I am very sorry to leave this nice place. What do you think is our fortnight's bag? Two old peaks. Seven new peaks — one of them first-class and four others very good. One new saddle, also first-class.
The traverse of the Engelhorn, also new and first-class.
That's not bad going, is it! ... .
To F. B.
GRINDELWALD, September 12th, 1901.
Our tale is a sad one. We went up to a hut for the new Finsteraarhorn arête yesterday morning, in very shaky weather. it shook down, rained all the afternoon, and at 6 a.m. this morning began to snow. By 8, when we left, there were 3 inches of new snow, so we raced back to Grindelwald... It is very provoking, when one feels one might do really good climbs! We hope to do a new Engelhorn peak, and we have not yet quite abandoned all hopes of one of the high arêtes. I would like to have one of them to my name! It is a silly ambition, isn't it! Still one does like to have the credit one really deserves.
To F. B.
November 27, 1901.
Of course I will take the Mothers' Meeting on Wednesday. I will find out about sending out the invitations. Will you tell me what you want read — any of the Health Book? — and if so, where is it? I can look out some story... .
To F.B.
RED BARNS, Thursday, December 18, 1901.
All has gone off quite well. We had over 200 people. Your telegram arrived and I read it out to them in the middle of my speech! The magic lantern slides are lovely, it was most exciting seeing them... .
Tell Father I've written to Maurice by every mail all about him! He mustn't get to think there's nothing else to write about! Hugo says Prout's an old fogey — that's what he says! I say Hugo is a great darling!
To F.B.
RED BARNS, December 29, 1901.
I have spent the afternoon in Clarence and Middlesbrough and made all the arrangements for the teas. My slides are announced, so all is well... .
Hugo sends seasonable wishes. He has retired into Cicero.
[1902. Gertrude, her father and Hugo indefatigably start for another sea voyage after the new year, leaving Liverpool January 14 and going by sea to Malta, then to Sicily and up through Italy. Hugo and his father returned and Gertrude made her way into Asia Minor.
Her letters, full of interesting descriptions, are too long to quote, from Malcajik, Smyrna, Magnesia, Burnabat and finally from Smyrna by sea to Haifa.]
[At Malcajik — "Mr. Van Lennep and his family full of help and hospitality." By Smyrna to Pergamos.]
"You should see me shopping in Smyrna, quite like a native only I ought to have more flashing eyes. At Pergamos I went all over the Acropolis and examined temples and palaces and theatres and the great altar of which the friezes are at Berlin."
[Magnesia and Sardis.] "I was fortunate enough to get a secondhand copy of Herodotus in French."
[Sardis] "I was delighted that I had Herodotus so fresh in my mind... ."
"It is a madly interesting place."
"Some day I shall come and travel here with tents but then I will speak Turkish, which will not be difficult and I will take only a couple of Turkish servants with me."
[To Butnabat, where she is warmly welcomed by Mr. Whittall and his family. To Ephesus. She then goes on an Austrian boat from Smyrna to Haifa. She finds a temporary abode at Mount Carmel.]
"I am now become one of the prophets-at least I make merry in their room so to speak — and it's a very nice room, I may add, and I am sitting writing at my own writing table with everything genteel about me."
To F. B.
MOUNT CARMEL, 26th March, 1902.
There must be something in the air of Mount Carmel favourable to mental derangement of a special kind — at any rate if you want to commence prophet you take a little house in Haifa, you could scarcely begin in any other way. I have already made the acquaintance of one or two for this afternoon I went down to Haifa — I live on the top of the hill — Haifa is half an hour away — to seek out a teacher. Presently I also approached the window and there was the prophet in his shirt with bare arms working at his trade which I take to be that of a carpenter... I distinctly like prophets — Herr Wasserzug is a charming man, most intelligent about Semitic languages. He sent me off to one Abu Nimrud, a native, 'comme de droit,' of Nineveh, who, he said, was the best man he could recommend. On my way I called on Mr. Monahan. offered me books and advice and coffee... I took a Persian history of the Babis from him and went off hunting Nimrud all over the town. At last I found him in his shop in the bazaar — he agreed to come up and give me my first lesson to-day, but need I say he hasn't come. The next thing was to get a Persian. My old friend Abbas Effendi... I heard that the son-in-law of Abbas, Hussein Effendi, lived here, and I determined to apply to him. Accordingly I made my way to his shop — a sort of little general store like the shop in a small country town — and in this unlikely setting I found a company of grave Persians, sitting round on the biscuit tins and the bags of grain, and Hussein himself leaning over the counter. The upshot of it is that I hope I shall end by getting a Persian to come and talk to me. A horse was the next necessity and horse dealers my next acquaintances — I see one this instant upon the road bringing me up a horse to try. I am excellently lodged in two rooms with a balcony from whence I see all across the bay and Acre at the end of a long stretch of sand, and the Plain of Esdraelon with Kishor, running through it and far away Hermon white with snow.
