434 The Hunting Grounds 



tramp of about a mile we came to a line of masses of 

 rock, piled one upon another, over which we had 

 great difficulty in making our way. As these ob- 

 structions appeared frequent, and we lost much 

 ground by seeking to avoid fissures that we dared 

 not leap, I determined to return once more to the 

 rocky ramparts on the side, and after a difficult climb 

 was once again on terra firma, and felt more at 

 home than on the surface of the glacier, whose 

 continual cracking, creaking, and heaving, made us 

 feel nervous lest it might open directly under our 

 feet and engulf us, which seemed very possible, 

 as we twice saw the ice sink, give way, and tear 

 asunder, forming fearful yawning chasms of unknown 

 depths. 



After several hours' continued exertion we got 

 to an altitude high above the head of the glacier, and 

 the aspect of the scenery became entirely changed ; 

 deep snow lay in all the gorges and ravines, and no 

 vegetation was seen except here and there a patch of 

 gentian or a few flowers of such intensely-brilliant blue 

 that they seemed to reflect the colour of the sky over- 

 head. The slope of the ridge up which we made our 

 way was furrowed with deep fissures and gullies pre- 

 senting a stern and monotonous appearance, and here 

 and there covered with huge, shapeless boulders of 

 detached granite, piled one upon another in wild con- 

 fusion. A strange depressing sense of desolation and 



