CLOUDS AND RIVERS, ICE AND GLACIERS. 47 



some distance above the fall yawn terribly. But by 

 jauticn we could get round them, and sometimes cross 

 them by bridges of snow. Here the skill and know- 

 ledge to be acquired only by long practice come' into 

 play ; and 'here also the use of the Alpine rope sug- 

 gests itself. For not only are the snow bridges often 

 frail, but whole crevasses are sometimes covered, the 

 unhappy traveller being first made aware of their exist- 

 ence by the snow breaking under his feet. Many lives 

 have thus been lost, and some quite recently. 



122. Once upon the plateau above the ice-fall we 

 and the surface totally changed. Below the fall we 

 walked upon ice ; here we are upon snow. After a 

 gentle but long ascent we reach a depression of the 

 ridge which bounds the snow-field at the top, and now 

 look over Italy. We stand upon the famous Col du 

 Geant. 



123. They were no idle scamperers on the mountains 

 that made these wild recesses first known ; it was not 

 the desire for health which now brings some, or the 

 desire for grandeur and beauty which brings others, oi 

 the wish to be able to say that they have climbed a 

 mountain or crossed a col, which I fear brings a good 

 many more ; it was a desire for knowledge that brought 

 the first explorers here, and on this col the celebrated 

 De Saussure lived for seventeen days, making scientiflc 

 observations. 



