Chapter I: Management and Leadership (2)

When the subsequent descent is begun it is at first, for many men, a matter of real difficulty to recover complete control of their machinery, and for the leader to reconstitute the different individuals into a single working unit. For a time the pace must be diminished, and the care redoubled. Precautions, of remonstrance and doubled ropes and moving singly, none of them possibly necessary in the same place with the party in working order must be put into force, until the normal condition is regained. The assumption that the state of mind makes no difference, and that a party can descend as securely the final slopes that it raced up light-heartedly in the bracing moment of success, is all too commonly made, and only too frequently regretted.

[Sidenote: Disappointment.]

If success has its short following period of danger, disappointment has a longer and more insidious effect. However necessary or admittedly correct the decision to turn back may have been, the disappointment works afterwards, often unconsciously, upon each individual, as he realizes his wasted effort and envisages his fatigue, with now no excitement or bracing of hope to counteract it. So come discouragement, and careless treading, and a resentful attitude towards precautions and manœuvres which no longer have any triumphant object as their excuse. Any weakness in condition or humour will grow doubly apparent at such a time; and as the disappointment is equally present in all minds, it is impossible to pretend unconsciousness of it, and often vain to attempt to raise the atmosphere by a counterfeit of cheerfulness. Mental and social tonics are for the time alike useless. The condition has to be accepted as an indisputable lowering of tone, which in its effects will prejudice the physical capacity of the party in many subtle ways. Since in this one case he cannot check the evil influence at its source in the mind, the leader must employ every concrete mountaineering device to prevent its endangering the actual safety. He must bring out all his reserves of spirit and technique to keep the party concentrated on the momentary details of their descent, and redouble his own activities in order to anticipate or correct any slip or mistake that the lowered tone may induce. On such occasions he can look himself for no relaxation of effort or release from anxiety until the rope is off at last and the safe path regained, no matter how little conscious his party may like to show themselves individually of any depreciation in their skill or good-will.

[Sidenote: Over-confidence.]

Equally difficult to deal with, and far more frequent in its appearance, is the state of mind to which most mountaineers are subject--and guides also--who have accomplished a great climb successfully and are retracing the comparatively easy passages of the lower ridges, glaciers and tracks. Conscious of their successful performance, confident in their skill and unwearied muscles, intoxicated by air and effort and fortune, they are unaware of fatigue, and the easier ground lulls their judgment into a condition of fatalistic confidence, almost of exaltation. Danger, obvious and immediate, has become familiar, and has been safely avoided; they can neglect its threat when it is not so present. They jump the bergschrund rather than look for the bridge; they chance the unseen rock foothold rather than lose time in using the doubled rope; they glissade the loose snow slope and scorn its possible avalanche; the rope hampers them, it is taken off; and recklessly self-reliant, a reliance that success has fooled them into thinking justified, they rush the risks of hidden crevasses on the glacier, of false steps or loose stones on the easy ridges, with an abandon that it will make them shudder the next day to recall. Even the lower zigzag path to the valley is a danger in such a condition of mind. Safe as Rotten Row for the sure foot, it has a dozen times proved a fatal trap for the stumble of fatigue or the careless swing of over-confidence. Few men can look back on a long mountaineering record without remembering some such evenings of mountain madness; and while they blush (let us hope) even in memory at their folly, they may wish they had had some cool leader to call them, grumbling, to their senses. For while reaction and disappointment reflect at once upon the vitality, lowering the tone and, like a flat liquor, offering little chance of reanimation, over-confidence is an effervescence, an overflow of spirits, which can be more easily regulated by apt manipulation. The leader must take control, sharply and steadily. He has little to fear from the effect of his interference upon a party in such spirits; any resentment will be temporary, and his own labour, of repressing and directing a surplus of energy, will be far less than in the cases where, as has been shown, he may have to provide a stimulus or even a substitute for its absence.

There is an insidious danger common to all these mental states. As one of a party working together, a leader must remember that he himself is subject to infection from a collective mood. He may consider that his confident action on occasion is entirely individual and calculated; or, again, he may be certain that his resolution to retreat represents only his own unbiased judgment; and in either case he may be puzzled later to account for an obvious error. He must learn to allow for his ‘atmospheric’ error, the unconscious perversion of his saner judgment by some collective mood of his party. The risk is very subtle. A leader has no defence against it except to keep its possibility constantly in mind. He must acquire the habit of challenging, mentally, his own opinions of the moment, and of confronting them, detachedly, with the sternest of mountain precepts and rules of thumb. The habit will stand him in good stead in moments of more dangerous decision, of excitement, and, therefore of more probable collective infection. It will at least check him from joining, even in his most ecstatic moments, in an unroped glacier stampede or in a ‘go-as-you-please’ skelter down a buttress; it may save him some of the lasting regrets of the leader who afterwards recognizes that he has turned back prematurely; and it will certainly protect him on many long tramps from that curious infection, hours of united, unreasoning mountain gloom.

