At the village of Chongur in Nepal I was able to purchase some extra
blankets and shoes for my men, as from this point we should soon come
among the snows, where we should remain for some time. Up to an
altitude of 11,000 feet we travelled among firs, and on very sharp,
slippery slopes without a trail. On a bit of level pasture-land we came
across two Jumli annuals or shepherds with some sheep. They were
curious types, wild and unkempt, with shaggy hair flowing upon their
face and shoulders. I do not think that I have ever seen men more
abruti—to use a French expression which fits them perfectly—than those
two. Shivering from cold, ill-clad, living on roots and whatever they
could pick up, which was not much, they were indeed the very picture of
misery and wretchedness. When they had recovered from their fright at
our approach, I gave them some food which would last them some time,
and their gratitude knew no bounds.
Farther on we met a Nepalese woman carrying a child slung in a basket
upon her back, while the husband walked peacefully behind. When the
camera was pointed at the couple they were so disturbed that the woman
dropped basket and child and took to her heels down a most precipitous
slope, while her better half ran away from us, also full speed, but on
a less dangerous route.
Farther on, as we got higher up, we encountered more shepherds, in as
pitiable a condition as the first we had seen, having nearly lost their
power of speech through leading a lonely life among these mountains.
They all suffered from fever and rheumatism; some from goitre through
drinking snow water.
The marching was very heavy, especially for my men who carried loads;
my pony, of course, had to be abandoned long before this, and I had
sent him down to lower elevations in charge of my sayce.
We were now nearing the magnificent Api Mountain, and we soon came to
the moraine of the glacier. We reached the glacier—which I named the
Elfrida Landor Glacier—at sunset, and it was indeed a most beautiful
sight with its huge walls of clear ice in irregular terraces, portions
only being in broken-up heaps. At the sides, mud of a greyish colour
and broken ice bordered the worn, eroded rock down to the level of the
valley where the glacier lies.
The glacier lies from N.E.E. to S.W.W., with two high peaks, one to the
N.N.W., the other to the S.S.E., the latter being known as the Api
Mountain. Two snow-fed streams descend from the glacier, and, joining
into a rapid torrent, become a tributary of the Lumpa River. The
natives call all these glaciers by the generic term Sho-gal, or “snow
glacier.”
The village of Chongur could be distinguished in the far distance to
the N.W. of us, down, down below in the valley of the Kali; and to the
N.N.W. we obtained a panoramic view of the Kuti River valley, with the
conical Bitroegoar Mountain and a high peak to the N.N.E. Even below
13,000 feet the vegetation had become very sparse, but patches of short
grass were found up to 16,000 feet. Above that all was absolutely
barren, and generally covered with snow. In the high valley we had
followed, whatever trees we found were weather-beaten and half-burnt by
the snow and cold winds of the winter months. For long distances we
occasionally walked on thick beds of wild strawberries. These high
valleys are considered good pasture-land by the Shokas, who send their
sheep for grazing in charge of annuals, such as those we had met.
The foot of the glacier where we pitched our tent was at an elevation
of 13,900 feet, and the temperature shortly before sunset not higher
than 33° Fahrenheit.
Perhaps to those who have never slept on the ice of a glacier it may be
interesting to know what it feels like. Barring a certain chilliness
which anybody can imagine, a first night on a glacier has many
surprises. I say “first night,” because we spent a great many, and we
got accustomed to the weird noises which kept us awake and in some
suspense on the first visit. Indeed, a Himahlyan glacier seems to be
the home of noises of all kinds. The wind blowing among the pinnacles
and recesses produces weird melodies like solos and immense choruses of
human voices; you can hear shrill whistling all round you when sharper
blades of ice cut the current of air, and roars like those of wild
beasts, only stronger, when the wind penetrates into some deep cavity.
No sooner were you closing your eyes again for a much-wanted sleep than
thunder, so loud that it made you jump, startled you, but when you
peeped out of the tent there were brilliant stars and a limpid sky
everywhere above you. Sleepy as you were, you could not resist—at
least, I could not, and I am not much of a star-gazer—the temptation to
gaze at the stars and planets. In the rarefied and limpid air they
showed like huge diamonds, and gave quite enough light to see all round
one, even when there was no moon. Indeed, no one who has never been to
exceptionally high elevations has an idea of the beauty of stars. They
appear several times larger than they do when seen from London or
Paris, for instance, and the magnificence of their ever-changing
colours is indescribable.
