There is something magnificent about going up these mountains, appalling as it seems to one"s nerves, at particular turns and angles of the road, where the mule stops you on the very "brink of forever,"
as one of the ladies said.
Well, at last we reached the top, and began to descend; and there, at our feet, as if we were looking down at it out of a cloud, lay the whole beautiful valley of the Rhone. I did not know then that this was one of the things put down in the guide book, that we were expected to admire, as I found afterwards it was; but nothing that I saw any where through the Alps impressed me as this did. It seemed to me more like the vision of "the land that is very far off" than any thing earthly.
I can see it now just as distinctly as I saw it then; one of these flat, Swiss valleys, green as a velvet carpet, studded with buildings and villages that looked like dots in the distance, and embraced on all sides by these magnificent mountains, of which those nearest in the prospect were distinctly made out, with their rocks, pine trees, and foliage.
The next in the receding distance were fainter, and of a purplish green; the next of a vivid purple; the next, lilac; while far in the fading view the crystal summits and glaciers of the Oberland Alps rose like an exhalation.
The afternoon sun was throwing its level beams in between these many-colored ranges, and on one of them the ruins of an old Roman tower stood picturesquely prominent. The Simplon road could be seen, dividing the valley like an arrow.
I had gone on quite ahead of my company, and as my mule soberly paced downward in the almost perpendicular road, I seemed to be poised so high above the enchanting scene that I had somewhat the same sensation as if I were flying. I don"t wonder that larks seem to get into such a rapture when they are high up in the air. What a dreamlike beauty there is in distance, disappearing ever as we approach!
As I came down towards Martigny into the pasture land of the great mountain, it seemed to me that the scenery might pa.s.s for that of the Delectable Mountains--such beautiful, green, shadowy hollows, amid great clumps of chestnut and apple trees, where people were making their hay, which smelled so delightfully, while cozy little Swiss cottages stood in every nook.
All were out in the fields, men, women, and children, and in one hayfield I saw the baby"s cradle--baby, of course, concealed from view under a small avalanche of a feather bed, as the general fashion in these parts seems to be. The women wore broad, flat hats, and all appeared to be working rather lazily, as it was coming on evening.
This place might have done for Arcadia, or Utopia, or any other of those places people think of when they want to get rid of what is, and get into the region of what might be.
I was very far before my party, and now got off my mule, and sat down on a log to wait till they came up. Then the drama enacted by C."s mule took place, which he has described to you. I merely saw a distant commotion, but did not enter into the merits of the case.
As they were somewhat slow coming down, I climbed over a log into a hayfield, and plucked a long, delicate, white-blossomed vine, with which I garlanded the top of my flat hat.
One is often reminded of a text of Scripture in these valleys--"He sendeth springs into the valleys, which run among the hills."
Every where are these little, lively, murmuring brooks falling down the rocks, prattling through the hayfields, sociably gossiping with each other as they go.
Here comes the party, and now we are going down into Martigny. How tired we were! We had to ride quite through the town, then through a long, long row of trees, to come to the Hotel de la Tour. How delightful it seemed, with its stone entries and staircases, its bedrooms as inviting as cleanliness could make them! The eating saloon opened on to a beautiful garden filled with roses in full bloom. There were little tables set about under the trees for people to take their strawberries and cream, or tea, in the open air if they preferred it, a very common and pleasant custom of continental hotels.
A trim, tidy young woman in a white cap, with a bunch of keys at her girdle, ushered us up two flights of stone stairs, into a very clean, nice apartment, with white muslin window curtains. Now, there is no feature of a room that speaks to the heart like white muslin window curtains; they always shed light on the whole scene.
After resting a while we were called down to a supper of strawberries and cream, and nice little rolls with honey. This honey you find at every hotel in Switzerland, as one of the inevitables of the breakfast or tea table.
Here we were to part from our Chamouni guides, and engage new ones to take us to St. Bernard. I had become so fond of mine that it really went quite to my heart; we had an affecting leave-taking in the dark stone entry, at the foot of the staircase. In the earnestness of my emotion I gave him all the change I had in my pocket, to buy _souvenirs_ for his little folks at home, for you know I told you we had compared notes on sundry domestic points. I really flattered myself that I was doing something quite liberal; but this deceitful Swiss coin! I found, when I came to tell C. about it, that the whole stock only amounted to about twenty cents: like a great many things in this world, it looked more than it was. The good man, however, seemed as grateful as if I had done something, wished all sorts of happiness to me and my children, and so we parted. Peace go with him in his Chamouni cottage.
JOURNAL--(CONTINUED.)
Sat.u.r.day, July 9. Rose in a blaze of glory. Rode five mortal hours in a _char-a-banc_, sweltering under a burning sun. But in less than ten minutes after we mounted the mules and struck into the gorge, the ladies m.u.f.fled themselves in thick shawls. We seemed to have pa.s.sed, almost in a moment, from the tropics into the frigid zone. A fur cloak was suggested to me, but as it happened I was adequately calorified without. Chancing to be the last in the file, my mule suddenly stopped to eat.
"_Allez_, _allez_!" said I, twitching the bridle.
"I _won"t_!" said he, as plainly as ears and legs could speak.
"_Allez_!" thundered I, jumping off and bestowing a kick upon his ribs which made me suffer if it did not him.
"I _won"t_!" said he, stuffily.
"Won"t you?" said I, pursuing the same line of inductive argument, with rhetorical flourishes of the bridle.
"Never!" he replied again, most mulishly.
