Page:Du Faur - The Conquest of Mount Cook.djvu/68

56 decided to rest to-morrow and climb the following day. Well pleased at the prospect of unlimited sleep I retired to my bunk, where I slept dreamlessly till eleven next morning. Finding it was a beautiful day I proceeded to get up, and on appearing was pleased to be able to answer the volley of questions as to how I felt by "Fine, and not at all stiff, thank you." Considering the contortions that rock-climbing demands of the human form divine, the fact that I really was not stiff pleased me mightily and surprised me considerably. Though I was none the worse for wear the same could not be said of my costume, so I sat down on a stone and proceeded to repair damages. The professor, seeing me so usefully employed, presently appeared dangling a pair of knickerbockers, which he surveyed ruefully, and then observed with obvious truth that he was afraid they were hardly fitted to stand the strain of glissading down the Minarets. Considering his noble efforts in feeding the hungry the night before, and in wasting this lovely day that we might all have a day's rest, I concluded it was up to me to patch the breeches; but with what was a question that puzzled me considerably. Knowing from past experience that the New Zealand guide is usually to be depended upon to produce anything from hairpins to a change of costume, I asked Graham to solve my difficulty. After much rooting round he appeared with some ancient tweed which, of course, could not compare in dignity to the professorial garment. The resulting patch was the cause of combined regret and mirth to me. Merely to contemplate it from behind, even in the most serious climbing crises, put new heart into me. About three o'clock Graham set off to reconnoitre, as the Minarets were unknown to him, only having been climbed once before somewhere in the dim, distant past by T. C. Fyfe and Malcolm Ross. Mr. Earle and I undertook to cook the dinner in his absence. The process was conducive to much laughter; with the