Scrambles Amongst the Alps in the Years 1860–69

Preface

In the year 1860, shortly before leaving England for a long continental tour, a certain eminent London publisher requested me to make for him some sketches of the great Alpine peaks. At that time I had only a literary acquaintance with mountain-climbing, and had not even seen—much less set foot upon—a mountain. Amongst the peaks which were upon the list was Mont Pelvoux, in Dauphiné. The sketches that were required of it were to celebrate the triumph of some Englishmen who intended to make its ascent. They came—they saw—but they did not conquer. By a mere chance I fell in with a very agreeable Frenchman who accompanied this party, and was pressed by him to return to the assault. In 1861 we did so, with my friend Macdonald—and we conquered. This was the origin of my Scrambles amongst the Alps.

The ascent of Mont Pelvoux (including the disagreeables) was a very delightful scramble. The mountain air did not act as an emetic; the sky did not look black, instead of blue; nor did I feel tempted to throw myself over precipices. I hastened to enlarge my experience, and went to the Matterhorn. I was urged towards Mont Pelvoux by those mysterious impulses which cause men to peer into the unknown. This mountain was reputed to be the highest in France, and on that account was worthy of attention; and it was believed to be the culminating point of a picturesque district of great interest, which was then almost unexplored! The Matterhorn attracted me simply by its grandeur. It was considered to be the most completely inaccessible of all mountains, even by those who ought to have known better. Stimulated to make fresh exertions by one repulse after another, I returned, year after year, as I had opportunity, more and more determined to find a way up it, or to prove it to be really inaccessible.

A considerable portion of this volume is occupied by the history of these attacks on the Matterhorn, and the other excursions that are described have generally some connection, more or less remote, with that mountain or with Mont Pelvoux. All are new excursions (that is, excursions made for the first time), unless the contrary is pointed out. Some have been passed over very briefly, and entire ascents or descents have been disposed of in a single line. If they had been worked out at full length, three volumes, instead of one, would have been required. Generally speaking, the salient points alone have been dwelt upon, and the rest has been left to the imagination. This treatment spares the reader from much useless repetition.

In endeavouring to make the book of some use to those who may wish to go mountain-scrambling, whether in the Alps or elsewhere, undue prominence, perhaps, has been given to our mistakes and failures; and it will doubtless be pointed out that our practice must have been bad if the principles which are laid down are sound, or that the principles must be unsound if the practice was good. We were not immaculate. Our blunders are not held up to be admired, or to be imitated, but to be avoided.

These Scrambles amongst the Alps were holiday excursions, and as such they should be judged. They are spoken of as sport, and nothing more. The pleasure that they gave me cannot be transferred to others. The ablest pens have failed, and I think must always fail, to give a true idea of the grandeur of the Alps. The most minute descriptions of the greatest writers do nothing more than convey impressions that are entirely erroneous—the reader conjures up visions, it may be magnificent ones, but they are infinitely inferior to the reality. I have dealt sparingly in descriptions, and have employed illustrations freely, in the hope that the pencil may perhaps succeed where the pen must inevitably have failed.

About fifty of the subjects were drawn on the wood by the late Mr. James Mahoney, and I am much indebted to that artist for the care and fidelity with which he followed my slight memoranda, and for the spirit he put into his admirable designs. Most of his drawings will be identified by his monogram. Twenty of the remainder are the work of Mr. Cyrus Johnson.

It is now my pleasant duty to acknowledge assistance rendered, directly or indirectly, by friends and strangers, at home and abroad. First of all, my thanks are due to my companions for having placed their journals and sketches freely at my disposal. I am particularly obliged to Mr. J. Longridge, to Mr. T. F. Mitchell, and to Mr. W. Cutbill, for the facilities that they granted me when examining the Fell railway in 1869. From Prof. T. G. Bonney, F.R.S., and Mr. Robert H. Scott, F.R.S., I have received many friendly hints and much valued criticism; and aid, in a variety of ways, from Mr. Budden, Prof. Gastaldi, and Sig. Giordano, in Italy; from M. Emile Templier and the Maréchal Canrobert, in France; and from Mr. Gosset of Berne. I am indebted to the Messrs. Longman for the use of a portion of their Map of the Western Alps. The other Maps are original.

Notes to the Preface of the Fifth Edition

The First Edition of Scrambles Amongst the Alps appeared in the summer of 1871, and the Second Edition in the autumn of the same year. In 1879, a Third (condensed) Edition was published, under the title The Ascent of the Matterhorn. The book then remained out of print for twelve years. In the Fourth Edition (1893) the matter which was omitted in the Third one was restored; the text was revised generally; corrections which had become necessary in consequence of the lapse of years were made; and, in the Appendix, the History of the Matterhorn was brought down to date.

