Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1894-02-09
THE TRACK OF AN AVALANCHE.

OF 1uel LOT the post. IL nau showed LOT
seventy hours without break, and at sew
eral points in the pass there were drifts
twenty feet high. There were twenty-five
of us, under command of a lieutenant,
and about noon we had dug our way half
through the pass. The mountain slopes
on each side were rough and rocky, but
the snow lay so deep that each slope look
ed as level as the floor, though the slant
was much sharper than the ordinary house
roof. 1t was a good thousand feet to the
cedars growing on the ridge, and it made
one dizzy to look up and realize the dis
lance.
eve are liable to meet with disaster
here" the officer had said as we began
work with our snow shovels in the msrn-
ing. "There must be no shooting with
your revOlvers-no horse play-no shout
ing. If the snow gets started up there,
not man of us will ever be found before
next June"
The pass ran east and west for dis
lance of two hundred feet, and then made
a sharp turn to the north. At the turn we
had what might be called third mountain
in front of us. The slope was as high as
the Others and pitched to the west or down
the pass. We thus had three slopes, two
'ng across the pass and the other
wise of it. For the first hour every
vas nervous and afraid. Then the
began to wear off, and some of the
men ,Xpressed their contempt of the peril
AT the end of two hours the officer had to
repeat his words of caution. At about II
O'Clock fall of snow from the left-hand
slope revealed the mouth of a cave about
thirty feet above our heads. 1t was be-
lieved by all to be the lair of a bear or
panther, and at noon, when the men sat
down in the pass to eat their pork and
hard tack, the officer started to go up and
investigate. Without a word on his part
followed him. The fall of snow had left
the rocks bare and revealed three or four
small trees, but it was a hard climb to
reach the cave 1t wasn't cave at all,
but only an indentation in cliff, with
shelf of rock Overhanging it. This over
hang extended out for perhaps four feet.
The men were not all in a bunch, but
some of them were even out of sight
around the bend. After discovering that
we had been duped about the cave we
stood looking down and across, and were
just moving to get down, when one of the
men below us shouted:
"a deer. A deer! Hurrah, boys-ven-
ison for supper"
The deer was above us, but we could
not see it on account of the overhang.
All the men had their revolvers, and as
they began to flourish them and prepare to
fire the officer called out a command and
warning. If they heard him, they did not
heed him. He was still speaking when
three or four shots were fired simultaneous
ly, and some one cried out that the deer
had been hit. 1t was the conclusion that
started the snow, and it started from the
very top of the slope, where the warm sun
had softened it soonest. felt a trembling
of the mountain and leaped back under
the Overhang, and as the lieutenant and |
stood side by side, the avalanche swept
over us. Daylight was blotted out in an
instant, and the grinding, roaring and
crashing were something terrific.
1t seemed as if the mountain rocked
and pitched like steamer at sea, and the
noise was louder than any clap of thunder
you ever heard. 1t couldn't have lasted
over sixty seconds, though the time seemed
ten times as long. Then we looked down,
to find the pass at the soles of our feet. In
other words, it had filled up to height of
thirty feet with snow, boulders, trees, and
earth. Two hundred feet to the west of
us was the lower mouth or opening-be-
yond that plain. The snow had not only
fallen from our slope, but from the one OBJ
posite. We were struck dumb for the
moment, and as we stood gazing blankly
the snow started on the third slope. AWAY
up near the crest a ball started rolling, and
ten seconds later the snow on a space three
hundred feet long was moving. Instead
of piling up in the ravine it struck and
forced the snow there to the west and fol-
lowed after.
1t was great river of snow sweeping
past us. Logs, trees and boulders which
weighed tens of tons were borne along
like straws, and so swiftly that the eve
caught no second glance. All at once
there was check, and right before us a
soldier was shot to the surface. 1t was
Corporal Herts, who was probably further
up the pass than any other man. He pop
ped out of the snow head first and at full
length, and for perhaps five seconds was
within ten feet of us and looking squarely
into our faces. He was bareheaded, his
overcoat gone, and his face bleeding He
knew what had happened, and no doubt
realized his peril, but as he stood there,
saved for the instant, up went his hand in
salute to the lieutenant. AS his arm drop
ped he disappeared from sight. 1t was dis
cipline in the face of death-an instance
that will never have its counterpart.
Out of that narrow, rocky pass poured
the tide with a fury which scraped it as
bare as floor and tore great rocks from its
sides. At the west mouth the snow filled
a ravine fifty feet deep, and then poured
out on the plain for a quarter of mile.
1t was no use to look for the bodies. Five
hundred men could not have moved that
mass in fortnight. Twenty-four men
were buried there. 1t was idle to hope
that any of them still lived. Along in the
last days of June we found them, one aft
er another, and even then we had to dig.
The snow would have smothered them as
ii rushed down, but with the snow came
rocks which crushed some of them to pulp.
The corporal who had saluted as he
looked into the eyes of death was the last
one found. He was at the bottom of the
ravine, the body without a shred of cloth
ing, and the arm he had raised had been
torn from its socket as he was whirled
along with that grinding mass.-N. Y.
Sun.
The family physician. Mrs. Helen r. Skaters,