Page:Du Faur - The Conquest of Mount Cook.djvu/206

162 We arrived at the Hermitage at dinner-time, to find that Alex was already over from Westland. He shook his head at us on hearing what we had been up to. We only laughed, and pointed out that in years to come many of our "great climbs" might be everyday affairs, but our route up the eastern face of Sebastopol would probably never be attempted again; as only under very special circumstances and to particular people would it appear worth attempting.

The Sebastopol climb, too, had another aspect; it proved effectually that I had absolutely recovered my physical fitness and need not be afraid of my nerves or muscles playing me tricks, and that I might once more attempt the highest peaks with safety. When I thought of my condition on arrival at the Hermitage just a month ago, and compared it with my now abounding energy and fitness, it seemed to me that the many detractors of mountaineering as a pursuit for women were amply answered.

An eminent professor of biology has often attempted to convince me that the mental and physical strain of sixteen hours' mountaineering is too great for a woman's constitution. I certainly do not agree with him. The strain on a woman who is physically fit is not so heavy as he thinks it is, and is not to be compared to the nervous and mental tension which has to be endured by a trained hospital nurse who tends a dangerous case for sixteen hours. I have tried both, and I know that the exercise, the invigorating air, and the healthy excitement of a big climb outweigh the nervous and physical strain. A few hours' sleep and the latter are forgotten, while the effects of the former are in evidence in a sense of physical fitness which I never experienced until I took up mountaineering.

With nursing, which I undertook for love of the profession, as I did mountaineering, the cases were