Now, it would be absurd to try to teach mountaineering in a chapter of this book, for it takes ten years at least to make a mountaineer. Still less dare I insult the mountaineer by advising him how to behave in his element, for he will not go high and far until he feels at home on the planks. By the time he has mastered the technicalities of ski-ing, he knows everything about the outfit which suits him best, and about his line of conduct on any expedition he may plan. My remarks on the subject in hand cannot, therefore, be anything but a series of very general reflections and impressions, simply intended as a loud warning to ski-runners that they should study “Alpinism,” and as a gentle reminder to mountaineers, that ski-running is a somewhat tricky complication of their art. Why should I tell the latter what type of ski to take on long tours, seeing that he knows on which kind he travels best; why should he ask me about his ice-axe when he is sure to take one or not according to the object in view?[9]
Ski-runners, unless they are climbing experts, or accompanied by such, must confine themselves to the usual practice-grounds and safe excursions, for only a mountaineer can decide on the spot whether hill craft is necessary or not. To explain how he arrives at this decision would mean a very thick volume. The ski-runner, therefore, who wishes to form a correct opinion of his own should make up his mind to learn from amateurs, guides, and books how to look about, think, and behave when he leaves the beaten track where multitudes are accustomed to go unthinking and unadvised. My random observations are to impress him with that necessity, and for the mountaineer they shall be an epitome of familiar principles.
In the winter the problem of the avalanche eclipses all others. The rule to go only with guides or experienced friends disposes of the general advice respecting glaciers, crevasses, slips, strategy, and discipline, for in these things a man must train himself during many seasons. The rule that only good ski-runners dare aspire towards high peaks saves a long repetition of detail as to outfit.[10] The ski-runner-mountaineer ought always to be a man who, during his apprenticeship, knew something of cold, hunger, slow companions, and broken ski. To have no spare gloves and no provisions, to fall where one ought to stand, to step on a hollow, or to risk a dashing slide, may have merely disagreeable results two miles from home; but the same omissions and commissions can be suicidal, nay, even criminal, when ten miles from the nearest human habitation. If you wish to kill, go alone, and kill yourself, for every party of mountaineers suffers for the thoughtlessness of each of its members, while the greatest skill or ability of one of them is as nothing in the balance of fate when the whole has to bear the inadequacy of the lowest unit.
Extreme suspicion and wariness are the only correct attitude towards the mountains in their winter garb. The number of factors which combine to prepare or prevent an avalanche is truly bewildering, and any single one of them may be the prime mover or the reliable safeguard in a given instance. And this one was perhaps overlooked in weighing the evidence. The secret of the avalanche is the breaking strain and snapping point of an unseen tension. Avalanches owe their growth and collapse to some or all of the following indications: The angle of the slope; the surface of the ground; the quantity of the snow; the snow of a month ago, of yesterday, and to-day; the temperature and the wind of a month ago, yesterday, and today, while the snow fell, or before it fell, or after it had fallen. And to consummate or prevent the catastrophy there are, in conjunction with the above, the temperature at the time of our arrival on the spot, the weight of the party, its methods of walking or ski-ing, and sundry other accidents. So many possibilities produce tantalising doubt rather than definite conviction, and more often than not a slope, which presents all the visible elements of danger, may be perfectly harmless. On the other hand, well-known guides have walked into mouse-traps because one exceptional condition had altered the internal character of a particular slope which, throughout their lives, they had known as perfectly safe. A strong sense of human weakness is therefore the proper frame of mind towards the mysterious and overwhelming power of the snow.
The mountaineer must condense the theory of avalanches into a few comprehensive rules of thumb, and when in doubt he must give the benefit to himself and not to the avalanche.
Suspicious.—Every open slope of about 25 deg. or steeper, and all new snow in warm weather. A thaw after a heavy fall of snow is the most common cause of the thick and heavy slides known as ground avalanches.
Dangerous.—Every heavy accumulation of snow at an angle of 40 deg. or more, on long open slopes, and in gullies. At lesser angles all snow which lies on a hard and smooth surface (grass, earth, old snow, crust, ice, &c.). Hard snow under the lee of ridges. This is liable to crack and to become suddenly transformed into what looks like a huge waterfall of lumps of sugar. Therefore, one ought to cross such slopes as high up as possible. The cornice which overhangs the ridge is more dangerous to those who walk on it than to those under it.
Safe.—All slopes under 25 deg; all slopes evenly dotted with trees or rocks; almost every perfectly homogeneous snow not deeper than 2ft. which lies on a rough surface (screes, &c.).
More cannot be said without conjuring up a flood of detail. This experience and acquired instinct must fill in. The tourist can find almost daily an opportunity of making experiments on a small scale, though he should not forget that a cubic yard of snow can dislocate his arm or break his leg.
As an instance, showing the effect of surface, I may mention that, in the Alpine spring, the grass slopes send down in huge avalanches the solid layer accumulated and consolidated during the winter. At the same time the firm, wet snow of exactly the same texture which lies on screes remains perfectly safe, and affords splendid ski-ing. It never slips off, but gradually melts, evaporates, and vanishes as the summer draws near.