Transcriber's Note:
Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have
been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
The Preface listed as being on page vii is on page ix.
TRUE TALES OF MOUNTAIN
ADVENTURE
[Illustration: MELCHIOR ANDEREGG 1894.
_Frontispiece._]
TRUE TALES OF
MOUNTAIN ADVENTURE
FOR NON-CLIMBERS YOUNG AND OLD
BY
MRS AUBREY LE BLOND
(MRS MAIN)
NEW YORK
E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY
1903
(_All rights reserved._)
TO
MR EDWARD WHYMPER
WHOSE SPIRITED WRITINGS AND GRAPHIC PENCIL FIRST AWAKENED
AN INTEREST IN MOUNTAINEERING AMONGST THOSE WHO
HAD NEVER CLIMBED, I DEDICATE THESE TRUE TALES
FROM THE HILLS, THE MATERIAL FOR SOME OF
THE MOST STRIKING OF WHICH I OWE
TO HIS GENEROSITY.
PREFACE
There is no manlier sport in the world than mountaineering.
It is true that all the sports Englishmen take part in are manly, but
mountaineering is different from others, because it is sport purely
for the sake of sport. There is no question of beating any one else,
as in a race or a game, or of killing an animal or a bird as in
hunting or shooting. A mountaineer sets his skill and his strength
against the difficulty of getting to the top of a steep peak. Either
he conquers the mountain, or it conquers him. If he fails, he keeps on
trying till he succeeds. This teaches him perseverance, and proves to
him that anything is possible if he is determined to do it.
In mountaineering, all the party share the pleasures and the dangers.
Every climber has to help the others. Every climber has to rely both
on himself and on his companions.
Mountaineering makes a person quick in learning how to act in moments
of danger. It cultivates his presence of mind, it teaches him to be
unselfish and thoughtful for others who may be with him. It takes him
amongst the grandest scenery in the world, it shows him the forces of
nature let loose in the blinding snow-storm, or the roaring avalanche.
It lifts him above all the petty friction of daily life, and takes him
where the atmosphere is always pure, and the outlook calm and wide. It
brings him health, and leaves him delightful recollections. It gives
him friends both amongst his fellow-climbers, and in the faithful
guides who season after season accompany him. It is a pursuit which he
can commence early in life, and continue till old age, for the choice
of expeditions is endless, and ascents of all scales of difficulty
and of any length are easily found.
That I do not exaggerate the joys and the benefits of mountaineering
will be borne out by those extracts from the true tales from the hills
of which this book chiefly consists. Some may think I have dwelt at
undue length on the catastrophes which have darkened the pages of
Alpine history. I do not apologize. If in one single instance any one
who reads these pages becomes afterwards a climber, and takes warning
from anything I have told him, I am amply justified.
It has been difficult in a work like this to know always what to
include and what to omit. My guiding principle has been to give
preference to descriptions which are either so exciting by reason of
the facts narrated, or else so brilliantly and wittily written, that
they cannot fail to excite the reader's interest. To these I have
added four chapters, those on mountaineering, on glaciers, on
avalanches, and on the guides of the Alps, which may help to make
climbing more intelligible to those who have never attempted it.
My warm thanks are due to Sir Leslie Stephen, Messrs Whymper, Tuckett,
Charles Pilkington, and Clinton Dent who have rendered the production
of this book possible by allowing me to quote at considerable length
from their writings; also to Messrs Longman who have permitted me to
make extracts from works of which they hold the copyright, and to
Messrs Newnes and Messrs Hutchinson for their kind permission to
re-print portions of my articles which have appeared in their
publications.
I am also under a debt of gratitude to Mr Philip Gosset, who has not
only allowed me to reprint his account of the avalanche on the
Haut-de-Cry, but has also most kindly placed his wide knowledge of
glaciers at my disposal by offering to revise the chapter I have
written on that subject in this book.
Dr Kennedy, whose beautiful edition of Mr Moore's diary, "The Alps in
1864," recently appeared, has generously given me permission to make
any extracts I desire from it.
Colonel Arkwright, whose brother perished on Mont Blanc in 1866, has
been good enough to allow me to reproduce a most interesting and
hitherto unpublished photograph of the relics discovered in 1897.
The illustrations, except those connected with the Arkwright accident,
and a view of the Matterhorn, by the late Mr W. F. Donkin, are from
photographs by me. By them I have tried rather to show how climbers
carry out their mountaineering than to illustrate any particular
locality.
In my own writings I have adopted, in the spelling of names of places,
the modern official forms, but, of course, when quoting I have kept to
those followed by each writer.
If, in the following pages, I have given any pleasure to those who
have never scaled a peak, or have perhaps recalled happy days amongst
the mountains to a fellow-climber, it will be a very real
gratification to me.
E. LE BLOND.
67, THE DRIVE,
BRIGHTON, _Oct. 30th, 1902_.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
PREFACE vii.