[Sidenote: Hysteria.]

From a fourth state, actual hysteria or hill-shock, a leader is presumably exempt. It occurs more frequently among mountains than anywhere else off the battlefield, since their conditions may put an excessive strain upon unaccustomed nerves. Old climbers are inoculated against most of its risks. If a type of danger has once been experienced, on any subsequent recurrence, even faintly resembling it in character, the consciousness flashes out at once to meet it, in all its possible reactions; the mind takes control of the nerve communications and blocks the way against any evil effects resulting from the sudden shock to the subconscious nervous system. Only an entirely unfamiliar form of danger or an unduly prolonged strain can rout the presence of mind of a tried climber. But it is well to remember that every man has his ‘cracking point,’ and that this is sooner reached in the case of an uneducated guide, however experienced, than in the person of an expert amateur, whose imagination will widen his experience.

It may originate in three ways. Firstly, from exhaustion, irritating brain and nerves until self-control is lost and any slight shock may cause the hysteria to break out, either in the usual violent symptoms, or, more intimidating because less anticipated, in silent tears. Exhaustion, not fear, is the basis. If it has not been possible to anticipate the crisis by precautionary rest or distraction, immediate inaction and quiet reassurance, without remonstrance or contradiction, are the best assistance to recovery.

Or, secondly, it may result from sudden shock, the realization of completely unexpected danger in a placid moment before the mind has time to assert its control over its own group of spinal nerves. This is the moment of panic which is the terror of all who have the charge of collections of human beings, in a theatre or on shipboard. If the shock can be anticipated by even the briefest of introductions, if a collective instantaneous realization of the danger can only be prevented by any method of more gradual communication of the news, half the risk of panic ensuing is gone. For if only the mind has the chance to realize the meaning of the news before the physical shock to the group of subconscious nerves has time to react, it takes command; and the man begins to act, and even to overact, for his own benefit if for no wider audience, in accordance with his conception of suitable gentlemanly behaviour under the circumstances. In climbing, indeed, there is often no time for such a gradual introduction. But in climbing, wherever danger is not cumulative, and therefore gradual, in its approach, the peril is over and past almost as soon as the shock is felt: for instance, the rock has fallen--and missed the party; the slip has occurred--and not pulled them down. So much the leader has in his favour in meeting its after-effects of fear. The crisis being over, it is best, if possible, to pretend to ignore its existence altogether, and to find some reason for a halt and for continued inattention until the nerves have had time to settle down. If this fails, the incident should be cheerfully recalled and discussed until its idea has become familiar, and so harmless. It is useful to remember that no individual panic, and for that matter no form of extreme emotion, can long survive the bland disregard of its existence by some one else in the same circumstances. But if a repetition of the peril still threatens, as might be the case after a rock or snow avalanche, and therefore immediate movement is desirable, the orders for action should be sharp and decided, but quite impersonal: they should neglect any individual more particularly affected, and apparently be addressed to the whole party. Personal attention only tends to increase the self-consciousness and the self-pity which, in the frightened man, will be militating against the recovery of his self-command.

The third and most difficult manifestation, that of hysterical obstinacy, may be the outcome of a long-continued state of nervousness or of, often, groundless fear, accumulating and indulged by self-compassion until it gets beyond control. The hysteria takes the form of a refusal to move up or down, and, without any violent symptoms, remains impervious to reason or direct remonstrance. A halt, and a deliberate disregard, emphasized by general talk about some unrelated matter, will often result in a gradual loosening of the tension, mental and muscular, and the beginnings of unwilling movement. Once the rigidity is past, the rope and quick and not too gentle impulse will do the rest. But if the situation does not allow of even so much delay, stronger measures are necessary. I have seen a guide use a startling slap on the cheek in an extreme case with good effect; or a jerk on the rope, that forces the victim to scramble to recover his own footing, may break the spell. In any case, if the leader is unfortunate enough to suffer such inconvenience with a beginner, he will be wise not to risk the like chance on a mountain a second time, in both their interests.

[Sidenote: Vertigo.]

What is called giddiness, the paralysing effect of sheer height, suddenly revealed, sometimes produces unexpectedly a similar condition of immobility. Fortunately, in this case it is not accompanied by the same objection to being moved into security by others.

Habit also will remove the inclination, sometimes felt on the edges of sheer walls or cliffs, to ‘throw oneself over.’ This is another of the symptoms of slight vertigo. In spite of its frequent and sensational appearance in narrative, the inclination would seem invariably to confine itself to remaining merely an inclination.

