And the free torrent’s far up-sounding hymn;
I love to leave my littleness behind
In the low vale where little cares are great.”
THE NEEDLE OF THE MATTERHORN.
[CHAPTER XX]
THE VALE OF CHAMONIX
WE saw everything that there was to see at Zermatt—the relics of the early climbers in the little museum; the pathetic graveyard where the victims of their mad ambition are commemorated, and the Imfeld relief-maps of the surrounding region. Here I had my first experience in what one might call mountain-climbing by proxy; we took the electric train up to the Gornergrat. Sir John Lubbock says:—
“It is impossible to give any idea in words of the beauty of these high snow-fields. The gently curving surfaces, which break with abrupt edges into dark abysses or sink gently to soft depressions or meet one another in ridges, the delicate shadows in the curved hollows, the lines of light on the crests, the suggestion of easy movement in the forms, with the sensation of complete repose to the eye, the snowy white with an occasional tinge of the most delicate pink, make up a scene of which no picture or photograph can give more than a very inadequate impression, and form an almost irresistible attraction to all true lovers of nature.”