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We attack the Südlenzspitz

Before leaving England we had made tolerably minute inquiries, but had failed to discover any record of a previous ascent of the Südlenzspitz, though, as suggested by Mr. W. M. Conway, the mountain may have been previously climbed by Mr. Chapman. Some uncertainty, therefore, whether we should find any traces of previous climbers, gave the required piquancy to the expedition. We made at once up the slope for a long rocky buttress, and towards a part of the mountain down which the guides asserted stones had been known to fall in the afternoon. This statement was probably made with a view of encouraging their charge to greater exertions, for an old sprained ankle compelled me to the continual necessity of putting my best foot foremost in walking over difficult places. Still, the rocks were at no point very formidable, and progress was rendered somewhat easier by the fact that no critical companion was with me, so I felt at perfect liberty to transport myself upwards in any style that happened to suit the exigencies of the moment. I had not at that time quite passed the stage of believing all that the guides asserted with reference to the climbing capacities of the individual who pays them for assisting his locomotion, and had a distinct idea that I mastered all the obstacles in a particularly skilful manner. They said as much in fact, but reiterated their compliments so often that I somewhat fear now that I must frequently have given occasion for these remarks of approbation; remarks which I have since observed are more frequently called forth to cover a blunder than to praise an exhibition of science. Probably my progress was about as graceful and sure as that of a weak-legged puppy placed for the first time in its life on a frozen pond, or a cockroach seeking to escape from the entrapping basin, for I had not then developed, in climbing rocks, the adhesive powers of – say the chest, which longer practice will sometimes furnish. We were accompanied by a porter of advanced years whose conversational powers were limited by an odd practice of carrying heavy parcels in his mouth. The day before he had carried up a large beam of wood for the camp fire in this manner. I never met a man with so much jaw and so little talk. He had apparently come out in order to practise himself for the mastication of the Saas mutton, for at the end of the day he would accept of nothing but a sum of two francs, for which I was very thankful. Similar disinterestedness in men of his class is not often met with nowadays.

The art of probing snow

After awhile we left the buttress of rock and turned our attention to a snow slope and made our way up its crest. Here steps were necessary but there was no particular difficulty, for the slope resembled a modern French drawing-room tragedy, in that it was as broad as it was long. We had but to feel that the rope was taut, and could then look about with security. In good time we stepped on to the ridge, and a glance upwards showed that the way was easy enough. We could not but feel that if we were to achieve the honour of a first ascent, such honour would be principally due to the fact that we had subdivided the secondary peaks of the chain more minutely than other travellers. The principle has been carried still further in these latter days, and as any little pale fish that can be caught and fried is considered whitebait, and any article that ladies choose to attach to their heads is termed a bonnet, so any point that can be climbed by an individual line of ascent is now held to be a separate mountain. A considerable snow cornice hung over on the northern side of the arête and great care was necessary, for the ridge itself was so broad and easy, that less careful guides might have made light of it; but Burgener, though he had already acquired a reputation for brilliancy and dash, never suffered himself for one moment to lose sight of the two great qualities in a guide, caution and thoroughness. At each step he probed the snow in front of him with all the diligence of a chiffonnier. It followed that our progress was somewhat slow, but it was none the less highly instructive. The accurate sense of touch in probing doubtful snow with the axe requires and deserves very much more practice than most people would imagine. The unpractised mountaineer may climb with more or less ease a difficult rock the first time he is brought face to face with it, but long and carefully acquired experience is necessary before a man can estimate with certainty the bearing power of a snow bridge with a single thrust of the axe. Indeed many guides of reputation either do not possess or never acquire the muscular sense necessary to enable them to form a reliable opinion on this matter. As a rule, if the rope be properly used and such a mistake be made, somebody plunges through, is hauled out again and no harm is done; but there are occasions when serious accidents have happened, when probably lives have been lost owing to want of skilled knowledge in this detail of snow mountaineering. I have known guides who never failed when they came to a treacherous-looking bridge, to give it one apparently careless thrust with the axe and then walk across with perfect confidence; and I have seen others do exactly the same and disappear suddenly to cool regions below through the bridge; and vice versâ. The unskilful prober will make wide detours when he might go in safety, and the man of good snow touch will avoid what looks sound enough: till in returning, perhaps you see that the hard crust concealed but rotten things beneath: as in an ill-made dumpling. It needs no small amount of training to judge between the man who quickly and with certainty satisfies himself of the safety of a particular snow passage, and the man who is too careless properly to investigate it; yet without such experience the amateur is not really able to decide whether a guide be a good or a bad one.

