1857 IN SWITZERLAND 209 



imagine what the Matterhorn and the rest of them looked 

 like from the wide plain of ne"vd just below the Weissthor. 

 It was quite a new sensation, and I would not have 

 missed it for any amount ; and besides this I had an 

 opportunity of examining the neVe" at a very great 

 height. A regularly stratified section, several hundred 

 feet high, was exposed on the Cima di Jazi, and I was 

 convinced that the Weissthor would be a capital spot for 

 making observations on the ne"ve" and on other correlative 

 matters. There are no difficulties in the way of getting 

 up to it from the Zermatt side, tough job as it is from 

 Macugnaga, and we might readily rig a tent under 

 shelter of the ridge. That would lick old Saussure into 

 fits. All the Zermatt guides put the S. Theodul pass far 

 beneath the Weissthor in point of difficulty ; and you 

 may tell Mrs. Hooker that they think the S. Theodul 

 easier than the Monte Moro. The best of the joke was 

 that I lost my way in coming dow/i the Riffelberg to 

 Zermatt the same evening, so thafr altogether I had a 

 long day of it. The next day I walked from Zermatt to 

 Visp (recovering Baedeker by the way), but my shoes 

 were so knocked to pieces that I got a blister on my 

 heeL Next day voiture to Susten, and then over 

 Qemmi to Kandersteg, and on Thursday my foot was so 

 queer I was glad to get a retour to Interlaken. I found 

 most interesting and complete evidences of old moraine 

 deposits all the way down the Leuk valley into the 

 Rhone valley, and I believe those little hills beyond 

 Susten are old terminal moraines too. On the other side 

 I followed moraines down to Frutigen, and great masses 

 of glacial gravel with boulders, nearly to the Lake of 

 Thun. 



My wife is better, but anything but strong. 



CHAMOUNIX, Aug. 16, 1857. 



My wife sends me intelligence of the good news you 

 were so kind as to communicate to her. I need not tell 

 VOL. I P 



