THE DUKE OF ABRUZZI 355 



rocks and over the fields of snow, on which no human being had ever set foot. 

 The thermometer registered lo below zero. Now and then the shroud of mist 

 would be blown aside, revealing immense piles of rock, buried in eternal ice, 

 seemingly stretching upward into the infinite. Already the duke was at an al- 

 titude of over 16,000 feet, much higher than the highest points of his own 

 Italian Alps. He and his brave troop, standing in silence at the foot of the 

 gigantic mountain, waited for the mists to clear and reveal to them the coveted 

 peak. 



At last, after several hours of waiting, the mist disappeared. K 2 appeared 

 in all its majesty. Abruzzi decided to devote some time exploring the rocky 

 base of the mountain. Its slopes, he surmised, were so steep as to render ava- 

 lanches wellnigh inevitable. 



The expedition was split up into small parties, which began to explore the 

 approaches to the peak in order to find some point from which it might be at- 

 tacked. With two guides the duke left his companions and spent four days 

 trying to discover a way up the huge mountain. In the course of his investi- 

 gations he scaled two neighboring peaks, both about 20,000 feet high, and 

 visited the western part of the great glacier, hitherto unexplored, and the 

 eastern part visited previously by Guilermood. 



The result of his four days' work was to convince him absolutely that K 2 

 was inaccessible to man, no matter what efforts he might put forth to attain its 

 summit. Hence the duke retraced his steps to the base of supplies at the head 

 of the glacier, where, throughout the month of June, the members of the ex- 

 pedition devoted themselves to topographical and photographic work around 

 the mountain and the adjacent country. 



ASCENT OF THE PEAK. 



At the end of June the little troop again took the road along the glacier, 

 and climbed to the summit of the Windigab, 20,000 feet above the sea, in order 

 to learn from there whether it would be possible to work downward into Little 

 Thibet, where there are regions little known or entirely unexplored. They 

 found that such a descent would be possible only without baggage, hence it 

 would be merely a hunting trip, which the duke resolved not to make. 



Instead he turned his attention to the Chogolisa or Bride Peak. Disap- 

 pointed in his desire to ascend K 2, he made up his mind that he would not be 

 foiled a second time. 



The weather was very variable ; perfectly clear days alternating with the 



