The stream of ice turned round a bend in the fissure, very near the curtain, and was lost to view; but Rosset stood by the hole through which I had passed--on the safer side of it--and despatched blocks of ice, which glided past me round the corner, and went whizzing on for a long time, eventually landing upon stones, and sometimes, we fancied, in water.

It is very awkward work, sitting on a gentle slope of the smoothest possible ice, with a candle in one hand, and an axe in the other, cutting each step in front; especially when there is nothing whatever to hold by, and the slope is sufficient to make it morally certain that in case of a slip all must go together.

Of course, a rope would have made all safe.

When I groaned over the maire's obstinacy, Rosset asked what could possibly be the use of a rope, if I were to slip; and, to my surprise, I found that he had no idea what I wanted a rope for.

When he learned that, had there been one, he would have played a large part in the adventure, and that he might have had me dangling over an ice-fall out of sight round the corner, he added his groans to mine, and would evidently have enjoyed it all very much.