184 SPORT, TRAVEL, AND ADVENTURE 



family of them, and one did not know whence they 

 had issued. Up here, among the clefts of the rocks, 

 they had hitherto been undisturbed by man, and when 

 they saw the unaccustomed sight of visitors they flew 

 restlessly to and fro, with ill-omened cawing, round 

 about the intruders as they hung on the rope. They 

 troubled me. One of them brushed my head with its 

 wing ; the horrible fancy flashed through my mind that 

 they were like birds of prey hovering about a man on 

 a gallows. . . . 



I was evidently tired ; it was fatigue that created 

 that dark vision in my mind. 



I have never understood as clearly as on that day 

 how the excellence of a climber depends not only 

 on his feet, his arms, or his lungs, but has a deeper 

 seat in us in our brains and our hearts. 



But the long duration of our climb told me that we 

 were at a great height, and that the end of our diffi- 

 culties must be near. 



And after a bit which seemed to me steeper and 

 worse than all the others, I raised my head above the 

 level of a ledge, and with a last effort I lifted my whole 

 body on to it." 



M. mile Javelle, a famous Alpinist, tells in his 

 reminiscences i of a narrow escape he had from an 

 avalanche of stones : " We had walked hitherto along 

 a spacious arete, where children could have played 

 and run about at ease, and all at once we found our- 

 selves before a wall a veritable wall which had to 

 be scaled. This is the first step, the first stage in 

 climbing the Cervin. 



After a time the north wind blew violently and 

 1 See Bibliography, 33. 