Sentiment on a summit

Here and there along the ridge short rock passages gave a welcome relief and at length we stood on the highest point of the ridge which culminates so gently in the actual peak of the Südlenzspitz. Our first care was to scrape about and hunt diligently for traces of any previous party. No relic of conviviality could be found, and as all the flat stones about appeared to be in their natural state of disorder, we piled up some of them into a neat little heap, and came to the conclusion that we had performed very doughty deeds. But we were younger then. The sun was out, there was a dead calm, and we lay for a while basking in the warmth and planning a serious expedition for some future year. It may seem strange in these days of rocket-like mountaineering when the climber, like the poet, nascitur non fit, but the peak whose assault we discussed was none other than the Matterhorn. It was no longer thought that goblins and elves tenanted its crags; but although these spectres had not yet been frightened away and turned out of house and home by sardine boxes and broken bottles, some trace of prestige still adhered to the mountain. It had not then, like a galley slave, been bound with chains, or, even as a trussed chicken, girt about with many cords. Nor was the ascent of the peak then talked about as carelessly as might be a walk along Margate pier. Alexander Burgener had never been up the peak, though he was most anxious to get an opportunity of doing so. I can remember well the advice that was given to me on the top of the Südlenzspitz to practise further on a few less formidable mountains before attacking the fascinating Mont Cervin itself. Alas for the old days and the old style of mountaineering! It may be doubted whether such discussions often take place nowadays; but then it was only my sixth season in the Alps. The following year we did hatch out the project laid on the top of the Südlenzspitz to climb the Matterhorn together. To this moment I can remember as I write every detail of the climb and every incident of the day as vividly as if it were yesterday; and what a splendid expedition it was then. The old, old fascination can never come back again in quite the same colours; better, perhaps, that it should not. Is it always true that “a sorrow’s crown of sorrow is remembering happier things”? Surely there is a keenness and a depth of pleasure to be found in recalling happiness, though it may never return in its old form; and the memory of pleasure just toned with a trace of sadness is one of the most profound emotions that can stir the human heart. Go on and climb the Alps ye that follow: nowhere else will you find the same pleasure. But it is changed, and in this amusement the old fascination will never be quite the same to you. It may be, it will be, equally keen, but as there is a difference between skating on virgin ice and that which, though still good, is scored by marks of predecessors, so will you fail to find a something which in the olden days of mountaineering seemed always present. Go elsewhere if you will, and seek fresh fields for mountaineering enterprise in the Caucasus, the Himalayas, the Andes. There you will find the mountains have a charm of their own: the mark is as good, but it is not the Alpine mark. That has been taken by others. Beati possidentes.

The feast is spread

Judging by the nature of these sentiments it would seem that we must have become pensive to the verge of slumber while on the summit. In descending, we followed our morning’s tracks, and scorning the seductive shelter of the hut made straight down for the hotel. On this occasion we found Franz, who was a man of varied resources and accomplishments, hanging his shirt, which apparently he had just washed, up to dry. Our unexpected arrival appeared to disconcert him a little, for the straitened nature of his wardrobe precluded him, to his great disappointment, from appearing at dinner in full costume. He conceived, however, an ingenious, though somewhat transparent subterfuge, and made believe that he had got a bad cold in the chest which compelled him to button his coat up tight round the neck. In honour of our achievements he said he would go down to the cellar and bring us up a curious old wine. The cellar consisted apparently of a packing-case in a shed. Old the wine may have been; curious it certainly was, for it possessed a strong heathery flavour and seemed to turn hot very suddenly and stick fast in the throat like champagne at a suburban charity ball. But nevertheless, with the remnants of the blackbird or some other rara avis made into a species of pie, we feasted royally.

