Now I'll tell you about the country from Little Valley to west ridge. First it's easy, across fields. Then you come to Westcott's Hill. Gee whiz, I don't know what he ever wanted to own a hill like that for. The side nearest Little Valley isn't very steep but going down the other side it's pretty steep. On that side the hill is sort of broken off like. We weren't worrying because we knew there'd be some way down. We should worry about hills. At the foot of that hill is a deep cut where the railroad goes through. On the other side of the railroad tracks the ridge begins. Before you get to the ridge there's a pond--a pretty big one. Up the side of the ridge are woods. Now most all the way from Little Valley to the ridge we could see the tree. There were only two places where we couldn't see it. One was just before we got to the hill. But after we got part way up the hill we could see it again. The other place was west of the hill, in the hollow. We knew how it would be there but we didn't care because we had our compass. We intended to go up through the woods on the ridge with our compass. It was pretty easy going till we got up to the top of the hill but then we saw that it was going to be pretty hard getting down it, it was so steep. It went down a little way, maybe ten feet, almost straight. Then there was a kind of a little slanting shelf with all grass and bushes. We didn't know how it was below that slanting shelf because we couldn't see. Maybe it was so that we could climb down. If it wasn't it would have to be pretty steep. So we stood on the top of the hill thinking what we would do. Warde Hollister said, "The only thing to do is for one of us to climb down on that ledge and look over and see how steep it is below. Then we'll know whether we can make it or not. There's no use turning back till we know we have to." "_Turning back?_" I said. "Well, what else are we going to do if we can't get down this hill?" he wanted to know. "All our day's hike for nothing?" Westy said. "I didn't say I'm for turning back," Warde said. "But this isn't a case of ringing front door bells and getting on the right side of people. Maybe scouts like Nature, but Nature doesn't care much about scouts." "You said something," I told him. "But, gee whiz, we don't want to turn back." He said, "Well, there's no use crying till we're hurt. We've got to find out how steep it is below and that ought to be easy." He started throwing off his jacket. "Only you'd better be careful," I said. "That ledge is kind of slanting." "It's all full of bushes," he said. "How will you get up again if you have to come back?" one of the fellows asked him. "A couple of you can reach down," he said. "There's a good foothold up on top here." I didn't like the idea of his doing that. But I didn't like the idea of turning back either.