A Tramp Abroad
pretty 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; the
mercury went up to about 200 degrees Fahrenheit. In the opinion of the
other scientists of the Expedition, this seemed to indicate that we had
attained the extraordinary altitude of two hundred thousand feet above
sea-level. Science places the line of eternal snow at about ten thousand
feet above sea-level. There was no snow where we were, consequently
it was proven that the eternal snow-line ceases somewhere above the
ten-thousand-foot level and does not begin any more. This was an
interesting fact, and one which had not been observed by any observer
before. It was as valuable as interesting, too, since it would open up
the 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 pang
to reflect that but for that ram we might just as well have been two
hundred thousand feet higher.
The success of my last experiment induced me to try an experiment with
my 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 I
could 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 not
impair his usefulness. But I was not allowed to proceed. Guides have
no feeling for science, and this one would not consent to be made
uncomfortable in its interest.
In the midst of my scientific work, one of those needless accidents
happened 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 well
performed on crutches as otherwise--but the fact remained that if the
Latinist had not happened to be in the way a mule would have got that
load. That would have been quite another matter, for when it comes down
to a question of value there is a palpable difference between a Latinist
and a mule. I could not depend on having a Latinist in the right place
every time; so, to make things safe, I ordered that in the future the
chamois must not be hunted within limits of the camp with any other
weapon than the forefinger.
My nerves had hardly grown quiet after this affair when they got another
shake-up--one which utterly unmanned me for a moment: a rumor swept
suddenly through the camp that one of the barkeepers had fallen over a
precipice!
However, it turned out that it was only a chaplain. I had laid in an
extra force of chaplains, purposely to be prepared for emergencies
like this, but by some unaccountable oversight had come away rather
short-handed in the matter of barkeepers.
On the following morning we moved on, well refreshed and in good
spirits. I remember this day with peculiar pleasure, because it saw
our road restored to us. Yes, we found our road again, and in quite an
extraordinary way. We had plodded along some two hours and a half, when
we came up against a solid mass of rock about twenty feet high. I did
not need to be instructed by a mule this time. I was already beginning
to know more than any mule in the Expedition. I at once put in a blast
of dynamite, and lifted that rock out of the way. But to my surprise and
mortification, 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, and
subordinates of my corps collected the rest. None of these poor people
were injured, happily, but they were much annoyed. I explained to
the head chaleteer just how the thing happened, and that I was only
searching for the road, and would certainly have given him timely notice
if I had known he was up there. I said I had meant no harm, and hoped
I had not lowered myself in his estimation by raising him a few rods in
the air. I said many other judicious things, and finally when I offered
to rebuild his chalet, and pay for the breakages, and throw in the
cellar, 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 he
had lost in view he had gained in cellar, by exact measurement. He said
there wasn't another hole like that in the mountains--and he would have
been 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 chalet
from its own debris in fifteen minutes. It was a good deal more
picturesque than it was before, too. The man said we were now on the
Feil-Stutz, above the Schwegmatt--information which I was glad to get,
since it gave us our position to a degree of particularity which we had
not been accustomed to for a day or so. We also learned that we were
standing at the foot of the Riffelberg proper, and that the initial
chapter of our work was completed.
We had a fine view, from here, of the energetic Visp, as it makes its
first plunge into the world from under a huge arch of solid ice, worn
through the foot-wall of the great Gorner Glacier; and we could also see
the Furggenbach, which is the outlet of the Furggen Glacier.
The mule-road to the summit of the Riffelberg passed right in front of
the chalet, a circumstance which we almost immediately noticed, because
a 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 to
tourists. My blast had interrupted this trade for a few minutes, by
breaking all the bottles on the place; but I gave the man a lot of
whiskey to sell for Alpine champagne, and a lot of vinegar which would
answer for Rhine wine, consequently trade was soon as brisk as ever.
Leaving the Expedition outside to rest, I quartered myself in the
chalet, with Harris, proposing to correct my journals and scientific
observations before continuing the ascent. I had hardly begun my work
when a tall, slender, vigorous American youth of about twenty-three, who
was on his way down the mountain, entered and came toward me with that
breezy self-complacency which is the adolescent's idea of the well-bred
ease of the man of the world. His hair was short and parted accurately
in the middle, and he had all the look of an American person who would
be likely to begin his signature with an initial, and spell his middle
name out. He introduced himself, smiling a smirky smile borrowed from
the courtiers of the stage, extended a fair-skinned talon, and while he
gripped my hand in it he bent his body forward three times at the
hips, as the stage courtier does, and said in the airiest and most
condescending and patronizing way--I quite remember his exact language:
“Very glad to make your acquaintance, 'm sure; very glad indeed, assure
you. I've read all your little efforts and greatly admired them, and
when I heard you were here, I ...”
