Part II.

Transcriber's note:

Minor spelling inconsistencies, mainly hyphenated words, have been

harmonized. Italic text has been marked with _underscores_.

Obvious typos have been corrected. Please see the end of this book

for further notes.

THE STORY OF THE HILLS.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: NORHAM CASTLE. AFTER TURNER.]

THE

STORY OF THE HILLS.

A BOOK ABOUT MOUNTAINS

FOR GENERAL READERS.

BY

REV. H. N. HUTCHINSON, B.A., F.G.S.

AUTHOR OF "THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE EARTH."

With Sixteen Full-page Illustrations.

They are as a great and noble architecture, first giving shelter,

comfort, and rest; and covered also with mighty sculpture and painted

legend.--RUSKIN.

New York:

MACMILLAN AND CO.

AND LONDON.

1892.

_Copyright, 1891_,

BY MACMILLAN AND CO.

University Press:

JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.

TO

ALL WHO LOVE MOUNTAINS AND HILLS

This little Book is Dedicated,

IN THE HOPE THAT EVEN A SLIGHT KNOWLEDGE OF THEIR PLACE IN

NATURE, AND PREVIOUS HISTORY, MAY ADD TO THE WONDER AND DELIGHT

WITH WHICH WE LOOK UPON THESE NOBLE FEATURES OF THE SURFACE OF

THE EARTH.

PREFACE.

Now that travelling is no longer a luxury for the rich, and thousands

of people go every summer to spend their holidays among the

mountains of Europe, and ladies climb Mont Blanc or ramble among the

Carpathians, there must be many who would like to know something of

the secret of the hills, their origin, their architecture, and the

forces that made them what they are.

For such this book is chiefly written. Those will best understand it

who take it with them on their travels, and endeavour by its use to

interpret what they see among the mountains; and they will find that

a little observation goes a long way to help them to read mountain

history.

It is hoped, however, that all, both young and old, who take an

intelligent interest in the world around, though they may never have

seen a mountain, may find these pages worth reading.

If readers do not find here answers to all their questions, they

may be reminded that it is not possible within the present limits

to give more than a brief sketch of the subject, leaving the gaps

to be filled in by a study of the larger and more important works

on geology. The author, assuming that the reader knows nothing of

this fascinating science, has endeavoured to interpret into ordinary

language the story of the hills as it is written in the rocks of

which they are made.

It can scarcely be denied that a little knowledge of natural objects

greatly adds to our appreciation of them, besides affording a deep

source of pleasure, in revealing the harmony, law, and order by which

all things in this wonderful world are governed. Mountains, when

once we begin to observe them, seem to become more than ever our

companions,--to take us into their counsels, and to teach us many a

lesson about the great part they play in the order of things. And

surely our admiration of their beauty is not lessened, but rather

increased, when we learn how much we and all living things owe to

the life-giving streams that flow continually from them. The writer

has, somewhat reluctantly, omitted certain parts of the subject

which, though very interesting to the geologist, can hardly be made

attractive to general readers.

Thus, the cause of earth movements, by which mountains are pushed up

far above the plains that lie at their feet, is at present a matter

of speculation; and it is difficult to express in ordinary language

the ideas that have been put forward on this subject. Again, the

curious internal changes, which we find to have taken place in the

rocks of which mountains are composed, are very interesting to those

who know something of the minerals of which rocks are made up, and

their chemical composition; but it was found impossible to render

these matters sufficiently simple.

So again with regard to the geological structure of mountain-chains.

This had to be very briefly treated, in order to avoid introducing

details which would be too complicated for a book of this kind.

The author desires to acknowledge his obligations to the writings

of Sir A. Geikie; Professor Bonney, Professor Green, and Professor

Shaler, of Harvard University; the volumes of the "Alpine Journal;"

"The Earth," by Reclus; the "Encyclopædia Britannica." Canon Isaac

Taylor's "Words and Places," have also been made use of; and if in

every case the reference is not given, the writer hopes the omission

will be pardoned. A few passages from Mr. Ruskin's "Modern Painters"

have been quoted, in the hope that others may be led to read that

wonderful book, and to learn more about mountains and clouds, and

many other things, at the feet of one of the greatest teachers of the

century.

Some of our engravings are taken from the justly celebrated

photographs of the High Alps,[1] by the late Mr. W. Donkin, whose

premature death among the Caucasus Mountains was deeply deplored

by all. Those reproduced were kindly lent by his brother, Mr. A. E.

Donkin, of Rugby. To Messrs. Valentine & Son of Dundee, Mr. Wilson

of Aberdeen, and to Messrs. Frith we are indebted for permission to

reproduce some of their admirable photographs; also to Messrs. James

How & Sons of Farringdon Street, for three excellent photographs of

rock-sections taken with the microscope.

[1] Published by Messrs. Spooner, of the Strand.

CONTENTS.

Part I.

THE MOUNTAINS AS THEY ARE.

CHAPTER PAGE

I. MOUNTAINS AND MEN 3

II. THE USES OF MOUNTAINS 33

III. SUNSHINE AND STORM ON THE MOUNTAINS 70

IV. MOUNTAIN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 103

Part II.

CHAPTER PAGE

HOW THE MOUNTAINS WERE MADE.

V. HOW THE MATERIALS WERE BROUGHT TOGETHER 139

VI. HOW THE MOUNTAINS WERE UPHEAVED 174

VII. HOW THE MOUNTAINS WERE CARVED OUT 205

VIII. VOLCANIC MOUNTAINS 242

IX. MOUNTAIN ARCHITECTURE 282

X. THE AGES OF MOUNTAINS AND OTHER QUESTIONS 318

ILLUSTRATIONS.

NORHAM CASTLE. After Turner _Frontispiece_

BEN LOMOND. From a Photograph by J. Valentine 16

CLOUDS ON BEN NEVIS 38

SNOW ON THE HIGH ALPS. From a Photograph by

Mr. Donkin 64

A STORM ON THE LAKE OF THUN. After Turner 86

THE MATTERHORN. From a Photograph by Mr. Donkin 98

ON A GLACIER. 116

RED DEER. After Ansdell 133

CHALK ROCKS, FLAMBOROUGH HEAD. From a Photograph by

G. W. Wilson 152

MICROPHOTOGRAPHS ILLUSTRATING ROCK FORMATION 172

THE SKAEGGEDALSFORS, NORWAY. From a Photograph by

J. Valentine 192

THE MER DE GLACE AND MONT BUET. From a Photograph

by Mr. Donkin 229

THE ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS IN 1872. From an

Instantaneous Photograph 250

COLUMNAR BASALT AT CLAMSHELL CAVE, STAFFA. From

a Photograph by J. Valentine 280

MONT BLANC, SNOWFIELDS, GLACIERS, AND STREAMS. 312

MOUNTAIN IN THE YOSEMITE VALLEY. 336

ILLUSTRATIONS II.

Fig. 1. SECTION ACROSS THE WEALD OF KENT AND SURREY. 237

Fig. 2. THE HIGHLANDS OF SCOTLAND ON A TRUE

SCALE (after Geikie.) 237

Fig. 1. THE RANGES OF THE GREAT BASIN, WESTERN

STATES OF NORTH AMERICA, SHOWING A SERIES OF

GREAT FRACTURES AND TILTED MASSES OF ROCK. 272

Fig. 2. SECTION THROUGH SNOWDON. 272

SECTIONS OF MOUNTAIN-RANGES, SHOWING THEIR

STRUCTURE AND THE AMOUNT OF ROCK WORN AWAY 306

PART I.

THE MOUNTAINS AS THEY ARE.

THE STORY OF THE HILLS.

Part I.

THE MOUNTAINS AS THEY ARE.

CHAPTER I.

MOUNTAINS AND MEN.

"Happy, I said, whose home is here;

Fair fortunes to the Mountaineer."

In old times people looked with awe upon the mountains, and

regarded them with feelings akin to horror or dread. A very slight

acquaintance with the classical writers of antiquity will suffice

to convince any one that Greeks and Romans did so regard them. They

were not so familiar with mountains as we are; for there were no

roads through them, as now through the Alps, or the Highlands of

Scotland,--to say nothing of the all-pervading railway. It would,

however, be a great mistake to suppose that the ancients did not

observe and enjoy the beauties of Nature. The fair and fertile

plain, the vine-clad slopes of the lower hill-ranges, and the

"many-twinkling smile of ocean" were seen and loved by all who had

a mind to appreciate the beautiful. The poems of Homer and Virgil

would alone be sufficient to prove this. But the higher ranges,

untrodden by the foot of man, were gazed at, not with admiration,

but with religious awe; for men looked upon mountains as the abode

of the gods. They dwelt in the rich plain, which they cultivated,

and beside the sweet waters of some river; for food and drink are

the first necessities of life. But they left the high hills alone,

and in fancy peopled them with the "Immortals" who ruled their

destiny,--controlling also the winds and the lightning, the rain and

the clouds, which seem to have their home among the mountains. A

childlike fear of the unknown, coupled with religious awe, made them

avoid the lofty and barren hills, from which little was to be got

but wild honey and a scanty supply of game. There were also dangers

to be encountered from the fury of the storm and the avalanche; but

the safer ground of the plains below would reward their toil with an

ample supply of corn and other necessaries of life.

In classical times, and also in the Middle Ages, the mountains,

as well as glens and rivers, were supposed to be peopled with

fairies, nymphs, elves, and all sorts of strange beings; and even

now travellers among the mountains of Switzerland, Norway, Wales,

or Scotland find that it is not long since the simple folk of these

regions believed in the existence of such beings, and attributed to

their agency many things which they could not otherwise explain.

Of all the nations of antiquity the Jews seem to have shown the

greatest appreciation of mountain scenery; and in no ancient writings

do we find so many or so eloquent allusions to the hills as in the

Old Testament. But here again one cannot fail to trace the same

feelings of religious awe. The Law was given to their forefathers

in the desert amidst the thunders of Sinai. To them the earth was

literally Jehovah's footstool, and the clouds were His tabernacle.

"If He do but touch the hills, they shall smoke."

But this awe was not unmixed with other and more comforting thoughts.

They felt that those cloud-capped towers were symbols of strength and

the abode of Him who would help them in their need. For so we find

the psalmists regarding them; and with our very different conceptions

of the earth's natural features, we can but dimly perceive and

realise the full force and meaning of the words, "I will lift up mine

eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help."

To take another example from antiquity, we find that the Himalayas

and the source of the Ganges have from very early times been

considered as holy by the people of India. Thousands of pilgrims from

all parts of that vast country still continue to seek salvation in

the holy waters of the Ganges, and at its sacred sources in the snowy

Himalayas. And to those who know India the wondrous snowclad peaks of

the Himalayas still seem to be surrounded with somewhat of the same

halo of glory as of old.

Mountains are intimately associated with the history of nations, and

have contributed much to the moulding of the human mind and the

character of those who dwell among them; they have alike inspired the

mind of the artist, the poet, the reformer, and the visionary seeking

repose for his soul, that, dwelling far from the strife and turmoil

of the world, he may contemplate alone the glory of the Eternal

Being. They have been the refuge of the afflicted and the persecuted;

they have braced the minds and bodies of heroes who have dwelt for a

time among them before descending once more to the plain that they

might play some noble part in the progress of the world.

Moses, while leading the flock of his father-in-law to the back of

the wilderness, came to Mount Horeb and received the divine summons

to return to Egypt and lead Israel out of bondage. David, with his

six hundred followers, fleeing from the face of Saul, found a refuge

in the hill country; and the life of peril and adventure which he

led during these years of persecution was a part of his training for

the great future task of ruling Israel, which he performed so well.

Elijah summoned the false prophets of Baal and Asherah to Mount

Carmel and slew them at the brook Kishon; and a little later we find

him at Mount Horeb listening, not to the wind or to the earthquake

or to the fire, but to the "still small voice" telling him to return

and anoint Jehu to be king.

Or, to take another example from a later age, we find that Mahomet's

favourite resort was a cave at the foot of Mount Hira, north of

Mecca; here in dark and wild surroundings his mind was wrought up to

rhapsodic enthusiasm.

And many, like these leaders of men, have received in mountain

retreats a firmness and tenacity of purpose giving them the right

to be leaders, and the power to redress human wrongs; or, it may

be, a temper of mind and spirit enabling them to soar into regions

of thought and contemplation untrodden by the careless and more

luxurious multitudes who dwell on the plains below. Perhaps Mr. Lewis

Morris was unconsciously offering his testimony to the influence of

mountains when he wrote those words which he puts into the mouth of

poor Marsyas,--

"More it is than ease,

Palace and pomp, honours and luxuries,

To have seen white presences upon the hills,

To have heard the voices of the eternal gods."[2]

[2] Epic of Hades.

The thunder and lightning, storm and cloud, as well as the soft

beauty of colour, and the harmony of mountain outline, have been a

part, and a very important part, of their training. The exhilarating

air, the struggle with the elements in their fierceness, the rugged

strength of granite, seem to have possessed the very souls of such

men, and made them like "the strong ones,"--the immortal beings to

whom in all previous ages the races of mankind have assigned their

abode in the hills, as the Greek gods were supposed to dwell on Mount

Olympus. On these heights such men seem to have gained something of

the strength of Him who dwells in the heavens far above their highest

peaks,--"the strength of the hills," which, as the Hebrew poet says,

"is His also."

We have spoken of the attitude of the human mind towards mountains in

the past; let us now consider the light in which they are regarded

at the present time by all thoughtful and cultivated people. And it

does not require a moment's consideration to perceive that a very

great change has taken place. Instead of regarding them with horror

or aversion, we look upon them with wonder and delight; we watch

them hour by hour whenever for a brief season of holiday we take

up our abode near or among them. We come back to them year by year

to breathe once more the pure air which so frequently restores the

invalid to health and brings back the colour to faded cheeks. We love

to watch the ever-varying lights and shades upon them, as the day

goes by. But it is towards evening that the most enchanting scenes

are to be witnessed, when the sinking sun sheds its golden rays upon

their slopes, or tinges their summits with floods of crimson light;

and then presently, after the sun has gone down, pale mists begin

to rise, and the hills seem more majestic than ever. Later on, as

the full moon appears from behind a bank of cloud, those wonderful

moonlight effects may be seen which must be familiar to all who know

the mountains as they are in summer or autumn,--scenes such as the

writer has frequently witnessed in the Highlands of Scotland, but

which only the poet can adequately describe.

There are few sights in Nature which more powerfully impress the mind

than a sunset among the mountains. General Sir Richard Strachey

concludes his description of the Himalayas with the following

striking passage:

"Here may the eye, as it sweeps along the horizon, embrace a

line of snowclad mountains such as exist in no other part of

the world, stretching over one third of the entire circle,

at a distance of forty or fifty miles, their peaks towering

over a sea of intervening ranges piled one behind another,

whose extent on either hand is lost in the remote distance,

and of which the nearest rises from a gulf far down beneath

the spectator's feet, where may be seen the silver line that

marks a river's course, or crimson fields of amaranth and the

dwellings of man. Sole representative of animal life, some

great eagle floats high overhead in the pure dark-blue sky,

or, unused to man, fearlessly sweeps down within a few yards

to gaze at the stranger who intrudes among these solitudes of

Nature. As the sun sinks, the cold grey shadow of the summit

where we stand is thrown forward, slowly stealing over the

distant hills, and veiling their glowing purples as it goes,

carries the night up to the feet of the great snowy peaks,

which still rise radiant in the rosy light above the now

darkening world. From east to west in succession the splendour

fades away from one point after another, and the vast shadow of

the earth is rapidly drawn across the whole vault of heaven.

One more departing day is added to the countless series which

has silently witnessed the deathlike change that passes over

the eternal snows, as they are left raising their cold pale

fronts against the now leaden sky; till slowly with the

deepening night the world of mountains rises again, as it were,

to a new life, under the changed light of the thousand stars

which stud the firmament and shine with a brilliancy unknown

except in the clear rarefied air of these sublime heights."

Year by year a larger number of busy workers from our great towns,

availing themselves of the increased facilities for travel, come to

the mountains to spend their summer holidays,--some to the Swiss

Alps, others to Wales, Cumberland, Norway, or the Highlands of

Scotland. There are few untrodden valleys in these regions, few of

the more important mountains which have not been climbed.

Our knowledge of mountains, thanks to the labours of a zealous army

of workers, is now considerable. The professors of physical science

have been busy making important observations on the condition of

the atmosphere in the higher regions; geographers have noted their

heights and mapped their leading contours. Geologists have done a

vast amount of work in ascertaining the composition and arrangement

of the rocks of which mountain chains are composed, in observing

their peculiar structures, in recording the changes which are

continually effecting their waste and decay, and thus interpreting

the story of the hills as it is written in the very rocks of which

they are built up.

Naturalists have collected and noted the peculiar plants and animals

which have their home among the hills, and so the forms of life, both

animal and vegetable, which inhabit the mountains of Europe, and some

other countries, are now fairly well known.

