The only other eye-witness of this appalling catastrophe was a traveller who was walking up the Kanderthal from Frutigen in the early morning. "He saw in the Gemmi direction a fearful whirlwind, with dust and snow-clouds, and experienced later a cold rain falling from a clear sky, the rain being probably due to the melting of the ice-cloud."
The scene after the disaster must have been a terrible one. "Winter had apparently come in the midst of summer"; the whole pasture was covered with masses of ice. "The body of the Vice-President was found lying 180 yards away from the hut. Another body had been flung into the branches of an uprooted tree, while a third was found still holding a stocking in one hand, having been killed in the act of dressing."
There was no chance of escape for the people, as only a minute or little more elapsed from the time the avalanche started till it reached the settlement. The cows were nearly all killed, "they seem to have been blown like leaves before a storm to enormous distances."
A year later, much of the avalanche was still unmelted.
The thickness of the slice of glacier which broke away is believed to have been about 25 feet, and it fell through a vertical height of 4700 feet. It moved at about the average rate of two miles a minute.
"It is difficult to realise these vast figures, and a few comparisons have been suggested which may help to give some idea of the forces which were called into play. The material which fell would have sufficed to bury the City of London to the depth of six feet, and Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens would have disappeared beneath a layer six-and-a-half feet deep. The enormous energy of the moving mass may be dimly pictured when we think that a weight of ice and stones ten times greater than the tonnage of the whole of England's battle-ships plunged on to the Alp at a speed of nearly 300 miles an hour."
An almost exactly similar accident had occurred in 1782.
AN AVALANCHE WHICH ROBBED A LADY OF A GARMENT
One of the greatest advantages in mountaineering as a sport is the amount of enjoyment it gives even when climbing-days are past. While actually engaged in the ascent of difficult peaks our minds are apt to be entirely engrossed with the problem of getting up and down them, but afterwards we delight in recalling every interesting passage, every glorious view, every successful climb; and perhaps this gives us even more pleasure than the experiences themselves.
If we happen to have combined photography with mountaineering we are particularly to be envied, for an hour in the company of one of our old albums will recall with wonderful vividness many an incident which we should have otherwise forgotten.