Giddiness, the inclination to fall and the impulse to throw oneself over, is the result of the inability of the eye at the moment to obtain an assurance that the body is upright or in balance. When a child is learning to walk it tumbles all over the place. Then it learns to fix some point on a level with its eye, and it can retain its balance in walking just so long as it can keep its eyes moving towards this point more or less on a level plane. Gradually it learns to get the same assurance from some distant point on the floor ahead: its eye has been educated to reason from a diagonal as much as from a level glance; and the ‘semicircular canal’ has been taught to interpret the message, and convert it into automatic balance. As it moves forward it shifts the point ahead, unconsciously obtaining that the third side of the triangle thus formed by its glance shall always demonstrate that the other two sides, the line of the floor and the vertical line through its own centre of gravity, are forming an approximate right angle. Still later it learns to apply the same principle to uphill or downhill gradients, where the line of gravity makes, not a right angle, but an acute or obtuse angle with the visible surface. That is, it learns to take the constant line of its own centre of gravity as the base-line of its triangle and not the fickle flooring; and it still keeps in balance in movement by measuring the third side with its eye, in order to be assured that whatever angle its body in balance is making with the ground, be it uphill and acute, or downhill and obtuse, shall remain the same during its next movement.

Even as men we cannot be sure that we are upright, that is, in balance--for our muscles permit us a few degrees of sway either way from our line of gravity--unless we are somehow in contact with the visible surface at two successive points in the line of direction in which we are moving, be the contact maintained by the touch of our second foot, by the hand, or by the glance of our eye. Shut your eyes, stand on one foot, and you will have proof of this. Men accustomed only to walking on the level make a habit of selecting the rest-point for their eye some distance ahead. Consequently, when they find themselves on a steep hillside, where the fall of the ground below makes a wider angle with their line of gravity than their eye has been trained to estimate, their glance wanders helplessly, they lose their assurance of balance, and they become ‘giddy’ or feel that they ‘must’ fall over. But habit will correct this. The climber soon learns to shorten his glance, to accept a reduced distance between his two requisite points of contact. The few inches of visible surface near his feet, be it only the edge of a rock ledge or the curve of a snow wall, projected against nothingness, will serve him, with practice, as sufficient rest-point for his eye, and give him the assurance that his body is upright and his balance secure.

Wherever, in climbing, the angle of the surface is so steep that even these few inches of margin for the eye’s reassurance are lacking,--for instance, on a precipitous rock wall with only minute stances, or on an almost vertical ice slope,--then, by the nature of the case, the climber can use his hands; and from this second point of contact, through his fingers, the climber gets an even more concrete assurance of his balance than from the judgment of his eye. There are cases, however, where the hands cannot or should not be used, and where the eye is so far confused that it must divide its responsibility for the second point of contact with some other agent; and for this we learn to use the second foot. Take the case of traversing along the summit of a narrow rock ridge, or across a knife-edge of ice. The hands are useless, and the eyes, unable to remain focused upon the narrow edge, wander away into the depths. The inexpert man will get giddy, and will only save himself, on the rock, by crawling across on hands and knees, thus forcing from his hands the assurance that his eyes refuse; while on the ice he will get giddy and--not get across at all. But the expert can step across either, rapidly and securely. In the first place he learns to focus his eyes undeviatingly upon the thin edge ahead, or upon some fixed point on the same line with it beyond; and in the second place he learns, since an expert’s eye is human and embraces a large field, to divide its balancing duty with his second foot. This foot, advanced in the direction of progress, provides a second rest-point for the assurance of balance quite good enough to complement the eye. He strides out rapidly, so as to shorten the doubtful interval while this foot is in the air, and for assurance in this doubtful interval he trusts again to his fixed glance. A blind-folded tight-rope walker balances on the same principle, only he obtains his assurance from two points of contact even nearer together, from one foot only just in advance of the other, or even from one foot alone, the two requisite points being then represented by his toe and his heel. Loose-wire walkers, who apparently deprive themselves of all fixed points for their estimate, substitute the pole or the parasol in their hands. This their trained sense continues to adjust at such an inclination to the shifting but relatively fixed point of their feet as may always give their hand a second relatively fixed point of judgment by which they can estimate the angle that then body is making, at any instant of rest or motion, with the line of gravity; and its leverage enables them to correct this angle whenever hand plus foot give warning that the body has so far departed from the line as to be entering upon the ‘forbidden degrees.’

The normal mountaineer, however, need never expect to have to do with less than two stable points of judgment, for foot and hand or eye, and these at least a few inches apart. It is entirely incorrect, therefore, for anyone to assume that, because he feels ‘giddy’ looking down from the top of a wall, he is disqualified from high mountaineering. Some degree of giddiness would be excusable in any mountaineer, however expert, who might be asked to look down off the edge of a sheer wall, where there was no handhold, no room to shift a foot forward or backward, and which was too vertical to afford any rest-point below for the eye. If he were asked to walk along the wall, he would probably do it cheerfully. In mountaineering, also, we may count upon handholds when the eye is obstructed or the assurance of a second foot denied us. We need only train our sense of balance to assure us of security upon a basis of narrowly spaced but still quite natural points of judgment. And in the process of learning we shall find that we lose all inclination to giddiness.

