DOWN IN THE VALLEYS
“I know a vale where I would go one day,
Where snows gleam bright above the vast moraine,
A mighty cleft in the great bosoming hills,
A great grey gateway to the mountains’ heart.”
_After_ BLISS CARMAN.
A book on climbing may be supposed to deal mainly with peaks, passes,
and glaciers; and perhaps, in these days of the rock experts, one
should add, precipices. It is supposed to be, very largely, a matter of
“victories of ascent, and looking down on all that has looked down on
us.” And in that phase of it, no doubt, lies the great joy of climbing.
Yet the days of defeat are not altogether to be despised. For one
thing they have a chastening influence upon the soul of the perhaps,
over-ambitious mountaineer. Beside his winter fire, too, when he sees
the great valleys and the high peaks taking form, once more, in the
smoke-wreaths of his evening pipe, the days spent in the valleys—days
when he never climbed at all—will mean for him a flood of precious
memories that he will have no desire to stay. This perhaps applies with
greater force to the climber in a new country, for he cannot—like his
brother in the older lands—take his ease along the level road, nor,
in a moment of temporary mental aberration, be tempted by a mountain
railway! For myself I have got great enjoyment in those days, when,
“having loitered in the vale too long,” I have “gazed, a belated
worshipper,” and even out of days when “the rain-clouds hung low on the
mountains with their burden of unshed showers.” Such days give one time
to indulge in a little quiet philosophy—to study his brother humans
under the lens of adversity; to see his own mind through the rays
of introspection; and, perchance, to concern himself with the minor
matters of birds and beetles, butterflies and flowers. I may therefore
be pardoned by the general reader—if not by the mountaineer—if, in
writing this chapter, I climb no higher than a mountain hut or a low
bivouac.
One sunny December day, when I was rather tired of work, and thinking
of some sort of holiday, a letter arrived from my friend and former
climbing companion Dr. Norman Cox. He asked me to join him in an
expedition to the Mount Cook district. There were several obstacles in
the way of my going. But the talk of mountaineering is as the whiff
of battle in the nostrils of an old war-horse, and when once the
conquering of virgin peaks and the making of new passes into unexplored
country begins to loom on the climber’s horizon, not all the gold in
Golconda will keep him back. Therefore the difficulties were brushed
aside, and one fine day my friend, my wife, and I found ourselves with
ice-axes, tent, sleeping bags, Alpine rope, and provisions, on board
the Mount Cook coach, bound once more for that goal of New Zealand
climbers, the Hermitage. We were to be joined there by Mr. T. C. Fyfe
and, later on, by Mr. W. J. P. Hodgkins, who, like Fyfe, had climbed
with us on other expeditions.
The weather had been bad at the Hermitage, but it now showed signs of
clearing, and, after waiting two days, my wife and I decided on a trip
up the Mueller Valley. We started one fine morning, she carrying the
camera, and I three days’ provisions and the sleeping bags. For some
miles from the Hermitage the ice of the Mueller Glacier is covered with
great rocks and scree fallen from the mountains on both sides of the
valley. Many of these rocks are in a position of unstable equilibrium,
and, consequently, very difficult to walk over. As it was a hot day and
we were not yet in form, we took matters somewhat easily, and, leaving
our packs after half a day’s march, returned to the Hermitage.
[Illustration: MOUNT SEFTON.]
Next day we started off again, intending to make a bivouac half-way up
the glacier. The weather was again fine, and a fierce sun beat down in
the valley, making the rocks quite hot. We made many halts, and glacier
pools, here few and far between, were in request. We lunched where the
glacier curved round a bend in the valley, near two pretty waterfalls,
a bluff of peculiar greenish-coloured rock, and some very fine ice
cliffs. A glacier stream ran purling past, a strong jet of water, from
which we filled our drinking-cups, pouring through an immense block of
ice that was jammed in the bed of the stream. And every now and then
an avalanche thundered down from the great ice cliffs that gleamed in
the noonday sun high up on the shoulders of Sefton. One magnificent
fall of ice arrested our attention and held us for a time spellbound.