Later. But for all that I find I shall have to déménager. Abu Nimrud came up this morning and gave me a long lesson but he declared that it was too far for him to come and that he could only get me a Persian on condition that I would come down into the town, so I rode down this afternoon and inspected the two hotels and fixed on one standing in a charming garden where I could get 2 big comfortable rooms; it has the further advantage of being kept by Syrians so that I shall hear and speak nothing but Arabic... Hussein Effendi's brother-in-law is going to teach me Persian.
To H.B.
MOUNT CARMEL, 30th March, 1902.
... But mind, if ever you think I'm unbearable, just say it straight out and mention what you can't abide and I'll do my best to mend it. To return to the East. I'm having a comic time, but most amusing. I had a delightful afternoon by myself on Friday and rode out from 1 to 6 on the worst horse in the world. I rode and rode all along the top of Carmel, and though the prophet declares that if you even flee there the Almighty would certainly find you, I think myself that he is mistaken. I can't find anything, not even a village, of which I am told there are some. But I rode over ridge after ridge of rolling hill, and round the top of valley after valley, rocky slopes covered with wild flowers running steeply down into waterless hollows and the whole mountain was heavy with the scent of gorse and the aromatic herbs that my horse crushed through from time to time to avoid an unusually slippery bit of rock in the path. The whole afternoon I saw only 2 houses and 4 people, shepherds with flocks of lop-eared goats — ridiculous ears they have, 10 inches long I should say, an absurd waste of skin... Sometimes I walked and drove my horse in front of me, and by this means I found out that he really could gallop, for he galloped away from me and I concluded not to let him go loose any more. I gathered 2 scarlet tulips, the lovely little tulips with the curling leaf; it is the same as the one of which Hafiz says thus, doubting the promises of Fate it carries always a Wine cup through the wilderness... I am much entertained to find that I am a Person in this country — they all think I was a Person! And one of the first questions everyone seems to ask everyone else is, "Have you ever met Miss Gertrude Bell?" Renown is not very difficult to acquire here.
Monday, 31. To-day I came down into Haifa early with Mr. M. and established myself in my new hotel. I had an Arabic lesson and interviewed a Persian who is to come and teach me every evening after dinner. My hotel is most comfortable, kept by Syrians and I hear and speak nothing but Arabic which is really ideal. I have a large sitting-room — you should see how nice it looks with all my books and things and great p
ots of mimosa and jasmine and wild flowers.
To H.B.
HAIFA, April 7th, 1902.
This afternoon I paid a long call on the mother and sisters of my Persian — their house is my house, you understand, and I am to go and talk Persian whenever I like. This is my day: I get up at 7, at 8 Abu Nimrud comes and teaches me Arabic — till 10. I go on working till 12, when I lunch. Then I write for my Persian till 1:30, or so, when I ride or walk out. Come in at 5, and work till 7, when I dine. At 7:30 my Persian comes and stays till 10, and at 10:30 I go to bed. You see I have not Much leisure time! And the whole day long I talk Arabic.
To F.B.
HAIFA, April 2, 1902.
I love my two sheikhs. It's perfectly delightful getting hold of Persian again, the delicious language! But as for Arabic I am soaked and soddened by it and how anyone can wish to have anything to do with a tongue so difficult when they might be living at ease, I can't imagine. I never stop talking in this hotel and I think I get a little worse daily... .
The birds fly into my room and nest in the chandelier!
To F. B.
Tuesday, 22nd April, 1902.
