Faces and Places Part 8

That was a good idea, and proved triumphantly successful; for, on arrival at Montreux, the Chancery Barrister's portmanteau turned up all right, the key innocently reposing on the handle, and, as subsequent investigation showed, the contents untouched.

Our Manufacturer had a still better way, though, as was urged, he comes from Yorks.h.i.+re, and we of the southern part of the island have no chance in compet.i.tion with the race. He lost his luggage somewhere between Dover and Paris, and has ever since been free from all care on the subject.

Perhaps it was the influence of these varied incidents that led to a scene of some excitement on our arrival at Montreux station. There, what was left of our luggage was disgorged, and of fourteen packages registered, only nine were visible to the naked eye. It was then the Patriarch came to the front and displayed some of those qualities which subsequently found a fuller field amid the solitude of the Alps.

We call him the Patriarch because he is a grandfather. In other respects he is the youngest of the party, the first on the highest peak, the first down in the afternoon with his ready order for "tea for ten," of which, if the party is late in arriving and he finds time hang heavy on his hands, he will genially drink five cups himself. With the care of half a dozen colossal commercial undertakings upon his mind, he is as merry as a boy and as playful as a kitten. But when once aroused his anger is terrible.

His thunder and lightning played around the station-master at Montreux on the discovery of the absence of five packages. The Patriarch has a wholesome faith in the all-sufficiency of the English language. The station-master's sole lingual accomplishment was French. This concatenation of circ.u.mstances might with ordinary persons have led to some diminution of the force of adjuration. But probably the station-master lost little of the meaning the Patriarch desired to convey. This tended in the direction of showing the utter incapacity of the Swiss or French nature to manage a railway, and the discreditable incompetency of the officials of whatever grade. The station-master was properly abashed before the torrent of indignant speech. But he had his turn presently. Calmer inspection disclosed the fact that all the fourteen packets were delivered. It was delightful to see how the station-master, immediately a.s.suming the offensive, followed the Patriarch about with gesticulation indicative of the presence of the baggage, and with taunting speech designed to make the Patriarch withdraw his remarks--whatever they might have been. On this point the station-master was not clear, but he had a shrewd suspicion that they were not complimentary. The Patriarch, however, now retired upon his dignity.

It was, as he said, no use arguing with fellows like this.

Les Avants sit high up among the mountains at the back of Montreux.

It seems madness to go there at a time when fires are still cheerful and when the leaves have not yet put forth their greenness. But, as was made apparent in due time, Les Avants, at no time inconveniently cold, would be, but for the winds that blow over the snow-clad hills surprisingly hot. To build an hotel here seems a perilously bold undertaking. It is not on the way to anywhere, and people going from the outer world must march up the hill, and, when they are tired of it, must needs, like the Duke of York in his famous military expedition, march down again. None but a Swiss would build an hotel here, and few but English would frequent it. Yet the shrewdness of the proprietor has been amply justified, and Les Avants is becoming in increasing degree a favourite pilgrimage.

The hotel was built nearly twenty years ago. Previously the little valley it dominates had been planted with one or two chalets which for more than half a century have looked out upon the deathless snows of the Dent du Midi. There is one which has rudely carved over the lintel of its door the date 1816. Noting which, the Chancery Barrister, with characteristic accuracy, observed that "five centuries look down upon us."

Our landlord is an enterprising man. His business in life is to keep an hotel, and the height of his ambition is to keep it well. Only a fortnight ago he returned from a grand tour of the winter watering-places, from the Bay of Biscay to the Bay of Genoa. The ordinary attractions of the show places from Biarritz to Bordighera had no lure for him. What he studied were the hotels and their various modes of management. He told us, with a flush of pride on his sun-tanned cheek, that he travelled as an ordinary tourist. There was no hint of his condition or the object of his journey, no appeal to confraternity with a view to getting bed and breakfast at trade prices, or some reduction on the _table d'hote_ charges. He travelled as a sort of Haroun al Raschid among innkeepers, haughtily paying his bills, and possibly feeing the waiters. He is a very good sort of a fellow, attentive and obliging, and it is odd how we all agree in the hope that he was from time to time over-charged.