The historian, the antiquary, and the student of languages have

made interesting discoveries with regard to the mountain races of

mankind. And only to mention this country, such writers as Scott,

Wordsworth, and Ruskin have given us in verse and prose descriptions

of mountain scenery which will take a permanent place in literature;

while Turner, our great landscape-painter, has expressed the glories

of mountain scenery in pictures which speak more eloquently than

many words. Thus we see that whatever line of inquiry be chosen, our

subject is full of varied interest.

With regard to the characteristics of mountain races, it is not easy

to say to what extent people in different parts of the world who

live among mountains share the same virtues or the same failings;

but the most obvious traits in the character of the mountaineer

seem to be the result of his natural surroundings. Thus we find

mountaineers generally endowed with hardihood, strength, and bravery.

To spend one's days on the hillsides for a large part of the year, as

shepherds and others do in Scotland or Wales, and to walk some miles

every day in pure bracing air, must be healthy and tend to develop

the muscles of the body; and so we find the highlanders of all

countries are usually muscular, strong, and capable of endurance. And

there can be little doubt that mountain races are kept up to a high

standard of strength and endurance by a rigorous and constant weeding

out of the weakly ones, especially among children. And if only the

stronger live to grow up and become parents, the chances are that

their children will be strong too. Thus Nature exercises a kind of

"selection;" and we have consequently "the survival of the fittest."

This "selection," together with the healthy lives they lead, is

probably sufficient to account for their strength and hardiness.

As might be expected, mountaineers are celebrated for their fighting

qualities. The fierce Afghans who have often faced a British army,

and sometimes victoriously; the brave Swiss peasantry, who have

more than once fought nobly for freedom; the Highlanders, who have

contributed so largely to the success of British arms in nearly

all parts of the world, and whose forefathers defied even the

all-conquering Roman in their mountain strongholds,--these and many

others all show the same valour and power of endurance. Etymologists,

whose learned researches into the meaning of words have thrown so

much light on the ages before history was written, tell us that the

Picts were so called from their fighting qualities, and that the

word "Pict" is derived from the Gaelic "peicta," a fighting man. And

Julius Cæsar says the chief god of the Britons was the god of war.

In some countries--as, for instance, Greece, Italy, and Spain--the

mountains are infested with banditti and robbers, who often become a

terror to the neighbourhood. In more peaceful and orderly countries,

however, we find among mountaineers many noble qualities,--such

as patience, honesty, simplicity of life, thrift, a dignified

self-reliance, together with true courtesy and hospitality. This is

high praise; but who that knows mountain peasants would say it is

undeserved? How many a tired traveller among the hills of Scotland

or Wales has had reason to be grateful for welcome, food, and rest

in some little cottage in a far-away glen! How many friendships have

thus been formed! How many a pleasant talk has beguiled the time

during a storm or shower! The old feuds are forgotten now that the

Saxon stranger and invader is at peace with the Celtic people whom

his forefathers drove into the hills. The castles, once centres of

oppression or scenes of violence, lie in peaceful and picturesque

ruins, and add not a little to the interest of one's travels in the

North. What true courtesy and consideration one meets with at the

hands of these honest folk, among whom the old kindly usages have

not died out! Often too poor to be afflicted with the greed and

thirst for wealth, which frequently marks the man of the plain as

compared with the man of the hills,--the Lowlander as compared with

the Highlander,--they exhibit many of those simple virtues which

one hardly expects to meet with among busy townspeople, all bent on

making money, or as the phrase is, "getting on in life."

[Illustration: BEN LOMOND. FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY J. VALENTINE.]

"The mountain cheer, the frosty skies,

Breed purer wits, inventive eyes;

And then the moral of the place

Hints summits of heroic grace.

Men in these crags a fastness find

To fight corruption of the mind;

The insanity of towns to stem

With simpleness for stratagem."

Mr. Skene, the Scotch historian, records a touching case of the

devotion of Highlanders to their chief. He says,--

"There is perhaps no instance in which the attachment of the

clan to their chief was so strongly manifested as in the

case of the Macphersons of Cluny after the disaster of 'the

Forty-five.' The chief having been deeply engaged in that

insurrection, his life became of course forfeited to the laws;

but neither the hope of reward nor the fear of danger could

induce any one of his people to betray him. For nine years

he lived concealed in a cave a short distance from his own

house; it was situated in the front of a woody precipice of

which the trees and shelving rocks concealed the entrance. The

cave had been dug by his own people, who worked at night and

conveyed the stones and rubbish into a neighbouring lake, in

order that no vestige of their labour might appear and lead to

the discovery of the retreat. In this asylum he continued to

live secure, receiving by night the occasional visits of his

friends, and sometimes by day, when the soldiers had begun to

slacken the vigour of their pursuit. Upwards of one thousand

persons were privy to his concealment, and a reward of £1,000

was offered to any one who should give information against

him.... But although the soldiers were animated by the hope

of reward, and their officers by promise of promotion for

the apprehension of this proscribed individual, yet so true

were his people, so inflexibly strict in their promise of

secrecy, and so dextrous in conveying to him the necessaries he

required in his long confinement, not a trace of him could be

discovered, nor an individual base enough to give a hint to his

detriment."

The mountaineer is a true gentleman. However poor, however ignorant

or superstitious, one perceives in him a refinement of manner which

cannot fail to command admiration. His readiness to share his

best with the stranger and to render any service in his power are

pleasing traits in his character. But there is one sad feature about

mountaineers of the present day which one frequently notices in

districts where many tourists come,--especially English or American.

They are, we regret to say, losing their independence, their simple,

old-fashioned ways, and becoming servile and greedy,--at least in the

towns and villages. Such changes seem, alas! inevitable when rich

townspeople, bent on pleasure or sport, invade the recesses of the

hills where poverty usually reigns. On the one hand, we have people,

often with long purses, eager for enjoyment, waiting to be fed,

housed, or otherwise entertained; on the other hand, poor people,

anxious to "make hay while the sun shines" and to extract as much

money as possible from "the visitors," who often allow themselves

to be unmercifully fleeced. Then there are in the Highlands the

sportsmen, who require a large following of "gillies" to attend them

in their wanderings, pay them highly for their services, and dismiss

them at the end of the season; and so the men are in many cases left

without employment all the winter and spring. Is it, then, surprising

that they give way to a natural tendency to idleness, and fall into

other bad habits? Any visitor who spends a winter, or part of one,

in the Highlands will be better able to realise the extent of this

evil, which is by no means small; and one cannot help regretting that

the sportsmen's pleasure and the tourist's holiday should involve

results of such grave consequence. We are inclined to think that in

these days sport is overdone, and wish it could be followed without

taking the hillman away from the work he would otherwise find, and

which would render him a more useful member of society. With the

agitation going on in some parts against deer-forests we do not

feel much sympathy, because they are based on the erroneous idea

that "crofters" could make a living out of the land thus enclosed;

whereas those who know the land and its value for agricultural

purposes tell us that with the exception of a few small patches here

and there, hardly worth mentioning, it could not possibly be made to

produce enough to maintain crofters and their families. Nevertheless,

another way of looking at the matter is this: that the man who merely

ministers to the pleasure of others richer than himself loses some of

the self-respect and independence which he would acquire by working

in his own way for a living.

The same changes for the worse are still more manifest in

Switzerland; and even in some parts of Norway the people are being

similarly spoiled. Mr. Ruskin, speaking of the former country, says:

"I believe that every franc now spent by travellers among

the Alps tends more or less to the undermining of whatever

special greatness there is in the Swiss character; and the

persons I met in Switzerland whose position and modes of life

render them best able to give me true information respecting

the present state of their country, among many causes of

national deterioration, spoke with chief fear of the influx

of English wealth, gradually connecting all industry with the

wants of strangers, and inviting all idleness to depend upon

their casual help, thus resolving the ancient consistency and

pastoral simplicity of the mountain life into the two irregular

trades of the innkeeper and mendicant."[3]

[3] Modern Painters, vol. iv.

Mountain people have still their superstitions; since the

introduction of railways many of the old legends and popular myths

have died out, but even what is left is interesting to the student of

folk-lore,--indeed, we might say, to every one.

Sir A. Geikie, speaking of Scotch mountain scenery says,--

"To the influence of scenery of this kind on the mind of a

people at once observant and imaginative, such legends as that

of the Titans should in all likelihood be ascribed. It would be

interesting to trace back these legends to their cradle, and to

mark how much they owe to the character of the scenery amongst

which they took their rise. Perhaps it would be found that the

rugged outlines of the Boeotian hills had no small share in

the framing of Hesiod's graphic story of that primeval warfare

wherein the combatants fought with huge rocks, which, darkening

the air as they flew, at last buried the discomfited Titans

deep beneath the surface of the land. Nor would it be difficult

to trace a close connection between the present scenery of our

own country and some of the time-honoured traditionary stories

of giants and hero kings, warlocks and witches, or between the

doings of the Scandinavian Hrimthursar, or Frost Giants, and

the more characteristic features of the landscapes and climate

of the North."[4]

[4] Scenery of Scotland.

The following passage from Ruskin brings out more strongly the

effects of mountains on men,--a subject to which he has given much

attention:--

"We shall find, on the one hand, the mountains of Greece and

Italy, forming all the loveliest dreams, first of Pagan, then

of Christian mythology, on the other, those of Scandinavia, to

be the first sources of whatever mental (as well as military)

power was brought by the Normans into Southern Europe. Normandy

itself is, to all intents and purposes, a hill country.... We

have thus one branch of the Northern religious imagination

rising among the Scandinavian fiords, tempered in France

by various encounters with elements of Arabian, Italian,

Provençal, or other Southern poetry, and then reacting upon

Southern England; while other forms of the same rude religious

imagination, resting like clouds upon the mountains of Scotland

and Wales, met and mingled with the Norman Christianity,

retaining even to the latest times some dark colour of

superstition, but giving all its poetical and military pathos

to Scottish poetry, and a peculiar sternness and wildness of

tone to the Reformed faith, in its manifestations among the

Scottish hills."[5]

[5] Modern Painters, vol. iv.

The Alps, like most other mountainous countries, have their fair

share of legends, some of which are very grotesque. We have selected

the following, as related by Professor Bonney.[6] The wild huntsman's

yell is still heard in many places by the shuddering peasants as his

phantom train sweeps by the châlet. There is also the wild goat-herd,

a wicked lad, who crucified an old he-goat and drove his flock to

worship it; lightning consumed him; and now he wanders forever over

the Alps, miserably wailing.

[6] "The Alpine Regions of Switzerland" (Deighton, Bell, & Co.),

a most interesting book, especially for travellers.

When the glacier of Gétroz burst, the Archfiend himself was seen

swimming down the Rhone, with a drawn sword in one hand and a golden

ball in the other; when opposite to Martigny he halted, and at his

bidding the waters rose and swept away part of the town. A vast

multitude of imps was seen about the same time on a mountain in the

Val de Bagnes by two mendicant friars from Sion, who, hearing of this

unlawful assembly, had gone out as detectives to learn what mischief

was hatching.

Many places also have their spectral animals, the Valois, according

to Tschudi, being the headquarters of these legends. There are also

pygmies to be seen in the lonely mountains, like the Norwegian

trolls, and brownies who make or mar the house, according as the

goodwife is neat or a slattern.

Many Alpine stories have reference to the sudden destruction of

pastures by the fall of rocks or ice. Here is one from the Clariden

Alps:--

Once upon a time these were fertile pastures, on which dwelt a

"senn." He grew rich, so that none could match him in wealth;

but at the same time he grew proud and haughty, and spurned

both the laws of Nature and the commandments of God. He was

so foolishly fond of his mistress that he paved the way from

the châlet to the byre with cheeses, lest she should soil her

feet, and cared so little for his mother that when she lay at

his door fainting with hunger, he offered her only milk to

drink in which he had thrown the foulest refuse. Righteously

indignant, she turned away, calling upon Heaven to punish such

an insult. Before she reached her home, the rocks and ice had

descended, crushing beneath them her wicked son, his mistress,

and possessions.

In the neighbourhood of Monte Rosa there is a tradition that

a valley exists in the heart of that mountain the entrance to

which has been sealed up by impassable glaciers, though the

floor of the "cirque" within is still a rich pasturage. In a

certain valley they point out a spring which bursts from the

ground, as the outlet of the torrent by which it is watered.

Once, said they, a _chasseur_ found the bed of this stream dry,

and creeping up its subterranean channel, arrived on the floor

of the valley. It was a huntsman's paradise; chamois were there

in plenty, bears also, and even bouquetins, wandering over the

richest pastures. He retraced his steps to announce the good

news; but when he returned again, the waters had resumed their

course, and the place has ever since remained inaccessible.

Mountains play a very important part in human history. In the first

place, they are natural barriers separating the nations of the

world from one another, and tending to keep them confined within

certain definite bounds; we say, tending to keep them thus confined,

because, as every one knows, these barriers have again and again been

surmounted by conquering armies. The rugged Alps could not ward off

Hannibal, who made his way through them to march upon the capital of

the Roman empire. In like manner Napoleon defied this great natural

rampart, made a road through it, and came to Italy. No mountains

would seem to be quite impassable; but although liable in the course

of ages to be occasionally overrun, they afford good protection and

produce a feeling of security.

The Himalayas separate our great Indian empire from that of China;

and we do not at present apprehend an invasion from that quarter.

The Suliman Mountains divide us from the Afghans, and the great

Russian and Persian empires farther west. Still, we know that in the

eleventh century a great Mahometan invasion of India took place;

our own armies have more than once penetrated to Kabul. Perhaps the

common garden wall separating adjacent suburban residences furnishes

a suitable illustration of the great natural walls which divide, not

households or families, but much larger families than these,--the

nations of the world.

Just as unruly boys sometimes climb over the neighbour's wall and

play games in a garden which is not their own; or as burglars may

surmount these obstacles to their progress, and finding a way

into the house by a back door or kitchen window, commence their

ravages,--so a neighbouring (but not neighbourly) nation, bent on

conquest, may invade some natural garden of the world, such as

India, by forcing their way through physical barriers which for

ordinary purposes serve to protect those within.

The Thian Shan Mountains divide Russia from China's sphere of

influence. The Caucasus Mountains separate Russia from Asia Minor.

Austro-Hungary is bounded by the Carpathians, Spain by the Pyrenees.

The Alps of Switzerland separate four nations not very friendly

to each other; and lastly, in our own country the Cheviot Hills,

together with the Tweed, form the boundary between Scotland and

England.

Where there are no mountains or hills, rivers sometimes serve as

boundaries, but of course they do not answer the purpose so well.

Sometimes a nation actually builds a wall for a boundary. Of this the

great wall of China and the Roman wall between the Cheviots and the

Solway Firth are familiar examples.

In the second place, mountains have always been a refuge and shelter

for conquered races; and the primitive tribes who once lived in the

plains have been forced by adverse circumstances to take to the

hills. This has taken place over and over again.

We know that the Celtic people now living in Brittany, Devonshire,

Cornwall, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, though now considerably

mixed, are the descendants of the old Celtic inhabitants of France

and Britain. But there is a great deal of unwritten history for which

we may look in vain to the ordinary sources of information, such as

books, and which is only to be read in quite different records,--in

antiquities buried up in peat-beds, in bogs, in ruins and ancient

forts, or camps; and last but not least, in the names of places,

rivers, or mountains. The hills, the valleys, the rivers, are the

only writing-tablets on which unlettered nations have been able to

inscribe their annals. For this kind of history we must go to the

antiquary, and, above all, to the philologist, who tells us the

meaning of the names of places, and who the people were who gave the

names that we see on our maps. The great advances which have of late

years been made in our knowledge of the primeval races of men, or

at least of nations but little known in the annals of history, are

largely due to the interpretation of the obscure records preserved in

local names. The Celtic, the Iberian, the Teutonic, the Scandinavian,

and Sclavonic races have thus for the most part made known to us

their migrations, conquests, and defeats. And so by studying the

names of places, rivers, and hills, as well as by careful collection

of works of art, implements, coins, such as may be seen in many a

museum, it has been possible to read a great deal of early history

which would otherwise have been lost.

Those who have studied these matters say they can trace wave after

wave of population which has thus left its mark,--Gaelic, Cymric (or

Welsh), Saxon, Anglian, Norwegian, Danish, Norman, and Flemish. Thus

it can be proved from the names on the map that almost the whole of

England was once Celtic, whereas now the Celts are almost entirely

confined to the hills. The Peak of Derbyshire and the mountains of

Cumberland retain a greater number of Celtic names than the districts

surrounding them; and the hills of Devonshire long served as a

barrier to protect the Celts of Cornwall from Anglo-Saxon conquerors.

But even mountain races are often a good deal mixed, and in the

Pyrenees we find the descendants of the Iberians, who, a very long

time ago, were driven from the lowlands of France and Spain. These

Iberians are a very interesting race, of short stature, with long

heads, and dark hair and eyes. This old type is to be met with in

Wales and the Highlands even in the present day. And so we learn--if

these conclusions are sound--that even the Celts in their early days

were invaders, and drove before them an older population. This race,

it seems, lived in Europe a very long time ago, before the discovery

of metals, when people made axes, hammers, and spear-heads out of

flints or other stones; and so they are said to belong to "the Stone

Age." Their remains are found in many of the caves which of late

years have been explored. Possibly the ancient people of Switzerland

who lived in wooden houses, erected on piles near the shores of lakes

(probably for safety), were also of the same stock.

