avoid rock faces of uncomfortable notoriety and to attack eccentric
types with precaution. A large number of climbs, even whole mountain
walls, that used to be popular on account of the attraction of their
weathered angles, are now left for the same reason almost unvisited.
But unsound rock cannot always be eluded, and a climber has to be ready
to deal with short bands or intrusions of inferior rock on any climb
which he does not personally know, and on many to which he returns for
love of their sounder sections. Fortunately, according to the nature
of rock, these intrusions are rarer and shorter on steeper rock, and
any more considerable section will provide its own alleviation in
a relenting angle, where the softer surface has disintegrated more
rapidly than its firmer surroundings. This may, of course, mean an
overhang, to the climber’s disadvantage. If not, it will at least
offer him an easier angle for advance over its unattractive trespass.
On unsound rock every merit that characterizes finished climbing by
balance, or compensation, is emphasized. A novice should never be
allowed to lead. A grip climber is a danger on the rope and a suicidal
choice as leader.
[Sidenote: Semi-detached.]
On bad rock every hold is an object of suspicion, since almost all
the holds will be liable to fail under one or another direction of
pull. The obviously bad hold, the hold that comes away at the first
touch, anyone will reject. But our object on unsound rock is to get
over it; and for that purpose to use its holds for what they are worth
rather than to start casting them down in an attitude of righteous
indignation--and insecurity. With a caressing hand the good climber
discovers what pull the hold is likely to be good for, and his judgment
telling him the direction and amount of pull that his next movement
will demand from it, he will avoid loosening it beforehand by any
test not necessary for this movement. The grip climber, therefore,
who puts half a dozen directions of strain upon each handhold in any
one lifting movement, will make no progress at all on unsound holds.
If he does not test them beforehand, in the end he will fall. If he
tests them properly in all the directions that his lift will demand,
he will remove most of the holds before he can use them. The balance
climber, who has practised putting only that direction of strain upon
a hold which his own next movement and the hold’s security agree upon,
is in less of a quandary. For, except in the case of fragments which
are already detached, and clearly ready to fall, nearly every surface
accident which is still in attachment to the main rock will stand
light additional strain in at least one direction. This, of course,
varies according to the stratification of the rock and its fractures.
As an instance, on a steep face the ordinary lines of fracture may
be vertical and horizontal to the discoverable inclination of the
strata. If the ‘hold’ is already detached from the rock on both these
lines, and only resting on a support, it is useless. If, however, the
excrescence is fractured at its base, horizontally, but attached to
the rock behind, vertically, it will be good for a straight outward
pull. It can also be tested, but it cannot otherwise be trusted, for
a downward or diagonal pull. If it is detached from the rock behind,
vertically, but still part of the rock below it, horizontally, it is
sound for a direct downward pull, but not for any outward or cross
strain. If the strata strike diagonally, and the cleavages correspond,
_mutatis mutandis_, the same rules apply for the different directions
of pull, permissible or not, upon their holds.
A climber has not only to make sure what direction of strain he may
safely put upon a hold, but to keep this direction of pull or thrust
constant all through his upward or downward movement, irrespective of
the changing position of his body in relation to the hold.
The vital importance of climbing by compensating balances becomes then
apparent. A climber who has trained his mechanism to the habit of
translating the support of any hold that any one of his extremities
engages, by means of the balance of his body, into movement in any
direction he requires, has little difficulty in keeping the strain he
puts upon a single hand or foot hold constant in direction. He can
do so even while he is using its support to lift his weight through
a succession of angles past and over the hold. It is, in fact, the
process that he has had to learn for his ordinary ‘sound’ climbing,
if he has become a balance climber of precision or pace. A clumsy
climber, or one who depends on grip normally, is helpless when faced
with handholds of this ‘one-direction’ kind. He may discover by test
how he ought to use them, but the moment the lifting or lowering
movement begins the habit of his mechanism will reassert itself, and he
will change the direction of his pull as his body nears or passes the
hold. Even if he maintains the direction by an effort of will at the
moment, his body will not have been trained to carry out the mechanical
conversions with sufficient power to overcome the pure difficulty of
many a passage, altogether apart from its insecurity. He will be forced
to fall back upon muscle or grip to finish his movement, and the hold
may break.
A grip climber who normally neglects footwork is in even worse case
on unsound rock, when he has to use, or test, such ‘one-direction’
holds with his feet. On unsound rock good footwork is, if anything,
more important than good handwork. Only exactly the same strain may
be applied by the less sensitive feet, when they take the place of
the hands on the hold. Since the downward thrust of a foot can only
be slightly modified in direction, this limitation must be remembered
in selecting and testing a hold by the hand. Otherwise it may not be
sound for the later and different requirements of the foot. Foothold
is always the danger-point on unsound rock; and this constitutes the
peculiar demerit of such rock for ‘climbing down,’ when the foot alone
must test and lead. A climber, especially when he is descending, must
never trust to his feet alone, but protect them by at least one tested
handhold. A good rule to remember in all very exacting climbing is that
never less than three extremities should have hold. On unsound rock the
better rule is, never less than four. The dangerous moment comes when
one hand or foot is in process of testing or shifting to a new hold.
The movement must be made without jerk; the weight must be distributed
between the other points according to their merit; and the direction of
the pull, as tested and found secure on each hold, must be remembered.
Hence our motion over unsound holds may be properly described as
creeping. Every attachment must be light but tenacious, and one
tentacle is only released when the others are secure. On insecure rock
we are no longer concerned to keep the body as far out as possible.
Our object is secure, not free, movement. Consequently, we move with
the body as close in to the rock as is consistent with sight and its
freedom from catching. If, then, one hold does break, there is less
outward pull upon the others, and the body can sink instantaneously
against the rock and help to sustain us by its friction.
[Sidenote: Detached.]
Small, loose fragments should be thrown well out from the cliff, or
tucked away discreetly on ledges that need not be used. Large, loose
fragments are best left _in situ_, and the word passed down the line
of their presence, until the last man, if he likes, may remove them.
Often a block or large stone, which is detached from the parent rock
both behind and through its base, may yet afford very sound foothold
for a good foot climber, supposing it is seen to be resting on a
level and sufficient ledge. The same may be the case with pinnacles
or splinters, partially fractured or jammed in cracks. Tested and
tactfully used, they are often stable for a steady thrust or pull in
one direction at least; but much depends upon the nature of their
bedding.
Rock on walls and ridges facing south, in the Alps or at home, must
be suspected of detached leanings, until its family connections are
demonstrated by investigation. Holds which have been covered by
verdure or subjected to the action of moisture in any form have to be
judiciously proved. Rocks projecting from ice or snow--those pleasant
oases towards which we steer with such relief to ease our step-cutting
or snow-wading--must always be approached as unsound rock. If, on
occasion, they prove our suspicions wrong, they have only proved
themselves an exception to a melancholy rule.
Except on frequented routes, it is never safe to assume the security
of big detached blocks, poised on ridges or choked in gullies, unless
their fashion of support is absolutely demonstrable. They should be
left to the last man to test. From all accounts rash leaders who
neglected this precaution have escaped more often and more miraculously
than their intelligence, at least, deserved. A leader, if he has any
doubt, should avoid touching such blocks altogether. If, for all his
caution, a block gives unaccountably, he must hang on to it for all he
knows, until the men below have got what shelter they can. Nor must he
forget the rope. If the block catches the rope in falling, the danger
is as great as if it strikes one of the party.
