But next year he ventured on a feat that, so far as I know, was not only extraordinary for one with comparatively so little experience of the higher Alps, magnificent climber though he was, but it has remained, I believe, unique in the annals of the great mountain on which it was performed. At Easter, 1893, Jones climbed the Dent Blanche, the mountain with which his name will be for ever associated in the climbing world. The ascent was made on the 25th and 26th April, and the expedition took thirty-six hours, a wonderful feat of strength and endurance. M. Adrien Spahr, the landlord of the Hotel de la Dent Blanche at Evolena, and of the new Kurhaus at Arolla (from which Jones started the day before his last, fatal climb), has kindly favoured me with the following brief note in reference to that expedition:—
‘C’est bien le 25 Avril, 1893, que Monsieur Jones a fait l’ascension de la Dent Blanche avec les guides Pierre Gaspoz et Antoine Bovier père d’Evolène. Je suis redescendu moi-même avec lui depuis Evolène à Sion.’
In an interview which appeared in the press in 1894 Jones said of this climb, one of the most difficult things he ever did:—‘The longest day I ever had afoot was at Easter, ’93, doing the Dent Blanche. We took two guides and a porter, and had great difficulty in getting them to attempt the last two hundred feet. We were out in the open for thirty-six hours, with very short rests, no sleep, and excessive labour, but we revelled in every minute of it. The mountain was in a dangerous condition, and the last five hours on the way home we spent in wading, waist-deep, through soft snow. It was rather painful, of course, but there was a certain pleasure even in our pain, for it helped to make philosophers of us. We agreed to think of other things in the midst of our sufferings, and we succeeded creditably well. I believe now that I could stand almost anything in the way of pain or exposure.’
In 1894 he commenced in the Engadine and then went on to the Dolomites, where his great skill as a cragsman and his familiarity with all sorts of rock-work made him much more at home than he yet was among the snow-peaks, as his list shows. On rocks I think it is not using the exaggerated language of friendship to say that he probably had no superior among his countrymen at the time of his death, and comparatively few equals. Among the great snow-peaks he had not attained so high a level. Had he lived he would, I believe, have ranked with the greatest, for he had not done all he was capable of; and when he met his death he was still in his prime, and he was a man of great courage, immense resourcefulness, and phenomenal physical endurance.
In 1895 he devoted himself largely to the reduction of the great peaks in the Zermatt district, some of which he already knew. In that year also he returned to the Dom Grat and the Fletschhorn Ridge, whose acquaintance he had made in 1892. The following passage from the Alpine Journal derives an added interest from the fact that Elias Furrer was his guide then, as he was his guide on the last, fatal climb:—
‘In August, 1895, Elias Furrer took me from the Täsch Alp to the Mischabeljoch, and thence over the Täschhorn and Dom to Randa, a course of seventeen and a half hours, including halts. Shortly afterwards Mr. W. E. Davidson followed our route from the Mischabeljoch. During the same week Furrer showed me a third pair of the Saas peaks. We bivouacked on the Eggfluh rocks one bitterly cold night, and next day traversed the Südlenspitze and Nadelhorn. The usual grande course is to include the Ulrichshorn, and descend to Saas again; but Furrer had business and I fresh raiment at Zermatt, and we hastened over the Stecknadelhorn (or was it the Hohberghorn?), and thence by the Hohberg Pass and Festi glacier down to Randa in fourteen hours from the start.’