Amongst changes and developments which are not noted in the narrative, it may be mentioned that an Inn at Lognan has replaced the chalets, and that there is another one at Prerayen, in addition to the old buildings. A cabane has been opened at Chanrion. A new Inn (Hôtel des Jumeaux) has been put up at Breuil, and the Albergo del Monte Cervino at Giomein has been enlarged. The building on the summit of the Col Théodule, which was formerly termed “the hut,” is now called Pavillon du Col St. Théodule.

The Maps have been re-engraved, on copper. That of the Matterhorn and its Glaciers is after the Siegfried Map of Switzerland, with such additions as are needful to adapt it to the text. The Map of the Chain of Mont Blanc is based on the Survey of Capt. Mieulet, the map by Mr. Adams-Reilly, and the Carte Dufour, but numerous corrections and additions have been made from personal observation. The Map of the Valley of Valpelline, etc., has been constructed from the new Italian Official Map, the survey by Mr. Reilly, and the Carte Dufour.

Toil and pleasure, in their natures opposite, are yet linked together in a kind of necessary connection.

Livy

I

Introductory

On the 23rd of July 1860, I started for my first tour in the Alps. As we steamed out into the Channel, Beachy Head came into view, and recalled a scramble of many years ago. With the impudence of ignorance, my brother1 and I, schoolboys both, had tried to scale that great chalk cliff. Not the head itself—where seabirds circle, and where the flints are ranged in orderly parallel lines—but at a place more to the east, where a pinnacle called the Devil’s Chimney had fallen down. Since then we have been often in dangers of different kinds, but never have we more nearly broken our necks than upon that occasion.

In Paris I made two ascents. The first to the seventh floor of a house in the Quartier Latin—to an artist friend, who was engaged, at the moment of my entry, in combat with a little Jew. He hurled him with great goodwill, and with considerable force, into some crockery, and then recommended me to go up the towers of Notre Dame. Half-an-hour later I stood on a parapet of the west front, by the side of the leering fiend which for centuries has looked down upon the great city, and then took rail to Switzerland; saw the sunlight lingering on the giants of the Oberland; heard the echoes from the cow-horns in the Lauterbrunnen Valley and the avalanches rattling off the Jungfrau; and crossed the Gemmi into the Valais, resting for a time by the beautiful Oeschinen See, and getting a forcible illustration of glacier-motion in a neighbouring valley—the Gasteren Thal. The upper end of this valley is crowned by the Tschingel Glacier, which, as it descends, passes over an abrupt cliff that is in the centre of its course. On each side the continuity of the glacier is maintained, but in the centre it is cleft in twain by the cliff. Lower down it is consolidated again. I scrambled on to this lower portion, advanced towards the cliff, and then stopped to admire the contrast of the brilliant pinnacles of ice with the blue sky. Without a warning, a huge slice of the glacier broke away, and fell over the cliff on to the lower portion with a thundering crash. Fragments rolled beyond me; although, fortunately, not in my direction. I fled, and did not stop until off the glacier; but before it was quitted learned another lesson in glacial matters. The terminal moraine, which seemed to be a solid mound, broke away underneath me, and showed that it was only a superficial covering resting on a slope of glassy ice.

On the steep path over the Gemmi there were opportunities for observing the manners and customs of the Swiss mule. Though it is not perhaps in revenge for generations of ill-treatment that the mule grinds one’s legs against fences and stonewalls, and pretends to stumble in awkward places (particularly when coming round corners and on the brinks of precipices), their evil habit of walking on the outside edges of paths (even in the most unguarded positions) is one that is distinctly the result of association with man. The transport of wood from the mountains into the valleys occupies most of the mules during a considerable portion of the year. The faggots into which the wood is made up project some distance on each side of the beast, and it is said that they walk intuitively to the outside of paths having rocks on the other side to avoid the collisions which would otherwise occur. When they carry tourists they behave in a similar manner; and, no doubt, when the good time for mules arrives, and they no longer carry burdens, they will still continue to do the same. This habit frequently gives rise to scenes. Two mules meet; each wishes to pass on the outside, and neither will give way. It requires considerable persuasion, through the medium of the tail, before such difficulties are arranged.

