The porter's rap came unexpectedly soon, and in response to the
question, "What is the weather?" he said, "Not utterly bad." There is
plenty of starlight; there had been through the night plenty of live
thunder leaping among the rattling crags, some of it very interestingly
near. We rose; there were three parties ready to make the ascent. The
lightning still glimmered behind the Matterhorn and the Weisshorn, and
the sound of the tumbling cataracts was ominously distinct. Was the
storm over? The guides would give no opinion. It was their interest
to go, it was ours to go only in good weather. By three o'clock I
noticed that the pointer on the aneroid barometer, that instrument that
has a kind of spiritual fineness of feeling, had moved a tenth of an
inch upward. I gave the order to start. The other parties said, "Good
for your pluck! _Bon voyage, gute reise_," and went to bed. In an
hour we had ascended one thousand feet and down again to the glacier.
The sky was brilliant. Hopes were high. The glacier with its vast
medial moraines, shoving along rocks from twenty to fifty feet long,
was crossed in the dawn. The sun rose clear, touching the snow-peaks
with glory, and we shouted victory. But in a moment the sun was
clouded, and so were we. Soon it came out again, and continued clear.
But the guide said, "Only the good God knows if we shall have clear
weather.
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