It broke from a gigantic cliff far up the mountain, and thousands of
tons poured over the grim precipices with a roar as of loud thunder.
The blocks were shattered into millions of pieces, and a great cloud
of ice-dust rose into the air and slowly disappeared as the seething
mass of ice reached the bottom of the valley and spread itself out like
some great living, moving monster on the side of the glacier. The
Mueller appeared to be much altered since our former visit some years
ago, and in one place the debris of an enormous rock avalanche covered
the ice, where before it was easy walking. Making our way up the ice
cliffs to the right of the waterfalls, and then rounding a sharp bend
in the glacier, we got amongst some very rough morainic boulders that
had apparently tumbled from a rotten precipice on the left. Thence we
climbed an old moraine and got a good view of our surroundings. Down
below, on a narrow strip of level moraine, lay some huge rocks that
promised us a good bivouac. Under one we found a little firewood,
and beneath the lee of another a quantity of dried snow-grass, that
afterwards served us for bedding. While I went to look for water, my
wife walked to the farthest point of moraine we could see to look
round the corner. Corners are always peculiarly tantalizing to her.
We had no billy, nothing, in fact, except the little pannikin of our
spirit-lamp, and before we separated we held a council as to the best
method of carrying the water when found. The brilliant idea struck us
of testing the much-vaunted waterproof capabilities of our rücksack,
and off I started with it down to the glacier, where, after some time,
I discovered a pool.
On returning I found my wife back, and huddled up in a blanket, for
the sunshine had gone from the valley and it was intensely cold.
Probably we felt it more so after the great heat of the day. Lighting
my spirit-lamp, I started tea-making, but under difficulties. The
tiniest little breeze wafted the almost invisible flame from one side
to the other, and prevented the heat from reaching the pannikin. The
snow-grass caught fire; I burnt my fingers; I almost lost my temper,
and felt inclined to boot the whole inadequate contraption over the
moraine. It seemed hours before we got that tea, and then it had a
smoky flavour with which it would not have passed muster in the regions
of civilization. Nevertheless, in this place, it was nectar to our
parched throats, and we enjoyed it, sitting there under the shadow of
that great rock, looking over towards the huge bulk of Sefton, cold
against the amber sky.
It was really too cold to sit up late that night, so it was decided
to gather our mattresses, and, knives in hand, we clambered up the
hillside to cut snow-grass and the eidelweiss and small celmesia. Here
we found some flowers of the ranunculus—the most perfect we had yet
seen.
The rock under which we had to sleep only partially covered us, but the
evening, so far, was beautifully fine. Everything promised well for
the morrow, and, already, the first ascent of Mount Sealy seemed an
accomplished fact. But, in the mountains, as elsewhere, hopes that are
cherished as the evening fires die down, are apt to vanish before the
morning fires are lit. So was it now. Our first blow, on turning out
our packs, was the discovery that the Alpine rope had been left behind!
Our hearts sank and our plans fell to the ground; but we were so eager
over our proposed climb that we collected all our straps, fastened them
together, and decided to climb with their aid rather than give it up
altogether. Then we wormed ourselves into our bags, and endeavoured
to sleep. But it was only a little after six o’clock, and since our
infancy we had seldom gone to bed at such a preposterous time. As we
lay watching the shoulder of Sefton, there came, creeping up behind
it, a wreath of fleecy cloud, that gradually grew, and moved until
it reached the summit. Puffs of warm wind stole across our faces. We
feared a nor’-wester was coming up.
