impossible" is a mere blockhead of a word. It finally became necessary to reach the sh.o.r.e, but I found this a work of extreme difficulty. At length, however, it became pretty evident that, if I could cross a certain creva.s.se, my retreat would be secured. The width of the fissure seemed to be fairly within jumping distance, and if I could have calculated on a safe purchase for my foot I should have thought little of the spring; but the ice on the edge from which I was to leap was loose and insecure, and hence a kind of nervous thrill shot through me as I made the bound. The opposite side was fairly reached, but an involuntary tremor shook me all over after I felt myself secure. I reached the edge of the glacier without further serious difficulty, and soon after found myself steeped in the creature comforts of our hotel.

On Monday, August 10th, I had the great pleasure of being joined by my friend Huxley; and though the weather was very unpromising, we started together up the glacier, he being desirous to learn something of its general features, and, if possible, to reach the Jardin. We reached the Couvercle, and squeezed ourselves through the Egralets; but here the rain whizzed past us, and dense fog settled upon the cascade of the Talefre, obscuring all its parts. We met Mr. Galton, the African traveller, returning from an attempt upon the Jardin; and learning that his guides had lost their way in the fog, we deemed it prudent to return.

The foregoing brief notes will have informed the reader that at the period of Mr. Huxley's arrival I was not without due training upon the ice; I may also remark, that on the 25th of July I reached the summit of the Col du Geant, accompanied by the boy Balmat, and returned to the Montanvert on the same day. My health was perfect, and incessant practice had taught me the art of dealing with the difficulties of the ice. From the time of my arrival at the Montanvert the thought of ascending Mont Blanc, and thus expanding my knowledge of the glaciers, had often occurred to me, and I think I was justified in feeling that the discipline which both my friend Hirst and myself had undergone ought to enable us to accomplish the journey in a much more modest way than ordinary. I thought a single guide sufficient for this purpose, and I was strengthened in this opinion by the fact that Simond, who was a man of the strictest prudence, and who at first declared four guides to be necessary, had lowered his demand first to two, and was now evidently willing to try the ascent with us alone.

[Sidenote: PREPARATIONS FOR A CLIMB. 1857.]

On mentioning the thing to Mr. Huxley he at once resolved to accompany us. On the 11th of August the weather was exceedingly fine, though the snow which had fallen during the previous days lay thick upon the glacier. At noon we were all together at the Tacul, and the subject of attempting Mont Blanc was mooted and discussed. My opinion was that it would be better to wait until the fresh snow which loaded the mountain had disappeared; but the weather was so exquisite that my friends thought it best to take advantage of it. We accordingly entered into an agreement with our guide, and immediately descended to make preparations for commencing the expedition on the following morning.

FIRST ASCENT OF MONT BLANC, 1857.

(11.)

[Sidenote: SCENE FROM THE CHARMOZ. 1857.]

On Wednesday, the 12th of August, we rose early, after a very brief rest on my part. Simond had proposed to go down to Chamouni, and commence the ascent in the usual way, but we preferred crossing the mountains from the Montanvert, straight to the Glacier des Bossons. At eight o'clock we started, accompanied by two porters who were to carry our provisions to the Grands Mulets. Slowly and silently we climbed the hill-side towards Charmoz. We soon pa.s.sed the limits of gra.s.s and rhododendrons, and reached the slabs of gneiss which overspread the summit of the ridge, lying one upon the other like coin upon the table of a money-changer.