It is curious to find how people living in separate valleys among the

mountains of Switzerland have, in the course of time, become so much

unlike their neighbours that they can hardly understand each other's

speech, so effectually have the mountains kept them apart. In some

districts almost every valley has its separate dialect. Switzerland

is only twice the size of Wales, yet the local names are derived

from half a dozen different languages, three or four of which are

still spoken by the people. In the Alps, too, the same mixture of

Celtic with an older Iberian stock has been detected.

A curious reversal of the usual order of things is noticed by the

late Dean Stanley in his "Sinai and Palestine." He points out that

the Jews took possession of many of the hills of Palestine soon after

the invasion under Joshua, but could not drive out the peoples of the

plains, because they were better armed, and had chariots of iron in

great number. The conquerors in this case kept to the hills; while

the Canaanites, Philistines, and other inhabitants of the country

retained for a long time their hold of the lower ground.

CHAPTER II.

THE USES OF MOUNTAINS.

The valleys only feed; the mountains feed and guard and

strengthen us.--RUSKIN.

It is not an exaggeration to say that there are no physical

features of the surface of the earth which render such a variety of

services as mountains. The operations which they perform involve

such far-reaching consequences that it is difficult to say where

their effects cease. Indeed, it might almost be maintained that

they are the mainspring of the world,--as far as its surface is

concerned,--for it would fare ill with mankind if they were removed

or in some way destroyed. Things would then very soon come to a

standstill. The soil would become exhausted; streams would cease to

flow; and the world would become a kind of stagnant pool.

The three main services of the hills are these:--

I. Mountains help to condense water-vapour from the atmosphere,

thus bringing back to the earth moisture which it loses

continually by evaporation.

II. Mountains are elevated reservoirs of water in one form or

another, and thus not only feed the streams and rivers, but

give them force and direction as well.

III. Mountains suffer themselves to be slowly worn away in

order that the face of the earth may be renewed; in other

words, they die that we, and all created things, may live.

I. _Mountains help to condense water-vapour from the atmosphere, thus

bringing back to the earth the moisture which it loses continually by

evaporation._ Every one knows that there is abundance of water-vapour

in the atmosphere, but the question arises, How does it get there?

The answer to this lies in the simple fact that every surface of

water exposed to the air undergoes loss by evaporation. If you wish

to satisfy yourself on this point, place a saucer of water in your

room, and in a few days it will all be gone. We hang clothes out to

dry, and so avail ourselves of this curious power that air has of

taking up water in the form of vapour. Steam, or water-vapour, is

really invisible, though we frequently talk of seeing the steam

issuing from a locomotive; but what we really see is a cloud of

condensed steam, and such clouds,[7] like those that we see floating

in the air, are really masses of little tiny particles of water which

can reflect or throw back the light which falls upon them, and thus

they become visible. Again, a kettle of water, if left too long on

the fire will entirely boil away. It is all turned into steam, and

the steam is somehow hidden away in the air, though a little of it

will be condensed into slight clouds by the colder air outside the

kettle.

[7] It has lately been proved that clouds can only form in air

which contains dust, and that each little suspended particle of

water contains a speck of dust or a tiny germ of some sort for

its nucleus.

But how can water stow itself away in the air without being seen or

felt?

An illustration may help to explain this. Suppose you scatter a

spoonful of small shot over a carpet or a dark-coloured table-cloth;

you would probably not be able to see them at a little distance.

Now, gather them together in a heap, and you see them at once. The

heap of shot in some ways resembles a drop of water, for in a drop

of water the tiny particles (or molecules) of which it is composed

are close together; but by heating water you cause them to fly

asunder and scatter themselves in various directions. They are lost

to sight, and moreover have no power of attracting each other or of

acting in concert; each one then takes its own course, whereas in

the drop of water they were in some wonderful way bound together by

mutual attraction. They dance in groups; but the rude force of heat

will scatter these little dancing groups, and break them up into that

state which we call a state of vapour.

The forces of heat and cohesion are directly at variance; and it

is just a question of degree whether the one or the other gets the

mastery in this "tug of war." The more you heat the water, the faster

the little groups of molecules break up and disappear in the air.

They must in some way go moving between the particles of air, and

collisions keep taking place with inconceivable rapidity.

And now another question arises; namely, how much water-vapour can

the air take? That depends chiefly on its temperature. Air when

heated will take up a great deal of steam; and the more you heat air,

the more it can take up. When air at a given temperature can take up

no more, it is said to be saturated for that temperature; but if the

temperature be raised, it will immediately begin to take up more. For

each degree of temperature there is a certain amount of water-vapour

which can be absorbed, and no more. But suppose we take some air

which is already saturated and lower its temperature by giving it

a sudden chill, what will happen? It will immediately give up part

of its steam, or water-vapour; namely, the exact amount which it is

unable to contain at the lower temperature.[8]

[8] Pressure also has an important influence, but was omitted

above for the sake of simplicity.

There are various ways in which you can test this matter for

yourself. For instance, take a hand-glass, and breathe on it. You

know what will happen: a film of moisture forms upon it; and you know

the reason why. It is simply that the cold glass gives a chill to

one's breath (which being warm is highly charged with water-vapour

from the lungs), and so some of the vapour is at once condensed. Now,

this serves very well to explain how mountains catch water-vapour,

and condense it. They are, as it were, a cold looking-glass; and

the hot breath of the plains, as it strikes their sides, receiving

a sudden chill, throws down part of the vapour it contains. On the

higher parts of mountain-ranges the cold is so great that the water

assumes the form of snow.

Mountains, as every one knows, are colder than the plains below.

No one cares to stay very long on a mountain-top, for fear of

catching cold. It may be worth while to consider why they are cold.

Perhaps you answer, "Because they are so high." That is true, but

not a complete answer to our question. We must look at the matter a

little more closely. The earth is a warm body surrounded by space in

which the cold is inconceivably intense; but just as we protect our

bodies against cold with garments, so the earth is wrapped up in an

atmosphere which serves more or less to keep in the heat. All warm

bodies give out heat as luminous bodies give out light; but the rays

of heat, unlike those of light, are quite invisible to our eyes, so

that we are unaware of them. These "dark heat-rays," as they are

called, do not make any impression on the retina, because our eyes

are not capable of responding to them as they do to the ordinary rays

of light. But there is a delicate little instrument known as the

thermopile, which responds to, and so detects these invisible rays;

and if our eyes were sensitive to such vibrations as these, we should

see heat-rays (which like light and sound are due to vibrations)

streaming from every object, just as light does from a candle-flame.

Those parts of the earth which are least covered or protected by the

atmosphere lose heat most rapidly,--in the same way that on a frosty

day one's fingers become cold unless covered up. Now, there is less

air over mountains; and in those higher regions above the peaks

what air there is, is more rarefied, and therefore less capable of

stopping the heat-rays coming from the earth. Professor Tyndall has

shown that water-vapour in the air has a great power of stopping dark

heat-rays; and the lower regions, which contain more vapour, stop or

absorb a good deal of heat which would otherwise escape into space.

Look at a map of any continent, and you will see the rivers streaming

away from the mountains. All those vast quantities of water come

from the atmosphere; and mountains do a large share of the work of

condensing it from the state of vapour to that of water. Take the

map of India, and look at the great range of the Himalayas. At

their feet is the hot valley of the Ganges, which meets that of the

Brahmapootra River. An immense amount of evaporation takes place

from these mighty rivers, so that the air above them becomes laden

with water-vapour. Farther south is the tropical Indian Ocean, from

which the direct rays of the sun draw up still vaster quantities of

water. And so when south winds blow over India, they are full of

water-vapour; and presently they strike the flanks of the Himalayas,

and at once they are chilled, and consequently part with a large

amount of the vapour which they contained. This is best illustrated

by the case of the southwest monsoon wind of the summer season, which

sets in during the month of April, and continues to blow steadily

towards the northeast till October. After leaving the Bay of Bengal,

this warm wind, laden with vapour, meets ere long with the range

known as the Khasi Hills, and consequently throws down a large part

of its vapour in the form of rain. The rainfall here in the summer

season reaches the prodigious total of five hundred inches, or about

twenty times as much as falls in London during a whole year. After

passing over these hills, the monsoon wind presently reaches the

Himalayas; and another downpour then takes place, until by the time

it reaches the wide plains of Thibet, so much water has been given up

that it becomes a very dry wind instead of a moist one.

It must not be supposed, however, that the condensation effected by

mountains is entirely due to this coldness. They have another simple

and effective way of compelling the winds to give up rain: their

sloping sides force the winds which strike them to ascend into higher

regions,--wedging them up as waves run up a sloping stony bank on the

seashore,--and when the winds reach higher regions of the atmosphere

they must (as explained above) suffer loss of heat, or in other

words, have their temperature lowered. They also expand considerably

as they rise into regions where the atmospheric pressure is less;

and as every gas or vapour loses heat in the act of expansion, they

undergo a further cooling from this cause also.

We have now learned that the cooling process is brought about in

three different ways: (1) By contact with the cold body of the

mountains; (2) By giving out heat into space; (3) By expansion of

the air as it reaches into the higher regions of the atmosphere.

The "cloud-caps" on certain mountains and promontories are to be

explained by all these causes combined.

The west coast of Great Britain illustrates the same thing on a

smaller scale. There the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, travelling

in a northeasterly direction straight away from the Gulf of Mexico,

strike the west coast of Ireland, England, and Scotland; and as most

people are aware, the mild climate of Great Britain is chiefly due

to this fact. If you contrast for a moment the east and west coasts

of Britain, you will see that the latter is much more rocky and

mountainous than the east coast. Mountains run down nearly all our

western coasts. Now, it is this elevated and rocky side of Britain

which catches most of the rain. Very instructive it is to compare the

annual rainfall in different parts of Britain. On Dartmoor about 86

inches of rain fall every year, while in London only about 24 inches

fall annually; but then London has no range of mountains near, and is

far away from the west coast. Again, while people in Ambleside have

to put up with 78 inches of rain, in Norfolk they are content with

the modest allowance of 24 inches or so. At a place called Quoich on

the west coast of Scotland, about 117 inches fall every year. These

differences are chiefly due to the different contour of the land down

the west side of Britain, which is mountainous, while the east side

is flat, and also to the fact that while easterly winds, which have

come over the continent, are dry, our prevailing winds are from the

west and southwest, and are consequently heavily laden with vapour

from the Atlantic Ocean. These winds follow the direction of the Gulf

Stream, driving it along before them; and in so doing they take up

large quantities of vapour from its surface. When these warm winds

touch our western coasts, they receive a chill, and consequently are

no longer able to contain all the vapour which they bring with them,

and so down comes the rain.

II. _Mountains are elevated reservoirs of water in one form or

another, and thus not only feed the streams and rivers, but give them

force and direction as well._ It is very important that the mountains

should not allow the waters they collect to run away too fast. Try

to think for a moment what would happen if instead of being, as it

were, locked up in the form of snowfields and glaciers, the water

were all in the liquid form. It would soon run away, and for months

together the great river-valleys would be dry and desolate. When the

rain came, there would be tremendous floods; dire destruction would

be wrought in the valleys; and very soon the great rivers would

dwindle down to nothing. Vegetation too would suffer seriously for

want of water during the summer months; and the valleys generally

would cease to be the fertile sources of life which they are at

present. The earth would become for the most part like a stagnant

marsh.

But in the higher mountain regions there is a beneficent process

going on which averts such an evil. The precious supplies of water

are stored up in the solid forms of snow and ice. Now, we all know

that snow and ice take a long time to melt; and thus Nature regulates

and like a prudent housewife economises her precious stores. The

rivers which she feeds continually, from silent snowfields and

glaciers among her mountain-peaks, are the very arteries and veins

of the earth; and as the blood in our bodies is forced to circulate

by pressure from the heart, so the rivers are compelled to flow by

pressure from the great heart of the hills,--slow, steady, continuous

pressure, not the quick pulses which the human heart sends through

the body.

And again, as the blood, after circulating through the body in an

infinite number of life-giving streams, returns to the heart once

more on its journey, so the thousand streams which wander over the

plains find their way back to the heart of the mountains, for the

water is brought there in the form of vapour and clouds by the winds.

When we build water-towers, and make reservoirs on high ground to

give pressure to the water in our pipes, and make it circulate

everywhere,--even to the tops of our houses,--we are only taking a

hint from Nature. The mountains are her water-towers, and from these

strong reservoirs, which never burst, she commands her streams,

forcing them along their courses in order that they may find their

way to the utmost bounds of continents.

But there is another way in which mountains regulate the supply

of water, and prevent it from running away too fast,--one not so

effective as the freezing process, but still very useful, because it

applies to the lower hills below the line of perpetual snow. This may

be well illustrated by the state of some of the Scotch hills in the

middle of summer or autumn, when there is little if any snow resting

upon them.

Any one familiar with these hills will have noticed how full of

water their sides are. Tiny threads of streams trickle slowly along

everywhere; peat-beds are saturated with dark-brown water; even the

grass and soil are generally more or less wet, especially under pine

forests. One can generally get a cup of water somewhere, except

after a long dry summer, which is exceptional. Then there is the dew

forming every night. Forests with their undergrowth of soil--moss

and fern--also help very considerably to check the flow of water. We

have often asked ourselves when watching some swift-flowing river,

"Where does all this water come from? Why does it not dry up in

hot weather?" The answer came fully after we had climbed several

mountains, and seen with our eyes the peat-beds among the hills, and

heard the trickling of the tiny rivulets hurrying along to feed

some neighbouring burn, or perhaps to run into some mountain tarn or

loch, and noticed the damp, spongy state of the soil everywhere,--not

to mention the little springs which here and there well up to the

surface, and so contribute their share.

The rivers and streams of Scotland assume various tints of amber

and dark-brown, according to the amount of rain which has recently

fallen. These colours are due to organic matter from the peat.

Compare Scott's description of the Greta:--

"In yellow light her currents shone,

Matching in hue the favourite gem

Of Albion's mountain diadem."

The waters of some Scotch rivers after heavy rain look as black as

pitch.

Nor must we omit the lakes which abound in most mountain regions,

and serve as natural reservoirs for the rivers, besides giving a

wonderful charm to mountain scenery.

The largest lakes in mountainous regions are found on the courses

of the rivers; and there is good reason to believe that they were

formed, not by any process of subsidence, but by the same operations

that carved out the valleys. In many cases they are due to the

damming up of a stream. But in some countries the streams dry up

during summer,--in Palestine or Sinai, where there is but little soil

on the hills, and consequently hardly any vegetation. Such barren

hills cannot hold the continual supplies which pour gently forth from

the mountains of higher latitudes.

The Alps feed four of the principal rivers of Europe. We cannot do

better than quote Professor Bonney, whose writings on the Alps are

familiar to all geologists. In his "Alpine Regions of Switzerland"

the following passage occurs:--

"This mass of mountains, the great highlands of Europe, is

therefore of the utmost physical and geographical importance.

Rising in places to a height of more than fifteen thousand

feet above the sea, and covered for an extent of many thousand

square miles with perpetual snow, it is the chief feeder of

four of the principal rivers in Europe,--the Po, the Rhone,

the Rhine, and the Danube. But for those barren fields of ice,

high up among the silent crags, the seeming home of winter and

death, these great arteries of life would every summer dwindle

down to paltry streams, feebly wandering over stone-strewn

beds. Stand, for example, on some mountain-spur, and look down

on the Lombardy plain, all one rich carpet of wheat and maize,

of rice and vine; the life of those myriad threads of green

and gold is fed from these icy peaks, which stand out against

the northern sky in such strange and solemn contrast. As it is

with the Po, so it is with the Rhine and the Rhone, both of

which issue from the Alps as broad, swelling streams; so, too,

with the Danube, which, although it does not rise in them, yet

receives from the Inn and the Drave almost all the drainage of

the eastern districts."

A very little reflection will serve to convince any one how vastly

important and beneficial is the slope of the mountains, and how it

gives force and direction to streams and rivers. Without this force,

due to universal gravitation, by which the waters seek continually

lower levels, the supplies in the hills would be useless. Mere lakes

on flat surfaces would not answer the purpose; and so the sources of

water are elevated in order that it may pour over the world below.