I visited the baths of Leuk, and saw the queer assemblage of men, women, and children, attired in bathing-gowns, chatting, drinking, and playing at chess in the water. The company did not seem to be perfectly sure whether it was decorous for elderly men to chase young females from one corner to another, but it was unanimous in howling at the advent of a stranger who remained covered, and literally yelled when I departed without exhibiting my sketch.

I trudged up the Rhône Valley, and turned aside at Visp to go up the Visp Thal, where one would expect to see greater traces of glacial action, if a glacier formerly filled it, as one is said to have done.

I was bound for the Valley of Saas, and my work took me high up the Alps on either side; far beyond the limit of trees and the tracks of tourists. The view from the slopes of the Weissmies, on the eastern side of the valley, 5,000 or 6,000 feet above the village of Saas, is perhaps the finest of its kind in the Alps. The full height of the three-peaked Mischabel (the loftiest mountain in Switzerland) is seen at one glance; 11,000 feet of dense forests, green alps, rocky pinnacles, and glittering glaciers. The summits seemed to me then to be hopelessly inaccessible from this direction.

I descended the valley to the village of Stalden, and then went up the Visp Thal to Zermatt, and stopped there several days. Numerous traces of the formidable earthquake-shocks of five years before still remained, particularly at St. Nicholas, where the inhabitants had been terrified beyond measure at the destruction of their churches and houses. At this place, as well as at Visp, a large part of the population was obliged to live under canvas for several months. It is remarkable that there was hardly a life lost on this occasion, although there were about fifty shocks, some of which were very severe.

At Zermatt I wandered in many directions, but the weather was bad, and my work was much retarded. One day, after spending a long time in attempts to sketch near the Hörnli, and in futile endeavours to seize the forms of the peaks as they peered out a few seconds above the dense banks of woolly clouds, I determined not to return to Zermatt by the usual path, but to cross the Gorner Glacier to the Riffel hotel. After a rapid scramble over the polished rocks and snow-beds which skirt the base of the Théodule Glacier, and wading through some of the streams which flow from it (at that time much swollen by the late rains) the first difficulty was arrived at, in the shape of a precipice about three hundred feet high. It seemed that it would be easy enough to cross the glacier if the cliff could be descended; though higher up, and lower down, the ice appeared, to my inexperienced eyes, to be impassable for a single person. The general contour of the cliff was nearly perpendicular, but it was a good deal broken up, and there was little difficulty in descending by zigzagging from one mass to another. At length there was a long slab, nearly smooth, fixed at an angle of about forty degrees between two wall-sided pieces of rock. Nothing, except the glacier, could be seen below. It was an awkward place, but being doubtful if return were possible, as I had been dropping from one ledge to another, I passed it at length by lying across the slab, putting the shoulder stiffly against one side, and the feet against the other, and gradually wriggling down, by first moving the legs and then the back. When the bottom of the slab was gained a friendly crack was seen, into which the point of the baton could be stuck, and I dropped down to the next piece. It took a long time coming down that little bit of cliff, and for a few seconds it was satisfactory to see the ice close at hand. In another moment a second difficulty presented itself. The glacier swept round an angle of the cliff, and as the ice was not of the nature of treacle or thin putty, it kept away from the little bay, on the edge of which I stood. We were not widely separated, but the edge of the ice was higher than the opposite edge of rock; and worse, the rock was covered with loose earth and stones which had fallen from above. All along the side of the cliff, as far as could be seen in both directions, the ice did not touch it, and there was a marginal crevasse, seven feet wide, and of unknown depth.

All this was seen at a glance, and almost at once I concluded that I could not jump the crevasse, and began to try along the cliff lower down; though without success, for the ice rose higher and higher, until at last further progress was stopped by the cliffs becoming perfectly smooth. With an axe it would have been possible to cut up the side of the ice; without one I saw there was no alternative but to return and face the jump.

Night was approaching, and the solemn stillness of the High Alps was broken only by the sound of rushing water or of falling rocks. If the jump should be successful—well; if not, I fell into that horrible chasm, to be frozen in, or drowned in that gurgling, rushing water. Everything depended on that jump. Again I asked myself, “Can it be done?” It must be. So, finding my stick was useless, I threw it and the sketchbook to the ice, and first retreating as far as possible, ran forward with all my might, took the leap, barely reached the other side, and fell awkwardly on my knees. Almost at the same moment a shower of stones fell on the spot from which I had jumped.