It is a fair prospect looked out upon from the bedroom window on our arrival. Almost at our feet, it seems, is the Lake of Geneva, though we remember the wearisome climb up the hill, and know it must be miles away. On the other side are the snow-clad hills that reach down to Savoy on the east, and are crowned by the heights of the Dent du Midi on the west. On the left, flanking our own place of abode, rise up the grim heights of the Roches de Naye, and, still farther back, the Dent du Jaman--a terrible tooth this, which draws attention from all the country round, and excites the wildest ambition of the tourist. The man or woman resting within a circuit of ten miles of Montreux, who has not touched the topmost heights of the Dent du Jaman, goes home a crushed person. A very small proportion do it, but every one talks of doing it---which, unless the weather be favourable, is perhaps the wiser thing to do. It fills a large place in the conversation as well as in the landscape, and it will be a bad thing for the Lake of Geneva if this tooth should ever be drawn.

Lovely as was the scene in the fresh morning air, with the glistening snow, the dark pines on the lower hills, the blue lake, and the greyish upland, they did but serve to frame the picture of the Patriarch as he sat upon the bench in the front of the hotel. A short jacket of blue serge, knickerbockers of the same material, displaying the proportions of a notable pair of legs, the whole crowned by a chimney-pot hat, went to make up a remarkable figure. The Patriarch had in his hand a blue net for catching b.u.t.terflies. The Naturalist had excited his imagination by stories of the presence of the "Camberwell Beauty," a rare and beautiful species of b.u.t.terfly, of which he was determined to take home a specimen. In later days he was fair to see with his hat thrown back on his brow, his net in his hand: and his stout legs twinkling in their haste to come up with a b.u.t.terfly.

The Alps have witnessed many strange sights since first they uplifted their heads to heaven. But it is calculated that the Patriarch was the first who brought under their notice the chimney-pot hat of the civilised Englishman.

This haste to be up on the first morning was a faithful precursor of the indomitable vitality of the Patriarch. He was always first up and first off, and, amongst many charming peculiarities, was his indifference as to which way the road lay. We generally had a guide with us, and nothing was more common in toiling up a mountain side than to discover the guide half a mile to the left and the Patriarch half a mile to the right, something after the fas.h.i.+on of the letter Y, we being at the stem. We saw a good deal more of the country than we otherwise should have done, owing to the constant necessity of going after the Patriarch and bringing him back. Sometimes he got away by himself, at others he deluded some hapless member of the company into following him. One young man, just called to the bar, had a promising career almost cut short on the second day. In the innocence of his heart he had followed the Patriarch, who led him through an apparently impa.s.sable pine forest on to the crest of a remote hill, whence he crawled down an hour late for luncheon, the Patriarch having arrived ten minutes before him, and having already had his knife into every receptacle for food that was spread out, from the loaf of bread to the box of sardines, from the preserved peaches to the cup without a handle that held the b.u.t.ter.

Walking up the hill behind the hotel on the way to the Jaman, the Member had a happy idea. "Why," he asked, "should not the Parliamentary Session be movable, like a reading party? Say the Bankruptcy Bill is referred to a grand committee. What is to prevent them coming right off here and settling down for a fortnight or three weeks, or in fact whatever time might be necessary thoroughly to discuss the measure?"

They might do worse, we agreed, as we walked on, carefully selecting the shady side of the road, and thinking of dear friends s.h.i.+vering in England. The blue haze under which we know the lake lies; the Alps all around, their green sides laced with snow and their heads covered with it; the fleckless blue sky; the brown rocks, and over all and through all the murmuring music of the invisible stream, as it trickles on its way down the gorge, would be better accompaniments to a good grind at a difficult Bill than any to be found within the precincts of Westminster.

"You remember what Virgil says?" the Chancery Barrister strikes in.

Divers things of diverse character we have discovered invariably remind the Chancery Barrister of Virgil or Horace, occasionally perchance of an English poet. This is very pleasant, and none the less so because the reminiscences come slowly, gathering strength as they advance, like the Chancery Barrister's laugh, which begins like the pattering of rain on leaves, and ends in the roar of a thunderstorm. The Chancery Barrister takes his jokes gently to begin with: he sees them afar off, and, closing one eye, begins to smile. The smile broadens to a grin, the grin becomes a cachinnation, then, as he hugs the fun, the cachinnation deepens to a roar of laughter, and the thing is complete.

It is thus with his quotations, though these are not always completed--at least, not in accordance with recognised authorities. As one of the ladies says, with that kindliness peculiar to the s.e.x, "The Chancery Barrister is most original when he is making a quotation."

