it disappeared behind a crag. We soon reached the foot of the precipices and began our work. The rocks were steep and frequently difficult; and the quantity of loose fresh snow and slippery ice that covered them, compelled us at times to proceed with great caution. Our work was varied by occasional couloirs of hard snow, across which we generally found it necessary to cut steps. These are awkward places for a novice. It requires a good head and sure foot to step from notch to notch, along a steep slope of frozen snow, which plainly terminates in a precipice some two or three hundred feet below. The rocks too were some times by no means easy: one place, I remember, was particularly disagreeable, where we had to climb round a buttress of splintered rock, just above an unusually steep couloir of snow: the chinks of the rock were filled with ice, so that it was very difficult to get a good foothold, and at one place the foot rested on a mere knob, not much more than an inch in height. I confess to feeling a "creep" as I took this step. The mountain, however, was less difficult than I had been led to expect, and as the view widened, our spirits rose, like ourselves, higher and higher, while we looked down on a wide expanse of serrated peaks, from among which the great pyramid of the Visof rose like an island out of a stormy sea. Our second local guide now began to look very unhappy. I had had my doubts of him from the very first, as he had a very miserable appearance and bad shoes, and as we went on he evidently became more and more fatigued. At last, when we halted for breakfast, he declared that he "could no more," so we left him to his meditations, bidding him go back and look after our things. Soon after this the clouds began to gather, and ere long a dense "brouillard" swept up to, and surrounded us. Our other local guide now began to complain. His tone, so confident two days before, was strangely changed, and he said that he was afraid to venture on the glacier. However, at last * A couloir is a steep narrow gully frequently filled with snow; after a heavy fall of snow they are very difficult and dangerous to cross; sometimes also showers of stones are discharged down them. After Twelve thousand five hundred and eighty-six feet. the Matterhorn it is perhaps the most striking mountain in the Alps. we persuaded him to take us up to it, that we might see what it was like. In about twenty minutes more its white cliffs gleamed through the mist, and we halted at the side of the ice, just where it poured in a cascade over the precipice. Here we consulted what to do. We were now reduced to five, for our French friend, despairing of success, had left us a little below. A parliament was accordingly held, in which the local guide found himself in a decided minority. "You promised to take us up to the top of the mountain," said we. "That was when it was fine," said he, "now I dare not, the 'crevasses' are all covered with snow, and we shall be lost." "Nonsense," said we, "here is a rope long enough and strong enough to bear the whole party, so what does it matter if one does break through, he others can hold him up." "No," said he, "I am tired, an old wound hurts me, and I will not go on." "You are a coward," said we, "if your general had told you to attack a place, would you have said- My general, I am afraid'? We care for our lives as much as you do for your's, and we are not afraid of the danger-you shew us the way and we will do all the work." No, he would not; entreaties, promises, threats, were all in vain, and at last we were reluctantly obliged to agree that it was no use going on. The mist shewed no signs of clearing. We had not the least notion of the direction of the top of the mountain. If the day had only been clear we would have gone on with our Chamounix guide who would have found out the right way somehow. There was no help for it: we set up the barometer, took an observation, and then descended with heavy hearts, scolding the scoundrel as we went down. Angry as I was, I could not help laughing at the variety of contemptuous epithets which Croz heaped on the country, its inhabitants in general, and its guides in particular. For my own part I do not believe that the guide had ever ascended the mountain. I doubt whether he had been much beyond the place where we halted, and suspect that he imagined we were like the usual tourists of his own nation, and would turn back as soon as we met with a bit of stiff climbing. We found that all the people about regarded the mountain as inaccessible. It was always the same story:-"You will get a little way up and then When worked out it gave ten thousand four hundred and thirty-five feet as the height of our position. meet with inaccessible precipices." These I suspect we had conquered, and I fancy no great difficulties lay between us and the foot of the final peak. The next morning we got a view of the range some twenty miles off, from a point on the high road above Guillestre. If we were right in our identification of the mountains (as I believe we were) we saw the very point at which we turned back, and nothing but a long series of snow fields lay between us and the foot of the highest peak. Still I cannot be positive, for it is most difficult to find out the names of the mountains in this country; the inhabitants are either entirely ignorant of them or else have patois names, which differ in different vallies. I fancy also that General Bourcet's map is not quite correct in the immediate neighbourhood of the Pelvoux, and the bad weather prevented our having good views of the range with which to test our knowledge. We descended carefully over our former route, and in due time reached the stone, where our baggage was deposited. There we found our friend and the other guide, together with several of the people from the chalets of L'Alefred. We rested two or three minutes, and then struck down the gorge into the valley; the descent was rough, but much easier than the path by which we had ascended to the cabane; so we came down as hard as we could, revenging ourselves upon our guides by giving them a good dose of quick walking, which we thought would act like Mr. Weller's recipe of a plank and barrow of earth, and shake the nonsense out of them. As soon as we arrived at the bottom of the valley we halted by the side of the stream. Here, though the clouds still hung about the top of the mountain, it was sunny and warm; so we enjoyed the luxury of a good wash, and then dined upon the provisions which we had hoped to have eaten up aloft. Dinner over, we stretched ourselves out in the sun and went to sleep for half-an-hour. After this we started quite fresh again for L'Abesse. At Ville de Val Louise we parted from our French friend with many expressions of mutual good will. He was a very agreeable companion and a capital mountaineer, a very rare accomplishment in men of his nation. We arrived at L'Abesse in about four hours, having walked at a great pace the whole way. After some trouble we got a carriage, for sleeping there was out of the question, when better quarters were within reach, and drove to Guillestre, about twelve miles; we arrived there soon after dark, found the inn, though not too clean, a palace as compared with that of L'Abesse, and after some supper went straight to bed. May my reader never sleep worse than I did that night. B. The Pelvoux was ascended this year by Messrs. Whymper and Macdonald, accompanied by Mons. Reynaud (our French companion). They had even more trouble with the guides than we had, but the weather was more propitious, so that they were enabled to take the matter into their own hands. The first attempt failed, owing to the lies the guide told them: on the second occasion they took only porters, and found their own way. turning, they were benighted about two thousand feet above the tree limit, and suffered much from the cold. I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr. Whymper for these and many other interesting particulars of their excursion. Re OUR COLLEGE FRIENDS. "Egli se n'ando dianzi in quel boschetto, (Lorenzo de' Medici.) I. TO THE LADY MARGARET. POETS who moved the hearts of fellow-men, Sharing their joys and sorrows through the years Of pilgrimage; Philosophers and seers Who sought for truths beyond the common ken; Warriors who strove alike with sword and pen For Liberty, despising selfish fears; Martyrs of science, gazing on far spheres Of knowledge, shackled in oppression's den; Artists, who wove bright-tinted dreams among The scenes of daily toil: Musicians blest With rapturous melodies of holy song, These were the Friends we loved: On earth repressed, Their souls outsoared the enmity and wrong, And shine serenely now in God's eternal rest. II. THE GREEK POETS. Their very names are invocative spells, Their ransomed beauties peer through the dim Past, And with Theocritus in pastoral dreams we stray. |