Page:My Climbs in the Alps and Caucasus.djvu/244

Rh and on the other side great ice cliffs dominate as wild and vast a wall of rock as the climber often sees. A wall which, sweeping round through well nigh 180 degrees, forms one of the sternest cirques the Alps can boast, and which, with its over-hanging séracs, vast cornices and black, ice-filled couloirs, recalls some of the more savage recesses of the Caucasus.

We stormed the short wall still intervening, broke through a thin crest of snow, and shouted our welcome to the Blaitière, the Charmoz, and the Grépon. We had reached the upper slopes of the little glacier on which Garr, Slingsby, and myself had spent such weary hours the preceding year. Now, however, we were above the series of ice walls, and could delight our eyes by studying the graceful curves with which the snows swept over towards the cliff. Immediately opposite were the gaunt crags we had tried to scale, and we recognised, with a feeling akin to pain, that from our furthest point the ridge could have been reached, in two or three hours at most, and the summit won. Our present position was, however, far more favourable. The little glacier—cut off from the rocks opposite by an appalling couloir of bare ice, in which no living being could cut or hew a pathway—led upwards in wind-moulded bends and sweeps, and though steep enough to require the use of the axe, afforded no serious obstacle to our progress.