we heard not the slightest sound. We spent two hours in this melancholy search, and by this time were well nigh frozen, for the wind was bitterly cold, our poles covered with ice, our shoes frozen as hard as horn. We were compelled to descend; we hurried down in perfect silence, and returned to the inn late at night."" 2 209. The gliding of the avalanche has been eloquently described by Talfourd. "You hear the thunder of the unseen avalanches among the recesses of the mountains, and the conviction that you are close to the unmelting miracle which defies the scorching heat that becomes yet more intense ;but it shall be disturbed-how? By the sight of that which unseen was so terrible! From some jutting knob of the size of a cricket-ball a handful of snow is puffed into the air, and lower down, on the neighbouring slant, you observe veins of white substance, creaming down the crevices-like the tinsel streams in the distance of a pretty scene in an Eastern melodrama quickened by a touch of magic wand,-and then a little cloud of snow, as from pelting fairies, rises from the frost-work basin,-and then a sound as if a thunder-clap,all is still and silent, and this is an avalanche ! If you can believe this, can realize the truths that snow and ice have just now been dislodged in power to crush a human village, -you may believe in the distance at which you stand from the scene, and that your eye is master of icy precipices embracing miles perpendicular ascent; but it is a difficult lesson; the disproportion between the awful sound and the pretty sight renders it harder. We saw two avalanches during the hour and a half which we spent in front of the cottage, and learned two other illustrations of the truth that amidst the grandeurs of the universe 'seeing is not always believing."" Somewhat similar to this, is the description of Simond:-"We sometimes saw a blue line suddenly drawn across a field of pure white; then another above another, all parallel, and attended each time with a loud crash like cannon, producing together the effect of long-protracted peals of thunder. At other times, 1 See Dr Martin Barry's Ascent of Mont Blanc; Ann. of Philos. xvii. 33. Vacation Rambles. 3 Jour. of Tour and Resid. in Swit. 2 vols. 8vo, 1822. some portion of the vast field of snow, or rather snowy-ice, gliding gently away, exposed to view a new surface of purer white than the first; and the cast-off drapery gathering in long folds, either fell at once down the precipice, or disappeared behind some intervening ridge, which the sameness of the colour rendered invisible, and was again seen soon after in another direction, shooting out of some narrow channel, a cataract of white dust, which observed through a telescope, was however found to be composed of broken fragments of ice or compact snow, many of them sufficient to overwhelm a village." 210. A melancholy list of casualties could easily be enumerated; let the following suffice :-In the year 1478, sixty soldiers were enveloped in an avalanche on the St Gothard; in 1500, no fewer than 100 perished on the Great St Bernard; in 1624, an avalanche from the Cassandra on the Italian side of the Alps, proved fatal to 300 soldiers. In 1636, thirty-six persons perished in the village of Randa by an avalanche from the Weisshorn. In 1719, 7000 Swedes perished during a snow-storm among the mountains of Sweden, while marching to attack Drontheim. In 1720, eighty-four men were lost in an avalanche, in the Ober-Gestelen, Vallais, near the Grimsel pass; on that occasion 400 cattle were killed, besides 120 horses. In 1749, an avalanche bounded from the Crispalt on the south of the valley and fell over the village of Ruaras in the Tavetsch-thal, Grisons; 100 persons were enveloped, of whom forty perished, and this is very remarkable, several houses were pushed to a distance so gently as not to awake those who were sleeping in them!-before the cause of the calamity was known, the simple Swiss wondered when it would be day-break! In 1800, a snow-storm of three days' duration was followed by an avalanche from a precipice in the valley of the Voder Rhein; it darted across the valley, recoiled from the other side, descended and again recoiled till it reached Trons, burying many of the houses in the snow. At the close of the same year avalanches fell upon the French army while making the passage of the horrifying gorge, the Cardinell, sweeping men and horse into the defile. In 1806, an avalanche fell upon the Val Calanca in the Grisons, carry ing before it a number of trees, and stranding one on the roof of the parsonage. On December 13. 1808, one fell from the Ruenatsch, upon the village of Selva in the Tavetsch-thal, near the Oberalp, killing forty-two human beings and 237 cattle. In 1814, one from the St Gothard enveloped forty horses laden with goods. In 1820, sixty-four lives perished by this cause at Fettan in the high valley of Engadin in Grisons, in the same year, twenty-three persons were killed at Breig; and eighty-four individuals, with 400 cattle, perished at the Obergestelen. On December 17. 1825, three guides and a traveller were thus lost on the Great St Bernard. In 1835, an avalanche overwhelmed a party of five peasants and eight horses in the wild glen of Lira, near Pianazzo in the Splügenpass. On March 22. 