A Tramp Abroad — Volume 06

by Mark Twain

  This was a serious difficulty; in fact, it was an impossibility.The courage of the men began to waver immediately; once more we werethreatened with a panic. But when the danger was most imminent, we weresaved in a mysterious way. A mule which had attracted attention from thebeginning by its disposition to experiment, tried to eat a five-poundcan of nitroglycerin. This happened right alongside the rock. Theexplosion threw us all to the ground, and covered us with dirt anddebris; it frightened us extremely, too, for the crash it made wasdeafening, and the violence of the shock made the ground tremble.However, we were grateful, for the rock was gone. Its place was occupiedby a new cellar, about thirty feet across, by fifteen feet deep. Theexplosion was heard as far as Zermatt; and an hour and a half afterward,many citizens of that town were knocked down and quite seriously injuredby descending portions of mule meat, frozen solid. This shows, betterthan any estimate in figures, how high the experimenter went.

  We had nothing to do, now, but bridge the cellar and proceed on our way.With a cheer the men went at their work. I attended to the engineering,myself. I appointed a strong detail to cut down trees with ice-axes andtrim them for piers to support the bridge. This was a slow business, forice-axes are not good to cut wood with. I caused my piers to be firmlyset up in ranks in the cellar, and upon them I laid six of my forty-footladders, side by side, and laid six more on top of them. Upon thisbridge I caused a bed of boughs to be spread, and on top of the boughsa bed of earth six inches deep. I stretched ropes upon either side toserve as railings, and then my bridge was complete. A train of elephantscould have crossed it in safety and comfort. By nightfall the caravanwas on the other side and the ladders were taken up.

  Next morning we went on in good spirits for a while, though our waywas slow and difficult, by reason of the steep and rocky nature of theground and the thickness of the forest; but at last a dull despondencycrept into the men's faces and it was apparent that not only they, buteven the guides, were now convinced that we were lost. The fact that westill met no tourists was a circumstance that was but too significant.Another thing seemed to suggest that we were not only lost, but verybadly lost; for there must surely be searching-parties on the roadbefore this time, yet we had seen no sign of them.

  Demoralization was spreading; something must be done, and done quickly,too. Fortunately, I am not unfertile in expedients. I contrived onenow which commended itself to all, for it promised well. I tookthree-quarters of a mile of rope and fastened one end of it around thewaist of a guide, and told him to go find the road, while the caravanwaited. I instructed him to guide himself back by the rope, in case offailure; in case of success, he was to give the rope a series of violentjerks, whereupon the Expedition would go to him at once. He departed,and in two minutes had disappeared among the trees. I payed out the ropemyself, while everybody watched the crawling thing with eager eyes.The rope crept away quite slowly, at times, at other times with somebriskness. Twice or thrice we seemed to get the signal, and a shout wasjust ready to break from the men's lips when they perceived it was afalse alarm. But at last, when over half a mile of rope had sliddenaway, it stopped gliding and stood absolutely still--one minute--twominutes--three--while we held our breath and watched.

  Was the guide resting? Was he scanning the country from some high point?Was he inquiring of a chance mountaineer? Stop,--had he fainted fromexcess of fatigue and anxiety?

  This thought gave us a shock. I was in the very first act of detailingan Expedition to succor him, when the cord was assailed with a series ofsuch frantic jerks that I could hardly keep hold of it. The huzza thatwent up, then, was good to hear. "Saved! saved!" was the word that rangout, all down the long rank of the caravan.

  We rose up and started at once. We found the route to be good enoughfor a while, but it began to grow difficult, by and by, and this featuresteadily increased. When we judged we had gone half a mile, we momentlyexpected to see the guide; but no, he was not visible anywhere; neitherwas he waiting, for the rope was still moving, consequently he wasdoing the same. This argued that he had not found the road, yet, butwas marching to it with some peasant. There was nothing for us to dobut plod along--and this we did. At the end of three hours we werestill plodding. This was not only mysterious, but exasperating. And veryfatiguing, too; for we had tried hard, along at first, to catch up withthe guide, but had only fagged ourselves, in vain; for although he wastraveling slowly he was yet able to go faster than the hampered caravanover such ground.

