Mountain Journeys 67 



the New Orleans Picayune gave a very picturesque and very 

 strangely worded account. Although I am quoting it, I do not hesi- 

 tate to say that it seems to me greatly exaggerated; I shall add, 

 along with the editor of the Alpine Journal, that I am not sure that 

 I have always understood what the author meant, 70 in his obscure 

 and bombastic style: 



At first they sang and whistled while they climbed; but these 

 noisy demonstrations soon ceased. Respiration became difficult. . . . 

 Up to about 2000 feet from the summit, the members of the company 

 were strung out at a great distance from each other. At that time, 

 some became weak and fell. Blood began to issue from their ears and 

 noses; their faces were so swollen that old friends knew each other only 

 by their garments. A few continued to climb some thousand feet, lay 

 down, went to sleep on the snow or the black dust, and awoke panting. 

 The artists, laden with their instruments, felt greatly the painful effects 

 of the atmosphere; with one accord they turned around and went back 

 down to the place where our companions who had no ambition and 

 poor endowment of lungs had stopped. . . . The engineers and the others 

 lay down; they were stumbling as they walked, incapable of will or 

 action, and calling to those who were ahead. Had it not been for the 

 continual struggle to cling to life, the distress in breathing, and the con- 

 stant loss of blood, one would have thought he was asleep and dream- 

 ing in a hollow in the snow or a gorge filled with ashes. We were 

 then at an elevation of about 16,000 feet. . . . General S. went on to- 

 wards the summit. In spite of the claims of the natives, it is doubtful 

 that anyone ever went as far as we did. During the war with Mexico, 

 20 years ago at the most, an officer tried to reach the summit; but he 

 fell paralyzed, at the height of 15,000 feet. His comrades went no 

 further, and at this point planted a standard the staff of which is still 

 there. 



Two-thirds of our company were out of sight; only three, besides 

 the terrified guides, went on. Blood issued from our ears, nostrils, and 

 mouths, and the veins stood out on our foreheads like dark lines; our 

 progress was more and more uncertain, the slope steeper and more 

 dangerous . . Colonel C. . . completely exhausted, talked incoherently 

 like an intoxicated man. 



A stone which broke the shoulder of General S. . . . compelled 

 them to retreat, at about 500 feet from the summit. 



North America. As we have seen, North America in many 

 places has peaks lofty enough for travellers to experience on them 

 the symptoms of mountain sickness. But the hardy explorers of 

 the banks of the Colorado, the Oregon (Columbia) , and the upper 

 Missouri, gave little heed to scientific and picturesque ascents. On 

 the other hand, the engineers and the officers whom the government 

 of the United States sent repeatedly to the Far West generally 

 were satisfied with making trigonometric abstracts, and journeyed 



