This Was Mt. Parnassus

Ursula Corning

IT looked just like the ordinary little Greek village fountain, and the water gushed out of the most unromantic cheap spout. We were surrounded by the usual crowd of ubiquitous small Greek urchins, staring at us, our unfamiliar clothes and our cameras, and waiting for a chance to show us the way to the local church. Fanny and I bent down in the unelegant pose required by the position of the fountain and drank. Then as we both have a deep- seated belief in magic of some sort, we gazed hopefully at each other. We had just drunk of the waters of Lethe.

Nothing happened. We felt faintly cheated. There was nothing to do but to follow the urchins and be shown the little church.

That was eight years ago. Today I am not so sure that all the magic had gone from those waters in spite of the unromantic spout, for even now I have no clear recollection about my adventures climbing Mt. Parnassus. I knew it was a happy day, one of those which one will never forget, but the route and the view and the names of the mountain tops and all the practical details had been wiped out of my mind as if by a sponge. In despair I wrote to Dick and Alice, who had shared the expedition, and sure enough they wrote back with the most wonderful details, which were the greatest help. I felt ashamed, but then they had not drunk the waters of Lethe the day after the climb. I have a valid excuse.

We met in May, 1935, at the “Pythian Apollo” at Delphi. They were standing there, young, American and obviously equipped to go up something. I was not. My mountaineering experiences in Greece were limited so far to a hazardous scramble out of an Upper Berth on the Orient Express at 4 a.m., landing on the face of a stout Greek woman, in order to see Mount Olympus rising up out of the haze of the Plains of Thessaly. It was worth any inconvenience to have that vision to look back on, though I doubt if my stable companion agreed with me. I am not a light weight.

Next day I found myself at the charming little rooms of the Greek Alpine Club. Its President was urging me to stay on in Greece till July so that he could take me up Olympus. Greek etiquette is severe and, mindful of Fanny’s remark that she hadto refuse the invitation of the same gentleman to ramble over Mount Hymettus behind Athens with a party of young people because it was so compromising, I felt I had made a rapid hit. Fanny quickly undeceived me. “Of course one can do anything with the English or Americans,” she remarked rather witheringly. No one wanted to climb mountains in May anyhow, so I put the idea out of my mind. We did many other good things, mostly with that inspiring young couple, Humfry and Dilys Payne, to whom excavation in Greece owes so much. We bathed at Sunion and roamed over the Acropolis by moonlight. We spent a day in a Greek fisherman’s boat on the Gulf of Corinth and roasted fish in the stern. We sat with the villagers on the shore at Aegosthenae drinking a lot of Retsina and singing local songs. We slept on the roof of a hospitable villager, and I know I heard the silvery piping of Pan far away in the hills, when the uncertain spring dawn came. And now we were in Delphi where Fanny wanted to paint and to show me the sights. I had forgotten that Parnassus was anywhere near. I’m not a good sightseer, so we had spent the day dreaming among the ruins and were strolling home at sunset. And there were Dick and Alice.

Where were they going? It was Parnassus alright, and it was full moon, so they were going to walk all night to reach the top by sunrise. Of course it was quite the wrong time of year, because Baedeker says it’s dangerous to go before July on account of the snow, but they had the only local guide. I told them baldly that they must take me too. They concealed their surprise and welcomed me so whole-heartedly that I felt we were friends for life before we had even started.

Of course I wasn’t properly dressed for the part. We were travelling very light, but I had a skirt and some rubber-soled shoes, and kind people lent me sweaters. I had never realized before how important sunburn lotions are. I had none and went around looking like a lobster for weeks afterwards.

It was an adventure for the three of us. Dick and Alice were on vacation from the American School in Rome. They had tramped over a lot of Greece, but this was their first mountain. I had climbed in Switzerland, but had no knowledge of this country. Neither Alice nor I knew more Greek than “Please,” “Thank you,” “yes” (“no” was not included in the vocabulary) and “Get Thee behind me Satan,” a very ambitious Biblical flight learned frommy father, who tried it with scant success on Athens beggars. Dick was an expert in Ancient Greek, but to our relief he didn’t do much better in conversation than we did.

The moon was just rising when a car left us at the little village of Arachova, 4 miles up the valley from Delphi. A shadowy form detached itself from a doorway and came towards us : George, our guide for the occasion. My experience had so far been limited to Valais guides, and it was plain at once that George had little in common with his Swiss colleagues. Ice-axes and ropes were unknown to him, but he did know his way up Parnassus and appeared to be a nice man with an engaging smile and a faint smattering of English. George knew without a doubt that all foreigners were mad, but could prove harmless and even valuable sources of income if the madness were humoured. It was clear to him at once that here were three particularly odd specimens, for who else would want to climb Parnassus at this unseasonable time ? However, we all smiled in friendly fashion, and our odd little procession moved off in the moonlight up the steep streets of Arachova and out onto the stony slope behind, in one zigzag after another. I had never seen such a golden moon, nor walked all night in completely unfamiliar country. It was magical and seemed the only fitting approach to the home of the Muses.

