ASCENT OF MONT BLANC. 25 



bribes were now in vain and they gave up their 

 luggage and set off on their way back to Chamouni. 

 AVe now felt, indeed, a forlorn hope ; but fortunately 

 we did not encounter anything worse than we had 

 already surmounted ; and about four o'clock in the 

 afternoon we got to the station at which we were 

 to remain until midnight. 



The Grands Mulcts are two or three conical rocks 

 which rise like island-peaks from the snow and ice at 

 the head of the Glacier des Bossons, and were they 

 loftier, would probably be termed aiguilles. They 

 are visible with the naked eye from Chamouni, ap- 

 pearing like little cones on the mountain-side. Look- 

 ing up to them, their left-hand face, or outer side, as 

 I shall call it, goes down straight at once, some hun- 

 dred feet, to the glacier. On the right hand, and in 

 front, you can scramble up to them pretty well and 

 gain your resting-place, which is about thirty feet 

 from the summit, either by climbing the rock from 

 the base, which is very steep and fatiguing, or by 

 proceeding farther up along the snow, and then 

 returning a little way, when you find yourself nearly 

 on a level with your shelf for such it is. A familiar 

 example of what I mean is given in a house built on 

 a steep hill, where the backdoor may be on the 

 third storey. 



The ascent of this rock was the hardest work we 

 had yet experienced : it was like climbing up an 

 immense number of flagstones of different heights 



