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Gouffre des Busserailles

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Date

1868

Artist

Arthur Cust (1842-1911)

Collection

The Maas Gallery

Description

Watercolour over pencil inscribed on opposite page "Val Tournanche. Chasm cut by/the stream, called Gouffre des Busserailles." and inscribed: "In Novr. 1865 the intrepid (Jean-Antoine) Carrel induced two trusty comrades - the Maquignaz's of Val Tournauche - to lower him by a rope into the chasm and over the cataract. The feat required iron nerves, and muscles and sinews of no ordinary kind and its performance alone stamps Carrel as a man of dauntless courage. One of the Maquignaz's subsequently descended in the same way, and these two men were so astonished at what they saw, that they forthwith set to work with hammer and chisel to make a way into this romantic gulf. In a few days they constructed a rough but convenient plank gallery into the centre of the gouffre. ...the length of the chasm is about 320 feet, & fr. top of its walls to surface of water abt. 110 ft. ... The most extraordinary features are the caverns (marmites) wh. [?] water has hollowed out. ... One of the greatest - a grotto (entrance appears in centre of sketch to the right) abt. 28 ft across & 15 or 16 high. ... the rocks of hard horn-blende. -/72. Whymper's Scrambles amont the Alps.'".

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Image Credit

Location

Gouffre des Busserailles, Italy

Country

Italy

Medium

Watercolour