  At three in the afternoon we were nearly dead with exhaustion--and stillthe rope was slowly gliding out. The murmurs against the guide had beengrowing steadily, and at last they were become loud and savage. A mutinyensued. The men refused to proceed. They declared that we had beentraveling over and over the same ground all day, in a kind of circle.They demanded that our end of the rope be made fast to a tree, so as tohalt the guide until we could overtake him and kill him. This was not anunreasonable requirement, so I gave the order.

  As soon as the rope was tied, the Expedition moved forward with thatalacrity which the thirst for vengeance usually inspires. But after atiresome march of almost half a mile, we came to a hill covered thickwith a crumbly rubbish of stones, and so steep that no man of us allwas now in a condition to climb it. Every attempt failed, and ended incrippling somebody. Within twenty minutes I had five men on crutches.

  Whenever a climber tried to assist himself by the rope, it yielded andlet him tumble backward. The frequency of this result suggested an ideato me. I ordered the caravan to 'bout face and form in marching order; Ithen made the tow-rope fast to the rear mule, and gave the command:

  "Mark time--by the right flank--forward--march!"

  The procession began to move, to the impressive strains of abattle-chant, and I said to myself, "Now, if the rope don't break Ijudge THIS will fetch that guide into the camp." I watched the ropegliding down the hill, and presently when I was all fixed for triumphI was confronted by a bitter disappointment; there was no guide tied tothe rope, it was only a very indignant old black ram. The fury of thebaffled Expedition exceeded all bounds. They even wanted to wreak theirunreasoning vengeance on this innocent dumb brute. But I stood betweenthem and their prey, menaced by a bristling wall of ice-axes andalpenstocks, and proclaimed that there was but one road to this murder,and it was directly over my corpse. Even as I spoke I saw that my doomwas sealed, except a miracle supervened to divert these madmen fromtheir fell purpose. I see the sickening wall of weapons now; I see thatadvancing host as I saw it then, I see the hate in those cruel eyes; Iremember how I drooped my head upon my breast, I feel again thesudden earthquake shock in my rear, administered by the very ram I wassacrificing myself to save; I hear once more the typhoon of laughterthat burst from the assaulting column as I clove it from van to rearlike a Sepoy shot from a Rodman gun.

  I was saved. Yes, I was saved, and by the merciful instinct ofingratitude which nature had planted in the breast of that treacherousbeast. The grace which eloquence had failed to work in those men'shearts, had been wrought by a laugh. The ram was set free and my lifewas spared.

  We lived to find out that that guide had deserted us as soon as he hadplaced a half-mile between himself and us. To avert suspicion, he hadjudged it best that the line should continue to move; so he caught thatram, and at the time that he was sitting on it making the rope fast toit, we were imagining that he was lying in a swoon, overcome by fatigueand distress. When he allowed the ram to get up it fell to plungingaround, trying to rid itself of the rope, and this was the signal whichwe had risen up with glad shouts to obey. We had followed this ram roundand round in a circle all day--a thing which was proven by the discoverythat we had watered the Expedition seven times at one and same spring inseven hours. As expert a woodman as I am, I had somehow failed to noticethis until my attention was called to it by a hog. This hog was alwayswallowing there, and as he was the only hog we saw, his frequentrepetition, together with his unvarying similarity to himself, finallycaused me to reflect that he must be th
e same hog, and this led me tothe deduction that this must be the same spring, also--which indeed itwas.

  I made a note of this curious thing, as showing in a striking manner therelative difference between glacial action and the action of the hog.It is now a well-established fact that glaciers move; I consider thatmy observations go to show, with equal conclusiveness, that a hog in aspring does not move. I shall be glad to receive the opinions of otherobservers upon this point.

  To return, for an explanatory moment, to that guide, and then I shall bedone with him. After leaving the ram tied to the rope, he had wanderedat large a while, and then happened to run across a cow. Judging that acow would naturally know more than a guide, he took her by the tail,and the result justified his judgment. She nibbled her leisurely waydownhill till it was near milking-time, then she struck for home andtowed him into Zermatt.