Apart from these and other permanent idiosyncrasies, most normally
sound rock surface will be found to have its times and places of
weathering or weakness. We have to learn to recognize the symptoms,
forgetting our prejudices in favour of old and trusted rock types, and
treat their intrusion with all the delicacy and consideration of tread
and touch which we owe to the small infirmities of tried friends.
In so far as they are, or were, rock, moraine and scree may be called
unsound.
[Sidenote: Moraine and Scree.]
The occasional stone on a steep glacier is a find for a foothold;
but the stones that coat the ice-core of moraine slopes are merely
treacherous. If we have to traverse a few steps on such a slope, it is
best to knock the stone out and tread in its ice-socket.
The summit edges of moraines often offer passable going, especially
if previous parties have knocked off the final blocks. Their side
walls, whether of stone or of stone and mud conglomerate, are the least
scalable and most exasperating inclines in the mountain world. They are
often even too hard to make steps in, and it is fatal to attempt short
cuts upon them.
In traversing along scree slopes, if the scree is small, the one thing
to remember is to ‘accept the slip’; to place the foot lightly and
let it slip till it stops; not to make convulsive efforts to recover
it, or to keep the foot up to the same line of traverse. If the foot
slips too far on steep scree, lean inward on the axe or stick, which
is held point inward across the body. To ‘rush’ scree on anything but
the downgrade is merely to waste energy and time. In ascending or
traversing take short steps; tread always for a particular stone, and
do not brown the mass of stones vaguely with a loose foot.
In travelling up or along big scree or moraine, balance and a sustained
rhythm are the thing to aim at. On flat-stone moraine, step for the
middle of the stone; on round or cornered stones, ‘dance’ from one
upper edge to the next. Rather than break the rhythm, if no good hold,
or possibly only an insecure-looking block, presents itself for the
next foot, slacken the knee and put no weight on the leg while you are
using the loose block; skimmer over it with the dropped leg of a horse
at a big bank, and trust to the next step to bring you up again. If you
balance lightly and move fast, a moving foothold is all but as good as
a fixed one.
On moraine the axe is always our third leg of balance. On long
moraines, or in traversing up or across scree slopes, it saves labour
in the task of choosing stones to follow close behind another man, and
let the swing of his feet draw yours mechanically on to the footholds
he has used.
To descend light scree is one of the chief rewards of a long climbing
day: to descend big scree one of its worst penances. The method falls
more properly under the section devoted to Glissading.
UNUSUAL ROCK
Unsound rock is counterchecked by an intensification of sound method.
To unusual rock we retort by an extension of our usual method. It would
exaggerate its importance to discuss its varieties in greater detail
than has seemed sufficient in the case of normal rock. A few instances
will serve to show that our principles remain, for all rock, unaltered.
Slate has an insidious surface. The exposed edges, or spillikins, of
strata may always break under a pull, unless they have allowed us to
grasp a sufficiency of thickness. But slate has a worse trick. In
chimney climbing, if we are using the usually safe and gentle hold of
a thrust with the flat foot, or a press or push hold with the hand,
against even a wide, smooth surface, the upper skin may crack locally
at an uncertain distance from the point of pressure and allow foot or
hand to shoot into space; and this always, unless the thrust is applied
exactly at right angles to the lie of the strata. Our only safeguard is
to extend to push and press holds on slate our practice with pull holds
in general, and keep the direction of the pressure constant through all
our lifting movement.
Quartz ledges and bands, which are the grateful solutions of many of
our cliff problems, are treacherous. Quartz brittles off, in crystals
or in masses, in unexpected directions. We cannot test it adequately
until our full weight comes upon it; when it may be too late. And so
we never step on to projecting quartz, or scale the vertical face of a
seam, unless we have hand or foot hold upon good rock above or below
it. Happily, quartz seams are usually narrow. We prefer soft-soled
shoes, which will distribute the pressure over the uneven facets.
Boot-nails snap the projecting crystals or slide on the flat facets,
especially after rain. The fingers similarly must take general holds,
and not trust to salient prisms. The direction of the growth of the
crystals can guide us in applying our pressures. A seam lying back at
a steep angle sometimes leaves good rock holds along its edges, where
quartz and rock have weathered at an unequal rate. A seam at a gentle
angle as often provides a delightful traverse of escape.
Soft sandstone, which in quarries and elsewhere is frequently used
as a practice ground, has its own fashion of soft crumbling and its
own body of hardened adherents. Its outlines are recognizable, and
in mountain masses we avoid it altogether. But those who attempt it
locally must remember that it is peculiarly deceptive for footwork. Its
ledges dissolve under a stiff boot. Sand shoes, or still better, boots,
are the only wear. Beginners should look for lines of ascent where
the subjacent heaps are still uncarted and propitious in the event of
failure. Old sandstone, when it emerges, is firmer for the feet but
offers little handhold, and makes very fatiguing climbing.
Chalk, and the methods of dealing with it, form a study by themselves.
Chalk climbing provides the missing link between rock and ice
technique. Those who frequent its cliffs use big claws and ice
methods, and pronounce it to be an unrivalled training for ice work.
Its occasional hard surface and its abundant projecting flints, whose
security is in inverse ratio to their graspability, have to be treated
with the measures of precaution proper to unsound rock.
Marble builds peaks of imposing outline, but its edges are not
constructed with an eye to good foot climbing. Its surfaces, where
exposed, slope against us; its slipperiness dictates the use of soft
soles; while the rubble with which it is cumbered makes soft soles
comfortless. It has appeared to me more often dangerous than difficult.
Old lava is as tiresome as quartz, and less often available as a last
resource. Desperately hard for the feet, it yet snaps out in diamond
cubes and litters with wrenching rubble its already jarring surface. I
know of no sound climbs upon it.
Gritstone has its own devotees and a growing literature. Its climbs and
their mosaic perils have all the charm of a well-executed miniature.
Limestone, as the layman uses the term, is deceitful, and offers
ridiculously little good climbing in proportion to the amount of it
that protrudes plausibly from the surface of Europe. One of the closest
escapes I have experienced was from a spontaneous fall of limestone
rock on a venerable and bland-looking western cliff. In the form of
‘dolomite’ it offers very agreeable sharp-edged dwarf-climbs even
in our islands, and it is to be regretted we have so little of good
stature.
[Sidenote: In Quarries.]
Scrambling in home quarries, on chalk, gravel, blue-stone,--all kinds
of rock,--is excellent practice. The surfaces are, however, raw and
untempered by time, and the crude fractures and ledges by which we
climb are made by man and survive by no natural law of the fittest.
No experience of rock structure can therefore suffice to allow of
calculation upon their security. Each hold must be separately tested
before use. The risk is generally out of all proportion to the height.
A rope from above should be used on any passage of doubt.
[Sidenote: Along Sea Cliffs.]
Sea cliffs have many votaries. It is perhaps ungrateful to class them
as unusual rock, but their unfamiliar conditions, their wave-polished
and often undercut bases, their summits artificially sculptured and
constantly strained and fractured afresh by the fall of the cliff
below, exclude them from a normal category. Their charm lies in their
variety of rock, revealed in forms pensive, brooding, surprised,
jovial or defiant, upon headland, island and stack. There are few more
exhilarating scrambles than the granite outcrops of Cornwall, set
in green seas, surf-spray and sunlight. The upper end of the coast
of Sutherlandshire alone provides eight or nine different varieties
of rock, and therefore of ascents. The whole island of Sark can be
circumambulated at about the mid-height of its cliffs.
Traverses are the peculiar property of sea cliffs, which are often
awkward or impossible of approach from their base for more direct
ascent. Whole days, in fact if it were desirable a whole holiday
lifetime of delightfully varied traversing at different levels may
be had along the cliffs, high or low, of the west coasts of Scotland
and of its islands, of Ireland, of England, and of parts of Wales.
