I Usually Dislike Bird's-Eye And Panoramic Views, But, Though
From A Mountain, This Was Not One.
Serrated ridges, not much
lower than that on which we stood, rose, one beyond another, far
as that pure
Atmosphere could carry the vision, broken into awful
chasms deep with ice and snow, rising into pinnacles piercing the
heavenly blue with their cold, barren grey, on, on for ever, till
the most distant range upbore unsullied snow alone. There were
fair lakes mirroring the dark pine woods, canyons dark and
blue-black with unbroken expanses of pines, snow-slashed
pinnacles, wintry heights frowning upon lovely parks, watered and
wooded, lying in the lap of summer; North Park floating off into
the blue distance, Middle Park closed till another season, the
sunny slopes of Estes Park, and winding down among the mountains
the snowy ridge of the Divide, whose bright waters seek both the
Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. There, far below, links of diamonds
showed where the Grand River takes its rise to seek the
mysterious Colorado, with its still unsolved enigma, and lose
itself in the waters of the Pacific; and nearer the snow-born
Thompson bursts forth from the ice to begin its journey to the
Gulf of Mexico. Nature, rioting in her grandest mood, exclaimed
with voices of grandeur, solitude, sublimity, beauty, and
infinity, "Lord, what is man, that Thou art mindful of him? or
the son of man, that Thou visitest him?" Never-to-be-forgotten
glories they were, burnt in upon my memory by six succeeding
hours of terror.
You know I have no head and no ankles, and never ought to dream
of mountaineering; and had I known that the ascent was a real
mountaineering feat I should not have felt the slightest ambition
to perform it. As it is, I am only humiliated by my success, for
"Jim" dragged me up, like a bale of goods, by sheer force of
muscle. At the "Notch" the real business of the ascent began.
Two thousand feet of solid rock towered above us, four thousand
feet of broken rock shelved precipitously below; smooth granite
ribs, with barely foothold, stood out here and there; melted snow
refrozen several times, presented a more serious obstacle; many
of the rocks were loose, and tumbled down when touched. To
me it was a time of extreme terror. I was roped to "Jim," but it
was of no use; my feet were paralyzed and slipped on the bare
rock, and he said it was useless to try to go that way, and we
retraced our steps. I wanted to return to the "Notch," knowing
that my incompetence would detain the party, and one of the
young men said almost plainly that a woman was a dangerous
encumbrance, but the trapper replied shortly that if it were not
to take a lady up he would not go up at all. He went on to
explore, and reported that further progress on the correct line
of ascent was blocked by ice; and then for two hours we
descended, lowering ourselves by our hands from rock to rock
along a boulder-strewn sweep of 4,000 feet, patched with ice and
snow, and perilous from rolling stones. My fatigue, giddiness,
and pain from bruised ankles, and arms half pulled out of their
sockets, were so great that I should never have gone halfway had
not "Jim," nolens volens, dragged me along with a patience and
skill, and withal a determination that I should ascend the Peak,
which never failed. After descending about 2,000 feet to avoid
the ice, we got into a deep ravine with inaccessible sides,
partly filled with ice and snow and partly with large and small
fragments of rock, which were constantly giving away, rendering
the footing very insecure. That part to me was two hours of
painful and unwilling submission to the inevitable; of trembling,
slipping, straining, of smooth ice appearing when it was least
expected, and of weak entreaties to be left behind while the
others went on. "Jim" always said that there was no danger, that
there was only a short bad bit ahead, and that I should go up
even if he carried me!
Slipping, faltering, gasping from the exhausting toil in the
rarefied air, with throbbing hearts and panting lungs, we reached
the top of the gorge and squeezed ourselves between two gigantic
fragments of rock by a passage called the "Dog's Lift," when I
climbed on the shoulders of one man and then was hauled up. This
introduced us by an abrupt turn round the south-west angle of the
Peak to a narrow shelf of considerable length, rugged, uneven,
and so overhung by the cliff in some places that it is necessary
to crouch to pass at all. Above, the Peak looks nearly vertical
for 400 feet; and below, the most tremendous precipice I have
ever seen descends in one unbroken fall. This is usually
considered the most dangerous part of the ascent, but it does not
seem so to me, for such foothold as there is is secure, and one
fancies that it is possible to hold on with the hands. But
there, and on the final, and, to my thinking, the worst part of
the climb, one slip, and a breathing, thinking, human being would
lie 3,000 feet below, a shapeless, bloody heap! "Ring" refused
to traverse the Ledge, and remained at the "Lift" howling
piteously.
From thence the view is more magnificent even than that from the
"Notch." At the foot of the precipice below us lay a lovely
lake, wood embosomed, from or near which the bright St. Vrain and
other streams take their rise. I thought how their clear cold
waters, growing turbid in the affluent flats, would heat under
the tropic sun, and eventually form part of that great ocean
river which renders our far-off islands habitable by impinging on
their shores. Snowy ranges, one behind the other, extended to
the distant horizon, folding in their wintry embrace the beauties
of Middle Park.
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