A few days later we crossed over to Zermatt by the Alphubel Joch, a heavy fall of snow having prevented any idea of making our contemplated assault on the Dom. A Swiss gentleman of a lively nature and excessive loquacity accompanied us. He was not an adroit snow walker, and disappeared on some five or six occasions abruptly into crevasses. The moment, however, that he got his head out again, he resumed his narrative at the exact point at which it had been perforce broken off without exhibiting the least discomposure. The subject to which his remarks referred I did not succeed in ascertaining. We parted at a little chalet not far from the Riffel, leaving our friend lying flat on his back on the grass contemplating the sky with a fixed expression, with his hands folded over his waistcoat. He may have been a poet inspired with a sudden desire for composition for aught I know, or may have assumed this attitude as likely to facilitate the absorption of a prodigious quantity of milk which he took at the chalet.

As we drew nearer to the odd mixture of highly coloured huts and comfortable hotels that make up the village of Zermatt, a sense of returning home crept over the mind, a consciousness of friends at hand, of warm welcomes, mixed with the half presentiment that is always felt on such occasions, that some change would be found; but happily it was not so. The roadway was in its former state; the cobble stones a trifle more irregular and worn more smooth, but still the same. The same guides, or their prototypes, were sitting on the same wall drumming their heels. The same artist was hard at work on a sketch of the Matterhorn in a field hard by. The same party just returning from the Görner Grat. The same man looking out with sun-scorched face from the salon window and the same click from the self-willed billiard balls on the uncertain table below. Ay, and the same unmistakable heartfelt greetings and handshakings at the door of the Monte Rosa. Churlish indeed should we have been if we had sighed to think that we had met our warmest welcome at an inn.

CHAPTER II.
THE ROTHHORN (MOMING) FROM ZERMATT

The Alpine dramatis personæ – Mountaineering fact and romance – The thirst for novelty and its symptoms – The first ascent of the Moming – Preliminaries are observed – Rock v. snow mountains – The amateur and the guide on rocks and on snow – The programme is made out – Franz Andermatten – Falling stones in the gully – We smooth away the difficulties – The psychological effects of reaching mountain summits – A rock bombardment and a narrow escape – The youthful tourist and his baggage – Hotel trials – We are interviewed – The gushers.

The writer of an Alpine narrative labours under more disadvantages than most literary folk – if authors generally will permit the association, and allow that those who rush into print with their Alpine experiences have the smallest claim to be dignified with such a title. One drawback is that their accounts necessarily suffer from a paucity of characters. A five-act tragedy supported, to use a theatrical expression, by two walking gentlemen, one heavy lead and a low comedy “super,” might possibly pall upon an audience, but in Alpine literature, if I may be permitted to push the metaphor a little further, not only is this the case but the unhappy reader finds the characters like “barn stormers” playing now comedy, now tragedy, and sometimes, it may possibly be added, dramas of romance.

Fact and romance

Again, in all matters absolutely relating to mountaineering in the Alps, the narrator feels bound to stick to matters of fact. The drama of romance must be excluded from his répertoire, or, at any rate, very cautiously handled. I knew a man once, who on a single occasion went a-fishing in Norway and caught a salmon. Naturally he was proud of the achievement, and when in the company of brother sportsmen, would hold up his head, assume a knowing air, and take part in the conversation, such conversation relating, of course, to the size of the various fish those present had caught. Such unswerving and prosaic veracity did my friend possess, that, though sorely tempted as he must have been on many occasions, for ten years he never added a single ounce to the weight of his fish. A writer, an Alpine scribbler at any rate, is perhaps justified if he introduces incidents into an account of an expedition which may not have happened on that particular occasion, but which did happen on some other; and surely he may, without impropriety, romance a little on such part of his work as is not strictly geographical; for example, he may describe a chalet as being dirty, when according to the peasant’s standard of cleanliness it would have been considered spotless, or describe a view as magnificent, when as a matter of fact he paid no attention to it, but he would be acting most culpably if he asserted that he got within fifty feet of the summit, well knowing that he was not fifty feet from the base of the peak, or if he stated that rocks were impossible, or an ice-fall impracticable, when the sole reason for his failure consisted in his being possessed with a strong desire to go back home. Of course a writer can only give his own impressions, and these are much tempered by increased experience and the lapse of time, but in taking up old accounts of Alpine work one not unfrequently finds a good deal of description that requires toning down. In these sketches I have striven honestly to render all that relates intimately to the actual mountains as accurate as possible, and would sooner be considered a dull than an unreliable historian.

