Even in the hands of a beginner it prevents him from crawling where he should be learning to walk in the rhythm of balance. In so far as it makes for upright movement it is the first instructor in balance climbing on easy ridges and descents.
In descending sideways to the rock, the axe-head, short held on the ledges, can give relief to the continued drag on the hands. Or again, if either hand is occupied with the rope, the spike of the axe thrust down to a lower edge with the free hand gives balance for the next awkward descending step, and avoids the check to the rope that the search for handhold, and the turn of the body to use it, would produce.
In traversing or descending easy faces or ridges, the axe, held straight across the body with the spike towards the rock, can give just those touches which the balance in easy movement from time to time demands, especially when there is loose rubble on the passing footholds or their angle slopes inconveniently.
In dancing down or across loose scree or moraine, that last test of rhythmical leg movement, which becomes a step-dance of delight or a slow, unhappy crawl according as it is rightly or wrongly performed, the axe held in the same position makes at any moment, with a passing touch, a third leg for balance. But it is wrong and retarding to make a perpetual tripod with it, and to lose the rhythm of balanced movement by continually leaning upon it.
FOOTNOTES:
[10] See on Boots, “Equipment,” p. [80].
[11] See on Nailing, “Equipment,” p. [82].
[12] See “Equipment,” p. [83].
CHAPTER V
CLIMBING IN COMBINATION
In no craft or sport is combination so vital as in climbing. The brilliant individual run or single score is impossible. The members of a party are combined for life or death. Their achievement is that of their united efficiency. Their progress depends upon their success in realizing complete harmony of thought and movement. The rope is their nervous link. There are few things more pleasing to watch than the co-operation of a good rope on a stiff rock climb. To the untutored eye the party may all appear to be doing different things—some pausing, some turning, some climbing. Only the expert may discover the continuity of motion passing from one end to the other of the rope through the separate actions of each climber. Like the progress of a snake, seen in a slow cinema film, the sinuous connection is only apparent to the eye that can read in each apparently stationary phase its relation to the phase which precedes and follows it.