CHAPTER XIV

A WONDERFUL FEAT BY TWO LADIES

One of the highest and hardest passes in the Alps is the Sesia-Joch, 13,858 feet high, near Monte Rosa. The well-known mountaineer, Mr Ball, writing in 1863, referred to its first passage by Messrs George and Moore, as "amongst the most daring of Alpine exploits," and expressed a doubt whether it would ever be repeated. The party went _up_ the steep Italian side (on the other, or Swiss side, it is quite easy). We can, therefore, judge of the astonishment of the members of the Alpine Club when they learnt that in 1869 "two ladies had not only crossed this most redoubtable of glacier passes, but crossed it from Zermatt to Alagna, thus descending the wall of rock, the ascent of which had until then been looked on as an extraordinary feat for first-rate climbers." The following extract from an Italian paper, aided by the notes communicated by the Misses Pigeon to _The Alpine Journal_, fully explains how this accidental but brilliant feat of mountaineering was happily brought to a successful termination.

"On 11th August 1869, Miss Anna and Miss Ellen Pigeon, of London, were at the Riffel Hotel, above Zermatt, with the intention of making the passage of the Lys-Joch on the next day, in order to reach Gressonay. Starting at 3 A.M. on the 12th, accompanied by Jean Martin, guide of Sierre, and by a porter, they arrived at 4 A.M. at the Gorner Glacier, which they crossed rapidly to the great plateau, enclosed between the Zumstein-Spitz, Signal-Kuppe, Parrot-Spitze, and Lyskamm, where they arrived at 10 A.M. At this point, instead of bearing to the right, which is the way to the Lys-Joch, they turned too much towards the left, so that they found themselves on a spot at the extremity of the plateau, from which they saw beneath their feet a vast and profound precipice, terminating at a great depth upon a glacier. The guide had only once, about four years before, crossed the Lys-Joch, and in these desert and extraordinary places, where no permanent vestiges remain of previous passages, he had not remembered the right direction, nor preserved a very clear idea of the localities. At the sight of the tremendous precipice he began to doubt whether he might not have mistaken the way, and, to form a better judgment, he left the ladies on the Col, half-stiffened with cold from the violence of the north wind, ascended to the Parrot-Spitze, and advanced towards the Ludwigshöhe, in order to examine whether along this precipice, which lay inexorably in front, there might be a place where a passage could be effected. But wherever he turned his eyes he saw nothing but broken rocks and couloirs yet more precipitous.

"In returning to the Col after his fruitless exploration, almost certain that he had lost his way, he saw among some _débris_ of rock, an empty bottle (which had been placed there by Messrs George and Moore in 1862). This discovery persuaded him that here must be the pass, since some one in passing by the place had there deposited this bottle. He then applied himself to examining with greater attention the rocks below, and thought he saw a possibility of descending by them. He proposed this to the ladies, and they immediately commenced operations. All being tied together, at proper intervals, with a strong rope, they began the perilous descent, sometimes over the naked rock, sometimes over more or less extensive slopes of ice, covered with a light stratum of snow, in which steps had to be cut. It was often necessary to stop, in order to descend one after the other by means of the rope to a point where it might be possible to rest without being held up. The tremendous precipice was all this time under their eyes, seeming only to increase as they descended. This arduous and perilous exertion had continued for more than seven hours when, towards 6 P.M., the party arrived at a point beyond which all egress seemed closed. Slippery and almost perpendicular rocks beneath, right and left, and everywhere; near and around not a space sufficient to stretch one's self upon, the sun about to set, night at hand! What a position for the courageous travellers, and for the poor guide on whom devolved the responsibility of the fatal consequences which appeared inevitable!

"Nevertheless, Jean Martin did not lose his courage. Having caused the ladies to rest on the rocks, he ran right and left, climbing as well as he could, in search of a passage. For about half an hour he looked and felt for a way, but in vain. At length it appeared to him that it would be possible to risk a long descent by some rough projections which occurred here and there in the rocks. With indescribable labour, and at imminent peril of rolling as shapeless corpses into the crevasses of the glacier below, the travellers at length set foot upon the ice. It was 8 P.M.; they had commenced the descent at 11 A.M.; they crossed the Sesia Glacier at a running pace, on account of the increasing darkness of the night, which scarcely allowed them to distinguish the crevasses. After half an hour they set foot on _terra firma_ at the moraine above the Alp of Vigne, where they perceived at no great distance a light, towards which they quickly directed their steps. The shepherd, named Dazza Dionigi, received them kindly, and lodged them for the night. Until they arrived at the Alp, both the ladies and the guide believed that they had made the pass of the Lys-Joch, and that they were now upon an Alp of Gressonay. It was, therefore, not without astonishment that they learned from the shepherd that, instead of this, they were at the head of the Val Sesia, and that they had accomplished the descent of the formidable Sesia-Joch."