There is nothing more elusive than trying to recapture one’s imagination of a place. I know that in my mind’s eye I saw Parnassus as a sort of immense Fuji-yama, capped with snow. On the top, quite irrationally, was a sort of sacred grove, where Apollo sat enthroned in state, grasping a large gold lyre. Muses diapha- nously clad, darted about, while poets of all ages stood round in knots, exactly like people at a garden party. Luckily the reality was far more attractive. In the first place, Parnassus is not one mountain, but a whole massif with two main summits, Tithorea and Lycorea. Our objective was Lycorea, and to reach it we had to pass over several smaller summits in the chain.

It is amazing how far one can tramp at night without feeling the least exertion. We were surprised when looking back we saw the lights of Arachova twinkling far below us in the valley. We traversed round our rocky spur, and George showed us the caves where the shepherds store their cheeses in the Summer. After this there was not much time for indulging in poetic meditation. The path vanished, and we groped our way amid hugeboulders and occasional fields of snow, which filled George with depression. Up and down and round, then all of a sudden we were standing on the top of something which George vehemently insisted was our peak. Though we were new to the district and had no map of any kind, it was quite plain to us all that ahead of us, though separated from us by a deep ravine, clear in the moonlight, lay the real summit, a snow pyramid, topped by black rocks. We also knew why George had sabotaged our ambitions. To reach the head of the ravine we had to cross a steep little arete, with a rocky gully on one side and a steep snowfield on the other. This was unattractive in soft snow without a rope or any other aid, and George flatly refused to tackle it. We equally refused to turn back. After all we had climbed all night and our objective was in sight. When all persuasion was in vain, George left us, saying he would look for another way. We knew that there couldn’t be one, so the moment his back was turned, deciding that we could only die once we marched gingerly across the ridge and waited on the other side to watch George’s face when he realized that he would have to follow us or get left behind. He came along, and another hour and a half saw us on the summit, the last bit mostly over shale and rock.

We stood on Parnassus at the psychological moment, for the dawn was breaking. It was an angry red sunrise with streaks of grey cloud. We felt as if we were much higher than a mere 8000 ft. and were thankful to gulp down some warming rum. We felt and looked extremely unworthy followers of Apollo, but for all that it was a very special thrill to be standing on what seemed the roof of the world. All around us rose the Parnassus massif: ridge after ridge, intersected by valleys, a wild world of its own. Far away in the N. we could guess at Mount Olympus; nearer us we could clearly make out the glittering strait of Euboea with its island beyond; to the S., the highest peaks of the Peloponnesus stood out above the lower Parnassus summits, and in the S. W. there was more sea again, like a silver ribbon. This combination of mountains and sea fascinated me, accustomed as I was only to the high Alpine views. We felt as if all the kingdoms of the world were spread out at our feet, especially when the rivers of Boeotia and Phocis began to shine in the early sunlight. I have since seen views in Maine to remind me of it, with the difference that in Greece there are few trees, streams or lakes. It is an austere sort of beauty relying on noble bare outlines and on the pure light, restful for that very reason. There are few trappings of which the mind can weary. Their scenery explains the passionate love many Greeks have for things we often take for granted: leafy trees, little streams with swiftly flowing water. I rarely hear the twinkling sound of water flowing over stones without thinking of my Greek friends, now so terribly cut off from our sympathy and affection.

The snow slopes were beginning to glisten and soften in the warm sun, so we started regretfully on our downward way, striking out S. to go straight down to Delphi. Glissading was very tempting, and before we know what had happened Dick was going a good deal faster than he had intended and shot down the slope with alarming speed. To our relief he landed safely in a little gully, and following at a more dignified speed we found him safe and sound though somewhat ragged in skin and clothing. We soon reached the snow-line, where a little hut had been built by the Greek Alpine Club for the use of skiers. During the Winter they had been up in large numbers, George told us, and the skiing should be excellent. In that sheltered hollow beneath the highest pines we found our first mountain flowers, not the little crocus and soldanella that I knew so well from the Alps, but tiny fragile purple iris, the most enchanting things imaginable. Poor long- suffering George had to stop again, for I was intent on grubbing some of them up to take to friends with gardens; but he was kind and obliging about it, and we stowed them away and started leisurely down the track among the pine trees, across the Livadi Plateau. This is the place sacred to Pan and the Nymphs, and high up on our right was the Korykian Grotto where wild Bacchic orgies were celebrated. But never a sign of nymph nor faun did we see, and I doubt if Pan could have lured us to any dance, pipe he never so wisely. Our rather inadequate foot-gear had found us out, and we were developing blisters which checked our course and made it more and more tempting to lie on a carpet of hot scented pine needles, as the burning sun brought out all the scents of the forest and the tiny lizards flashed across the stones.

We had been going 15 hours when we topped a little rise, and there before us lay the Gulf of Itea and the sea beyond. Delphi was at our feet. A few sharp zigzags down the Kake Skala or evil steps brought us to the hospitable open doors of the “Pythian Apollo” and our friends to welcome us and to ask about our day spent among the Muses. Never again would Parnassus be a mere name for us, but rather a dear familiar friend who had given us priceless treasures of memories.

As for the little iris, I took them carefully to England a week later. They have found a second home in a corner of an old Worcestershire garden and seem to like the English soil, for they flower happily year after year, regardless of bombing and other signs of the times. Every year when my old friend writes to say that the Parnassus iris are in bloom, it is like a greeting from the far away mountains of Greece and from that brave and splendid people. It seems as if with the unfolding of those delicate purple petals new hope were born for them and for us.