ASCENT OF MONT BLANC. 73 



direction. Some of these we leap across with a vivid con- 

 sciousness that our foothold, on either brink, is but the 

 slippery ice. If too broad to leap, a light ladder is thrown 

 across to serve as a bridge. Over this the tin; id crawl 

 on hands and knees. The thought of being suspended 

 by the rung of a ladder over a dark abyss without visi- 

 ble bottom is well calculated to arouse the nervousness 

 of the most stolid. The snows of winter bridge many 

 of the crevasses, and when these bridges are softened by 

 the sun they become pitfalls, requiring the skill of ex- 

 perienced guides to detect them. The danger is greatly 

 increased when the crevasses are concealed by freshly 

 fallen snow. 



The intersection of the crevasses cuts the ice into vast 

 prismoidal masses, standing vertically. The increasing 

 separation of the walls of the chasms gives these blocks a 

 soi't of isolation. Very often, the lateral pressure, or some 

 subglacial protuberance of rock, suffices to thrust such 

 ice-masses into the air. These effects occur especially in 

 the neighborhood of the junction of Glacier des Bossons 

 with Glacier de Taconnay. This region is rather the 

 parting of the broad field of ice by the protruding rocky 

 ridge called Aiguille de la Tour. Striking against this, 

 the ice-field is terribly wrenched. Outliers of this ridge 

 crop out through the ice, from a quarter of a mile to two 

 miles above, and other protuberances must exist, under- 

 lying the ice and heaving it up into the chaotic aspects 

 which it presents. The very entrance upon this tre- 

 mendous cataract of ice is through a sort of natural tun- 

 nel. Once in the region of the Junction, a fearful laby- 

 rinth lies before us. It seems at a glance impossible to 

 cross. Here are some of the greatest difficulties encoun- 



