PROFESSOR TYNDALL AMONG THE ALPS.*
MORE than ten years ago Professor Tyndall published a book not very dissimilar in form to the one now before us, which will pro- bably be regarded in future times as his chief title to fame. We find hero the same qualities which give the Gl:cciers of the Alps so eminent a rank among scientific books,—the same intense and sympathetic appreciation of all the beauties of nature, the same power of vivid description, the same remarkable lucidity and felicity of language, rendering his account of scientific fact or theory delightful reading even to the unscientific. But hero the parallel ceases ; the former work contained a complete exposition of a totally new theory on an important subject, long discussed, but never before satisfactorily treated. In the present volume there can only be additional illustrations of the same topic. It is because the Glaciers of the Alps already exists, a zrAza ig Ei., that this record of subsequent experiences has only a temporary or subsidiary value. Professor Tyndall would, however, probably deprecate any com- parison of the two books. "'rho present volume," to cite his own words, "is, for the most part, a record of bodily action, written partly to preserve to myself the memory of strong and joyous hours, and partly for the pleasure of those who find ex- hilaration in descriptions associated with mountain life." A very large proportion of the various papers have been already pub- lished ; several of them in a little volume entitled Mountaineering in 1861 ; two or three others, if we mistake not, in the columns of a weekly contemporary. There are also two chapters by other hands ; also reprints, one by Mr. Vaughan Hawkins, narrating the first serious attempt ever made on the Matterhorn, by himself and Professor Tyndall in 1860, the other, the account given in the Alpine Journal by the survivor of the accident which cost the life of Bennen, Professor Tyndall's favourite guide. To the narrative portion, which forms the bulk of the volume, is added a sort of appendix, entitled "Notes and Comments on Ice and Glaciers, and other Scraps ; " three of these papers, older in date than the Glaciers of the Alps and republished apparently from scientific periodicals, con- tain a sort of sketch for the detailed picture which that work affords of all glacier phenomena. A subsequent article, reviewing a lecture by the eminent German physicist Pro- fessor I lehnholtz, may serve to show how thoroughly and speedily Tyndall's theory of glaciers has been accepted by the scientific world. The lecture in question treats the theory as established s. Hours of Exercise fat the Alps. By Jelin Tyndall, LL.D„ F.R.S. London : Longinus. Ital. beyond possibility of dispute, but discusses the cause of regelation, the property of ice on which Tyndall's whole theory depends, and adopts views different from those of Faraday, the original observer of the phenomenon since called by that name. Both Helmholtz and Tyndall have since agreed to treat the cause of regelation as an open question for the present, and the whole controversy is no inapt illustration of the way:in which scientific discovery is carried on, by fits and starts, or rather with a flux and reflux like that of the rising tide. Principe%%Forbes saw clearly a fact, perfectly capable of verification by means of observation and experiment, but never before set forth in its full significance, that a glacier moves in a manner closely analogous to the flow of a stream of lava, tar, or any other viscous semi-fluid. He sought about for an explanation, but gave none which could in any true sense account for the phenomenon, the substance of ice being by no means viscous, but most especially and remarkably brittle. The cause to be assigned for the unquestionable but apparently paradoxical fact that a glacier composed of this brittle substance moved as if its mass were semi-fluid was hotly debated, until a new fact, observed by Faraday, suggested to Tyndall an explanation which turned out to be adequate. If two pieces of ice are brought into contact, they will immediately freeze together, provided their surfaces are moist. This phenomenon, which received the name of regelation, together with the obvious fact that ice breaks to pieces under pressure, afforded, under Tyndall's skilful manipulation, a key to all the mysteries which surrounded glacier motion. The theory was almost from the first accepted as sound and adequate, but a new controversy arose, as we have seen, respecting the physical cause of the fact which rendered the full explanation of glaciers thus possible. Of the two hypotheses, that of James Thomson, which refers it to the mechanical pressure exerted on each other by pieces of ice when brought into contact, would give, if it were proved true, as complete an explanation of the fact ot regelation as Tyndall's theory has afforded of the observed facts of glacier motion. But there seem to be strong reasons for doubting the truth of this hypothesis, and for pre- ferring that of Faraday, which connects it with the obscure laws of crystallization, and thereby only advances a single step ; for even if regelation is to be so explained, we have next to discover why the laws of crystallization are what they are observed to be. Nothing new, so far as we are aware, has thrown light on the sub- ject since 1865, when Helmholtz and Tyndall, while preferring each his own view, agreed that the question must be left open. Doubt- less at some future time a discovery, or a fresh observed fact, will do for regelation what it did for glacier motion, and ad- vance human knowledge another definite step in the infinite series.