[Sidenote: The Effect of Height.]

There remains one state, of whose nature and origin we at present know very little. It is generally called the ‘psychological’ effect of height; which it almost certainly is not. It has none of the bodily symptoms of mountain sickness; and I know no remedy for it, mental or physical. It is simply that certain men above certain heights appear to lose some portion of their nervous energy. Training or habit seem powerless to restore it. They become incapable of moving with the certainty or rhythm which are theirs at lower levels. You can watch the effects in tentative, slower movements, a visible effort in balancing, clumsiness with the rope, insecurity in steps, sometimes a vagueness or absence of mind, as if the vitality were running low. And yet the men will be most vigorous and competent mountaineers up to their limit of height. Liability to suffer from it appears to depend on no question of physique or of probabilities. As its result many fine climbers on lower hills never achieve marked success in the Alps, and many fine alpinists, including most guides, are failures, relatively, in the Himalaya. If we were to go high enough, we should probably find that every man has his limit of height, above which no training or habit would enable him to climb with his normal vigour or efficiency. But what concerns a leader in the Alps, or an explorer in higher ranges, is to discover which of his party is subject to it, and at what heights, and make his dispositions accordingly if he is planning an expedition or series of expeditions which will exceed this limit. Otherwise, just at those heights and in those situations where the greatest individual skill is called for and the least attention can be spared to others, he will find that the symptoms will begin to put in an unwelcome appearance. The mountaineer himself is rarely aware of his weakness; he probably explains it to himself as a touch of passing mountain sickness. It is only when he, or more probably his leader, notices that it recurs at the same height and that the symptoms are not physical or mental, but affect the mysterious half-way region that we must call ‘nervous,’ that the true cause suggests itself. A leader must watch every new member of his party, and if he finds that he has such a height limit, he must not take him above it, if the ascent is severe, or he must be prepared to give him much increased attention and shepherding until the limit is repassed on the descent.

SOCIAL COMPOSITION OF THE PARTY

The social and psychological conditions that regulate the relations of any collection of human beings associated for a common effort or pursuit are seldom taken sufficiently into account. The interaction of individual temperaments in mountaineering and the reactions of common mood under the stress of elemental conditions or of great physical effort have, in consequence, seldom been allowed for in anticipatory organization or made a matter for previous agreement, or for the acceptance of precautionary control. When the crises have arisen, it has been often, consequently, too late for remedy or for the exclusion of the dissonant elements. This must be my excuse for sketching these superficial classifications of nervous and mental states that are as positive in their influence upon the success or harmony of a mountaineering holiday as the possession or lack of a developed trapezius major or a sound digestion. Explorers of experience sometimes recognize the importance of choosing men for temper and temperament as much as for physique, and make their arrangements with this in view, in practice if not in their printed records. Mountaineering is done under much the same conditions; but its temporary, holiday character leads us generally, as we sit at home in the comfort of pleasant prospect, to overlook in our arrangements the almost primitive conditions of temper, health and fierce struggle under which we shall be living during our mountain association.

A mountaineer, in the composition and management of his party, cannot afford to neglect the action of health and condition upon temper, or of temperament and mood upon achievement. He must select men, therefore, not by their promise of the plains, but by what he knows or concludes will be their conduct under the harder test of the heights. If he has to take anyone on chance, he must be on the watch from the first, and, if he finds he has made a mistake, content himself with a less ambitious programme. In big mountaineering no man has more than a momentary margin. In less exacting work no man has a continuous margin of will-power, nerve and temper, to say nothing of skill, for more than himself and one other. Every party of more than two should contain two men of tried nerve--that is, of an experience that has learned to control the effects of shock or of fatigue upon the nerves. Every party, for its own peace, should contain one expert rock climber and one reliable iceman. A good second-man, or ‘backer-up,’ and a weight-carrier are invaluable assets. These parts may, of course, be doubled in a single individual. The ability to heal, or cook, or sing may be allowed to outweigh some minor defects--but not temper, clumsiness or a sluggish vitality.

A manager has also to remember that that party earns the best success which works with the most collective good-humour and good-will. With the object of maintaining the genial atmosphere that best resists local disturbances, mental or physical, one member of a party of three or four may well be either younger or less experienced than the rest. Rowing eights in training have discovered the merits of a mascot or protégé, whom the rest can look after and laugh with or at. No party of men or women can quarrel if there are children (not belonging to them) of their number. One considerably younger member of a party, or one younger in the sense that he or she is a novice to the work, and in so far is a child, gives the climbing group the pleasant sense of centring round some one as a common care. He is a permanent distraction. In moments of excitement, pleasure or fatigue, every member of such a party unconsciously puts himself first into the new-comer’s attitude of mind, and speculates how the sensation will present itself to him. The process provides our individual consciousness with an external interest that diverts us from the oppression of absorption in ourselves.

