_ACCIDENT ON THE PIZ MORTERATSCH._
While staying at Pontresina in 1864 I joined Mr. Hutchinson, and Mr.
Lee-Warner, of Rugby, in a memorable expedition up the Piz Morteratsch.
This is a very noble mountain, and, as we thought, safe and easy to
ascend. The resolute Jenni, by far the boldest man in Pontresina, was
my guide; while Walter, the official _guide chef_, was taken by my
companions. With a dubious sky overhead, we started on the morning of
July 30, a little after four A.M. There is rarely much talk at the
beginning of a mountain excursion: you are either sleepy or solemn so
early in the day. Silently we passed through the pine woods of the
beautiful Rosegg valley, watching anxiously at intervals the play of
the clouds around the adjacent heights. At one place a spring gushed
from the valley-bottom, as clear and almost as copious as that which
pours out the full-formed river Albula. The traces of ancient glaciers
were present everywhere, the valley being thickly covered with the
rubbish which the ice had left behind. An ancient moraine, so large
that in England it might take rank as a mountain, forms a barrier
across the upper valley. Once probably it was the dam of a lake, but it
is now cut through by the river which rushes from the Rosegg glacier.
These works of the ancient ice are to the mind what a distant horizon
is to the eye. They give to the imagination both pleasure and repose.
The morning, as I have said, looked threatening, but the wind was
good; by degrees the cloud-scowl relaxed, and broader patches of blue
became visible above us. We called at the Rosegg chalets, and had
some milk. We afterwards wound round a shoulder of the hill, at times
upon the moraine of the glacier, and at times upon the adjacent grass
slope; then over shingly inclines, covered with the shot rubbish of the
heights. Two ways were now open to us, the one easy but circuitous,
the other stiff but short. Walter was for the former, and Jenni for
the latter, their respective choices being characteristic of the two
men. To my satisfaction Jenni prevailed, and we scaled the steep and
slippery rocks. At the top of them we found ourselves upon the rim of
an extended snow-field. Our rope was here exhibited, and we were bound
by it to a common destiny. In those higher regions the snow-fields
show a beauty and a purity of which persons who linger low down
have no notion. We crossed crevasses and bergschrunds, mounted vast
snow-basses, and doubled round walls of ice with long stalactites
pendent from their eaves. One by one the eminences were surmounted.
The crowning rock was attained at half-past twelve. On it we uncorked
a bottle of champagne; mixed with the pure snow of the mountain, it
formed a beverage, and was enjoyed with a gusto, which the sybarite of
the city could neither imitate nor share.
We spent about an hour upon the warm gneiss-blocks on the top. Veils
of cloud screened us at intervals from the sun, and then we felt the
keenness of the air; but in general we were cheered and comforted
by the solar light and warmth. The shiftings of the atmosphere were
wonderful. The white peaks were draped with opalescent clouds which
never lingered for two consecutive minutes in the same position. Clouds
differ widely from each other in point of beauty, but I had hardly seen
them more beautiful than they appeared to-day, while the succession of
surprises experienced through their changes were such as rarely fall to
the lot even of an experienced mountaineer.
These clouds are for the most part produced by the chilling of the
air through its own expansion. When thus chilled, the aqueous vapour
diffused through it, which is previously unseen, is precipitated in
visible particles. Every particle of the cloud has consumed in its
formation a little polyhedron of vapour, and a moment’s reflection will
make it clear that the size of the cloud-particles must depend, not
only on the size of the vapour polyhedron, but on the relation of the
density of the vapour to that of its liquid. If the vapour were light
and the liquid heavy, other things being equal, the cloud-particle
would be _smaller_ than if the vapour were heavy and the liquid light.
There would evidently be more _shrinkage_ in the one case than in the
other. Now there are various liquids whose weight is not greater than
that of water, while the weight of their vapours, bulk for bulk, is
five or six times that of aqueous vapour. When those heavy vapours
are precipitated as clouds, which is easily done artificially, their
particles are found to be far coarser than those of an aqueous cloud.
Indeed water is without a parallel in this particular. Its vapour is
the lightest of all vapours, and to this fact the soft and tender
beauty of the clouds of our atmosphere is mainly due.[19]
[19] Chapter V., p. 405, is devoted to ‘Clouds.’ See also note, p. 82.
After an hour’s halt upon the summit the descent began. Jenni is the
most daring man and powerful character among the guides of Pontresina.
The manner in which he bears down all the others in conversation,
and imposes his own will upon them, shows that he is the dictator of
the place. He is a large and rather an ugly man, and his progress up
hill, though resistless, is slow. He had repeatedly expressed a wish
to make an excursion with me, and on this occasion he may have desired
to show us what he could do upon the mountains. He accomplished two
daring things--the one successfully, while the other was within a
hair’s-breadth of a very shocking issue.