On Monday I went to lunch with my Persians. A young gentleman was invited to meet me-he's a carpenter-and he and I and Mirza Abdullah lunched together solemnly while the wife and sisters waited on us. We had a very good lunch, rice and pillau and sugared dates and kabobs. It was all spread on the table at once and we helped ourselves with our forks at will, dilating the while on the absurdity of the European custom of serving one dish after another so that you never knew what you were going to have, also of whipping away your plate every moment and giving you another! The conversation was carried on in Persian which I speak worse than anyone was ever known to do. I told you that there were 2 American Professors of Divinity in the Hotel? One whose name I don't know is a particularly attractive man, oldish, very intelligent and with a sweet goodness of face and I am sure of character which is very loveable. I was telling Mirza Abdullah about him last night and he said he would like to see him and ask him a question. So I went out and fetched my old American, telling him the sort of person he had to deal with, and Mirza Abdullah (I being interpreter) asked him what he considered were the proofs of Christ's being God. The American answered in the most charming manner, but of course could give no proofs except a personal conviction. Mirza A. said, "He speaks as a lover, but I want the answer of the learned." I felt as I interpreted between them how much the philosophic inquiring eastern mind differed from ours. The value my professor attached to the vivifying qualities of Christ's teaching was certainly lost on the Oriental, and on the other hand Abdullah's dialectics were incomprehensible to the western — at least the starting point was incomprehensible. They talked for about an hour and at the end Abdullah was quite as much at a loss as before to understand why the Professor accepted one prophet and rejected the others and I'm bound to say I quite sympathised with him. He said to me after the Professor had gone: "You must reject all or accept all, but he chooses and can give no reason. He believes what his fathers have taught him." It was a very curious evening. The professor was a perfect angel all the time. One could not help being immensely impressed with the quality of his faith.
[She returns to England at the end of May. She has a pleasant month at home, and early in July we find her in Switzerland again.]
To F.B.
ROSENLAUI, July 8th, 1902.
I had a most luxurious journey. My 2 guides met me, I dined and made plans and went to bed and slept for 11 hours! . . . We got up to this enchanting place in time for lunch and I was received with rapture by my friend the innkeeper — oh! I must tell you that the guard on the train of the Brünnig line asked me if I were Miss Bell who had climbed the Engelhorn last year. This is fame. There is another climbing woman here — Frl. Kuntze — very good indeed she is, but not very Well Pleased to see me as I deprive her of Ulrich Fuhrer with whom she has been climbing. She has got a German with her, a distinguished climber from Berne, and I sat and talked to them this afternoon when they came in from a little expedition. They have done several things in the Engelhorn but the best thing hereabouts remains to be done and Ulrich and I are going to have an inspection walk the day after tomorrow. Tomorrow we propose to do a new rock which Will probably give us an amusing climb and which will, I hope, be short... The flowers are entrancing — piles of things of which I remember the pictures in my alpine book and forget the names. I wish you would send me that book — Alpine Flora, I think it's called — on one of the shelves above MY writing table at Redcar.
To F. B.
ROSENLAUI, July 11th, 1902.
We had a delightful day on Tuesday, did a charming little rock, up one way and down another, both ways new though the point had been made from a third side by some guides. especially the descent which was quite difficult. We got ourselves landed on to the top of some very smooth rocks, down which we slid on an extra rope with the exciting uncertainty as to whether the rope would reach far enough and as to what would lie below. But the rope was exactly long enough to a foot and led us down to some broken cracks and couloirs by which we descended on to the grass slopes... . Between the two Wellhorns there is an arête of rocks which has never been attempted — it is indeed one of the 4 impossibles of the Oberland — and we intend to do it and we think we can... Accordingly we got up to-day at midnight, a beautifully starry night, and set off with quantities of spare rope up the slopes to the foot of the Vorder Wellhorn. We hadn't been gone more than half-an-hour before a storm began coming up from all sides at once and we called a halt to see how matters were going to turn out. We lay shivering under a rock for some time while the clouds blew up faster and faster, and lightning began and the thunder and the first drops of rain reached us. Fortunately there were some deserted chalets just below us so I sent Ulrich to see if we could take shelter in them. He came back looking rather dubious and I asked whether there was any one in them. "Dere is pig," he replied. Still pig were better than rain, so we hurried down and fortunately found a hut with nothing in it but some clean hay on which we established ourselves luxuriously. It was half-past 2 or 3 by this time and we lay and waited to see what the dawn would bring, Ulrich relating alpine adventures to pass the time. But the dawn brought more rain and more thunder and we gave up hope, and ran down to the inn where we arrived about 5. I went to bed promptly and slept till 12. And if it clears we are going to begin the same game again to-night.
To F. B.
VORDER WELLHORN, July 14th, 1902.