As I lay there an awful thought came into my mind. The rücksack was
a fine pea-green colour, and we had noticed a peculiar taste about
the water it had held. It was not merely a waterproof flavour. What
if arsenic were employed in the preparation of the knapsack? Horrible
thought! I instantly felt as ill as if I had been reading a medical
encyclopædia, and was positive that, already, I exhibited all the
symptoms of arsenical poisoning. Then my wife, who had dropped off
into a doze, woke up in great excitement to tell me what she had just
dreamt. She thought we were climbing up a steep snow slope by means of
the aforesaid straps. Suddenly I disappeared down a crevasse, leaving
her with all the straps dangling at her feet. She went as near to the
great lip as she dared, but could only see down a short distance into
its horrible blue depths. A good idea struck her. Hastily grasping the
straps, she lowered the end into the crevasse. To her delight, she felt
a pull on the improvised rope. She put forth all her strength and stood
firm. Judge of her horror when the head of another man appeared, quite
old, and bearded like Rip Van Winkle. “I’ve been down there for years!
You certainly haven’t hurried yourself!” he remarked, as his head rose
above the edge of the crevasse.
With the shock of this strange apparition my wife awoke, and as she
retailed her droll dream to me we both laughed so loudly that sleep
flew out of our cavern door, and seemed in no hurry to come back again.
For a mountain bivouac, however, our bed was not at all an
uncomfortable one, and we did manage to sleep, though we were not at
all reassured in our minds about the weather. One long, narrow streak
of cloud, lit by the moon, trailed right across the heavens from the
north-west, and boded ill. The barometer, too, began to fall, and it
was evident that we were to have a change of weather. At 2.30 a.m.
we were awakened by the first gusts of the approaching storm, and by
the pattering of the rain on such portion of our sleeping bags as did
not come within the shelter of the rock. This was the final blow to
our plans. We had intended to rise early and start on our climb by
candle-light; but now all we could do was to huddle as far under the
rock as possible, in order to keep ourselves dry, and wait for daylight
to enable us to beat a retreat to the more friendly shelter of the
Hermitage. At 5 a.m. we wriggled out of our sleeping bags, and, in the
pouring rain, walked down the glacier. Dripping wet from head to foot,
we sneaked quietly into the house, and, after a wash—which we scarcely
needed—and a change of clothes, we appeared at the breakfast-table,
much to the surprise of the other inhabitants, who had been wasting
their sympathy on the two mad mountaineers whom they thought to be
storm-bound on the Mueller Glacier.
On the following day the weather was again fine, so I started for
the hut on the Tasman Glacier, distant some fourteen miles from the
Hermitage. Next day Dr. Cox and I carried swags of provisions and
Alpine appliances some eight miles farther up the glacier to our old
bivouac at the foot of Mount de la Bêche. Cox returned to the hut the
same day, and I waited at the Bivouac, intending on the morrow to
gather some Alpine scrub for firewood from the sunny slopes of the
Malte Brun Range across the valley. In crossing the glacier next day I
found the ice very much crevassed, and, not taking a good route, had to
resort to step-cutting in more than one place before gaining the other
side. Firewood was very scarce, but I got a small bundle—enough to boil
the billy two or three times—and returned to the Bivouac, thence making
my way down the glacier to the Ball Hut. Here I found Dr. Cox enjoying
a well-deserved rest after the unwonted exercise of swagging.
An abrupt change from the surgery or the office stool to the swag
enables the victim to make quite a number of new discoveries in the
science of anatomy. The amateur porter may begin gaily in the morning
with a full stomach and a light heart. In the cool, bracing air that
succeeds the chilly dawn his fifty or sixty-pounds burden may seem
almost as light as his own heart. But a couple of hours’ experience
of a New Zealand moraine, with a mile or so of hummocky ice thrown
in, will convince him that neither his pack, nor the important part
of his anatomy already mentioned, is quite the feather-weight of his
early morning imagination. And, while he has become aware that he is
the possessor of an organ that can pump at quite an alarming rate,
he is prepared to take oath that his pack is rapidly increasing in
weight at the rate of from three to five pounds per mile according
to the instability or the steepness of the moraine over which it is
his ill-fortune to be scrambling. But of these two steepness is the
more wearing, because instability gives only a momentary shock, and
there is (generally) recompense in the exhilaration of a quick, though
not always graceful, recovery; whereas steepness—or, worse still,
the combination of steepness and instability—looms before you like
a long nightmare, and depresses, even after it is conquered. By noon
the straps are cutting into one’s aching shoulders, and it seems only
a matter of time until the friction caused by the juxtaposition of
swag and vertebræ has done irreparable damage to certain garments that
need not be mentioned, and all this time the amateur porter has been
performing acrobatic feats on slippery ice, and the measure that he
has been treading over the unstable, live moraine has been remarkable,
not so much for the dignity of its movement as for the language that
has accompanied it. Finally, when hungry, athirst, and a-weary, he
crawls up to his cold and lonely bivouac at the close of a grilling,
sweltering day, he will tell you, with much forcible detail, that
his pack weighs over a hundred pounds, and that swagging is the most
matured and well considered invention of the Devil and all his angels.
