vii THE BEST CLIMBER IN GAVARNIE 179 



and the deepest fog I ever saw came on. I was really 

 very much alarmed on account of the men, whose voices 

 we could hear up in that awful place, which was shrouded 

 in impenetrable mist. Every now and then a great 

 stone came thundering down, dislodged by either the 

 men or the bouquetin. At last, to my great relief, we 

 saw the men clinging to the precipice side but out of 

 the fog, and in a few moments they were safely down. 

 Nothing more could be done that day, the boodah had 

 repulsed our troops, and, beaten, we were obliged to 

 stumble sorrowfully back to the cabane. I should not 

 forget to say that in the smallest of the three males I 

 had recognised my young yellow-eyed friend who had 

 been a shade too sharp for me a day or two before. I 

 see I have also forgotten that the day we first ran the 

 boodah up to the castle one of the men shot a fine 

 solitaire on the salle d?attente> and the day Celestin 

 shot the female bouquetin one of the men shot a 

 fine young dog fox on our way home. On arriving 

 at the cabane we found to our delight that the 

 best climber in Gavarnie, a man called Michell, had 

 come over with our letters, and if any one living could 

 put the ibex out of the chambre a coucher, he was the 

 man. Michell has often climbed into places where 

 goats had got stuck, and let them down with a rope, 

 calmly climbing down himself without a soul to help 

 him. He is the only man that Celestin allows to be 

 beaucoup plus fort than himself. Next morning, full 

 of hope, we returned to the castle, accompanied by 

 Michell ; but before we arrived there, snow, icicles, fog, 

 and filth of every description, began to fall, and after 

 waiting in vain for it to clear, we beat a retreat. For 

 another day or two we were snowed in, and the gales 

 that blew at night sometimes shook the old cabane like 

 a leaf. At last a fine day came, and we started for 



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