"What's that Wolsey says about the pomps and vanities of this world?"

"'Vain pomps and vanities of this world,'" the Chancery Barrister begins, and we know we are in for a quotation. "No, not pomps and vanities. 'Vain pomps and glories of this world' (that's it)--"

"'Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye.

I feel my heart new opened. O how wretched Is the poor man that hangs on princes' favours!

There is betwixt the smile we would aspire to, That sweet aspect of princes and their ruin, More pangs and fears than wars or women have.'"

It's odd how one thing leads to another. By the time the Chancery Barrister has got his quotation right, the Patriarch is half a mile ahead in the wrong direction, and we all have to go and look for him.

The Col de Jaman is the salvation of many tourists. Not being regular Alpine climbers, they start over the Dent and get as far as the Col, rest awhile just under the great mountain molar, and come down. We had a splendid day for our expedition. It had been freezing hard in the night, and when we reached the snow region we found the pines frosted.

On the Col a beneficent commune has built some chalets furnished with plentiful supply of firewood. Out of the sun it was bitterly cold, and we were glad to light a fire, which crackled and roared up the broad chimney and made a pretty accompaniment to the Chancery Barrister's song about the Jolly Young Waterman. He sang it all in one key, and that the wrong one. But it was a well-meant effort, and we all joined in the chorus.

There's some talk to-day of a startling episode at an hotel up the Rhone Valley. A Russian gentleman was sitting sipping his tea, when there approached him a lady, who addressed him in three languages.

His replies not being satisfactory she shot him. This is cited by the Chancery Barrister as showing the advantage of an early acquaintance with foreign languages, and the desirableness of a pure accent.

It is quite agreed that if our Naturalist had been in the Russian's place he would have been shot after the first question. This morning, on ringing for his bath, he was answered by a chambermaid with a "Pas encore." Why "not just yet" our Naturalist did not know. He was not unusually early. But he had done his duty. He had tried to get up and have his bath; it was not ready, so he might go back to bed with a quiet conscience. Presently came another knock, and our Naturalist, carefully robing himself, opened the door, and discovered the chambermaid standing there with a plate, a knife, and a breakfast roll.

"What the dev----I mean _qu'c'est qu'c'est_?" he asked.

"_Monsieur a demande le pet.i.t pain_," the girl replied, astonished at his astonishment.

With great presence of mind he accepted the situation, took in the bread, and did without his bath. The Member says that, coming upon him suddenly amid the silence of the snow, he heard him practising the slightly different sounds of _pain_ and _bain_.

Nothing but snow between the Col and the Dent du Jaman, but snow at its very best, hard and dry. Just before we reach the top we come upon a huge drift frozen hard and slippery. We might have gone round, but we decided to try and climb. The Patriarch of course was first, and achieved the task triumphantly. Others followed, and then came the Chancery Barrister. Another step, and he would have safely landed.

But unhappily a quotation occurred to him.

"This is jolly," he said, turning half round, with the proud consciousness that he was at the crest and that with another stride all would be well; "what's that Horace says about enjoying what you have?"

"'Me pascant olivae, Me cich.o.r.ea, levesque malvae, Frui paratis, et valido mihi, Latoe, dones, et, precor, integra c.u.m----'"

Here the most terrible contortion appeared on the generally pleasant countenance of the Chancery Barrister. He clutched desperately at the ice; but his suspicion was too true. He had begun to move downwards ("When he got to _c.u.m_ he came," the Member, who makes bad jokes, says), and with increasing impetus he slid down the bank. His face during the terrible moments when he was not quite certain where he would stop, or indeed whether he would ever stop, pa.s.sed through a series of contortions highly interesting to those on the bank above.

"_Me pascant olivae_!" cried the Member. "Olives are evidently no use as a support in a case like yours, and diachylon would be more use to you now than soft mallows."

The Chancery Barrister, who had happily reached the bottom, walked round by a more accessible path, and nothing further either from Horace or Virgil occurred to him for more than an hour.

Perhaps the difference in the weather had something to do with it, but we found the Dent du Jaman not nearly so difficult to climb as the Roches de Naye. After the scamper across the snow and the climb over this little ice-collar down which the Chancery Barrister had slipped, there is no more snow. We climb up by steps worn by the feet of many adventurers. The top is a level cone with an area not much greater than that of a moderate-sized dining-room. There was not a breath of wind, and the sun beat down with a warmth made all the more delicious by the recollection of the frozen region through which we had pa.s.sed.

