Page:My Climbs in the Alps and Caucasus.djvu/77

56 the result that a ceaseless hail of fragments was whizzing and humming down it. We were forced, therefore, to take the gully on the Matterhorn side, which, so far, was quite free from the mountain musketry. Burgener took the lead again, and soon found that he had no ordinary work before him. The ice was bare and as hard as well-frozen ice can be; it was, moreover, excessively steep. So evil did it look above, that he halted and gazed anxiously at the rocks of the Matterhorn to see if we could escape in that direction. It was, however, obvious that we should encounter prolonged difficulty on them; besides which, it would leave the problem of the couloir unsolved. Once more he turned sullenly to the wall of ice, and. foot by foot hewed out a way. The projecting rocks on our right, ever tilting the slope outwards, forced us to the left into a sort of semicircular recess in the cliff. Suddenly the step-cutting ceases. "Der Teufel" is apostrophised in soul-curdling terms, and half the saints in the Romish calendar are charged, m the strongest language known to the German tongue, with the criminal neglect of their most obvious duties.

Burgener's axe had broken!

Midway in an ice couloir two thousand feet high, a single axe alone stood between us and utter helplessness. I untied and carefully lashed my axe to the rope and sent it up to Burgener.