I. WHAT IS MOUNTAINEERING? 1
II. A FEW WORDS ABOUT GLACIERS 7
III. AVALANCHES 15
IV. THE GUIDES OF THE ALPS 22
V. THE GUIDES OF THE ALPS (Continued) 50
VI. AN AVALANCHE ON THE HAUT-DE-CRY--A RACE
FOR LIFE 59
VII. CAUGHT IN AN AVALANCHE ON THE MATTERHORN--THE
ICE-AVALANCHE OF THE ALTELS--AN AVALANCHE
WHICH ROBBED A LADY OF A GARMENT 72
VIII. LOST IN THE ICE FOR FORTY YEARS 92
IX. THE MOST TERRIBLE OF ALL ALPINE TRAGEDIES 107
X. A WONDERFUL SLIDE DOWN A WALL OF ICE 113
XI. AN ADVENTURE ON THE TRIFT PASS--THE PERILS OF
THE MOMING PASS 122
XII. AN EXCITING PASSAGE OF THE COL DE PILATTE 134
XIII. AN ADVENTURE ON THE ALETSCH GLACIER--A LOYAL
COMPANION--A BRAVE GUIDE 142
XIV. A WONDERFUL FEAT BY TWO LADIES--A PERILOUS CLIMB 153
XV. A FINE PERFORMANCE WITHOUT GUIDES 170
XVI. THE PIZ SCERSCEN TWICE IN FOUR DAYS--THE FIRST
ASCENT BY A WOMAN OF MONT BLANC 194
XVII. THE ASCENT OF A WALL OF ICE 208
XVIII. THE AIGUILLE DU DRU 221
XIX. THE MOST FAMOUS MOUNTAIN IN THE ALPS--THE
CONQUEST OF THE MATTERHORN 250
XX. SOME TRAGEDIES ON THE MATTERHORN 268
XXI. THE WHOLE DUTY OF THE CLIMBER--ALPINE DISTRESS
SIGNALS 289
GLOSSARY 293
INDEX 295
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Melchior Anderegg, 1894 _Frontispiece_
Climbers Descending the Ortler 2
The Aletsch Glacier from Bel Alp 7
General View of a Glacier 8
A Glacier Table: after a Storm 11
A Crevassed Glacier 13
An Avalanche near Bouveret: a Tunnel through an
Avalanche 17
Edouard Cupelin 22
Descending a Rock Peak near Zermatt 31
A Big Crevasse: the Gentle Persuasion of the Rope 37
A Typical Couloir: the Ober Gabelhorn: the Wrong Way
to Descend: Very Soft Snow 42
Piz Palü: Hans and Christian Grass 44
Christian Almer, 1894 54
An Avalanche Falling 59
Eiger and Mönch from Lauberhorn 66
Avalanche Falling from the Wetterhorn 79
On Monte Rosa 83
Mr Whymper: Mrs Aubrey Le Blond: Group on a High Peak
in Winter 85
Mrs Aubrey Le Blond and Joseph Imboden: Crossing a Snow
Couloir 89
Mont Blanc: Nicolas Winhart: a Banker of Geneva: the
Relics of the Arkwright Accident 92
Alpine Snow-Fields 108
A Start by Moonlight: Shadows at Sunrise: a Standing
Glissade: a Sitting Glissade 136
On a Snow-Covered Glacier 148
Martin Schocher and Schnitzler 150
Exterior of a Climber's Hut: Interior 157
The Meije: Ascending a Snowy Wall 171
Top of Piz Scerscen: Party Descending Piz Bernina: On
a Mountain Top: Descent of a Snow-Ridge 194
Hard Work: Setting Out in a Long Skirt 204
A Steep Icy Slope: On the Top of a Pass 216
A Slab of Rock: Negotiating a Steep Passage 225
The Family of Herr Seiler, Zermatt: Going to Zermatt in
the Olden Days 250
The Guides' Wall, Zermatt 259
The Zermatt Side of the Matterhorn: Rising Mists 260
A Bitterly Cold Day: The Matterhorn from the Zmutt Side 265
Jost, Porter of Hotel Monte Rosa, Zermatt 268
Hoar Frost in the Alps 274
ERRATA
The plate labelled to face page 225, to face page 11.
" " " " 5, " 83.
TRUE TALES OF MOUNTAIN
ADVENTURE
CHAPTER I
WHAT IS MOUNTAINEERING?
Mountaineering is not merely walking up hill. It is the art of getting
safely up and down a peak where there is no path, and where steps may
have to be cut in the ice; it is the art of selecting the best line of
ascent under conditions which vary from day to day.