The Dent is only a trifle above six thousand feet high, but the prospect as seen from it stretches far. Below is the Canton de Vaud, a portion of the Jura chain of mountains, the far-reaching Alps of the Savoy, a bit of the lake gleaming like an emerald under the white tops of the mountains, a cloud on the southern horizon that the guide tells us are the mountains of the Valais, and, still to the south just touched by the sun, glitter the snow summits of the Great St. Bernard.

Coming down, we bivouac in the _chalet_, lighting up the fire again.

Here, twelve hundred feet lower down, it is bitterly cold, in spite of, perhaps because of, the fire. The _chalet_ is built with commendable deference to the necessity for ventilation. The wind, smelling fire, comes rus.h.i.+ng over the snow, and we are glad to put on coat and caps.

The conversation turns to legal topics, and certain eminent personages are discussed with great severity. Of one it is roundly a.s.serted that he is mad.

"I am quite sure of it," said the Chancery Barrister, who has recovered his spirits with his footing, "and I'll tell you why. He seconded me for the Reform Club, and----"

We all agree that this is quite enough; but the Chancery Barrister insists on proceeding with his narrative, of which it seems this was merely the introduction.

We found our Naturalist of very little use. We had expected he would mount with us whatever heights we sought, and had pleasing views of his explaining the flora as we went along. But he always had some excuse that kept him on lower levels. One morning he declared he had pa.s.sed a sleepless night owing to the efforts of two Scotch lads who occupied the room next to him. They had some taste for carpentering, and were addicted to getting up in the dead of the night and doing odd jobs about the room. At half-past five a.m. they left their couch and began playing Cain and Abel. Only the Naturalist protested there is no authority in Scripture for the fearful row Abel made when Cain got him down on his back.

At other times our Naturalist had heard of a "Camberwell Beauty" in the neighbourhood, and must needs go and catch it, which, by the way, he never did. On the whole, we conclude our Naturalist is an impostor.

We reserved the Roches de Naye till the last day. It was rather a stupendous undertaking, the landlord a.s.suring us that four guides were necessary. One led a horse that no one would ride, one carried the indispensable luncheon-basket, and two fared forth at early morn to cut steps in the snow. The sun was s.h.i.+ning when we started on this desperate enterprise, and it was hot enough as we toiled along the lower heights.

But when we reached the snow level, the sun had gone in, having just shone long enough to make the snow wet. Then a cold bleak wind set in, and we began to think that, after all, there was more in the Naturalist than met the eye. Whilst we were toiling along, sometimes temporarily despairing, and generally up to our waists in snow, he was enjoying the comforts of the hotel, or strolling about in languid search of fabulous b.u.t.terflies.

Picking our way round a hill in which had been cut in the snow a ledge about two feet wide, we came in face of the slope we were to climb. Up at the top, looking like black ants, were the guides cutting a zigzag path in the snow. The Member observed that if any one were to offer him a sovereign and his board on condition of his climbing up this slope, he would prefer to remain in indigent circ.u.mstances. As we were getting nothing for the labour, were indeed paying for the privilege of undertaking it, we stuck at it, and after a steady climb reached the top, when the wind was worse than ever. It was past luncheon time, and every one was ferociously hungry; but it was agreed that if we camped here and lunched, we should never get to the top. So on we went, through the sloppy snow, pursued by the keen blast that cut through all possible clothing.

It was a hard pull and not much to see for it, since clouds had rolled up from the west and hid the promised panorama. The wind was terrible, and there was no shelter. But we could hold out no longer, and the luncheon being laid upon the sloppy gra.s.s, the Patriarch, with his accustomed impartiality, went round with his knife.

By this time we had induced him to take the sardines last, which he obligingly did.

We ran most of the way back to the side of the hill where the snow had been cut. The exercise made us a little warmer; and the genial influence of the cold fowl, the hard-boiled eggs, the sardines and the thin red wine beginning to work, we were able to enjoy the spectacle of the Patriarch leading the first party down the perilous incline. We had ropes, but didn't think it worth while to be tied. The party was divided into two sections, half a dozen holding on to a rope. It must have been a beautiful sight from many a near mountain height to watch the Patriarch's chimney-pot hat slowly move downwards on the zigzag path.

"What's that Virgil says about ranging mountain tops?" said the Chancery Barrister: