Page:1880. A Tramp Abroad.djvu/544

 After having been on his feet twenty-four hours, in the exhausting work of mountain-climbing, Sir George began the re-ascent at the head of the relief party of six guides, to recover the corpse of his brother. This was considered a new imprudence, as the number was too few for the service required. Another relief party presently arrived at the cabin on the Grands Mulets and quartered themselves there to await



events. Ten hours after Sir George's departure toward the summit, this new relief were still scanning the snowy altitudes above them from their own high perch among the ice-deserts 10,000 feet above the level of the sea, but the whole forenoon had passed without a glimpse of any living thing appearing up there.

This was alarming. Half a dozen of their number set out, then, early in the afternoon, to seek and succor Sir George