In the volume before us, however, the narrative and descriptive element predominates so decidedly over the purely scientific, that we ought to devote the remainder of our space to Professor Tyndall's very characteristic papers of mountain adventure. There is probably no living writer on this or any kindred topic, not even Captain Burton, whose style is so unmistakable. We could imagine reading a new and anonymous book of Mr. W. G. Palgrave's without recognizing it as his ; we should be at a loss for criteria by which to mark Sir Samuel Baker's style; we could even be deceived, to come nearer home to the Alps, as to the author- ship of a paper by Mr. Leslie Stephen. But in all Professor Tyndall's writings there is a flavour which is entirely unique, and which seems to disclose the man himself, as few written compositions ever do, or at least appear to do. We are not in a position to assert, even if it were consistent with the established and reasonable laws of reviewing to do so, that his character is in reality what his writings seem to suggest ; but in days when philosophers like Mr. Mill pre- dict despondingly that men's characters will before long grow as much alike as so many peas, it is refreshing to find a strongly- marked individuality, which is not affectation, in any literary pro- duction. With every apology, then, to Professor Tyndall, if we have misinterpreted him, and with every belief that the sugges- tion, so far as it has any effect, will lend additional interest to his always interesting book, we would ask his readers whether they can- not trace in it the lineaments of a character thoroughly English in many respects, in the shadows as well as in the lights, and which, where it is not English, is not so through possessing faculties of insight which would greatly adorn and elevate the national character ? Read Professor Tyndall's narrative of the last part of the ascent of the Weissborn, and see if it does not breathe the very spirit of English doggedness, which cannot give in, which perseveres to the end, not so much because it has counted the cost and deliberately resolved to pay it, as because it has
never contemplated the possibility of doing otherwise. Another development of the same temper is the growing cooler in the presence of danger, not merely having a reserve fund of energy ready to meet an emergency, but being sobered instead of excited by it. This higher and rarer gift—surely that which above all others has made our race apt for empire—is con-
spicuous in half-a-dozen of Professor Tyndall's adventures, most conspicuously of all, perhaps, in the account of an accident which, happened in 1862 to one of his porters. The man had been sent on with a comrade to the hut where the party were to pass the-
night before ascending the Jungfrau, and through his own foolhardiness had fallen iuto a crevasse. His companion, instead.
of shouting after another party which had mot them a few minutes. before (and of which the present writer happened to be one), waited stolidly until his employers came up, an hour afterwards, and then told them what had happened. With well-directeet effort there was little doubt that he might be rescued, but delay might be fatal, and the effect on the imagination of gazing down into a black hole, and hearing moans rising out of the darkness, can- be imagined by all, realized by none who have not had some similar experience. Barmen, one of the bravest and most skilful. of guides, "when he hoard the moaning, became almost frantic. He attempted to get into the crevasse, but was obliged to recoil- It was quite plain that a second life was in danger, for my guide-
seemed to have lost all self-control. I placed my hand heavily on. his shoulder, and admonished him that upon his coolness depended,
the life of his friend. If you behave like a man, we shall save- him ; if like a woman, he is lost.' A first-rate rope accompanied, the party, but unhappily it was with the man in the crevasse..
Coats, waistcoats, and braces were instantly taken off and, knotted together. I watched Benneu while this work was going on ; his hands trembled with excitement, and his knots were. evidently insecure. The last junction complete, he exclaimed, Now let me down!' ' Not until each of these knots has been tested, —not an inch.'" And there is no doubt that to Professor Tyndall's perfect coolness throughout was due the successful rescue of the man from an icy grave. Similarly, we might. trace in these pages the love for old associations, which, in the sphere of polities makes us the most cautious of peoples and the most tolerant of anomalies, because they have their roots iii the past. Something, too, there is of the temper which has won for Englishmen somewhat bitter dislike. from other nations,—the calm amid unconscious assumption of being. better than our neighbours, or at least sure to be right wherever
we differ from them, which is by no ineaus inconsistent with the- most complete and generous recognition of the merits of others.. What is not emphatically the Englishman in Professor Tyndall is- the scientific enthusiast. Whenever he goes among the moun- tains, in snow and rain as uuder cloudless sky, amid dangers and difficulties as on beaten tracks, he is ever ready to remark what. may prove of scientific interest, over skilful to apply the most. ordinary natural phenomena so as to illustrate physical truths in, a novel manner. Science and sentiment, delight in muscular and intellectual effort, are ever blended, in his style as in his thoughts.. Occasionally he goes beyond physical science, and tAkes a flight in, the misty region of metaphysics, as in the curious passage in the preface, in which he attempts to trace the origin of his interest. in fine scenery ; but usually he limits his speculations to the world, or at the utmost to the problems which lie on the, outer margin of our knowledge ; and it is satisfactory to read
from the pen of one who is often counted among the typical men of science, who can and will take nothing on trust, and try everything by the test supplied by their own intellects, such a. passage as that which follows, and which has, at least, no. antagonism to the genuine utterances of Christian faith :—
"Looking at those eharaotered cliffs, one's thoughts involuutarilT revert to the ancient days, and we restore in idea a state of things. which had disappeared from the world before the development of man.. Whouno this wondrous power of reconstruction ? WWI it looked like. latent heat in ancient inorganic nature and developed as the ages rolled? Are other and grander powers 8 tiIl latent in nature, destined to blossom in another ego? Lot us question fearlessly, but, having done so, lot us avow frankly that at bottom we know nothing, that we are. imbedded in a mystery, towards the solution of which no whisper has. been yet conceded to the listening intellect of man."
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