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“ An ocean of mist, as smooth as a chalcedony, as soft and white as the down of the eider-duck’s breast, lay over the whole lower world; and as I rose above it, and ascended the mountain to its overhanging verge, it seemed an infinite abyss of vapor, where only the mountain tops were visible, on the Jura range like verdant wooded islands, on the Mont Blanc range as glittering surges and pyramids of ice and snow. No language can describe the extraordinary sublimity 45and beauty of the view. ”

“ Presently a breeze dissipated the cloud, and I descended upon the glacier. The surface is very uneven, rising like the waves of a troubled sea, descending low, and interspersed by rifts that sink deep. The field of ice is almost a league in width, but I spent nearly two hours in crossing it. The opposite mountain is a bare perpendicular rock. From the side where I now stood Montanvert was exactly opposite, at the distance of a league; and above it rose Mont Blanc, in awful majesty. I remained in a recess of the rock, gazing on this wonderful and stupendous scene. ”

“ 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. ”

“ I have seen, on August days, lofty mountains of cloud piled up on the horizon, vast pearly cliffs, keenly outlined pinnacles, and I have imagined that they were the Himalayas—Kunchinjunga or Everest—or the Caucasus topped by Elbruz—or the Andes lifting on high Huascarán or Coropuna—or more frequently the Alps crowned by Mont Blanc or the Jungfrau. For a moment the illusion is perfect, but alas! they change before your very eyes—perhaps not more rapidly than our earthly ranges in the eyes of the Deity to whom a thousand years is but a day. They, too, are changing, changing. ”

“ Mont Blanc and the line of mountains which runs off from it, and the masses of ice which fill up the immense ravines, make up the eastern wall of the valley, on which, throughout its entire length, seven glaciers, of which one is considerably larger than the others, run down to the bottom of the valley. ”

“ The Alps merit a patient novitiate, 213 and the mountaineer who does his Matterhorn and Mont Blanc in his first season misses the essential charm of the hills. We spent some ten summers and four winters in the mountains before we even crossed the snow-line. But the bitterness of waiting was redeemed by the joy of long deferred fulfilment. We learned during those years the fascination of the lower hills, too often dismissed as tedious grinds fit to serve only as training walks or as exercise for an off-day in bad weather. They are worthy of a more loving study. ”

“ Just beyond the lake of Chambon the road begins to mount the long curves of the Col de Diane, the pass which leads over into the valley of Mont Dore. As we rose through bleak meadows and patches of scant woodland, the mountains of Auvergne unrolled themselves to the east in one of those lonely tossing expanses of summit and ridge and chasm that suggest the mysterious undulations of some uninhabited planet. ”

“ A converse often illuminates the less obvious side of a question, and the converse of our love for the mountains is strikingly shown by Sir Leslie Stephen, who records that a highly intelligent Swiss guide pronounced the dreary expanse of chimney-pots round the South-Western Railway finer than the view from the top of Mont Blanc. It was a contrast to his ordinary life, and therefore, for him, beautiful. ”

“ Only a few millions of years ago Mont Blanc was higher than Everest; in the yesterday of the mind the little Welsh hills, or our own Appalachians, were higher than the Alps.
Like summer clouds, then, on the horizon are piled up the mighty wrinkles of our old Mother Earth. We cannot see them change, but they are dissolving, disintegrating. Only a day or two ago I read in the newspaper of a great peak which rolled down into the valley, [Pg 34] sweeping away and burying vineyards and orchards and forests and the habitations of men. ”

“ In winter Mont Louis is a cold and wretched prison. Clouds envelop the mountain-tops, cold rain and heavy falls of snow alternate with furious and icy gales. In summer the vapours often fill the valley, and from the ramparts of Mont Louis is seen the spectacle of a vast plain of snow, recalling the scenes of winter; but the snow now is the surface of cloud lying low, silvered by the light from above.
This wild country saw the end of Othman abu Nessu, the Moorish Governor of Narbonne.
In 725 Ambessa, Moslem Governor of Spain, crossed the Pyrenees. ”

