OUR SIXTH ATTEMPT TO ASCEND THE MATTERHORN.(81)
“But mighty Jove cuts short, with just disdain,
The long, long views of poor, designing man.”
HOMER.
Carrel had _carte blanche_ in the matter of guides, and his choice fell
upon his relative Cæsar, Luc Meynet, and two others whose names I do not
know. These men were now brought together, and our preparations were
completed, as the weather was clearing up.
We rested on Sunday, August 9, eagerly watching the lessening of the mists
around the great peak, and started just before dawn upon the 10th, on a
still and cloudless morning, which seemed to promise a happy termination
to our enterprise.
By going always, though gently, we arrived upon the Col du Lion before
nine o’clock. Changes were apparent. Familiar ledges had vanished; the
platform, whereupon my tent had stood, looked very forlorn, its stones had
been scattered by wind and frost, and had half disappeared: and the summit
of the Col itself, which in 1862 had always been respectably broad, and
covered by snow, was now sharper than the ridge of any church roof, and
was hard ice. Already we had found that the bad weather of the past week
had done its work. The rocks for several hundred feet below the Col were
varnished with ice. Loose, incoherent snow covered the older and harder
beds below, and we nearly lost our leader through its treacherousness. He
stepped on some snow which seemed firm, and raised his axe to deliver a
swinging blow, but, just as it was highest, the crust of the slope upon
which he stood broke away, and poured down in serpentine streams, leaving
long, bare strips, which glittered in the sun, for they were glassy ice.
Carrel, with admirable readiness, flung himself back on to the rock off
which he had stepped, and was at once secured. He simply remarked, “It is
time we were tied up,” and, after we had been tied up, he went to work
again as if nothing had happened.(82)
We had abundant illustrations during the next two hours of the value of a
rope to climbers. We were tied up rather widely apart, and advanced,
generally, in pairs. Carrel, who led, was followed closely by another man,
who lent him a shoulder or placed an axe-head under his feet, when there
was need; and when this couple were well placed the second pair advanced,
in similar fashion,—the rope being drawn in by those above, and paid out
gradually by those below. The leading men again advanced, or the third
pair, and so on. This manner of progression was slow, but sure. One man
only moved at a time, and if he slipped (and we frequently did slip) he
could slide scarcely a foot without being checked by the others. The
certainty and safety of the method gave confidence to the one who was
moving, and not only nerved him to put out his powers to the utmost, but
sustained nerve in really difficult situations. For these rocks (which, it
has been already said, were easy enough under ordinary circumstances) were
now difficult in a high degree. The snow-water which had trickled down for
many days past in little streams, had taken, naturally, the very route by
which we wished to ascend; and, refrozen in the night, had glazed the
slabs over which we had to pass,—sometimes with a fine film of ice as thin
as a sheet of paper, and sometimes so thickly that we could almost cut
footsteps in it. The weather was superb, the men made light of the toil,
and shouted to rouse the echoes from the Dent d’Hérens.
We went on gaily, passed the second tent platform, the Chimney, and the
other well-remembered points, and reckoned, confidently, on sleeping that
night upon the top of “the shoulder;” but, before we had well arrived at
the foot of the Great Tower, a sudden rush of cold air warned us to look
out.
It was difficult to say where this air came from; it did not blow as a
wind, but descended rather as the water in a shower-bath! All was tranquil
again; the atmosphere _showed_ no signs of disturbance; there was a dead
calm, and not a speck of cloud to be seen anywhere. But we did not remain
very long in this state. The cold air came again, and this time it was
difficult to say where it did _not_ come from. We jammed down our hats as
it beat against the ridge, and screamed amongst the crags. Before we had
got to the foot of the Tower, mists had been formed above and below. They
appeared at first in small, isolated patches (in several places at the
same time), which danced and jerked and were torn into shreds by the wind,
but grew larger under the process. They were united together, and rent
again,—showing us the blue sky for a moment, and blotting it out the next;
and augmented incessantly, until the whole heavens were filled with
whirling, boiling clouds. Before we could take off our packs, and get
under any kind of shelter, a hurricane of snow burst upon us from the
east. It fell very heavily, and in a few minutes the ridge was covered by
it. “What shall we do?” I shouted to Carrel. “Monsieur,” said he, “the
wind is bad; the weather has changed; we are heavily laden. Here is a fine
_gîte_; let us stop! If we go on we shall be half-frozen. That is _my_
opinion.” No one differed from him; so we fell to work to make a place for
the tent, and in a couple of hours completed the platform which we had
commenced in 1862. The clouds had blackened during that time, and we had
hardly finished our task before a thunderstorm broke upon us with
appalling fury. Forked lightning shot out at the turrets above, and at the
crags below. It was so close that we quailed at its darts. It seemed to
scorch us,—we were in the very focus of the storm. The thunder was
simultaneous with the flashes; short and sharp, and more like the noise of
a door that is violently slammed, multiplied a thousandfold, than any
noise to which I can compare it.
