Page:My Climbs in the Alps and Caucasus.djvu/409

352 time forth my friends have been firm converts to the doctrine, that if from a party of three you abstract the weakest member, the party is very materially strengthened and improved, and that two competent climbers constitute a fax safer and better party than the two guides and a traveller, so dear to the orthodox authorities on mountaineering.

Since, however, it is conceivable that an extensive snow bridge might give way, and let the leader fall some distance before the rope could come into play, it may be of advantage to describe a method of using the rope by which, even in this case, a party of two should still be able to work out their own salvation. It is a fairly well known fact, attested by a considerable number of involuntary experiments, that one man can hold a companion who has fallen some distance into a crevasse. The friction of the rope on the edge of the crevasse, and the splendid holding ground which the soft, level snow affords, enables the fall to be checked without very grave difficulty. The crucial point is, however, to get your companion out again. This, with the rope used in the customary manner, is impossible. Ferdinand Imseng and other of the experimenters referred to above have tried it and