It is no easy matter to reproduce almost on the spot an account of a climb with absolute accuracy, however strong the desire may be to do so. Besides, a climber does not pursue his pastime with a note book perpetually open before him. If he does, his mountaineering is more of a business than he is usually willing to admit. The guide often, the amateur commonly, fails to recognise exactly from a distance a line of ascent or descent on rocks, though but just completed. Still more difficult is it to work out the precise details of a particular route on a map or photograph. The microscopist knows that the higher powers of his instrument give him no additional insight into the structure of certain objects, but rather mislead. Even so may my readers be asked to employ but gymnoscopic criticism of these sketches.

The thirst for novelty

In September 1872 our party reached Zermatt from Chamouni by the “high-level” route, a series of walks which no amount of familiarity will ever deprive of their charm, and concerning which more will be found elsewhere in this work. All Alpine climbers were then burning as fiercely as they ever did to achieve something new. They had just begun to realise that the stock of new peaks and passes was not inexhaustible, and that the supply was wholly inadequate to meet the demand. This feeling showed itself in various ways. Climbers looked upon each other with something of suspicion and jealousy, and if any new expedition was being planned by any one of their number the others would quickly recognise the state of affairs. If an Alpine man were found secreted in obscure corners conversing in a low voice with his guides and intent on a study of the map, or if he returned evasive answers when questioned as to his plans, he was at once set down as having, probably, a new expedition in mind. As for the guides, they assumed at once airs of importance, as does a commencing schoolboy newly arrayed in a tall hat, and exhibited such mystery that their intentions were unmistakable. Their behaviour, indeed, may have been partly due to the fact that the natural efforts of their comrades to extract information was invariably accompanied by somewhat undue hospitality, and their brotherly feelings were usually expressed in an acceptably liquid form. As a rule such hospitality did not fail in its object. Whether due to a certain natural leakiness of mind on the part of the guides or not, I cannot say, but certainly the information always oozed out, and the intentions of the party were invariably thoroughly well known before the expedition actually started to achieve fresh glory. Every one of the first-rate peaks in the Zermatt district had been ascended, most of them over and over again, before 1872, but the Rothhorn was still out of the pale of the Zermatt expeditions. Messrs. Leslie Stephen and F. Craufurd Grove, who first climbed the peak, ascended it from Zinal, and descended to the same place. It seemed to us, therefore, that if we could prove the accessibility of the mountain from Zermatt, we should do something more than merely climb the peak by a new route. The rocks looked attractive, and the peak itself lay so immediately above Zermatt that it seemed possible enough to make the ascent without sleeping out or consuming any great amount of time.

We went through all the necessary preliminary formalities. We assumed airs of mystery at times; why, I know not. We inspected distant peaks through the telescope. At other times we displayed an excess of candour, and talked effusively about districts remote from that which we intended to investigate. We climbed up a hill, and surveyed the face of our mountain through a telescope, thereby wasting a day and acquiring no information whatever. We pointed out to each other the parts of the mountain which appeared most difficult, and displayed marvellous differences of opinion on the subject, owing, as it is usually the case, to the circumstance that we were commonly, in all probability, talking at the same time about totally distinct parts of the peak. With the telescope I succeeded in discovering to my own entire satisfaction a perfectly impracticable route to the summit. Finally, in order that no single precaution might be omitted to ensure success, we sent up the guides to reconnoitre – a most useless proceeding. We had new nails put in our boots, ordered provisions, uncoiled our rope and coiled it up again quite unnecessarily, gave directions that we should be called at an unhallowed hour in the morning, and went to bed under the impression that we should not be object in the least to turn out at the time arranged.

