Here with a little difficulty they mounted—sometimes the rock growing too steep and the ice appearing the easier path, then the reverse, till at last they stood well up on the surface of the frozen river and began its toilsome ascent.
“Now you’ll find the advantage of your big-nailed boots, Saxe,” said his leader merrily. “Go cautiously, my lad; we mustn’t spoil our explorations by getting sprained ankles.”
The warning was necessary, for the ice surface was broken up into ruts, hollows, folds, and crags that required great caution, and proved to be laborious in the extreme to surmount.
“Is there much more of this rough stuff?” said Saxe, after half an hour’s climbing.
The guide smiled.
“The ice gets bigger and wilder higher up,” he replied. “There are smooth patches, but it is broken up into crags and seracs.”
This was another surprise to Saxe, to whom the surface of the glacier, when seen from above on the bluff, had looked fairly smooth—just, in fact, one great winding mass of ice flowing down in a curve to the foot. He was not prepared for the chaos of worn, tumbled and crushed-up masses, among which the guide led the way. Some parts that were smoother were worn and channelled by the running water, which rushed in all directions, mostly off the roughly curved centre to the sides, where it made its way to the river beneath.
It was quite a wonderland to the boy fresh from town, entering the icy strongholds of nature; for, after ascending a little farther, their way was barred by jagged and pinnacled masses heaped together in the wildest confusion, many of the fragments being thirty, even forty feet high.
“Have we got to climb those?” said Saxe, in dismay.
The guide shook his head.