Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1879-01-17

loot OF the garden, giving II decent burial. -
Letter IN PFOrideHce JOurHdi
Day in the Alps.
We defy the most phlegmatic of noun
taneerlng men to sleep the sleep of the
dreamless on the eve of an adventure You
may have dozed of into feverish slumber
when you hear the guides knuckles on the
panels of the door but you are on the floor
before he has forced the latch There is
something eerie and almost uncanny in the
unbroken silence, in the faint earthly flavor
of the dregs of the night air, as you stand in
the village street in the cleaning Not
crow yet from the earliest village cock to
warn the ghosts that may be fitting about the
churchyard not chirp from the sparrows
in the hayrlcks, or a twitter from the swal-
lows under the caves. You grope your way
down to the bridge over the brook. and only
catch the first faint tinge of light on the
mountain tops, as you are leaving the upper
hay patches for the gloom of the lower fir
woods. 1t is the herald of tie glorious day
that will make it, as a Scotchman would say
hard travelling" over the snow fields As
you follow the BlordiHe that borders the glac-
ier the snow-crests are flushing in the rosy
glow as you descend on the great ice-sea it.
self, and cautiously thread the network of its
crevasses, the whole grand expanse of the
snowy landscape is sparkling under the azure
vaults overhead. Through the floods of illu-
sve light you look up 10 the domes and peaks
Leagues shrink up into short kiIOmetTts, till
the most distant SUBMITS seem close to YOU
You can fancy that those black dots might
be chamois in reality they are huge masses
of rock. As yet you feel nothing of that
physical exhaustion which is so often con-
founded with rarefaction of the air. The at
tupsrlblr4 IN. nj ip iii. I'll
champagne or sat- rOidtiI and soda water it
is not only that it gives you the feeling Of re-
generated youth, but that it has freed you
from all shadow of care in the future. The
soul seems releasing itself from its cerements
of flesh, and soaring in advance of you toward
the sublimity of the Serene. We believe that
the most prosaic of mortals must have ten
dency to rhapsodze in such circumstances,
although habit gives him the strength to re-
sist it, and he has the grace beside to be
ashamed of himself.
The intense appreciation and enjoyment
are feeting like everything earthly. As you
set your face sternly TO the snow slopes, and
plod and labor over the melting surface, your
sobbing breath comes faster, and your strain
ing muscles begin TO ache. For, if this is
your maiden effort for the season, il must be
presumed you are more or less out of condi-
dition. That uucOmpromising hill with its
passive existence shuts out the views you had
been reveling in before. But in time there is
fresh prospect opening up to you, and un-
der rather trying circumstances. Pumped as
you have been, you are not sorry to draw
breath but the shelving platform you have
attained ends in narrow ledge, leading like
u gutter to the bottom of a steep ice-roof
You have to turn the ugly precpice by an
awkwardly hreak-neck ascent The chief guide
goes ahead to hew the steps that were to give
those who follow precarious toe-hold. As for
the roping together, that had much better be
left alone, whore the slip of any one individ-
ual may be the death warrant of the party.
You scramble up somehow, hand over hand,
keeping your eye rveted on the ice within a
few inches of your nose behind and beneath
you is nothing but space, and the glance past
your own familiar boots loses itself in the
vagueness of the infinite.
1t is intense relief TO the boldest of crags-
men when he can throw himself down and
relax the self-cOncentration that is the safety
of the adventurer in such difficult crcumstan-
ces. We have reason to believe that the ear
lest explorers, the authors of the volumes of
Peaks, PASSES, and Glaciers" colored rather
brilliantly, if they did not romance, when
they reported those exploits of theirs in un-
trodden solitudes. But there is no doubt that
there are ugly places in the high Alps, even
when weather, with everything else, is in your
favor. Thus the final drete you bestrde in
the case We are picturing bears an unpleas-
antly close resemblance to a jagged knife
edge, or the bridge of Al Sint of the Moham-
medan believer. But you are repaid when
you find your legs again on the little plat
form, and look down in literally bird s-eye
view. over the billowy sea of snowy SUBMITS
on the lakes that are shrunken into pools,
and the towns that have been dwarfed into
Lilliputian hamlets.
The Alpine work is apt to be ugly, even
when the weather and everything else is pro-
pitious. But II sudden change, when you
least expect it, may come over the blissful
spirit of your dream. The splendors Of the
sunshine show signs of being overcast just as
you have fairly committed yourself to the
difficulties of the descent There is an occa-
sional stirring of the air, with sad and ftful
sighing. There is perceptible infusion of
damp-depressing, not to say alarming. The
low, long bank of cloud that was gathering on
the western horizon, begins to mount and
spread with startling rapidity. The sun-glow
on the one side is made ominously bright by
the sinister shadows that are falling ON the
other The guides say little but they shake
their heads and stride onward with sterner
resolution. As you are standing once more
on the brink Of the glacier, you have an OPP |
portunity of studying the night-sde of ma |
ture. Everything above you is enyeloped in
gloom most of the mountains you admired |
in the morning have vanished; but in their |
place is a cloud-landscape of peaks and preci- |
pices and battlemented castles that is even |
more imposing in its way, could you only ad- |
mire it in comfort, To tell the truth, You |
can take small enjoyment in nature at that |
particular moment. As the cloud canopes |
come down in sleet which turns to II binding |
driZZle MS Won 90 lower your mind is set on |
the sheltered path in the tir-wood and the |
comfortable chamber in the village inn. Be |
fore you are well into the wood-not out of |
it-you are half inclined to forswear noun
taineering once and forever. OF course that |
is only an unwholesome fancy, the reflection
of the gloomy weather overhead. When you
have bathed and dressed and are seated over
the festal supper-board, with the sparkling |