Picturesque Tour through the Oberland; index
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JOURNAL OF A TOUR TO THE GLACIERS OF THE CANTON OF BERNE IN SWITZERLAND, IN THE SUMMER OF 1812.
My father having, in company with his brother Jerome, convinced himself, in the summer of 1811, of the practicability of ascending the most elevated summits and peaks of the range of glaciers in the canton of Berne, prepared the following year for a second journey thither. His object was, by means of exact measurements to give greater accuracy to my grandfather's model of the glaciers; to make experiments on the air, electricity, heat, light, sound, &c.; and at the same time to prove how groundless were the doubts of certain sceptics, who pretended, that in the first visit they had been mistaken in regard to the peak called the Jungfrau.
We provided ourselves with the necessary instruments for this purpose. The company consisted of my father, Rudolph, and my uncle, Jerome Meyer, who had performed the first journey in 1811; Dr. Thilo, master of the school of Aarau; my brother Gottlieb, and myself. From the Grimsel we had, besides several porters, some herdsmen and chamois-hunters for our guides. Two of these, Aloys Volker, and Joseph Barthes, were Valaisans; and two others, Caspar Huber and Arnold of Melchthal, servant to the master of the Grimsel inn, were from Oberhasli. These men, accustomed from their youth to clamber in all sorts of weather after their goats among the mountains, or to hunt chamois, frequently excited our highest astonishment by their courage and agility. Without them we should not have been able to reach many of the places that we visited. For this reason I have mentioned their names, as any person, with the aid of these guides, and by consulting the annexed map, may easily traverse this icy region which we so long inhabited.
Besides the requisite provisions, poles, ropes, instruments of different <61> kinds, two mattresses and bedding, we took with us a quantity of canvass and a small tent. Our porters were obliged to bring us up fire-wood from time to time out of the valleys over the glaciers.
In the evening of the 25th of July we left the Grimsel inn, which is itself above 5628 feet above the level of the sea, and approached the glacier of the Aar. A path conducted us through a desert full of masses of rock over a hill, called the Kessi Tower, into the Upper Aar-Alp. Here we passed the night with a herdsman from the Valais, who, in his wretched, lonely hut, divided with us his black bread, which, together with goats' milk, is for four months of the year his only food on the borders of the habitable world.
Meanwhile my father, accompanied by a herdsman's boy, had set out before us by himself, in the morning, for the glacier, to ascertain whether our design was practicable or not. Night came on, and he had not returned.
The following morning, July 26, we set out with the first rays of the rising sun. The ascent was fatiguing, though not dangerous, through a narrow valley, over endless fields of ice. We saw the summit, which appeared to be not far distant; but simple objects of one uniform colour are very apt to deceive the eye. At length we climbed the acclivity of the valley, but the day was drawing towards a close. Here we obtained the first view of the empire of everlasting winter. All below and above us was ice and snow. Before us towered the immense pyramid of the Finsteraarhorn, from which we were separated only by a valley, the upper extremity of the Viescher glacier. In the background, Mont Blanc, Rosa, and Matterhorn were crimsoned with the roseate rays of the setting sun.
After halting a short time to rest ourselves, we continued to ascend to the valley of the Viescher glacier. The last faint trace of the <62> inhabited earth, the dark green of the Alps, disappeared behind the ice-hill; the wide firmament of heaven above seemed to shut us within a narrower compass, and an inanimate nature surrounded us on every side.
When we had crossed this white, silent valley, and ascended the opposite height, we met with my father. He had the preceding day reached the Finsteraarhorn with his young attendant, but being overtaken unawares by dusk, had been obliged to pass the night upon a bare rock, and without fire, beneath the inclement sky.
In the middle of the height upon which we stood rose a black perpendicular rock: this is the Finsteraarhorn. On the left of us glistened the snow-clad summit of the Rothhorn; and at our feet lay the Viescher glacier,with its numerous chasms. The black colour of the rock, the whiteness of the snow, and the bluish green of the ice, together with the beautiful azure of the sky, which seems to rise from the glaciers and to sink on the opposite side upon the ice, afford the only variety to the dazzled eye.
In a deep ravine of the Finsteraarhorn, between rocks, at an elevation of 10,370 feet above the sea, we took up our lodging for the night. On the north side of our rock, where, in the height of summer, what is scarcely thawed by the noon-tide sun freezes again at night, we found the moss-like silene acaulis in flower, clinging to the tempest-beaten granite. A stray wasp was humming round it. The very mosses had here ceased, and the naked stone was covered only with yellow and blackish flakes.
Chamois never climb these heights unless when pursued. Like the soldanella in the vegetable kingdom, they love the confines of everlasting snow. So likewise does the marmot, whose curious burrows we frequently found here and there underneath the glacier, not <63> far from the extreme boundary of vegetation. On the first appearance of the sun, these pretty animals leave their holes to bask in his rays, and, like the chamois, to betray themselves by their shrill piping to the hunter.
