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It was pointing to a stratum halfway up to the summit of one of the aiguilles to the west of the Mer de Glace, a chamois climb. He told me later that he found the crystals in the couloir that brought them down from that stratum. A dear old man was Coutet, and fully deserving the affection and confidence of Ruskin.
He was going to begin with the geology and botany of Chamouni, and work through the Alps, eastward. At Chamouni they had the good fortune to meet with Joseph Coutet, a superannuated guide, whom they engaged to accompany the eager but inexperienced mountaineer.
Coutet got him away, at last, to the Alps; worn out and in despondent reaction after all this excitement. He spent a month at Macugnaga, reading Shakespeare and trying to draw boulders; drifting gradually back into strength enough to attack the next piece of work, the study of Turner sites on the St. Gothard, where he made the drawings afterwards engraved in "Modern Painters."
Coutet was one of those men of natural ability and kindliness whose friendship is worth more than much intercourse with worldly celebrities, and for many years afterwards Ruskin had the advantage of his care of something more than mere attendance. At any rate, under such guidance, he could climb where he pleased, free from the feeling that people at home were anxious about him.
John had been given a month's leave from July 26 to explore the Higher Alps, with Coutet his guide and George his valet. The old people stayed at the Hôtel des Bergues, and thought of little else but their son and his affairs, looking eagerly from day to day for the last news, both of him and of his book. Mr.
Coutet and Allen are very anxious to do all they can now that Crawley is away; and I don't think I shall manage very badly," etc. This place was for some time the hermitage in which he wrote his political economy.
As Rowse said of him later, "he wanted me to hold the brush while he painted." But our ideas clashed continually, and what he wanted was impossible, to make me see with his eyes; and so we came to great disappointment in the end. I was very much interested in his old guide, Coutet, with whom I had many climbs.
He tried to persuade the Ruskins that the Swiss Sonderbund war, then going on, made travelling unsafe, and so forth. But in vain. Mr. John was allowed to go, for the first time alone, without his parents, taking only a servant, and meeting the trustworthy Coutet at Geneva. With seven months at his own disposal, he did a vast amount of work, especially in drawing.
Truly it was impossible that any day could be more perfect towards its close. We reached Nant Bourant at twelve o'clock, or a little before, and Coutet having given his sanction to my wish to get on, we started again soon after one and reached the top of the Col de Bonhomme about five.
Of his lonely rambles he wrote later on: "If I have a definite point to reach, and common work to do at it I take people anybody with me; but all my best mental work is necessarily done alone; whenever I wanted to think, in Savoy, I used to leave Coutet at home. Constantly I have been alone on the Glacier des Bois and far among the loneliest aiguille recesses.
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