‘Neither the Jungfrau nor the Finsteraarhorn has yet been trodden by the
foot of man!’
The topmost peaks of the Alps ... A whole chain of rugged precipices ...
The very heart of the mountains.
Over the mountain, a pale green, clear, dumb sky. Bitter, cruel frost;
hard, sparkling snow; sticking out of the snow, the sullen peaks of the
ice-covered, wind-swept mountains.
Two massive forms, two giants on the sides of the horizon, the Jungfrau and
the Finsteraarhorn.
And the Jungfrau speaks to its neighbour: ‘What canst thou tell that is
new? thou canst see more. What is there down below?’
A few thousand years go by: one minute. And the Finsteraarhorn roars back
in answer: ‘Thick clouds cover the earth.... Wait a little!’
Thousands more years go by: one minute.
‘Well, and now?’ asks the Jungfrau.
‘Now I see, there below all is the same. There are blue waters, black
forests, grey heaps of piled-up stones. Among them are still fussing to and
fro the insects, thou knowest, the bipeds that have never yet once defiled
thee nor me.’
‘Men?’
‘Yes, men.’
Thousands of years go by: one minute.
‘Well, and now?’ asks the Jungfrau.
‘There seem fewer insects to be seen,’ thunders the Finsteraarhorn, ‘it is
clearer down below; the waters have shrunk, the forests are thinner.’ Again
thousands of years go by: one minute.
‘What seeest thou?’ says the Jungfrau.
‘Close about us it seems purer,’ answers the Finsteraarhorn, ‘but there in
the distance in the valleys are still spots, and something is moving.’ ‘And
now?’ asks the Jungfrau, after more thousands of years: one minute.
‘Now it is well,’ answers the Finsteraarhorn, ‘it is clean everywhere,
quite white, wherever you look ... Everywhere is our snow, unbroken snow
and ice. Everything is frozen. It is well now, it is quiet.’
‘Good,’ said the Jungfrau. ‘But we have gossipped enough, old fellow. It’s
time to slumber.’
‘It is time, indeed.’
The huge mountains sleep; the green, clear sky sleeps over the region of
eternal silence.
_February 1878._