Higher than the ordinary haunts of the chamois, at an elevation of 7 or 8000 feet, we observed traces of another species of mammalia, which we had not opportunity to examine sufficiently near to be able to describe it. The first intimation we received of its existence was from the following circumstance: One of our people had lost his cap in the glacier, and when we found it again, it was half eaten away, as if by mice. This animal belongs either to the weasel or squirrel species; it is about as thick as the former, and five or six inches long, but dark brown, with a short tail; it runs very swiftly, and its haunts are every where to be found in the clefts of the rock.
Birds continued to hover round us at an elevation of 13,000 feet; sometimes we heard the snow-fowl, and crows were sporting over the Rothhorn. We saw an eagle sailing in wide circles round the highest summits of the Finsteraarhorn.
Even these animals, however, appear but rarely in the boundless solitude; insects are more frequent, but it is probable that in many instances they are brought hither by currents of wind. Wasps and gnats are sometimes to be seen. At the base of the Finsteraarhorn, at an actual elevation of 12,000 feet, we observed a butterfly resembling the common white species, and another on the Aletsch glacier upwards of 9,000 feet high. The latter had just crept out of the chrysalis attached to a mass of rock. On the same glacier we sometimes found sunny tracts of snow, for half a mile together completely covered with small black insects, belonging to the species of poduræ, in the class of the apteræ. They are scarcely a line in length, and spring by means of their elastic tail, like fleas, especially <64> when you approach them, to the distance of several inches from their former position. I regret that such of them as we took with us, for the purpose of examining them more at our leisure at home, perished by the way. The next rock free from snow was at least a quarter of an hour's walk distant from the rendezvous of these glacier poduræ; they must, consequently, perform considerable journeys, for it is not likely that they lay their eggs upon the snow. They, as well as others of their species, can have no other food here than the dry leaves which the tempestuous winds from time to time carry up from the abodes of men to these dreary deserts. We saw even beech and oak-leaves upon the ice of the Aletsch towards the Valais. Perhaps, also, they may derive nourishment from the pollen of the scarlet lichen, which colours extensive tracts of snow, here of a paler and there of a darker red.
We employed ourselves towards evening in preparing our lodging for the night : we cleared the snow and ice from the rock; built a wall of loose stones; formed a roof of poles, which we covered with a tent-cloth, and laid stones at top. As contented as a family of Greenlanders, we assembled round a cheerful fire to our coffee, which we boiled with snow-water.
The sun gradually sunk behind Mont Blanc. His last rays scarcely tinged its summit, when the full moon rose from among the icy peaks into the dark azure, and threw her cold light upon the white plain around us. It was the silence of death. You might almost have heard our hearts throbbing in our bosoms. A monotonous chaos of ice and snow and ruins of riven mountains spread their horrors among chasms and shadowed precipices.
No trace of life, no habitation, no motion, met the eye in the unbounded solitude. A cloud only now and then passes over the inanimate scene, as over the relics of a world which the Creator has <65> resolved to forget. Gigantic columnar black rocks rise from abysses lost in snow and vapour, like sepulchral monuments of deceased nature.
We slept soundly, and towards morning were awaked by the cold. Every preparation was made for the ascent of the Finsteraarhorn, the highest mountain in Europe excepting Mont Blanc; but the dark red glow diffused by the rising sun unfortunately, predicted a rainy day. Above and below us was an ocean of dull clouds. As early as nine o'clock snow began to fall, and continued faster and faster. We frugally fed our fire the whole day, as we had not a splinter of wood to waste. Thus we passed a most tedious winter day in the middle of summer.
Night came on: the clouds grew blacker. We heard the hollow murmuring of the wind in the valleys. The storm soon reached us, after the long silence of the grave, like the roaring and howling of the cataract of the Rhine. The dry snow was driven upward out of the abysses, and penetrated through our leaky walls.
About three in the morning, (of the 28th of July,) the tempest made a pause. It was a stillness that stunned the ear. The wind then returned in gusts, from the valley of the glacier, with increasing violence, and a noise like that of an avalanche. The rocks seemed to shake. It passed off, and in the distance sounded like rolling thunder. Such hurricanes can scarcely be experienced even upon the ocean itself; in inhabited regions I had never met with any thing like it. Or had, perhaps, the auditory nerves been rendered more delicate by having been habituated for some days to the most profound silence?
We were obliged to go out several times during the night, to clear away the snow from the tent-cloth, that it might not crush the roof. <66> The cold was intense. About day-break the mercury in a Reaumur thermometer indicated eleven degrees below the freezing point. Our stock of wood decreased. None of us could sleep. The morning appeared gloomy: we, therefore, resolved to return to the Grimsel inn; leaving the instruments in the snow-covered hut, and surrounded by fogs, we took the way by which we had come. But on the Upper Viescher glacier an ice-hill had in the mean time split in two, and half was suspended overhead, and threatened every moment to cover the valley. Our guides, fearful lest a step should involve us in destruction, would not venture to pass under it; and we were necessitated to seek another way to the heights of the glacier of the Upper Aar.
Meanwhile the fog cleared way. The sun scorched us with his rays. A dazzling mantle of snow was spread over the extensive glacier, and deceitfully covered its clefts and chasms. Such places are commonly the graves of those hunters who go out to their occupation and never return. We all fastened ourselves, at the distance of ten paces from one another, to a rope, so that none of us could easily have been lost. Our guides, who led the way, explored suspicious places with their poles. We had a fatiguing journey, up to the knees in snow. The sun burned our faces, and our eyes smarted. Green gauze and green spectacles, which we took with us, were an insufficient protection. The reflection from the fresh snow was like the powerful sunshine itself, and every look cast upon it threatened to deprive us of sight. We frequently stopped, and by way of relief laid our faces in the snow.
