The Initials. Baroness Jemima Montgomery Tautphoeus
he is considerably taller than you are—there would be at least half a yard of leg uncovered.”
“The dress is certainly very becoming,” observed Hamilton, “but I cannot imagine it particularly comfortable.”
“If you had to climb, you would find it as comfortable as becoming,” answered Baron Z—; “and that it is judicious admits of no doubt; all mountaineers have something similar; and you may be sure the dress was originally adopted for its convenience. It is unquestionably advantageous, having the knees uncovered in ascending and descending mountains.”
“And the monstrous shoes”—begun Hamilton——
“Give a steadier footing and preserve the feet from the pointed stones or rocks.”
“I remember,” said A. Z., “the first time I ascended an alp, I wore thin shoes and open-work silk stockings; I came home nearly barefoot, of course, and with quite a new idea of an alp.”
“Oh, pray do give me some idea of one,” cried Hamilton; “I—I must confess I have none whatever; for when people talk of alps, I cannot help thinking of the Alps.”
“I am not surprised at your question, for I doubt if the word be in the dictionary with the meaning attached to it here. People call the pasture-lands on the hills or lower parts of the mountains, ‘alp.’ Almost every farmer of any importance has one to which he sends the greater part of his cattle during the summer months, and there butter and cheese are made for the winter. Where the alps are extensive, they are held by several persons, and instead of one little wooden residence, there are sometimes twenty or thirty.”
“A sort of inhabited common, perhaps?”
“By no means. They are inherited or bought, or given in leases, and are sometimes very valuable.”
“The view from them is, of course, very extensive,” observed Hamilton.
“Generally, or I should not have been on so many.”
“And I,” said Baron Z—, “always endeavour to pass the night on one when I am on a hunting expedition; for, besides the chance of a few hours’ sleep in a hay-loft, one can warm one’s self at a good fire, and breakfast before daybreak. You shall see an alp, and a chamois-hunt, also, if I can manage it, before you return to Seon.”
“I have no doubt of being able to mount any alp you please,” said Hamilton; “but for a person who is not a good shot to undertake anything so dangerous as a chamois-hunt——”
“Danger! There is none whatever.”
“No danger! Why, I have read frightful accounts of chamois-hunts!”
“Read! Oh, so have I—and I don’t deny that an accident may occur occasionally. In Switzerland, for instance, where the chase is free, the chamois have become so scarce and shy that they have taken refuge in the highest parts of the mountains. There, and perhaps in those parts of Tyrol where they are only nominally protected, they are difficult to be got at—but in the neighbourhood of Berchtesgaden, Ischl, and Steyermark, a chamois is not much more difficult to shoot than a stag or a roebuck.”
“But,” said A. Z., “you must confess that people always think more of a chamois-hunt than of any other. You would rather, I am sure, shoot a chamois than a deer.”
“That is true, but there is no use in making more of it than is necessary. Mr. Hamilton, with his present ideas, will be greatly disappointed, I fear.”
“No, for I was just going to tell him that I have been on mountains where the chamois have been seen springing from rock to rock in places to which I could easily have mounted if I had put on a pair of Steigeisen.”
“What is that? What are they?”
“I scarcely know how to describe them; they look like pattens at a distance, and are buckled over the shoes in the same manner, but they are provided with four strong iron spikes, to enable you to plant your feet steadily in the ground, or in the fissures of the rocks.”
“That’s it!” cried Hamilton. “They were also in the description which I read.”
“Do not have too exalted an idea of the danger on that account,” answered A. Z., laughing; “for I have heard that many people who inhabit the mountainous parts of this country use them when they walk on the snow in winter.”
“So, after all,” said Hamilton, “a chamois-hunt is quite a common sort of thing.”
“You are falling into the contrary extreme now,” said Baron Z—; “for, though it is no uncommon thing, strong sinews, good lungs, a quick eye, and a steady hand are always required in order to be successful.”
They arrived at Ruhpolding, and found their guides waiting for them—tall, strong-looking men, with sunburnt faces and bushy mustaches. Their dress was of coarser materials, but in other respects quite resembling Baron Z—‘s, excepting that their grey stockings, with a fanciful pattern in green, were short, and left their knees perfectly bare. On their shoulders were slung canvas bags, into which they immediately packed the cloaks, shawls, and provisions of every description.
A couple of miles beyond Ruhpolding the carriage was abandoned, and the party commenced their expedition on a footway through the Fishbach valley. The vegetation around them was of the richest colouring, the mossy grass under the trees of the deepest green; and wild berberry trees, with their delicate leaves and pendent crimson berries grew luxuriantly in every direction. A variety of beautifully delicate wild-flowers pleased Hamilton’s eye, but he looked on with some impatience, while A. Z. and her husband leisurely gathered and examined some, took others up by the roots, and placed all in a tin box, evidently brought for the purpose. Long and serious too were the discussions about them, which, as Hamilton did not understand, he was glad when, in contrast to this scene of fertility, their way brought them to the immediate base of the mountains, where it ran parallel with the dry bed of a torrent almost deserving the name of river when in spring it rushes from its snowy source, sweeping away heaps of stones and trunks of torn-up trees, which, thrown high on either side, leave the valley between a scene of stony desolation. They continued for a considerable time between the almost perpendicular sides of the mountains, sometimes climbing over colossal masses of stone, at others enjoying the shade of the thick pine-trees or over-hanging rocks, when, on passing an abrupt turn, a foaming waterfall seemed suddenly to prevent all further progress; for, after passing over the very path they were pursuing, it bounded from the rocks, which sometimes arrested, but could not impede its progress, until having half-exhausted itself in spray, it reached a solid bed of stone, and finally disappeared among the dark-green fir-trees of the narrow valley below.
While Hamilton looked in silent admiration down the precipice, A. Z., her husband, and the two guides disappeared in the cavity of the rock behind the waterfall, and seemed greatly to enjoy his surprise when he discovered them sitting under the trees at the other side. While one of the guides unpacked his canvas bag, and laid the contents on the nearest rock, Hamilton joined them, and they remained beside the waterfall more than an hour, enjoying their frugal repast while resting in the shade, and tranquillised almost to laziness by the sound of the rushing waters. Baron Z—was, of course, the first to move.
“Ah, there is a châlet!” exclaimed Hamilton, pointing towards some small wooden buildings on a green hill before them; below which a second waterfall, forming natural cisterns in the rocks, fell in cascades from one to the other. “A châlet at last!”
“We call them Senner huts here,” said A. Z. “When men have the charge of the cattle, they are called Senners; when women, Sennerins. Let us go to where that girl is standing at the door of her hut; she seems an acquaintance of our guide’s. These Sennerins,” she continued, looking attentively at the one who was now about to supply them with cheese and butter—“these Sennerins are the theme of almost all the national poetry and songs here in the mountains.”
“They would not inspire me,” said Hamilton, laughing. “I see