Page:Canadian Alpine Journal I, 1.djvu/124

Rh here to the cliff was identical with that of the former trip, but, to our great satisfaction, the snow was in perfect condition, and so remained the entire day. Accordingly, we made sufficiently good time, with the same stops as before. The arête from the shoulder to the base of the cliff was now child's play. The cliff was the same old story, though I recall one variants—the hand and foot holds on one occasion lost their grip on the man passing between the first two anchorages, and left him for a moment in a state of what might be called "suspended animation." Arriving at the top, all was changed from the conditions of 1901. The broken arête was indeed under a draping of recent snow, but no cornice was in evidence. It was "plain sailing"—and yet very interesting, for the arête was so narrow and thin that one astride it could have his left leg vertical over a sheer drop, at first indeed overhanging, of hundreds if not thousands of feet, while its mate pointed down that 70° slope of snow, as silent now as it was noisy in 1901. At eleven o'clock we were on the summit—Goodsir was ours. The repulse of two years before was forgotten, and our affections went out to the graceful peak, no longer a sullen monster, and, for the joys of that one glorious hour spent on its pure snowy summit, we granted it our love for a lifetime.