As an accompaniment to the foregoing highly-coloured narrative, the following modest notes, sent to _The Alpine Journal_ by the Misses Pigeon, will be read with interest:

"All mountaineers are aware how much the difficulty of a pass is lessened or increased by the state of the weather. In this we were greatly favoured. For some days it had been very cold and wet at the Riffel; and when we crossed the Sesia-Joch we found sufficient snow in descending the ice-slope to give foothold, which decreased the labour of cutting steps--the axe was only brought into requisition whenever we traversed to right or left. Had the weather been very hot we should have been troubled with rolling stones. It was one of those clear, bright mornings so favourable for mountain excursions. Our guide had only once before crossed the Lys-Joch, four years previously, and on a very misty day. We were, therefore, careful to engage a porter who professed to know the way. The latter proved of no use whatever except to carry a knapsack.

"We take the blame to ourselves of missing the Lys-Joch; for, on making the discovery of the porter's ignorance, we turned to _Ball's Guide Book_, and repeatedly translated to Martin a passage we found there, warning travellers to avoid keeping too much to the right near the Lyskamm. The result of our interference was that Martin kept too much to the left, and missed the Lys-Joch altogether.

"When we perceived the abrupt termination of the actual Col, we all ascended, with the aid of step-cutting, along the slope of the Parrot-Spitze, until we came to a place where a descent seemed feasible. Martin searched for a better passage, but, after all, we took to the ice-slope, at first, for a little way, keeping on the rocks. Finding the slope so very rapid, we doubted whether we could be right in descending it; for we remembered that the descent of the Lys-Joch is described by Mr Ball as _easy_. We therefore retraced our steps up the slope to our former halting-place, thus losing considerable time, for it was now twelve o'clock. Then it was that Martin explored the Parrot-Spitze still further, and returned in three-quarters of an hour fully persuaded that there was no other way. We re-descended the ice-slope, and lower down crossed a couloir, and then more snow-slopes and rocks brought us to a lower series of rocks, where our passage seemed stopped at five o'clock. Here the mists, which had risen since the morning, much impeded our progress, and we halted, hoping they would disperse. Martin again went off on an exploring expedition, whilst the porter was sent in another direction. As both returned from a fruitless search, and sunset was approaching, the uncomfortable suggestion was made that the next search would be for the best sleeping quarters. However, Martin himself investigated the rocks pronounced impracticable by the porter, and by these we descended to the Sesia Glacier without unusual difficulty. When once fairly on the glacier, we crossed it at a running pace, for it was getting dark, and we feared to be benighted on the glacier. It was dark as we scrambled along the moraine on the other side, and over rocks and grassy knolls till the shepherd's light at Vigne gave us a happy indication that a shelter was not far off. The shouts of our guide brought the shepherd with his oil-lamp to meet us, and it was a quarter to nine o'clock P.M. when we entered his hut. After partaking of a frugal meal of bread and milk, we were glad to accept his offer of a hay bed, together with the unexpected luxury of sheets. When relating the story of our arrival to the Abbé Farinetti on the following Sunday at Alagna, the shepherd said that so great was his astonishment at the sudden apparition of travellers from that direction, that he thought it must be a visit of angels.

"We consider the Italian account incorrect as to the time we occupied in the descent. We could not have left our halting-place near the summit for the second time before a quarter to one o'clock, and in eight hours we were in this shepherd's hut.

"The Italian account exaggerates the difficulty we experienced. The rope was never used 'to hold up the travellers and let them down one by one.' On the contrary, one lady went _last_, preferring to see the awkward porter in front of her rather than behind. At one spot we came to an abrupt wall of rock and there we gladly availed ourselves of our guide's hand. The sensational sentence about 'rolling as shapeless corpses into the crevasses' is absurd, as we were at that juncture rejoicing in the prospect of a happy termination of our dilemma, and of crossing the glacier in full enjoyment of our senses."

