eleven miles. We intended to try to hit a point on the ridge immediately above the part where it seemed to be easiest.
We left Entraignes at 3.30 on the morning of June 27, and proceeded, over very gently-inclined ground; towards the foot of the Pic de Bonvoisin (following in fact the route of the Col de Sellar, which leads from the Val Louise into the Val Godemar);[1] and at 5 a.m., finding that there was no chance of obtaining a view from the bottom of the valley of the ridge over which our route was to be taken, sent Almer up the lower slopes of the Bonvoisin to reconnoitre. He telegraphed that we might proceed; and at 5.45 we quitted the snow-beds at the bottom of the valley for the slopes which rose towards the north.
The course was N.N.W., and was prodigiously steep. In less than two miles' difference of latitude we rose one mile of absolute height. But the route was so far from being an exceptionally difficult one, that at 10.45 we stood on the summit of the pass, having made an ascent of more than 5000 feet in five hours, inclusive of halts.
Upon sheet 189 of the French map a glacier is laid down on the south of the Crête des Bœufs Bouges, extending along the entire length of the ridge, at its foot, from east to west. In 1864 this glacier did not exist as one glacier, but in the place where it should have been there were several small ones, all of which were, I believe, separated from each other.[2]
We commenced the ascent from the Val d'Entraigues, to the west of the most western of these small glaciers, and quitted the valley by the first great gap in its cliffs after that glacier was passed. We did not take to the ice until it afforded an easier route than the rocks; then (8.30) Croz went to the front, and led with
- ↑ The height of Col de Sellar (or de Celar) is 10,073 feet (Forbes). I was told by peasants at Entraigues that sheep and goats can be easily taken across it.
- ↑ See map on p. 202. It is perhaps just possible, although improbable, that these little glaciers were united together at the time that the survey was made. Since then the glaciers of Dauphiné (as throughout the Alps generally) have shrunk very considerably. A notable diminution took place in their size in 1869, which was attributed by the natives to the very heavy rains of that year.