No writer has given such fascinating descriptions of mountains as

Mr. Ruskin; and no one has more eloquently described the functions

they perform. In the fourth volume of his "Modern Painters," which

every one who cares for mountains should read, we find the following

beautiful passage:--

"Every fountain and river, from the inch-deep streamlet that

crosses the village lane in trembling clearness, to the massy

and silent march of the everlasting multitude of waters in

Amazon or Ganges, owe their play and purity and power to the

ordained elevations of the earth. Gentle or steep, extended

or abrupt, some determined slope of the earth's surface is of

course necessary before any wave can so much as overtake one

sedge in its pilgrimage; and how seldom do we enough consider,

as we walk beside the margins of our pleasant brooks, how

beautiful and wonderful is that ordinance, of which every

blade of grass that waves in their clear waters is a perpetual

sign,--that the dew and rain fallen on the face of the earth

shall find no resting-place; shall find, on the contrary,

fixed channels traced for them from the ravines of the central

crests down which they roar in sudden ranks of foam to the dark

hollows beneath the banks of lowland pasture, round which they

must circle slowly among the stems and beneath the leaves of

the lilies; paths prepared for them by which, at some appointed

rate of journey, they must evermore descend, sometimes slow,

and sometimes swift, but never pausing; the daily portion of

the earth they have to glide over marked for them at each

successive sunrise; the place which has known them knowing

them no more; and the gateways of guarding mountains opened for

them in cleft and chasm, none letting them in their pilgrimage,

and from afar off the great heart of the sea calling them to

itself: 'Deep calleth unto deep.'"

Geologists, however, do not in these days teach that the present

paths of rivers were made for them, but rather that the rivers have

carved out their own valleys for themselves. The old teaching before

the days of Lyell and Hutton, the founders of modern geology, was

that valleys were rents in the rocks of the earth's crust formed

by some wonderful convulsion of Nature, whereby they were cracked,

torn asunder, and upheaved. But a careful study of rivers and their

valleys for many years has shown that there is no evidence of such

sudden convulsions. The world is very old indeed, and rivers have

been flowing much as we see them for ages and ages. A few thousand

years is to the geologist but a short space of time; and there can be

no doubt that a stream can in the course of time carve out for itself

a valley. The operations of Nature seem slow to us because our lives

are so short, and we can see so little change even in a generation;

but the effects of these changes mount up enormously when continued

through a long space of time. Nature works slowly; but then she has

unlimited time, and never seems in a hurry. It is like the old story

of the hare and the tortoise; and the river, working on steadily and

quietly for hundreds or thousands of years, accomplishes far more in

the end than sudden floods or violent catastrophes of any sort.

III. _Mountains suffer themselves to be slowly worn away in order

that the face of the earth may be renewed; in other words, they die

that we, and all created things, may live._ The reader will find a

full account of the methods by which these results are accomplished

in chapters v. and vii., and therefore we must not anticipate this

part of the subject. Let it suffice for the present to say that

this destruction of the hills is brought about by the action of

heat and cold, of rain and frost, of snow and ice, and the thousand

streams that flow down the mountain-sides. It is with soils that we

are chiefly concerned at present. Try to think for a moment of the

literally _vital_ consequences which follow from the presence of

good rich soils over different parts of the earth, and ask whether

it would be possible for civilised races of men to flourish and

multiply as they do if it were not for the great fertile valleys and

plains of the world. Mountain races are neither rich nor powerful.

Man exists mainly by cultivation of the soil; and among mountains

we only find here and there patches that are worthy of the labour

and expenditure of capital involved in cultivation. But in the great

plains, in the principal river-valleys of the world, and among the

lesser hill-ranges it is different. The _lowlands_ are the fertile

regions. All great and powerful nations of the world are children

of the plains. It was so in the past; it will be so in the future,

unless men learn to feed on something else than corn, milk, and

flesh, which is not very likely.

The Egyptians, the earliest civilised race of which we have

satisfactory records, dwelt in the fertile valley and delta of

the Nile. They clearly perceived the value of this great river to

themselves, and worshipped it accordingly. They knew nothing of its

source in the far-away lakes of Central Africa; but they knew truly,

as Herodotus tells us, that Egypt was "the gift of the Nile," for the

alluvial soil of its delta has been formed by the yearly floods of

that great river, as its waters, laden with a fine rich mud, spread

over its banks, and for a time filled the valley with one sheet of

water. The Assyrians and Babylonians had their home in the valley of

the Euphrates and Tigris. The Chinese, too, have their great rivers.

Russia is well watered by powerful rivers. The most populous parts of

the United States of America are watered by the great Mississippi,

and the other rivers which flow into it. England, Germany, and France

are furnished with well-watered plains.

Soils are the chief form of national wealth. Minerals, such as coal

and iron, are of course extremely valuable, and help to make an

industrious race rich; but the land is the main thing, after all, and

by land we mean soil. The two words are almost synonymous. But since

the soil is formed chiefly of débris brought from the mountains, it

would be more true to say that these are the real sources of wealth.

Soils contain besides a large amount of valuable organic matter (that

is, decayed matter which has once had animal or vegetable life)

different kinds of minerals, which are necessary to the support of

plant life: potash, soda, carbonate of lime, silica, magnesia, iron,

phosphorus, and manganese in their various compounds are all present

in the rocks of which mountains are composed. We must again fall back

upon "Modern Painters" for an effective description of the forming of

soil by destruction of the hills:--

"The higher mountains suffer their summits to be broken into

fragments and to be cast down in sheets of massy rock, full, as

we shall presently see, of every substance necessary for the

nourishment of plants; these fallen fragments are again broken

by frost, and ground by torrents into various conditions of

sand and clay,--materials which are distributed perpetually by

the streams farther and farther from the mountain's base. Every

shower that swells the rivulets enables their waters to carry

certain portions of earth into new positions, and exposes new

banks of ground to be moved in their turn.... The process is

continued more gently, but not less effectively, over all the

surface of the lower undulating country; and each filtering

thread of summer rain which trickles through the short turf of

the uplands is bearing its own appointed burden of earth down

on some new natural garden in the dingles beneath."

It may be laid down as a simple economic truth, that no nation can be

powerful, rich, or prosperous, unless it possess in the first place

a good soil. Other conditions, such as large navigable rivers, a

good seaboard for harbouring ships, are also important; but unless

the land will yield plenty of food, the population cannot be very

great, for people must be fed. Foreign supplies of corn at a low

price, meat and provisions of various kinds, supplement what is

grown in England; but without a good soil we could not have become a

powerful nation.

A high state of civilisation is in a large measure to be traced to

climate and soil. The sequence is somewhat as follows:--

Mountains collect rain.

Rain fills the rivers.

Rivers make rich alluvial plains.

Agriculture follows; and food is produced.

Abundant food maintains a large population.

The population works to supply its various wants; such as roads,

railways, ships, houses, machinery, etc. Then follows exchange with

other countries. They send us what they can best produce, and we send

them what we can best and most easily produce, and so both parties

gain.

Thus towns spring up. Education, refinement, learning, and the higher

arts follow from the active life of towns, where more brain-work is

required, and the standard of life is higher.

And thus we may, in imagination, follow step by step the various

stages by which the highest phases of civilisation are brought to

pass, beginning at the mountains and ending with human beings of

the highest type,--the philosopher, artist, poet, or statesman, not

omitting the gentler sex, who are often said to rule the world.

The following lines of Milton possess, in the light of these facts, a

deeper meaning than the poet probably intended to convey:--

"Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures

Whilst the landscape round it measures:

Russet lawns and fallows grey,

Where the nibbling flocks do stray;

Mountains on whose barren breast

The labouring clouds do often rest;

Meadows trim with daisies pied,

Shallow brooks and rivers wide;

Flowers and battlements it sees

Bosomed high in tufted trees,--

Where perhaps some beauty lies,

The cynosure of neighbouring eyes."

With a little rearrangement of the lines, the sequence we have

indicated above would be well illustrated. The mountains must come

first; then the clouds, ready to bring forth their rain; then the

brooks and rivers, then "russet lawns and fallows grey,"--with their

"nibbling flocks." Then come the human elements in the scene,--the

"towers and battlements," containing armed warriors, well fed, no

doubt, and ready to do their master's bidding; lastly, the lady

who adorns the home of her lord, and, let us hope, makes it worth

fighting for.

For commercial purposes, large navigable rivers are of great use. And

in spite of the modern railway, rivers still exert an influence in

determining the routes followed by trade. London, Liverpool, Glasgow,

and other busy centres of life owe their importance to the rivers

which flow through them, especially since they are tidal rivers.

Heavily laden barges may be seen from London Bridge going up and down

with the tide every day.

Since the direction as well as the existence of large rivers is

regulated by mountains, it is clear that mountains have a very direct

influence on the trade of the world.

_Mountains supply many of our wants._ Besides water and soil, how

many useful things come from the hills! Their slopes, watered by

the clouds, frequently support an abundant growth of pine forest;

and thus we get wood for the shipwright and joiner. Again, mountains

are composed of harder rocks than we find in the plains, and that

is one reason why they stand out high above the rest of the world.

Their substance has been hardened to withstand for a longer time the

destruction to which all rocks are subjected. They have been greatly

compressed and generally more or less hardened by subterranean heat.

We bake clay and make it into hard bricks; so Nature has baked and

otherwise hardened the once soft strata of which mountains are

chiefly composed, converting them into slates, schist, gneiss, and

other kinds of rock called "metamorphic" by geologists, because they

have been altered or metamorphosed from their original condition (see

chapter viii., page 277). Again, granite, basalt, and other rocks

known as "igneous," which once existed in a molten condition, have

forced their way up from subterranean regions into the rocks forming

mountain-chains; and a good deal of the hardening just alluded to is

due to the presence of these fiery intruders, which have baked and

hardened the rocks around them to a considerable extent, altering

at the same time their mineral composition. The same causes which

led to the injection of granite, basalt, and other igneous rocks in

mountain-ranges brought other consequences in their train. Whatever

the causes, they were closely connected with volcanic eruptions, so

that highly heated water and steam found their way through cracks and

other fissures in the rocks; and in the course of time the chemical

actions thus set up led to the deposition of valuable metallic ores

within these fissures. In this way mineral veins were formed; and

volcanic action seems to be largely responsible for the production of

minerals. Thus we find around Vesuvius, and in fact in all volcanic

regions, large and varied supplies of minerals. Now, the geologist

discovers that many mountain-chains--such, for example, as the

Grampians, Alps, and Carpathians--have in past geological periods

been the seats of volcanic action on a grand scale; and so we need

not be surprised to learn that mountainous countries yield large

supplies of valuable gems and metallic ores (see chapter viii.,

page 277). Even in the days of Solomon, the active and business-like

Phoenicians were carrying on trade with Great Britain; and the tin

came from Cornwall. Besides tin, gold, silver, lead, copper, zinc,

and other metals come from our hills. Now, however, we get our copper

mostly from the Andes, and our gold from Australia or South Africa,

because it can be got more cheaply from these countries, to which

many of our Cornish miners have emigrated.

Precious stones also come chiefly from the hills, for the same

reason; for they were formed at the same time and by the same causes.

Cairngorms, agates, chalcedony, jasper, onyx, topaz, diamonds, and

many other gems are silent but certain witnesses to the action of

subterranean heat, acting long ago on the rocks which we now see

standing up high above the general surface of the ground, though

once they were buried deep down below the surface. Diamonds as well

as gold are often got from the beds of streams, but this is easily

accounted for; the streams have washed them out and brought them down

from the hills.

The following words from the Book of Job (xxviii. 5) might well be

applied to the hills.

"As for the earth, out of it cometh bread:

And underneath it is turned up as it were by fire.

The stones thereof are the place of sapphires,

And it hath dust of gold."

We have thus explained the three principal services rendered by

mountains, but some others remain to be mentioned.

_Mountains have an important influence on climate._ The climate of

highlands everywhere has certain peculiarities which distinguish

it from that of adjacent lowlands. The air resting on mountains is

less dense than that of the lowlands, and hence has fewer molecules

to obstruct the entering sunbeams by day, or to stop the outward

radiation at night. Therefore mountain air must be cooler; and so we

find that on mountains the mean, or average, annual temperature is

lower. This rarity of the air causes the ground to become hotter by

day and colder by night than the ground of the plains; and so the

extremes of temperature are greater. These extremes are injurious to

vegetation in the higher regions, and the want of moisture still

more so. But mountain-slopes _up to a certain height_ usually have

a moist climate; that is, they have more clouds and rain than the

surrounding lowlands. Below the region of snow there is generally

a heavy growth of forest; and forests in their turn exercise an

important influence, helping to collect moisture, and in various ways

to prevent extremes either of heat or cold.

The earth is divided into three well-marked zones or belts of

climate: (1) The torrid zone within the tropics, where the sun is

vertical twice a year, and days and nights are nearly equal; (2)

The temperate zones, where the sun's rays come more obliquely,

and so are less powerful, and where the length of day and night

varies considerably; and (3) The frigid zones, round each of the

poles, regions of intense cold, where for six months of the year

the sun is never seen. Now, these broad divisions, so familiar to

school children, are considerably interfered with by the height of

various districts above the sea-level, or, as geographers say, by

altitude. High ranges of mountains bring somewhat arctic conditions

with them, even in low latitudes, where one would expect great

heat. Thus the climate of the plains is very different from that

of their neighbouring mountain-ranges, although their latitudes are

practically the same. Travellers in Switzerland know how hot it can

be in the Rhone Valley or in the plain of Lombardy, and how much

cooler it is when you get up among the glaciers and the snowfields.

Or to take an illustration from Great Britain: a hot summer would be

somewhat trying in Edinburgh, Glasgow, or even Inverness, because

they lie low, while among the Grampians, on Speyside, or Braemar, it

would be very pleasant.

Vegetation follows climate. The sultry plains of the Ganges show

a luxuriant tropical vegetation, while on the middle slopes of

the Himalayas the climate is temperate, like that of Europe, and

consequently the vegetation resembles that of a temperate region; and

the highest parts of this great range are like polar latitudes in

their climate, and partly also in their vegetation.

The arctic character of the climate of high mountain regions shows

itself in the flora; for on the High Alps and the Highlands of

Scotland and Norway, we find no small number of truly arctic plants

whose home is much farther north. A very long time ago, when the

climate of the whole of Northern Europe was extremely severe, and

when great glaciers descended from the mountains into the plains,

so that the aspect of the country was somewhat similar to that of

Greenland at the present day, arctic plants and animals came down

from their northern home, and flourished abundantly. This was during

the _Great Ice Age_, which has left behind unmistakable evidences

which the geologist can interpret as if they were written records.

Then for some reason the climate became milder, the glaciers melted

away, in Great Britain at least; but these arctic plants were left

behind, and flourished still on the cool mountains, though they died

out on the warm plains (see chap. iv., pp. 123-124).

[Illustration: SNOW ON THE HIGH ALPS. FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY MR.

DONKIN.]

_Mountains help to cause movement and change in the atmosphere._

Let us see how this takes place. Mountains expose on one side their

masses of rock to the full heat of the sun. Rocks are capable of

becoming highly heated under a blazing sun: we have known stone

walls, even in England, to be almost too hot to touch; and perhaps

the reader may have often noticed the quivering of the hot air as

it rises from the ground on a summer day, especially over a road or

any piece of bare rocky ground. This quivering tells us that the air

is highly heated by the ground beneath, and is consequently rising.

You know how the pebbles look beneath a clear running stream; and

the things which we see through air in this state all seem to be

similarly moving or quivering. It is easy then to imagine how masses

of heated air would rise up from the side of a mountain-range which

faces the sun,--that is, the southern side,--while on the other, or

northern side they cast a soft shadow for leagues over the plains

at their feet. In this way mountains divide a district into two

different climates, with a light warm air on their southern slopes,

and colder air on the northern, and the rising of the warm air will

cause a certain amount of circulation and movement. Hence mountains

help to make currents in the atmosphere, and these currents produce

important consequences.

When mountain-ranges trend more or less directly across the direction

of prevailing winds, they always have a moist side and a dry one. In

the torrid zone, where easterly winds prevail, the eastern slope is

usually the moist side; but in higher latitudes, as, for example, in

Europe, the western side of mountain-ranges receives the greatest

amount of rainfall, because westerly winds prevail there.

_Mountains are barriers dividing not only one nation from another,

but separating also various tribes of plants and animals._ It will

be readily understood that with the exception of birds, whose powers

of flight render them independent of physical barriers, most animals

find mountains more impassable than men do. We can make roads and

railways, but they cannot thus aid their powers of locomotion; hence

mountains put limits to their migrations. Still, climate and food

supplies have a greater influence in determining the boundaries of

zoölogical provinces (see chapter iv.).

_Mountains are the backbones of continents._ A glance at a map of

the world will show that there is evidently a close connection

between continents and great mountain-chains. This connection shows

itself both in the shapes and general direction of continents.

Thus, the long continuous line of mountain-chain which extends from

the southern spur of the Andes to the northern end of the Rocky

Mountains,--a distance of about nine thousand miles,--corresponds

with the general trend of the North American continent, and forms

the axis or backbone of that vast tract of land. It seems as if the

sea on its western side were kept at bay by this great rocky wall,

while on its eastern side the rivers have formed new land. A line of

mountains is often the coast line, for the sea cannot overcome it

unless subsidence takes place. The backbone of Asia and Europe runs

east and west, and the continental area of the Old World follows the

same general direction.

