THE END 261 



to see the mountains month after month only forty 

 miles away and not to be able to move a foot in their 

 direction ; to study them so that we came to know 

 the changing patches of lower snow and almost the 

 very crevasses in the glaciers, and still to be forced 

 to be content with looking and longing for "the hills 

 and the snow upon the hills." 



To look for fifteen months at that great rock preci- 

 pice, and those long fields of snow untrodden yet by 

 foot of man, to anticipate the delight of attaining to 

 the summits and to wonder what would be seen beyond 

 them on the other side, those were pleasures that kept 

 one's hopes alive through long periods of dull inaction. 

 The aching disappointment of turning back and leaving 

 the mountains as remote and as mysterious as they 

 were before words of mine cannot express ; but happily 

 there is always comfort to be found in the reflexion 

 that 



" Some falls are means the happier to arise." 