"Then if words and kicks won"t do," said I, "let us see what virtue there is in stones;" and suiting the action to the word, I showered him with fragments of granite, as from a catapult. At every concussion he jumped and kicked, but kept his nose in the same relative position.
I redoubled the logical admonition; he jumped the more perceptibly; finally, after an unusually affecting appeal from a piece of granite, he fairly budged, and I seized the bridle to mount.
"Not at all," said he, wheeling round to his first position, like a true proslavery demagogue.
"Ah," said I; and went over the same line of argument in a more solid and convincing manner. At length the salutary impression seemed permanently fastened on his mind; he fairly gave in; and I rode on in triumph to overtake the party--having no need of a fur coat.
h.o.r.eb, Sinai, and Hor! What a wilderness! what a sudden change!
Nothing but savage, awful precipices of naked granite, snowy fields, and verdureless wastes! In every other place in the Alps, we have looked upon the snow in the remote distance, to be dazzled with its sheeny effulgence--ourselves, meanwhile, in the region of verdure and warmth. Here we march through a horrid desert--not a leaf, not a blade of gra.s.s--over the deep drifts of snow; and we find our admiration turns to horror. And this is the road that Hannibal trod, and Charlemagne, and Napoleon! They were fit conquerors of Rome, who could vanquish the sterner despotism of eternal winter.
After an hour"s perilous climbing, we reached, at last, the _hospice_, and in five minutes were sitting at the supper table, by a good blazing fire, with a lively company, chatting with a gentlemanly abbe, discussing figs and fun, cracking filberts and jokes, and regaling ourselves genially. But ever and anon drawing, with a half shiver, a little closer to the roaring f.a.gots in the chimney, I thought to myself, "And this is our midsummer nights"
dream"!
LETTER x.x.xVI.
Dear:--
During breakfast, we were discussing whether we could get through the snow to Mont St. Bernard. Some thought we could, and some thought not.
So it goes here: we are gasping and sweltering one hour, and plunging through snow banks the next.
After breakfast, we entered the _char-a-banc_, a crab-like, sideway carriage, and were soon on our way. Our path was cut from the breast of the mountain, in a stifling gorge, where walls of rock on both sides served as double reflectors to concentrate the heat of the sun on our hapless heads. To be sure, there was a fine foaming stream at the bottom of the pa.s.s, and ever so much fine scenery, if we could have seen it; but our chars opened but one way, and that against the perpendicular rock, close enough, almost, to blister our faces; and the sun beat in so on our backs that we were obliged to have the curtain down. Thus we were as uncognizant of the scenery we pa.s.sed through as if we had been nailed up in a box. Nothing but the consideration that we were travelling for pleasure could for a moment have reconciled us to such inconveniences. As it was, I occasionally called out to C., in the back carriage, to be sure and take good care of the fur coat; which always brought shouts of laughter from the whole party. The idea of a fur coat seemed so supremely ridiculous to us, there was no making us believe we ever should or could want it.
That was the most unpleasant day"s ride I had in the Alps. We stopped to take dinner in the little wretched village of Liddes. You have no idea what a disagreeable, unsavory concern one of these villages is.
Houses, none of which look much better than the log barns in our Western States, set close together on either side of a street paved with round stones; coa.r.s.e, sunburnt women, with their necks enlarged by the goitre; and dirty children, with tangled hair, and the same disgusting disease,--these were the princ.i.p.al features of the scene.
This goitre prevails so extensively in this region, that you seldom see a person with the neck in a healthy condition. The worst of the matter is, that in many cases of children it induces idiocy. Cases of this kind were so frequent, that, after a while, whenever I met a child, I began to search in its face for indications of the approach of this disease.
They are called _cretins_. In many cases the whole head appears swelled and deformed. As usual, every one you look at puts out the hand to beg. The tavern where we stopped to dine seemed more like a great barn, or cavern, than any thing else. We go groping along perfectly dark stone pa.s.sages, stumbling up a stone staircase, and gaining light only when the door of a kind of reception room opens upon us--a long, rough-looking room, without any carpet, furnished with a table, and some chairs, and a rude sofa. We were shown to a bed room, carpetless, but tolerably clean, with a very high feather bed in each corner, under a canopy of white curtains.
After dinner we went on towards St. Pierre, a miserable hamlet, where the mules were taken out of the chars, and we prepared to mount them.
It was between three and four o"clock. Our path lay up a desolate mountain gorge. After we had ascended some way the cold became intense. The mountain torrent, by the side of which we went up, leaped and tumbled under ribs of ice, and through banks of snow.
I noticed on either side of the defile that there were high posts put up on the rocks, and a cord stretched from one to the other. The object of these, my guide told me, was to show the path, when this whole ravine is filled up with deep snow.
I could not help thinking how horrible it must be to go up here in the winter.
Our path sometimes came so near to the torrent as to suggest uncomfortable ideas.
In one place it swept round the point of a rock which projected into the foaming flood, so that it was completely under water. I stopped a little before I came to this, and told the guide I wanted to get down.
He was all accommodation, and lifted me from my saddle, and then stood to see what I would do next. When I made him understand that I meant to walk round the point, he very earnestly insisted that I should get back to the saddle again, and was so positive that I had only to obey.
It was well I did so, for the mule went round safely enough, and could afford to go up to his ankles in water better than I could.
As we neared the _hospice_ I began to feel the effects of the rarefied air very sensibly. It made me dizzy and sick, bringing on a most acute headache--a sharp, knife-like pain. S. was still more affected.