We started from Zermatt on the 13th of July, at half
past five, on a brilliant and perfectly cloudless morning.
We were eight in number—Croz (guide), old
Peter Taugwalder (guide) and his two sons; Lord F.
Douglas, Mr. Hadow, Rev. Mr. Hudson, and I. To insure
steady motion, one tourist and one native walked together.
The youngest Taugwalder fell to my share. The
wine-bags also fell to my lot to carry, and throughout
the day, after each drink, I replenished them secretly
with water, so that at the next halt they were found
fuller than before! This was considered a good
omen, and little short of miraculous.
On the first day we did not intend to ascend to any
great height, and we mounted, accordingly, very leisurely.
Before twelve o’clock we had found a good position
for the tent, at a height of eleven thousand feet.
We passed the remaining hours of daylight—some
basking in the sunshine, some sketching, some collecting;
Hudson made tea, I coffee, and at length we retired,
each one to his blanket bag.
We assembled together before dawn on the 14th and
started directly it was light enough to move.
One of the young Taugwalders returned to Zermatt.
In a few minutes we turned the rib which had intercepted
the view of the eastern face from our tent platform.
The whole of this great slope was now revealed, rising
for three thousand feet like a huge natural staircase.
Some parts were more, and others were less easy, but
we were not once brought to a halt by any serious
impediment, for when an obstruction was met in front
it could always be turned to the right or to the left.
For the greater part of the way there was no occasion,
indeed, for the rope, and sometimes Hudson led, sometimes
myself. At six-twenty we had attained a height
of twelve thousand eight hundred feet, and halted
for half an hour; we then continued the ascent without
a break until nine-fifty-five, when we stopped for
fifty minutes, at a height of fourteen thousand feet.
We had now arrived at the foot of that part which,
seen from the Riffelberg, seems perpendicular or overhanging.
We could no longer continue on the eastern side.
For a little distance we ascended by snow upon the
are^te—that is, the ridge—then
turned over to the right, or northern side. The
work became difficult, and required caution.
In some places there was little to hold; the general
slope of the mountain was less than forty degrees,
and snow had accumulated in, and had filled up, the
interstices of the rock-face, leaving only occasional
fragments projecting here and there. These were
at times covered with a thin film of ice. It
was a place which any fair mountaineer might pass
in safety. We bore away nearly horizontally for
about four hundred feet, then ascended directly toward
the summit for about sixty feet, then doubled back
to the ridge which descends toward Zermatt.
A long stride round a rather awkward corner brought
us to snow once more. That last doubt vanished!
The Matterhorn was ours! Nothing but two hundred
feet of easy snow remained to be surmounted.
