Canadian Alpine Journal/Volume 1/Number 2/The Alpine Club's Jubilee

by Mary T. S. Schäffer

Layout 2

THE ALPINE CLUB'S JUBILEE.

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By Arthur O. Wheeler.

What was the Jubilee of the Alpine Club? It was the celebration of the fiftieth birthday of the oldest of such organizations—the Alpine Club of England. Founded in 1857, this Club has become famous the world over for its thrilling feats in mountain conquest, its records of scientific exploration among the high places of the earth and its introduction of art into the regions of snow and ice.

While the second Annual Camp of the Alpine Club of Canada was in progress, during July of 1907, an invitation was received by the President to attend the Jubilee Celebration. It was accepted, and thus the honor of representing our youthful Alpine Club, the Canadian Rocky Mountains and Canada at this gathering of the clans from all lands, far and near, devolved upon the writer.

The celebration may be summed in a sentence: It was a gathering of the foremost men of the world interested in mountain regions from all except the mercenary aspect, and a review of the foundation and past history of the Club.

For the information of our members, a few words as to its origin and early life may not be amiss. In an address to the Club by its President, the Right Rev. the Bishop of Bristol, delivered at the Winter Meeting, December 16th, 1907, he makes the statement that "the University of Cambridge had the predominant share in the formation of the Club and its earliest activities in literature and art as well as in the world of ice, rocks and snow."

The President had for thirty-four years been a "devoted son" of that University. Whatever rival claims there may have been to predominance, it is a fact that the first proposal for the formation of an Alpine Club emanated from William Mathews to F. J. A. Hort, both high up in the highest honors of Cambridge, the latter during the years 1850 and 1851 carrying off three out of the four Honour Triposes and coming out as Third Classic. In the formation and detail, F. Vaughan Hawkins and Dr. Lightfoot took an active part. Both were Senior Classics and Wranglers.

According to an article devoted to the Jubilee Celebration, appearing in the Graphic of December 14th, the Club was founded at a meeting at Ashley's Hotel on 22nd December, 1857. The articles goes on to say: "It was greeted with a storm of ridicule. The press pronounced it to be an association of suicidal monomaniacs, and Ruskin uttered a wild protest in which he declared that 'the Alps themselves, which your own poets used to love so reverently, you look upon as soaped poles in a bear garden, which you set yourselves to climb and slide down again with shrieks of delight.' But the storm soon blew over. Ruskin himself found that men might climb mountains without vulgarising them, and gave practical effect to his recantations by himself joining the Club."

From an original membership of thirty-one, it has gradually advanced in the fifty years of its life to some seven hundred. The membership is small compared to that of other clubs since formed, whose members are in the thousands, one of them, the German-Austrian, boasting of more than seventy thousand members. The reason for the comparatively small membership is due to the very high standard set and maintained by the Club, and the great care with which applicants for membership have been selected. This fact is well illustrated by the names of now famous men which appear in the first list of members, published in 1859, when the dimensions of the Club had swelled from the original thirty-one to one hundred and thirty members.

In glancing over this publication, a copy of which has been presented to the writer by Mr. Edward Whymper, such names as Matthew Arnold, John Ball, E. F. Blackstone, Rev. T. G. Bonney, Joseph Chamberlain, Rev. J. L. Davies, Rev. F. J. Hort, William Mathews, John Murray, Rev. Leslie Stephen, Prof. J. Tyndall, Alfred Wills and Horace Walker appear, names of young men who have since risen in their various departments to the highest fame and greatest responsibilities that can be acquired. With mental power and physical energy of a calibre such as these names indicate, it is not difficult to understand why the Mother Club stands to-day on a pinnacle whose heights, have been climbed by her alone. It shows most conclusively that of all noble sports, that of mountaineering is most noble, in that it appeals to all classes and professions and brings forth the lofty traits of patience, perseverence, courage and skill. It has, moreover, much to do with the formation of a nation's character, in the development of the intellectual and religious senses, the former through scientific inquiry and artistic representation, and the latter through the unseen but much felt force of an Almighty Power behind an apparent chaos, evolving a scientific scheme of order and an artistic blending of color. An alpine club built on lines similar to the Mother Club is a national asset of which a country may well feel proud.

From the parent club has sprung a large family, one hundred and sixty-six in number. While many of these are, properly speaking, tourist associations rather than actual alpine clubs, yet the same keen activity, the same spirit of emulation and the same desire to come in touch with the cruder forms of nature is the mainspring of each organization.

