To Harriet Jane or Julia Moore   4th Aug 1858.

4^th Aug 1858.

My dear Miss Moore

I am writing to M^r Faraday¹ and seize the occasion to send you a very little note. Since I saw you I have scampered over many of the glaciers and mountains of the Oberland² including Rosenlaui,³ the two glaciers of Grindelwald,⁴ the Aar⁵ and the Rhone.⁶ I plucked some flowers from the top of the Scheideck⁷ pass intending to enclose them in this note for your sister,⁸ I put them in my pocket where they were ground to pieces by my keys! I am now upon the Eggishorn⁹ round which the finest glacier in Switzerland winds. I have already been several times upon this glacier, and the night before last I lay under a roof of rock near the origin of the glacier. The Jungfrau¹⁰ was quite at hand, with the Monk¹¹ and Eiger¹² & other great mountains of the Oberland. My object in lying there was to start early on an expedition to the top of the Finsteraarhorn¹³ which is the highest of the Bernese Alps.¹⁴ We¹⁵ started at 3 o’clock in the morning and succeeded in reaching the summit at half past 10. The climb was a very formidable one and I carried an apparatus for boiling water on my back which greatly increased the difficulty. My guide¹⁶—I had only one—wished to carry it, but the poor fellow had enough without it, and I insisted on bearing my own share. Water boils at the top at a temperature of 187º Fah^t. We descended the greater part of the mountain after the fashion of avalanches, sitting on the snow and sliding down with extraordinary rapidity. After 16½ hours of great toil we reached this hotel.¹⁷ I am resting today, and feel quite fresh and well. Tomorrow I expect to be sufficiently strong to undertake another journey of the kind.

Pray give my kindest remembrances to all my friends at Peters.¹⁸ —In a few days I expect to be at Zermatt.¹⁹

Goodbye Ever Yours. | J. Tyndall.

RI MS JT/1/TYP/3/863–4