Like me, Dr. König had noticed from the Zmutt glacier how practicable the Matterhorn would be. In fact, Maurice would have tackled the Zmutt arête on the slightest provocation. Meeting at Zermatt Captain Meade, who had just achieved the Zinal Rothhorn, Dr. König communicated to him his observation concerning the Matterhorn. As was soon made public, Captain Meade succeeded in making a January ascent of the Matterhorn. Unfortunately he suffered very severely from exposure.
I had returned to my ordinary occupations in Geneva, when I was startled one morning by a note in the local papers. On the very day on which Captain Meade was “doing” the Matterhorn—January 31st—Louis Theytaz was perishing on the glacier de Seilon, an occurrence which changed an otherwise successful trip into a dreadful ordeal. The cold may be gauged from Captain Meade’s notes in the Alpine Journal. The thermometer down at Zermatt at 7 a.m. showed 27 degrees of frost Fahrenheit.
The fatal accidents to ski-ing parties that I so far know of in the Alps have proceeded from one or another of three causes: avalanches, exhaustion ensuing upon stress of weather or losing one’s way, and crevasses. For no accident yet can ski be made responsible, a rather remarkable exception, when one reflects how easily a ski blade may break or a fastening get out of order.
Theytaz’s accident was caused by a crevasse. He was one of four able and well-known guides accompanying a party of three gentlemen who put implicit faith in their leadership and in whom they had every confidence.
The third on a rope of three, Louis Theytaz followed the two leading over a crevasse which, after the event, showed itself about 7 feet wide, and of which the party had become aware before launching themselves across it. It was unfortunate that the leading guide “took” the crevasse obliquely to its width. The moving rope, too, compelled each man in succession to bring his weight to bear on the same spot. The rope could not be of much use for want of stable supporting points. A man advancing carefully on foot breaks his speed at every step. Not so a runner on ski.
TOP OF DENT BLANCHE.
To face p. 234.
The gentleman preceding Theytaz made a stopping turn on the further side of the crevasse, and waited to see him over. By that time Theytaz’s brother Benoît, who was leader on the rope, might have been ready. Anyhow, the snow broke. Theytaz was hurled down and the rope snapped.