I indicated a chair, and he sat down. This grandee was the grandson of
an American of considerable note in his day, and not wholly forgotten
yet--a man who came so near being a great man that he was quite
generally accounted one while he lived.
I slowly paced the floor, pondering scientific problems, and heard this
conversation:
GRANDSON. First visit to Europe?
HARRIS. Mine? Yes.
G.S. (With a soft reminiscent sigh suggestive of bygone joys that may
be tasted in their freshness but once.) Ah, I know what it is to you. A
first visit!--ah, the romance of it! I wish I could feel it again.
H. Yes, I find it exceeds all my dreams. It is enchantment. I go...
G.S. (With a dainty gesture of the hand signifying “Spare me your callow
enthusiasms, good friend.”) Yes, _I_ know, I know; you go to cathedrals,
and exclaim; and you drag through league-long picture-galleries and
exclaim; and you stand here, and there, and yonder, upon historic
ground, and continue to exclaim; and you are permeated with your first
crude conceptions of Art, and are proud and happy. Ah, yes, proud and
happy--that expresses it. Yes-yes, enjoy it--it is right--it is an
innocent revel.
H. And you? Don't you do these things now?
G.S. I! Oh, that is VERY good! My dear sir, when you are as old a
traveler as I am, you will not ask such a question as that. _I_ visit
the regulation gallery, moon around the regulation cathedral, do the
worn round of the regulation sights, YET?--Excuse me!
H. Well, what DO you do, then?
G.S. Do? I flit--and flit--for I am ever on the wing--but I avoid the
herd. Today I am in Paris, tomorrow in Berlin, anon in Rome; but you
would look for me in vain in the galleries of the Louvre or the common
resorts of the gazers in those other capitals. If you would find me, you
must look in the unvisited nooks and corners where others never think
of going. One day you will find me making myself at home in some obscure
peasant's cabin, another day you will find me in some forgotten castle
worshiping some little gem or art which the careless eye has overlooked
and which the unexperienced would despise; again you will find me as
guest in the inner sanctuaries of palaces while the herd is content to
get a hurried glimpse of the unused chambers by feeing a servant.
H. You are a GUEST in such places?
G.S. And a welcoming one.
H. It is surprising. How does it come?
G.S. My grandfather's name is a passport to all the courts in Europe. I
have only to utter that name and every door is open to me. I flit from
court to court at my own free will and pleasure, and am always welcome.
I am as much at home in the palaces of Europe as you are among your
relatives. I know every titled person in Europe, I think. I have my
pockets full of invitations all the time. I am under promise to go to
Italy, where I am to be the guest of a succession of the noblest houses
in the land. In Berlin my life is a continued round of gaiety in the
imperial palace. It is the same, wherever I go.
H. It must be very pleasant. But it must make Boston seem a little slow
when you are at home.
G.S. Yes, of course it does. But I don't go home much. There's no life
there--little to feed a man's higher nature. Boston's very narrow, you
know. She doesn't know it, and you couldn't convince her of it--so I say
nothing when I'm there: where's the use? Yes, Boston is very narrow, but
she has such a good opinion of herself that she can't see it. A man who
has traveled as much as I have, and seen as much of the world, sees it
plain enough, but he can't cure it, you know, so the best is to leave it
and seek a sphere which is more in harmony with his tastes and culture.
I run across there, once a year, perhaps, when I have nothing important
on hand, but I'm very soon back again. I spend my time in Europe.
H. I see. You map out your plans and ...
G.S. No, excuse me. I don't map out any plans. I simply follow the
inclination of the day. I am limited by no ties, no requirements, I
am not bound in any way. I am too old a traveler to hamper myself with
deliberate purposes. I am simply a traveler--an inveterate traveler--a
man of the world, in a word--I can call myself by no other name. I do
not say, “I am going here, or I am going there”--I say nothing at all, I
only act. For instance, next week you may find me the guest of a grandee
of Spain, or you may find me off for Venice, or flitting toward Dresden.
I shall probably go to Egypt presently; friends will say to friends,
“He is at the Nile cataracts”--and at that very moment they will be
surprised to learn that I'm away off yonder in India somewhere. I am