133 TRA VELS A3I0NGST THE GREA T ANDES, chap. yi. 



exceeded 160 lbs. We pushed on for a few hundred feet 

 higher^ up steep slopes of volcanic sand^ having a very vague 

 idea of the situation of the summit^ as we had been in clouds 

 nearly all the day ; and, upon arriving at some sufficiently flat 

 ground, encamped at 15,207 feet, with sleet falling thickly. All 

 the people (except the Carrels), along with the animals, were 

 then sent back to the farm. 



In course of time it was found that we had got close to the 

 southern edge of a glacier on the eastern side of the peak, and 

 that the upper 2200 feet or thereabouts of the mountain was 

 composed of a large wall (which is possibly nothing more than 

 a dyke), of no great thickness from east to west ; having two 

 principal ridges, — one descending from the summit towards the 

 south-south-west, and the other north-north-east. The face 

 fronting the east was almost entirely covered by glacier right 

 up to the summit, and there was also a glacier, or more than 

 one, on the western side. 



Jean-Antoine and I started soon after daybreak on Feb. 9,^ 

 and made good progress over the glacier so long as it was at a 

 moderate inclination ; but in the course of an hour we found 

 ourselves driven over to the western side of the mountain, and 

 shortly afterwards were completely stopped in that direction by 

 immense seracs. We then doubled back to the main ridge, and 

 reached the crest of it, at a somewhat greater height than 16,000 

 feet, up some very steep gullies filled with snow. The huge 

 seracs looming through the mist above us on the western side 

 shewed clean walls of ice which I estimated were 200 feet high, 

 lurching forwards as if ready to fall, separated by crevasses not 

 less than twenty to twenty-five feet across. Nothing could be 

 done on that side. The ridge was steep and broken ; its rocks 

 were much decomposed, externally of a chalky-white appearance, 

 pervaded with veins and patches of lilacs and purples, and inter- 



1 Leaving Louis in charge of the camp. He came by his own desire, though 

 still unable to walk. 