These are the chief uses of mountains, and the facts which we have

brought forward will serve to show how indispensable they are. The

following eloquent passage from "Modern Painters" may form a fitting

close to the present chapter:--

"And thus those desolate and threatening ranges which in nearly

all ages of the world men have looked upon with aversion or

with horror, and shrunk back from as if they were haunted by

perpetual images of death, are in reality sources of life

and happiness, far fuller and more beneficent than all the

bright fruitfulness of the plain. The valleys only feed; the

mountains feed and guard and strengthen us. We take our ideas

of fearfulness and sublimity alternately from the mountains and

the sea; but we associate them unjustly. The sea-wave, with

all its beneficence, is yet devouring and terrible; but the

silent wave of the blue mountain is lifted towards heaven in a

stillness of perpetual mercy; and the one surge, unfathomable

in its darkness, the other unshaken in its faithfulness, for

ever bear the seal of their appointed symbolism:--

"'Thy _righteousness_ is like the great mountains,

Thy _judgements_ are a great deep.'"

CHAPTER III.

SUNSHINE AND STORM ON THE MOUNTAINS.

I would entreat your company

To see the wonders of the world.

_Two Gentlemen of Verona._

"The spirit of the hills is action, that of the lowlands repose."[9]

The plains, with their peaceful meadows and meandering streams, might

almost be said to be asleep; but the mountains are wide awake. They

are emphatically scenes of violent or rapid action. The wind blows

more fiercely among the mountain-peaks than over the plains below;

heat and cold are more extreme; and every process of change or decay

seems quickened.

[9] Ruskin, "Modern Painters."

Avalanches, falls of rock, earthquakes, storms, and floods exhibit

the more terrible aspects of the hills. Yet they have their gentler

moods: witness the brightness of the starry sky overhead, and its

intense blue by day, the wonderful sunrises and sunsets, the lovely

effects of light and shade, of cloud and mist, the stillness and

silence of the eternal snows in summer, and the beauty of the Alpine

flower.

Let us see what those who know mountains best have to say about the

wonderful things they have seen there. To begin with sunset and

sunrise. Professor Bonney remarks,--

"Not the least interesting peculiarity of an Alpine sunset

is the frequency with which its most beautiful effects are

revealed quite unexpectedly. Often at the close of a rainy

afternoon, the clouds, just before the sun goes down, break,

roll up, sometimes disperse as if by magic, in the glory of

those crimson rays that come darting upon them and piercing

every rift. Many a time have I watched the vapours around a

mountain-peak curling lightly upwards, and melting away into

the sky, till at last the unclouded summit glowed with flushes

of orange and rose, ere it grew pale and dead in its shroud of

fresh-fallen snow."[10]

[10] The Alpine Regions of Switzerland.

Here is a description by Professor Tyndall of a sunset witnessed in

the neighbourhood of the Weisshorn:--

"As the day approached its end, the scene assumed the most

sublime aspect. All the lower portions of the mountains were

deeply shaded, while the loftiest peaks, ranged upon a

semicircle, were fully exposed to the sinking sun. They seemed

pyramids of solid fire; while here and there long stretches

of crimson light drawn over the higher snowfields linked the

glorified summits together. An intensely illuminated geranium

flower seems to swim in its own colour, which apparently

surrounds the petals like a layer, and defeats by its lustre

any attempt of the eye to seize upon the sharp outline of the

leaves. A similar effect has been observed upon the mountains;

the glory did not seem to come from them alone, but seemed also

effluent from the air around them. This gave them a certain

buoyancy which suggested entire detachment from the earth.

They swam in splendour which intoxicated the soul; and I will

not now repeat in my moments of soberness the extravagant

analogies which ran through my brain. As the evening advanced,

the eastern heavens low down assumed a deep purple hue, above

which, and blended with it by infinitesimal gradations, was a

belt of red, and over this again zones of orange and violet. I

walked round the corner of the mountain at sunset, and found

the western sky glowing with a more transparent crimson than

that which overspread the east. The crown of the Weisshorn was

embedded in this magnificent light. After sunset the purple

of the east changed to a deep neutral tint; and against the

faded red which spread above it, the sun-forsaken mountains

laid their cold and ghostly heads. The ruddy colour vanished

more and more; the stars strengthened in lustre, until finally

the moon and they held undisputed possession of the blue-grey

sky."[11]

[11] Mountaineering in 1861 (Longman).

Marvellous sunsets are to be witnessed from the mountains of the New

World. The following is a short and graphic description of sunset

glories on the Sierra Nevada Mountains by Mr. Clarence King, whose

name is well known to geologists:--

"While I looked, the sun descended, shadows climbed the

Sierras, casting a gloom over foothill and pine, until at last

only the snow summits, reflecting the evening light, glowed

like red lamps along the mountain-wall for hundreds of miles.

The rest of the Sierra became invisible. The snow burned for a

moment in the violet sky, and at last went out."

These marvellous effects appeal powerfully to our sense of beauty

and produce in most minds feelings of intense delight; but they also

appeal to the reasoning faculty in man, and an intelligent observer

naturally inquires, "Why are these things so? How are those glorious

colours of crimson, orange, and yellow produced?" A full explanation

cannot be attempted here; but this much may perhaps be said without

tiring the patience of the reader. White light, such as sunlight or

the light from an electric arc, is composed of all the colours of the

rainbow,--violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, and red. A ray

of sunlight on passing through a prism is split up into all these

colours in the above order, and we get them arranged in a band which

is known as the spectrum. Thus it is proved that white light is made

up of all colours (black is not a colour, but the absence of colour).

Now, when the sun is low down in the sky, as at sunset, only some of

these colour-rays are able to pass through the atmosphere and so to

reach our eyes, while others are stopped in passing through very many

miles of atmosphere (as they must obviously do when the sun is low).

Those which are stopped are the blue rays and others allied to blue,

such as purple and green; but the red and yellow rays are able to

pass on till they come to us. Hence red, yellow, and orange are the

prevailing sunset tints.

What, then, becomes of the missing blue rays? They are caught by the

myriads of little floating particles in the air, and reflected away

from us. That is why we do not see them; their course is turned

back, just as waves breaking against a stone sea-wall are turned

back or reflected. A person situated _behind_ such a wall will not

see the waves which break against it; but suppose a _very_ big wave

came: it would come right over, and then we should soon become aware

of its presence. So it is with the little waves of light: some are

stopped and turned back as they break against the myriads of little

dust particles and the still more numerous particles of mist always

floating in the air; while others, which are larger, break over

them and travel on undisturbed until they reach our eyes. Now, the

larger waves of light are the red waves, while the smaller ones are

the blue waves; hence there is no difficulty in understanding why

the red waves (or vibrations) are seen at sunset and sunrise, to

the exclusion of the blue waves. But it must be borne in mind that

light-waves are of infinitesimal smallness, thousands and thousands

of them going to make up an inch. Sound also travels in waves, and

the phenomena of sound serve to illustrate those of light; but

sound-waves are very much larger.

The reason why the sky overhead appears blue is that we see the blue

rays reflected down to the earth from myriads of tiny dust and water

particles, while the red rays pass on over our heads, which is just

the reverse of what happens at sunset.

On the southern slopes of the Alps the blues of the sky are generally

very different from those on the northern side; and this is probably

due to the greater quantity of water-vapour in the air, for the moist

winds come from the south. Sunrises in the Alps are quite as glorious

to behold as sunsets; but comparatively few people rise early enough

to see them. Speaking generally, it may be said that in Alpine

sunrises the prevailing colours are orange and gold, in sunsets

crimson or violet-pink. After a cool night the atmospheric conditions

will obviously be different from those which exist after a warm day,

and more water-vapour will have been condensed into mist or cloud.

Hence we should expect a somewhat different effect.

The snowfields on high ranges of mountains are of a dazzling

whiteness; and their bright glare is so great as to distress the

eyes of those who walk over them without blue glasses, and even

to cause inflammation. At these heights the traveller is not only

exposed to the direct rays of the sun, untempered save for a thin

veil of rarefied air, but also to an intense glare produced by the

little snow-crystals which scatter around the beams of light falling

upon them. Scientific men, who have studied these matters, say that

the scorching of the skin and "sun-burning" experienced by Alpine

travellers is not caused, as might be supposed, by the heat of the

sun, but by the rays of light darting and flashing on all sides from

myriads of tiny snow-crystals.

Occasionally a soft lambent glow has been observed on snowfields

at night. This is a very curious phenomenon, to which the name of

"phosphorescence" has, rightly or wrongly, been given. A pale light

may often be seen on the sea during a summer night, when the water

is disturbed in any way; and if one is rowing in a boat, the oars

seem glowing with a faint and beautiful light. It is well known that

this is caused by myriads of little light-producing animalcules

in the sea-water. But we can hardly suppose that the glow above

referred to is produced by a similar cause. One observer says the

glow is "something like that produced by the flame of naphtha;"

and he goes on to say that at every step "an illuminated circle

or nimbus about two inches in breadth surrounded our feet, and we

seemed to be ploughing our way through fields of light, and raising

clods of it, if I may be allowed the expression, in our progress."

Another observer, also an Alpine traveller, says that at almost every

footstep the snowy particles, which his companion in front lifted

with his feet from the freshly fallen snow, fell in little luminous

showers. The exact cause which produces this strange effect at night

has not been ascertained.

There is another curious phenomenon often seen just before sunset on

a mountain in Hungary. It is known as "The Spectre of the Brocken."

The Brocken is the highest summit of the Hartz Mountains. As you step

out upon the plateau upon the top of the hill, your shadow, grim and

gigantic, is apparently flung right out against the eastern sky,

where it flits from place to place, following your every movement.

The explanation is simply this: to the east of the Hartz Mountains

there is always a very dense and hazy atmosphere, so dense that it

presents a surface capable of receiving the impression of a shadow,

and of retaining it, as a wall does. The shadows are really close

at hand, not a long way off, as might at first sight be supposed. If

very far away, they would be too faint to be visible.

In all mountainous regions the permanent habitations of men cease

at a limit far below the most elevated points reached by the

mountain-climber. St. Veran and Gargl, the highest villages of France

and Germany, are situated at the respective heights of 6,591 and

6,197 feet; but the Hospice of St. Bernard, in Switzerland, built

centuries ago to shelter travellers when benumbed with the cold, is

much more elevated, its height being 8,110 feet above sea-level. The

most elevated cluster of houses in the world is the convent of Hanle,

inhabited by twenty Thibetan priests; its height is 14,976 feet. None

of the villages of the Andes, except perhaps that of Santa Anna, in

Bolivia, have been built at so great a height.

Travellers who venture to ascend lofty mountains not only have to

suffer all the rigours of cold and run the risk of being frozen

on their route, but they may also experience painful sensations

owing to the rarefaction of the air. It would naturally be supposed

that at an elevation at which the pressure of the atmosphere is

reduced to one half, or even to one fourth that of the plains below,

a certain uneasiness should be caused by the change, the more so

since other conditions, such as warmth and moisture, are different.

Undaunted climbers, like Professor Tyndall, who have never felt the

effect of this "mountain-sickness" (_mal de montagne_), deny that

the sensations proceed from anything else than mere fatigue. In the

Himalayas, the traveller does not begin to suffer from the attacks of

this ailment until he has reached a height of 16,500 feet; while on

the Andes a large number of persons are affected by it at an altitude

of 10,700 feet. In the South American mountains, the symptoms are

much more serious: to the fatigue, head-ache, and want of breath are

added giddiness, sometimes fainting-fits, and bleeding from lips,

gums, and eyelids. The aeronaut, however, who is spared all the

fatigue of climbing, rarely suffers any inconvenience except from

cold, at such elevations. But on rising to greater heights, 30,000 or

40,000 feet, the malady shows itself; and if the balloon continued to

rise, the aerial voyager would infallibly perish.

Professor Bonney says:--

"I have occasionally seen persons singularly affected on high

mountains; and as the barometer stands at about sixteen inches

on Mont Blanc, and at thirty at sea-level, one would expect

this great difference to be felt. Still, I do not think it easy

to separate the inconveniences due to atmosphere from those

caused by unwonted fatigue, and am inclined to attribute most

of them to the latter."

But the fact that the aeronaut suffers seems conclusive.

The violent storms which break upon mountain districts often cause

floods of considerable magnitude, such as may be compared with the

memorable bursting of the Holmfirth reservoir. Hardly a year passes

without considerable damage being done: bridges are swept away; roads

are buried under torrents of mud, and fields overwhelmed with débris.

In August of the year 1860 a severe storm was witnessed by visitors

staying at Zermatt. It began with a thunder-storm; and rain fell for

about thirty-six hours, after which, as may be supposed, the torrents

were swollen far beyond their usual size. Lower down in the valleys

much harm was done, but there one bridge only was swept away. It

was, however, an awful sight to see the Visp roaring under one of the

bridges that remained, and to hear the heavy thuds of the boulders

that were being hurried on and dashed against one another by the

torrent.

In September, 1556, the town of Locarno, in the Canton Ticino, was

visited by a destructive storm and flood. The day began by several

shocks of earthquake, followed, about five o'clock, by a terrific

gale from the south. Part of the old castle was blown down; the doors

of St. Victor's Church were burst open by a blast while the priest

was at the altar; and everything within was overturned. At midday the

clouds were so thick that it was almost as dark as night. A violent

thunder-storm and torrents of rain followed, lasting from two to six

o'clock in the evening. The rivulets all became torrents; the stream

flowing through the town was so choked by uprooted trees and rocks

that its water flooded the streets and almost buried them under mud

and gravel. Such a sight as this gives one a powerful impression of

the geological work of streams when greatly swollen; for all this

débris must have been brought down from the surrounding mountains.

Many lives were lost by this calamity, and a great deal of property

was destroyed. Late in the year, during unsettled weather, the

traveller often encounters on Alpine passes a sudden storm of snow,

accompanied by violent gusts of wind, which fill the air with drifted

flakes; so that becoming bewildered, he loses his way, and at last

sinks down benumbed with cold and dies. Many a frequented pass in

Switzerland has been the scene of death from this cause. Exhausted

with fatigue, and overcome with cold, the traveller sinks down by the

wayside, and the guides, after having in vain endeavoured to urge him

on, are compelled, in order to save their own lives, to leave him to

his fate and press forward. The name "Tourmente" is given to these

storms.

On the tops of the highest mountains, even in very fine weather,

the wind often blows with great force; and the north wind, supposed

to be the mountaineer's best friend, is sometimes his enemy. It

not unfrequently happens that a gale renders the passage of some

exposed slope or ridge too dangerous, or the intense cold produces

frost-bites, so that an expedition has to be abandoned when success

is within reach, which naturally is very annoying. Professor Bonney,

speaking of such a gale which he experienced in 1864, says,--

"The cold was something horrible; the wind seemed to blow not

round, but through me, freezing my very marrow, and making my

teeth chatter like castanets; and if I stopped for a moment, I

shook as if in an ague-fit. It whisked up the small spiculæ of

frozen snow, and dashed them against my face with such violence

that it was hardly possible to look to windward. Thin sheets of

ice as large as my hand were whirled along the surface of the

glacier like paper.... When these gales are raging, the drifted

snow is blown far to leeward of the peaks in long streamers

like delicate cirrus-clouds; and on such occasions the mountain

is said by the guides _fumer sa pipe_ (to smoke his pipe). This

Mont Blanc was doing to some purpose the day that we were upon

him."

It is a curious fact that these gales are often confined to the

crests of the mountains, so that the wind may be raging among the

peaks while a few hundred feet lower down there is comparative calm.

The chief of the prevailing winds in the Alps is the Föhn. This is

a hot blast from the south which probably comes from the African

deserts. On its approach the air becomes close and stifling, the sky,

at first of unusual clearness, gradually thickens to a muddy and

murky hue, animals become restless and disquieted by the unnatural

dryness of the hot blast which now comes sweeping over the hills. In

some villages, it is said, all the fires are extinguished when this

wind begins to blow, for fear lest some chance spark should fall on

the dry wooden roofs and set the whole place in a blaze. Still the

Föhn is not altogether an "ill wind that blows nobody any good,"

for under its warm touch the winter snows melt away with marvellous

rapidity. In the valley of Grindelwald it causes a snow-bed two

feet thick to disappear in about a couple of hours, and produces in

twenty-four hours a greater effect than the sun does in fifteen days.

There is a Swiss proverb which rather profanely says: "If the Föhn

does not blow, the golden sun and the good God can do nothing with

the snow."

In summer-time, however, the south wind is never welcome, for the

vapour which it brings from the Italian plains is condensed by the

snows of the Alps, and streams down in torrents of rain.

A thunder-storm is always a grand spectacle. Among mountains such

storms are more frequent than on the plains, and also, as might be

expected, far more magnificent, especially at night. Flashes, or

rather sheets, of unutterable brilliancy light up the sky; distant

chains of mountains are revealed for a moment, only to be instantly

eclipsed by the pall of night. Says Professor Bonney,--

"No words can adequately express the awful grandeur of these

tempests when they burst among the mountains. I have often

been out in them,--in fact, far more frequently than was

pleasant; but perhaps the grandest of all was one that welcomed

me for the first time to Chamouni. As we entered the valley,

and caught sight of the white pinnacles of the _glacier des

Bossons_, a dark cloud came rolling up rapidly from the west.

