By the aid of our glasses we were able to sweep the rough slopes and
precipitous descents below, to the distance of many miles; and,
forgetting De Aery, we watched the development of the phenomenon with
terror. The larger slides gradually absorbed the smaller ones, as
common fish are swallowed by sharks; but those which remained, fattened
and expanded by what they fed on, assumed enormous dimensions. Choosing
different paths, they pursued their course in smoking tracks of
devastation. Rocks, precipices, forests, furnished no obstruction.
Roaring, crashing onward, as though Mars or the Sun had opened its
batteries upon us, those sliding, whirling worlds of snow swept through
valleys large enough to have furnished sites for cities, without a
check, and bore down or over-leaped all obstacles, as easily as a man
would walk over an ant-hill, or some hollow where a toad had burrowed.
Finally they were lost to sight, passing behind intervening spurs or
ridges of the mountain, or becoming hidden in the cloud-mists which lay
heavily about its base; but the sound continued to roll back upon us
for some time, like the roar of distant artillery. I could no longer
wonder at the terror with which the cry of an avalanche is said to fill
the dwellers among the Alps.
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