The constitution of the Alpine Club does not admit of women members, and, though the climbing record of many is on a par, if not superior to that of the average member, they are without the pale. It was, therefore, somewhat of a satire that, on the very night of the great dinner to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of organization, a women's club should have been formed in London; thus putting the nose of the Alpine Club of Canada "out of joint," previously the baby and flower of the flock.

The most attractive and important features of the Jubilee Celebration were an exhibition of alpine paintings and drawings by past and present members at the club rooms, from December loth to 28th, and the now historic dinner of the 17th December, 1907.

The former comprised a very fine and, to a stranger, instructive collection of mountain paintings. The representations were chiefly from the European Alps, the Himalayas, the Caucasus and the Andes. Of the first, Mont Blanc, the Matterhorn, the Wetterhorn and the Breithorn stood out conspicuously. Among others, striking pictures were shown of Mt. Everest and Aconcagua. There was also a representation of Fujiama; and even of Mt. Ararat.

Among the member-artists whose works were contributed figured the names of Ruskin, Watts, Loppe, Alfred Williams, McCormick, Sir J. Collier, Franz Schrader, Elijah Walton, and Willink. There were besides numerous pen and ink sketches, both humorous and descriptive. Taken as a whole, the several hundreds of paintings and drawings presented a collection of incalculable value; not only that it was a rare exhibition of art, but also from its association with members who had "done things"; and as an important series of links in the history of the Club, showing not alone the evolution of art in mountaineering, but the evolution of mountaineering itself.

The dinner was held in the historic hall of Lincoln's Inn, loaned by the Benchers for the occasion. Although a room of vast proportions, the three hundred and fifty-odd guests did not seem to fill it, and in the gloom beyond the brilliantly-lighted tables there was plenty of space. The walls were hung with portraits of by-gone Chief Justices whose names are famous in the pages of England's history, and at the President's left hand, among the honored guests, sat the present Lord Chief Justice.

The gathering was a most remarkable one in that it represented the Church, the State, the Navy, the Army, Science, and all the learned professions in a very high degree. Numerous stars, orders and ribbons scattered through the assembly showed that many of those there had made their mark in their respective callings.

The dinner was the best London could provide, and was served in a style for which the Alpine Club is famous; but the supreme charm of the entertainment lay in the speeches, which were terse, brilliant and witty, and full of a pleasing reference to the history of the Club. A few extracts from them will serve to give point to our own existence, the objects and aims we have in view and the trials of infancy.

In proposing the toast of "The Alpine Club" the President said: "I find an extract which I should like to read to you, dating from the year 1854; it was an early time in the history of climbing, but I am privileged to say that this was not written by Sir Alfred Wills. This is the extract: 'It is a somewhat remarkable fact that a large proportion of those who have made the ascent of Mt. Blanc have been persons of unsound mind.' (Laughter). That, my lords and gentlemen, was no passing jest; it was in the sixth edition of Murray's 'Guide to Switzerland.' I take it that the fact was this—the writer himself had done it—(Laughter)—and he generalized from the one to the many, hence this remark. Having himself the curious mental twist he has described, he took a well-known proverb, transposed the word in, and changed the construction into mens insana, corpore sano. (Laughter). Of course he was speaking about the danger of the ascent as it was then."

Speaking of the care taken by the Alpine Club to obviate danger in climbing, he remarked: "I have had sent me reproachful cuttings from newspapers month after month in the season, with 'What do you think of this, President of the Alpine Club?' written upon them. (Laughter). I find this sort of thing: a party of three has been lost; one was a shoemaker, another a waiter, and another a student of the age of sixteen; that is the sort of thing with which we are reproached. With regard to the Club itself we are in this position: People talk about the danger of going without guides. Now, in the list of qualifications for entrance to the Club applicants frequently state that certain of their ascents were made guideless. We found that to be of very little real use as evidence, because so many members of the Alpine Club are at least as good as guides. We are now obliged to ask, 'Who was your companion when you ascended guideless?' (Laughter). The committee has had to make that change in very recent times. That, I think, may be a useful hint to those who are not exactly of us this evening, how very much the Alpine Club has succeeded in eliminating the element of danger. There are, of course, heaps of places where if you do slip there is probably an end of you; but the Alpine Club knows so well how to negotiate these places that in the last three years, and for some time before that, I am glad to say there has not been a single accident to any one of the six or seven hundred members of the Club." (Hear, hear).