Next morning as he rises, cold and stiff in every joint and limb, from
the road-metal mattress upon which he has been trying to keep warm and
snatch some well-earned repose, his outlook may be philosophic, though
it will certainly not be optimistic. But breakfast, and the bracing
mountain air, which is like a vintage wine, and a glorious summer
sun, and further exercise will gradually dispel the miasma of initial
trouble, while a week of this kind of work, with a minor peak or pass
thrown in, will send him forth as a giant refreshed, ready to oppose
all the ills that flesh is heir to, and eager to conquer the long icy
slopes and grim precipices that guard the way to the virgin summits of
his native land. Before long even his unquenchable thirst will have
vanished, and, with forty or fifty pounds’ weight on his back, he will
be able to hop from a moving rock on the live moraine to more solid
footing without barking his shins in the endeavour, or to bound like
a kangaroo across the rounded hummocks of the great glacier. “Ach!”
said a distressed German scientist to me, on one occasion when I was
setting the pace down the Great Tasman Glacier in a bitter rain-storm,
“you are like a glacier flea—you take such joomps!” He had, himself,
fallen twice on the hard, slippery ice hummocks, and his hand was
freely bleeding from a cut, but he spoke more in sorrow than in anger,
and at the end of the march he produced a couple of bottles of ale—one
for himself and one for me—and then the two rival nations fraternized
beneath the Southern Cross; and, under the soothing influence of the
beverage, discussed the question of compulsory arbitration in labour
disputes, and other abstruse economic problems so dear to the German
mind.
On arrival at the hut I found that Fyfe and Mrs. Ross had walked the
fourteen miles from the Hermitage, and, in the evening, Hodgkins
surprised us by strolling into the hut after dark, he having left the
coach near the Hooker Cage and tramped up the track the same evening.
We were now ready to try the ascent of one of the higher peaks, but the
barometer had fallen, and there were indications of a storm, which duly
came to hand, so we stayed in the hut, amusing ourselves with a variety
of games, cooking on the fire-can outside, and studying the habits of
Mr. _Nestor Notabilis_, famed throughout New Zealand, and the world, as
the most cruel of all sheep-killers.
This bird—a mountain parrot of beautiful plumage, and quaint and
curious ways—is probably the most interesting of all the feathered
reivers left on the ramparts of civilization. His home is amongst
the hills and valleys of the Southern Alps. In most districts he is
an outlaw, with a price on his head. At Mount Cook he is protected,
because here there are few sheep to kill, and a few tourists to be
pleased. Originally he must have waxed fat—or grown lean—on a diet
largely vegetarian—with perhaps an odd worm or a grub or two thrown
in, by way of variety—and the question of how he came to acquire
carnivorous habits has been much discussed. Before the advent of the
white man there were no four-footed animals in New Zealand, except,
perhaps, a native rat, and it is doubtful if the kea touched him.