At length we reached terra firma. The verdure of the Alps was balsam to our eyes. We arrived at the Grimsel inn. The weather continued unfavourable. Snow fell several times, whilst the people in the valley were reaping the harvest. Part of the company returned home, but I remained till the 14th of August. A serene <67> evening then afforded the promise of finer weather. I immediately hastened with our guides to the but of the herdsman on the Upper Aar-Alp, with the intention of proceeding again to the glacier the following morning.
We accordingly set out very early in the morning of the 15th of August. The ice and snow were firm and dry; and soon after noon we reached our first night's station. Here we found our instruments, provisions, and other things that we had left behind, enveloped in masses of ice. Many were broken or spoiled by the cold. With the aid of a hatchet and a good fire we cleared away the ice from them; but these different mishaps left but little chance of the success of the various experiments which my father had projected.
The sun was setting. In the habitable world, in summer evenings we see the sun's rays glistening on the summits of the lofty mountains long after it is quite dark in the valleys: the effect is the very reverse when you are on the tops of the mountains. The light of the sun is thence seen retiring to the distant abysses, till at length it is wholly extinguished at the deepest point.
As soon as the icy peaks were again tinged by Aurora, we prepared to prosecute our journey. It was the 16th of August, and a fine day. I determined to attempt the ascent of the Finsteraarhorn, that black pyramid, which, according to the measurements of Trallès, rises to the height of 13,234 feet above the Mediterranean sea, and the summit of which no mortal foot had yet trodden.
We traversed the Viescher glacier, proceeding to the left of the deep glacier of the Finsteraar towards the prodigious tower of granite. We reached the ravine, and crept cautiously over it from the glacier to the solid earth. It is well known, that ice and snow melt most at the part nearest to the earth. The glaciers, therefore, seldom <68> or never touch the rocks, but encircle the steep mountain peaks at the distance of thirty or forty feet. A deep cleft separates them. For this reason it is often impossible to get from the glacier to the solid earth, unless they happen to be connected by bridges of ice or snow.
After this we had to climb an almost perpendicular wall of snow on the rock. We set our feet in the steps made by the boldest of our party, who went first, always thrusting one arm deep in the snow, as a precaution against the insecurity of our footing. In some places the smooth ice was bare. Here the foremost cut steps for the feet and hands, and for the greater safety, we all fastened a rope round our bodies. In this manner we climbed over rocks, ice, and snow; and once also under a projecting block of ice of the most beautiful green, whose columnar icicles hung down like stalactites, and the moment we touched them, fell rattling into the unfathomable abyss of the glacier of the Finsteraar*.
About noon, after ascending for six hours, we approached the summit of the mountain; but this height was not climbed without difficulty and danger from the overhanging glacier.
We stood upon the Upper Aarhorn. The prospect was unbounded; the lofty mountains of the ancient cantons lay below us, and beyond the Alps of the Grisons we descried those of the Tyrol. The ranges of the Valais only retained from their proximity the appearance of mountains: the Upper Valais only looked like a valley; this tract alone exhibited a green colour, studded by the pine-woods with black spots. Nothing else could be discriminated <69> by the naked eye--all was one unbroken mass of vapour. Italy was concealed behind a curtain of clouds. The abodes of men lay below us, like a dark sea. The Alps, with their snow-clad summits, did not resemble mountains, but projected above the dark green of their bases, like waves whose tops are whitened with foam. An uninterrupted covering of ice extended from our feet into the valleys, and ascended again to the heights of the Viescher and Aletsch peaks, and on the right to the ridges of the Walcher, the Jungfrau, and the Monk. It was impossible to contemplate the abysses immediately beneath us without shuddering.
The most elevated peak of the mountain appeared like a black rock before us to the north. This was the Finsteraarhorn, which was still to be climbed. It was one o'clock in the afternoon. My strength failed me: I therefore staid behind on the narrow ridge of the glacier, where I hewed myself a seat in the ice--an exalted throne, at the foot of which lay all the kingdoms of the earth. Caspar Huber was obliged to keep me company.
Arnold and the Valaisaus determined, however, to make the last attempt, to which I encouraged them. They ascended to the ridge of the mountain. The following particulars are from the relation which they gave me the same evening.
They climbed the lofty rocky mountain with great difficulty. They imagined that they were on the peak of the Finsteraarhorn, but on reaching the top, discovered their mistake. A still more elevated pinnacle, from which they were separated by a precipice, towered aloft before them. It was long before any of them would venture to climb the last peak, or at least to lead the way; for the rock, cased with naked ice, overhung them. Through the arch they looked down into the glacier of the Finsteraar. At length Arnold took courage. Fastened to a rope held by the others, and creeping <69> on his hands and knees, he scrambled over the hollow cap of ice, and drew his companions after him.