From the highest-point I turned to have a last look at the Mer de Glace; and through a pair of very dark spectacles I could see with perfect distinctness the looped dirt-bands of the glacier, which to the naked eye are scarcely discernible except by twilight. Flanking our track to the left rose a series of mighty Aiguilles--the Aiguille de Charmoz, with its bent and rifted pinnacles; the Aiguille du Grepon, the Aiguille de Blaitiere, the Aiguille du Midi, all piercing the heavens with their sharp pyramidal summits. Far in front of us rose the grand snow-cone of the Dome du Gouter, while, through a forest of dark pines which gathered like a cloud at the foot of the mountain, gleamed the white minarets of the Glacier des Bossons. Below us lay the Valley of Chamouni, beyond which were the Brevent and the chain of the Aiguilles Rouges; behind us was the granite obelisk of the Aiguille du Dru, while close at hand science found a corporeal form in a pyramid of stones used as a trigonometrical station by Professor Forbes. Sound is known to travel better up hill than down, because the pulses transmitted from a denser medium to a rarer, suffer less loss of intensity than when the transmission is in the opposite direction; and now the mellow voice of the Arve came swinging upwards from the heavier air of the valley to the lighter air of the hills in rich deep cadences.

[Sidenote: Pa.s.sAGE TO THE PIERRE a L'ECh.e.l.lE. 1857.]

The way for a time was excessively rough, our route being overspread with the fragments of peaks which had once reared themselves to our left, but which frost and lightning had shaken to pieces, and poured in granite avalanches down the mountain. We were sometimes among huge angular boulders, and sometimes amid lighter shingle, which gave way at every step, thus forcing us to shift our footing incessantly. Escaping from these, we crossed the succession of secondary glaciers which lie at the feet of the Aiguilles, and having secured firewood found ourselves after some hours of hard work at the Pierre a l'Ech.e.l.le. Here we were furnished with leggings of coa.r.s.e woollen cloth to keep out the snow; they were tied under the knees and quite tightly again over the insteps, so that the legs were effectually protected. We had some refreshment, possessed ourselves of the ladder, and entered upon the glacier.

[Sidenote: LADDER LEFT BEHIND. 1857.]

[Sidenote: DIFFICULT CREVa.s.sES. 1857.]

The ice was excessively fissured: we crossed creva.s.ses and crept round slippery ridges, cutting steps in the ice wherever climbing was necessary. This rendered our progress very slow. Once, with the intention of lending a helping hand, I stepped forward upon a block of granite which happened to be poised like a rocking stone upon the ice, though I did not know it; it treacherously turned under me; I fell, but my hands were in instant requisition, and I escaped with a bruise, from which, however, the blood oozed angrily. We found the ladder necessary in crossing some of the chasms, the iron spikes at its end being firmly driven into the ice at one side, while the other end rested on the opposite side of the fissure. The middle portion of the glacier was not difficult. Mounds of ice rose beside us right and left, which were sometimes split into high towers and gaunt-looking pyramids, while the s.p.a.ce between was unbroken. Twenty minutes' walking brought us again to a fissured portion of the glacier, and here our porter left the ladder on the ice behind him. For some time I was not aware of this, but we were soon fronted by a chasm to pa.s.s which we were in consequence compelled to make a long and dangerous circuit amid crests of crumbling ice. This accomplished, we hoped that no repet.i.tion of the process would occur, but we speedily came to a second fissure, where it was necessary to step from a projecting end of ice to a ma.s.s of soft snow which overhung the opposite side. Simond could reach this snow with his long-handled axe; he beat it down to give it rigidity, but it was exceedingly tender, and as he worked at it he continued to express his fears that it would not bear us. I was the lightest of the party, and therefore tested the pa.s.sage, first; being partially lifted by Simond on the end of his axe, I crossed the fissure, obtained some anchorage at the other side, and helped the others over. We afterwards ascended until another chasm, deeper and wider than any we had hitherto encountered, arrested us. We walked alongside of it in search of a snow bridge, which we at length found, but the keystone of the arch had unfortunately given way, leaving projecting eaves of snow at both sides, between which we could look into the gulf, till the gloom of its deeper portions cut the vision short. Both sides of the creva.s.se were sounded, but no sure footing was obtained; the snow was beaten and carefully trodden down as near to the edge as possible, but it finally broke away from the foot and fell into the chasm. One of our porters was short-legged and a bad iceman; the other was a daring fellow, and he now threw the knapsack from his shoulders, came to the edge of the creva.s.se, looked into it, but drew back again. After a pause he repeated the act, testing the snow with his feet and staff. I looked at the man as he stood beside the chasm manifestly undecided as to whether he should take the step upon which his life would hang, and thought it advisable to put a stop to such perilous play. I accordingly interposed, the man withdrew from the creva.s.se, and he and Simond descended to fetch the ladder. While they were away Huxley sat down upon the ice, with an expression of fatigue stamped upon his countenance: the spirit and the muscles were evidently at war, and the resolute will mixed itself strangely with the sense of peril and feeling of exhaustion. He had been only two days with us, and, though his strength is great, he had had no opportunity of hardening himself by previous exercise upon the ice for the task which he had undertaken. The ladder now arrived, and we crossed the creva.s.se. I was intentionally the last of the party, Huxley being immediately in front of me. The determination of the man disguised his real condition from everybody but myself, but I saw that the exhausting journey over the boulders and debris had been too much for his London limbs. Converting my waterproof haversack into a cushion, I made him sit down upon it at intervals, and by thus breaking the steep ascent into short stages we reached the cabin of the Grands Mulets together. Here I spread a rug on the boards, and placing my bag for a pillow, he lay down, and after an hour's profound sleep he rose refreshed and well; but still he thought it wise not to attempt the ascent farther. Our porters left us: a baton was stretched across the room over the stove, and our wet socks and leggings were thrown across it to dry; our boots were placed around the fire, and we set about preparing our evening meal. A pan was placed upon the fire, and filled with snow, which in due time melted and boiled; I ground some chocolate and placed it in the pan, and afterwards ladled the beverage into the vessels we possessed, which consisted of two earthen dishes and the metal cases of our brandy flasks. After supper Simond went out to inspect the glacier, and was observed by Huxley, as twilight fell, in a state of deep contemplation beside a creva.s.se.