  CHAPTER XXXVIII

  [I Conquer the Gorner Grat]

  We went into camp on that wild spot to which that ram had brought us.The men were greatly fatigued. Their conviction that we were lost wasforgotten in the cheer of a good supper, and before the reaction had achance to set in, I loaded them up with paregoric and put them to bed.

  Next morning I was considering in my mind our desperate situation andtrying to think of a remedy, when Harris came to me with a Baedekermap which showed conclusively that the mountain we were on was still inSwitzerland--yes, every part of it was in Switzerland. So we were notlost, after all. This was an immense relief; it lifted the weight of twosuch mountains from my breast. I immediately had the news disseminatedand the map was exhibited. The effect was wonderful. As soon as the mensaw with their own eyes that they knew where they were, and that itwas only the summit that was lost and not themselves, they cheered upinstantly and said with one accord, let the summit take care of itself.

  Our distresses being at an end, I now determined to rest the men in campand give the scientific department of the Expedition a chance. First,I made a barometric observation, to get our altitude, but I could notperceive that there was any result. I knew, by my scientific reading,that either thermometers or barometers ought to be boiled, to make themaccurate; I did not know which it was, so I boiled them both. There wasstill no result; so I examined these instruments and discovered thatthey possessed radical blemishes: the barometer had no hand but thebrass pointer and the ball of the thermometer was stuffed with tin-foil.I might have boiled those things to rags, and never found out anything.

  I hunted up another barometer; it was new and perfect. I boiled it halfan hour in a pot of bean soup which the cooks were making. The resultwas unexpected: the instrument was not affecting at all, but there wassuch a strong barometer taste to the soup that the head cook, who wasa most conscientious person, changed its name in the bill of fare.The dish was so greatly liked by all, that I ordered the cook to havebarometer soup every day.

  It was believed that the barometer might eventually be injured, but Idid not care for that. I had demonstrated to my satisfaction that itcould not tell how high a mountain was, therefore I had no real use forit. Changes in the weather I could take care of without it; I did notwish to know when the weather was going to be good, what I wanted toknow was when it was going to be bad, and this I could find out fromHarris's corns. Harris had had his corns tested and regulated at thegovernment observatory in Heidelberg, and one could depend upon themwith confidence. So I transferred the new barometer to the cookingdepartment, to be used for the official mess. It was found that even apretty fair article of soup could be made from the defective barometer;so I allowed that one to be transferred to the subordinate mess.

  I next boiled the thermometer, and got a most excellent result; themercury went up to about 200 degrees Fahrenheit. In the opinion of theother scientists of the Expedition, this seemed to indicate that we hadattained the extraordinary altitude of two hundred thousand feet abovesea-level. Science places the line of eternal snow at about ten thousandfeet above sea-level. There was no snow where we were, consequentlyit was proven that the eternal snow-line ceases somewhere above theten-thousand-foot level and does not begin any more. This was aninteresting fact, and one which had not been observed by any observerbefore. It was as valuable as interesting, too, since it would open upthe deserted summits of the highest Alps to population and agriculture.It was a proud thing to be where we were, yet it caused us a pangto reflect that but for that ram we might just as well have been twohundred thousand feet higher.

  The success of my last experiment induced me to try an experiment withmy photographic apparatus. I got it out, and boiled one of my cameras,but the thing was a failure; it made the wood swell up and burst, and Icould not see that the lenses were any better than they were before.

  I now concluded to boil a guide. It might improve him, it could notimpair his usefulness. But I was not allowed to proceed. Guides haveno feeling for science, and this one would not consent to be madeuncomfortable in its interest.

  In the midst of my scientific work, one of those needless accidentshappened which are always occurring among the ignorant and thoughtless.A porter shot at a chamois and missed it and crippled the Latinist.This was not a serious matter to me, for a Latinist's duties are as wellperformed on crutches as otherwise--but the fact remained that if theLatinist had not happened to be in the way a mule would have got thatload. That would have been quite another matter, for when it comes downto a question of value there is a palpable difference between a Latinistand a mule. I could not depend on having a Latinist in the right placeevery time; so, to make things safe, I ordered that in the future thechamois must not be hunted within limits of the camp with any otherweapon than the forefinger.

