‘The problem before me was a difficult one. It was quite impossible to climb down alone, and I could not expect to succeed where guides had failed; the only course open was to attempt to turn the gendarme on the right. This I succeeded in doing with great difficulty, owing to the ice on the rocks and the necessity of cutting up an ice slope in order to reach the ridge. In about another hour I gained the summit, and was greeted with a faint cooey, probably from the party we had seen. I could not see them nor make them hear, so made my way down with all reasonable speed, hoping to overtake them. When I reached the lowest gendarme—the one with a deep narrow fissure—a sudden mist hid everything from view. It was impossible to see the way off; and while I was trying various routes a snowstorm and cold wind drove me to seek shelter on the lee-side of the rocks. There, tied on with my rope, and still further secured by an ice-axe wedged firmly in front of me, I was forced to remain until mid-day on Tuesday. Then the mist cleared, and, climbing very carefully down the snow-covered rocks I reached the snow arête, where most of the steps had to be re-cut. The next serious difficulty was the lower part of the Wandfluh; I could not remember the way off, and spent two or three hours in futile efforts before I found a series of chimneys on the extreme right, leading down to the glacier. The sun set when I was on the high bank of moraine on the Zmutt Glacier, and in the growing darkness it was far from easy to keep the path. The light in the Staffel Alp inn was a guide as long as it lasted, but it went out early, and, keeping too low down, I passed the inn without seeing it, and being forced to stop by the nature of the ground, spent the night by the side of the torrent. It was late in the morning when I awoke, and then a scramble of a few minutes brought me to the path, near the sign-post, and I reached Zermatt at half-past eleven.’
Mr. Hill’s escape is one of the most wonderful in the history of mountaineering. His endurance and courage are not less remarkable. To have been out alone, in bad weather, without anything to eat save five raisins, and with nothing to drink but ice and snow, on a difficult and dangerous mountain, and to have returned safely is, I believe, a record in climbing annals. I may add a few details, given me by Mr. Hill when I first met him after the accident, which he has not reproduced in the above narrative.
He thinks his companions were killed instantaneously. They uttered no sound; they made no apparent attempt to save themselves. With arms outspread they rolled helplessly down the awful face of the mountain. He watched them for a few seconds, powerless to help, if help would indeed have availed, and then turned from the sickening sight.
During the last part of his descent, even his great strength began to fail. Once, on the Wandfluh, he lost his axe and had to spend an hour in climbing down to recover it, as it was absolutely essential to his safety. After he left the Zmutt glacier in darkness, he appears to have become delirious. He was constantly talking to imaginary companions. He fell into holes in the ground and went to sleep without strength to rise. He wakened from cold, called to his companions to go on as it was time to be leaving, stumbled, and fell asleep again.
On Saturday morning Dr. Sumpner arrived, having travelled straight through from Birmingham to Evolena. Friends tramped down from Arolla, others had come from Zermatt, the secretary of Jones’s section of the Swiss Alpine Club came from near Neuchâtel. A carriage bore Jones’s plain black coffin, with a gilt cross on it, down from Haudères. We buried him and the Evolena guide, Vuignier, in the little graveyard of the Roman Catholic church, almost in sight of the glorious, but terrible, mountain on which they met their fate. The scene in the village almost baffles description. All the villagers, men and women, attended the funeral, clad in coarse white robes. The grief of the women, especially of Vuignier’s poor old mother, was heart-rending to witness. The little Roman Catholic chapel was crowded, the congregation all in white, save the acolytes, two village boys, who served the altar in their coarse brown, everyday clothes, and the choir, whose strong voices rang through the whitewashed, humble building. A little knot of Englishmen, sunbrowned, of another faith or of no faith at all, joined in the impressive and solemn service. It was a sight that no one present can ever forget.
After the service, we bore the two coffins to the graveyard. Rev. Mr. Scott, the Anglican chaplain, read the English burial service over Owen Jones’s grave. Mr. Hill sent a beautiful wreath of edelweiss and the foliage of the Alpine rose. A rude wooden cross marked the spot till Jones’s friends erected a suitable gravestone. The lovely warm sunshine and the bright blue sky, and the gleaming snows on the slopes of the Dent Blanche, formed a curious contrast to the mourning of the village in that Alpine valley.
Thus perished, as he would, I doubt not, like to have died, Owen Glynne Jones, a brave and dashing mountaineer, a cheery and kindly friend, whose presence will be long missed by all who had the privilege of knowing him. His death was due to a pure accident, occurring when he was in the plenitude of his powers, and when he seemed just about to reap the reward of long years of patient, ardent toil.
W. M. CROOK.