We have done the first of the impossibles , the Wellhorn arête, and are much elated. We started at 5 yesterday and ran up the Vorder Wellhorn as fast as ever we could, making only a 5 minutes halt while we roped. The arête looked awful from the top of the Vorder Wellhorn. There was a most discouraging bit of smooth rock in it and above that an overhang round which we could see no way. My heart sank — I thought we should never do it. However we set off and when we came nearer we found that these two places were not half as bad as they looked and after 4 hours of very fine arête climbing we lunched at the top of the overhang in the best of spirits. But the worst was to come — a long knife edge of rock so rotten that it fell away in masses as we went along, horrid precipices beneath us so that the greatest care was needed at every step. And it ended in a sharp gap on the further side of which 2 short but extremely exposed chimneys led up to the final slopes. We took nearly an hour over these, I standing most of the time, shivering with cold, at the bottom of the lowest, while my two guides worked on the tiny ledge above me which was too narrow for us all 3. Finally Ulrich called out "I have hold of it!" and Heinrich and I scrabbled after him with the aid of an iron nail driven in in the worst place and of a double rope. We ended our day by crossing the Rosenlaui glacier under the séracs, a thing we had no business to do for they hung over us in the most threatening manner, but it Saved us at least 2 hours and we got through without their falling On us. I think if the weather holds, I shall go over to the Gr
imsel, for the second impossible is now on our minds and we want to set about it as soon as we can.
To H. B.
KURHAUS ROSENLAUI, BERNER OBERLAND July 20, 1902.
I came over here yesterday morning, walking over the Scheidegg, and a most delicious hot day. Yseult Grant Duff met me on the top of the pass and walked down with me... This morning I started out at 5:30 to — well, Ulrich Calls it examining the movement of rocks, it means that you go up and see if a stone falls On You and if it doesn't you know you can go UP that way. It's a new ascent of the Wetterhorn — a mad Scheme I'm inclined to think, but still we'll see how it goes. We went up the steep slopes and up rocks and under a glacier fall, where I examined the movement of a stone on my knee — fortunately a small one, but it hurt for it fell from a long way up — and then we hastily turned back. However, on examination we thought we could get up another way and we intend to try it seriously... .
To H. B.
MEIPLINGEN, Sunday, August 3, 1902.
For once I must begin by acknowledging that Donmul's gloomy forebodings came very near to being realised, and I am now feeling some satisfaction in the thought that my bones are not lying scattered on the Alpine mountains cold. Don't be alarmed, however, they are all quite safe and sound in the Grimsel and if it were not for a little touch of frostbite in the feet I should be merrily on my way to fresh adventures... On Monday it rained and we could do nothing. On Tuesday we set out at 1 a.m. and made for a crack high up on the Wetterhorn rocks which we had observed through glasses. We got up to it after about 3 hours' climbing only to find to our sorrow that the séracs were tumbling continually down it from all directions. We concluded that it was far too risky — indeed it would have been madness to attempt it for we could see from the broken ice on the rocks that the great blocks were thrown from side to side as they fell and swept the whole passage and it was the only place where the cliffs could be climbed at all; we turned sadly back. I record this piece of prudence with pleasure... Next day I came up here. It was a most delicious morning. I left Meiringen at 6 and shared my coach with a dear little American couple who were making a walking tour in Switzerland-by coach mostly, I gathered. There was also a pleasant Englishman called Campbell who was coming up with a rope and an ice axe, a member of the A.C. as I found on talking to him at the halting places. He appears later in the story. Well, we lunched here and set off in the afternoon to the Pavillon Dolfuss, of ill omen, where We arrived at 6. But anything more inviting than the little hut that evening it would be difficult to imagine. It was perfect weather, the most lovely evening I have ever seen in the Alps. Until the sun set at 7 behind the Schreckhorn I sat out of doors without a coat and walked over the tiny alp botanizing while my guides cooked the soup. Every sort of Alpine plant grows on the cultivated alp; i found even very sweet pale violets under the big stones. I had it all to myself; I was the lord of all mountains that night and rejoiced exceedingly in my great possessions. The matter we had in hand was the ascent of the face of the Finsteraarhorn: it is a well-known problem and the opinions of the learned are divided as to its solution. Dr. Wilson looked at it this year and decided against it. We have looked at it for 2 years and decided for it and other authorities agree with us in what I still think is a right opinion. The mountain on the side facing the Schreckhorn comes down in a series of arches radiating from the extremely pointed top to the Finsteraar glacier... The arête, the one which has always been discussed, rises from the glacier in a great series of gendarmes and towers, set at