194 TRAVELS A3I0NQST THE GREAT ANDES, chap. x. 



be effected in a fog. It was necessary to see where we were going, 

 and to arrive at this part at an early hour, before the mists had 

 risen. It was therefore arranged to camp out, at the edge of the 

 glacier, as high as natives could be taken. 



On March 9, at 12.55 p.m., we started again ; got the caravan 

 to the foot of the moraine at 2.40, and all the baggage up to the 

 camping - place (15,984 feet) by 4 p.m. Our natives with Verity 

 then returned to the hacienda, leaving us at the extreme top of 

 the moraine^ on the right bank of the glacier, which forms a tail 

 or lower prolongation of the basin in the centre of the engraving. 

 A fierce hail-storm occurred while we were on the way, and snow 

 fell heavily afterwards ; yet the temperature did not descend so 

 low as the freezing-point in the night, and at 4 a.m. on the 10th 

 it stood at 40° -5 Faht. 



The weather seemed very doubtful in the morning, and we 

 delayed until daybreak, to see how it would develop. The Carrels 

 and I got away at 5.38 a.m., and travelled quickly, through deriv- 

 ing considerable benefit from the track made on the 7th, which 

 was well seen, although several inches of snow had recently fallen. 

 At 7.30 a.m. clouds formed around the highest point of the mount- 

 ain, and it remained invisible until the afternoon. At about 8 

 a.m., when approaching the summit ridge, we got into a labyrinth 

 of crevasses, and had difficulty in finding a way amongst them. 

 The chasms in the ice on the upper part of Antisana are of great 



^ The moraine on which we encamped contained samples of the upper rocks of 

 Antisana that had come from various heights and directions. All were lavas, — 

 some compact and others scoriaceous. Several of the more compact varieties are 

 very handsome rocks when polished, in colour ranging from lavender-grey to purple- 

 black. No rocks could be obtained higher than the camp. Such as were exposed 

 were in inaccessible positions. 



My collection has been examined by Prof. T. G. Bonney, and is described by 

 him at length in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, Mar. 13, 1884. " The rocks 

 which form the actual peak of Antisana," he says, " are augite-andesites, containing 

 at any rate occasionally hypersthene, and to the same group belongs, though perhaps 

 it is slightly more basic, the rock of the great lava-stream which has descended 

 to Antisanilla." 



