Cambridge
30th October 1818
I am greatly concerned at not hearing from you: and I really think I shall some fine morning give alma mater the slip; and pay you a visit. Pray write. I was agreeably surprized this morning by a visit from Ld Winchilsea<1> and George Finch<2> on their way from Burley.<3> It was only nine o'clock, so you will be surprized that I was visible, but I intend to make six, my rising hour for the rest of the term, in which case my levee will not I presume be very numerously attended. I find it quite impossible to get up at seven, it is much easier at six. One's drowsiness attains its maximum about seven.
I will tell you some more particulars about the flood at Martigny.<4> You know I suppose that the river Drance flows through the valley of Bagne in the Valaise. This valley is narrow and enclosed by steep mountains covered by glaciers. Last winter part of one of the glaciers broke off and stopped up the valley. The stream was turned into a lake which kept continually increasing in depth. In the middle of May it was more than a mile and a quarter long, 200 yards wide, and 180 feet deep. The people were alarmed, and in order to let the water off gradually, cut a gallery through the ice, 700 feet long. This had in part the desired effect, and the people ventured to return to their houses in the valley. The town of Martigny is situated 21 miles lower down the valley than the place where this ice barrier was formed, however (as it had been swept away in 1595 [illegible deletion] under similar circumstances) the inhabitants thought it advisable to build a strong wall or dam in the shape of a half Moon, before the Town in order to break the force of the flood, if it should come. Moreover they placed a watchman in the castle, which is on an eminence near the Town, to be always on the look out. Things went on smoothly for several weeks, and the people were returned to their usual occupations, - when, one afternoon about five o'clock, the sentinel looking up the valley, perceived a dust. He immediately fired a cannon, and cried Sauve qui peut.<5> The flood came on with inconceivable rapidity, carrying in front a barrier of trees, 20 feet high. Just as it reached the wall the people had built, and apparently before it touched it, the wall parted in the middle and let the current pass on, through the town, which it almost entirely swept away. - It had Such was its rapidity that it performed the 21 miles down to Martigny, in five quarters of an hour. The ruin it occasioned was immense: for few vallies in Switzerland were more fertile, than this, which when Nicholson saw it, three days after, was covered only with sand. Where trees had resisted the stream, this had twisted about them, like ropes, the trunks and stems which it brought down with it. As the flood pursued its course, the valley becoming wider, its force abated, and until it reached the lake of Geneva, the East End of which it covered with floating wood. When Nicholson viewed the spot, it was covered with wrecks of houses, and the ground strewed with dead dogs, horses, cattle, men, women, and children -
I remain Yr Affte Son
W. H. F. Talbot
The Lady Elisabeth Feilding
[illegible deletion]
London
Post office Brighton<6>
To be forwarded <7>
Notes:
1. George Finch, 9th Earl of Winchilsea (1752-1826).
2. George Finch (1794-1870), JP & MP.
3. Burley, near Oakham, Rutland.
4. On 16 June 1818, an ice-dammed lake in the Val de Bagnes above Martigny collapsed; the resulting landslide and flood devastated Martigny with high casualties. It is this tragedy that initiated Jean de Charpentier's studies of glaciers in Switzerland, which in turn inspired Louis Agassiz's studies.
5. Run for your life, literally meaning 'escape who can'.
6. Written in another hand.
7. Written in WHFT's hand.