such an angle on the steep face of the mountain that you wonder how they can stand at all and indeed they can scarcely be said to stand, for the great points of them are continually overbalancing and tumbling down into the couloirs between the arêtes and they are all capped with loosely poised stones, jutting out and hanging over and ready to fall at any moment. But as long as you keep pretty near to the top of the arête you are Safe from them because they fall into the couloirs on either side, the difficulty is to get on to the arête because you have to cross a couloir down which the stones fall, not to speak of avalanches; the game was beginning even when we (crossed it an hour after dawn. We left the hut at 1:35 a.m. Thursday. Crossed the séracs just at dawn and by 6 found ourselves comfortably established on the arête, beyond the reach of the stones which the mountain had fired at us (fortunately with rather a bad aim) for the first half-hour on the rock. we breakfasted then followed a difficult and dangerous climb. It was difficult because the rocks were exceedingly steep, every now and then we had to creep up and Out of the common hard chimney — one in particular about mid-day I remember, because we subsequently had the very deuce of a time coming down it, or round the face of a tower or cut our way across an ice couloir between two gendarmes and it was dangerous because the whole rock was so treacherous. I found this out very early in the morning by putting my hand into the crack of a rock which looked as if it went into the very foundations of things. About 2 feet square of rock tumbled out upon me and knocked me a little way down the hill till I managed to part company with it on a tiny ledge. I got back on to my feet without being pulled up by the rope, which was as well for a little later I happened to pass the rope through my hands and found that it had been cut half through about a yard from my waist when the rock had fallen on it. This was rather a nuisance as it shortened a rope we often wanted long to allow of our going up difficult chimneys in turn. So on and on we went up the arête and the towers multiplied like rabbits above and grew steeper and steeper and about 2 o'clock I looked round and saw great black clouds rolling up from the west. But by this time looking up we also saw the topmost tower of the arête far above us still, and the summit of the mountain further still and though we could not yet see what the top of the arête was like we were cheered and pushed on steadily for another hour while the weather signs got worse and worse. At 3 just as the first snow flakes began to fall, we got into full view of the last two gendarmes and the first one was quite impossible. The ridge had been growing narrow, its sides steeper as we mounted, so that we had been obliged for some time to stick quite to the backbone of it; then it threw itself up into a great tower leaning over to the right and made of slabs set like slates on the top with a steep drop of some 20 feet below them on to the Col. We were then 1000 feet below the summit I should guess, perhaps rather less, anyway we could see our way up, not easy but possible, above this tower and once on the top could get down the other side in any weather. It had to be tried: we sat down to eat a few mouthfuls the snow falling fast driven by a strong wind, and a thick mist marching up the valley below, over the Finsteraar loch, then we crept along the knife edge of a col, fastened a rope firmly round a rock and let Ulrich down on to a ledge below the overhang of the tower. He tried it for a few moments and then gave it up. The ledge was very narrow, sloped outwards and was quite rotten. Anything was better than that. So we tried the left side of the tower: there was a very steep iced couloir running up at the foot of the rock on that side for about 50 feet, after which all would be well. Again we let ourselves down on the extra rope to the foot of the tower, again to find that this way also was impossible. A month later in the year I believe this couloir would go; after a warm August there would be no ice in it, and though it is very steep the rocks so far as one could see under the ice, looked climbable. But even with the alternative before us of the descent down the terrible arête, we decided to turn back; already the snow was blowing down the couloir in a small avalanche, small but blinding, and the wind rushed down upon us carrying the mists with it. If it had been fine weather we should have tried down the arête a little and then a traverse so as to get at the upper rocks by another road. I am not sure that it could be done but we should have tried anything — but by the time we had been going down for half-an-hour we could see nothing of the mountain side to the right or to the left except an occasional glimpse as one cloud rolled off and another rolled over. The snow fell fast and covered the rocks with incredible speed. Difficult as they had been to go up, you may imagine
