There was another and more important consideration which helped to decide on the form actually taken. Our Alpine climbers of the highest rank are born, not made. But most of the others, taking with them some natural aptitude and plenty of money, are made abroad. Why do they not take their preliminary training for a year or two in Wales, or Cumberland, or on the Scottish hills? It would be much wiser and cheaper to support the ‘home industry’ so far as it goes, before making their _débuts_ on the high Alps. Our British hills can give them no glacier practice, but they can learn a vast deal concerning rock-climbing before they leave the country. To such as these the book is primarily dedicated. There are no professional guides in Cumberland who know anything about the rocks. The amateur must come out and manage for himself. But it is here intended to show that the Cumberland school is a well-graded one; that the novice can start with the easiest and safest of expeditions, and can work his way up to a standard of skill comparing favourably with that of the average Swiss guide. There is nothing so instructive as guideless climbing, be it ever so humble in character. It makes the man wonderfully critical when taken in hand by guides later on, and renders him also much more able to profit by their practical instruction. For such beginners, the mere statement of the position of a gully and the number and character of its chief obstacles would be quite useless. He requires something more; a suggestion here and there of the manner in which the troubles can be avoided or overcome, and a comparison of these difficulties with others. It is natural that every man has his own way of employing the limbs; my way of dealing with a pitch might not at all suit another climber, who perhaps relies less upon balance and more on strength of arm than myself, or _vice versâ_. It is therefore unwise to appear dogmatic in describing methods, and I hasten to assure those knowing critics that I have never meant to appear so. And yet it is none the less a definite object throughout to render the accounts in sufficient detail for those who want assistance in repeating the ascents. I have not hesitated to draw on old experiences, gained when the ground was comparatively new to me; for there is a tendency to depreciate, or indeed to overlook entirely, the difficulties in any familiar route after constant practice has removed those elements that introduce risk or uncertainty of success, and a novice can often explain to a novice far more effectively than an expert.