Page:My Climbs in the Alps and Caucasus (1908).djvu/156

150 wedging his axe between the rock and ice, and, subsequently using it as a footing, was able to gain tolerable standing ground on a shelving rock. I then threw the end of the rope on which Venetz had been climbing across to Burgener, who, as soon as he had tied on, went up to the shelf. Meanwhile I had fixed one of our axes in the snow, and having fastened a short length of rope to it, slid down on to the bridge and crossed to the foot of the chimney, where the rope was already waiting for me. The rock was painfully cold, and it was with great satisfaction that I reached the top of the chimney and could join the men in the endeavour to rub a little life into our fingers.

Fairly easy rocks now enabled us to make rapid progress. A little stream which also used these rocks as a pathway, though in the opposite direction, submitted us to an occasional douche. After a time it struck us that even the pleasures of a shower-bath may be overdone, and we turned to our right and got on to the snow of the couloir. We followed this till its walls began to close in on either side in such grim sort, that we feared we should find no way out if we ascended it any further. Turning to our left we effected, after much difficulty, a lodgment on the cliff, and were able to ascend with tolerable ease for a few hundred feet. We were then confronted by an impassable slab that blocked, or rather terminated, the gully