Scrambles Amongst the Alps in the Years 1860-69

by Edward Whymper

Fig. 2.

The point was, Did the strata continue with a similar dip throughout the mountain? If they did, then this great eastern face, instead of being hopelessly impracticable, should be quite the reverse. In fact, it should be a great natural staircase, with steps inclining inward; and if it were so, its smooth aspect might be of no account, for the smallest steps, inclined in this fashion, would afford good footing.

They did so, so far as one could judge from a distance. When snow fell in the summer-time, it brought out long terraced lines upon the mountain, rudely parallel to each other; and the eastern face on those occasions was often whitened almost completely over; while the other sides, with the exception of the powdered terraces, remained black, for the snow could not rest upon them.

The very outline of the mountain, too, confirmed the conjecture that its structure would assist an ascent on the eastern face, although it opposed one on all other sides. Look at any photograph of the peak from the north-east, and you will see that upon the right-hand side (that facing the Z’Muttgletscher) there is an incessant repetition of overhanging cliffs and of slopes, all trending downward; in short, that the character of the whole of that side is similar to Fig. 1; and that upon the left hand (or south-east) ridge the forms, so far as they go, are suggestive of the structure shown by Fig. 2, above. There is no doubt that the contours of the mountain, seen from this direction, have been largely influenced by the direction of its beds.

It was not therefore from a freak that I invited Mr. Reilly to join in an attack upon the eastern face, but from a gradually-acquired conviction that it would prove to give the easiest path to the summit; and if we had not been obliged to part the mountain would doubtless have been ascended in 1864.

My guides readily admitted that they had been greatly deceived as to the steepness of the eastern face, when they were halted to look at it in profile as we came down the Z’Muttgletscher on our way to Zermatt, but they were far from being satisfied that it would turn out to be easy to climb, and Almer and Biener expressed themselves decidedly averse to making an attempt upon it. I gave way temporarily before their evident reluctance, and we made the ascent of the Théodulhorn to examine an alternative route, which I expected would commend itself to them in preference to the other, as a great part of it led over snow.

There is an immense gully in the Matterhorn which leads up from the Glacier du Mont Cervin to a point high up on the south-eastern ridge. I proposed to ascend this to its head, and to cross over the south-east ridge on to the eastern face. This would have brought us on a level with the bottom of the great snow-slope shown upon the centre of the eastern face in the engraving. This snow-slope was to be crossed diagonally, with the view of arriving at the snow upon the north-east ridge, which is shown upon the same engraving about half an inch from the summit. The remainder of the ascent was to be made by the broken rocks, mixed with snow, upon the north side of the mountain. Croz caught the idea immediately, and thought the plan feasible: details were settled, and we descended to Breuil. Luc Meynet the hunchback was summoned, and expressed himself delighted to resume his old vocation of tent-bearer; and Favre’s kitchen was soon in commotion preparing three days’ rations, for I intended to take that amount of time over the affair—to sleep on the first night upon the rocks at the top of the gully, to make a push for the summit, and to return to the tent on the second day; and upon the third to come back to Breuil.

We started at 5.45 A.M. on June 21, and followed the route of the Breuiljoch for three hours. We were then in full view of our gully, and turned off at right angles for it. The closer we approached the more favorable did it look. There was a good deal of snow in it, which was evidently at a small angle, and it seemed as if one-third of the ascent, at least, would be a very simple matter. Some suspicious marks in the snow at its base suggested that it was not free from falling stones, and as a measure of precaution we turned off on one side, worked up under cover of the cliffs, and waited to see if anything should descend. Nothing fell, so we proceeded up its right or northern side, sometimes cutting steps up the snow, and sometimes mounting by the rocks. Shortly before 10 A.M. we arrived at a convenient place for a halt, and stopped to rest upon some rocks close to the snow which commanded an excellent view of the gully.

While the men were unpacking the food I went to a little promontory to examine our proposed route more narrowly, and to admire our noble couloir, which led straight up into the heart of the mountain for fully one thousand feet. It then bent toward the north, and ran up to the crest of the south-eastern ridge. My curiosity was piqued to know what was round this corner, and whilst I was gazing up at it, and following with the eye the exquisitely drawn curves which wandered down the snow in the gully, all converging to a large rut in its centre, I saw a few little stones skidding down. I consoled myself with thinking that they would not interfere with us if we adhered to the side. But then a larger one came down, a solitary fellow, rushing at the rate of sixty miles an hour—and another—and another. I was unwilling to raise the fears of the men unnecessarily, and said nothing to them. They did not hear the stones. Almer was seated on a rock, carving large slices from a leg of mutton, the others were chatting, and the first intimation they had of danger was from a crash, a sudden roar, which reverberated awfully amongst the cliffs; and looking up they saw rocks, boulders and stones, big and little, dart round the corner eight hundred feet or so above us, fly with fearful fury against the opposite cliffs, rebound from them against the walls on our side, and descend; some ricochetting from side to side in a frantic manner, some bounding down in leaps of a hundred feet or more over the snow, and more trailing down in a jumbled, confused mass, mixed with snow and ice, deepening the grooves which a moment before had excited my admiration.

The men looked wildly around for protection, and, dropping the food, dashed under cover in all directions. The precious mutton was pitched on one side, the wine-bag was let fall, and its contents gushed out from the unclosed neck, while all four cowered under defending rocks, endeavoring to make themselves as small as possible. Let it not be supposed that their fright was unreasonable or that I was free from it. I took good care to make myself safe, and went and cringed in a cleft until the storm had passed. But their scramble to get under shelter was indescribably ludicrous. Such a panic I have never witnessed, before or since, upon a mountain-side.