His energy in climbing this year was remarkable, I had almost said stupendous. In addition to the long climbs referred to in the above extract, it will be seen from the list given above that he twice ascended the Zinal Rothhorn, traversed the Obergabelhorn and Matterhorn, and did two important climbs without guides. The ascent of the Rothhorn from Zinal was the first that Mr. Hill and he made together in Switzerland. The traverse of the Rothhorn and the ascent of the Weisshorn he did without guides, in company with the Hopkinsons, who perished in 1898 on the Petite Dent de Veisivi. Mr. W. J. Williams, who climbed much with Jones in the Alps, has kindly placed in my hands a very characteristic post-card of Jones’s, giving, in his own brief, vivacious way, a clearer idea of his boundless enthusiasm and energy in his favourite sport than anything that anyone else could write. It is dated ‘Bellevue, Zermatt, Monday, Sept. 2, 1895,’ and reads as follows:—‘The Hopkinsons and I traversed the Rothhorn without guides in grand style. Reached the summit from the Mountet in 4¼ hours, including ¾ hour halt. Had a shock of earthquake on the top. Next day we went up to the Weisshorn, bivouac in open air, and the day after managed the Weisshorn. It was delightful. Then they went off to their people at the Bel Alp, and I stayed on at Zermatt ever since. The weather was bad at the end of the week (Weisshorn on Friday), but on Monday I crossed the Furggenjoch with Elias Furrer, whom I took on for 14 days at 20 francs, and Tuesday traversed the Matterhorn; Wednesday, the Monte Rosa hut; Thursday, Monte Rosa from the Lysjoch, a lengthy expedition, but magnificent; I carried my camera the whole time; Friday, the Fluh Alp; Saturday, the traverse of Rimpfischhorn from the Adler pass, dangerous by falling stones, but very jolly; Sunday, I rested and photographed down here. To-day I go to the Täsch Alp, and to-morrow shall attempt the traverse of Täschhorn and Dom in one day. If the weather still holds I shall then traverse the Dent Blanche, which is now in fine condition, like ourselves. Love to all.—Owen.’
Lived there ever a keener mountaineer? On the day before he was killed, as we were walking down the Arolla Valley together, I expressed surprise at the vast amount of eager work he was crushing into every week. He replied, ‘You see there are only a few years in which I can do this sort of thing, and I want to get as much into them as possible.’ Alas! Owen Jones had not twenty-four hours more; the years were ended.
The season of 1896 was a terribly bad one and Jones suffered with less energetic and less daring mortals. In the Alpine Journal he laments that he only did six peaks, but he crossed the Col du Géant twice, traversed the Aiguille de Charmoz, and did the North peak of the Périades by the Arête du Capucin. And the disappointments of that summer season had the effect of sending him to the Alps in the following winter—his first winter visit. He deserted his favourite Christmas hunting grounds, Wastdale Head Inn and Pen-y-gwrwd, for the Bear Hotel at Grindelwald. It so happened that I was there when he arrived. On the last day of 1896 I had made an unsuccessful attempt on the Schreckhorn after being out fourteen and a half hours, and after an accident to the leading guide, which confined him to bed for three weeks. I returned to Grindelwald and thence to England. Jones, who had just come out, determined to climb the Sehreckhorn. The first attempt failed, as the snow was in very bad condition, and he only got as far as the hut, where he spent a far from comfortable night. A few days later, however, he made a second attempt with successful results. Both in print and in manuscript he has left an account of the two expeditions. I quote a short passage—it has not too close a relation to the climbs, but it illustrates the playful humour which made Jones so charming and vivacious a companion, alike in an alpine hut or in the smoke room of ‘P.Y.G.’
‘I approach for a moment with some delicacy the threadbare topic of the insect population of alpine huts, the fauna of the alpine bed. In summertime the traveller must not assume that the straw on which he lies is more dead than alive. Carelessness in this respect may cost him his peak next day; he should bring Keating and use it liberally. But in winter he is almost safe and unmolested. Some say that the fleas go down to the valley with the last autumn party, and come up in the early summer with the first tourists. Others think that they hibernate in the warmest corners of the hut and make it a rule to emerge only when it is well worth while. An occasional winter tourist is probably too tough, his attractions too few. The solution of the problem I must leave to others. It will probably be offered by some conscientious German biologist, in an exhaustive illustrated monograph, published in the Mittheilungen.’