[Sidenote: STAR TWINKLING. 1857.]

Gradually the stars appeared, but as yet no moon. Before lying down we went out to look at the firmament, and noticed, what I suppose has been observed to some extent by everybody, that the stars near the horizon twinkled busily, while those near the zenith shone with a steady light.

One large star in particular excited our admiration; it flashed intensely, and changed colour incessantly, sometimes blushing like a ruby, and again gleaming like an emerald. A determinate colour would sometimes remain constant for a sensible time, but usually the flashes followed each other in very quick succession. Three planks were now placed across the room near the stove, and upon these, with their rugs folded round them, Huxley and Hirst stretched themselves, while I nestled on the boards at the most distant end of the room. We rose at eleven o'clock, renewed the fire and warmed ourselves, after which we lay down again. I at length observed a patch of pale light upon the wooden wall of the cabin, which had entered through a hole in the end of the edifice, and rising found that it was past one o'clock. The cloudless moon was shining over the wastes of snow, and the scene outside was at once wild, grand, and beautiful.

[Sidenote: START FROM THE GRANDS MULETS. 1857.]

Breakfast was soon prepared, though not without difficulty; we had no candles, they had been forgotten; but I fortunately possessed a box of wax matches, of which Huxley took charge, patiently igniting them in succession, and thus giving us a tolerably continuous light. We had some tea, which had been made at the Montanvert, and carried to the Grands Mulets in a bottle. My memory of that tea is not pleasant; it had been left a whole night in contact with its leaves, and smacked strongly of tannin. The snow-water, moreover, with which we diluted it was not pure, but left a black residuum at the bottom of the dishes in which the beverage was served. The few provisions deemed necessary being placed in Simond's knapsack, at twenty minutes past two o'clock we scrambled down the rocks, leaving Huxley behind us.

The snow was hardened by the night's frost, and we were cheered by the hope of being able to accomplish the ascent with comparatively little labour. We were environed by an atmosphere of perfect purity; the larger stars hung like gems above us, and the moon, about half full, shone with wondrous radiance in the dark firmament. One star in particular, which lay eastward from the moon, suddenly made its appearance above one of the Aiguilles, and burned there with unspeakable splendour. We turned once towards the Mulets, and saw Huxley's form projected against the sky as he stood upon a pinnacle of rock; he gave us a last wave of the hand and descended, while we receded from him into the solitudes.