The north coast of Ireland has attractive sections alternating in
this instance with pinnacles and scarps of decadent blends. Usually
the return from such traverses can be made in the evening up a gully,
by which we resume, if we wish, on the morrow. As a last resource in
difficulties there is always the sea for a header of escape.
Rubber soles are the best wear; or, for some varieties, raw soft hide
with the hair on, as worn in the west of Ireland; but rubber is, of
course, treacherous on wet or weedy tidal rocks. This fact should be
remembered in our stimulating races with the waves for the foot of a
promising crack.
During the novitiate even hardy heads must beware of the intimidating,
often vertiginous, effect produced by the constant movement of water
below the feet. Both the sound and the motion are found to react almost
unconsciously upon toughened climbing nerves.
The cliffs of the east coast of England consist too often of subsiding
clay and water, or of a hard pebbly conglomerate; but they provide at
least unusual climbing.
A good earth glissade can occasionally be found down their rifts;
and every section affords opportunity for a cautious scramble or an
ingenious trick route. On the harder earth and pebble mixtures there
is sometimes occasion for step-cutting practice. The cliff edges
frequently overhang, and present all the dangers of unseen cornices if
approached from above, and more than their difficulties if reached from
below.
Boots are best on these east cliffs. Vertigo is unknown, since the
waves are all too rarely in close proximity to the cliffs!
Ireland, on the east, is more fortunate; it possesses some fine firm
stacks and cliffs. Parts also of the east cliffs of Scotland are
excellent.
[Sidenote: On Freaks.]
Some regions are rich in incidental pillars, pinnacles, stacks,
needles, pins, fingers, boulders, erratics (‘off-comduns’),
Wellington’s Noses, Grey Ladies, Devil’s domestic utensils, or their
fantastic like. It is difficult to connect the records of their
(periodic) first conquests with any general principles except those
forming the groundwork of a local literary reputation. A long rope over
the summit would seem to be the preliminary to many such a climb, and
statuesque photography its culmination. But between these extremes a
peripatetic climber can find many joyous and gentle passages, where he
may even remain anonymous if he goes armed only with such sound method
as the type of rock suggests, and shod with soft soles. One experienced
companion would be found of more service than many onlookers; and a
tradition of classical mountaineering demands that the rope between two
men should not pass over the summit before either has started. To save
time, once, when we were crossing a series of smooth needles two of us
agreed to climb continuously, in the hope that if the man descending
on the far side of one needle slipped (as was the more probable) the
man on its near side would be assisted to the summit more quickly by
the rope; and so no impulse would be wasted. Unhappily, it was the rear
man, ascending, who slipped, and at a moment when, owing to the length
of the rope, the front man was already himself ascending the next
needle. Neither, at all events, was left long in suspense.
Bouldering is the pleasantest of off-day distractions; but too many
men allow themselves to spend the time on the merely difficult. Its
use should be for safe exercises on rules of style. When you can climb
an easy block without your hands, or balance up a wall with such light
finger-hold that a friend can pass his hand under yours, or have
discovered how to solve a shelf climb by a push hold and a twisting
arm-lever, you have made a fair test that will be of future use. To
wrestle up pure difficulty, such as you would not attempt in exposed
higher climbing, by dint of muscle and strenuosity, proves nothing and
does no good; it only reduces the restful value of the off-day. Our
object on such unusual rock should be to extract from it the soundest
practice for our usual method.
CLIMBING DOWN
It is more difficult to climb down than to climb up. So long as the
majority of rock climbers continued to grip and struggle, they could
find no pleasure in descending. The characters of our hills abetted the
neglect. The labour of the day went in finding the steep climb and then
forcing a way up it; there remained for the evening too great a choice
of easy slopes to run down. Even in the Alps the habit followed the
early rock climber; he was too ready to choose a peak “which would give
plenty of sport on the ascent, and an easy snow-route down.” During our
gully and grip epochs, when this self-imposed limitation was almost
universal, rock climbing reached its furthest point of divergence from
real mountaineering. The development of balance climbing perforce
broke down the tradition. Climbing down had to be learned when really
big mountaineering was attempted. Where mountains have no easy ways
down, it is as important to be able to descend as to ascend. On new or
difficult climbs the method and time-calculation for a return in case
of failure call for more forethought than the ascent itself.
But beyond this, climbing down was discovered to have its own pleasure
as motion. A good climber in training, and descending upon rock that
gives continuous hold, enjoys a sense of swift restrained rhythm, and a
rushing thrill through his own extremities, that has something of the
pleasure of flying and a pleasure from quick light contacts that even
flying does not possess. His hands and feet appear to adhere almost
accidentally underneath him, like the spokes of a revolving rimless
wheel. They move across a sound hold with his change of balance rather
than check him at each contact. His eye has selected a whole succession
of small holds ahead, or rather afoot. He balances down them as a
complementary sequence. He does not ask of every hold that it should
become the basis for a fresh beginning. ‘Touch and pass’ as contrasted
with ‘grip and hang’ perhaps sums up the method.
Of course each hold must in itself be adequate to check and direct the
passage of the body, otherwise momentum is acquired, and the method
might be defined with justice as only a fine fashion of falling. The
check is distributed over a series of holds, each of which serves only
to retard the downward movement just sufficiently to direct it, with
no acquired impetus, on to the next hold. The holds on such a passage
complement one another. Each is used transiently but safely, because
the action of the next is anticipated. The definite arrest-points of
course occur, but they are selected by the eye at longer convenient
intervals.
To read rock holds and their balance values ahead in this fashion
requires a more practised eye and judgment than were needed merely
to decide on the reliability of the next grip hold. It was this art
of the longer glance, the practice of descending as a regulated
movement rather than as a succession of stances and rests, which rock
climbers neglected, and still too largely neglect. The shortness of
our island climbs, as our young climbers increased in numbers and in
ambition, drove them to the discovery of a rapid progression of more
and more difficult variations. These climbs could not be ascended
‘continuously.’ The art of continuous up-climbing was almost forgotten,
and with it disappeared any idea that continuous down-climbing need
even be practised. The strenuous up-climb exhausted our interest
in a particular series of problems; the prospect of a similarly
‘interrupted’ descent of the same places seemed rather boring; in fact,
we preferred to run down an easy way, and begin upon a new ascent of
new problems. Climbing down joined climbing continuously, up or down,
in a limbo, from which it had to be desperately rescued when we went to
the Alps or to regions of longer climbs.
Some years ago, on perceiving that the neglect was spoiling the style
and achievement of climber after climber of the British school who came
out to the Alps, I ventured to publish something of a protest. Happily
this made a few important converts. And now it would appear that the
evil spell is broken. No good cragsman would nowadays seem to be happy
until he has done his fine rock climb both ways; a few are beginning
to specialize upon descents. The admirable practice of traversing or
‘girdling’ great cliffs, which involves the ascent and descent of the
steepest sections of many difficult climbs, has finally placed climbing
up and climbing down on a footing of mountaineering equality. It may be
said that this result was inevitable once balance climbing had come to
its own. Once the eye and the body were set free from their confining
and convulsive habit, it could not be long before hands and feet opened
up the new ways of pleasure in moving downwards and sideways as readily
as upward.