Well, there was poetry enough in that, but you were soon awakened from
your contemplation by some unexpected explosion which made you think
the whole landscape before you must have been blown up. But no, there
were no visible signs of commotion around. It was merely a new
crevasse, some hundreds of feet deep, splitting, for some reason,
climatic or other, in the ice. Constant rumblings you heard, near and
distant; and you only had to close your eyes and you could imagine
yourself in a forest with the wind rustling among the trees, or the
pleasant sound of a waterfall close by, or an æolian harp being played
by a divine hand.
Echoes, of course, there are by the dozen on mountains, and each sound
is repeated over and over again till it fades away. An occasional
boulder gets loose from the rotted rock up on the mountain side, and is
precipitated with bounding leaps on to the ice of the glacier; a huge
one weighing some tons came down that night and missed our tent by not
very many yards. My men said the spirits of the mountains were doing
all this for our special benefit, to see whether we were brave or not!
The big boulder they had flung at and purposely missed us to show us
their powers, but not to hurt us. This was a good sign. “The gods are
with us,” they stated; but internally I heartily prayed that we might
have no more “good signs” of that nature.
While I was trying to make some hot chocolate with a small
spirit-stove, my men were busy packing up, they bearing the discomfort
with some considerable pluck. We had not been able to make a fire, and
we had not the prospect of seeing many for some weeks to come. I always
found chocolate the most useful and sustaining food for mountaineering
purposes, and I carried any number of tablets in my pockets. On the
march I constantly ate it; food, I found, keeping one’s strength up and
being more easily digested under those circumstances, if spread in
small quantities over the entire day, than if eaten in large quantities
twice or three times a day at given hours. I had my chocolate specially
prepared with a percentage of meat and fat, which gave it additional
nourishment. For days and days at a time I lived on chocolate only, it
being impossible to cook food, and deeming it rather dangerous to eat
tinned meats cold.
I was able to overcome the caste scruples of my men, and they, too,
partook freely of my chocolate, although I never let them know that it
contained beef. Had they known this, most of them would have lost their
caste. They ate it because they believed it entirely prepared by
machinery and not touched by unclean hands!
I was sorry when we struck camp and left behind the beautiful glacier
and Api Mt., 19,919 feet. We soon rose over a pass (13,050 feet) where
we obtained a view of a second glacier, almost as fine as the first, in
precipitous terraces, and with a gigantic terminal moraine, covered in
great part by débris and rotten rock, fallen from the mountain at the
side. This I called the Armida Glacier. It spread in a direction from
N.E. to S.W. To the west of the glacier on the mountain side there was
hardly any snow up to 16,000 feet, but to the east, as one looked
towards it, there were huge masses.
The entire valley of the Lumpa river along which we were travelling
made part of a gigantic glacier, with side glaciers such as those we
have seen. In the lower portion of the valley the ice was covered with
débris.
At the foot of the Armida Glacier were some immense parallel crevasses
in the ice. The upper portion of these was a mixture of dark grey mud
and rock embedded in the ice, showing vertical streaks and
corrugations. Then there were some curious pits in the moraine, such as
the one shown in the illustration, funnel-shaped and of great depth,
some 60 feet deep and more, and about 100 feet in diameter. These
funnels, cone-shaped, had a great fascination—quite an irresistible
attraction—when one looked into them. The ice, of a beautiful light
green colour, was corrugated into grooves converging towards the centre
at the bottom, where a deep hole was generally to be found. The ridges
of the myriads of grooves reflected in a line of silver the rays of the
sun, and these many dazzling luminous streaks all converging towards
one point had quite an hypnotic effect on some of my more highly strung
men. One man became quite giddy in looking down, and very nearly went
over, and several other men experienced a strong desire to precipitate
themselves into these pits.
I puzzled my head a great deal to find out exactly how these funnels
were produced, and the only plausible explanation seemed that some
boulder fallen from the mountain side had, owing to its sun-absorbed
high temperature, gradually bored a hole into the ice. The walls of the
cylindrical hole, becoming in their turn exposed to the strong
sunlight, went through a process of melting, the heat affecting the
upper portion to a much greater extent than farther down, where the
strength of the sun’s rays would be mitigated by the influence on the
temperature of the air by the surrounding ice. Thus the quicker melting
of the upper portion compared with the lower would at once have a
tendency to produce the conical shape of the funnels.
Then, of course, the grooves in the ice are produced by the water of
the melting surface ice flowing down. In fact, in the daytime, the
lower centre hole, which had vertical walls, was almost invariably
filled with water.