Beneath it, just where two tall peaks towered up, the sky

glowed like a sheet of red-hot copper, and a lurid mist spread

over the neighbouring hills, wrapping them, as it seemed, in a

robe of flame. Onward rolled the cloud; the lightning began to

play; down the valley rushed a squall of wind, driving the dust

high in air before it, and followed by a torrent of rain.

Flash succeeded flash almost incessantly,--now darting from

cloud to cloud; now dividing itself into a number of separate

streaks of fire, and dancing all over the sky; now streaming

down upon the crags, and at times even leaping up from some

lofty peak into the air. The colours were often most beautiful,

and bright beyond description."

[Illustration: A STORM ON THE LAKE OF THUN. AFTER TURNER.]

The mountain traveller, when caught in a thunder-storm, undergoes a

strange experience, not unattended with danger. One observer[12] thus

describes his sensations:--

[12] Mr. R. S. Watson, in "The Alpine Journal," vol. i., p. 143.

"A loud peal of thunder was heard; and shortly after I observed

that a strange singing sound, like that of a kettle, was

issuing from my alpenstock. We halted, and finding that all the

axes and stocks emitted the same sound, stuck them into the

snow. The guide from the hotel now pulled off his cap, shouting

that his head burned; and his hair was seen to have a similar

appearance to that which it would have presented had he been

on an insulated stool under a powerful electrical machine. We

all of us experienced the sensation of pricking and burning in

some part of the body, more especially in the head and face,

my hair also standing on end in an uncomfortable but very

amusing manner. The snow gave out a hissing sound, as though a

heavy shower of hail were falling; the veil on the wide-awake

of one of the party stood upright in the air; and on waving

our hands, the singing sound issued loudly from the fingers.

Whenever a peal of thunder was heard, the phenomenon ceased, to

be resumed before its echoes died away. At these times we felt

shocks, more or less violent, in those portions of the body

which were most affected. By one of these shocks my right arm

was paralysed so completely that I could neither use nor raise

it for several minutes, nor indeed until it had been severely

rubbed; and I suffered much pain in it at the shoulder-joint

for some hours."

The successive layers of snow which fall on the mountains do not

remain there for ever. Unless got rid of in some way their thickness

would mount up to an enormous extent. It is reckoned that on the

Alps the average yearly fall of snow is thirty-three feet. In the

course of a century, therefore, the height of these mountains would

be increased by 3,300 feet, which we know is not the case. Various

causes prevent its accumulating, among which we may mention the

powerful influence of the sun's rays, the evaporation promoted by

the atmosphere, the thawing influence of rain and mist, avalanches,

and lastly, which is perhaps the most important, the fact that the

snow composing the snowfields, as they are called, of the high

regions slowly creeps down towards the valleys, where they move

along as glaciers, the ends of which are gradually melted away by

the warm air surrounding them, and thus the muddy glacier-streams

are originated. Few perils are more dreaded by the inhabitant of

the Alps than those of the avalanches. The particular way in which

each avalanche descends is varied according to the shape of the

mountain, the condition of the snow, and the time of the year. Hence

there are three different kinds of avalanche. First, there is the

ice-avalanche. The smaller glaciers, which, in the Alps, cling to the

upper slopes of the higher mountains, frequently terminate abruptly

on the edge of some precipice. Thus the ice, urged on by the pressure

of the masses above it, moves forward until it plunges over and

falls into the abyss below. Large portions break off; and these, as

they bound down the cliffs, are dashed into countless pieces, which

leap from crag to crag high into the air: now the falling mass, like

some swollen torrent, dashes with sullen roar through a gully, now,

emerging, crashes over a precipice, or spreads itself out like a fan,

as it hisses down a snow-slope. These avalanches expend their force

in the higher regions, and are harmless, unless any one happens to

be crossing their track at the time; but accidents from this source

can generally be avoided. In the distance the avalanches look like

waterfalls of the purest foam, but when approached are found to be

composed of fragments of ice of every size, from one, two, or more

cubic yards down to tiny little balls. In spring and summer, when the

white layers, softened by the heat, are falling away every hour from

the lofty summits of the Alps, the pedestrian, taking up a position

on some adjacent headland, may watch these sudden cataracts dashing

down into the gorges from the heights of the shining peaks. Year

after year travellers seated at their ease on the grassy banks of

the Wengern Alp have watched with pleasure the avalanches rolling to

the base of the silvery pyramid of the Jungfrau. First, the mass of

ice is seen to plunge forth like a cataract, and lose itself in the

lower parts of the mountain; whirlwinds of powdered snow, like clouds

of bright smoke, rise far and wide into the air; and then, when the

cloud has passed away, and the region has again assumed its solemn

calm, the thunder of the avalanche is suddenly heard reverberating

in deep echoes in the mountain gorges, as if it were the voice of the

mountain itself.

The other two kinds of avalanche are composed of snow. The

dust-avalanche usually falls in winter-time, when the mountains are

covered deep with fresh-fallen snow. Such masses of snow, not yet

compacted into ice, rest insecurely upon the icy slopes, and hang

in festoons and curtains over the peaks, or lie on smooth banks of

pasture, until some accident, such as a gust of wind, breaks the

spell, and the whole mass slides down into the valley below. These

avalanches are accompanied by fearful blasts of wind which work dire

destruction. Almost the whole village of Leukerbad was destroyed by

one of these on the 14th of January, 1719, and fifty-five persons

perished. In 1749, more than one hundred persons were killed in the

village of Ruaras (Grisons), which during the night was overwhelmed

by an avalanche. So silently were some of the houses buried that the

inhabitants, on waking in the morning, could not conceive why the

day did not dawn. It is said, though it seems almost incredible,

that in the time of the Suabian War, in the year 1498, one of these

avalanches swept four hundred soldiers over a cliff, and they all

escaped without serious injury.

The army of General Macdonald, in his celebrated passage of

the Splügen in December, 1800, suffered severely from these

dust-avalanches. A troupe of horse was completely cut through while

on the march; and thirty dragoons were precipitated into a gulf below

the road, where they all perished. And again, some days afterwards,

in descending a gorge, the columns were repeatedly severed by

avalanches; and more than one hundred soldiers, with a number of

horses and mules, were lost. On one of these occasions the drummer

of a regiment was carried away; and it is said that they heard him

beating his drum in the gorge below, in the hope that his comrades

would come to his rescue. Help, however, was out of the question. The

sounds gradually became fainter, and the poor lad must have perished

in the cold.

The ground-avalanches are different from those just described,

consisting of dense and almost solid masses of snow which have lain

for a long time exposed to atmospheric influences. They are much

heavier than the dust-avalanches, and therefore more destructive;

so that the inhabitants take great pains to protect themselves from

this source of danger. Thickly planted trees are the best protection

against avalanches of every kind. Snow which has fallen in a wood

cannot very well shift its place; and when masses of snow descend

from the slopes above, they are unable to break through so strong

a barrier. Small shrubs, such as rhododendrons, or even heaths and

meadow-grass, are often sufficient to prevent the slipping of the

snow; and therefore it is very imprudent not to allow them to grow

freely on mountain-slopes. But it is still more dangerous to cut down

protecting forests, or even to do so partly. This was illustrated by

the case of a mountain in the Pyrenees, in the lofty valley of Neste;

after it had been partially cleared of trees, a tremendous avalanche

fell down in 1846, and in its fall swept away more than fifteen

thousand fir-trees.

The Swiss records tell us what a terrible scourge the avalanche can

be in villages which in summer-time appear such calm and happy

scenes of pastoral life. M. Joanne, in the introduction to his

valuable "Itinéraire de la Suisse"[13] gives a list of twelve of

the most destructive avalanches that have fallen in Switzerland. In

old days they seem to have been as great a source of danger as in

modern times. Thus we find that in the year 1500, a caravan of six

hundred persons was swept away in crossing the Great St. Bernard;

three hundred were buried under an avalanche which fell from Monte

Cassedra (Ticino). Another one in the year 1720, at Obergestelen,

in the Rhone Valley, destroyed one hundred and twenty cottages,

four hundred head of cattle, and eighty-eight persons. The bodies

were buried in a large pit in the village cemetery, on the wall

of which was engraved the following pathetic inscription: "O God,

what sorrow!--eighty-eight in a single grave!" ("Gott, welche

Trauer!--acht und achtzig in einem Grab!")

[13] Conservateur Suisse, xlvi. p. 478, vol. xii.

It is a curious fact that animals have a wonderful power of

anticipating coming catastrophes. When human beings are unaware of

danger, they are often warned by the behaviour of animals. Country

people sometimes say that they can tell from the birds when the

weather is about to change; and there is little doubt but that

sea-gulls come inland before rough, stormy weather. But in the case

of earthquakes the behaviour of birds, beasts, and even fishes is

very striking. It is said that before an earthquake rats, mice,

moles, lizards, and serpents frequently come out of their holes, and

hasten hither and thither as if smitten with terror. At Naples, it

is said that the ants quitted their underground passages some hours

before the earthquake of July 26, 1805; that grasshoppers crossed

the town in order to reach the coast; and that the fish approached

the shore in shoals. Avalanches, it is well known, produce tremors

similar to those due to slight earthquake shocks; and there are many

stories in Switzerland of the behaviour of animals just before the

catastrophe takes place. Berlepsch relates that a pack-horse on the

Scaletta Pass, which was always most steady, became restive when

an avalanche was coming; so that he was valuable to his owners in

bad weather. One day, when near the summit of the pass, he suddenly

stopped. They foolishly took no notice of his warning this time; but

he presently darted off at full speed. In a few seconds the avalanche

came and buried the whole party.

If these stories can be relied upon, it would seem that animals are

either more sensitive to very slight tremors of the earth, or else

that they are more on the lookout than human beings. Perhaps North

American Indians have learned from animals in this respect, for they

can tell of a coming enemy on the march by putting their ears to the

ground and listening.

But there are worse dangers in the mountains than falls of snow and

ice, for sometimes masses of rock come hurtling down, or worse still,

the whole side of a mountain gives way and spreads ruin far and wide.

Perpendicular or overhanging rocks, which seem securely fastened,

suddenly become detached and rush headlong down the mountain-side.

In their rapid fall, they raise a cloud of dust like the ashes

vomited forth by a volcano; a horrible darkness is spread over a once

pleasant valley; and the unfortunate inhabitants, unable to see what

is taking place, are only aware of the trembling of the ground, and

the crashing din of the rocks as they strike together and shatter one

another in pieces. When the cloud of dust is cleared away, nothing

but heaps of stones and rubbish are to be seen where pastures once

grew, or the peasant ploughed his acres in peace. The stream flowing

down the valley is obstructed in its course, and changed into a

muddy lake; the rampart of rocks from which some débris still comes

crumbling down has lost its old form; the sharpened edges point out

the denuded cliff from which a large part of the mountain has broken

away. In the Pyrenees, Alps, and other important ranges there are but

few valleys where one cannot see the confused heaps of fallen rocks.

Many of these catastrophes, known as the "Bergfall," have been

recorded; and the records tell of the fearful havoc and destruction

to life and property due to this cause. In Italy the ancient Roman

town of Velleja was buried, about the fourth century, by the downfall

of the mountain of Rovinazzo; and the large quantity of bones and

coins that have been found proves that the fall was so sudden that

the inhabitants had no time to escape.

Taurentum, another Roman town, situated, it is said, on the banks

of Lake Geneva, at the base of one of the spurs of the Dent d'Oche,

was completely crushed in A. D. 563 by a downfall of rocks. The

sloping heap of débris thus formed may still be seen advancing like a

headland into the waters of the lake. A terrible flood-wave, produced

by the deluge of stones, reached the opposite shores of the lake and

swept away all the inhabitants. Every town and village on the banks,

from Morges to Vevay, was demolished, and they did not begin the work

of rebuilding till the following century. Some say, however, that the

disaster was caused by a landslip which fell from the Grammont or

Derochiaz across the valley of the Rhone, just above the spot where

it flows into the Lake of Geneva. Hundreds of such falls have taken

place within the Alps and neighbouring mountains within historic

times.

Two out of the five peaks of the Diablerets fell down, one in 1714

and the other in 1749, covering the pastures with a thick layer

of stones and earth more than three hundred feet thick, and by

obstructing the course of the stream of Lizerne, formed the three

lakes of Derborence. In like manner the Bernina, the Dent du Midi,

the Dent de Mayen, and the Righi have overspread with ruin vast

tracts of cultivated land. In Switzerland the most noted Bergfalls

are those from the Diablerets and the Rossberg. The former mountain

is a long flattish ridge with several small peaks, overhanging very

steep walls of rock on either side. These walls are composed of

alternating beds of limestone and shale. Hence it is easily perceived

that we have here conditions favourable for landslips, because if

anything weakens one of these beds of shale the overlying mass

might be inclined to break away. The fall in the year 1714, already

referred to, was a very destructive one.

[Illustration: THE MATTERHORN. FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY MR. DONKIN.]

"For two whole days previously loud groaning had been heard to

issue from the mountain, as though some imprisoned spirit were

struggling to release himself, like Typhoeus from under Etna;

then a vast fragment of the upper part of the mountain broke

suddenly away and thundered down the precipices into the valley

beneath. In a few minutes fifty-five châlets, with sixteen

men and many head of cattle, were buried for ever under the

ruins. One remarkable escape has indeed been recorded, perhaps

the most marvellous ever known. A solitary herdsman from the

village of Avent occupied one of the châlets which were buried

under the fallen mass. Not a trace of it remained; his friends

in the valley below returned from their unsuccessful search,

and mourned him as dead. He was, however, still among the

living; a huge rock had fallen in such a manner as to protect

the roof of his châlet, which, as is often the case, rested

against a cliff. Above this, stones and earth had accumulated,

and the man was buried alive. Death would soon have released

him from his imprisonment, had not a little rill of water

forced its way through the débris and trickled into the châlet.

Supported by this and by his store of cheese, he lived three

months, labouring all the while incessantly to escape. Shortly

before Christmas he succeeded, after almost incredible toil, in

once more looking on the light of day, which his dazzled eyes,

so long accustomed to the murky darkness below, for a while

could scarcely support. He hastened down to his home in Avent,

and knocked at his own door; pale and haggard, he scarcely

seemed a being of this world. His relations would not believe

that one so long lost could yet be alive, and the door was shut

in his face. He turned to a friend's house; no better welcome

awaited him. Terror seized upon the village; the priest was

summoned to exorcise the supposed demon; and it was not till he

came that the unfortunate man could persuade them that he was

no spectre, but flesh and blood."[14]

[14] Bonney.

The valley is still a wild scene of desolation, owing to the

enormous masses of stones of every shape and size with which its bed

is filled.

In September of the year 1806, the second fall of the mountain

Rossberg took place, after a wet summer. It is underlaid by beds of

clay which, when water penetrates, are apt to give way. The part

which fell was about three miles long and 350 yards wide and 33 yards

thick. In five minutes one of the most fertile valleys in Switzerland

was changed to a stony desert. Three whole villages, six churches,

120 houses, 200 stables or châlets, 225 head of cattle, and much land

were buried under the ruins of the Rossberg; 484 persons lost their

lives. Some remarkable escapes are recorded.

In the year 1618 the downfall of Monte Conto buried 2,400 inhabitants

of the village of Pleurs, near Chiavenna. Excavation among the

ruins was subsequently attempted, but a few mangled corpses and a

church-bell were all that could be reached.

Geologically these phenomena, appalling as they are from the human

point of view, possess a certain interest, and their effects deserve

to be studied.

There is yet another danger to which dwellers in mountains are

occasionally exposed; namely, the earthquake. It seems to be an

established fact that earthquake shocks are more frequent in

mountainous than in flat countries. The origin of these dangerous

disturbances of the earth's crust has not yet been fully explained.

They are probably caused in various ways; and it is very likely

that the upheaval of mountain-chains is one of the causes at work.

Earthquakes have for many years been carefully studied by scientific

men, and some valuable discoveries have been made. Thus we find that

they are more frequent in winter than summer, and also happen more

often by night than by day. Day and night are like summer and winter

on a small scale, and so we need not be surprised at this discovery.

Some have maintained that there is a connection between earthquakes

and the position of the moon; while others consider that the state

of the atmosphere also exerts an influence, and that earthquakes

are connected with rainy seasons, storms, etc. Earthquakes are very

often due to volcanic eruptions, but this is not always the case (see

chapter vi., page 199).

CHAPTER IV.

MOUNTAIN PLANTS AND ANIMALS.

