Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 133.djvu/59

 that poor unknown wanderer, who was found a year or two ago in one of the highest chalets of the Val de Bagne, having just been able to struggle thither, in the winter, with strength enough to write a few words on a bit of paper, for the instruction of those who would find his body when the spring brought back the nomadic inhabitants. Some shadowy anticipation suggested itself of a possible newspaper paragraph, describing the zeal with which we had argued against our friend's drowsiness, of our brandy giving out, and pinches, blows, and kicks gradually succeeding to verbal remonstrance. Have not such sad little dramas been described in numberless books of travel? But the foreboding was thrown away. Our friend's distress yielded to the simplest of all conceivable remedies. A few hunches of bread and cheese restored him to a vigor quite excluding even the most remote consideration of the propriety of applying physical force. He was, I believe, the freshest of the party when we came once more, as the moonlight made its last rally against the gathering storm, in sight of the slumbering hospice. It certainly was as grim as ever — solitary and gloomy as the hut of an Esquimaux, representing an almost presumptuous attempt of man to struggle against the intentions of nature, which would have bound the whole region in the rigidity of tenfold torpor. To us, fresh from still sterner regions, where our dreams had begun to be haunted by fierce phantoms resentful of our intrusion, it seemed an embodiment of comfort. It is only fair to add that the temporary hermit of the place welcomed us as heartily as might be to his ascetic fare, and did not even regard us as appropriate victims of speculation.

After this vision of the savageness of winter, I would willingly venture one more description; but I have been already too daring, and beyond certain limits I admit the folly of describing the indescribable. There are sights and scenes, in presence of which the describer, who must feel himself to be, at best, a very poor creature, begins to be sensible that he is not only impertinent but profane. I could, of course, give a rough catalogue of the beauties of the Wengern Alp in winter; a statement of the number of hours' wading in snow across its slopes; a rhapsody about the loveliness of peaks seen between the loaded pine-branches, or the marvellous variety of sublimity and tender beauty enjoyed in perfect calm of bright weather on the dividing ridge. But I refrain. To me the Wengern Alp is a sacred place — the holy of holies in the mountain sanctuary, and the emotions produced when no desecrating influence is present and old memories rise up, softened by the sweet sadness of the scenery, belong to that innermost region of feeling which I would not, if I could, lay bare. Byron's exploitation of the scenery becomes a mere impertinence; Scott's simplicity would not have been exalted enough; Wordsworth would have seen this much of his own image; and Shelley, though he could have caught some of the finer sentiments, would have half spoilt it by some metaphysical rant. The best modern describers cannot shake off their moralizing or their scientific speculations or their desire to be humorous sufficiently to do justice to such beauties. A follower in their steps will do well to pass by with a simple confession of wonder and awe.

The last glorious vision showed itself as we descended from Lauterbrunnen; in the evening, regretting the neglect of nature to provide men with eyes in their backs. The moonlight reflected from the all-enveloping shroud of snow, slept on the lower ridges before us, and gave a mysterious beauty to the deep gorge of the white Lübschine; but behind us it turned the magnificent pyramid of the Jungfrau from base to summit into one glowing mass of magical light. It was not a single mass — a flat continuous surface, as it often appears in the more emphatic lights and shades of daytime; but a whole wilderness of peak, cliff, and glacier, rising in terrace above terrace and pyramid above pyramid, divided by mysterious valleys and shadowy recesses, the forms growing more delicate as they rose, till they culminated in the grand contrast of the balanced cone of the Silberhorn and the flowing sweep of the loftiest crest. A chaos of grand forms, it yet suggests some pervading design, too subtle to be understood by mortal vision, and scorning all comparison with earthly architecture. And the whole was formed, not of vulgar ice and earth, but of incarnate light. The darkest shadow was bright against the faint cliffs of the shadowy gorge, and the highest light faint enough to be woven out of reflected moonshine. So exquisitely modulated, and at once so audacious and so delicate in its sumptuous splendors of design, it belonged to the dream region, in which we appear to be inspired with supernatural influences.

But I am verging upon the poetical. Within a few hours, we were again 