156 WHERE ROLLS THE OREGON 



had had no practice in dodging rocks. To be 

 sandbagged on the level is a risk that I have been 

 indifferent to these many years; to be knocked on 

 the head by a ricochetting rock, however, with 

 ten thousand feet to fall, disturbed me consider- 

 ably. But the guide thought nothing of it. The 

 incident apparently left no impression upon him. 

 He was used to flying rocks. He was used to 

 this particular climb, too. How easily, surely he 

 moved ! If I had my life to live over again, I 

 thought, I would be a climber of mountain-peaks 

 so superior did he seem ! So admirable is any 

 sort of mastery ! And how carefully he moved ! 

 kicking the niche for his toe, or cutting the step 

 into the ice with all deliberateness, giving me 

 time to jack my feet up and fix them where his 

 had been. Still the rope that fastened me to him 

 was continually taut; I was loaded with lead. 

 Then the man behind me groaned and stopped. 

 I reached back, took his camera and it was 

 lead, solid lead. Then the man behind him groaned 

 and stopped, seized with nausea. But the line 

 crawled on up, up, up, through a gateway of 

 snow to the bare rock of the summit. 



The experience was worth while; and the view, 



