XXIVJ 



HOME LIFE 



413 



du Midi, where at first we were the only visitors in a huge 

 new hotel, but for the second week had the company of an 

 English clergyman, his wife, and son. We greatly enjoyed 

 the beautiful subalpine flowers then in perfection, and one 

 day I went with the clergyman and his son, a boy of about 

 thirteen, to see how far we could get on the way to the great 

 mountain's summit. On the alp above the pine forest we 

 had our lunch at a cow-herd's hut, with a large jug of cream, 

 and then got the man to act as guide. He took us over a 

 ravine filled with snow, and then up a zigzag path among 

 the rocks along a mauvais pas^ where an iron bar was fixed 

 on the face of a precipice, and then up to an ice-smoothed 

 plateau of limestone rock, still partly snow-clad, all the 

 crevices of which were full of alpine flowers. I was just 

 beginning to gather specimens of these and thought to enjoy 

 an hour's botanizing when our guide warned us that a snow- 

 storm was coming, and we must return directly, and the 

 black clouds and a few snowflakes made us only too willing 

 to follow him. We got back safely, but I have always 

 regretted that hasty peep of the alpine rock-flora at a time 

 of year when I never afterwards had an opportunity of 

 seeing it. 



We then went by Martigny over the St Bernard, reaching 

 the hospice after dark through deep snow, and next day 

 walked down to Aosta, a place which had been recommended 

 to me by Mr. William Mathews, a well-known Alpine 

 climber. It was a very hot place, and its chief interest 

 to us was an excursion on mules to the Becca de Nona, 

 which took us a long day, going up by the easiest and 

 descending the most precipitous road — the latter a mere 

 staircase of rock. The last thousand feet I walked up alone, 

 and was highly delighted with the summit and the wonderful 

 scene of fractured rocks, ridges, and peaks all around, but 

 more especially with the summit itself, hardly so large as 

 that of Snowdon and exhibiting far grander precipices and 

 rock-masses, all in a state of visible degradation, and showing 

 how powerfully the atmospheric forces of denudation are in 

 constant action at this altitude — 10,380 feet. Hardly less 