We have made a great step in advance: we practise climbing down as an
art in Britain, but we have still a long way to go in developing our
practice of ‘continuous’ climbing, down even more than up. I have seen
the start of many of our finest island rock climbers in the Alps, men
whose feats on difficult rock still stand unsurpassed, and I have never
seen one who, when he came out, was even the equal of a good average
guide in continuous going on moderate or steep rock, especially in
descending. These men quickly recognized their defect when they saw the
styles contrasted, and set themselves to correct it. But others, who
have gone guideless and never enjoyed the opportunity of comparison,
have continued even in the Alps their interrupted method and,
consequently, have achieved a degree of performance in no way equal to
their real standard of climbing ability. A very illuminating instance
was that of one of the greatest of our rock pioneers, whose style was
as finished and deliberate as his enterprise was remarkable. After many
years of climbing in our islands, with an unrivalled record, and of
climbing guideless in the Alps, with practically nothing to show for
it, he spent one season, later in life, with a fast first-class guide.
As a result he, admittedly, changed his whole habit, and subsequently
climbed with an accomplished continuity that without diminishing his
security multiplied his amount of performance three and four fold.
Climbing down requires more practice than climbing up, because the
mechanism of the body is contrived more conveniently for upward
movement, and because we have eyes in our head and not in our toes or
heels. The eye has to learn to select its holds from awkward angles.
The hands and feet have to learn accurately to follow the eye’s choice,
in movements mechanically more difficult to execute. Consequently
in descending the inclination to grip and hang becomes even stronger
than in ascending, and until the right attitudes become instinctive it
requires some resolution to force the body steadily outward until it is
in balance over its footholds and is not depending from the hands.
Once the natural impediments are mastered the gain to pace and to
security which we obtain from our balance and foot method soon makes
even the memory of our desire to cling strange. The muscular strain
is less. We are free to use the friction of the body, in any part, to
regulate the pace or suggest direction. The body descends naturally on
to firm positions on the feet, and stands ready without readjustment of
balance or holds to give any assistance required to the man below on
the rope.
It is on continuous descending, and on the management of the rope this
involves, that the improvement in our method has had most effect.
The principle of descent in balance is to keep face outwards or face
sideways as long as possible. In such positions our eye commands both
the whole rope and the rock almost continuously, and we can decide at
any instant whether we should proceed, or pause, or tauten the rope on
the man below.
It is almost startling to see a first-class mountaineer come down steep
rock, as last man, in a series of well-timed rushes, while he still
protects the continuous descent of his less expert front-men. He never
allows the rope to slacken. He keeps the safety check while the man in
front is moving; but in any intervals his lightning rushes make up the
necessary ground.
In descending, a slight tension of the rope is sufficient to check a
weak climber, whereas in going up he would have required a hard pull;
and a light guide or a quick amateur, judging his moments well, can
‘anchor’ and secure the safe descent of a whole rope of heavy-weights
below him, and yet never check their progress while he interpolates his
own flights of descent.
[Sidenote: Positions.]
In descending, so long as is conveniently possible, and practice alone
discovers how much longer the position is tenable than appears to us at
first, the face should be kept turned outward.
So soon as the outward position becomes insecure, that is, when
nothing but holds for the heels present themselves and the balance is
felt to be thrust out by the steepness of the rock beyond the feet,
thus throwing a clinging strain upon the hands, the body should be
turned sideways to the rock.
Only as a last extremity, on perpendicular or overhanging rock where
the eye is no longer of use to find footholds, should the face be
turned in to the rock, in the position most natural for ascending.
[Sidenote: Facing Outward.]
In the face-outward position the action of the feet remains still that
of the balance step. For easy movement footholds should be selected,
if the choice offers, outside, to right and left of the vertical
descending line, rather than directly below the body. The legs are
used as tense springs to break the jar. In fact, the motion is that of
‘dancing down.’ The heels are little used; the toes and sides of the
feet take the holds, much as in ascending. The hands have to find their
hang holds or pressure holds at the level of the thighs or knees. For
the hang holds the knuckles are turned backwards, on either side of
the body, and the fingers grip the rock much as in ascending. For the
pressure holds the heels of the hands are pressed downward on to the
ledges, close to the sides, and rest in the position of a reversed push
hold. It should be remembered that this last fashion of hold, always
the most tempting in starting a descending movement, becomes useless
and even dangerous because of the outward thrust of the arm, so soon
as the waist has sunk below the level of the hands. For this reason,
before lowering down on this hold we must make sure that the reach for
the leg to the next foothold will be short.
In the face-outward position the hands can be relieved of much of their
effort in holding by the backward or sideways pressures of the calf, of
the back of the thigh, or even of the elbow or shoulder, against the
rock. A twist of the firm knee in a convenient angle of the rock, or a
sidelong ‘steady’ with the heel of the firm foot against the back or
side of its rock hold, gives us often balance enough to allow the other
foot to descend without using the hands at all. This is what is really
happening in the ‘rushing’ movements alluded to above. The expert is
using any and every part of him, from ankle to elbow or shoulder, for
friction and balance touches while his feet descend; and consequently
he has both hands free to tighten or pull in the rope as he goes, even
in mid step. The eyes, since they can see uninterruptedly, guide the
feet accurately. Elbows, legs, thighs, etc., by judicious touches help
out the balance and relieve the hands to a large extent for other work.
[Sidenote: Facing Sideways.]
The sideways position, which is admirably adapted for balanced
climbing, is still all too seldom practised. Climbers instinctively
turn face inward the instant the holds get small or the rocks steep.
But to turn sideways is safer, because the eye can see both holds
and rope, and the body is in a good position to adjust itself for
anchoring; it is better suited to the normal lie of holds, because
holds rarely occur in vertical sequence on rock, and a diagonal descent
is often possible where direct descent is interrupted; and it is more
in balance. For in the sideways position the single hand employed
takes the natural hold, such as it is accustomed to use in ascending:
either a cling hold, or even more often a lower push hold reinforced
by an inward curving of the arm towards the rock as a lever. The outer
hand is left free to manage the rope or to use the axe. The feet fall
naturally into position on the ledges, with the side of the foot, and
not merely the toe, on the hold. The flex of the knee and thigh works
parallel to the face of the rock; and neither the bending of the knee,
as happens while descending face inward, nor the curve of the flank,
as in descending face outward, can get in the way of an easy lowering
of the body above the firm foot. The climber also, as he leans out to
the full length of one arm, is far more free to prospect his descent
in advance. Lastly, while actually more comfortably balanced, a man
so descending is in a better discretionary position to adopt any
alternative attitude, face inward or outward, by a half turn on the
foot, according as his larger range of vision advises.
In traversing the big ridges or crossing the great rock faces of the
Alps a large proportion of the climbing must be done in this sideways
attitude. Economy of effort, ease of balance, and the carriage of rope
and axe in a free hand demand it. The technique is one that it is
essential to master, and once acquired it will be found to become the
normal position for pace and comfort in descending.
[Sidenote: Facing Inward.]
It is the exception when the conditions make it imperative to turn the
body face inward. The occasions are the descent of vertical or rounded
convex surfaces, of overhanging ‘cave pitches’ and the like, where the
holds do not permit of an upright or balanced position, and where the
legs have to be swung in underneath and out of sight in order to find
the next holds for the feet.
Here, if it is more than the question of a step or so, there can be
no question of the whole party moving together. The rope is therefore
dropped from the hand, since both hands will be needed to lower the
whole weight during the movement. As soon as the feet can find hold,
the balance should be readjusted upon them, and the eyes set free to
look round again and prospect. Even though it may appear to be more
comfortable and safe to continue in a jammed or face inward position
after it ceases to be absolutely indispensable, the inclination should
be resisted. The longer the duration of the face inward descent, the
longer must continue the interruption to the advance of the whole rope.