The editor of _The Alpine Journal_ concludes with the following comments:

"It is impossible to pass over without some further remark the behaviour of the guide and porter who shared this adventure. Jean Martin, if he led his party into a scrape, certainly showed no small skill and perseverance in carrying them safely out of it. Porters have as a class, and with some honourable exceptions, long afforded a proof that Swiss peasants are not necessarily born climbers. Their difficulties and blunders have, indeed, served as one of the standing jokes of Alpine literature. But we doubt if any porter has ever exhibited himself in so ignoble a position as the man who, having begun by obtaining an engagement under false pretences, ended by allowing one of his employers, a lady, to descend the Italian side of the Sesia-Joch last on the rope."

A PERILOUS CLIMB

In the year 1865 but few different routes were known up Mont Blanc. It has now been ascended from every direction and by every conceivable combination of routes, yet I doubt if any at all rivalling the one I intend quoting the account of has ever been accomplished. The route in question is by the Brenva Glacier on the Italian side of the great mountain, and the travellers who undertook to attempt what the guides hardly thought a possible piece of work, consisted of Mr Walker, his son Horace, Mr Mathews, and Mr Moore, the account which I take from _The Alpine Journal_ having been written by the latter. For guides they had two very first-rate men, Melchior Anderegg and his cousin, Jacob Anderegg.

I shall omit the first part of the narrative, interesting though it is, and go at once to the point where, not long after sunrise, the mountaineers found themselves.

"We had risen very rapidly, and must have been at an elevation of more than 12,000 feet. Our position, therefore, commanded an extensive view in all directions. The guides were in a hurry, so cutting our halt shorter than would have been agreeable, we resumed our way at 7.55, and after a few steps up a slope at an angle of 50°, found ourselves on the crest of the buttress, and looking down upon, and across, the lower part of a glacier tributary to the Brenva, beyond which towered the grand wall of the Mont Maudit. We turned sharp to the left along the ridge, Jacob leading, followed by Mr Walker, Horace, Mathews, Melchior, and myself last. We had anticipated that, assuming the possibility of gaining the ridge on which we were, there would be no serious difficulty in traversing it, and so much as we could see ahead led us to hope that our anticipations would turn out correct. Before us lay a narrow but not steep arête of rock and snow combined, which appeared to terminate some distance in front in a sharp peak. We advanced cautiously, keeping rather below the top of the ridge, speculating with some curiosity on what lay beyond this peak. On reaching it, the apparent peak proved not to be a peak at all, but the extremity of the narrowest and most formidable ice arête I ever saw, which extended almost on a level for an uncomfortably long distance. Looking back by the light of our subsequent success, I have always considered it a providential circumstance that, at this moment, Jacob, and not Melchior was leading the party. In saying this, I shall not for an instant be suspected of any imputation upon Melchior's courage. But in him that virtue is combined to perfection with the equally necessary one of prudence, while he shares the objection which nearly all guides have to taking upon themselves, without discussion, responsibility in positions of doubt. Had he been in front, I believe that, on seeing the nature of the work before us, we should have halted and discussed the propriety of proceeding; and I believe further that, as the result of that discussion, our expedition would have then and there come to an end. Now in Jacob, with courage as faultless as Melchior's, and physical powers even superior, the virtue of prudence is conspicuous chiefly from its absence; and, on coming to this ugly place, it never for an instant occurred to him that we might object to go on, or consider the object in view not worth the risk which must be inevitably run. He therefore went calmly on without so much as turning to see what we thought of it, while I do not suppose that it entered into the head of any one of us spontaneously to suggest a retreat.

