chap, in TO SPITSBERGEN 49 



that the steamer had left her anchorage and was steaming 

 away up the fjord. Abandoning the arete, I turned straight 

 down the west face of the mountain, thinking it better to risk 

 a precipitous but rapid descent than run the chance of a 

 lingering death from starvation. 



My troubles soon began : the couloir down which I 

 started became rapidly steeper ; the snow into which I 

 plunged up to my knees gave no support, and showed an 

 evident intention of breaking away ; and a little farther down, 

 the sudden acceleration of a leg which I had tentatively 

 advanced, showed the presence that I had dreaded of under- 

 lying ice. There was no choice but to continue the descent 

 by the rotten rock ridge on my right. This involved great 

 delay, armfuls of debris had to be pushed away, and a 

 little platform constructed for each step : even then there 

 was no feeling of security. 



Suddenly the buttress I was descending stopped short at 

 the junction of two couloirs. Like those farther to the 

 north, which I had avoided in the morning, they were swept 

 by avalanches from the arete above, and presented a steep 

 surface of treacherous ice. Retreat was impossible, so, 

 casting an apprehensive glance up the wicked-looking gully 

 above me, I began rapidly cutting steps with my hammer 

 across the narrowest part of the couloir. I fear these steps 

 would not have passed muster by the editor of the Bad- 

 minton book on Mountaineering, where we read that "the 

 greatest number " of strokes " is required in cutting steps 

 for a traverse of a very steep, ice-filled gully," and further, 

 that " a good guide has been known to take seventy strokes 

 to fashion a step " ; but I must own that my dominating 

 impulse was to reach the far side of the couloir as quickly 

 as possible. Once, when nearly across, a stone tobogganed 

 gracefully past me, serving, if possible, to hasten my move- 

 ments. But at last I was across, and after this the slope 