  My nerves had hardly grown quiet after this affair when they got anothershake-up--one which utterly unmanned me for a moment: a rumor sweptsuddenly through the camp that one of the barkeepers had fallen over aprecipice!

  However, it turned out that it was only a chaplain. I had laid in anextra force of chaplains, purposely to be prepared for emergencieslike this, but by some unaccountable oversight had come away rathershort-handed in the matter of barkeepers.

  On the following morning we moved on, well refreshed and in goodspirits. I remember this day with peculiar pleasure, because it sawour road restored to us. Yes, we found our road again, and in quite anextraordinary way. We had plodded along some two hours and a half, whenwe came up against a solid mass of rock about twenty feet high. I didnot need to be instructed by a mule this time. I was already beginningto know more than any mule in the Expedition. I at once put in a blastof dynamite, and lifted that rock out of the way. But to my surprise andmortification, I found that there had been a chalet on top of it.

  I picked up such members of the family as fell in my vicinity, andsubordinates of my corps collected the rest. None of these poor peoplewere injured, happily, but they were much annoyed. I explained tothe head chaleteer just how the thing happened, and that I was onlysearching for the road, and would certainly have given him timely noticeif I had known he was up there. I said I had meant no harm, and hopedI had not lowered myself in his estimation by raising him a few rods inthe air. I said many other judicious things, and finally when I offeredto rebuild his chalet, and pay for the breakages, and throw in thecellar, he was mollified and satisfied. He hadn't any cellar at all,before; he would not have as good a view, now, as formerly, but what hehad lost in view he had gained in cellar, by exact measurement. He saidthere wasn't another hole like that in the mountains--and he would havebeen right if the late mule had not tried to eat up the nitroglycerin.

  I put a hundred and sixteen men at work, and they rebuilt the chaletfrom its own debris in fifteen minutes. It was a good deal morepicturesque than it was before, too. The man said we were now on theFeil-Stutz, above the Schwegmatt--information which I was glad to get,since it gave us our position to a degree of particularity which we hadnot been accustomed to for a day or so. We also learned that we werestanding at the foot of the Riffelberg proper, and that the initialchap
ter of our work was completed.

  We had a fine view, from here, of the energetic Visp, as it makes itsfirst plunge into the world from under a huge arch of solid ice, wornthrough the foot-wall of the great Gorner Glacier; and we could also seethe Furggenbach, which is the outlet of the Furggen Glacier.

  The mule-road to the summit of the Riffelberg passed right in front ofthe chalet, a circumstance which we almost immediately noticed, becausea procession of tourists was filing along it pretty much all the time.

  "Pretty much" may not be elegant English, but it is high time it was.There is no elegant word or phrase which means just what it means.--M.T.

  The chaleteer's business consisted in furnishing refreshments totourists. My blast had interrupted this trade for a few minutes, bybreaking all the bottles on the place; but I gave the man a lot ofwhiskey to sell for Alpine champagne, and a lot of vinegar which wouldanswer for Rhine wine, consequently trade was soon as brisk as ever.

  Leaving the Expedition outside to rest, I quartered myself in thechalet, with Harris, proposing to correct my journals and scientificobservations before continuing the ascent. I had hardly begun my workwhen a tall, slender, vigorous American youth of about twenty-three, whowas on his way down the mountain, entered and came toward me with thatbreezy self-complacency which is the adolescent's idea of the well-bredease of the man of the world. His hair was short and parted accuratelyin the middle, and he had all the look of an American person who wouldbe likely to begin his signature with an initial, and spell his middlename out. He introduced himself, smiling a smirky smile borrowed fromthe courtiers of the stage, extended a fair-skinned talon, and while hegripped my hand in it he bent his body forward three times at thehips, as the stage courtier does, and said in the airiest and mostcondescending and patronizing way--I quite remember his exact language: