3-011-868 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Descending Mont Cenis in Winter, 1864. Travelling over the Alps by sleigh. '...tremendous faces of rock rise perpendicularly...there is a fearful precipice, from going over which we are only protected by a row of stone posts with single rails between them...[At] the summit of Mont Cenis...a single animal [is] placed in the shafts of the sleigh; away it dashes full gallop down the steep road...every one looks about, and endeavours to make out something of his whereabouts through the driving snow...The road winds round the side of the mountain, making at times frightfully sharp turns; and here we can often see those ahead of us rushing along apparently under our feet, while those who are in the rear are tearing along high up overhead. Sometimes we look down into immense valleys and see the villages, only distinguishable in the plain of snow by the little church-towers and the larger buildings which show through it. And we may see here how easily a slip of the snow (which is an avalanche) from the side the huge mountain may destroy in a few seconds a whole village...The last turn of this division of the road is at last reached, the sleighs dash across the wooden bridge, and are in the high street of Lans-le-Bourg'. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.