The Ascent of Chief Mountain 



tain's well-known cleft. The other chimney 

 seemed to lead directly to the summit, but its 

 lower mouth was inaccessible — cut off by over- 

 hanging cliff. Our plan, therefore, if we could 

 ever reach the halfway shelf, was to use the 

 first chimney in the beginning, then try to find 

 a way around the dividing shoulder into the 

 second, then follow that to the top. And at 

 9 o'clock we began on the lower wall. 



Of course, the work which followed was not 

 so difficult as it had promised from below — 

 rock work rarely is — but it thoroughly taxed 

 our slender experience, and, for a single man 

 without a rope, must have been far worse. 

 The Doctor and I took turns in leading, car- 

 rying up or having thrown to us from below a 

 rope, on which the others then ascended. Most 

 of the difficulty was thus confined to one man, 

 and he could often be assisted from beneath. 

 We were not skilled enough in the use of the 

 rope to risk tying ourselves together. 



Two hundred feet up came our first trouble, 

 perhaps the worst of the day. We were sid- 

 ling along a narrow shelf, with arms out- 

 stretched against the wall above, when we 

 reached a spot where the shelf was broken 

 by a round protruding shoulder. Beyond it 



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