Page:My Climbs in the Alps and Caucasus.djvu/151

126, before the loss of time became really serious, Venetz took advantage of a smooth rock and some interlaced brambles, and went head-over-heels, no one exactly knew where, though, from some remarks he let fall, I gathered that it was one of the less desirable quarters of Hades. When he reappeared the lantern was no more, and we were able to make better progress, till, after a weary grind, we reached the Nantillon Glacier.

We did not much like the idea of repeating the traverse by which we had reached the upper slopes on our way to the Charmoz, We therefore halted and looked for a better method of turning the ice fall. A steep tongue of glacier between the cliffs of the Charmoz and the buttress of rock which projects from the Blaitière seemed to offer an easy and fairly safe line of ascent, and we unanimously decided in its favour. Having settled this preliminary to our day's work we strolled up to the foot of the tongue. We kept straight up it, and found that it was just steep enough to require step cutting the whole way. The process was tedious, and, much to Burgener's chagrin, a party bound for the Blaitière were catching us up, hand over hand, on the easy rocks to our right. Our leader exerted his utmost strength, and by herculean efforts managed to