The high hills are a refuge for the wild goats, and so are the

stony rocks for the conies.--_Psalm civ. 18._

There must be few people who have neither seen nor heard of the

beauty and exquisite colours of Alpine[15] flowers. They are first

seen on the fringes of the stately woods above the cultivated

land; then in multitudes on the sloping pastures with which many

mountain-chains are robed, brightening the verdure with innumerable

colours; and higher up, where neither grass nor loose herbage can

exist, among the slopes of shattered fragments which roll down from

the mountain-tops,--nay, even amidst the glaciers,--they gladden the

eye of the traveller and seem to plead sweetly with the spirits of

destruction. Alpine plants fringe the vast hills of snow and ice of

the high hills, and sometimes have scarcely time to flower and ripen

a few seeds before being again covered by their snowy bed. When

the season is unfavourable, numbers of them remain under the snow

for more than a year; and here they safely rest, unharmed by the

alternations of frost and biting winds, with moist and springlike

days. They possess the great charm of endless variety of form and

colour, and represent widely separated divisions of the vegetable

kingdom; but they are all small and low-growing compared to their

relatives grown in the plains, where the soil is richer and the

climate milder. Among them are tiny orchids quite as interesting

in their way as those from the tropics; liliputian trees, and a

tree-like moss (_Lycopodium dendroideum_) branching into an erect

little pyramid as if in imitation of a mountain pine; ferns that peep

cautiously from narrow rocky crevices as if clinging to the rock

for shelter from the cold blasts; bulbous plants, from lilies to

bluebells; evergreen shrubs, perfect in leaf and blossom and fruit,

yet so small that one's hat will cover them; exquisite creeping

plants spreading freely along the ground, and when they creep over

the brows of rocks or stones, draping them with curtains of colour

as lovely as those we see in the forests; numberless minute plants

scarcely larger than mosses, mantling the earth with fresh green

carpets in the midst of winter; succulent plants in endless variety;

and lastly the ferns, mosses, and lichens which are such an endless

source of pleasure and delight to the traveller. In short, Alpine

vegetation presents us with nearly every type of plant life of

northern and temperate climes, chastened in tone and diminished in

size.

[15] The word "Alpine" is used in a general sense to denote the

vegetation that grows naturally on the most elevated regions of

the earth; that is, on all high mountains, whether they rise up

in hot tropical plains or in cooler northern pastures.

It is not difficult to account for the small size of these plants;

for in the first place we cannot expect a large or luxuriant growth

where the air is cold, the soil scanty, and the light of the sun

often obscured by clouds, and where the changes of temperature are

rapid,--which is very unfavourable to most plants. Again, in the

close struggle for existence which takes place on the plains and low

tree-clad hills, the smaller forms of plant life are often overrun by

trees, trailing plants, bushes, and vigorous herbs; but where these

cannot find a home, owing to the severity of the winter and other

causes, the little Alpine plants, covered up by snow in the winter,

can thrive abundantly. And lastly, like the older and conquered races

of men who have been driven to the hills (see chap. i., p. 28) and

find shelter there, so there are both plants and animals living in

the mountains which man will not suffer to live in the plain where

he grows his crops, pastures his cattle, or builds his cities. We

would also venture to suggest that possibly some plants have been

ousted from plains by newer and more aggressive types, which came and

took their place. If so, vegetable life would afford an illustration

of a process which has so often taken place in human history. This

is only a speculation, but still it might be worth following up. If

Alpine plants, or any considerable number of them, could be shown

to belong to more ancient types, such as flourished in the later

geological periods, that would afford some evidence in favour of

the idea. Whether this is so or not, plant life on the mountains is

almost entirely protected from the destroying hands of men with their

ploughs and scythes, as well as from many grazing animals. As Mr.

Ruskin quaintly says:

"The flowers which on the arable plain fell before the plough

now find out for themselves unapproachable places, where year

by year they gather into happier fellowship and fear no evil."

It is clear that the climate of a mountainous region determines the

character of the vegetation. Now, the climate will be different in

different parts of a mountain-range, and will depend upon the height

above the sea and other causes.[16] Some writers upon this subject

have attached too much importance to absolute height above the sea,

as though this were the only cause at work. It is a very important

cause, no doubt, but there are others which also have a great

influence, such as the position of each locality with respect to the

great mountain masses, the local conditions of exposure to the sun

and protection from cold winds, or the reverse. However, in spite of

local irregularities there are in the Alps certain broad zones or

belts of vegetation which may be briefly described as follows:--

[16] The following remarks are largely taken from the

Introduction to Ball's well-known "Alpine Guide."

1. _The Olive region._--This region curiously illustrates what has

just been said about other causes besides height influencing the

climate and vegetation. For along the southern base of the Alps, the

lower slopes and the mouths of the valleys have a decidedly warmer

climate than the plains of Piedmont and Lombardy. Thus, while the

winter climate of Milan is colder than that of Edinburgh, the olive

can ripen its fruit along the skirts of the mountain region, and

penetrates to a certain distance towards the interior of the chain

along the lakes and the wider valleys of the Southern Alps. Even up

the shores of the Lake of Garda, where the evergreen oak grows, the

olive has become wild. The milder climate of the Borromean Islands,

and some points on the shores of the Lago Maggiore, will permit many

plants of the warmer temperate zone to grow; while at a distance of a

few miles, and close to the shores of the same lake, but in positions

exposed to the cold winds from the Alps, plants of the Alpine region

grow freely, and no delicate perennials can survive the winter. The

olive has been known to resist a temperature of about 16° F. (or

16° below the freezing point of water), but is generally destroyed

by a less degree of cold. It can only be successfully cultivated

where the winter frosts are neither long nor severe, where the mean

temperature of winter does not fall below 42° F., and a heat of 75°

F. during the day is continued through four or five months of the

summer and autumn.

2. _The Vine region._--The vine, being more tolerant of cold than the

olive, can grow at a higher level; and so the next zone of vegetation

in the Alps may be called "the Vine region." But to give tolerable

wine it requires at the season of ripening of the grape almost as

much warmth as the olive needs. Vines can grow in the deeper valleys

throughout a great part of the Alpine chain, and in favourable

situations up to a considerable height on their northern slopes.

On the south side, although the limit of perpetual snow is lower,

the vine often reaches near to the foot of the greater peaks. But

the fitness of a particular spot for the production of wine depends

far more on the direction of the valley and of the prevailing winds

than on the height. And so it happens that in the Canton Valais, the

Valley of the Arc in Savoy, and some others on the north side of the

dividing range, tolerable wine is made at a higher level than in the

valleys of Lombardy, whose direction allows the free passage of the

keen northern blasts. It is a curious fact that in the Alps the vine

often resists a winter temperature which would kill it down to the

roots in the low country; and we must explain it by the protection

of the deep winter snow. Along with the vine many species of wild

plants, especially annuals, characteristic of the flora of the south

of Europe, show themselves in the valleys of the Alps.

3. _The Mountain region, or region of deciduous trees._--Many writers

take the growth of corn as the characteristic of the colder temperate

zone, corresponding to what has been called the mountain region of

the Alps. But so many varieties, all with different requirements,

are in cultivation, that it is impossible to take the growth of

cereals in general as marking clearly any natural division of the

surface. A more natural limit is marked by the presence of deciduous

trees (trees which shed their leaves). Although the oak, beech, and

ash do not exactly reach the same height, and are not often seen

growing side by side in the Alps, yet their upper limit marks pretty

accurately the transition from a temperate to a colder climate that

is shown by a general change in the wild, herbaceous vegetation. The

lower limit of this zone is too irregular to be exactly defined, but

its upper boundary is about 4,000 feet on the cold north side of the

Alps, and often rises to 5,500 feet on the southern slopes, which of

course get more sunshine and warmth. The climate of this region is

favourable to the growth of such trees as the oak, beech, and ash,

but it does not follow that we should see them there in any great

numbers at the present time; for it is probable that at a very early

date they were extensively destroyed for building purposes, and to

clear space for meadow and pasture land, so that with the exception

of the beech forests of the Austrian Alps, there is scarcely a

considerable wood of deciduous trees to be seen anywhere in the

chain. In many districts where the population is not too dense, the

pine and Scotch fir have taken the place of the oak and beech, mainly

because the young plants are not so eagerly attacked by goats, the

great destroyers of trees.

4. _The region of Coniferous trees._--Botanically this region is

best distinguished by the prevalence of coniferous trees, forming

vast forests, which if not kept down by man (and by goats) would

cover the slopes of the Alps. The prevailing species are the common

fir and the silver fir. In districts where granite abounds, the

larch flourishes and reaches a greater size than any other tree.

Less common are the Scotch fir and the arolla, or Siberian fir.

In the Eastern Alps the dwarf pine becomes conspicuous, forming

a distinct zone on the higher mountains above the level of other

firs. The pine forests play a most important part in the natural

economy of the Alps; and their preservation is a matter of very great

importance to the future inhabitants. But in some places they have

been considerably diminished by cutting. This has especially happened

in the neighbourhood of mines; and in consequence the people of the

unfrequented communes have become so alive to this that some jealousy

is felt of strangers wandering among the mountains, lest they should

discover metals and cause the destruction of the woods. Their fears

are not unreasonable; for the forests, besides exerting a good deal

of influence on rainfall and climate, form natural defences against

the rush of the spring avalanches (see chapter iii., page 93). It is

recorded that after the war of 1799, in which many of those near the

St. Gothard Pass were destroyed, the neighbouring villages suffered

terribly from this scourge. Hence the laws do not allow of timber

being cut in certain forests called "Bannwalde;" and in most places

the right of felling trees is strictly regulated, and the woods are

under the inspection of officials.

In spots high up among the mountains, to which access is difficult,

the timber is converted into charcoal, which is then brought down

in sacks by horses and mules. There are two ways in which timber is

conveyed down from the forest: either it is cut up into logs some

five feet long, and thrown into a neighbouring torrent, which brings

it down over cliff and gorge to the valley below; or else trough-like

slides are constructed along the mountain-sides, down which the

trunks themselves are launched.

It is this region of coniferous trees which mainly determines the

manner of life of the population of the Alps. In the month of May the

horned cattle, having been fed in houses during the winter (as they

are in the Scotch Highlands, where the cowsheds are called "byres"),

are led up to the lower pastures. The lower châlets, occupied in May

and part of June, generally stand at about the upper limit of the

mountain region. Towards the middle or end of June the cattle are

moved up to the chief pastures, towards the upper part of the region

of coniferous trees, where they usually remain for the next two or

three months. But there are some available pastures still higher up,

and hither some of the cattle are sent for a month or more.

5. _The Alpine region._--This is the zone of vegetation extending

from the upper limit of trees to where permanent masses of snow first

make their appearance; so that where the trees cease, the peculiar

Alpine plants begin; but we still find shrubs, such as the common

rhododendron, Alpine willow, and the common juniper, which extend

up to, and the latter even beyond, the level of perpetual snow. The

limits of this interesting and delightful botanical region may be

fixed between 6,000 and 8,000 feet above the sea, and at least 1,000

feet higher on the south slopes of the Alps, which get more sunshine.

It is used to some extent for pasture; and in Piedmont it is not

uncommon to find châlets at the height of 8,500 feet, and vegetation

often extends freely up to 9,500 feet. Here and there, at levels

below this zone, many Alpine species may be found, either transported

by accident from their natural home, or finding a permanent

refuge in some cool spot sheltered from the sun, and moistened by

streamlets descending from the snow region. But it is chiefly here

that those delightful flowers grow which make the Alps like a great

flower-garden,--great anemones, white and sulphur-coloured; gentians

of the deepest blue, like the sky overhead; campanulas, geums, Alpine

solanellas, and forget-me-nots; asters, ox-eyed daisies, pale pink

primulas, purple heartsease, edelweiss, saxifrages, yellow poppies,

Alpine toad-flax, monkshood, potentilla, and others too numerous to

mention. Says Professor Bonney,--

"Who cannot recall many a happy hour spent in rambling from

cluster to cluster on the side of some great Alp?--the scent of

sweet herbage or of sweeter daphne perfuming the invigorating

air, the melody of the cattle-bells borne up from some far-off

pasture, while the great blue vault of heaven above seems

reflected in the gentian clusters at his feet. The love of

flowers seems natural to almost every human being, however

forlorn his life may have been, however far it may have missed

its appointed mark. It may well be so; they at least are fresh

and untainted from their Maker's hand; the cry of 'Nature red

in tooth and claw' scarce breaks their calm repose. Side by

side they flourish without strife; none 'letteth or hindereth

another,' yet so tender and delicate, doomed to fade all too

soon, a touch of sadness is ever present to give a deeper

pathos to our love."

6. _The Glacial region._--This comprehends all that portion of the

Alps that rises above the limit of perpetual snow. But a word of

explanation is necessary. The highest parts of the Alps are not

covered by one continuous sheet of snow; otherwise we should never

see any peaks or crags there. Some are too steep for the snow to

rest upon them, and therefore remain bare at heights much greater

than the so-called "limit of perpetual snow," and that limit varies

considerably. Still this term has a definite meaning when rightly

understood. Leaving out of account masses of snow that accumulate in

hollows shaded from the sun, the "snow-line" is fairly even, so that

on viewing an Alpine range from a distance, the larger patches and

fields of snow on adjoining mountains, with the same aspect, are seen

to maintain a pretty constant level.

[Illustration: ON A GLACIER.]

Vegetation becomes scarce in this region, not, as commonly supposed,

because Alpine plants do not here find the necessary conditions for

growth, but simply for want of soil. The intense heat of the direct

rays of the sun (see chapter iii., pages 76-77) compensates for the

cold of the night; and it is probable that the greater allowance of

light also stimulates vegetable life. But all the more level parts

are covered with ice or snow; and the higher we ascend, the less the

surface remains bare, with the exception of the projecting rocks

which usually undergo rapid destruction and breaking up from the

freezing of whatever water finds its way into their fissures.

Nevertheless, many species of flowering plants have been found even

at the height of eleven thousand feet.

It is in this region that plants are found whose true home is in the

arctic regions (see chapter ii., pages 64-65).

For the sake of those who love ferns, lycopods, and other cryptogamic

or flowerless plants, a few words may be said here. Of the

polypodies, the beech fern and oak fern are generally common, so is

the limestone polypody in places where limestone occurs. Another

species (_P. alpestre_) very like the lady fern grows plentifully

in many places. The parsley fern, familiar to the botanist in Wales

and other parts of Great Britain, is common, especially on the

crystalline rocks, and ascends to above seven thousand feet. The

holly fern is perhaps the most characteristic one of the higher Alps.

It is abundant in almost every district from the Viso to the Tyrol,

ranging from about five thousand feet to nearly eight thousand feet.

The finest specimens are to be found in the limestone districts.

Nestling down in little channels worn out of the rock, it shoots out

great fronds, often more than eighteen inches long, which are giants

compared to the stunted specimens seen on rockwork in English gardens.

_Asplenium septentrionale_ is very common in most of the districts

where crystalline rocks abound. The hart's tongue is hardly to be

called a mountain fern. The common brake is confined to the lower

slopes.

_Cistopteris fragillis_ and _C. dentata_ are common, and the more

delicate _C. Alpina_ is not rare. The noble _Osmunda regalis_ keeps

to the warmer valleys. The moonwort abounds in the upper pastures.

The club-mosses (_Lycopodium_), which are found in Great Britain,

are common in most parts of the Alps, especially the _L. selago_,

which grows almost up to the verge of the snows. Lower down is the

delicate _L. velveticum_, which creeps among the damp mosses under

the shade of the forest. Many of the smaller species stain with

spots of crimson, orange, and purple the rocks among the snowfields

and glaciers, and gain the summits of peaks more than eighteen

thousand feet above the sea, reaching even to the highest rocks in

the Alpine chain. For the sake of readers who are not familiar with

that wonderful book, "Modern Painters," we will quote some exquisite

passages on lichens and mosses, full of beautiful thoughts:--

"We have found beauty in the tree yielding fruit and in the herb

yielding seed. How of the herb yielding no seed,--the fruitless,

flowerless[17] lichen of the rock?

[17] Flowerless in the ordinary, not the botanical sense.

"Lichens and mosses (though these last in their luxuriance are deep

and rich as herbage, yet both for the most part humblest of the

green things that live),--how of these? Meek creatures!--the first

mercy of the earth, veiling with trusted softness its dintless rocks,

creatures full of pity, covering with strange and tender honour

the scarred disgrace of ruin, laying quiet finger on the trembling

stones to teach them rest. No words that I know of will say what

these mosses are; none are delicate enough, none perfect enough, none

rich enough. How is one to tell of the rounded bosses of furred and

beaming green; the starred divisions of rubied bloom, fine-filmed, as

if the Rock Spirits could spin porphyry as we do grass; the traceries

of intricate silver, and fringes of amber, lustrous, arborescent,

burnished through every fibre into fitful brightness and glossy

traverses of silken change, yet all subdued and pensive, and framed

for simplest, sweetest offices of grace? They will not be gathered,

like the flowers, for chaplet or love token; but of these the wild

bird will make its nest and the wearied child his pillow.

"And as the earth's first mercy, so they are its last gift to us.

When all other service is vain, from plant and tree the soft mosses

and grey lichen take up their watch by the headstone. The woods, the

blossoms, the gift-bearing grasses, have done their parts for a time,

but these do service for ever. Tree for the builder's yard--flowers

for the bride's chamber--corn for the granary--moss for the grave.

