32 RAMBLES IN WESTERN SWITZERLAND 



to see which, indeed, was one principal object of our expedition. We 

 found the house— the lower part serving for the goats, and, we presume, 

 the upper being appropriated to bipeds — but the master himself we 

 did not find, and were obliged to wait some time before any one could 

 be hunted up to conduct us. It would have been quite useless to 

 attempt to explore upon speculation, as the glacier is in a cavern, 

 whose mouth would not be easily seen, even at a short distance. 

 Meanwhile we examined the primitive wooden houses of which the 

 village was composed, and amused ourselves with watching the few 

 inhabitants in the place, who, in their turn, were most energetically 

 employed in scrutinising us. After waiting some time, a half- silly 

 half-drunk individual presented himself, and in the fewest possible 

 words intimated his readiness to be our escort. As there was no 

 choice we accepted his services, and immediately commenced a clam- 

 bering ascent through the thick forest, which, as I have said, clothes 

 the face of the mountain, and seems to rise like a green wall behind 

 the village. Although we had been walking for some hours, and our 

 guide had apparently very recently emerged from a cabaret, we did 

 not find this specimen of a Swiss mountaineer peculiarly active or dif- 

 ficult to keep up with. At every fallen tree that we came to he 

 paused, and intimated his desire to rest ; and although at first we in- 

 dulged him, and plucked the strawberries and other fruits which 

 abounded, yet we soon discovered that it would be long before we 

 arrived at the top if we did not set an example of activity. After a 

 good deal of difficulty, we got the poor wretch to understand that we 

 would not pause so often, and at length, in about an hour, reached 

 the summit, crossed the ridge, and, descending for a short distance, 

 came upon the verge of the cavern, into which we immediately de- 

 scended by the help of three ladders, and then found ourselves in a 

 large natural ice-house. 



It was a hot August day, and about noon, when we arrived here ; 

 and the sudden transition from the burning sun to the cold chilly 

 cavern was very delightful, and lent, perhaps, a favourable colouring 

 to the scene before us. We had descended about forty feet, and 

 entered, by a vertical and rather chimney-shaped aperture, a regular 

 and extensive cavern, of which the walls and flooring were of clear, 

 solid, and excellent ice, forming beautiful stalactites and stalagmites, 

 grouped in all kinds of fanciful and grotesque positions. The thick- 

 ness of ice was extremely great, greater, indeed, in most parts, than 

 could be calculated ; but the roof was of bare rock, and exposed the 

 geological structure of the cavern. It was formed along the line of 