"On most arêtes, however narrow the actual crest may be, it is generally possible to get a certain amount of support by driving the pole into the slope on either side. But this was not the case here. We were on the top of a wall, the ice on the right falling vertically (I use the word advisedly), and on the left nearly so. On neither side was it possible to obtain the slightest hold with the alpenstock. I believe also that an arête of pure ice is more often encountered in description than in reality, that term being generally applied to hard snow. But here, for once, we had the genuine article, blue ice without a speck of snow on it. The space for walking was, at first, about the breadth of an ordinary wall, in which Jacob cut holes for the feet. Being last in the line I could see little of what was coming until I was close upon it, and was therefore considerably startled on seeing the men in front suddenly abandon the upright position, which in spite of the insecurity of the steps and difficulty of preserving the balance, had been hitherto maintained, and sit down _à cheval_. The ridge had narrowed to a knife edge, and for a few yards it was utterly impossible to advance in any other way. The foremost men soon stood up again, but when I was about to follow their example Melchior insisted emphatically upon my not doing so, but remaining seated. Regular steps could no longer be cut, but Jacob, as he went along, simply sliced off the top of the ridge, making thus a slippery pathway, along which those behind crept, moving one foot carefully after the other. As for me, I worked myself along with my hands in an attitude safer, perhaps, but considerably more uncomfortable, and, as I went, could not keep occasionally speculating, with an odd feeling of amusement, as to what would be the result if any of the party should chance to slip over on either side--what the rest would do--whether throw themselves over on the other side or not--and if so, what would happen then. Fortunately the occasion for the solution of this curious problem did not arise, and at 9.30 we reached the end of the arête, where it emerged in the long slopes of broken _névé_, over which our way was next to lie. As we looked back along our perilous path, it was hard to repress a shudder, and I think the dominant feeling of every man was one of wonder how the passage had been effected without accident. One good result, however, was to banish from Melchior's mind the last traces of doubt as to our ultimate success, his reply to our anxious enquiry whether he thought we should get up, being, 'We must, for we cannot go back.' In thus speaking, he probably said rather more than he meant, but the fact will serve to show that I have not exaggerated the difficulty we had overcome."

Mr Moore goes on to describe the considerable trouble the party had in mounting the extremely steep snow-slope on which they were now embarked. The continual step-cutting was heavy work for the guides. At last they were much annoyed to find between them and their goal "a great wall of ice running right across and completely barring the way upwards. Our position was, in fact, rather critical. Immediately over our heads the slope on which we were, terminated in a great mass of broken _séracs_, which might come down with a run at any moment. It seemed improbable that any way out of our difficulties would be found in that quarter. But, where else to look? There was no use in going to the left--to the right we _could_ not go--and back we _would_ not go. After careful scrutiny, Melchior thought it just possible that we might find a passage through those séracs on the higher and more level portion of the glacier to the right of them, and there being obviously no chance of success in any other direction, we turned towards them. The ice here was steeper and harder than it had yet been. In spite of all Melchior's care, the steps were painfully insecure, and we were glad to get a grip with one hand of the rocks alongside of which we passed. The risk, too, of an avalanche was considerable, and it was a relief when we were so close under the séracs that a fall from above could not well hurt us. Melchior had steered with his usual discrimination, and was now attacking the séracs at the only point where they appeared at all practical. Standing over the mouth of a crevasse choked with _débris_, he endeavoured to lift himself on to its upper edge, which was about 15 feet above. But to accomplish this seemed at first a task too great even for his agility, aided as it was by vigorous pushes. At last, by a marvellous exercise of skill and activity, he succeeded, pulled up Mr Walker and Horace, and then cast off the rope to reconnoitre, leaving them to assist Mathews, Jacob and myself in the performance of a similar manoeuvre. We were all three still below, when a yell from Melchior sent a thrill through our veins. 'What is it?' said we to Mr Walker. A shouting communication took place between him and Melchior, and then came the answer, 'He says it is all right.' That moment was worth living for."

Mr Moore tells how, over now easy ground, the party rapidly ascended higher and higher. "We reached the summit at 3.10, and found ourselves safe at Chamouni at 10.30. Our day's work had thus extended to nearly 20 hours, of which 17½ hours were actual walking."

It is interesting to note that in after years a route was discovered on the opposite, or French side of Mont Blanc, of which the chief difficulty was an extremely narrow--but in this case also steep--ice ridge. This ascent, _via_ the Aiguille de Bionnassay, enjoys, I believe, an even greater reputation than that by the Brenva. It has been accomplished twice by ladies, the first time by Miss Katherine Richardson, whose skill and extraordinary rapidity of pace have given her a record on more than one great peak. Miss Richardson, having done all the hard part of the climb, descended from the Dome de Gouter. The second ascent by a lady was undertaken successfully in 1899, by Mademoiselle Eugénie de Rochat, who has a brilliant list of climbs in the Mont Blanc district to her credit.