Chapter IV: Rock Climbing (3)

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.