It is one of the principal objections to this position, which is
individually safe enough, that it necessitates an interruption and
break of rhythm for the party. Climbers, from an instinct of safety,
turn into it too frequently, and continue it too long, in places where
a sideways descent if the problem be a slab, or a face outward straddle
if it be a steep chimney, would be the correcter and quicker method.
It is not only retarding in its effect on the rope, it is always slow
in actual performance. Men move into it ponderously and reluctantly
if they have been face outwards before. They continue in it slowly,
because they cannot see and are using clinging methods; and a natural
reluctance to take the slight risk of turning round again before they
have reached a large ‘turning’ stance makes them keep the position
usually longer than the difficulties demand. Meanwhile the whole party
waits.
If a man is a practised sideways climber he can turn into this face
inward attitude when necessary, and out again the moment he finds
balance foothold, with a minimum of check to the rope. From a sideways
position he has only got to bring round his other hand, and he is ready
to climb face inward for as long as he has estimated will be needed.
[Sidenote: Down Chimneys or Cracks.]
In jamming down chimneys or cracks the face outward or sideways
positions are always to be preferred. The eye, free to select, can
generally find footholds close or far out on the side-walls, which
would be invisible to the face inward position. If these holds fail,
the jam with outstretched arms, or knee or thigh or shoulder against
the containing walls, is still always safer for a man in the outward
and sideways attitudes, unless he be on an absolute overhang. At the
same time, since his hands are free in descending sideways or outwards,
he can still manage the rope even in his moments of descent, and so
save any check to the progress of the party. Whereas in the face inward
position the hands are useless except for holds. I have seen a guide
serpentining down a crack of this sort, face outward, by the pressure
of his shoulders and thighs against the walls alone. The fact that he
was free to watch the party even while he moved down enabled him to
anticipate the slip of a climber below; and he took the whole pull
upon one quick outward pressure of his knees and arms against the side
walls. An average climber, with the slightest of holds for his feet, in
this attitude can hold practically any usual weight. It is a question
of balance and judgment.
[Sidenote: The Rope in Continuous Descent.]
To secure the safety of the party on the descent a right position
will do much. A man who climbs face outward or face sideways is ready
mechanically to take a very considerable and sudden strain. But a right
use of the rope over the accidents of the rock will enable him to do
still more. On steep or unsound rock we are always on guard against the
unexpected slip or the breaking hold. Therefore, while on the rope,
we note at every step how we are placed to take a jerk. If we are all
moving together down steep rock we note, as we pass, every corner or
point round which we could with a single motion of the hand throw the
rope as an ‘anchor’ in case a man below us slipped. If we are all
moving quickly, and therefore presumably a safe party, we need not
do more than note them. But if the party is weak, or we are moving
interruptedly, then, no matter how easy our own sector, we should not
only note but use points suitable for the anchor.
It must be remembered that such anchoring on a descent is designed to
assure the balance of the stationary man, in case of a sudden jerk;
and only indirectly to support the man descending below. The actual
pull of a slip, if it comes, should be taken up on the arm, but never
directly on the rock anchorage. It is useful for every one to practise
this cursive anchoring on any descent which is too steep to allow of
the party moving really rapidly together. There will be time then to
swing the rope over and off the points as we pass them, without check.
Once the trick is acquired, the eye will go on instinctively always
selecting the anchors, but the actual movements we can discontinue.
Habit will at once make the movements actual again wherever
expedient,--on all descents of medium difficulty, or on easy descents
where a slip might have dangerous consequences, such as the edge of a
lofty ridge, or an easy gallery above a sheer wall.
[Sidenote: The Doubled Rope.]
It is a sound general rule that a climber has never been justified
in going on up where he finds that he cannot get down without fixing
a rope. Now that good cragsmen consider nothing mastered unless it
has been climbed both ways, the occasions for the fixed rope are or
should be rare. But there are exceptions, and in such cases we use the
‘doubled rope.’
The first would be the case of a party descending by a line which they
have not previously ascended, or which has never been ascended or
descended at all--a not infrequent experience in making new traverses
of peaks. In this case a doubled rope may be the only method of
descending a holdless passage. But when he employs it in such places
a climber is again taking a serious responsibility, supposing that
he judges it to be a place which he could not reascend. He must be
certain from observation that the rest of the descent will go below,
or he will be cutting off his retreat unjustifiably. If he cannot make
sufficiently certain, the doubled rope should be left behind so that
the reascent may be possible if a return becomes necessary.
The second exception is the change that is often produced by a change
of weather. A fall of snow, or an ice-glazing on the rocks, may make a
descent both difficult and dangerous where the ascent on dry rocks was
sound. In this case constant use of the doubled rope may be the only
chance of ensuring a safe descent. Such changes are not infrequent in
the British Isles as well as in the Alps, and they are the most trying
occasions in a mountaineer’s experience. A picnic ascent of an easy
buttress may be, and has been in Wales, turned by a light shower of
rain, freezing immediately into a coat of verglas on the rocks, into a
dangerous duel of descent against darkness and difficulty; and a joyous
frolic up the walls of an aiguille above the Mer de Glace, owing to a
hailstorm that coated the rocks with freezing particles, has become a
prolonged wrestle with fate, demanding painful hours where the ascent
took minutes, and necessitating the descent of almost every foot of
the thousand-metre wall by each man in turn on the ‘long rope’ or the
‘doubled rope.’
The third exception is when it is necessary for the last man to save
time in a race with darkness. Then, after letting the rest down, he
follows on the ‘double’ as fast as he can.
And the last is the rare case when it is expressly intended to force
the descent of a passage which has defeated all attempts to ascend. In
such case we use all the help that we need for safety.
The double rope can be used in these cases of difficulty or haste to
assist the descent of every member of a party. Usually it is only to
protect the last man.
The method of using the ‘double’ is to lay the rope round any point
or knob which prevents it slipping off under an outward and downward
strain, and from which it can be conveniently released by pull or flick
from below. If such a generally comfortable point is not discoverable,
a length of the rope should be cut off and knotted into a secure sling,
which is wound in a triple coil round any excrescence good enough to
hold it permanently secure. The triple coil cannot break under the
friction, and allows the rope to play through more easily. The rope to
be used is then passed through the sling.
Some climbers carry ready-made slings; others favour iron rings, which
they slip on to the slings, and then pass the rope through the ring.
The rope runs more easily, but I have never liked the practice. A ring
can never be carried of sufficient size to use on more than a single
thickness of rope, to say nothing of a safe triple sling. And not only
is the single sling more likely to snap under the rub of the hard ring
as we descend than under the more springy pull of another rope passed
through it, but if left it is more likely to be a danger to the next
party descending. Guides are always ready to use a finished-looking
piece of mechanism, like a ring on a loop, without testing it fully,
where they would be suspicious of a mere weathered sling of rope. The
metal reassures just where it should warn them; for the ring, where it
touches, will have rusted into and eaten the rope strands. The same
point comes up under the heading of Pegs and Aids.
It must always be remembered that the use of the sling or ring involves
unroping, which the ‘double’ on a good belay does not; and in so far it
uses more time.
For short descents the last man can use the slack of the rope between
himself and the next man as a double, provided he sees that, when
doubled, it will allow him to descend as far as his next stance, and
there leave him slack enough to flick it off the belay.
He should always use the double as a fixed rope, that is, it should
never be paid out to him round the belay, as he descends, by the man
below; nor should he ever attempt to pay it out to himself as he
descends on the double. Either attempt will certainly fray the rope
round the belay, possibly jam it, and probably jerk it off the belay.
For any considerable height it is better to use a spare doubled rope.
