Through all the years of this our life to lead
From joy to joy: for she can so inform
The mind that is within us, so impress
With quietness and beauty, and so feed
With lofty thoughts.—Wordsworth.
September 4.—Started at 6 A.M. My wife and myself on foot, the little boy on horseback. We walked down the Zermatt valley to Stalden; and then, turning to the right, ascended the Saas valley. The latter being narrower—so narrow as to bring the opposite mountains very near to you—makes the scenery often more striking than that of the parallel, and wider, valley you have just left. Sometimes the mountain sides are so precipitous, quite down to the torrent, which tumbles, and brawls, along the rocky bottom, that no space is presented even for a cherry or apple-tree. For a great part of the way there is no valley, but only a fissure between the two mountain ranges; and nothing can establish itself in the rifts, and almost on the surface of the rocks, but the larch.
We stopped at a small roadside inn, about an hour and a half from Saas, for luncheon. A German professor and his wife came in for the same purpose. He was a tall, gaunt, study-worn man; she a tough, determined little woman. He recommended Heidelberg (it was not his university) both as a winter residence, and as a place of education. The pair appeared to be, like their country-people generally, honest, earnest, and simple-minded, and in the habit of making the most of their small means without complaining. They were carrying very little besides themselves. We reached Saas im Grund at 12.30. We had been on our legs for six hours. The reason why walking on the level takes more out of one than climbing for an equal number of hours, is not merely that in walking the effort is always the same, but that it is at the same time rapid and continuous; whereas in climbing it is not only varied, sometimes up and sometimes down, but is also deliberate, and often interrupted for a moment or two, while you are looking where to set your foot.
A guide, who was on his way to Saas, overtook us soon after we had left St. Niklaus, and asked permission to accompany our party. He had lately made his first attempt to ascend the Matterhorn. He had not got to the top, but his having failed to do so was no fault of his. He could speak a little French, and was a good-natured, talkative fellow.
At Saas we put up at Zurbriggen’s Hotel. We found the house clean, the people obliging, the charges moderate, and the aspect of things quite unlike—all the difference being on the right side—that of the large Swiss caravansary.
The contrast between Saas and Zermatt is very great. At Zermatt the valley ends, with great emphasis, in a grand amphitheatre of mountains and snowy peaks. At Saas it seems suddenly brought to a close without any objects of interest to look upon. With the mind full of Zermatt, Saas appears but a lame and impotent conclusion. The village, however, is very far indeed from being at the head of the valley. That is to be found at the Monte Moro, five hours further on; and, as it includes the Allalein glacier, the grand scenery of the Mattmark See, and of the Monte Moro itself, it has enough to satisfy even great expectations; such as one has, of course, coming from Zermatt.