Mountaineering as a science took long to perfect. It is more than a
century since the first ascent of a big Alpine peak was accomplished,
and the early climbers had but little idea of the dangers which they
were likely to meet with. They could not tell when the snow was safe,
or when it might slip away in an avalanche. They did not know where
stones would be likely to fall on them, or when they were walking over
one of those huge cracks in the glacier known as crevasses, and
lightly bridged over with winter snow, which might break away when
they trod on it. However, they soon learnt that it was safer for two
or more people to be together in such places than for a man to go
alone, and when crossing glaciers they used the long sticks they
carried as a sort of hand-rail, a man holding on to each end, so that
if one tumbled into a hole the other could pull him out. Of course
this was a very clumsy way of doing things, and before long it
occurred to them that a much better plan would be to use a rope, and
being all tied to it about 20 feet apart, their hands were left free,
and the party could go across a snow-field and venture on bridged-over
crevasses in safety.
At first both guides and travellers carried long sticks called
alpenstocks. If they came to a steep slope of hard snow or ice, they
hacked steps up it with small axes which they carried slung on their
backs. This was a very inconvenient way of going to work, as it
entailed holding the alpenstock in one hand and using the axe with the
other. So they thought of a better plan, and had the alpenstock made
thicker and shorter, and fastened an axe-head to the top of it. This
was gradually improved till it became the ice-axe, as used to-day, and
as shown in many of my photographs. This ice-axe is useful for
various purposes besides cutting steps. If you dig in the head while
crossing a snow-slope, it acts as an anchor, and gives tremendous
hold, while to allude to its functions as a tin-opener, a weapon of
defence against irate bulls on Alpine pastures, or as a means for
rapidly passing through a crowd at a railway station, is but to touch
on a very few of its admirable qualities.
[Illustration: CLIMBERS DESCENDING A SNOW-CLAD PEAK (THE ORTLER).]
When people first climbed they went in droves on the mountains, or I
should say rather on the mountain, for during the first half of the
nineteenth century Mont Blanc was the object of nearly all the
expeditions which set out for the eternal snows. After some years,
however, it was found quite unnecessary to have so many guides and
porters, and nowadays a party usually numbers four, two travellers and
two guides, or three, consisting generally of one traveller and two
guides, or occasionally five. Two is a bad number, as should one of
them be hurt or taken ill, the other would have to leave him and go
for help, though one of the first rules of mountaineering is that a
man who is injured or indisposed must never be left alone on a
mountain. Again, six is not a good number; it is too many, as the
members of the party are sure to get in each other's way, pepper each
other with stones, and waste no end of time in wrangling as to when to
stop for food, when to proceed, and which way to go up. A good guide
will run the concern himself, and turn a deaf ear to all suggestions;
but the fact remains that six people had better split up and go on
separate ropes. And if they also, in the case of rock peaks, choose
different mountains, it is an excellent plan. The best of friends are
apt to revile each other when stones, upset from above, come whistling
about their ears.
The early mountaineers were horribly afraid of places which were at
all difficult to climb. Mere danger, however, had no terrors for them,
and they calmly encamped on frail snow-bridges, or had lunch in the
path of avalanches. After a time the dangerous was understood and
avoided, and the difficult grappled with by increased skill, until
about the middle of the nineteenth century there arose a class of
experts, little, if at all, inferior to the best guides of the present
day.
The most active and intelligent of the natives of Chamonix, Zermatt,
and the Bernese Oberland now learnt to find their way even on
mountains new to them. Some were chamois hunters, and accustomed to
climb in difficult places. Others, perhaps, had when boys minded
the goats, and scrambled after them in all sorts of awkward spots.
Others, again, had such a taste for mountaineering that they took to
it the very first time they tried it. Of these last my own guide,
Joseph Imboden, was one, and later on I will tell you of the
extraordinary way in which he began his splendid career.
[Illustration: ON A ROCK RIDGE NEAR THE TOP OF MONTE ROSA.
The Schallihorn may be seen in the top right-hand corner of the
picture.]
It is from going with and watching how good guides climb that most
people learn to become mountaineers themselves. Nearly all take guides
whenever they ascend difficult mountains, but some are so skilful and
experienced that they go without, though few are ever good enough to
do this quite safely.
I am often asked why people climb, and it is a hard question to answer
satisfactorily. There is something which makes one long to mountaineer
more and more, from the first time one tries it. All climbs are
different. All views from mountains are different, and every time one
climbs one is uncertain, owing to the weather or the possible state of
the peak, if the top can be reached or not. So it is always a struggle
between the mountain and the climber, and though perseverance, skill,
experience, and pluck must give the victory to the climber in the
end, yet the fight may be a long one, and it may be years before a
particularly awkward peak allows one to stand on its summit.
Perhaps, if you have patience to read what follows, you may better
understand what mountaineering is, and why most of those who have once
tried it become so fond of it.
[Illustration: THE ALETSCH GLACIER FROM BEL ALP.
The medial moraine is very conspicuous. This glacier is about a mile
in width.]