PREVIOUS ATTEMPTg. 193 



intervals, and the supposition that the injnry was caused 

 by avalanches, are equally ridiculous.^ 



Attempts to ascend Kazbek have not been numerous. 

 Klaproth claims to have got halfway up, but, as he admits 

 that he did not reach the snov^r -level, the halfway did not 

 amount to much. In 1811, the well-known German tra- 

 veller Parrot made a series of most determined attempts 

 to reach the summit, by the same route we adopted ; but he 

 was compelled to retreat from the foot of the icewall by 

 bad weather, and the fears of his companions. About 

 1844, Herr Moritz Wagner ascended ' to the lower limits 

 of eternal snow,' to use his own words — a very moderate 

 measure of success, upon which some German and English 

 newspapers lately claimed for him the honom-s, such as 

 they are, of the first ascent. Several half-hearted attempts 

 to climb the mountain have been made of late years by 

 Russian ofiicers, but with very little success, owing to the 



* Mons. E. Fan'e, of Geneva,'a well-known geologist who visited theDevdorak 

 glacier a few weeks after ourselves, came to the following conclusion as to the 

 nature of the catastrophe. No avalanche, he saj's, could without the aid of 

 water traverse the space between the end of the glacier and the Terek, and 

 he accounts for the disasters which have taken place in the following way. 

 He believes the Devdorak glacier, to which he finds a parallel in the Eofen 

 Vernagt glacier in the CEtzthal Alps, to be subject to periods of sudden 

 advance. During these the ice finds no sufficient space to spread itself out in 

 the narrow gorge into which it is driven, and is consequently forced by the 

 pressure from behind into so compact a mass that the ordinary water-channels 

 are stopped, and the whole drainage of the glacier is pent-up beneath its surface. 

 Sooner or later the accumulated waters burst open their prison, carrying away 

 with them the lower portion of the glacier. A mingled flood of snow and ice, 

 increased by earth and rocks torn from the hillsides in its passage, sweeps down 

 the glen of Devdorak. Issuing into the main valley it spreads from side to 

 side, and dams the Terek. A lake is formed, and increases in size until it breaks 

 through its barrier, and inundates the Dariel gorge and the lower valley. 



Mons. Favre has also printed a paper, entitled ' Les Causes des Avalanches du 

 Glacier du Kasbek, par le Colonel Statkowski, extrait du Journal du Ministere 

 des Voies et Communications, 1866,' wliich contains an explicit statement as to 

 tlie most recent catastrophe. The Colonel says : ' The last avalanche of the 

 Glacier of Devdorak fell in 1832. In 184'2 and in 18oo similar disasters were 

 expected, but did not take place.' 



O 



