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Presently, the guides faced right about, and grounded their axes on the frozen snow-slope. The brother seeing the slope still beyond, and not knowing it was merely the cornice, overhanging a precipice of several thousand feet rushed onward. The writer will never forget their cry of agonized warning. His brother stood a moment on the very summit, and then, the snow yielding, began to fall through.
Games had to be undertaken as long as the daylight lasted chief among which were tobogganing down the snow-slope, and football on the ice.
Today also they frequently stood still to listen; but they heard nothing, not the slightest sound. Neither was anything to be seen excepting the dazzling snow from which emerged, here and there, black peaks and ribs of rock. At last the boy thought he saw a flame skipping over a far-away snow-slope. It bobbed up and dipped down again. Now they saw it, and then again they did not.
The steepness is not expressed in degrees, but by the memory of the sensation produced when a snow-slope seems to be rising up and smiting you in the face; when, far away from all human help, you are clinging like a fly to the slippery side of a mighty pinnacle in mid air.
Away to the north-east there appeared to be a snow-slope that might give a path to the lower country, and so we retraced our steps down the long slope that had taken us three hours to climb. We were at the bottom in an hour. We were now feeling the strain of the unaccustomed marching. We had done little walking since January and our muscles were out of tune.
A working party started to dig a hole in the snow-slope about forty feet above sea-level with the object of providing a site for a camp. They made fairly good progress at first, but the snow drifted down unceasingly from the inland ice, and in the end the party had to give up the project. The weather was fine on April 23, and we hurried forward our preparations.
Then the three toiled on to the top of the snow-slope, which was about four hundred yards away. "Look, Baas," said Otter, who had turned to gaze a fond farewell at the gulf behind; "there are people yonder on the further side." He was right. On the far brink of the crevasse were the forms of men, who seemed to be waving their arms in the air and shouting.
I made a careful examination of the spit with the object of ascertaining its possibilities as a camping- ground. Apparently, some of the beach lay above high-water mark and the rocks that stood above the shingle gave a measure of shelter. It would be possible to mount the snow-slope towards the glacier in fine weather, but I did not push my exploration in that direction during the gale.
"We were late that day on the mountain," he resumed, "and it was dark when we got down to a long snow-slope at its foot. It was new ground to us. We were very tired. We saw it glimmering away below us. It might end in a crevasse and a glacier for all we knew, and we debated whether we should be prudent or chance it. We chanced the crevasse.
"One never knows when a sheer precipice will shut up the way in places like this." The youth, however, was confident, and the man of experience was too amiable and yielding. There was also urgent reason for haste. It was therefore decided that the steeper slopes should be attempted. They began with a glissade. A very steep snow-slope happened to be close at hand.
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