The topmost summit of the Finsteraarhorn was now conquered. It was four o'clock. They had been three hours in going a distance which might, to all appearance, have been performed in a quarter of an hour, so near did the last height seem to us all.
The extreme point of the Finsteraarhorn is sharp. The ice upon it is several fathoms thick. Through a cleft in the ice you see the glacier of the Finsteraar. Not a mountain round about appears higher. Here the spectator commands all the other peaks. The black mountains of Switzerland, Alps, hills, and plains, appear one dark level. The lake of Thun alone glistened in the sun's rays in the depth beneath.
I saw from my glacier the bold fellows endeavouring, with great trouble, to erect a flag of red canvass upon the summit of the peak. They suffered from intense cold, though with me, three hours before, they had enjoyed the warmth of summer. They had taken with them a barometer and thermometer, but their observations on these instruments were so imperfect, that I could not pay any regard to them. This might be owing partly to the fatigue and anxiety of the men, and partly to the violence of the wind to which they were exposed, and which indeed was so great, that they could scarcely keep their feet. Whilst they were still on the top, the wind tore the flag from the pole, to which they again fastened it. In about half an hour, for no longer could they endure the intense cold, they set out on their return.
We descended from these heights on the west side with much greater facility, and now discovered, when too late, that the Finsteraarhorn may be ascended from that side without difficulty; <71> whereas from the Grimsel side the task is a most arduous one. We came down without danger to the Viescher glacier, over snow and, rocky crags, and to the mountain, on the opposite side of which was the hut where we passed the night. The mountain was conquered. We rejoiced in the expectation of rest, but were disappointed.
The evening was cold and calm, but the night brought some snow. In the middle of it we were wakened by burning pains in the eyes, of which we had felt nothing on lying down. Most of us were also troubled with oppressions of the chest; so that we were obliged to rise and seek refreshment in the cold outside of the hut.
Next morning we broke up our hut, for the weather was bad, and we wanted wood for fuel. I determined to wait for better weather in the Alpine huts on the Aletsch glacier, which is seen far above Brieg and Naters, in the Valais. We traversed the Viescher glacier, and proceeded through the solitary icy valley on the height between the Viescherhorn and Walcher. A boundless ocean of ice opened upon us; the middle of it is the Aletsch glacier, which almost extends to the lake of Aletsch, and, surrounded by steep mountains, disappears at its extremity between verdant hills.
The clouds rose darker and darker above the summits of the masses of ice. A violent tempest soon drove us before it from the foot of the Jungfrau. The lightning flashed through the blackened firmament, till the storm spent itself in a torrent of rain which poured down upon the ice-fields. We, meanwhile, skipped away over the clefts in the ice to the beginning of the lake, where we found shelter in a cavern of crystal.
On the bluish bosom of this lake, about a league in length, as in the Arctic ocean, float ice-lands, formed of fragments of masses <72> precipitated from the glaciers. Around it appears the verdure of the Alps.
The quantity of water discharged by it into the Viescher valley changes almost every quarter of an hour, according as the outlet is more or less obstructed by the blocks of ice. It has frequently happened, especially after hot summers, that the whole lake has, on a sudden, completely emptied itself; and its waters, together with the glacier, have tumbled into the valley, and desolated whole districts.
At the southern extremity of the lake I was hospitably received by the stone huts of my guides. Here I remained six days. Even in fine weather we were obliged to abstain from ascending the glaciers, on account of inflammations of the eyes.
On the 24th of August, however, I determined myself to ascend the summit of the Finsteraarhorn once more from the west side, with a view to make at least some observations there. The sky was serene.
We reached the top of the Aletsch glacier. The pleasingly-terrific impressions produced by the prodigious desert of snow, are always renewed at every fresh visit. No movement far around, but the vapours creeping up the mountains, or detached clouds floating in the deep azure of the firmament; no sound, save now and then the crash of a mass of falling ice, repeated by numerous echoes, or the rattling of blocks, which, dashing from rock to rock, at length dissolved in snow and fog, expand into clouds of spray, and form, for a few moments, the most beautiful cataracts. A rocky mountain towers above the glistening solitude, like an <73> island in the Frozen ocean. In the clefts and hollows, where a small quantity of mould had collected, blossomed solitary flowers among short grass; the purple silene without stalk, the small golden alpendraba, the moss-like saxifrage (saxfraga cæsia,) poa laxa, &c. This mountain is, on this account, denominated by the chamois hunters the Green Horn.
Here, in the midst of the sea of ice, I discovered, to my very great joy, human beings. They were our fellow-travellers, who had returned from the lower world; my brother Gottlieb, my uncle Jerome, and Dr. Thilo, with their guides and porters. They had passed the night on the Green Horn.
They had left the Grimsel the preceding day, and traversed the Upper Aar and Viescher glaciers. What with the intense heat, and the necessity of wading through the snow, their journey had been both long and fatiguing. They sunk several times into pits when the deceitful covering of snow gave way under their feet; but the fall and preservation of my brother Gottlieb bordered on the miraculous.