“ The mighty Mont Blanc, full seventy miles away, first caught our eyes, and then, still farther off, the Monte Rosa group; while, rolling away to the east, one unknown range after another succeeded in unveiled splendor, fainter and fainter in tone, but still perfectly defined, till at last the eye was unable to distinguish sky from mountain, and they died away in the far-off horizon. Monte Viso rose up grandly, but it was less than forty miles away, and we looked over it to a hazy mass we knew must be the plains of Piedmont. ”

“ That seen from Mont Blanc itself is notoriously unsatisfactory. When you are upon that summit you look down upon all the rest of Europe. There is nothing to look up to—all is below; there is no one point for the eye to rest upon. ”

“ THE ASCENT OF MONT PELVOUX.
The district of which Mont Pelvoux and the neighboring summits are the culminating points is, both historically and topographically, one of the most interesting in the Alps. As the nursery and the home of the Vaudois, it has claims to permanent attention: the names of Waldo and of Neff will be remembered when men more famous in their time are forgotten, and the memory of the heroic courage and the simple piety of their disciples will endure as long as history lasts. ”

“ Sweeping round, the vision meets an aggregate of peaks which look, as fledglings to their mother, towards the mighty Dom. Then come the repellent crags of Mont Cervin, the idea of moral savagery, of wild untameable ferocity, mingling involuntarily with our contemplation of the gloomy pile. Next comes an object scarcely less grand, conveying it may be even a deeper impression of majesty and might than the Matterhorn itself—the Weisshorn, perhaps the most splendid object in the Alps. But beauty is associated with its force, and we think of it, not as cruel, but as grand and strong. ”

“ The tops of the mountain, are covered with perpetual snow. During the summer months the snow-line gradually recedes up the sides of the mountain, and from it flow considerable streams of water, that are finally lost in the plains below. ”

“ Looking upwards, the Aiguilles de Charmoz and du Dru rose right and left like sentinels of the valley, while in front of us the ice descended the steep, a bewildering mass of crags and chasms. At the other side was the pine-clad slope of the Montanvert. Further on the Aiguille du Midi threw its granite pyramid between us and Mont Blanc; on the Dôme du Goûter the séracs of the mountain were to be seen, while issuing as if from a cleft in the mountain side the Glacier des Bossons thrust through the black pines its snowy tongue. ”

“ Its nearness is as subduing as that of a great mountain, and next to the Mont Ventoux it is the sublimest object in Provence. The solitude of its site, and the austere lines of the surrounding landscape, make it appear as much on the outer edge of civilisation as when it was first planted there; and its long defile of arches seems to be forever pushing on into the wilderness with the tremendous tread of the Roman legions. ”

“ The bad weather was evidently confined to the Mont Cervin, for when the clouds lifted we could see everything that could be seen from our gîte. Monte Viso, a hundred miles off, was clear, and the sun set gorgeously behind the range of Mont Blanc. We passed the night comfortably—even luxuriously—in our blanket-bags, but there was little chance of sleeping, between the noise of the wind, of the thunder, and of the falling-rocks. I forgave the thunder for the sake of the lightning. A more splendid spectacle than its illumination of the Matterhorn crags I do not expect to see. ”

“ They entered the formidable valley in which so many men had already fallen, disappeared in the smoke, and then, emerging from the gloom, reappeared on the other side of the valley, still in a close compact column, mounting at a trot, under a tremendous canister fire, the frightful muddy incline of the plateau of Mont St. ”

“ On the 4th I rose early, and, strapping on my telescope, ascended to the Montanvert, where I engaged a youth to accompany me up the glacier. The heavens were clear and beautiful:—blue over the Aiguille du Dru, blue over the Jorasse and Mont Mallet, deep blue over the pinnacles of Charmoz, and the same splendid tint stretched grandly over the Col du Géant and its Aiguille. No trace of condensation appeared till towards eleven o'clock, when a little black balloon of cloud swung itself over the Aiguilles Rouges. ”

