THE COL DU GfiANT 257 



you. A thousand greetings to my wife and children. I hope that 

 in a fortnight we shall all be reunited. I look forward with joy to that 

 moment.' 



The next letter was to his wife : 



' nth July. 



' I never felt in better health. I slept last night in my tent, which 

 had frozen after the rain so that the canvas crackled like a bracelet, 

 yet I have not had the least indisposition or cold. Theodore, too, 

 is very well. We have furious appetites, our days are very pleasant, 

 but the evenings, even when it is fine, are always very trying, and 

 when the weather is bad, naturally still more so. The messenger my 

 daughter sends me wants me to let him go, so I have no time to write 

 you a learned letter for Uncle Bonnet ; that must be for next time. 

 Still, you may tell him that the constellations near the zenith at this 

 moment Lyra and Aquila do not scintillate at all ... that the 

 shooting stars appear overhead, and never under my feet, and that 

 they look very small. . . .' * 



' 18th July. 



'Do not be alarmed at receiving this little letter dated from a 

 spot so full of terror for your sensitive heart. I am leaving it to- 

 morrow, and certainly for ever. I shall close this letter to-morrow at 

 Courmayeur and send it off at once to announce my happy return to 

 the regions destined for mortals. Yet these heights have tried their 

 best to make us regret them, we have had the most magnificent even- 

 ing ; all these high peaks that surround us and the snows that separate 

 them were coloured with the most beautiful shades of rose and carmine. 

 The Italian horizon was girdled with a broad belt from which the full 

 moon, of a rich vermilion tint, rose with the majesty of a queen. The 

 air was calm and of an admirable purity ; the vapours condensed below 

 us in the valleys made them seem an obscure and gloomy dwelling- 

 place compared to the empyrean which we inhabit. ... I have 

 made a number of fresh important observations on meteorology, 

 electricity, and the winds, but principally on the origin of rain. I 

 have been able to watch its development from the smallest cloud to 

 the most terrible of storms, because Mont Blanc, which we are so near, 

 is the centre round which all the atmospheric changes take place. 

 I always keep watch till midnight, while Theodore goes to bed early, 

 but, on the other hand, he gets up at four and I remain in bed till seven, 

 and though we are both conscious of the rarity of the air, mental effort 

 costs me far less than in the plain. I find much more easily solutions 



1 See p. 435. 

 B 



