My climb of the Mont Blanc in 1838

“It was not the wretched fame of being the first woman attempting such kind of adventure that was giving me that euphoria; it was more the consciousness of the spiritual wellness obtained”

Henriette d’Angeville

…Such is the view from the top of Mont Blanc, that togetherness, so imposing, more radiant to the sun light. The sky, it was of a gloomy azure, from our head it lightened till becoming plain blue over the horizon: but the colours were so fused in to one another that it would’ve been impossible to identify the exact point of the mutation.
That sky so extraordinary, that caos of immane mountains, those pierced clouds overcome by grey peaks, the eternal snow, the solemn silence of that desert, the absence of any noise, of any living being, of vegetation and especially of a big city whose view could remind us that we are not far from mankind, everything, in one word, together to create an illusion of a new world, of being transported in the earliest eras. For a second I thought of assisting to the spectacle of creation that rises from the womb of caos. “Now that you have seen everything that can be seen from a peak” Cutter told me “you have to go to places that are even higher then the Mont Blanc”
“Is there a road that takes us to the moon from here?”
“You shall see”
And, showing me his hand entangled together with Displan’s he invited me to sit down on that improvised chair: I did it guessing his intention; so the two mountaineers lifted me from the snowy ground, they raised me as much as possible and with that sort of ovation they made me reach higher places then the Mont Blanc, and not to offend the male pride, higher then all my predecessors.
I had the curiosity to see how I was, myself, I grabbed the mirror and got scared: my face had swollen nose and lips, the white of my eyes was red and marked by bloody veins of a dark tone, my skin was seared from the cold… Other then this horrendous mask I was really good, physically and spiritually.
Before leaving for ever that place I wrote in the snow my favourite aphorism: “Want is Power”. Then I gave the signal of departure. With sadness, almost to say regret, today I remember that ungrateful departure, deprived of thankfulness to God for the success obtained. I should’ve blessed him and kneeled in front of the artworks that he was exhibiting in front of my eyes; my imagination, struck by this same magnificence, took possession of that poetic aspect forgetting the religious sentiment that such a place would’ve inspired… in other parts of the path I was better behaved.

Henriette d’Angeville – My climb of the Mont Blanc in 1838
ed. Vivalda Editori