In a holiday party of four, which is the best number for serious guideless climbing, enabling the break into the ideal pairs for rock climbing, and the safer combination for glaciers, one member may well be an ‘infant’ or beginner of this sort; but if such an element is included the ‘breaking’ must be confined to very safe passages. In a party of three, provided that two are thorough experts, and one of these possibly a first-class guide, and provided that no severe climbing is contemplated, maleficent psychic influences may be combated by the inclusion of our less responsible third. If serious work is in prospect, the third must be at least strong and efficient; in fact, in parties of less than four, considerations of skill or experience must always take precedence of purely social qualifications. In a party of two, for rock climbing, both must be, primarily, expert, and our social selection must be confined to this class. For glacier work any party of two, even though, socially, they speak with the tongues of angels, must always be unsound. The popularity of the party of two as a rock climbing combination compels us continually to reconsider its suitability under new aspects. As a social companionship the association of two friends, equally expert, is ideal. The association of two friends, one of them less expert but equally competent to share in the responsibility for a joint decision, is quite defensible. But it must be remembered that any external feeling strong enough to interfere with the complete concentration of a leader upon his climbing reduces the efficiency of his normal standard and still more of his standard of the day. His feeling of a particular responsibility for an individual, other than his general responsibility to a party, may act as a dangerous distraction. A man, therefore, who climbs alone with a novice, a younger person or a pupil, towards whom he is in a position of personal trust, handicaps himself to an extent that should forbid him to attempt any but absolutely safe and elementary climbing. The usual risks, even of merely external chance, which he may take lightly for himself or for a second companion of equal discretion, he may not take for his charge; and the cheerful consent of an inexperienced comrade to ‘share’ in taking such a chance cannot be considered as relieving the single expert of any part of his exclusive responsibility. If he has the sense of it constantly in mind, the feeling turns to anxiety in moments of crisis, and interferes with his coolness of judgment and with the nervous harmony upon which his skill depends; at more ordinary times its presence materially biases his ordinary mental and physical climbing habit. If, on the other hand, he undertakes such a charge, and then does not keep it in mind in all his decisions and actions, no one will consider him to have been a happy choice for the responsibility entrusted to him.

Where the sense of responsibility is further complicated by an emotional relationship its debilitating effect is increased. It is a commonplace of all active undertakings that relationship is irreconcilable with cool command and undisturbed performance. Similarly, a father climbing alone with his child or children, a husband climbing with his wife, cannot preserve the nervous concentration or the emotional detachment indispensable for an unsupported leader. Whatever their normal ability as mountaineers, in such a companionship both their discretion and their execution must be subject to a hundred distracting influences. The disturbance, even the danger, of an emotional state in a member of a party has already been indicated. In these cases, however, it is the leader, whose business it should be to correct, who is the man affected; and, further, in a party of two so constituted, where the leader alone is morally or by nature responsible, no other can compensate for his abnormality or qualify the effects of his state or of his action. In my view no mountaineer should ever climb alone with anyone less competent for whom he must be held responsible either by relationship or by delegated authority; unless the climbing is so short and so safe that he can be sure of always safeguarding his charge against the ill consequence of any and every form of ‘accident’ however remote or unlikely. Practically this means that, except for simple ‘bouldering’ or elementary, separate ‘pitch’ climbs, without the addition of a second fully competent mountaineer all parties of this description are unsound.

In larger parties it is wise to give full value to social considerations in selecting the members, since we can always secure, by addition or subtraction, that any element of weakness introduced by relationship or private responsibility is balanced by a greater proportion of mountaineering skill. But for combinations of two our first business is to make absolutely certain that each man is equally competent, in his own and his friend’s eyes even more than in the eyes of the world, to take his full share of _responsibility_. We may then, if we will, treat the separate contributions of skill as a collective whole, and not quarrel with an expert who takes a less expert companion, provided he be competent and responsible, if by so doing he secures a wider field for his social choice.

WALKING MANNERS

There are several points of what may be termed walking manners, common to all types of long mountain walking and not only to climbing, whose observance contributes a great deal to the individual peace of mind during the early and late hours of a long alpine day. Men when they are off the rope, or who have never been on a rope, almost universally neglect them, and are blind to the cumulative effect upon a tired companion’s temper or upon their own humour. Every one thinks he can walk, and most men never bother to discover why the excellent companion of the Sunday afternoon ramble proved a failure on a long walking tour.

The first point of manners for the man in control is that of pace. Most climbers suffer from the weakness of increasing the pace the moment they take the lead on a path, slope or glacier. This is trying to the party, consciously or not, and wasteful. A manager should either block the way himself, or, if he is behind, keep consistently to what he considers the right tempo. It is better he should be thought to be getting old or lazy than that the party should be rushed inopportunely.