The evening previous our guide had examined the glacier for some distance, his progress having been arrested by a creva.s.se. Beside this we soon halted: it was spanned at one place by a bridge of snow, which was of too light a structure to permit of Simond's testing it alone; we therefore paused while our guide uncoiled a rope and tied us all together. The moment was to me a peculiarly solemn one. Our little party seemed so lonely and so small amid the silence and the vastness of the surrounding scene. We were about to try our strength under unknown conditions, and as the various possibilities of the enterprise crowded on the imagination, a sense of responsibility for a moment oppressed me. But as I looked aloft and saw the glory of the heavens, my heart lightened, and I remarked cheerily to Hirst that Nature seemed to smile upon our work. "Yes," he replied, in a calm and earnest voice, "and, G.o.d willing, we shall accomplish it."

[Sidenote: A WRONG TURN. 1857.]

A pale light now overspread the eastern sky, which increased, as we ascended, to a daffodil tinge; this afterwards heightened to orange, deepening at one extremity into red, and fading at the other into a pure ethereal hue to which it would be difficult to a.s.sign a special name.

Higher up the sky was violet, and this changed by insensible degrees into the darkling blue of the zenith, which had to thank the light of moon and stars alone for its existence. We wound steadily for a time through valleys of ice, climbed white and slippery slopes, crossed a number of creva.s.ses, and after some time found ourselves beside a chasm of great depth and width, which extended right and left as far as we could see. We turned to the left, and marched along its edge in search of a _pont_; but matters became gradually worse: other creva.s.ses joined on to the first one, and the further we proceeded the more riven and dislocated the ice became. At length we reached a place where further advance was impossible. Simond in his difficulty complained of the want of light, and wished us to wait for the advancing day; I, on the contrary, thought that we had light enough and ought to make use of it.

Here the thought occurred to me that Simond, having been only once before to the top of the mountain, might not be quite clear about the route; the glacier, however, changes within certain limits from year to year, so that a general knowledge was all that could be expected, and we trusted to our own muscles to make good any mistake in the way of guidance. We now turned and retraced our steps along the edges of chasms where the ice was disintegrated and insecure, and succeeded at length in finding a bridge which bore us across the creva.s.se. This error caused us the loss of an hour, and after walking for this time we could cast a stone from the point we had attained to the place whence we had been compelled to return.

[Sidenote: SeRACS OF THE DoME DU GOuTER. 1857.]

Our way now lay along the face of a steep incline of snow, which was cut by the fissure we had just pa.s.sed, in a direction parallel to our route.

On the heights to our right, loose ice-crags seemed to totter, and we pa.s.sed two tracks over which the frozen blocks had rushed some short time previously. We were glad to get out of the range of these terrible projectiles, and still more so to escape the vicinity of that ugly creva.s.se. To be killed in the open air would be a luxury, compared with having the life squeezed out of one in the horrible gloom of these chasms. The blush of the coming day became more and more intense; still the sun himself did not appear, being hidden from us by the peaks of the Aiguille du Midi, which were drawn clear and sharp against the brightening sky. Right under this Aiguille were heaps of snow smoothly rounded and const.i.tuting a portion of the sources whence the Glacier du Geant is fed; these, as the day advanced, bloomed with a rosy light. We reached the Pet.i.t Plateau, which we found covered with the remains of ice avalanches; above us upon the crest of the mountain rose three mighty bastions, divided from each other by deep vertical rents, with clean smooth walls, across which the lines of annual bedding were drawn like courses of masonry. From these, which incessantly renew themselves, and from the loose and broken ice-crags near them, the boulders amid which we now threaded our way had been discharged. When they fall their descent must be sublime.

[Sidenote: THE LOST GUIDES. 1857.]