When I say that the thunder was _simultaneous_ with the lightning, I speak
as an inexact person. My meaning is that the time which elapsed between
seeing the flash and hearing the report was inappreciable to me. I wish to
speak with all possible precision, and there are two points with regard to
this storm upon which I can speak with some accuracy. The first is in
regard to the distance of the lightning from our party. We _might_ have
been 1100 feet from it if a second of time had elapsed between seeing the
flashes and hearing the reports; and a second of time is not appreciated
by inexact persons. It was certain that we were sometimes less than that
distance from the lightning, because I saw it pass in front of well-known
points on the ridge, both above and below us, which were less (sometimes
considerably less) than a thousand feet distant.
Secondly, in regard to the difficulty of distinguishing sounds which are
merely echoes from true thunder, or the noise which occurs simultaneously
with lightning. Arago entered into this subject at some length in his
_Meteorological Essays_, and seemed to doubt if it would ever be possible
to determine whether echoes are _always_ the cause of the rolling sounds
commonly called thunder.(83) I shall not attempt to show whether the
rolling sounds should ever, or never, be regarded as true thunder, but
only that during this storm upon the Matterhorn it was possible to
distinguish the sound of the thunder itself from the sounds (rolling and
otherwise) which were merely the echoes of the first, original sound.
At the place where we were camped a remarkable echo could be heard (one so
remarkable that if it could be heard in this country it would draw crowds
for its own sake); I believe it came from the cliffs of the Dent d’Hérens.
It was a favourite amusement with us to shout to rouse this echo, which
repeated any sharp cry, in a very distinct manner, several times, after
the lapse of something like a dozen seconds. The thunderstorm lasted
nearly two hours, and raged at times with great fury; and the prolonged
rollings from the surrounding mountains, after one flash, had not usually
ceased before another set of echoes took up the discourse, and maintained
the reverberations without a break. Occasionally there was a pause,
interrupted presently by a single clap, the accompaniment of a single
discharge, and after such times I could recognise the echoes from the Dent
d’Hérens by their peculiar repetitions, and by the length of time which
had passed since the reports had occurred of which they were the echoes.
If I had been unaware of the existence of this echo, I should have
supposed that the resounds were original reports of explosions which had
been unnoticed, since in intensity they were scarcely distinguishable from
the true thunder; which, during this storm, seemed to me, upon every
occasion, to consist of a single, harsh, instantaneous sound.(84)
Or if, instead of being placed at a distance of less than a thousand feet
from the points of explosion (and consequently hearing the report almost
in the same moment as we saw the flash, and the rollings after a
considerable interval of time), we had been placed so that the original
report had fallen on our ears nearly at the same moment as the echoes, we
should probably have considered that the successive reports and rollings
of the echoes were reports of successive explosions occurring nearly at
the same moment, and that they were not echoes at all.
This is the only time (out of many storms witnessed in the Alps) I have
obtained evidence that the rollings of thunder are actually echoes; and
that they are not, necessarily, the reports of a number of discharges over
a long line, occurring at varying distances from the spectator, and
consequently unable to arrive at his ear at the same moment, although they
follow each other so swiftly as to produce a sound more or less
continuous.(85)
The wind during all this time seemed to blow tolerably consistently from
the east. It smote the tent so vehemently (notwithstanding it was partly
protected by rocks) that we had grave fears our refuge might be blown away
bodily, with ourselves inside; so, during some of the lulls, we issued out
and built a wall to windward. At half-past three the wind changed to the
north-west, and the clouds vanished. We immediately took the opportunity
to send down one of the porters (under protection of some of the others, a
little beyond the Col du Lion), as the tent would accommodate only five
persons. From this time to sunset the weather was variable. It was
sometimes blowing and snowing hard, and sometimes a dead calm. The bad
weather was evidently confined to the Mont Cervin, for when the clouds
lifted we could see everything that could be seen from our gîte. Monte
Viso, a hundred miles off, was clear, and the sun set gorgeously behind
the range of Mont Blanc. We passed the night comfortably—even
luxuriously—in our blanket-bags, but there was little chance of sleeping,
between the noise of the wind, of the thunder, and of the falling rocks. I
forgave the thunder for the sake of the lightning. A more splendid
spectacle than its illumination of the Matterhorn crags I do not expect to
see.(86)
The greatest rock-falls always seemed to occur in the night, between
midnight and daybreak. This was noticeable on each of the seven nights
which I passed upon the south-west ridge, at heights varying from 11,800
to 13,000 feet.
I may be wrong in supposing that the falls in the night are greater than
those in the daytime, since sound is much more startling during darkness
than when the cause of its production is seen. Even a sigh may be terrible
in the stillness of the night. In the daytime one’s attention is probably
divided between the sound and the motion of rocks which fall; or it may be
concentrated on other matters. But it is certain that the greatest of the
falls which happened during the night took place after midnight, and this
I connect with the fact that the maximum of cold during any twenty-four
hours very commonly occurs between midnight and dawn.
