Between Earth and Sky ([page 163]).

An extremely narrow Snow Ridge, but a much easier one to pass than that described by Mr Moore ([page 160])

The position was terrible, and Herr Nasse was at the end of his forces. He called out in a dying voice that he could bear no more—it was the last time he spoke.

Of Schnitzler nothing was heard, and the others could not tell if he were still alive.

But while this terrible scene was passing, Schnitzler had performed an act of the highest bravery. First he had tried, by using his axe, to climb out of the icy prison where he hung. This he could not do, so steadying himself against the glassy wall, he deliberately cut himself loose from the rope. He dropped to the floor of the crevasse, which, luckily, was not of extraordinary depth, and being uninjured, he set himself to find a way out. He followed the crevasse along its entire length, and discovered a little ledge of ice, with the aid of which, panting and exhausted, he reached the surface.

But even with Schnitzler's help it was impossible to raise Herr Nasse out of the chasm. The rope had cut deeply into the snow. He hung underneath an eave of the soft surface and could not be moved. Another willing helper, an Englishman, now came up, and after a time the body—for Herr Nasse had not survived—was lowered to the floor of the crevasse. Every effort was made to restore animation, but with no result, and there was nothing left to do but leave that icy grave and descend to the valley. Herr Nasse had suffered from a weak heart and an attack of pleurisy, and these gave him but a poor chance of withstanding the terrible pressure of the rope. Dr Scriven, from whose spirited translation from the German I have taken my facts, remarks that, "The death of Professor Nasse seems to emphasize a warning, already painfully impressed on us by the loss of Mr Norman Neruda, that there are special dangers awaiting those whose vital organs are not perfectly sound, and who undertake the exertion and fatigue of long and difficult climbs."

CHAPTER XIV
A WONDERFUL FEAT BY TWO LADIES

One of the highest and hardest passes in the Alps is the Sesia-Joch, 13,858 feet high, near Monte Rosa. The well-known mountaineer, Mr Ball, writing in 1863, referred to its first passage by Messrs George and Moore, as "amongst the most daring of Alpine exploits," and expressed a doubt whether it would ever be repeated. The party went up the steep Italian side (on the other, or Swiss side, it is quite easy). We can, therefore, judge of the astonishment of the members of the Alpine Club when they learnt that in 1869 "two ladies had not only crossed this most redoubtable of glacier passes, but crossed it from Zermatt to Alagna, thus descending the wall of rock, the ascent of which had until then been looked on as an extraordinary feat for first-rate climbers." The following extract from an Italian paper, aided by the notes communicated by the Misses Pigeon to The Alpine Journal, fully explains how this accidental but brilliant feat of mountaineering was happily brought to a successful termination.

"On 11th August 1869, Miss Anna and Miss Ellen Pigeon, of London, were at the Riffel Hotel, above Zermatt, with the intention of making the passage of the Lys-Joch on the next day, in order to reach Gressonay. Starting at 3 A.M. on the 12th, accompanied by Jean Martin, guide of Sierre, and by a porter, they arrived at 4 A.M. at the Gorner Glacier, which they crossed rapidly to the great plateau, enclosed between the Zumstein-Spitz, Signal-Kuppe, Parrot-Spitze, and Lyskamm, where they arrived at 10 A.M. At this point, instead of bearing to the right, which is the way to the Lys-Joch, they turned too much towards the left, so that they found themselves on a spot at the extremity of the plateau, from which they saw beneath their feet a vast and profound precipice, terminating at a great depth upon a glacier. The guide had only once, about four years before, crossed the Lys-Joch, and in these desert and extraordinary places, where no permanent vestiges remain of previous passages, he had not remembered the right direction, nor preserved a very clear idea of the localities. At the sight of the tremendous precipice he began to doubt whether he might not have mistaken the way, and, to form a better judgment, he left the ladies on the Col, half-stiffened with cold from the violence of the north wind, ascended to the Parrot-Spitze, and advanced towards the Ludwigshöhe, in order to examine whether along this precipice, which lay inexorably in front, there might be a place where a passage could be effected. But wherever he turned his eyes he saw nothing but broken rocks and couloirs yet more precipitous.