In descending we went straight down upon a bergschrund, which had
compelled us to make a circuit in coming up. This particular kind of
fissure is formed by the lower portion of a snow-slope falling away
from the upper, a crevasse being thus formed between both, which often
surrounds the mountain as a fosse of terrible depth. Walter was the
first of our party, and Jenni was the last. It was quite evident that
the leader hesitated to cross the chasm; but Jenni came forward, and
half by expostulation, half by command, caused him to sit down on the
snow at some height above the fissure. I think, moreover, he helped
him with a shove. At all events, the slope was so steep that the guide
shot down it with an impetus sufficient to carry him clear over the
schrund. We all afterwards shot the chasm in this pleasant way. Jenni
was behind. Deviating from our track, he deliberately chose the widest
part of the chasm, and shot over it, lumbering like behemoth down the
snow-slope at the other side. It was an illustration of that practical
knowledge which long residence among the mountains can alone impart,
and in the possession of which our best English climbers fall far
behind their guides.
The remaining steep slopes were also descended by glissade, and
we afterwards marched cheerily over the gentler inclines. We had
ascended by the Rosegg glacier, and now we wished to descend upon the
Morteratsch glacier and make it our highway home.
We reached the point at which it was necessary to quit our morning’s
track, and immediately afterwards got upon some steep rocks, rendered
slippery here and there by the water which trickled over them. To our
right was a broad couloir, filled with snow, which had been melted
and refrozen, so as to expose a steeply sloping wall of ice. We were
tied together in the following order: Jenni led, I came next, then Mr.
Hutchinson, a practised mountaineer, then Mr. Lee-Warner, and last of
all the guide Walter. Lee-Warner had had but little experience of the
higher Alps, and he was placed in front of Walter, so that any false
step on his part might be instantly checked.
After descending the rocks for a time Jenni turned and asked
me whether I thought them or the ice-slope the better track. I
pronounced without hesitation in favour of the rocks, but he seemed
to misunderstand me, and turned towards the couloir. I stopped him at
the edge of it, and said, ‘Jenni, you know where you are going; the
slope is pure ice.’ He replied, ‘I know it; but the ice is quite bare
for a few yards only. Across this exposed portion I will cut steps,
and then the snow which covers the ice will give us a footing.’ He cut
the steps, reached the snow, and descended carefully along it, all
following him, apparently in good order. After some time he stopped,
turned, and looked upwards at the last three men. ‘Keep carefully in
the steps, gentlemen,’ he said; ‘a false step here might detach an
avalanche.’ The word was scarcely uttered when I heard the sound of a
fall behind me, then a rush, and in a moment my two friends and their
guide, all apparently entangled together, whirred past me. I suddenly
planted myself to resist their shock, but in an instant I was in their
wake, for their impetus was irresistible. A moment afterwards Jenni
was whirled away, and thus, in the twinkling of an eye, all five of us
found ourselves riding downwards with uncontrollable speed on the back
of an avalanche which a single slip had originated.
Previous to stepping on the slope, I had, according to habit,
made clear to my mind what was to be done in case of mishap; and
accordingly, when overthrown, I turned promptly on my face and drove
my bâton through the moving snow, and into the ice underneath. No
time, however, was allowed for the break’s action; for I had held it
firmly thus for a few seconds only, when I came into collision with
some obstacle and was rudely tossed through the air, Jenni at the same
time being shot down upon me. Both of us here lost our bâtons. We had
been carried over a crevasse, had hit its lower edge, and, instead of
dropping into it, were pitched by our great velocity far beyond it.
I was quite bewildered for a moment, but immediately righted myself,
and could see the men in front of me half buried in the snow, and
jolted from side to side by the ruts among which we were passing.
Suddenly I saw them tumbled over by a lurch of the avalanche, and
immediately afterwards found myself imitating their motion. This was
caused by a second crevasse. Jenni knew of its existence and plunged,
he told me, right into it--a brave act, but for the time unavailing.
By jumping into the chasm he thought a strain might be put upon the
rope sufficient to check the motion. But, though over thirteen stone in
weight, he was violently jerked out of the fissure and almost squeezed
to death by the pressure of the rope.
A long slope was below us, which led directly downwards to a brow where
the glacier fell precipitously. At the base of the declivity the ice
was cut by a series of profound chasms, towards which we were rapidly
borne. The three foremost men rode upon the forehead of the avalanche,
and were at times almost wholly immersed in the snow; but the moving
layer was thinner behind, and Jenni rose incessantly and with desperate
energy drove his feet into the firmer substance underneath. His voice,
shouting ‘Halt! Herr Jesus, halt!’ was the only one heard during the
descent. A kind of condensed memory, such as that described by people
who have narrowly escaped drowning, took possession of me, and my power
of reasoning remained intact. I thought of Bennen on the Haut de Cry,
and muttered, ‘It is now my turn.’ Then I coolly scanned the men in
front of me, and reflected that, if their _vis viva_ was the only thing
to be neutralised, Jenni and myself could stop them; but to arrest both
them and the mass of snow in which they were caught was hopeless. I
experienced no intolerable dread. In fact, the start was too sudden and
the excitement of the rush too great to permit of the development of
terror.
