Page:Mannering - With axe and rope in the New Zealand Alps.djvu/53

Rh Reaching the bottom of the slopes we made an examination of the Haast Glacier at its junction with the Tasman, which disclosed a terribly crevassed stream, the ice appearing like the leaves of a half-opened book, the alternating crevasses occupying by far the greater space. There ensued an aggravating scramble over the moraine, followed by a weary trudge across the ice of the Hochstetter, and we reached our camp at the Ball Glacier by nightfall.

Sleep visited our wearied eyelids that night and had never seemed so sweet, but the morning broke raining and stormy, and as it was from the nor'-west and looked like continuing, we determined to make homewards for the Hermitage at once.

Then ensued the awful scramble down between the moraine and the mountain side with those terrible swags, but, being by this time in good trim, we arrived at the terminal face of the glacier in four hours and a quarter, a distance which occupied Mr. Green with Emil Boss and Ulrich Kaufmann thirteen hours in coming down in their final retreat.

On reaching the Hooker, we found the river running strongly and rising fast with the nor'-west rain, but after some looking about discovered a possible ford where the river anastomosed into four branches, and steadying ourselves with our ice-axes, waded through the torrent. Cold! Cold was no word for it, and the force of the current was terrible as it rushed over an uneven and treacherous bed of boulders.

But we got through safely, and soon the Hermitage, our haven of refuge, was in sight, and we struck up the shingle flats at a merry pace, reaching our destination