We turned out at 3.30 A.M. on the 11th, and were dismayed to find that it
still continued to snow. At 9 A.M. it ceased to fall, and the sun showed
itself feebly, so we packed up our baggage, and set out to try to get upon
“the shoulder.” We struggled upwards until eleven o’clock, and then it
commenced to snow again. We held a council; the opinions expressed at it
were unanimous against advancing, and I decided to retreat. For we had
risen less than 300 feet in the past two hours, and had not even arrived
at the rope which Tyndall’s party left behind, attached to the rocks, in
1862. At the same rate of progression it would have taken us from four to
five hours to get upon “the shoulder.” Not one of us cared to attempt to
do so under the existing circumstances; for besides having to move our own
weight, which was sufficiently troublesome at this part of the ridge, we
had to transport much heavy baggage, tent, blankets, and provisions,
ladder, and 450 feet of rope, besides many other smaller matters. These,
however, were not the most serious considerations. Supposing that we got
upon “the shoulder,” we might find ourselves detained there several days,
unable either to go up or down.(87) I could not risk any such detention,
being under obligations to appear in London at the end of the week.
[Illustration: THE CRAGS OF THE MATTERHORN, DURING THE STORM, MIDNIGHT,
AUG. 10, 1863.]
We returned to Breil in the course of the afternoon. It was quite fine
there, and the tenants of the inn received our statements with evident
scepticism. They were astonished to learn that we had been exposed to a
snow-storm of twenty-six hours’ duration. “Why,” said Favre, the
innkeeper, “_we_ have had no snow; it has been fine all the time you have
been absent, and there has been only that small cloud upon the mountain.”
Ah! that small cloud! None except those who have had experience of it can
tell what a formidable obstacle it is.
[Illustration: MONSIEUR FAVRE.]
Why is it that the Matterhorn is subject to these abominable variations of
weather? The ready answer is, “Oh, the mountain is so isolated; it
attracts the clouds.” This is not a sufficient answer. Although the
mountain _is_ isolated, it is not so much more isolated than the
neighbouring peaks that it should gather clouds when none of the others do
so. It will not at all account for the cloud to which I refer, which is
not formed by an aggregation of smaller, stray clouds drawn together from
a distance (as scum collects round a log in the water), but is created
against the mountain itself, and springs into existence where no clouds
were seen before. It is formed and hangs chiefly against the southern
sides, and particularly against the south-eastern side. It frequently does
not envelop the summit, and rarely extends down to the Glacier du Lion,
and to the Glacier du Mont Cervin below. It forms in the finest weather;
on cloudless and windless days.
I conceive that we should look to differences of temperature rather than
to the height or isolation of the mountain for an explanation. I am
inclined to attribute the disturbances which occur in the atmosphere of
the southern sides of the Matterhorn on fine days,(88) principally to the
fact that the mountain is a _rock_ mountain; that it receives a great
amount of heat,(89) and is not only warmer itself, but is surrounded by an
atmosphere of a higher temperature than such peaks as the Weisshorn and
the Lyskamm, which are eminently _snow_ mountains.
In certain states of the atmosphere its temperature may be tolerably
uniform over wide areas and to great elevations. I have known the
thermometer to show 70° in the shade at the top of an Alpine peak more
than 13,000 feet high, and but a very few degrees higher 6000 or 7000 feet
lower. At other times, there will be a difference of forty or fifty
degrees (Faht.) between two stations, the higher not more than 6000 or
7000 feet above the lower.
Provided that the temperature was uniform, or nearly so, on all sides of
the Matterhorn, and to a considerable distance above its summit, no clouds
would be likely to form upon it. But if the atmosphere immediately
surrounding it is warmer than the contiguous strata, a local “courant
ascendant” must necessarily be generated; and portions of the cooler
superincumbent (or circumjacent) air will naturally be attracted towards
the mountain, where they will speedily condense the moisture of the warm
air in contact with it. I cannot explain the downrushes of cold air which
occur on it, when all the rest of the neighbourhood appears to be
tranquil, in any other way. The clouds are produced by the contact of two
strata of air (of widely different temperatures) charged with invisible
moisture, as surely as certain colourless fluids produce a white, turbid
liquid, when mixed together. The order has been—wind of a low
temperature—mist—rain—snow or hail.(90)
This opinion is borne out to some extent by the behaviour of the
neighbouring mountains. The Dom (14,935 feet) and the Dent Blanche
(14,318) have both of them large cliffs of bare rock upon their southern
sides, and against those cliffs clouds commonly form (during fine, still
weather) at the same time as the cloud on the Matterhorn; whilst the
Weisshorn (14,804) and the Lyskamm (14,889), (mountains of about the same
altitude, and which are in corresponding situations to the former pair)
usually remain perfectly clear.
[Illustration: CROSSING THE CHANNEL.]
I arrived at Chatillon at midnight on the 11th, defeated and disconsolate;
but, like a gambler who loses each throw, only the more eager to have
another try, to see if the luck would change: and returned to London ready
to devise fresh combinations, and to form new plans.