"Yet as in one sense the humblest, in another they are the most

honoured of the earth-children; unfading as motionless, the worm

frets them not and the autumn wastes not. Strong in lowliness, they

neither blanch in heat nor pine in frost. To them, slow-fingered,

constant-hearted, is entrusted the weaving of the dark, eternal

tapestries of the hills; to them, slow-pencilled, iris-dyed, the

tender framing of their endless imagery. Sharing the stillness of

the unimpassioned rock, they share also its endurance; and while the

winds of departing spring scatter the white hawthorn blossom like

drifted snow, and summer dims on the parched meadow the drooping

of its cowslip,--gold far above, among the mountains, the silver

lichen-spots rest, star-like, on the stone; and the gathering

orange-stain upon the edge of yonder western peak reflects the

sunsets of a thousand years."

Alpine and arctic plants are met with in Great Britain, but Scotland

has a much more extensive arctic-Alpine flora than England, Wales,

or Ireland, the reason being the greater altitude of its mountains.

The combined flora of the United Kingdom contains only ninety-one

species of arctic-Alpine plants, and of these eighty-eight--that is,

all but three--are natives of Scotland. Of these three the first is

a gentian (_Gentiana verna_), which is to be found on the hills of

West Yorkshire, Durham, Westmoreland, and other parts. It comes from

the Alps. The second is _Lloydia serotina_,--a small bulbous plant

with white flowers, which is found on the hills of Carnarvonshire,

in Wales. The third, well known in English gardens, is London pride

(_Saxifraga umbrosa_), which is only to be found on the southwest

Irish hills.

Of the ninety-one arctic-Alpine species, just about half are also

natives of England and Wales, but only twenty-five belong to Ireland.

If we examine the lists of the flora of Arctic Europe we find that

all these, except about six, are found in arctic regions; and if we

travel farther north till we come actually to polar regions, we find

nearly fifty of these species growing there near the sea-level. The

Grampian Mountains are the chief centre of the Scottish arctic-Alpine

flora. The two principal localities for such flowers in that range

are the Breadalbane Mountains in Perthshire, and the Cænlochan and

Clova Mountains of Forfarshire. There are also a goodly number on the

mountains of the Braemar district.

The history of the arctic-Alpine flora of Europe is a very

interesting one. These plants, whose true home is in the arctic

regions, living high up on the mountains of Europe, give unmistakable

evidence of a time, very far back, when Northern Europe was overrun

by glaciers and snowfields so as to resemble in appearance and in

climate the Greenland of the present day. This period is known to

geologists as the "Great Ice Age." The moraines of glaciers, ice-worn

rock surfaces, and other unmistakable signs may be well seen in

many parts of Great Britain. How long ago this took place we cannot

say; but judging from the considerable changes in geography which

have undoubtedly taken place since then, we must conclude that many

thousands of years, perhaps two hundred thousand, have intervened

between this period and the present time.

When arctic conditions prevailed over this wide area, the plants

and animals which now live in arctic latitudes flourished in Great

Britain; but as the climate gradually became more genial, and the

snow and ice melted, the plants and animals mostly retreated to

their northern home. A certain number doubtless became extinct; but

others took to the highest parts of the mountains, where snow and

ice abound; and there they remain to the present day, separated from

their fellows, but still enjoying the kind of climate to which they

have always been accustomed, and testifying to the wonderful changes

which have taken place since the mammoth, whose bones are found

embedded in our river-gravels, wandered over the plains of Northern

Europe.

_Animal Life._

The rocky fastnesses of the Alps still afford a home to some of the

larger wild animals which in other parts of Europe have gradually

disappeared with the advance of civilisation. During the latter part

of the "Stone Age," long before history was written, when men used

axes, hammers, arrow-heads, and other implements of stone, instead of

bronze or iron, Switzerland was inhabited by animals which are not to

be seen now. The gigantic urus (_Bos primigenius_), which flourished

in the forests of the interior during this prehistoric human period,

and gave its name to the canton of Uri, has become extinct. The marsh

hog was living during the period of the Swiss lake-dwellers. These

people made their houses on piles driven in near the shore, and were

acquainted with the use of bronze, and therefore later than the men

of the "Stone Age." The remains of these strange dwelling-places

have been discovered in several places, as well as many articles of

daily use. The marsh hog has disappeared; and its place is taken by

the wild boar and domestic hog, which afford sport and food to the

present population. But taking Switzerland as it now is, we will say

a few words about the more interesting forms of animal life dwelling

in the Alps, beginning with those which are highest in the animal

kingdom. Chief among these is the brown bear, still occasionally

found, but it is exceedingly rare, except in the Grisons and in the

districts of the Tyrol and Italy bordering on the canton, where it

still carries on its ravages.[18] Some also believe that it still

lingers in the rocky fastnesses of the Jura Mountains, to the east of

the Alps. There is properly only one species of bear in Switzerland,

but the hunters generally speak of three,--the great black, the

great grey, and the small brown. The second of these is merely an

accidental variety of the first; but between the grey and the small

brown bears there is a good deal of difference. They assert that

the black bear is not only considerably larger than the brown, but

is also different in its habits. It is less ferocious and prefers a

vegetable diet,--feeding on herbs, corn, and vegetables, with the

roots and branches of trees. It has a way of plundering bee-hives and

also ants' nests; it delights in strawberries and all kinds of fruit,

plundering the orchards, and even making raids on the vineyards,

but always retreating before dawn. As a rule it does not attack

human beings. The brown bear is much more formidable, prowling by

night about the sheepfolds, and causing the sheep by their fright to

fall down precipices. Goats, when alarmed, leap on the roofs of the

châlets, and bleat, in order to arouse the shepherds; so that when

Bruin rears himself up against the wall he often meets his death.

There are many stories on record of fierce fights for life between

man and bear. The bear passes the winter in a torpid state, and eats

little or nothing then.

[18] We are again indebted to Professor Bonney's "Alpine Regions

of Switzerland" for the information here given.

The wolf, though still lingering in several lonely parts of the

Alps, is rapidly becoming rare. It is most frequent in the districts

about the Engadine and in the Jura Mountains. Only in winter-time,

when hard pressed by hunger, does it approach the haunts of man. It

takes almost any kind of prey it can get,--foxes, hares, rats, mice,

birds, lizards, frogs, and toads. Sheep and goats are its favourite

prey. The wolf is an affectionate parent, and takes his turn in

looking after the nurslings, which is a necessary precaution, as his

friends and relations have a way of eating up the babies.

The fox is common in many parts of the Alps, but not often seen

by travellers. Instead of taking the trouble to burrow, he

frequently manages by various cunning devices to take possession

of a badger's hole. As Tschudi quaintly observes, "He has far too

much imagination and poetic sentiment to like so monotonous and

laborious an occupation as burrowing." Like the wolf, the mountain

fox eats whatever he can catch, even beetles, flies, and bees. Those

in the valleys live more luxuriously than their relations on the

mountains,--plundering bee-hives and robbing orchards. As it was in

Judæa in the days of Solomon, so it is now in Switzerland among the

vineyards; and a peasant might well say, "Take us the foxes, the

little foxes that spoil the vineyards."

The lynx is only occasionally found in the Alps, which is fortunate

for the shepherds, for they can play terrible havoc with the sheep.

Wild-cats still linger in the most unfrequented parts. Their fur is

valuable, and the flesh is sometimes eaten. The badger is far from

common, though rarely seen by day. It is very cunning in avoiding

traps, and so is generally either dug out of its hole drawn by

dogs, or pulled out by a pole with nippers or a hook at the end.

Passing on to less ferocious beasts, we find the otter common along

the borders of rivers and lakes. The polecat, weasel, and stoat

are often too abundant for keepers of poultry. The squirrel is

common enough in the forests, but varies greatly in colour. It is

doubtful whether the beaver still lingers by some lonely Alpine

stream. It is last mentioned in a list of Swiss mammals, published

in 1817, as found, though rarely, in some lonely spots. Rabbits are

common, but hares rather scarce; of these there are, as in Scotland,

two varieties,--the brown hare, which is seldom found at heights

greater than four thousand to five thousand feet, and the blue

hare, which ranges up to nine thousand feet. The latter changes

colour: its fur in summer is of a dull bluish-grey, and in winter it

becomes perfectly white, and so affords a striking illustration of

"protective mimicry," for with snow lying on the ground it would be

very hard to see the creature.

The marmot is common in all the higher Alpine regions. These

interesting little creatures are very watchful, and easily scent

danger. When an intruder approaches, a sentinel marmot utters a

long shrill whistle, which is often repeated two or three times,

and then they all make for their burrows; but it is not easy to

distinguish them from the grey rocks among which they live. The fur

is a yellowish or brownish grey, with black on the head and face,

and a little white on the muzzle; the tail is short and bushy with a

tipping of black. They have different quarters for summer and winter.

The summer burrows are in the belt of rough pasture between the

upper limits of trees and the snows; towards the end of autumn they

come down to the pastures which the herdsmen have just abandoned

and there make their winter burrows, which are much larger than the

summer ones. Like rabbits, they frequently make a bolt-hole, by which

they may escape from an intruder. In winter the holes are plugged up,

and the marmots, rolling themselves up in a ball, go to sleep for six

months or more. Sometimes hunters dig them out; but so soundly do

they sleep that, according to De Saussure, they may often be taken

out, placed in the game-bag, and carried home without being aroused.

They wake up about April.

The chamois, a very favourite subject with the wood-carvers, is the

only member of the antelope family in Western Europe; it is found

in almost every part of the Alps, but is now much rarer than it was

formerly. A full-grown chamois in good condition weighs about sixty

pounds. The hair is thick, and changes colour with the season, being

a red yellowish-brown in summer and almost black in winter. The

horns, which curve backwards, rise from the head above and between

the eyes to a height which rarely exceeds seven inches. When the

kid is about three months old, the horns make their appearance, and

at first are not nearly as hook-shaped as they afterwards become.

When full-grown, it stands at the shoulder about two feet from the

ground. The hind-legs being longer than the fore-legs, its gait is

awkward on level ground, but they are admirably suited for mountain

climbing. When at full speed, it can check itself almost instantly,

and can spring with wonderful agility. Its hoofs are not well adapted

for traversing the ice, and therefore it avoids glaciers as far as

possible. Having a great fear of concealed crevasses, it is very

shy of venturing on the upper part of a glacier; and the tracks

which it leaves in these places often show by their windings and

sudden turnings that the animal has exercised great caution. And so

travellers often use this as a useful clue to getting safely over

a glacier. Its agility is something extraordinary. It can spring

across chasms six or seven yards wide, and "with a sudden bound leap

up the face of a perpendicular rock, and merely touching it with its

hoofs, rebound again in an opposite direction to some higher crag,

and thus escape from a spot where, without wings, egress seemed

impossible. When reaching upwards on its hind-legs, the fore-legs

resting on some higher spot, it is able to stretch to a considerable

distance, and with a quick spring bring up its hind-quarters to a

level with the rest of the body, and with all four hoofs together,

stand poised on a point of rock not broader than your hand."[19] The

chamois feed on various mountain herbs, and on the buds and sprouts

of the rhododendron and latschen (a pine). At night they couch among

the broken rocks high upon the mountains, descending at daybreak

to pasture, and retreating, as the heat increases, towards their

fastnesses. When winter comes, they are forced down to the higher

forests, where they pick up a scanty subsistence from moss, dead

leaves, and the fibrous lichen which hangs in long yellowish-grey

tufts from the fir-trees and bears the name of "chamois-beard."

While browsing on this, they sometimes get their horns hooked in a

bough, and so, being unable to disentangle themselves, perish with

hunger. The senses of hearing, smell, and sight are exceedingly

acute; so that the hunter must exercise all his craft to approach

the animals. Pages might be filled with the hair-breadth escapes and

fearful accidents which have befallen hunters; and yet they find the

pursuit so fascinating that nothing will induce them to abandon it. A

young peasant told the famous De Saussure (the pioneer of Alpine

explorers) that though his father and grandfather before him had met

their death while out on the hunt, not even the offer of a fortune

would tempt him to change his vocation. The bag which he carried with

him he called his winding-sheet, because he felt sure he would never

have any other. Two years afterwards he was found dead at the foot of

a precipice.

[19] Bonar on Chamois-hunting in Bavaria.

The bouquetin, or steinbock, once abundant throughout the greater

part of the Alps, is now confined to certain parts where it is

preserved by the King of Italy. De Saussure observes that in his

time they had ceased to be found near Chamouni. Its whole build is

remarkably strong, giving it quite a different appearance from the

slender and graceful chamois.

[Illustration: RED DEER. AFTER ANSDELL.]

The roe, the fallow deer, and the red deer have, it is said, quite

disappeared from the French and Swiss Alps, but all of them occur in

the Bavarian and Austrian highlands. They frequent the forests which

clothe the lower slopes, and do not often wander into the more rocky

districts. The wild boar only now and then appears across the Rhine,

although it is common in the Subalpine forests farther east; but we

can hardly consider it a true Alpine quadruped.

Passing on to the birds which frequent the Alps, we must first notice

the bearded vulture, the lämmergeier of the Germans, which once was

common, but now only holds its own here and there in some lonely

mountain fastness. Although preferring living prey to carrion, still

in many ways it is closely allied to the true vulture. The upper part

of the body is a greyish-brown hue, the under side white, tinged with

reddish brown. The nest, built on a high ledge of rock, consists of

straw and fern, resting on sticks, on which are placed branches lined

with moss and down. It is a rare thing for the traveller to obtain

a view of this monarch of the Alpine birds. Like the true vulture,

its digestive powers are marvellous. According to Tschudi ("Les

Alpes"), the stomach of one of these birds was found to contain five

fragments of a cow's rib, a mass of matted wool and hair, and the

leg of a kid perfect from the knee downwards. Another had bolted a

fox's rib fifteen inches long, as well as the brush, besides a number

of bones and other indigestible parts of smaller animals, which

were slowly being eaten away by the gastric juice. Sheep, goats,

full-grown chamois, and smaller quadrupeds are eagerly devoured by

this voracious bird. It is said to be bold enough to attack a man,

when it finds him asleep or climbing in any dangerous place. Tschudi,

in his book on the Alps, gives several instances of young children

being carried off. One of these happened in the Bernese Oberland, as

follows: Two peasants, making hay upon the pastures, had taken with

them their daughter Anna, a child about three years old. She quickly

fell asleep on the turf near the hay châlet; so the father put his

broad-brimmed hat over her face, and went to work some little way

off. On his return with a load of hay the child was gone; and a brief

search showed that she was nowhere near. Just at this time a peasant

walking along a rough path in the glen was startled by the cry of a

child, and going towards the place whence it came, saw a lämmergeier

rise from a neighbouring summit and hover for some time over a

precipice. On climbing thither in all haste, he found the child

lying on the very brink. She was but little injured; some scratches

were found on her hands and on the left arm, by which she had been

seized; and she had been carried more than three quarters of a mile

through the air. She lived to a good old age, and was always called

the Geier-Anna, or Vulture's Annie, in memory of her escape. The

particulars are inscribed in the registers of the parish of Habkeren.

The golden eagle is not uncommon in most parts of the Alps, although

travellers rarely obtain a near view. It is said to be very fond

of hares, chasing and capturing them very cleverly. As in Great

Britain, it is accused of carrying off children; but this is at least

doubtful. The kite, buzzard and falcon are occasionally seen. There

are at least ten species of owls, among which is the magnificent

eagle-owl. The raven is found in the lonelier glens, and is often

tamed. Its thieving propensities are very amusing. Alpine birds

of prey correspond very closely with British. The jackdaw is also

common. It would be impossible within our short limits to give

a complete list of Swiss birds, but we may mention among others

the nutcracker, the jay, the white-breasted swift, the wheatear,

the common black redstart, the beautiful wall-creeper, and the

snow-finch, which mounts to the borders of the snow. Of game-birds

we may mention the capercailze, the black grouse, and the hazel

grouse, all of which are common in many of the forests. The ptarmigan

haunts the stony tracts on the borders of perpetual snow. In winter

it turns white, and in summer greyish-brown, though a good deal of

white remains.

Pheasants and partridges cannot be said to be Alpine birds; but the

Greek partridge may be so considered.

Numbers of the mountain streams and tarns contain excellent trout,

and most of the larger lakes are well stocked with fish. Some of the

trout of the Swiss and Italian lakes are of great size. The pike

frequently weigh twelve to fifteen pounds.

Reptiles are not numerous. The common frog, which is said to be found

as high as ten thousand feet above the sea, swarms in some parts of

the Rhone Valley. Of true lizards, five species have been recognized.

The blind-worm (which is not a snake), so common on many of our

English heaths, is often met with. Among the true snakes we find the

English ringed snake--quite harmless--and two adders. The common

adder is found at a height of seven thousand feet above the sea.

Lower forms of life not possessing a backbone (invertebrates) abound

in this region; but they are far too numerous to be considered here.

Butterflies and moths are abundant; and many of those which are rare

in England are common in the Alps, so that the entomologist finds

a happy hunting-ground. The beautiful swallowtail and the handsome

apollo, coppers, painted ladies, fritillaries, and many other

Lepidoptera thrive in these regions, and are less easily frightened

than at home in England.

PART II.

HOW THE MOUNTAINS WERE MADE.

Part II.

HOW THE MOUNTAINS WERE MADE.