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Steep Trails-Part25_John Muir(1838-1914)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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At noon next day we left camp and began our long climb. We were in



light marching order, save one who pluckily determined to carry his

camera to the summit. At night, after a long easy climb over wide and



smooth fields of ice, we reached a narrow ridge, at an elevation of

about ten thousand feet above the sea, on the divide between the



glaciers of the Nisqually and the Cowlitz. Here we lay as best we

could, waiting for another day, without fire of course, as we were now



many miles beyond the timberline and without much to cover us. After

eating a little hardtack, each of us leveled a spot to lie on among



lava-blocks and cinders. The night was cold, and the wind coming down

upon us in stormy surges drove gritty ashes and fragments of pumice



about our ears while chilling to the bone. Very short and shallow was

our sleep that night; but day dawned at last, early rising was easy,



and there was nothing about breakfast to cause any delay. About four

o'clock we were off, and climbing began in earnest. We followed up



the ridge on which we had spent the night, now along its crest, now on

either side, or on the ice leaning against it, until we came to where



it becomes massive and precipitous. Then we were compelled to crawl

along a seam or narrow shelf, on its face, which we traced to its



termination in the base of the great ice cap. From this point all the

climbing was over ice, which was here desperately steep but



fortunately was at the same time carved into innumerable spikes and

pillars which afforded good footholds, and we crawled cautiously on,



warm with ambition and exercise.

At length, after gaining the upper extreme of our guiding ridge, we



found a good place to rest and prepare ourselves to scale the

dangerous upper curves of the dome. The surface almost everywhere was



bare, hard, snowless ice, extremely slippery; and, though smooth in

general, it was interrupted by a network of yawning crevasses,



outspread like lines of defense against any attempt to win the summit.

Here every one of the party took off his shoes and drove stout steel



caulks about half an inch long into them, having brought tools along

for the purpose, and not having made use of them until now so that the



points might not get dulled on the rocks ere the smooth, dangerous ice

was reached. Besides being well shod each carried an alpenstock, and



for special difficulties we had a hundred feet of rope and an axe,

Thus prepared, we stepped forth afresh, slowly groping our way through



tangled lines of crevasses, crossing on snow bridges here and there

after cautiously testing them, jumping at narrow places, or crawling



around the ends of the largest, bracing well at every point with our

alpenstocks and setting our spiked shoes squarely down on the



dangerous slopes. It was nerve-trying work, most of it, but we made

good speed nevertheless, and by noon all stood together on the utmost



summit, save one who, his strength failing for a time, came up later.

We remained on the summit nearly two hours, looking about us at the



vast maplike views, comprehending hundreds of miles of the Cascade

Range, with their black interminable forests and white volcanic cones



in glorious array reaching far into Oregon; the Sound region also, and

the great plains of eastern Washington, hazy and vague in the



distance. Clouds began to gather. Soon of all the land only the

summits of the mountains, St. Helen's, Adams, and Hood, were left in



sight, forming islands in the sky. We found two well-formed and

well-preserved craters on the summit, lying close together like two plates



on a table with their rims touching. The highest point of the

mountain is located between the craters, where their edges come in



contact. Sulphurous fumes and steam issue from several vents, giving

out a sickening smell that can be detected at a considerable distance.



The unwasted condition of these craters, and, indeed, to a great

extent, of the entire mountain, would tend to show that Rainier is



still a comparatively young mountain. With the exception of the

projecting lips of the craters and the top of a subordinatesummit a



short distance to the northward, the mountains is solidly capped with

ice all around; and it is this ice cap which forms the grand central



fountain whence all the twenty glaciers of Rainier flow, radiating in

every direction.






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