All of them were upon the ridge of an ice-mountain in the Viescher glacier, the same where we had fixed our first night's station. When they were about to descend on the other side, one of the guides remarked, probably only in jest, that they might slide down the mountain, sitting on the surface of the snow. Gottlieb sat down to make the attempt. At first he proceeded pleasantly enough, but soon with accelerated velocity. He could not stop himself, as the frozen ice was too hard for him to make any impression upon it with his feet. Obliged to resign himself to his fate, he perceived below him a projecting rock. He strove whilst descending, to guide himself towards it, that he might be able to hold fast there. The declivity, however, became steeper, and his descent more and <74> more rapid, so that he was glad to avoid the rock, where he must have been dashed in pieces. All that he could now do was to keep his legs stiffly extended. The velocity of his descent redoubled. It hurled him from time to time, for some distance, through the air over the surface of the snow. All hope of saving his life vanished; he lost his equilibrium, and was at length precipitated into a cleft thirty or forty feet deep, upon the relics of an avalanche that had fallen in. The shock was so violent, that he rebounded from the snow, and the back of his head was buried in it. Lumps of ice rolled rattling down to the depths below. Thus he had gone, in two minutes, a distance that would have taken a quarter of an hour. Had he not been stopped by this cleft in his fall, he must infallibly have been precipitated twice as far as he had already descended. For some time he lay senseless, imbedded in snow. On coming to himself, he scrambled out, and found that he had sustained no injury, excepting a slight contusion on the hand. It is true, indeed, that for a few days he complained of pains in his chest. Whilst he was sitting at the bottom of the chasm, recovering from his fright, a black squirrel, or one of the glacier weasels already mentioned, ran quickly past him, and crept away between masses of rock and ice.
He clambered out of the chasm without accident. It was a considerable time before he was found by his companions. They had pursued their way over the Ghofer, or Gufer, that is to say, over the rubble of fallen rocks.
Thus did they at length reach the Green Horn, where our whole party was assembled, and where we resolved to take up our abode for several days.
We constructed a hut upon the rock. It was the 24th of August one of the hottest days in the year. The rocks were heated. In the afternoon, when the mercury in the thermometer on the lake of Thun, <75> as well as at Aarau, stood in the shade at twenty-four degrees, and according to Zschokke's observations at Aarau, it was only thirty degrees even in the sun, it rose upon the glacier to thirty-five degrees.
The weather, nevertheless, continued during the succeeding days to be extremely variable. We measured a horizontal line of 5500 feet over snow and chasms in the ice, but were often interrupted in the operation. We made experiments with colours, to ascertain at what distance from the Green Horn we could discern them in the Aletsch glacier. But these attempts also were frustrated by the fickleness of the weather: sometimes it snowed, at others rained, and at others, again, there was so thick a fog, that, after passing three days to no purpose on this spot, we were obliged to seek refuge again in the huts near the Aletsch lake. The cold increased; and, as the surface of this lake was not thawed the whole day in the first month of autumn, we returned through the Upper Valais to the Grimsel, to recruit ourselves after our fatigues. My brother Gottlieb alone remained behind at the lake with the two Valaisans, determined to wait for a fine day to ascend the summit of the Jungfrau.
Before I proceed to give an account of this expedition and of the manner in which he accomplished his purpose, I will introduce a few observations on these most elevated portions of our quarter of the globe.
It is vain to attempt to produce accurate topographical descriptions of the regions of the glaciers, as of other tracts of country, because the face of them changes every year. The towering summits and spiry peaks of the mountains alone remain unaltered; they alone serve as land-marks for the traveller upon these oceans of ice, when he beholds them again after the lapse of years. Valleys are transformed into hills, and hills into valleys. Here fields of ice fall <76> in and disappear; there bald rocks become enveloped with a frozen mantle, while other peaks lose the icy caps with which they were covered. The tempests and frost of a nine months' winter, and the intense heat of the short summer, are incessantly moulding new forms in these changeable regions.
We saw masses of ice more than one hundred feet thick. Not even these are permanent. As much as accumulates on their surface by snow and rain, so much melts away below through the natural heat of the earth. The purity and dryness of the atmosphere in these regions, promote a rapid and copious evaporation of the melted surface. To this must be added, that the weight of the masses of ice, piled up above the ridges of the mountains, naturally tends to sink them into the valleys. There their extreme borders are incessantly melting away, whilst the upper part falls in and becomes intersected by long clefts running in general parallel to one another.
The observations of Saussure respecting the electrical phenomena on the ice mountains of Savoy, and on the daily rise and fall of the thermometer, apply to those of the canton of Berne. The difference of the heat and cold at the same hours in the valley, at the foot of the mountains, and on the glaciers, still remains to be ascertained by more numerous experiments. As the summer of 1812 had but few hot days, and even on these the heat was never so intense as it usually is in other years, still, as I have already remarked, the mercury in the sun rose to thirty-five degrees above the freezing point hence it is highly probable, that on hotter days it may be up to forty degrees. How low it may be in the depth of winter, it would be difficult to determine. The meteorological observations making by the Natural History Society, among other places, on Mount St. Bernard, will afford points of approximation. Meanwhile we know, that the cold there in winter is from twenty to twenty-three degrees, though the convent has an absolute elevation of only 7560 feet, <77> and is screened by more lofty mountains. There cannot, therefore, be any doubt, that in the Alps, especially on the glaciers, the degrees of heat and cold are more intense than in the valleys situated at their feet; and that, consequently, those must be egregiously mistaken who assert, that winter and summer, or the warmest and coldest hour, are nearly the same in the Alps as in the less elevated plains. Though it cannot be denied, that, beyond our atmosphere, where the sun's rays find no more caloric to set at liberty, the temperature of winter and summer must be invariably alike; still the mountains of our earth are much too small a standard for calculating the point beyond our globe, where there is neither winter nor summer, cold nor heat. For, so far as the atmospheric air extends, the difference is very considerable, and the elevated regions of the peaks of the glaciers may often happen to abound most with the ascending gases, in which the principle of heat may be developed; as, on the contrary, in serene weather, especially in winter, a maximum of cold may be produced, of which we, in habitable regions, cannot perhaps form any conception, owing to the proximity of the surface of the earth and the evolution of vapours.