what they were like going down when we could no longer so much as see them. There was One corner in particular where we had to get round the face of a tower. We came round the corner, down a very steep chimney, got on to a sloping out rock ledge with an inch of new snow on it; there was a crack in which you could stand and with one hand hold in the rock face, from whence you had to drop down about 8 feet on to steep snow. We fixed the extra rope and tumbled down one after the Other On to the snow; it was really more or less safe because one had the fixed rope to hold on to, but it felt awful: I shall remember every inch of that rock face for the rest of my life. It was now near 6. Our one idea was to get down to the chimney — the mid-day chimney which was so very difficult — so as to do it while there was still only a little snow on it. We toiled on till 8, by which time a furious thunderstorm was raging. We were standing by a great upright on the top of a tower when suddenly it gave a crack and a blue flame sat On it for a second just like the one we saw when we were driving, you remember, only nearer. My ice axe jumped in my hand and I thought the steel felt hot through my woollen glove — was that possible? I didn't take my glove off to see! Before we knew where we were the rock flashed again — it was a great sticking out stone and I expect it attracted the lightning, but we didn't stop to consider this theory but tumbled down a chimney as hard as ever we could, one on top of the other, buried our ice axe heads in some shale at the bottom of it and hurriedly retreated from them. It's not nice to carry a private lightning conductor in your hand in the thick of a thunderstorm, It was clear we could go no further that night, the question was to find the best lodging while there was still light enough to see. We hit upon a tiny crack sheltered from the wind, even the snow did not fall into it. There was just room for me to sit in the extreme back of it on a very pointed bit of rock; by doubling up I could even get my head into it. Ulrich sat on my feet to keep them warm and Heinrich just below him. They each of them put their feet into a knapsack which is the golden rule of bivouac. The other golden rule is to take no brandy because you feel the reaction more after. I knew this and insisted on it. It was really not so bad; we shivered all night but our hands and feet were warm and climbers are like Pobbles in the matter of toes. I went to sleep quite often and was wakened up every hour or so by the intolerable discomfort of my position, which I then changed by an inch or two into another which was bearable for an hour more. At first the thunderstorm made things rather exciting. The claps followed the flashes so close that there seemed no interval between them. We tied ourselves firmly on to the rock above lest as Ulrich philosophically said one of us should be struck and fall out. The rocks were all crackling round us and fizzing like damp wood which is just beginning to burn — have you ever heard that? It's a curious exciting sound rather exhilarating — and as there was no further precaution possible I enjoyed the extraordinary magnificence of the storm with a free mind: it was worth seeing. Gradually the night cleared and became beautifully starry. Between 2 and 3 the moon rose, a tiny crescent, and we spoke of the joy it would be when the sun rose full on to us and stopped our shivering. But the sun never rose at all — at least for all practical purposes. The day came wrapped in a blinding mist and heralded by a cutting, snow-laden wind — this day was Friday; we never saw the sun in it. It must have snowed a good deal during the thunderstorm for when we stepped out of our crack in the first grey light about 4 (too stiff to bear it a moment longer) everything was deep in it. I can scarcely describe to you what that day was like. We were from 4 a.m. to 8 p.m. on the arête; during that time we ate for a minute or two 3 times and my fare I know was 5 ginger bread biscuits, 2 sticks of chocolate, a slice of bread, a scrap of cheese and a handful of raisins. We had nothing to drink but about two tablespoonfuls of brandy in the bottom of my flask and a mouthful of wine in the guides' wine skin, but it was too cold to feel thirsty. There was scarcely a yard which we could come down without the extra rope; you can imagine the labour of finding a rock at every 50 feet round which to sling it, then of pulling it down behind us and slinging it We had our bit of good luck-it never caught all day. But both the ropes were thoroughly iced and terribly difficult to manage, and the weather was appalling. It snowed all day sometimes softly as decent snow should fall, sometimes driven by a furious bitter wind which enveloped us not only in the falling snow, but lifted all the light powdery snow from the rocks and sent it whirling down the precipices and into the couloirs and on to us indifferently. It was rather interesting to see the way a mountain behaves in a snowstorm and how avalanches are born and all the wonderful and terrible things that happen in high places. The couloirs were all running with snow rivers — we had to cross one and a nasty uncomfortable process it was. As soon as you cut a step it was filled up before you could put your foot into it. But I think that when things are as bad as ever they can be you cease to mind them much. You set your teeth and battle with the fates. we meant to get down whatever happened and it was such an exciting business that we had no time to think of the discomfort. I know I never thought of the danger except once and then quite calmly. I'll tell you about that presently The first thing we had to tackle was the chimney. We had to fix our rope in it twice, the second time round a very unsafe nail. I stood in this place holding Heinrich, there