My own idea is that it was his inordinate inquisitiveness that led
to the change, and that the change was brought about in quite an
accidental manner, just as that glorious and more famous discovery
of roast sucking-pig was made! Thus when the early settlers, in the
mountains, killed a sheep, they spread the skin, woolly side down, on
the stock-yard fence. The kea, ever curious, swooped down upon it,
and began to tear it to pieces with his strong, sharp beak. “Hallo!”
he said to himself, “this is a great sport,” and then, after a few
pecks, he stopped and began to think, for there was a new taste in his
mouth—and the taste was good! It was the taste of mutton fat. And, from
that day to this, the kea has never forgotten it. Then, one cold, hard
winter, when all the berries were done, and he was idly pecking at
another skin upon the stock-yard fence, there was set up in his brain a
train of reasoning, till it suddenly dawned upon him that the sheepskin
must have something to do with the sheep. And, next day, being hard put
to it for a dinner, he flew down into the valley, and, there being no
sheepskins about, he went back to the mountain-side and settled upon
a live sheep. There he got his dinner! And, that same evening, the
other keas, seeing him satisfied and replete, while they were cold and
hungry, asked him where he had got such a good dinner, and he being
in a good mood after such a dinner—for keas are very much like men in
this matter—told them, and next day, and for many days afterwards,
they all dined well. But the poor sheep could not understand why these
hitherto innocent and friendly birds had suddenly become possessed of
devils, and the owner of the sheep could not understand why so many
of his sheep were dead on the hillside. But one day the owner of the
sheep, through his spy-glass, saw a kea alight on the back of a sheep,
and begin to dig, with his cruel beak, into the loin, so that he might
get some nice warm kidney-fat for his dinner. And the silly sheep, not
knowing how to ward off the attack, simply ran and ran till it fell
down exhausted, and then, while the kea finished his dinner, the poor
sheep died in great agony. But the next day the owner of the sheep
got his gun, and all the shepherds got their guns, and there was woe
and lamentation in many a kea family before the shadows of evening
came down. From that day onward a price was upon the head of the kea,
till now more keas are killed by man than there are sheep killed by
keas; for the kea cannot get the taste of mutton fat out of his mouth,
any more than an aboriginal—or for the matter of that his civilized
brother—can forget the taste of roast sucking-pig.
Yet in spite of all this—which is quite a true story—my sympathies are
with the kea; for, after all, this was the kea’s country, and the man
should not have brought his silly sheep into it. And, when I see the
flashing scarlet of his under wings against the blue of an Alpine sky,
or note the metallic green and blue of his overdress contrasted against
some snowy slope or dome, a feeling of deep regret about his ultimate
destruction comes over me.
My wife, who, during my absences from camp and bivouac on the higher
climbs, has had frequent opportunities of studying his character, does
him more justice than any other writer I know of. He reminds her of
“one of those Highland chieftains whose greatest glory was their being
‘put to the horn.’ With what impudence the kea struts, dances, or
flutters past your very feet! How he poses himself on a near rock, and
lets you come up boldly and miss him, and how condescendingly he waits
for another shot, encouraging you with a cheeky ‘Kea!’ ‘Kea!’ I have
seen a man unversed in the ways of the kea, steal along, holding his
missile carefully behind him; but there is no need for concealment. You
can go boldly up and have your shot—nothing to pay either, and probably
no result, for even if you stun him he recovers quickly, and is off to
his heights unless you are very smart indeed.
“I have had a dozen round me while I have been baking, interchanging
confidential and probably contemptuous remarks on my method and
results. They hardly troubled to get out of my way as I passed from
hut to fire. I am not a good shot, and I feel sure they knew it. Any
tins or rags thrown out are carefully inspected by them, generally in
committee, and I have even seen them burn themselves picking coals out
of the fire.
[Illustration: COOKING SCONES.]
[Illustration: T. C. FYFE.]
“Once, in the days before the luxury attendant upon huts and chimneys
had crept into the Tasman Valley, I was cooking scones on an
improvised oven made out of an old nail-can, when a number of keas flew
down from the great shoulder of Mount Cook above the Ball Glacier.