During the course of his speech the Bishop of Bristol read a note of congratulation from President Roosevelt which concluded as follows: "I have always peculiarly prized my honorary membership in the Club, for not only has the Club itself done a great work, but it has set the standard for all similar organizations in all other countries, and its example has counted much in many fields other than those of strict mountaineering."

Continuing the Bishop said: "Now, my lords and gentlemen, I should like to take as the text for a sermon as short as I can make it Theodore Roosevelt's remark that this club has set an example in many fields other than those of strict mountaineering. I should like to read to you—many of you may have forgotten this—an extract from the form of application for membership in the club: 'The applicant must send a list of his mountaineering expeditions or a statement of the amount of contribution to Alpine literature, science, or art, upon which he founds the claim for membership'—not strict mountaineering, you see, but a good deal that is outside that."

Again speaking of the contributions of Alpine men to the letters of the day: "With regard to literature, is it surprising that Alpine literature should be of a very striking kind? I think it is not. Beginning with Sir Alfred Wills, and even some before him, and going on to the list of other delightful writers—we can never forget 'Peaks, Passes and Glaciers'—they have been men of observation in many scenes of quite unrivalled beauty; not only of unrivalled beauty, but of mystery—a solitariness—a mystery that always makes an impression upon the sensitive mind. But more than that, anything that the skilled Alpine climber does must be virile and strenuous. Therefore you have thoughtful, imaginative, strenuous, virile literature as the natural literature which comes from the Alpine Club. (Hear, hear). It has been—I was going to say my duty—my pleasure to look once more at some of the literature which Alpine Club men have put forth to the world, apart from descriptions of mountaineering efforts. I have been very much struck indeed with one of the earliest of the important works to which I refer; I mean Mr. Whymper's great book on the Andes. (Hear, hear). That book is a marvellous collection of archaeology, history and science of all kinds—geology, petrology, entomology, and all sorts of things; excellently put as literature, and accompanied by abundant evidence of, I suppose, about the most skilled power of illustrating man ever had. (Hear, hear). There is nothing like Whymper's illustrating, I think, done by the mere hand. He makes noxious insects much more real than life. There is one standing prominent in the middle of a page, the most dangerous, poisonous, mischevious beast that is to be found in the whole of the Andes. I regret to say that the natives call it the 'Bishop.' (Laughter). A few pages on he describes another formidable stinging beast, evidently only less bad than the 'Bishop.' This the people call the 'Devil.' (Laughter). The libel stands in the latest edition."

Again: "Here is Conway, going wherever there is anything to be seen that other people have not seen, describing it in a wonderful way, taking about with him men who can produce those marvellous photographs of mountain scenery accessible and inaccessible. The Alpine Club has done at least as much as any to bring about that development to the very height of perfection which has now been reached by photography in mountain scenery. Here is Conway, conquering unconquered mountains, and describing it all in so fascinating a way; and the mystery of it is that he makes it all seem so easy, though he confesses now and then that it is not always pleasant. He, too, is everywhere, not in literature only, but emphatically in art, very much more than a mere mountaineer."

Passing on to science: "What a chance the Alpine Club men have always had in the direction of science. They have had to examine the effects of rain and rivers, frost and fire, ice and snow. All the elements that have produced the present configuration of the earth's surface are familiar to them, and in fact to all of us who have climbed the Alps with our eyes open—a normal condition of the Club's eyes, whether its members are scientific or not scientific men. By no means all of our best climbers have cared much for the science of the Alps. Leslie Stephen once made a scientific report on the state of the atmosphere at a certain time earlyish in the morning. An early morning start, after a night on some hard material, was not his best time. I remember once moving up to him, about half-past two in the morning, and saying something genial. He responded with: 'If you think I am such a fool as to be in a good temper at half-past two in the morning, you're very much mistaken.' (Laughter). Well, Leslie Stephen once made a scientific report on the state of things he found at the top of a peak. It took this form: 'If there was any ozone in the atmosphere, ozone is a greater fool than I take it to be.' (Laughter) That sort of thing is not confined to Alpine Club men. For example, we have with us here tonight Sir George Darwin. Sir George Darwin had a father. This was a remark made by the first lieutenant of the ship 'Beagle' to Darwin, who was engaged in dredging, and no doubt was making a great mess on the decks: 'If the captain would leave me in charge of this ship for one day I would have you and your filth overboard in five minutes.' (Laughter). The latest instance of the scientific nature of the Club is very interesting. It is this: The University of Oxford has given the degree of Doctor in Medicine to a member of this club, than whom none has a bolder record as a mountaineer, for a highly scientific treatise on mountain sickness. (Applause). Some of our visitors who have not seen Dr. Longstaff's treatise may not know, perhaps, that the compound word 'mountain-sickness' is not formed on the same plan as that very nice word 'home-sickness.' (Laughter).