A second and frequent failing is the ‘half step’ trick. Some fifty per cent. of fast walkers, whenever they walk abreast on road or path or hill, persistently keep half a stride in front, their shoulder just clear of their companion. It may be due to some half-formed feeling of satisfaction in setting the pace and having a margin to turn round and talk from. Its effect is that the friend is perpetually straining to catch up, and the pace thus steadily accelerates till both are practically racing. Then one gives up, and both lag, until the game starts again. The habit is often unconscious, but it is extraordinarily irritating on a long tramp, or to a tired companion.

A third breach of manners, all too common, is passing ahead in the line of march. Over most broken country, glacier, snow or rough hillsides, men naturally fall into single file. Cattle tracks or man tracks are rarely wide enough for two abreast, and if it is a question of selecting a line, it saves reduplication of the effort to leave the task to one and to drop in behind him. There are few inexperienced walkers who do not take advantage of the slightest error in the choice of route on the first man’s part, to break off and pass him on the shorter line. In doing so, they take the responsibility of taking all the rest who follow off the line also. On an ordinary hill walk, when the going is all free and easy, this is excusable,--no one is compelled to follow another longer than suits him; as also in the case when the first man is obviously mistaken, and to cut his line is a distinct saving of effort for those who follow. But, done as by one of a line of men either tired or with a big day before them, where one has been taking the extra burden of route-selecting for the rest, it is a serious breach of mountain manners. The gain is probably only a yard or two, and the front man may justly resent having been left the labour of choosing the route at a hundred points, only to have advantage taken of his single doubtful choice in order to displace him. He either runs ahead to regain his place, and the rhythm of the party is broken in a silly competition none the less irritating that it is rarely acknowledged in words, or he plods behind with a slight sense of injury.

A more debatable occasion, where the same point comes into prominence, is on the ascent of steep slopes or open hillsides. An experienced front man will probably take these on a zigzag. To a less experienced walker, and to all beginners of energy and leg muscle, it is generally a temptation to cut the zigzags on the direct line, and so pass ahead. This is bad walking, but there is the more excuse for it in that on such slopes men rarely do follow each other exactly, and most of the party will probably be preferring each to take his zigzag at the most comfortable angle to himself. The best rule of manners to remember is that, while every man is free to choose any line and pace he likes on such places, yet, if one man has been definitely leading and choosing the line, the others ought to drop into their places in the line behind him again so soon as the single-file formation is resumed. It is more politic to be considered a well-mannered tramp than to assert one’s powers as a limber hill-rusher.

Another blunder, from which many a good walker is not free, is the inclination to hurry the pace if the line or short-cut he has chosen takes the party for a while over worse ground, or proves, for other reasons, not to have been the best route. His almost unconscious acceleration is due to some impulse to get back quickly and unnoticed to good going, and so to slur over the mistake, or the momentary disagreeability of the route for which he is responsible, as much to himself as to those who follow. It is a trick to notice and avoid. It forces the rhythm and pace over just the ground where it should, if anything, be eased. Men who walk much with parties which are afflicted with the ‘racing’ or ‘passing’ manias, are particularly liable, from a sort of nervous self-defence, to develop this failing also.

A leader must not walk carelessly or break the rhythm of step arbitrarily. The man who forces a plodding following to change feet unexpectedly does not know his business. Again, when walking in single file, or any way but comfortably abreast, men inexpert in acting as guides do not realize that although the man in front can hear all that is said behind him, yet that, unless he turns his head over his shoulder and throws his words out, he himself is inaudible down the line behind him. As the remarks from the leader on a long tramp, and when men are tired, have usually some direct bearing on the way, those behind him crowd up to hear; they break step, and are often put irritably on the strain. The complaint of many a young mountaineer, that his elder companion will never answer at all while walking, usually finds its explanation in the fact that the young man’s energy carries him ahead, and as his remarks are addressed to the scenery, his companion prefers consistent silence and inattention to the strain of trying to hear, or to the irritation to himself and his friend of continually repeating, “What d’you say?” These matters may seem too slight to mention, but neglect of their observance brings many a party home with some member or other out of harmony and unappreciative of the sunset.

In the grumpy morning start or during the evening tired return it is for such details that the manager has to be most on the look out. He should, if possible, set the pace himself, and keep it without questioning or remark to what he judges to be the best pace of the laggard of the day. He should never let himself be pressed by some one at his heels, race ahead, or allow others to do so, except for some specified and universally beneficial reason (such as ordering tea ahead!), merely because the difficulties seem to be over and the way plain for the stronger members of his party. There is no pleasure in being left behind; it provokes a tired man and generally makes him obstinately slower.

It used to be said, and by the best authorities, that with a tired or tramping party it is essential to keep the pace always the same, or they will lose the rhythm that alone can keep them going. This is a mistake. In the first place, variations in pace are a rest in themselves, provided that the actual effort put into each step does not vary. In the second place, it is definitely more fatiguing to be held back to a fixed pace on a sudden downhill gradient; and it is vexatious to pass from a long uphill grind on to a level stretch without the relief of a ‘swing out.’ Similarly, it is futile to change from a level to an uphill gradient and attempt to keep a party to the same rate. The mistaken teaching has been due to a confusion between actual rate of movement over the ground and the amount of effort required for each step.