Our observations upon the effect of those elevations on the human constitution are still too defective for us us to draw any certain inferences from them. Much, therefore, that is related by M. de Saussure, concerning the effects of the atmosphere at such a height upon the human frame, is not generally applicable, but only to particular cases. None of us, for instance, was seized, at an absolute elevation of from ten to twelve thousand feet, with sleepiness, violent fever, vomiting, fainting fits, or other affections, which, according to some travellers, are incidental to such situations. Much also that is ascribed to the purity of the air may have been the effect of alarm at the prospect of possible dangers, connected with extraordinary exertion, which naturally occasions more speedy exhaustion. Though it is not to be denied; that the pulses beat twice as quick as before, <78> yet, with sufficient repose, they return to the same state as in the valley and plains. We all of us several times repeated this experiment. Even the fainting-fit which seized one of our guides near the summit of the Jungfrau, seemed to be produced partly by excessive exertion in ascending, and partly by fear of the dangers incurred. None of us ever experienced any thing of the kind in descending. The effects of the atmosphere upon the frame must necessarily differ, according as the atmosphere is more or less dry or humid. On dull days, when there is a damp fog or rain, they are not, of course, the same as in clear and brilliant weather.
Every traveller may convince himself of the truth of this upon the glaciers of the canton of Berne, the traversing of which is not attended with so many difficulties and dangers as people would hitherto fain have it imagined. The journey as far as the ridge between the Jungfrau and Mönch, where you descend into the valleys of the highlands of Berne, may be performed without any danger upon the dry glaciers. The Viescher glacier and the glacier and lake of Aletsch afford prospects to the lover of rural nature, which fully indemnify him for any little trouble that he may have taken. From the Grimsel inn he may make excursions in every direction and always return thither in bad weather for shelter and refreshment. The attendance is far superior to what might be expected in so remote a place, though the landlord does not charge every customer as if he were an English nobleman.
When the weather at length cleared up, on the 2d of September, Gottlieb Meyer set out the same evening, with his two Valaisans, at five o'clock, and crossed the Aletsch glacier to the Green Horn. They proceeded till long after dark, the one warning the others of the chasms in the ice, and each treading in the footsteps of his predecessor. About nine they arrived at their hut on the Green Horn.
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At five the next morning, they travelled over the glacier between the Mönch and the Jungfrau to the foot of the colossus which they had to climb, and which glistened in the rays of the rising sun. Under the idea of finding a better way, they ascended the east side of the Jungfrau; consequently, on exactly the contrary side to that which they had chosen the preceding year. The acclivity of the mountain became more and more steep, and at length so abrupt that the guides sunk nearly exhausted. It was the more unpleasant to them all, as they had that morning taken nothing warm, and had left their kettle behind at the Aletsch lake. Gottlieb Meyer cheered them as well as he could. They refreshed themselves a second time with bread and cheese and some snow, and continued to ascend, having fastened themselves to ropes at a certain distance from one another.
Soon after eleven o'clock they arrived before the last peak, about four hundred feet in height. It seemed to be nearly perpendicular. In climbing up they came to a chasm of great depth, three feet broad and the sides perpendicular as a wall; above it hung an enormous mass of ice, upwards of one hundred feet high.
After a momentary embarrassment, one of the guides laid a pole against this mass across the abyss. The others helped him up, and he cut footsteps in the ice. Gottlieb Meyer followed, but at the first step the ice broke under him. He caught hold of the pole and clambered up. The third followed with better luck. The first now tied the rope to his stick; the others held fast by this rope; each made or enlarged with a knife the steps in the ice, to obtain a hold for their hands and feet. In this manner they reached the ice-covered ridge of the mountain, from which they could look down into the black dark valleys of the inhabited world, and on the other side, into the abysses of the glaciers. The ridge along which they were obliged to proceed was very narrow, and conducted to the most elevated summit of the Jungfrau.
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Here one of the guides fell exhausted with excessive exertion and alarm. He lay down upon the ice, pale and speechless, and was able only to motion with his hand. His companions hewed him a safe resting-place, where they left him lying, and pursued their way, for the goal was just before them, After some time he recovered; crept to a rock, the most elevated on the peak of the Jungfrau, licked from the stone the snow water, melted by the sun, that ran down it, and followed them after this refreshment to the summit.