With regard to art: "Is it possible that Alpine Club men can climb as they do without breaking out into art, if they can use their fingers at all? Why, our club rooms are at this moment crowded and overcrowded with examples of the art of members. Nothing but the work of a member has been admitted there at all."

Finally: "What about Alpine work as an old man's memory? Well, just this: It is clean and wholesome, pure and unselfish, from one end to the other; there is nothing like it. Just think of the recollections of companionship. You have a jovial, genial companion for a week; you give him chaff and he probably gives you more in return; and so you go on as if the whole thing was just a happy lark. Suddenly there comes a crisis. In a moment your companion is like a steel spring, instinct with keenness of mind. He knows exactly the right thing to do, and exactly the right way to do it. Many and many a time that steel spring, instinct with keennes of mind, has saved a valuable life. And at the end when the time comes to shake hands and say 'Auf wiedersehen,' not one word, not one glance, throughout the whole of the week that either has reason to regret. (Applause). That is the sort of thing we old men have, recollections of things like that. You younger men, not perhaps of the club, get this, that and the other in your course through life, but with all your getting get clean memories for your older age. (Applause).

"We have heard a good deal of late of Honours Classes. I am not going to put the Alpine Club in the first class of clubs, or of sports. There is one word that has only once been used in all the centuries of honours of the University of Cambridge. Far above all First Classes I place our club; with this one word written over it, the word that has only once been used in all the centuries of honours of the University of Cambridge—incomparabilis. (Applause)."

I have quoted largely from this speech because from beginning to end it is a masterly pronounciation. It is a sermon worth the hearing, and compresses into a few terse sentences the objects, aims and possibilities of an Alpine Club, as a mold in which to form a nation's character and comprise within it all the high moral, scientific, artistic and literary attributes that go to make the life of a nation or of a man beautiful.

Mr. Hermann Woolley, the President-elect—who, by the way, has spent a summer exploring and climbing in the Canadian Rockies—in replying to the toast of "The Alpine Club" said among other remarks: "Brilliant work has been done by those members who delight only in guideless climbing. Some of these gentlemen even disdain the services of the harmless, necessary porter, so successfully have they adjusted the weight of their equipment to the fewness of their wants. Whatever may be the disadvantages of guideless climbing, one thing may be said in its favor. When two or three men have climbed habitually together the safety of each one constantly depending upon the skill, judgment and watchfulness of his companion or companions, I believe that a feeling of confidence, sympathy and friendship must spring up between them strong enough to outlast all the wear and tear of later life. Last night's meeting impressed upon me the great development that has taken place within recent years in the Club, and also the value of the possession it has become to us. There is, I think, in one of Thackeray's books something to this effect: that we ought to cherish with gratitude and reverence a wine of noble vintage carefully laid down by our wise forefathers at a time when we were intent on childish things. In the same spirit we ought to cherish, and do cherish, the heritage that has been handed down to us by the climbers of the fifties and sixties in the records, traditions and literature of the Alpine Club." These are words of wisdom, and are good to meditate upon.

