AN ASCENT OF MONT VENTOUX
Thanks to its isolated position, which leaves it freely exposed on every side to atmospheric influence; thanks also to its height, which makes it the topmost point of France within the frontiers of either the Alps or Pyrenees, our bare Provençal mountain, Mont Ventoux, lends itself remarkably well to the study of the climatic distribution of plants. At its base the tender olive thrives, with all that multitude of semiligneous plants, such as the thyme, whose aromatic fragrance calls for the sun of the Mediterranean regions; on the summit, mantled with snow for at least half the year, the ground is covered with a northern flora, borrowed to some extent from arctic shores. Half a day’s journey in an upward direction brings before our eyes a succession of the chief vegetable types which we should find in the course of a long voyage from south to north along the same meridian. At the start, your feet tread the scented tufts of the thyme that forms a continuous [[197]]carpet on the lower slopes; in a few hours they will be treading the dark hassocks of the opposite-leaved saxifrage, the first plant to greet the botanist who lands on the coast of Spitzbergen in July. Below, in the hedges, you have picked the scarlet flowers of the pomegranate, a lover of African skies; above you will pick a shaggy little poppy, which shelters its stalks under a coverlet of tiny fragments of stone and unfolds its spreading yellow corolla as readily in the icy solitudes of Greenland and the North Cape as on the upper slopes of the Ventoux.
These contrasts have always something fresh and stimulating about them; and, after twenty-five ascents, they still retain their interest for me. I made my twenty-third in August 1865. There were eight of us: three whose chief object was to botanize and five attracted by a mountain expedition and the panorama of the heights. Not one of our five companions who were not interested in the study of plants has since expressed a desire to accompany me a second time. The fact is that the climb is a hard and tiring one; and the sight of a sunrise does not make up for the fatigue endured.
One might best compare the Ventoux with a heap of stones broken up for road-mending purposes. Raise this heap suddenly to a height [[198]]of a mile and a quarter, increase its base in proportion, cover the white of the limestone with the black patch of the forests, and you have a clear idea of the general aspect of the mountain. This accumulation of rubbish—sometimes small chips, sometimes huge blocks—rises from the plain without preliminary slopes or successive terraces that would render the ascent less arduous by dividing it into stages. The climb begins at once by rocky paths, the best of which is worse than the surface of a road newly strewn with stones, and continues, becoming ever rougher and rougher, right to the summit, the height of which is 6270 feet. Greenswards, babbling brooks, the spacious shade of venerable trees, all the things, in short, that lend such charm to other mountains, are here unknown and are replaced by an interminable bed of limestone broken into scales, which slip under our feet with a sharp, almost metallic ‘click.’ By way of cascades the Ventoux has rills of stones; the rattle of falling rocks takes the place of the whispering waters.
We are at Bédoin, at the foot of the mountain. The arrangements with the guide have been made, the hour of the start fixed; the provisions are being talked over and got ready. Let us try to rest, for we shall have to spend a [[199]]sleepless night on the mountain to-morrow. But sleeping is just the difficulty; I have never managed it and that is where the chief cause of fatigue lies. I would therefore advise those of my readers who think of making a botanizing ascent of the Ventoux not to arrive at Bédoin on a Sunday evening. They will thus avoid the noisy bustle of an inn with a café attached to it, those endless loud-voiced conversations, those echoing cannons of the billiard-balls, the ringing of glasses, the drinking-songs, the ditties of nocturnal wayfarers, the bellowing of the brass band at the ball hard by, and the other tribulations inseparable from this blessed day of idleness and jollification. Will they obtain a better rest on a week-day? I hope so, but I do not guarantee it. For my part, I did not close an eye. All night long, the rusty spit, working to provide us with food, creaked and groaned under my bedroom. A thin board was all that separated me from that machine of the devil.
But already the sky is growing light. A donkey brays beneath the windows. It is time to get up. We might as well not have gone to bed. Foodstuffs and baggage are strapped on; and, with a ‘Ja! Hi!’ from the guide, we are off. It is four o’clock in the morning. At the head of the caravan walks Triboulet, with his Mule and his Ass: Triboulet, [[200]]the Nestor of the Ventoux guides. My botanical colleagues inspect the vegetation on either side of the road by the cold light of the dawn; the others talk. I follow the party with a barometer slung from my shoulder and a note-book and pencil in my hand.
My barometer, intended for taking the altitude of the principal botanical halts, soon becomes a pretext for attacks on the gourd with the rum. No sooner is a noteworthy plant observed than somebody cries:
‘Quick, let’s look at the barometer!’
And we all crowd around the gourd, the scientific instrument coming later. The coolness of the morning and our walk make us appreciate these references to the barometer so thoroughly that the level of the stimulant falls even more swiftly than that of the mercury. In the interests of the immediate future, I must consult Torricelli’s tube a little less often.
As the temperature grows too cold for them, first the oak and the ilex disappear by degrees; then the vine and the almond-tree; and next the mulberry, the walnut-tree and the white oak. Box becomes plentiful. We enter upon a monotonous region extending from the end of the cultivated fields to the lower boundary of the beech-woods, where the predominant plant is Satureia montana, the winter savory, [[201]]known here by its popular name of pébré d’asé, Ass’s pepper, because of the acrid flavour of its tiny leaves, impregnated with essential oil. Certain small cheeses forming part of our stores are powdered with this strong spice. Already more than one of us is biting into them in imagination and casting hungry glances at the provision-bags carried by the Mule. Our hard morning exercise has brought appetite and more than appetite, a devouring hunger, what Horace calls latrans stomachus. I teach my colleagues how to stay this rumbling stomach until they reach the next halt; I show them a little sorrel-plant, with arrow-head leaves, the Rumex scutatus, or French sorrel; and, practising what I preach, I pick a mouthful. At first they laugh at my suggestion. I let them laugh and soon see them all occupied, each more eagerly than his fellow, in plucking the precious sorrel.