Mountain Journeys 69 



And yet they were only at a height of 8559 feet (2610 meters) ; 

 barometer 564 mm., temperature 17.5°. 



September 2, they had passed the highest point of their journey, 

 10,032 feet (3056 meters), at the pass of Coochetopa, in Colorado; 

 they complained of no symptoms. (P. 47.) 



The Reverend Hines 7: ' made the ascent of Mount Hood in Oregon 

 with three companions, July 24, 1866. It was not without trouble, 

 as he says energetically: 



We had only about 700 feet to go, but it taxed our sinews for two 

 hours to climb them. The sun was shining again, and the sweat was 

 dripping from our brows; but as we approached the summit, fatigue 

 seemed to disappear, and it was with a feeling of triumph that we 

 trod the summit of the highest mountain in North America. (P. 83.) 



Hines was wrong on this last point; Williamson, 74 who climbed 

 Mount Hood again in 1867, found its height to be only 3420 meters; 

 it is then not the highest of the Cascades, much less of North 

 America. 



More recently, a very well-known English mountaineer, M. 

 Coleman, ascended mountains as high as or even higher than 

 Mount Hood. 



In August, 1868, he climbed Mount Baker (3390 meters). 75 In 

 his account he speaks only of sulphurous exhalations from which 

 he and his companions suffered; one of them was seized by vomit- 

 ing (P. 365). In August, 1870, ascent of Mount Rainier (4400 

 meters), 70 on the summit of which he passed the night, warming 

 himself at the crevasses of the volcano, but much inconvenienced 

 by their exhalations: here too, no physiological trouble. But that 

 proves nothing, for we shall see, when we speak of the Alps, that 

 professional mountaineers today seem to make it a point of honor 

 never to speak of the sufferings of mountain sickness. 



3. Etna. 



In the preliminary chapter, I reminded the reader that the 

 ancients had frequently made the ascent of Etna (3313 meters); 

 but they have left us no record that might make us think that they 

 felt any extraordinary symptoms. The authors of the Middle Ages, 

 who followed their steps, and told of their own journeys, are no 

 more explicit than the ancients. 



Pietro Bembo, 77 who in 1494 made the ascent with his friend 

 Angelo Chabriele, does not even speak of his fatigue in his cele- 

 brated dialogue with his son. In 1540 and 1545, Filoteo climbed 

 Etna with several of his friends: he says nothing definite. 78 Thomas 