Mr. Clinton Dent, replying to the same toast, traced the history of the Club from its first home in Hinchliff's chambers in Stone Buildings, Lincoln's Inn, to its present comfortable and suitable quarters at 23 Savile Row. He said: "The club has often changed its home; it has never, thank Heaven! changed its character. (Hear, hear). From our rooms and from our present habitation we may have to pass elsewhere. Much water has flowed under the bridges since the days of our first President, John Ball, and much has been done since Wills ascended the Wetterhorn and crossed the Fenêtre de Saleinaz; since Llewelyn Davies—happily with us tonight—(Hear, hear) made his famous ascent of the Dom or joined with his old friend Vaughan Hawkins in an expedition on the west side of Mont Blanc and the Col de Miage. The members have gone farther and higher since then. They have found the right way up peaks in the Andes, in the Himalaya, in the Caucasus, in the Rockies; while in the English Lake District and Scotland they have found the wrong way up nearly every conceivable ascent. (Laughter). The club has expanded, developed and increased its membership. But, notwithstanding all this, the essential old bond of union—the love of the mountains—remains as it always has been, and the club has been constantly true to its traditions on the lines which you, the founders, laid down, and which you, the early members, so successfully developed. (Hear, hear). It has been said often that it is with a feeling of regret that one finds one's mountaineering is coming to an end. I cannot quite myself take that view, for it is not till towards the time when we are approaching the end of our more active career that we realize to the full all that the mountains have done for us—(hear, hear)—and indeed, the consciousness may come quite suddenly upon us that we have perhaps, after we have climbed our very last mountain, gained a great possession of valued friendships and of happy memories—(hear, hear)—memories of which the recollection can fade away only with life itself. In the first volume of 'Peaks, Passes and Glaciers' John Ball wrote: 'The community of taste and feeling amongst those who in the life of the High Alps have shared the same enjoyments, the same labors and the same dangers constitutes a bond of sympathy stronger than many of those by which men are drawn into association.' Is not this true? Could any prediction have been more amply verified? Of a truth we were brought up not only in the law but amongst the prophets. You, the founders, revealed a new and wholesome pleasure which the early members so successfully deveolped. You discovered and made known the most unselfish and the grandest sport in this world. But in founding the Alpine Club you did a great deal more than that. You were the means of linking together, fascinated by one common pursuit, men of every taste, pursuit and occupation in life; and much more, and more important, men of every age—the young, those more mature in years, and those who have arrived at the period which the young are pleased to consider old, but which as a matter of fact is nothing of the kind. (Laughter and applause). This you, the founders, and you, the early members, have done for us, and for it we the rest shall ever be grateful to you.

"It is impossible, as I look round these tables, not to miss many faces once familiar and constantly seen at our Winter Dinners. It is hard indeed to believe that we must search in vain for Leslie Stephen or for the keen, alert face of Charles Mathews. Let that pass. I would not on the present occasion touch, however faintly, a note of sadness. Let us be content with McCormick's happy suggestion that our old friends are with us in spirit this evening. Gaps there may be, but our ranks are still close. Among our founders—those who have written after their names those mystic letters 'O.M.,' signifying alternatively 'Original Member,' or to us the rare 'Order of Merit'—(hear, hear)—those who are still with us are both present to-night in the persons of Walters and Wills."

In the following remarks Mr. Douglas Freshfield struck a keynote: "And now they, and we, are called on to a more arduous task—to preserve our conquest. The Alps are threatened with invasion by a horde of Goths and Vandals: the company-promoter, the syndicate and the speculator. Men who know not Nature, and whose God is Mammon, are in the field. They make pretence to be philanthropists. They would have us believe that they desire to benefit the peasantry and the economic tourist. It is a false pretence. What does the peasant, the guide, the driver, or the local innkeeper gain by the crowd, done by contract, that is whirled past his door? What does the tourist gain that is carted, tightly packed in a covered van, through scenery he could better see in a cinematoscope? I met the other day in Switzerland a specimen of the modern tourist. 'Sir,' said he, 'I wish to sample the glasher region. Can you tell me if I can do it from Berne in a day without sleeping out?' He did it, and found it 'less extensive than he had anticipated.'

"It is for this class of travellers that the modern engineer is set to work. For them he has veiled the Staubbach in sooty reek; for them he has turned the flowery turf of the Wengern Alp into a Happy Hampstead; for them he is ready to plant a moving platform in the sublime solitudes of the Aletsch Glacier; for them he proposes to furnish the Matterhorn with a lift, and to convert the summit into a grotto furnished with a restaurant, a consulting-room for sufferers from the rarity of the air, and a stall for the sale of picture postcards."

The foreging extracts serve to illustrate the high estate to which a national institution such as the Alpine Club of England may arrive within a period of fifty years, and the valuable national asset it may become as a bond of sympathy and good feeling between men in various paths of life, as well as an exponent of all that is best in literature, science and art.

The text of the speeches in full is a brief history of the Club, most charmingly told, and our members are advised to obtain copies of the February number of the Alpine Journal, Vol. XXIV., No. 179 (Address Edward Stanford, 12, 13 and 14 Long Acre, London, W.C. Price two shillings). The same number contains an account of the accident on the Schwarzhorn written by Mr. G. L. Stewart, who, as well as the writer, was with the climbing party when the deplorable accident occurred. An account of this accident appeared also in the May number of "Rod and Gun," in the account given of the President's visit to England to attend the Alpine Club's Jubilee.