rope, and axe: 
  The sweet girl with golden ringlets—­her dear name was Mary Ann—­
  Whom I helped to climb the Jardin, and who cut me at Lausanne: 
  On these, the charms of Chamonix, sweeter far than words can tell,
  At the witching hour of twilight doth my memory love to dwell. 
  Ye, who ne’er have known the rapture, the unutterable bliss
  Of Savoy’s sequestered valleys, and the mountains of La Suisse;
  The mosquitos of Martigny; the confusion of Sierre;
  The dirt of Visp or Minister, and the odours everywhere: 
  Ye, who ne’er from Monte Rosa have surveyed Italia’s plain,
  Till you wonder if you ever will get safely down again;
  Ye, who ne’er have stood on tip-toe on a ‘knife-like snow-arete,’
  Nor have started avalanches by the pressure of your weight;
  Ye, who ne’er have packed your weary limbs in sleeping bags at night,
  Some few inches from a berg-schrund, ’neath
      the pale moon’s freezing light: 
  Who have ne’er stood on the snow-fields, when the sun in glory rose,
  Nor returned again at sun-set with parched lips and skinless nose;
  Ye, who love not masked crevasses, falling stones, and blistered feet,
  Sudden changes from Siberia’s cold to equatorial heat;
  Ye, who love not the extortions of Padrone, Driver, Guide;
  Ye, who love not o’er the Gemmi on a kicking mule to ride;
  You miserable creatures, who will never know true bliss,
  You’re not the men for Chamonix; avoid, avoid La Suisse!

THE ALPINE CLUB MAN.

  “Up the high Alps, perspiring madman, steam,
  To please the school-boys, and become a theme.”
      Cf.  Juv.  Sat. x, v. 106.

  We who know not the charms of a glass below Zero,
  Come list to the lay of an Alpine Club hero;
  For no mortal below, contradict it who can,
  Lives a life half so blest as the Alpine Club man.

  When men of low tastes snore serenely in bed,
  He is up and abroad with a nose blue and red;
  While the lark, who would peacefully sleep in her nest,
  Wakes and blesses the stranger who murders her rest.

  Now blowing their fingers, with frost-bitten toes,
  The joyous procession exultingly goes;
  Above them the glaciers spectral are shining,
  But onward they march undismay’d, unrepining.

  Now the glacier blue they approach with blue noses,
  When a yawning crevasse further progress opposes;
  Already their troubles begin—­here’s the rub! 
  So they halt, and nem. con. call aloud for their grub.

  From the fountain of pleasure will bitterness spring,
  Yet why should the Muse aught but happiness sing? 
  No! let me the terrible anguish conceal
  Of the hero whose guide had forgotten the veal! [1]

  Now “all full inside” on the ice they embark: 
  The moon has gone down, and the morning is dark,
  Dreary drizzles the rain, O, deny it who can,
  There’s no one so blest as the Alpine Club man!