Milestone Mountain and a Neiv Kings-Kern Pass. 5 



who was the lightest member of the party, would venture, 

 I would assist him up over a rounding projection which 

 blocked the way at one end of the ledge, and possibly from 

 above he might find a way out of our difficulty. He agreed 

 to attempt it and after climbing onto my shoulders man- 

 aged to get a footing on a little nub of granite which jutted 

 out from the slightly sloping wall, and crawled up to a point 

 which offered a more favorable foothold. Just as he was 

 out of my sight and I thought that he had succeeded, he 

 shouted to me to get out of the way and with such terror in 

 his voice that I felt that he must be slipping, and I shouted 

 back that I would do what I could to hold him. He kept 

 repeating his command for me to get out of the way so that 

 I managed to get back to a broader portion of the ledge on 

 which I was standing, and informed him that I was safe, 

 when a tremendous stone weighing half a ton fell from 

 where he was and struck the narrow foothold which I had 

 just left and bounded down hundreds of feet below. The 

 smell of brimstone pervaded the air, due to the friction re- 

 sulting from the first impact. Immediately the ledge occu- 

 pied by Price and myself began to look all to narrow as a 

 perch for sensible mortals. Where a moment before we had 

 looked down the precipitous face of the cliff without flinch- 

 ing, we suddenly acquired a desire to hug as close to it as 

 the ledge would permit, and the yawning depths below now 

 seemed like a veritable chasm ready to engulf us if we made 

 a move. I managed to get out again to where I had been 

 before and helped Farquhar down. It seems that in reach- 

 ing up for a hold he had placed his arm around what had 

 every appearance of being a solid projection, but on throw- 

 ing his weight on it, to his horror, it moved off its base. 

 Fortunately he secured a firm hold with his other hand and 

 bravely held the great weight from slipping further until I 

 could get out from my position underneath. Our nerve had 

 temporarily left us so we waited until it had partially re- 

 turned and then set about descending the way we had 

 ascended. It was surprising how much more difficult the 

 dangerous points had become and how much more we relied 

 on the rope I had with me. 