Perhaps, to avoid the absurd criticisms of fault-discovering critics
(which criticisms arise merely from their own appalling and fantastic
ignorance), it may be as well to remind the reader that the sun’s rays,
even at very great elevations and among quantities of snow and ice, can
be very powerful—85°, 90°, and even more. This particularly if the
region in which one is travelling is, as was that where we were, in a
latitude north of 30° 4′ 0″ only from the Equator. Naturally, the drop
in the temperature when the sun disappears is enormous, from 60° to
100° being nothing very exceptional. This also applies in a lesser
degree between the sun and shade in the daytime. When marching, for
instance, due north or south in those regions, it is not unusual to
have one’s anatomy roasting on the side where it is struck by the sun,
and to be half-frozen on the other side.
We continued our journey upon the moraine of the main glacier, avoiding
as much as we could the dangerous cracks and treacherous holes.
Half-way up the main glacier we were at an altitude of 13,600 feet. On
descending some 400 feet we came to a plain wherein grew rhubarb and
some turnips, the former wild, the latter planted by Nepalese
shepherds. There were, in fact, three tiny shelters of stones and mud
where the poor wretches had lived. We were much rejoiced at finding
some shrubs we could use as fuel. The glacier we were leaving behind
was separated from this valley by a high dune of mud and débris.
After crossing a stream we came to a third, the Martia Glacier, some
15,500 feet above sea-level. This glacier was not quite so impressive
as the other two, but it was, nevertheless, a most beautiful basin
filled with masses of clear ice in irregular terraces. A great moraine
extended here across the valley from the glacier, forming a ridge which
we had to climb in order to proceed on our journey. There seemed to be
traces of iron in the débris of the moraine as well as in the rocks of
the mountains around, and upon the gigantic boulders which had been
shot down upon the ice.
On the opposite side of the Lumpa stream to the one on which we stood,
just before reaching the third glacier, were high vertical rocks of
brilliant colouring. To the south-east of the glacier at the foot was
the usual dune, and we again found a great many gigantic pits, all with
water at the bottom.
We came to a very dangerous crevasse which we could not cross, and we
had to make a considerable detour. The edge on which we had got seemed
on the point of giving way, and might have collapsed at any moment.
Where the surface ice was covered by débris it showed graceful
undulations and well-rounded mounds, but occasionally there were higher
hillocks of conical shape and quite pointed.
Still travelling upon the moraine of the Lumpa Glacier we arrived at
last at the spot where the Lumpa river has its birth, dripping gently
from the glacier. Here, too, the ice with the overlying débris showed
in its general lines the peculiar sweeping curves noticeable in all
these glaciers, the section to the east being, in this particular
glacier, an exception to the rule, and exhibiting a disorderly mass of
débris and huge blocks of ice.
We had reached a point where a bifurcation occurred, one arm of the
glacier extending to 160° bearings magnetic (S.S.E.), the other and
principal one to 120° bearings magnetic, towards the Lumpa Mountain.
We selected this spot to make our camp, and a very cold camp it was,
too. We pitched our tent alongside a big rock, and with fuel we had
brought up, tried, after sundown, to make a fire inside the tent in
order to keep ourselves warm. But we were nearly suffocated by the
smoke. During the night, while my men were asleep—and the fire gone
out—I changed the plates in three magazine cameras, forty-eight plates
altogether; a job which with semi-frozen and trembling fingers, and
careful packing of negatives already exposed, took me the best part of
two hours. Indeed, one of the great tortures of exploration in cold
climates, is the immense care with which one must nurse one’s surveying
and other instruments under most adverse circumstances, and the
inexpressible trouble which photography, if done seriously, involves.
For similar kind of work I always found plates infinitely more reliable
than films; but, of course, with them the use of a red lantern becomes
imperative, and often leads to the use of a good deal of bad language.
If you adopt an oil-lantern the oil gets frozen into a solid mass, and
it is somewhat troublesome to keep the lantern burning, whereas candles
have other disadvantages. As for feeling the film side with your
fingers, and changing plates in the dark, it is, of course, out of the
question when your hands are too cold.
Maybe another hint when mountaineering at great altitudes will be
useful to you. Never use a waterproof sleeping-bag, such as those you
see advertised and recommended, as the very thing you want on a
mountain. If you do, and the night is a cold one, you will find
yourself and your blankets soaked in condensed moisture from the heat
of your body coming in contact with the cold waterproof sheet, through
which it is unable to escape. Of course it is wise to use a waterproof
sheet to lie on under one’s blankets.
On that particular night, feeling extra cold and not thinking of
consequences, I wrapped myself up, over my blankets, in a waterproof.
The results were disastrous. Everything got drenched, and, when I got
up, blankets and clothes became solid sheets of ice!