The Alps

by Sir William Martin Conway

THE GLETSCHERHORN FROM THE PAVILION, HOTEL CATHREIN, CLOSE TO CONCORDIA HUT

One of the finest situations for views of the ice-world where no climbing is required.

If elsewhere I have praised the charms of contrast, of passing from low to high, from fertile to barren, let me here exalt another method. Who that has tried it will not agree that it is likewise well, sometimes, to hide oneself in the very heart of the upper snows, and there dwell for a while apart from the haunts of men? Formerly this was difficult to accomplish, but now, in the Alps at any rate, it is easy; for well-found high-level huts are many. Such, for instance, is the Becher Refuge, planted in the midst of the Tirolese Übelthal glacier, or the Kürsinger Hut, on the north slope of the Gross Venediger. Settled in either of these, you are in the midst of the high snowy world. The névés are within a stone's throw, and the final peaks may be gained by a morning's walk. The Concordia Hut (now Hôtel, I believe) is similarly situated; whilst the hut on the top of the Signal Kuppe of Monte Rosa is yet more highly elevated. It is easy to spend a day or two in any of these huts, and so to pass before the eyes the whole daily drama as it is played upon the heights. So easy is it, that one wonders why more mountain-lovers do not avail themselves of the opportunity. The drawback, of course, is that such a hut is a centre of human activity. You forsake the hordes of men below, only to join a colony above. Solitude in these places is not to be had except in bad weather.

There is one way, and one only, by which fully to experience the long emotion of a dweller in the heights: it is to camp out. Few, indeed, are they who have tried it in the Alps. Some have slept in a tent on the mountain-side before a great climb; but they are fewer now than a score of years ago. It is not, however, to such brief lodging I refer; but to a settlement made and victualled for several days. Mr. Whymper, I believe, is one of the few English climbers who has spent many days together with a tent at high altitudes in the Alps, and he has not published any notice of his experiences. It is a thing I have long wished to do, knowing so well the charms of such life in other mountain regions.

From a high-planted camp you can climb if you must, but you can also enjoy yourself without climbing. To awake on a fine morning in the midst of the snow-fields and see the coming of day at leisure, with no preparations to be made for immediate departure; then to watch the sun climb aloft and flood the depths of the valleys with its glory; to spend the whole day at leisure in the vicinity of your tent, strolling now to look into some bergschrund, now to scramble on to some neighbouring point of rock, returning at intervals to dine, or read some pleasant book, or to sketch in the shadow of the tent;—that is the way to let the mountain-glory sink in. My climbing days on the heights have left me pleasant memories enough, but the high-level days of idleness have been more delightful, even when they were days of storm and driving snow.

THE TRUGBERG

Looking up the Aletsch glacier from corner of Märjelen See.

To be in the midst of a storm at a high altitude is a wonderful experience, which all climbers pass through sooner or later; but it is an uncomfortable experience. When you are camping-out high up you can enjoy a storm far more easily. I have sat warmly in my sleeping-bag and looked out for hours through a chink of the tent-door, fascinated to watch the whirling of the snow and to listen to the wild music of the gale. It is not the fine weather alone that is fair. There is a yet grander glory in the storms. What can be more superb than to watch the oncoming of such a visitant, to see the white valleys and dark precipices swallowed up in the night of its embrace, to feel the power of its might and the volume of its onrush, and to see and feel all this with the sense of security such as a limpet may be conceived to feel in the presence of waves breaking upon it? Who would not wish to spend a few hours in the Eddystone Lighthouse in the midst of a December gale? That would surely be worth while; like standing beneath the Falls of Niagara.