Rhythm is essential to ensure good tramping, and to minimize fatigue. To secure rhythm the amount of effort put into each step, and not necessarily the pace, should be kept constant. Thus, in changing from uphill to level ground, the pace can be pleasantly quickened and the step lengthened, without any increase of effort in the stride or any change of rhythm. A longer stride is often a positive relief. In changing from level to uphill the length of the step shortens, since a lifting step is always more fatiguing, and the pace should be taken more slowly, though the output of effort is kept the same. On a change to a downhill gradient it is possible to change to a longer stride, or even a run, without altering the rhythm or increasing the amount of effort exacted of the muscles or of the lungs.

In resuming, after a halt, a frequent error is to start too fast. Young climbers, like young giants refreshed with wind, rush off at top pace. The re-start should always be slow--if anything slower than the average pace before the halt. Gradually, as the circulation and organs begin to readjust themselves to their work, the previous pace can be recovered. But a halt is definitely making reparation for the past, not accumulating a margin to waste in the immediate future.

When the energy of the party is running out, it is better to avoid halts altogether. To break the rhythm in such case and relax the mechanism is to make the resumption each time more difficult and the recovery of an equal rate afterwards very improbable.

To lead and choose the line is definitely more fatiguing than to follow. To save strength and maintain pace, during a long day, the leader ought to be changed at regular intervals. This is too rarely done.

[Sidenote: Some Notes on Hill Walking.]

There are one or two further points connected with walking up or down hill which are matters of method rather than of manners, but which in so far as they affect the individual comfort react upon the peace of a party.

In walking uphill, the foot should always be placed so that the heel rests on the ground. It is a beginner’s mistake to rush a hill and spring from the toes alone. If the flex of the ankle is stiff--men vary much in this respect--and the gradient is too steep to allow the heel to drop, look out for any little stone or excrescence, however small, to set it upon. If the path is very steep, and without stones, it is more comfortable to set the foot slightly sideways, so that the heel gets some support. This is often particularly useful at the turns of the interminable zigzags on alpine paths, where the track is apt to swoop up steeply round the bend. If the foot is thus placed slightly aslant at every turn, it is ready to advance at once after the bend in the direction of the new zag. A very slight economy, you may say: but multiply it by several thousand zags in a day!

Always take the outside and easiest line round such curves in ascending tracks.

The secret of all long grinds uphill is to set, and maintain, a regular pace that becomes rhythmic from the first. The moment you get behind a good hill walker, you will see the difference between his regular, restrained swing, more of the whole body than the leg, and the uneven jumping step, that seems each time to be a separate balancing effort, of the inexperienced walker.

Do not take long steps uphill, or lift the foot high. Raise it by slightly swaying the body across the firm leg and let the loose foot swing forward with its own weight. A good hill walker, of the ‘tireless’ variety, always moves with a slight balance or sway.

Always ‘accept a slip.’ That is, if the foot slips back on a loose surface, do not tire the muscles by a convulsive effort to stop it and to keep your balance. Let the foot go till it stops of itself as the topple of your weight, out of balance, comes upon it; and then swing from that point with the other foot.

The effort you put into each step should be kept the same, whatever the change in the angle of the surface.

If you are leading and doubtful of your pace, try to sing. So long as you can sing or whistle two lines without panting or effort, you are keeping within your measure.

On a zigzag uphill, do not take the apparent short-cuts. They are made by men descending, and only waste strength and spoil rhythm.

On an open hillside, zigzag as if on a path, starting at the angle which lets you comfortably get the heels down. For a step or two, if there is no room to zag, you can walk with only the one heel down, and the other foot springing from the toe; but not for more.

If circumstances make it imperative to go fast, lean well forward over the feet, and as it were ‘tumble up’ the slope. This eases the work of the heart. If you have to race, and legs and breath begin to give out, make the hands do their share, and unashamedly pull the knees up to the stride by the breeches. You can thus keep a long uphill stride at a fast pace going long after the leg muscles, unaided, would have given out.

In descending take the shortest cuts you like. There are two weak points to look to: one the toes, and the other the muscles of the back, which do most of the balancing. The toes are protected by well-fitting boots and a well-placed foot. The back muscles are best indulged by letting the shoulders go loose, as you do when jog-trotting on horseback. This eases the effort of balance and the amount of holding back and taut that the muscles have to perform. It also diminishes the jar.

Except for grown men, of exceptionally strong ankles and knees, it is best not to plunge ‘all-out’ downhill, leaping straight-legged from heel to heel. The legs should be kept under control, and the feet pointed down and kept well under the body. The knees should be bent, tense, but not rigid; they will serve to take up all the jar, and act as springs. The step resembles a dancing pace, with a bent knee.