Looking in advance, I noticed that the slope, for a short distance,
became less steep, and then fell as before. ‘Now or never we must be
brought to rest.’ The speed visibly slackened, and I thought we were
saved. But the momentum had been too great: the avalanche crossed the
brow and in part regained its motion. Here Hutchinson threw his arm
round his friend, all hope being extinguished, while I grasped my belt
and struggled to free myself. Finding this difficult, from the tossing,
I sullenly resumed the strain upon the rope. Destiny had so related
the downward impetus to Jenni’s pull as to give the latter a slight
advantage, and the whole question was whether the opposing force would
have sufficient time to act. This was also arranged in our favour,
for we came to rest so near the brow that two or three seconds of our
average motion of descent must have carried us over. Had this occurred,
we should have fallen into the chasms, and been covered up by the tail
of the avalanche. Hutchinson emerged from the snow with his forehead
bleeding, but the wound was superficial; Jenni had a bit of flesh
removed from his hand by collision against a stone; the pressure of the
rope had left black welts on my arms; and we all experienced a tingling
sensation over the hands, like that produced by incipient frostbite,
which continued for several days. This was all. I found a portion of my
watch-chain hanging round my neck, another portion in my pocket; the
watch was gone.
This happened on the 30th of July. Two days afterwards I went to Italy,
and remained there for ten or twelve days. On the 16th of August,
being again at Pontresina, I made on that day an expedition in search
of the lost watch. Both the guides and myself thought the sun’s heat
might melt the snow above it, and I inferred that if its back should
happen to be uppermost the slight absorbent power of gold for the solar
rays would prevent the watch from sinking as a stone sinks under like
circumstances. The watch would thus be brought quite to the surface;
and, although a small object, it might possibly be seen from some
distance. Five friends accompanied me up the Morteratsch glacier. One
of them was the late Mr. North, member for Hastings, a most lovable
man. He was then sixty-four years of age, but he exhibited a courage
and collectedness, and indeed a delight, in the wild savagery of the
crevasses which were perfectly admirable.
Two only of the party, both competent mountaineers, accompanied me
to the track of our glissade, but none of us ventured on the ice
where it originated. Just before stepping upon the snow, a stone some
tons in weight, detached by the sun from the heights above us, came
rushing down the line of our descent. Its leaps became more and more
impetuous, and on reaching the brow near which we had been brought to
rest it bounded through the air, and with a single spring reached the
lower glacier, raising a cloud of ice-dust. Some fragments of rope
found upon the snow assured us that we were upon the exact track of
the avalanche, and then the search commenced. It had not continued
twenty minutes when a cheer from one of the guides--Christian Michel of
Grindelwald--announced the discovery of the watch. It had been brought
to the surface in the manner surmised, and on examination seemed to
be dry and uninjured. I noticed, moreover, that the position of the
hands indicated that it had only run down beneath the snow. I wound it
up, hardly hoping, however, to find it capable of responding. But it
showed instant signs of animation. It had remained eighteen days in
the avalanche, but the application of its key at once restored it to
action, and it has gone with unvarying regularity ever since.
* * * * *
Mr. Hutchinson has published the following note of the accident in the
‘Alpine Journal’:
‘As one of the party concerned in the accident on the Piz Morteratsch
last July, I trust I shall not be thought presumptuous in bearing my
testimony to the entire accuracy of Professor Tyndall’s account. I can
add no facts of any importance to those there mentioned, unless it be
that we estimated the distance down which we were carried at fully
1,000 feet--a conclusion which, Mr. Tyndall tells me, was confirmed by
his subsequent visit to the spot. The angle of the slope we did not
measure, nor can I give the time of our descent with any accuracy; it
seemed to me a lifetime. From the moment that the snow cracked, Jenni
behaved with the greatest coolness and courage. But he ought not to
have taken us down the ice-slope so late in the day--it was then nearly
half-past two o’clock--and that after a warning word from Professor
Tyndall and myself. Of Walter’s conduct the less said the better; our
opinion of his courage was not raised by this trial of it.’
* * * * *
[Until Mr. Gossett’s letter reached me a few days ago I was not aware
of the singular likeness between the loss of Bennen’s watch and of my
own.--April 1871.]
[Illustration: THE GORGE OF PFEFFERS (SHOWING EROSIVE ACTION).]