In this case the last man can at once see if the two ends of the double
reach to the next stance below. If no spare rope is available, the next
man below may have to unrope, in order to leave the last man enough to
double and descend upon.
If the descent is of exceptional difficulty, e.g. an overhang, a spare
rope should always be used. The second, or climbing, rope round the
last man’s waist is then held by the man below, as a protection in case
the effort of clinging to the double exhausts the last man’s hands; or,
still better, it also can be laid over the belay and paid out to him,
lightly, as he descends. As it will then be sliding upon the fixed
rope, and there will be no strain upon it, it will be the less likely
to jam on the belay, fray or jump off.
To descend on the double the last man grasps both ropes in his hands
immediately below the belay, drawing them taut before he starts to
see that the belay is rightly arranged for the strain. He descends,
using what footholds he can on the rock, or, failing them, by frankly
swarming down. If he is unroped from his party, and using the only
rope as a double, a protection in case of a slip is to tie both ends
of the doubled rope to his own waist before descending. The arms in
such descending should be kept bent. The most trying point is just
before he reaches the stance, where the double ropes are resting on the
ledge and are no longer kept taut by their own weight in suspension.
If the climber is using one of the leg brakes below described, its
tension will still keep the ropes taut for his hands. If not, and he is
descending by hands alone, finding what foothold he can upon the rocks,
he should get the man below to pull on the ends of the two ropes and
keep them taut till he is down. If he is descending first of the party,
and therefore there is no one below, a convenient device to the same
end is to sling his sack down on the end of the ropes and leave it just
suspended.
[Sidenote: Brakes].
Gloves protect the hands; but long descents are often too great a
strain for amateur fingers, and the chance of their slipping or
cramping cannot be risked. In this case one of the following leg brakes
should be used. Experienced climbers always use them where footholds
fail, for however short a distance.
_The Foot Brake._--This is the commonest device in gymnasium
rope-climbing. The body is turned sideways to the rock, the double
rope inside it. The twin ropes are caught up under the sole of the
inside boot and out over the instep of the outside boot. The boot edges
are clenched upon the ropes between them, and the amount of friction
over the boots resulting allows the weight, with small effort of boot
clenching, to slip in easy control down the ropes. The body is kept
upright by the hands grasping the rope above.
_The Thigh Brake._--This is the most frequently used in the Alps, as
rock descents are seldom entirely vertical or overhanging, and a sudden
extrusion of rock under the feet when using the foot brake upsets the
balance; whereas with the thigh brake the body can lie sideways against
a projecting or convex curve of rock, and slide down the boss, swinging
to the perpendicular again where it ends, without effort at balancing.
The right method is to turn sideways to the rock, slightly raise the
_outside_ thigh, pass the double rope under it high up between the
legs, and grip the farther lengths of rope so passed with the outside
hand, palm upwards. The inside hand grasps the tightened ropes above,
with bent arm, at about the level of the head. The outside hand, by
lowering or lifting the slack lengths below or above the level of the
raised thigh, diminishes or increases the friction of the rope round
the thigh, and so controls the pace. If a complete rest is needed, the
outside hand merely brings up its double rope to join that held by the
inside hand, and a very light clasp of the two hands together on the
four ropes so united, aided by the almost total arrest of the rope
passing under the thigh, easily stops the descent. It is a mistake, but
a frequent one, to start the rope round the _inside_ thigh. Round the
outside thigh is safer and more comfortable; and it leaves the inside
leg free to use any foothold that turns up.
The same fashion of brake can be used under the foot instead of under
the outside raised thigh. But this necessitates holding the leg very
rigid, and makes it more difficult to balance. Nor does the rope run as
smoothly under the boot as under the thigh.
_The Body Brake._--This brake, which has several variants, need
practically never be used. The amount of friction introduced demands
of a climber almost more effort to push his way down the rope in
constricting jerks than he would use in swarming down it without a
brake at all. The simplest form is to pass the double rope under both
thighs slightly bent, back, across and in front of the body, and out,
round and behind the shoulders, to the control of the outside hand.
_The Chair._--As I am dealing with these devices, a note upon this
may not be out of place. Except for an injured man it can rarely be
required in descending; although I have, on occasion, employed it for a
beginner who could not be trusted to manage any form of brake that left
anything to his discretion. But it may be found of use in excessively
difficult passages of ascent, where the leader has only got through
with great difficulty and where the possibility of a less brilliant
member of his following having to be hauled up clear on the rope and
remain suspended for a perceptible time makes it necessary to find
some sort of attachment that will not suffocate him. Men vary in their
resistance, but no man can hang clear, on a rope tied round his chest,
for more than two minutes without partial suffocation and considerable
pain. In ascending, both hands are needed for climbing, and no form of
the usual descending brake is therefore suitable. The chair is formed
by making two easy loops for the thighs opposite one another on the
rope, secured by a sound central knot (triple bowline). Through these
loops the climber passes his legs, as through breeches. If he then
straightens his thighs, he can sit in easy balance in the loops; but
as security against falling out backwards he should knot a scarf or
cord round his body and make it fast to the main rope in front of him.
In this chair he is perfectly free to climb and use his hands and feet
so long as they help him; and when he slips off, he swings comfortably
clear in his loops. He has only to remember to keep his body and thighs
straight, so as not to sag backwards and downwards out of the slings.
The men above do the rest. The chair is much used by bird’s-nesting
cliff climbers, who desire to keep their hands free, and who may have
to remain suspended for long periods.
[Sidenote: Springing the Rope.]
After the last man is down on the double rope comes the crucial moment,
when the rope has to be run or ‘sprung’ off the belay from below.
Nothing is more irritating, or of more frequent occurrence, than to
find that the double rope, after running a certain distance round the
belay, has stuck, and that a laborious and often hazardous reascent,
trusting to its partial attachment, is necessary in order to release
it. If the belay has been well chosen, or the sling well fixed, it
ought to run without difficulty. To pull it off without hitch it is
essential first to see that there is no knot in it, especially at the
running end, where the fatal knot beloved of guides and many amateurs,
for purposes of their waist-noose, generally lurks as a permanent
threat.
The rope should be pulled round the belay slowly but continuously at
first; any re-start implies a dangerous jerk that may entangle the
loose end as it jumps about. The last ten feet are the danger, for the
short, swinging loose end may at any second jam or catch round the taut
rope in its dance. To break any slight friction or hitch, and give the
end of the rope a springing release from its belay, these last few feet
should be rushed with a sharp continuous pull by two or more of the
party, who must then look out for their heads!
If there is not sufficient rope to allow of its being used as a double
rope down the whole descent required to the next stance, it is possible
to attach a ring to one end, and, putting the end with the ring round
the belay, to pass the hanging rope through the ring, making a sort of
running noose. The rope is then used as a single, not a double, fixed
rope for descent. To loosen it afterwards, it is necessary at the start
to tie an equal length of light cord to the ring. This is pulled from
below, dragging the ring downwards and the rope after it round the
belay. I have never liked the method, and never seen it work properly.
It incurs all the disadvantages of the rope jamming, and of the single
sling breaking, and gives only a single thickness of slight alpine rope
to climb down. It is very rare that a climber cannot reach some sort
of a stance by using all the rope he has, as a double, even if he has
no spare rope. If he has, for security, to let the rest of the party
down farther to some larger platform on the whole rope used as a ‘long
rope,’ as last man he can usually find some half-way stance sufficient
to let him pull the ‘double’ down after him. He can then refix it, or,
failing a belay, descend the rest of the passage without the double,
first roping on again to the men below, and directed and helped by
their advice as to his holds.
[Sidenote: The Long Rope.]