The glacier was crossed without further trouble, but the Riffel,2 which was then a very small building, was crammed with tourists, and could not take me in. As the way down was unknown to me, some of the people obligingly suggested getting a man at the chalets, otherwise the path would be certainly lost in the forest. On arriving at the chalets no man could be found, and the lights of Zermatt, shining through the trees, seemed to say, “Never mind a guide, but come along down, I’ll show you the way;” so off I went through the forest, going straight towards them. The path was lost in a moment, and was never recovered. I was tripped up by pine-roots, tumbled into rhododendron bushes, and fell over rocks. The night was pitch dark, and after a time the lights of Zermatt became obscure, or went out altogether. By a series of slides, or falls, or evolutions more or less disagreeable, the descent through the forest was at length accomplished; but torrents of formidable character had still to be passed before one could arrive at Zermatt. I felt my way about for hours, almost hopelessly; by an exhaustive process at last discovering a bridge, and about midnight, covered with dirt and scratches, reentered the inn which I had quitted in the morning.

Others besides tourists get into difficulties. A day or two afterwards, when on the way to my old station, near the Hörnli, I met a stout curé who had essayed to cross the Théodule pass. His strength or his wind had failed, and he was being carried down, a helpless bundle and a ridiculous spectacle, on the back of a lanky guide, while the peasants stood by with folded hands, their reverence for the church almost overcome by their sense of the ludicrous.

I descended the valley, diverging from the path at Randa to mount the slopes of the Dom,3 in order to see the Weisshorn face to face. The latter mountain is the noblest in Switzerland, and from this direction it looks especially magnificent. On its north there is a large snowy plateau that feeds the glacier of which a portion is seen from Randa, and which on more than one occasion has destroyed that village. From the direction of the Dom—that is, immediately opposite, this Bies Glacier seems to descend nearly vertically. It does not do so, although it is very steep. Its size is much less than formerly, and the lower portion, now divided into three tails, clings in a strange, weird-like manner to the cliffs, to which it seems scarcely possible that it can remain attached.

Unwillingly I parted from the sight of this glorious mountain, and went down to Visp. A party of English tourists had passed up the valley a short time before with a mule. The party numbered nine—eight young women and a governess. The mule carried their luggage, and was ridden by each in turn. The peasants—themselves not unaccustomed to overload their beasts—were struck with astonishment at the unwonted sight; and made comments, more free than welcome to English ears, on the nonchalance with which young miss sat, calm and collected, on the miserable beast, while it was struggling under her weight, combined with that of the luggage.

Arriving once more in the Rhône Valley, I proceeded to Viesch, and from thence ascended the Eggischhorn; on which unpleasant eminence I lost my way in a fog, and my temper shortly afterwards. Then, after crossing the Grimsel in a severe thunderstorm, passed on to Brienz, Interlaken, and Bern; and thence to Fribourg and Morat, Neuchâtel, Martigny, and the St. Bernard. The massive walls of the convent were a welcome sight as I waded through the snow-beds near the summit of the pass, and pleasant also was the courteous salutation of the brother who bade me enter. He wondered at the weight of my knapsack, and I at the hardness of their bread. The saying that the monks make the toast in the winter that they give to tourists in the following season is not founded on truth; the winter is their most busy time of the year. But it is true they have exercised so much hospitality, that at times they have not possessed the means to furnish the fuel for heating their chapel in the winter.4

Instead of descending to Aosta, I turned aside into the Val Pelline, in order to obtain views of the Dent d’Erin. The night had come on before Biona was gained, and I had to knock long and loud upon the door of the curé’s house before it was opened. An old woman, with querulous voice, and with a large goitre, answered the summons, and demanded rather sharply what was wanted; but became pacific—almost good-natured—when a five-franc piece was held in her face, and she heard that lodging and supper were requested in exchange.

My directions asserted that a passage existed from Prerayen, at the head of this valley, to Breuil, in the Val Tournanche, and the old woman, now convinced of my respectability, busied herself to find a guide. Presently she introduced a native, picturesquely attired in high-peaked hat, braided jacket, scarlet waistcoat, and indigo pantaloons, who agreed to take me to the village of Val Tournanche. We set off early on the next morning, and got to the summit of the pass without difficulty. It gave me my first experience of considerable slopes of hard steep snow, and, like all beginners, I endeavoured to prop myself up with my stick, and kept it outside, instead of holding it between myself and the slope, and leaning upon it, as should have been done. The man enlightened me; but he had, possibly, a very small opinion of his employer, and it is probably on that account that, a few minutes after we had passed the summit, he said he would not go any further and would return to Biona. All argument was useless; he stood still, and to everything that was said answered nothing but that he would go back. Being rather nervous about descending some long snow-slopes, which still intervened between us and the head of the valley, I offered more pay, and he went on a little way. Presently there were some cliffs down which we had to scramble. He called to me to stop, then shouted that he would go back, and beckoned to me to come up. On the contrary, I waited for him to come down; but instead of doing so, in a second or two he turned round, clambered deliberately up the cliff, and vanished. I supposed it was only a ruse to extort offers of more money, and waited for half-an-hour, but he did not appear again. This was rather embarrassing, for he carried off my knapsack. The choice of action lay between chasing him and going on to Breuil, risking the loss of my knapsack. I chose the latter course, and got to Breuil the same evening. The landlord of the inn, suspicious of a person destitute of luggage, was doubtful if he could admit me, and eventually thrust me into a kind of loft, which was already occupied by guides and by hay. In later years we became good friends, and he did not hesitate to give credit and even to advance considerable sums.

