Then he set about getting the scheme well advertised, and securing plenty of money for himself if he succeeded in accomplishing it.
On August 17th, 1859, he made the trip across the Falls in the presence of 50,000 spectators.
His rope was 175 feet above the waters.
He was not satisfied with merely walking across; he crossed again blindfolded, and then carrying a man on his back, and once again wheeling a barrow before him.
In the summer of 1860 he crossed once more in the presence of the Prince of Wales, and carried a man on his back, whom he set down on the rope six times, while he rested.
News has reached us that a great avalanche of snow has fallen upon the Monastery of St. Bernard, and has destroyed the left wing of the building, though happily without costing any lives.
The Great St. Bernard is a mountain pass in the Swiss Alps, and the monastery was built in the year 963 by a nobleman named Bernard de Menthon, for the use of pilgrims on their way to Rome.
As the years have passed away, the pilgrims have become tourists, but still the monastery's doors have been open for all who asked for shelter there. There is sleeping accommodation for one hundred people, but in bad weather as many as six hundred guests have been sheltered at one time.