THE ASCENT OF MONT BLANC 



8'85 



vasses, for they descend upon the unsus- 

 pecting chmber with appalhng force and 

 without a moment's warning. No adroit- 

 ness on his part can parry this danger; 

 neither rope nor ice-axe is of any avail. 

 Only as recently as 1891 two members of 

 an ascending party were buried here by 

 an avalanche, five others at the same time 

 "being swept into a crevasse. 



So we kept as far to the east of the 

 plain as possible, and soon, after two 

 more hours of hard climbing, we arrived 

 .at the entrance of the last or Grand 

 Plateau (see page 896). 



WHAT rut GRAND PIvATI^AU IS IvIK^: 



Imagine an oval ravine, as it were, 

 sloping very gently upward for about 

 two miles to the base of a conical peak, 

 the summit of the mountain, its sides 

 iDeing formed by lofty walls of snow- 

 covered rock, its entrance guarded by 

 two almost perpendicular walls, and its 

 bottom full of snow that has fallen into 

 it for ages from the summit at its upper 

 end and the ridges at its sides, and you 

 have some idea of what the Grand Pla- 

 teau of Mont Blanc is like. It is the 

 head of the long snow slope facing 

 Chamonix and beginning just below the 

 summit. 



The frozen stream slips down this 

 inclined groove, almost unbroken by 

 crevasses, to its base between the two 

 shoulders of the mountain, the Dome du 

 Gouter and Mont Blanc de Tacul. Here 

 its motion is impeded by the foothills of 

 the Dome, and it slowly works its way 

 over to the Tacul side, where it shoots 

 like a terrific ice-cascade over the slope 

 below, forming an unscalable precipice. 



On the Dome side, owing to a greater 

 angle in the slope, the lower ice glides 

 on, but the upper part is torn apart, 

 forming a huge chasm or crevasse always 

 to be found here. This "crevasse of the 

 Dome" extends quite across the entrance 

 of the plateau ; and, as at one end there 

 is an impassable precipice and at the 

 other the almost perpendicular wall of 

 the Dome, it is clear that the climber 

 must cross the crevasse before he can 

 mount higher. 



]\Iany accidents have therefore oc- 

 curred here. It was just above this cre- 



vasse that Jacques Balmat had to remain 

 all night, as in the darkness he could not 

 find the snow bridge which traversed it. 

 In 1864 a porter named Coutlet, while 

 descending with a party, fell into this 

 crevasse. Two intrepid fellow-guides 

 were lowered by ropes to a distance of 

 90 feet ; but, owing to the suffocating air, 

 could descend no further. They lowered 

 a bottle a hundred feet further, but with- 

 out touching bottom, and so the body of 

 their companion was never found. Of 

 all the dangers on Mont Blanc, that of 

 the crevasse is the commonest. 



HOW CRi:VASS]^S ARE I^ORMED 



These huge rents in the ice are caused 

 by the pushing of the half rigid, inflexi- 

 ble ice along over uneven surfaces ; the. 

 mass may be broken by passing over a 

 projecting ridge far below, in conse- 

 quence of the huge weight above. In the 

 higher parts of the mountain, as in the 

 Grand Plateau region, the glacier is com- 

 posed of neve ; that is, consolidated snow, 

 not solid ice. It is opaque and stratified, 

 and has a dull white luster, instead of 

 being greenish and transparent and of 

 crystalline texture, as in the lower parts 

 of the mountain. Lacking in compact- 

 ness, it breaks easily if subjected to vio- 

 lence, and thus forms crevasses. The 

 chasms soon disappear, for their sides 

 are crushed together when new obstacles 

 are encountered in front; and, as the ice 

 is ever moving, new fissures are con- 

 stantly being formed there. Hence, the 

 crevasses seem to be stationary, though 

 the ice in which they are formed is never 

 still. But experienced guides know, how- 

 ever, that these gigantic rifts are always 

 in the same places, just as are the rocks 

 and peaks. 



Generally the crevasses have smooth, 

 perpendicular walls, though often they 

 are hollowed out into beautiful caverns 

 filled with greenish light, let in through 

 their translucent roofs. Often, too, they 

 are adorned with column-like icicles ex- 

 tending to the floor, just like pillars ar- 

 tistically designed. 



These yawning chasms are generally 

 crossed by snow bridges which have 

 drifted across them. If the snow bridge 

 is too frail to allow the weight of a man 



