Mr. Francis Galton is a man to be envied. He
has found a spot in the Jungfrau range where a man, standing in safety, may watch the avalanches come down within ten yards' distance. The spot directly faces the Jungfrau Hotel, and in one half-day Mr. Galton saw three descents, the avalanches sliding 2,000 feet, then leaping in two great bounds 1000 feet more to the channel by which he was standing, and then bursting out at the foot of the channel "like a storm of shrapnell." The general appearance when seen so near "is that of an orderly mob filling the street and hastening, not hurrying, to the same object," and the noise like "the sound of a rapid tide rushing up many channels." Xhe avalanche consists of a mass of ice-balls, usually from a foot to a yard in diameter, which produce "the fearful rattle of the ice cascade."
Previous page
