94 SPARKS FKOM A GEOLOGIST'S HAMMEE. 



solved on desperate adventures. He climbed the terrible 

 slope to the Corridor and passed over to the Glacier de 

 Brenva. He looked down on Courmayer and the valley 

 of Aosta in Piedmont. He looked toward Mont Blanc 

 and thought he saw a way to ascend, but would not, be- 

 cause bis companions would not be witnesses. It was 

 night, and he stood in a wilderness of snows and frosts 

 and storms. He descended ; he encountered the Grand 

 Crevasse. Darkness enveloped him, and he found no way 

 to cross. Nothing but the dire and untried alternative 

 of a night upon the ice was before him. Alpine snow 

 shot through the air like needles. It was a fearful fate, 

 but Balmat's heart never felt fear, nor despondency. 

 We must imagine how the night was passed. He looked 

 down on the lights of Chamonix and thought of his com- 

 panions in their warm beds. He wondered if they would 

 think of him. The "craquement" of the glaciers sounded 

 from minute to minute. In the intervals of silence he 

 heard the barking of a dog at Courmayer. " That," he 

 said, "diverted me; it was the only sound from the earth 

 which reached me. Toward midnight the evil cur was 

 silent, and I fell again into that devil of stillness which 

 one experiences in cemeteries; for I took no account of the 

 noise of the glaciers and avalanches which startled me. 

 At two o'clock I saw appear in the horizon the same line 

 of light as on the two previous nights. The sun fol- 

 lowed as befoi-e. Mont Blanc also donned his perruque; 

 he does this when in bad humor, and then there's no use 

 meddling with him. I was acquainted with his character, 

 and I determined to leave him undisturbed. ' When he 

 smokes his pipe,' as they say in the valley, ' there's no 

 use trying to extinguish it,'" 