was an overhang. He climbed a bit of the way and then fell on to soft snow and spun down the couloir till my rope brought him up with a jerk. Then he got up on to a bit of rock on the left about half as high as the overhang. Ulrich came down to me and I repeated Heinrich's process exactly, the iced extra rope slipping through my hands like butter. Then came Ulrich. He was held by Heinrich and me standing a good deal to the left but only half as high up as he. He climbed down to the place we had both fallen from asking our advice at every step, then he called out " Heinrich, Heinrich, ich bin verloren," and tumbled off just as we had done and we held him up in the couloir, more dead than alive with anxiety. We gave him some of our precious brandy on a piece of sugar and he soon recovered and went on as boldly as before. We thought the worst was over but there was a more dangerous place to come. It was a place that had been pretty difficult to go up, a steep but short slope of iced rock by which we had turned the base of a tower. The slope was now covered with about 4 inches of avalanche snow and the rocks were quite hidden. It was on the edge of a big couloir down which raced a snow river. We managed badly somehow; at any rate, Ulrich and I found ourselves on a place where there was not room for us both to stand, at the end of the extra rope. He was very Insecure and could not hold me, Heinrich was below on the edge of the couloir, also very insecure. And here I had to refix the extra rope on a rock a little below me so that it was practically no good to me. But it was the only possible plan. The rock was too difficult for me, the stretches too big, I couldn't reach them: I handed my axe down to Heinrich and told him I could do nothing but fall, but he couldn't, or at any rate, didn't secure himself and in a second we were both tumbling head over heels down the couloir, which was, you understand, as steep as snow could lie. How Ulrich held us I don't know. He said himself he would not have believed it possible but hearing me say I was going to fall he had stuck the pointed end of the ice axe into a crack above and on this alone we all three held. I got on to my feet in the snow directly I came to the end of my leash of rope and held Heinrich and caught his ice axe and mine and we slowly cut ourselves back up the couloir to the foot of the rock. But it was a near thing and I felt rather ashamed of my part in it. This was the time when I thought it on the cards we should not get down alive. Rather a comforting example, however, of how little can hold a party up. About 2 in the afternoon we all began to feel tired. I had a pain through my shoulder and down my back which was due, I think, to nothing but the exertion of rock climbing and the nervous fatigue of shivering — for we never stopped shivering all day, it was impossible to control one's tired muscles in that bitter cold. And so we went on for 6 hours more of which only the last hour was easy and at 8 found ourselves at the top of the Finsteraar glacier and in the dark, with a good guess and
good luck, happened on the right place in the Bergschrund and let ourselves down over it. It was now quite dark, the snow had turned into Pouring rain, and we sank 6 inches into the soft glacier with every step. Moreover we were wet through: we had to cross several big crevasses and get down the sérac before we could reach the Unteraar glacier and safety. For we had felt no anxiety having relied upon our lantern but not a single match would light. We had every kind with us in metal match boxes but the boxes were wet and we had not a dry rag of any kind to rub them with. We tried to make a tent Out of my skirt and to light a match under it, but our fingers were dripping wet and numb with cold — one could scarcely feel anything smaller than an ice axe-and the match heads dropped off limply into the snow without So much as a spark. Then we tried to go on and after a few steps Heinrich fell into a soft place almost up to his neck and Ulrich and I had to pull him out with the greatest difficulty and the mists swept up over the glacier and hid everything; that was the only moment of despair. We had so looked forward to dry blankets in the Pavillon Dollfuss and here we were with another night out before us. And a much worse one than the first, for we were on the shelterless glacier and in driving drenching rain. We laid our three axes together and sat on them side by side. Ulrich and I put our feet into a sack but Heinrich refused to use the other and gave it to me to lie on. My shoulders ached and ached. I insisted on our all eating something even the smallest scrap, and then I put a wet pocket handkerchief over my face to keep the rain from beating on it and went to sleep. It sounds incredible but I think we all slept more or less and woke up to the horrible discomfort and went to sleep again. I consoled myself by thinking of Maurice in S. Africa and how he had slept out in the pouring rain and been none the worse. We couldn't see the time but long before we expected it a sort of grey light came over the snow and when at last I could read my watch, behold it was 4. We gathered ourselves up; at first we could scarcely stand but after a few steps we began to walk quite creditably. About 6 we got to where we could unrope — having been 48 hours on the rope — and we reached here at 10 on Saturday.
Letters From Baghdad Page 14