It infrequently happens on big descents that weather conditions, giant
slabs or deciduous holds make it necessary for a party while descending
to move down greater distances, in order to find safe stances, than
their allowances of rope will permit. Sometimes each member of the
party will have to be lowered a hundred feet or more, not once, but
several times in succession. This does not necessarily imply that no
holds are to be found over all this distance, or that the individuals
are not able to climb much of it unaided. But once unroping has become
necessary, and the time it takes is lost in any case, it is quicker and
safer to let each man down the full length of the whole rope at once,
so as to reach some really secure stance where he can stay unroped in
safety while the next descends. The whole object, then, should be to
save as much time as possible. The best way is for two men to remain
in charge of the rope above, one directing and lowering, the other
anchoring and paying out. Neither of them need necessarily be attached
to the rope, provided it is well secured. The moment the man below
reaches safety he should untie, without losing a second. Meanwhile, the
next man to come can already have tied on to the other loose end above,
and be beginning his descent. While one man above holds him the other
pulls up the loosened rope from the man who has finished descending.
If the rope is long enough, and the men prompt and not ‘loose stone
kickers,’ two men, at sufficient intervals, can be descending at the
one time, on either end of the rope; while the two ropes are managed,
one for each of them, by the lowerer and by the anchor man above.
(In descending easy rocks with two beginners or weak climbers, a
variant on the same method serves excellently to save time. The expert
ties himself on to the rope between them, and lets them both descend,
at intervals, ahead of him. He holds both their ropes meanwhile, and he
follows himself when they reach security. The same economical method
can be used in ascending easy rocks with a like party.)
The last man, when the party has used the ‘long rope’ and the rocks
baffle even _his_ skill in employing short, crafty ‘doubles,’ does
best, if he has a good second, to keep him close to him when their turn
comes to descend. He lets the second down to the nearest place he can
stand at all, and uses a double or a shuffle down to him, helped by
his directions or arms. Two good men thus weaving spells together, and
keeping the cauldron bubbling, can shepherd one another down passages
of toil and trouble where a last man would require constant ‘doubles’
to help him, but would conjure them in vain alone; and where the rest
may have had to submit to the full witch-dance of a descent upon the
long rope.
PEGS AND AIDS
Artificial aids have never been popular with us. If a climber does not
feel safe in descending, he ought to practise on rock which he can
climb, not spoil rock which he cannot with blacksmith’s leavings. If a
security greater than rock can afford him remains his object, it would
be more consistent to fix up a ladder or windlass at once. I am told
that a delightful contrivance--a pulley or block--has been advertised,
which enables the climber to haul himself up or down without effort. As
to how we may fix the pulley to draw ourselves up, or unfasten it after
we have descended, we have clearly only to adopt the method followed by
Baron Munchausen when he descended from the moon on a short rope--and
the thing is done!
For those who cannot climb down in Britain there is always an easy way
round. The only two pegs I can recall having seen in our hills were
left by two foreigners, and were not needed.
In big mountaineering there may be more excuse. A descent may have
really become more difficult, even unsafe, owing to the coming on of
darkness or the glazing of rocks.
In such case, pegs to hammer in and anchor to are a remedy for
our failures, our failure to carry on, to adjust the climb to the
day-length, or to watch the weather. Their use then is corrective, not
auxiliary. My party has taken pegs three times in all, as a precaution,
and used one once (on a new descent where the precise ‘impossible’
passage had been previously located). Pegs taken for this purpose
should be short and sharp, and sheathed for carriage in pocket or sack.
They should be made with a ring or eye to pass the rope through. They
are smitten in and out as convenience and the rock dictate.
Pegs should never be left as memorials. Prongs and rings poked
permanently into popular routes are more harmful than helpful. The
mountaineer will not need them, and they may mislead him, as they
usually follow the best lowering rather than the best climbing
line. Where fixed irons are placed with fixed ropes attached, as on
the Matterhorn or the Dent du Géant, they spoil the climber and the
climbing alike. They attract feckless folks on to the peaks, and
torment them with the rock-barrages of pantechnicon parties or the
stonier sharp-shooting of daft solitary scramblers.
On the rock peaks of the Eastern Alps, however, the peculiar character
of the climbing has created a different tradition. Already a large
literature has grown up on the subject of mechanical contrivances for
descents. Pitons and ring-pegs and slings are taken and used to an
extent that almost relieves a climber of the need of considering his
descent at all. A practice which is sanctioned by many fine cragsmen
who have developed their methods to suit their own type of rock, and
not ours, must be respected in its own territory. But just as among our
own countrymen the over-use of the rope and of belays has contributed
towards a diminution in individual responsibility and to an increase
in ill-chosen associations, so also the opinion suggests itself that
the over-use of pegs and other contrivances by our colleagues abroad
has led to a recklessness in leading and a disregard of what we mean
by collective safety and power, which have proved even more fatal in
result than our own error. Recently among the best continental experts
there have been indications of a change of doctrine. They are finding,
as we did, that the neglect of the art of _climbing_ down is a definite
bar to achieving success in greater mountaineering.
There would be no purpose in discussing the technicalities of a
practice so little likely to be popular with us.
In ascending, a peg is no protection to a leader, although its
insertion may tempt him perilously to go beyond what he should. His
second man, 50 to 60 feet below him, can give him as much ‘safety’ with
the rope as a rigid peg 10 to 20 feet down. If he has room to drive in
a number of shorter-distance pegs, there should certainly be room for
him to have up his second man. If he has got to run out more than the
50 to 60 feet before he can get a stance, it is useless to waste time
driving in a peg; no rope light enough to run out in this way could be
trusted to stand the jerk of a fall of any height upon a rigid bar or
ring.
On long horizontal or diagonal traverses on very steep rock, pegs may
have a purpose, as a moral support to the leader; although, if he is
free to hammer in pegs and loop ropes, it would probably be better for
him to get on with his leading and get it over. On such a traverse also
a peg may serve to carry the rope, and relieve the waist of some of the
drag from the lengthening run-out.
A peg is really only ‘sound,’ in our sense, for ascending or
traversing, if the rope over it is being ‘played’ by a human being.
Then it may become an extra anchor or belay where natural belays may
be lacking; it can secure a second man while he is looking after the
leader’s rope, and enable him to protect the party below against the
consequences of the fall of the leader above. The occasions are so
rare when a little ingenuity cannot find or contrive a better stance
and anchor out of the natural features than out of a driven peg, that
pegs are seldom worth taking on this chance, except for some known
difficulty.
Any man who feels when he looks at a passage that he wants more
protection behind him than the character of the rock allows his second
man to give him, should not attempt the passage at all. If he decides
to take the risk, he should do so only on his own account, and unrope
from his party. He can send the rope down afterwards, or, in the case
of a traverse, leave them one loose end to hold. As a protection to the
party it is even better to unrope than to drive in pegs to carry the
lengthening rope; and as a protection to more than the _morale_ of the
leader the peg is futile on such passages.
The times when it is justifiable to use pegs on a descent are the
same as I have already mentioned in dealing with rope doubles: the
intentional descent of that which has not or cannot be ascended, the
retreats in worse conditions, or over glazed rock, and the races
against time. The first is a praiseworthy exercise in gymnastics, for
which rings, bars and poles may be taken and used according to taste;
the last two allow of pegs or any other precautionary means we may
have with us being used that may prevent defeat or miscalculation from
becoming disaster.
I can imagine no other cases where a climber should not feel that he
is confessing to incapacity or some misjudgment if he has to fall
back upon pegs and aids to help him to come down what he, or some
other man, has ascended. After one such experience, any conscientious
climber would now set himself to practise climbing down, until he had
remedied a very serious defect in his qualification to rank as a good
mountaineer.