It was past two o'clock in the afternoon. It had taken them full four hours to ascend a height of 400 feet. The most elevated point of the Jungfrau, on which they now stood, had undergone considerable alteration since the preceding year, when it was much more rounded. It was now nearly pointed. They were obliged to hew themselves seats. Of the old flag which they fixed up the year before, not a vestige was left*. They floated, as it were, in a boundless ocean of ether. The sky was serene around them; beneath was a sea of clouds, through the apertures and chasms of which appeared here and there the dark ground of the earth. They clearly distinguished the lake of Thun. All the mountains round about were clear; Mont Blanc, Mount Rosa, and the Matterhorn alone were enveloped in clouds.
Gottlieb Meyer, while the Valaisans were praying, observed the thermometer and barometer. The following was the state of the mercury in the instruments at half past three on the 3d of Sept.--
Barometer Therm. '' ''' º At Aarau . . . . . . . 27 0 62 14 6/10 --the Lake of Thun . . . . . 26 6 3 12 4/10 --summit of the Jungfrau . . 16 11 50 6
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It should be farther remarked, that at Aarau the barometer was elevated six feet above the ground on the steeple of St. Laurence. On the lake of Thun, it was eleven feet above the mean height of the surface of the water. From various barometrical observations, made at the same time, it was ascertained, that the mean elevation of the lake of Thun is 486 Paris feet above Aarau.
While Meyer was making these observations, and measuring some angles with a pocket sextant, the Jungfrau began to be enveloped in fog. This terrified the guides, as nothing is more alarming to persons ascending the mountains. They hastened to leave behind a mark of the second ascension of the Jungfrau; made a hole five feet deep in the ice and snow, to receive a long pole, to which was fastened a piece of oil-cloth, about four feet square, as a flag. To render the mark still more independent of the caprice of the tempestuous wind, a second pole without a flag was firmly planted in the ice near the other.
The three travellers now prepared for their return. The Valaisans vowed, on the summit of the Jungfrau, to the Blessed Virgin, to perform a pilgrimage to Maria Einsiedlen, if they came off unhurt from their perilous situation*. They now descended cheerfully and without stopping. Though the Valaisans, in ascending, had been obliged to rest every ten paces, and even felt symptoms of sickness, they perceived nothing of the kind in going down. They arrived without accident, about seven in the evening, at their station for the night on the Green Horn. The fog followed close after them from the Jungfrau to their hut.
The thickness of the fog prevented them on the following day from climbing to the summit of the Mönch. About four in the afternoon, <82> snow began to fall in large flakes, which descended quietly and softly. About the same hour there was a thunder-storm, which extended over Switzerland*. At the same time there was, in the vicinity of the lake of Aletsch, a hurricane with snow, probably the reaction of the electric explosions, or strong atmospheric shocks. Nothing, however, of all these revolutions of the lower regions of the atmosphere was perceived on the summit of the Green Horn.
On the 5th of September, the travellers returned in bad weather to the huts on the lake of Aletsch. The same day that my brother ascended to the top of the Jungfrau, I proceeded from the Grimsel over the glacier to Grindelwald.
A report exists here and there among the herdsmen of the neighbouring valleys, that, about one hundred years ago, a Dr. Klauss made his way over the glacier of Grindelwald to the Grimsel. Ebel, in his Directions for Travelling in Switzerland, says, under the head of Grindelwald:--"According to the report still prevalent here, there were formerly fertile valleys between the Mettenberg, Eiger, and the Viesch-hörner, which whole space is now full of ice, and a pass led through these valleys into the Upper Valais. As a proof of this, a bell, with the date of 1044, which hung in the chapel of St. Petronella, in this pass to the Valais, is still shewn at Grindelwald. A similar tradition, in the Upper Valais, corresponds with the former. There, in the Vieschthal, may still be seen even remains of the former road to Grindelwald, and the Vieschthal is now almost entirely filled with ice."
Hunters affirm, that chamois, when pursued, seek refuge from Grindelwald in the icy valley between the Schreckhorn and Finsteraarhorn, <83> where they are perfectly safe; for few of the boldest hunters have yet advanced to the distance of one league only beyond the glacier of the Finsteraar.
To ascertain whether the way from the Grimsel to Grindelwald is still practicable, I set out from the hospital with two guides very early on the morning of the 4th of September. Jerome Meyer and Dr. Thilo were resolved, if there were any hope of success, to attempt the passage in company with me. To this end, after making my observations, I was to return to a cavern on the Lauteraar, where we agreed to meet in the evening and pass the night.
I first followed with my companions the course of the Lower Aar to its source, where it issues in a powerful stream from a recess of the glacier. Here dwells a herdsman. During the whole summer an overhanging block of ice is the only shelter of himself and his little stock.
We pursued our journey with ease from this place over the glacier of the Lower Aar, along the ridge of which run two lines of guffer from the Finsteraar. Guffer lines are those series of heaps of stone, or rather of sand and gravel, which extend longitudinally over all the glaciers, down to the valleys, where they commonly produce a vast pile of rubbish, and form the borders of the glacier, which are frequently a hundred feet in height. In warm summers, these lines of guffer, and the ice upon which they lie, are more elevated than the other parts of the glacier. Thus you here and there see lofty pyramids of ice, with large pieces of rock upon their summits. It would seem, that the stones and rubbish prevent the melting of the ice situated beneath them. This is asserted by some naturalists, though it is well known that a stone lying upon ice, will, when warmed by the sun, sink into the ice by melting it: hence the origin of the many <84> holes, large and small, in the glaciers, which perforate the whole thickness of the ice.