1838, an avalanche fell upon the Hospice of the Grimsel, breaking the roof and filling the house with snow; the servant and dog effected their escape and reached Meyringen in safety, the avalanche was preceded by an alarming noise heard the night before and on the morning of its fall. In 1827, Biel in the valley of Conches, Upper Valais, was almost destroyed by an enormous avalanche, which began its descent at the distance of nearly two leagues. In 1843, one fell in the Department of Isere, destroying Valsenestre, covering twenty-six houses, and killing ten individuals. One fell from the Aiguilles-rouges on the 15th February 1847, at 7 P. M., burying the hamlet of Chable, situated in the valley through which flows the Arve; eleven persons escaped, on the third day six were dug out and seven found dead. 211. The wind of the avalanche, or current of air which accompanies its impetuous descent, is often productive of loss of life and property. In the winter of 1769–70, an avalanche fell into the Valley of Sixt, en route from Geneva to Chamouni, the wind-gust of which uprooted numerous trees growing upon the declivity, and overturned others, together with sheds upon the opposite side of the Gipre river. On December 27. 1819, the village of Randa in the Visp-thal suffered severely from a similar cause, arising from the descent of an ice-avalanche which overhung a precipice of the Weiss N horn 1500 feet high. One of the spires of the Convent of Dissentis is said to have been thrown down "by the gust of an avalanche which fell more than a quarter of a mile off." 212 Alpine regions are subject, besides the avalanche, to other great calamities. The expansion of the frozen water in the crevices of the rocks often hurls down immense masses of the mountain upon the devoted inhabitants below. This is the Eboulement, the steen-skreed of the Scandinavians. "Mountains have fallen, Leaving a gap in the clouds, and with the shock The ripe green valleys with destruction's splinters; Which crush'd the waters into mist, and made Manfred, act i. sc. ii. In 1248, the town of St André and five parishes were buried by the fall of part of Mont Grenier, facing Chamberry; the ruins, now covered with vineyards, extend over nine square miles, called Les Abymes de Myans. On the 4th September 1618, the Monte Conto fell into the Val Bregaglía, in the Grisons, destroying Pleurs and its 2430 inhabitants; all traces of the catastrophe are now nearly gone, only some chestnuts mark the spot. In 1751, part of a mountain fell near Servoz, on the road to Chamouni; and in 1772, three villages were destroyed by part of a mountain which fell in Treviso, in the state of Venice. No less sad were the falls of the Diablerets, between the Valais and the Pays de Vaud, in 1714 and 1749. On the former occasion a strange preservation is recorded. A shepherd of Avers was in his châlet communing in secret with his God, when an enormous mass of limestone was hurled in the direction of his hut. It rested against the rocky precipice and bent over the humble dwelling, thus was the pious inmate preserved from an instantaneous death! Débris followed and entombed the Swiss, protected from the first danger of the éboulement. All was darkness, and soon a solemn still 1 M. Venetz,-Bib. Univ. Fev. 1820, p. 150; Ed. Phil. Jour. vol. iii. p. 274 2 Murray's Handb. for Switz. " Vide Bakewell's Introd. to Geol.; Trav. in the Tarentaise, i. 201. • Malte-Brun,-Geog. i. 435. ness reigned, but, says he "I was no longer in fear; I did not lose my courage, and directly I set myself to work to open an issue. A few pieces of cheese which I had made, were my food, and a rill of water which descended among the ruins quenched my thirst. After many days, which I was unable to count in the long darkness of my subterraneous prison, I discovered, by creeping about the rocks, an opening. I saw again the sun's light, but my eyes were for some time unable to bear it. The Almighty, in whom I always confided, and who always kept alive my hope of preserving life, has sent me back to my family, to be a witness and a proof of His power and bounty." When on Christmas-eve, three months after the event, pale, emaciated, almost naked, and spectre-like, he returned to his children, who had been declared orphans by law, the doors were closed against him,—the people were afraid. At last, convincing them of his human nature and identity, he was admitted, and narrated his extraordinary deliverance. On the 2d of September 1806, the Rossberg was precipitated into the Vale of Goldau at the foot of the Rigi,-eight or nine hundred persons perished.' On the 4th April 1818, a large portion of a mountain near Sonceboz in the Valley of St Imier, in Switzerland, separated and fell.' The Andes are free from both the avalanche and éboulement, but there, the volcano and the earthquake more than supply their place. 213. A snowy covering is of much utility to the ground, by protecting it against the influence of intensely cold winds, and preventing the loss of heat by radiation, partly because this meteor is a slow conductor of caloric, and chiefly by its low radiating force. This is strikingly exhibited in Siberia, where the difference of temperature between the ground under its snowy mantle and the air above, has amounted to 38° F.3 We observe, too, with what care the Author of nature clothes the animal creation and the feathered tribe in the polar regions, with a covering of corresponding colour, and changes 1 Nicholson's Jour. xv. 150; Dr Zay,-Murray's Handb. for Switz. P. 43. 2 Brande's Jour. v. 377. Sir Ch. Bell,-Paley's Nat. Theol. vol. ii. p. 10. |