The Days of a Man 1:1890 



the Matterjoch, we engaged as guide Cesare Carrel, 

 brother of the noted Jean Antoine Carrel, who was 

 so long associated with Whymper and was, in fact, the 

 first to ascend the Matterhorn from the Italian side. 



On the The Matterjoch trip ordinarily involves merely a 



j on g c ii m b across snow fields, tedious enough but 

 offering neither difficulty nor danger. Soon after 

 we left Le Breuil, however, a heavy rain set in; as 

 we proceeded, it became a blinding snowstorm. 

 Struggling along with increasing difficulty, we finally 

 reached the little inn of Saint Theodule on the top 

 of the ridge, a modest stone hostelry of two structures. 

 One, the original rude cabin, sheltered the guides 

 and the family of our host. The other marked two 

 distinct periods of growth, for it consisted of a fairly 

 comfortable, heated room where meals were served, 

 and another section made up of narrow bedrooms, 

 each with a small window and outside door, but no 

 inner connections. 



Snow- With our arrival and that of two English mountain- 



eers w ^ na< ^ a ^ so sou g nt refuge from the weather, 

 the little inn was crowded to the utmost. It was, 

 however, plain that no one could go farther until 

 the tempest should pass. We accordingly disposed 

 ourselves as comfortably as possible, trusting that 

 by morning it might have cleared. But the storm 

 proved to be one of the severest known for years in 

 early August, and during it several mountain climbers 

 lost their lives among them Jean Baptiste Mac- 

 quignaz, Tyndall's favorite guide, praised by him 

 for his "high boiling point." Fortunately for us we 

 were sheltered and fed, though snowbound for three 

 nights and nearly three days. And each morning 

 we had literally to be dug out, as the snow would 



C 352 3 



