NATURAL HISTORY. 



505 



such as led me to think that Ju- 

 piter's satellites might be distin- 

 guished by the naked eye; and 

 had he not been in the neighbour- 

 hood of the moon^ I might pos- 

 sibly have succeeded. He con- 

 tinued distinctly visible for several 

 hours after the sun was risen, and 

 did not wholly disappear till al- 

 most eight. At the time 1 rose, 

 my thermometer, which was on 

 Fahrenheit's scale, and which I 

 had hung on the side of the rock 

 without the hut, was 8° below the 

 freezing point. Impatient to pro- 

 ceed, and having oj'dered a large 

 quantity of snow to be melted, I 

 filled a small cask with Avater for 

 my own use, and at three o'clock 

 we left the hut. Our loute was 

 across the snow ; but the chasms 

 which the ice beneath had formed, 

 though less numerous than those 

 that we had passed on the pre- 

 ceding day, embarrassed our as- 

 cent. One in particular had open- 

 ed so much in the few days that 

 intervened between M. de Saus- 

 sure's expedition and our own, as 

 for the time to bar the hope of any 

 further progress ; but at length, 

 after having wandered with nuich 

 anxiety along its bank, I found a 

 place which I hoped the ladder 

 was sufficiently long to cross. The 

 ladder was accordingly laid down, 

 and was seen to rest upon the op- 

 posite edge, but its bearing did 

 not exceed an inch on either side. 

 We now considered that, should 

 we pass the chasm, and should 

 its opening, which had enlarged 

 so much in the course of a few 

 preceding days, increase in the 

 least degree before the time of our 

 descent, no chance of return re- 

 mained. We also considered that, 

 if the clouds which so often enve- 



lope the hill should rise, the hope 

 of finding, amidst the thick fog, 

 our way back to this only place in 

 which the gulf, even in its pre- 

 sent slate, was passable, was little 

 less than desperate. Yet, after 

 a moment's pause, the guides con- 

 sented to go with me, and we 

 crossed the chasm. We had not 

 proceeded far when the thirst, 

 which, since our arrival in the 

 upper regions of the air, had been 

 always troublesome, became al- 

 most intolerable. No sooner had 

 I drank than the thirst returned, 

 and in a few minutes my throat 

 became perfectly dry. Again I 

 had recourse to the water, and 

 again my throat was parched. 

 The air itself was thirsty ; its ex- 

 treme of dryness had robbed my 

 body of its moisture. Though 

 continually drinking, the quantity 

 of my urine was almost nothing ; 

 and of the little there was, the 

 colour was extremely deep. The 

 guides were equally affected. Wine 

 they would not taste ; but the mo- 

 ment my back was turned, theii 

 mouths were eagerly applied to 

 my cask of water Yet we con- 

 tinued to proceed till seven o'clock; 

 when, having passed the place 

 where ]M. de Saussure, who was 

 provided with a tent, had slept the 

 second night, we sat down to 

 breakfast. All this time the ther- 

 mometer was 4" below the freez- 

 ing point. We were now at the 

 foot of Mount Blanc itself; for, 

 though it is usual to apply that 

 term to the whole assemblage of 

 several successive mountains, vet 



' ml 



the name properly belongs only to a 

 small mountain of pyramidal form 

 that rises from a narrow plain 

 which at all times is covered with 

 snow. Here the thinness of the 

 atmosphere 