The guffer lines run sometimes along the border, at others in the middle of the descent of the glacier from the height into the valley, in long and frequently parallel stripes, which run from above downward. Writers have often puzzled themselves to account for this phenomenon, of which the following is the simple explanation:--Every efflux of a glacier that hangs down from the icy sea into the valley, is compressed at the point where, like a river issuing from a lake, it enters between banks of rock. The ice, drawn down by the power of gravity towards the valley, forcibly rubs off the stones and covers itself with the fragments. As the glacier keeps annually settling from the same cause, the line of rubbish grows longer. The guffer lines are still more frequently formed by such stony matter as falls from the higher rocks which bound the sides of the glacier. Were it not for the gradual settling of the glaciers towards the valleys, large heaps of rubbish would, in time, be formed. At present they assume the appearance of long stripes. If you ascend high enough into the fields of ice, you always discover the commencement of each line of guffer under the rocks that overhang it.
It was five good hours before I reached the foot of the Finsteraarhorn with my companions. Here, on the left, you see the northern glacier of the Finsteraarhorn descending in terrific beauty; like ten of the cataracts of the Rhine placed one above another, and whose falling waves have been suddenly transformed, in the midst of their impetuous motion, to solid ice. From this inanimate chaos rises the gigantic peak of the Finsteraarhorn. We could still discern with our glasses the pole that had been planted on its top.
From this place the glacier runs round the Lauteraarhorn, where <95> commences an immense basin of ice, three leagues across, surrounded with precipitous rocks. The way up this dazzling field is not steep, but yet we were much fatigued. We were tormented with thirst, which the eating of snow rather augments than allays. We discovered, to our comfort, on the height a running stream in the glacier. From this height we were obliged to climb the summit of a rock. We fortunately found a bridge of snow, which filled up the chasm between the glacier and the rocky mountain, and in an hour we had ascended the latter.
What a glorious prospect! At our feet lay nothing but ice full of chasms, which resembled a hardened stream of lava, tumbling between the icy precipices of the Eiger and Schreckhorn into the fine verdant valley of Grindelwald. The Oberland of Berne lay extended at our feet; the mountains in the distance beyond the lake of Thun looked like small stripes of clouds, and behind them appeared bound less plains. Whilst we were resting here, we plainly discerned, with the telescope, our companions on the summit of the Jungfrau. It is in vain to attempt to describe the sensations that agitated me in this remarkable moment of my life.
We all thought it impossible to get across those icy precipices into the valley. It was doubtful also whether we should find an outlet on the left. The ice was here covered with recent snow. This favoured our purpose, for the snow afforded better hold for our feet. It balled under them, rolled down, formed small avalanches, and tumbled over the precipices into the depths below. We fortunately came to a green hill at the foot of this mass of ice. A band of snow, diversified with rocks, skirted an abyss.
At this moment, when we beheld the land of promise at so small a distance before us, when we would not venture again in the night upon the glacier, none of my guides were willing to turn back. We <86> therefore glided boldly and with little difficulty upon our poles, as upon a sledge, down the snowy declivity. Steering between lofty pyramids of ice, and avoiding the deep chasms, we at length once more reached a verdant spot. We had now no other way left than over a precipice 200 feet deep. A wide chasm, through which ran a small stream, separated us from the opposite side. We ventured to clamber down it, and succeeded better than we had expected. Descending from ledge to ledge, we at length reached the ice again, and there we espied the first herdsman's hut. We joyfully ran across the glacier that lay between us and this pleasing object, and entered the dwelling of the friendly herdsmen, who listened to the recital of our adventure as to a tale of another world. They refreshed us with the best they had. We then descended into the valley by a way hewn in the rocks; towards evening we entered the cool pine-forest, and before eight o'clock had reached the inn of Grindelwald.
Dr. Thilo and Jerome Meyer had the same day proceeded across the Lauteraar towards the foot of the Schreckhorn. Here they waited for us, and passed the night in a cavern, which is known to the chamois-hunters by the name of the inn. Next morning, seriously concerned respecting us, they followed our steps, which led them to the top of the glacier of Grindelwald. They had already surmounted the principal difficulties, when so thick a fog rose from the valleys, that they could not see before them, and were obliged to turn back to the Grimsel. Thence they returned to Aarau, as I did from Grindelwald, and thus terminated our adventures.
Notes
1. * When in the autumn of the same year, our two Valaisans passed this way in a hunting excursion, they found that this prodigious block of ice had tumbled from the mountain into the valley. back
2. * This is the less remarkable, as signal-posts, set up the preceding year on the Tittlis, were completely buried by the snow. back
3. * This vow they executed in the autumn of the same year, and on their return paid a visit to their fellow-traveller as they passed through Aarau. back
4. * This storm, of the 4th of September, did not reach the zenith of Aarau till about seven in the evening. back