Rock v. snow mountains

It is on the rock mountains of Switzerland that the acme of enjoyment is to be found. Not that I wish to disparage the snow-peaks; but if a comparison be instituted it is to most climbers, at any rate in their youthful days, infinitely in favour of the rock. Of course it may be argued that there are comparatively few mountains where the two are not combined. But a mountaineer classifies peaks roughly as rock or snow, according to the chief obstacles that each presents. A climber may encounter serious difficulties in the way of bergschrunds, steep couloirs, soft snow, and so forth; but if on the same expedition he meets with rocks which compel him to put forth greater energies and perseverance than the snow required, he will set the expedition down as a difficult rock climb, simply, of course, because the idea of difficulty which is most vividly impressed on his mind is in connection with that portion of his climb, and vice versâ. An undeniable drawback to the snow peaks consists in their monotony. The long series of steps that have to be cut at times, or the dreary wading for hours through soft or powdery snow, are not always forgotten in the pleasure of overcoming the difficulties of a crevasse, reaching the summit of a peak, or the excitement of a good glissade. It is the diversity of obstacles that meet the rock climber, the uncertainty as to what may turn up next, the doubt as to the possibility of finding the friendly crack or the apposite ledge, that constitute some of the main charms. Every step is different, every muscle is called into play as the climber is now flattened against a rough slab, now abnormally stretched from one hold to another, or folded up like the conventional pictures of the ibex, and every step can be recalled afterwards with pleasure and amusement as the mountain is climbed over again in imagination.

The amateur and the guide

But there is more than this; on rocks the amateur is much less dependent on his guides and has much more opportunity of exercising his own powers. It must be admitted that on rocks some amateurs are occasionally wholly dependent not on, but from their guides, and take no more active share in locomotion than does a bale of goods in its transit from a ship’s hold to a warehouse. Too often the amateurs who will not take the trouble to learn something of the science and art of mountaineering are but an impediment, an extra burden, as has been often said, to the guides. The guides have to hack out huge steps for their benefit. The amateurs wholly trust to them for steering clear of avalanches, rotten snow bridges, and the like. The amateur’s share in a snow ascent usually consists, in fact, either in counselling retreat, insisting on progress, indicating impossible lines of ascent, or in the highly intellectual and arithmetical exercise of counting the number of steps hewn out to ensure his locomotion in the proper direction.

Place the unpaid climber, on the other hand, on rocks. Here the probability is that a slip will entail no unpleasant consequences to anyone but the slipper. The power of sustaining a sudden strain is so enormously increased when the hands have a firm grip that the amateur can, if he please, sprawl and scramble unaided over difficult places with satisfaction to himself and usually without risk to anyone else; that is, as soon as he has fully persuaded the guides (no easy task, I admit) that the process of pulling vehemently at the rope, possibly encircling his waist in a slip knot, is as detrimental to his equilibrium as it is to his digestion. Guides, however, as has been hinted, do not acknowledge this fact in animal mechanics, and their employers frequently experience as an acute torture that compressing process which, more deliberately applied, is not regarded by some as hurtful, but rather as a necessary accompaniment of fashionable attire. When the amateur has succeeded in overcoming the natural instinct of the guides to pull when there is no occasion to do so, he becomes a unit in the party, a burden of course, and a hindrance to some guides, but nothing to what he was on the snow.

Sentiments similar to the above have not unfrequently been set forth in print: they seldom, if ever, actuate the minds of mountaineers when actually engaged in their pastime or when describing their exploits to less skilled persons.

There is great satisfaction, too, in translating one’s self over a given difficult rock passage without other assistance than that provided by nature herself, and without surreptitious aid from one’s neighbour in the shape of steps. Then again, snow mountains are as inconsistent as cheap aneroids. One day each step costs much labour and toil, and almost the next perhaps the peak will allow itself to be conquered in one-tenth of the time. Not that the writer seeks to argue that there is no pleasure to be derived from snow mountains. It is to climbing per se that these remarks apply. After all, everyone has his own opinion; but he who has not tasted the pleasures of a really difficult and successful rock climb – especially if it be a new one – knows not what the Alps can really do for his amusement.