So long as a man depends upon his own hands and feet and his knowledge
of the rock, he remains master of the situation. He has four chances
always in his favour. Whereas, if he is swinging loose from an inserted
artificial peg, he has only one chance; and that one neither so much
under his physical control as his own fingers and toes, nor even as
calculable in its efficiency as a natural rock-borne belay.
THE AXE ON ROCKS
[Sidenote: Its Carriage.]
The axe is only less useful on rocks than on ice and snow. It is at
once a long third leg and a third claw hand of honourable service. Its
correct carriage in walking is important, and must become instinctive.
Guides carry it, and it is the best position, over the hollow of the
elbow, like a gun, with the head under the shoulder, and so turned that
the curve of the pick adheres upward along the shoulder-blade and only
the balanced weight of the shaft rests across the forearm. The only
absolute rule is that, whether carried in hand or over or under the
shoulder, the axe should always be held with the spike end of the shaft
pointing forward. Nothing betrays the beginner or the badly instructed
climber so fatally as an axe swung with the head to the front and the
spike out behind. Habit should be trained so as to avoid this false
position as instinctively as that of carrying a gun with the muzzle
pointing directly to the rear.
Much walking, and all climbing, in the Alps is done in single file.
Even the chance that one of the file may in carelessness swing
up his axe into the wrong position, on path or easy ridge, is a
perpetual threat to the eyes and teeth of anyone following him, and
its possibility, in the person of one ill-trained companion, is an
irritation for the whole party to contemplate. It is one of the
slight jeopardies to harmony which a leader is justified in directly
correcting.
It is best for actual climbing on easy rocks to carry the axe on a
wide, soft sling on the wrist. If then both hands are needed for holds,
it can be safely dropped for the moment on to the sling, and jerked
back again, cup-and-ball fashion, into the hand, without interruption
or the waste of even an arm movement.
If a steeper, and short, passage occurs where the arm must be entirely
free, and the axe on the wrist-sling would hamper movement, the sling
can be thrust right up on to the shoulder. The axe then hangs behind
the body and well out of the way of both arm and leg motions.
On rocks, whenever and wherever practicable, the axe should be carried
in the hand. The machinations of an axe under control can be allowed
for; but an axe swinging free from wrist, shoulder or back is a devil
of stumbling and catching unchained. For this reason, the device,
employed by most guides on long difficult passages or chimneys where
the hands and shoulders must be kept free, of wearing a string loop
attached to sack or rope, through which they pass the axe, is not
sound. The axe is out of sight, loose and out of control. It is better
to shove it through the loop of rope round the waist, where it is
kept fairly rigid and its position can be allowed for. With a single
movement it can be pulled to either side or behind, as convenience
dictates.
It is useful to practise carrying the axe on British rock climbs,
in order to acquire the instinct of its proper carriage for later
indispensable service in the Alps. The alpine climber is never without
his axe; and when he looks ahead at a rock section to select his holds,
he subconsciously decides at the same time how he must carry his axe;
in the left or the right hand, according as to which will be the outer
or free hand; on the wrist, if it be only for a step or two; slung on
his shoulder, for a longer passage; or thrust through his waist-rope on
the left, right or behind, for a chimney or severe struggle.
If the rock problem is of great severity or length, it saves time
in the end to tie all the axes on to a rope, and to send them up
separately. So sent, they should be tied with a clove-hitch, not at the
end of the rope, but so as to leave sufficient rope hanging below to
guide them and prevent their catching. This also applies to sending up
the sacks.
An axe of some ingenuity has lately been designed for use by a leader
on difficult rock. This will take in half. On severe passages both
halves can be packed into the sack for the time, or if the crack
contains ice in places where there is no room to manipulate a long axe,
the head half can be retained in the hand or in the waist-noose, and be
conveniently used to make nicks in the ice or to serve as a claw-hand
in minute cracks. It has stood some severe testing, but time has still
to show if the convenience of the shortening is secured at too great
a sacrifice of strength in the shaft to make the axe sound for long or
heavy step-cutting.
The short axes popular with those modern climbers who rely exclusively
upon their ice-claws, have a habit in rock climbing of working out of
the waist-noose or sling and disappearing down the cliff at crucial
moments. They are also of no use as the invaluable third leg on easy
rock or in descending.
When halts are made it is important to see that the axes are put in
safety, where they cannot be dislodged by forgetful movements. A
climber without his axe is like a lion-hunter without his rifle--and no
tree to climb.
[Sidenote: As an Extra Hand.]
In ascending rocks the axe comes into use as a long claw-hand, where
snow, ice, grass or heather covers the ledges and hides the holds. The
pick can then either be driven in as a handhold--in which case it is
important to remember that the axe must be held rigid in the position
in which it is first driven in, whatever the subsequent alterations in
the direction of the pull upon it--or it can be used to clear out the
obstruction.
On bare rock, if the pick is driven into a crack and the shaft set
firm against the rock below, the head can provide a useful handhold or
foothold; it can be further secured if it is held in this position by
a man below. As a pull handhold, with the pick hooked over an edge, in
ascending rocks, it should be used with caution. The direction of the
pull upon a handhold always tends to change, as the weight is raised
near or past it; and an axehold can rarely be found of a kind to resist
the outward or slanting strain as a climber raises himself. One or
two guides in the Alps have perfected a remarkable trick that may be
mentioned. When a vertical or sloping crack in a slab gets too small
even to admit a finger, and all other holds are lacking, they force the
point of the pick into the crack above their heads, and give a slight
outward and upward twist to the shaft with the wrist, so that the point
of the pick and its square edges are jammed slantwise and upwards in
the crack. Holding the shaft rigid in this position, they then raise
their weight by sheer strength inside the bent arm which holds the
shaft, at the same time using whatever friction-holds they can find
for their feet to help them. A second’s catlike clinging of the feet
and of their free hand to the rock gives them just time to thrust the
pick farther up the crack and twist it firmly in again. The feat is one
that demands exceptional strength and skill, and it is only employed in
circumstances from which the best amateur would retire without choice.
But it is worth practising, if only to be held in reserve as a relief
or extra security, when, on rocks less naturally desperate, a crack or
a slab proves unexpectedly iced or nasty.
I have occasionally seen an axe-head made use of in the fashion of
a ‘peg.’ Where a belay point was lacking, a climber has jammed his
axe-pick in a crack, and anchored or belayed the rope over it. I never
came upon such a contrivance without a distinct feeling of relief that,
in once again avoiding ‘coming upon the rope,’ I had once again shirked
being the first to make trial of the doubtful efficacy of this sort of
belay.
In well-chosen spots, the familiar ledges or terraces where slopes of
deep heather or grass cover the rock and leave no sure stance, the
axe can also be used for belaying. The spike should then be driven in
deeply, the shaft sloping away from the pull, and the rope be passed
low down round its base, getting some extra friction upon the grass
or heather immediately round the shaft. But these belays should be
employed with discretion.
[Sidenote: As a Manx Leg.]
In traversing the crests of long ridges, with their constant rise
and fall, and in descending easy or moderate rocks, the axe, well
handled, is an invaluable telescopic third leg. The spike of the shaft
reached forward or downward to some cranny or lower step beyond the
reach of the foot, preserves the balance in free walking or during
a long downward step. Its practised use enables the body to balance
continuously and rhythmically in a walking upright attitude over broken
crests or down angles and high steps of rock that would otherwise
demand a constant effort of balance and much help from handholds.
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.