They watched the culinary operations for a time at a respectful
distance, and it was quite evident that some of them had never before
seen a fire. One, more daring or more inquisitive than the rest, came
closer and closer to it, and I watched him from an adjacent rocky seat
cocking his head first on one side and then on the other as he eyed
the glowing embers. Finally, he walked right up to the fire and picked
out a live coal with his beak. The result was startling. He dropped
it with a loud scream, and, after a few seconds of vituperation, flew
away to the moraine. There he was joined by all the other keas, and,
judging from their chatter, they held a committee meeting, and carried
a condemnatory resolution about the cook who exhibited to the eye of
unoffending keas a beautiful red thing that made the beak so sore, and
that filled the mouth with anger.
“But it is at the first streak of dawn they are liveliest. We came to
the conclusion that the offenders were young birds out all night on the
spree and coming home with the milk. On occasions, at the Ball Glacier
Hut, their antics were the cause of much bad language in various
tongues, for it was impossible to sleep during the entertainment. They
held a sort of circus or gymnastic performance, but it lacked variety.
About a dozen sat in a row on the ridge of the corrugated iron roof of
our hut. One of them said ‘Off!’ and they glissaded down, scratching
and clawing with their feet all the way, amid the great applause of the
audience outside, and the curses loud and deep of the victims inside.
“The intervals were filled up by the whole troupe prowling round the
hut yelping like puppies, with now and then a cry like that of a very
fractious baby. And so it went on, for hours, unless someone was
willing to get up and out and chase them off the premises. And then
there would be heard more strong language, as the shivering pyjamaed
individual, groping about in the dusk for some suitable missile, would
tread on a meat-tin, or knock his big toe against one of the many rocks
that surrounded the hut.”
One day, during our enforced idleness in the hut, a surfaceman engaged
on the track came up to consult our doctor. He had been suffering
dreadfully from toothache. After a careful diagnosis, it was resolved
that the tooth must come out. But how? That was a question to puzzle a
layman, for there were no dentist’s instruments within ninety miles of
the Tasman Glacier. Nevertheless, it was decided to operate, and the
doctor and I and the patient filed out of the hut to do the dreadful
deed. We sat the victim down on a boulder, and while I held his head
the doctor, with the blade of his penknife, skilfully dug out a much
decayed molar! After it was all over the victim gave a sigh of relief,
but did not seem quite satisfied. He felt around amongst the remaining
caverns with the tip of his tongue, and at last found speech. “Thank
’oo very much, Dachter Cax—but—but—are ’oo shure you’ve gat the roight
wan?” I confess I had my doubts on the point, but the doctor assured
him it was all right, and he went away satisfied. Verily faith is a
great thing! However, the little bloodletting had a soothing influence
for the time being, and the real cause of the trouble was afterwards
extracted at the Hermitage, with a more suitable instrument than a
penknife.
The weather continuing bad, Dr. Cox decided to walk down to the
Hermitage. After two or three days the weather cleared, and Hodgkins
and I did a little rock-climbing on one of the spurs of Mount Cook,
and some step-cutting on the ice cliffs of the Ball Glacier. On
Saturday the 28th the weather had cleared. We devoted the morning to
photography, and at 2 p.m., as there was still no sign of Dr. Cox
or Fyfe from the Hermitage, we left with swags for the De la Bêche
Bivouac, some eight miles farther up the glacier. The journey up over
rough moraine and hummocky ice took us four hours and twenty minutes.
My shoulders ached with the swag straps, and we all felt a little
tired with the unwonted exercise of swagging over the loose rocks of
the moraines, and with the jumping _à la_ kangaroo from hummock to
hummock of the white ice. At 8.30 p.m. the three of us turned into our
sleeping bags under the rock. It was a glorious evening, and, through
the entrance of our cave-bedroom, we looked far down the valley to the
cold grey snows on the summit of Aorangi, which, an hour or so before,
had been bathed in the golden splendour of evening. The morrow promised
to be fine, and, thinking it a pity to waste a day, we decided to make
the ascent of the Hochstetter Dome, hoping that Cox and Fyfe would have
arrived by the time we got back. Alas! Cox climbed no more with us that
year. On an ordinary level path near the Hermitage he sprained his
ankle badly, and it was not healed for months.