My sketches from Breuil were made under difficulties, for my materials had been carried off. Nothing better than sugar-paper could be obtained, and the pencils seemed to contain more silica than plumbago. However, they were made, and the pass5 was again crossed, this time alone. By the following evening the old woman of Biona again produced the faithless guide. The knapsack was recovered after the lapse of several hours, and then I poured forth all the terms of abuse and reproach of which I was master.

The following night was spent at Courmayeur, and the day after I crossed the Col Ferret to Orsières, and on the next the Tête Noir to Chamounix.6 The Emperor Napoleon arrived the same day, and access to the Mer de Glace was refused to tourists; but, by scrambling along the Plan des Aiguilles, I managed to outwit the guards, and to arrive at the Montanvert as the Imperial party was leaving: the same afternoon failing to get to the Jardin, but very nearly succeeding in breaking a leg by dislodging great rocks on the moraine of the glacier.

From Chamounix I went to Geneva, and thence by the Mont Cenis to Turin and to the Vaudois valleys. A long and weary day had ended when Paesana was reached. The inn was full, and I was tired, and about to go to bed, when some village stragglers entered and began to sing. They sang to Garibaldi! The tenor, a ragged fellow, whose clothes were not worth a shilling, took the lead with wonderful expression and feeling. The others kept their places, and sang in admirable time. For hours I sat enchanted; and, long after I retired, the sound of their melody could be heard, relieved at times by the treble of the girl who belonged to the inn.

The next morning I passed the little lakes, which are the sources of the Po, on my way into France. The weather was stormy, and misinterpreting the patois of some natives—who in reality pointed out the right way—I missed the track, and found myself under the cliffs of Monte Viso. A gap that was occasionally seen, in the ridge connecting it with the mountains to the east, tempted me up; and, after a battle with a snow-slope of excessive steepness, I reached the summit. To the north there was not a particle of mist, and the violent wind coming from that direction blew one back staggering; while on the side of Italy, the valleys were completely filled with dense masses of cloud to a certain level; and there—where they felt the influence of the wind—they were cut off as level as the top of a table, the ridges appearing above them.

I raced down to Abriès, and went on through the gorge of the Guil to Mont Dauphin. The next day found me at La Bessée, at the junction of the Val Louise with the Valley of the Durance, in full view of Mont Pelvoux; and by chance I walked into a cabaret where a Frenchman was breakfasting, who, a few days before, had made an unsuccessful attempt to ascend that mountain with three Englishmen and the guide Michel Croz of Chamounix;7 a right good fellow, by name Jean Reynaud.

The same night I slept at Briançon, intending to take the courier on the following day to Grenoble; but all places had been secured several days beforehand, so I set out at two p.m. on the next day for a seventy-mile walk. The weather was again bad; and on the summit of the Col de Lautaret I was forced to seek shelter in the wretched little hospice. It was filled with workmen who were employed on the road, and with noxious vapours proceeding from them. The inclemency of the weather was preferable to the inhospitality of the interior. Outside, it was disagreeable, but grand; inside, it was disagreeable and mean.8 The walk was continued under a deluge of rain, and I felt the way down—so intense was the darkness—to the village of La Grave, where the people of the inn detained me forcibly. It was perhaps fortunate that they did so; for, during that night, blocks of rock fell at several places from the cliffs on to the road with such force that they made large pits in the macadam. I resumed the walk at half-past five the next morning, and proceeded, under steady rain, through Bourg d’Oysans to Grenoble, arriving at the latter place soon after seven p.m.

This was the end of the Alpine portion of my tour of 1860, on which I was introduced to the great peaks, and acquired the passion for mountain-scrambling, the development of which is described in the following chapters.