The guides’ room

An expedition of suitable magnitude and difficulty was suggested by the guides, viz. an ascent of the Rothhorn (or Moming) from the Zermatt side. Mr. Passingham of Cambridge was at the time staying at the Monte Rosa Hotel, and it was soon arranged that we should combine our forces. The guides, on being asked their opinion as to the projected climb, reported diplomatically that, given fine weather, the ascent would be difficult but possible. This is the answer that the guides generally do give. We decided to attempt the whole excursion in a single day, considering that a short rest in the comparatively luxurious beds provided by M. Seiler was preferable on the whole to more prolonged repose in a shepherd’s hut; for the so-called repose means usually a night of misery, and the misery under these conditions is apt to make a man literally acquainted with strange bed-fellows. At 2 in the morning we sought for the guides’ room, to superintend the packing of our provisions. It was not easy to find, but at last we discovered a dingy little subterranean vault with one small window tightly jammed up and covered with dust. Of this den there were two occupants. One was employed silently in eating large blocks of a curious boiled mess out of a pipkin. The other was smoking a very complicated pipe, and sitting bolt upright on a bench with half a bottle of vin ordinaire before him. Why he was carousing thus in the small hours was not evident. From these signs we judged correctly that the apartment was devoted to the guides as a dining, smoking, club and recreation room.

Our staff was already in attendance, and it struck both of us that the success of the expedition was a foregone conclusion if it depended on the excellence of our guides – Alexander Burgener, the embodiment of strength, endurance, and pluck; Ferdinand Imseng, of activity and perseverance, alone would have sufficed, but we had in addition a tough, weather-beaten, cheery companion (for he was always a companion as well as a guide), Franz Andermatten, ever sagacious, ever helpful and ever determined. It would be hard to find a successor adequately to fill our old friend’s place. It is impossible to efface his memory from my mind, nor can I ever forget how on that day he showed all his best qualities and contributed mainly to our success.¹¹ The prologue is spoken; let us raise the curtain on the comedy.

A false start

The guides had already made their usual preparations for packing up – that is to say, they had constructed a multiplicity of little paper parcels and spread them about the room. As to the contents of these little parcels, they were of course uncertain, and all had to be undone to make sure that nothing had been omitted. A good deal of time was thus lost, and nothing much was gained, except that we corrected the error of packing up a handful of loose lucifers and two tallow dips with the butter and honey in a glass tumbler. Then the parcels were stowed away in the knapsacks, the straps of course all rearranged and ultimately replaced by odds and ends of string. Eventually, at 3 A.M., we started, leaving the two occupants of the guides’ room still engaged in the same manner as when they first came under observation, and walked up the narrow valley running due north of Zermatt and leading towards the Trift Joch and the base of the mountain for which we were making. Having journeyed for about half an hour, it was discovered that the telescope had been left behind. Franz instantly started off to get it; not because it was considered particularly necessary, but chiefly on the ground that it is not orthodox to go on a new expedition without a telescope. We stumbled up the narrow winding path, and close below the moraine called our first halt and waited for Franz’s return. I selected a cool rock on which to complete the slumber which had been commenced in bed and continued on a tilted chair in the guides’ room. After waiting an hour we decided to proceed, as no answer was returned to our frequent shouts. Presently, however, a distant yell attracted our attention, and we beheld, to our astonishment, the cheery face of Franz looking down on us from the top of the moraine. Stimulated by this apparition, we pushed on with great vigour, clambered up the moraine, whose extreme want of cohesion necessitated a treadmill style of progression, and having reached the top passed along it to the snow. Here we bore first to the right, and then, working round, made straight for a sharp-topped buttress which juts out at a right angle from the main mass of the mountain. Arrived at a patch of rocks near the commencement of the arête, we disencumbered ourselves of superfluous baggage; that is to say, after the traditional manner of mountaineers, we discarded about three-fourths of the impedimenta we had so laboriously dragged up to that point, and of which at no subsequent period of the expedition did we make the slightest use. Next, we prepared for such rock difficulties as might present themselves, by buttoning up our coats as tight as was convenient, and decorated our heads respectively with woollen extinguishers like unto the covers placed by old maids over cherished teapots.