Do not be shy of using the arms and hands, on trees, rocks or scrub, to ease in any way the effort of balance and the leg-strain during rapid descents. An ankle or sinew once wrenched is permanently weakened.

Long, hard road-tramping, with the leg swung straight, is not a good preparation for climbing. It jolts and stiffens the muscles, and fixes them in certain stereotyped movements. Good climbing guides are rarely good or fast road walkers. A long trudge often breaks them down and renders them unfit temporarily for severe climbing.

Standing about on the feet while the arms are being exercised merely tires the legs, and does not strengthen them. Many guides, who work hard at wood-chopping or in quarries during the winter, find their legs are all to pieces when the season begins. The knees are especially sensitive in this respect.

A climber’s leg machinery is a delicate engine of educated springs and fine interactions. It can do a rough-and-tumble better than most, at need, but it should be guarded for its special and exacting work, and not battered or shaken out of gear unnecessarily.

Hill walking exercises and develops all the movements of foot, ankle, knee and trunk which we use in balance-climbing on rock or snow. It is the best training for the fine and precise motions that we need to educate. There is no doubt of the soundness of a man’s climbing if he is seen to be a light and tireless hill walker. He may not necessarily be brilliant on rocks, but what he does he will do in good style.

If we wish to interest our young folk in climbing, the surest way is to let them walk and run loose by themselves upon the hills in early years. Rocks will meet them naturally, and if they are going to climb, they will begin to climb them naturally as they occur, with the feet and with the balance they have practised on their hill walks. To take them to rocks too early, as to a gymnasium, is to spoil their taste and deprive them of the chance of developing a personal enthusiasm and a natural style. Every good mountaineer must rediscover the hills and the passion for climbing them as of himself.

CHOICE OF DISTRICT

One consideration remains for the leader, if it has not been already decided by the preferences of his party--that of the district he will choose for the season. A few general principles may help to guide his choice.

The tour may be either concentric, with ascents made from one or from a succession of centres, or eccentric, in which case the party will be moving forward and carrying its own luggage. The first is the more luxurious, the second the more attractive, holiday. The choice depends upon the character of the party and upon the weather of the season.

With beginners, in a good season, it is more instructive and independent to move along a range, crossing passes and taking only the climbs that come. The same progressive type of tour is the best to follow in a really bad season, when the big peaks are out of the question, for the time at least, and when there may yet be a delightful holiday spent in wandering among the lower Alps below the cloud-level. Even for those who may be ambitious of big peaks, this is a better alternative than sitting cooped up with other murmurers waiting for the impossible in high hotels.

On the other hand, in good but uncertain weather, if the party is desirous of big climbs, and has to economize its time, it is better to move by express routes from centre to centre, and to strike for the big peaks without loss of days, when the good weather comes, and while it lasts.

In more doubtful weather, when the days are playing at ‘alternates’ but the peaks are still possible on fair days, and when consequently we are not forced down to the pleasures of low rambling, it is well to climb still from centres, and from the hotel itself. If, indeed, the party is aiming at a special peak, it should occupy the nearest hut, and provision it as a centre, ready to start on the first clear morning. But if, as is wiser in a bad season, it is wishful to take anything that offers, it is even better to stay at the central hotel below--since peaks enclosing a valley are often differently affected by different kinds of weather--and the party is then in a position to set out at once for whichever mass first becomes feasible. It can start overnight, and so avoid the hut altogether. The fatigue and romance of an all-night tramp are less prejudicial to the chances of a successful climb on the following day than the depression of a dull and stiff morning start after a comfortless night.

On the other hand, there is no more memorable experience than to sleep out in the open air during a spell of settled weather, with the stars for company and the first stir of wind before dawn as a strange awakening. The man who wishes to taste the full pleasure of a mountaineering day should sleep out whenever he can the night before, and he should lie far enough from his companions to be able to feel himself alone.

Possibly the pleasantest holiday of all is obtained by a combination of the concentric and eccentric methods, according as weather and inclination direct. To wander forward independent of times and plans, and to make pauses when we wish for more prolonged assaults upon peaks that tempt us, is a twofold delight. But it postulates leisure.

At home it is natural to base our calculations upon an estimate of a climb every day. Only when we are faced with the facts on the spot, the distances, portages and weather, do we recognize that we are lucky if we can make two or three good climbs a week. We must allow two days for each big climb, and leave a margin for the off-days. Younger heads or less experienced legs must be taught this last doctrine for their own good. The more practised will more easily recall that contrast is the essence of enjoyment, and that the days of hard going on ice and heated rocks are only fully realized and remembered if they are relieved by occasional lapses into tranquil lounging in the grassy valleys, amid the cool temptations of lemon-ices and clinking teetotal glasses.

If the party, having settled its general plan, has no preference for any particular district, it may be guided, in the Alps, by a few broad distinctions as between the best known districts.