“ Like everything else in the Alps, a night out is in itself a great pleasure. In no other way can one see such gorgeous sunsets, such "wind-enchanted shapes of wandering mist," such exquisite effects of fading light playing amongst fantastic pinnacles of tottering ice. To watch the night crawling out of its lair in the valley and seizing ridge after ridge of the lower hills till the great white dome of Mont Blanc towers alone above the gathering darkness, is a joy that is hidden to dwellers in inns, and is never dreamt of amidst the riot of the table d'hôte. ”

“ We now inhabit a little cottage on the opposite shore of the lake, and have exchanged the view of Mont Blanc and her snowy aiguilles for the dark frowning Jura, behind whose range we every evening see the sun sink, and darkness approaches our valley from behind the Alps, which are then tinged by that glowing rose-like hue which is observed in England to attend on the clouds of an autumnal sky when day-light is almost gone. The lake is at our feet, and a little harbour contains our boat, in which we still enjoy our evening excursions on the water. ”

“ Seen from below the American Fall is certainly exquisitely beautiful, but it is a mere frill of adornment to its nobler neighbour the Horseshoe. At times we took to the river, from the centre of which the Horseshoe Fall appeared especially magnificent. A streak of cloud across the neck of Mont Blanc can double its apparent height, so here the green summit of the cataract shining above the smoke of spray appeared lifted to an extraordinary elevation. ”

“ A more experienced bird may be more difficult in its choice of a bower; but in my present temper of mind, the budding flowers, the fresh grass of spring, and the happy creatures about me that live and enjoy these pleasures, are quite enough to afford me exquisite delight, even though clouds should shut out Mont Blanc from my sight. ”

“ Mont Louis stands at the point of suture of the three little provinces out of which Louis XIII formed that of Roussillon—the Conflent, the Capcir, and Cerdagne.
In Mont Louis there is nothing to be seen of particular interest. ”

“ The mountains are very much humanized here, there are plenty of carriage-drives, walks innumerable, well kept up, to reach even great altitudes. But beyond all this Luchon is one of the principal centres of Pyrenean-Alpine climbing, it is the point of departure for bold climbers who go to the Mont Maudit, the loftiest of all the chain, but on Spanish soil" (Ardouin-Dumazet) .
But even easy ascents lead to superb and savage scenery. The Lake of Seculejo is easily reached, and is accessible even in a carriage. ”

“ The moon makes her circuit of the heaven in twenty-eight days plus about an hour, and with her return to the sign from which she set forth, completes a lunar month. ”

“ The whole Mount still kept the grand style; it expressed the unity of Church and State, God and Man, Peace and War, Life and Death, Good and Bad; it solved the whole problem of the universe. ”

“ The hard soil and four months of snow make the inhabitant of the northern temperate zone wiser and abler than his fellow who enjoys the fixed smile of the tropics. ”

“ I like mountains that go beyond the clouds, with terrible shadows in the hollows, and belts of snow lying in the gorges where the sun cannot reach, and the snow is blue in the sunshine, or shining till you think it is silver, and the mist so wonderful all about it, changing each moment and drifting up and down, that you cannot tell what name to give the colors. ”

“ There is a cold gray light upon this mountain in winter mornings, that even to look upon, sends a chill to the very marrow, especially if the snow-banner be flying; yet perhaps at evening tide, when twilight shadows have darkened the valley below, this vast pyramid of hoar frost and storm-swept ridges is transformed into a great beacon light of glory, where the warm mellow light loves to linger ”

“ On Mountain Tops the Mount of God ON mountain tops the mount of God
In latter days, shall rise
Above the summit of the hills,
And draw the wond'ring eyes.
To this the joyful nations round,
All tribes and tongues shall flow ”

“ All is silence in the mountains. Not a breath of breeze disturbs the foliage of the trees, and outside the camp not a living object is to be seen. The moon, which had risen over the eastern mountains, floods valley and hill, forest and mountain, with golden light, beautifying and glorifying the whole landscape with its touch. ”