They crossed the bergschrund with less difficulty than they had anticipated, and ascending a ridge of debris, by the side of the lateral glacier which descended from the cliffs of the Aiguille d'Argentière, they advanced into the bay under the southern wall of the Aiguille du Chardonnet. On the top of this moraine Jean halted, and the party breakfasted, and while they breakfasted Chayne told Sylvia something of that mountain's history. "It is not the most difficult of peaks," said he, "but it has associations, which some of the new rock-climbs have not. The pioneers came here." Right behind them there was a gap, the pass between their mountain and the Aiguille du Chardonnet. "From that pass Moore and Whymper first tried to reach the top by following the crest of the cliffs, but they found it impracticable. Whymper tried again, but this time up the face of the cliffs further on to the south and just to the left of the summit. He failed, came back again and conquered. We follow his road." And while they looked up the dead white of that rounded summit ridge changed to a warm rosy color and all about that basin the topmost peaks took fire. "It is the sun," said he. Sylvia looked across the valley. The great ice-triangle of the Aiguille Verte flashed and sparkled. The slopes of the Les Droites and Mont Dolent were hung with jewels; even the black precipices of the Tour Noir grew warm and friendly. But at the head of the glacier a sheer unbroken wall of rock swept round in the segment of a circle, and this remained still dead black and the glacier at its foot dead white. At one point in the knife-like edge of this wall there was a depression, and from the depression a riband of ice ran, as it seemed from where they sat, perpendicularly down to the Glacier d'Argentière. "That is the Col Dolent," said Chayne. "Very little sunlight ever creeps down there." Sylvia shivered as she looked. She had never seen anything so somber, so sinister, as that precipitous curtain of rock and its riband of ice. It looked like a white band painted on a black wall. "It looks very dangerous," she said, slowly. "It needs care," said Chayne. "Especially this year when there is so little snow," added Sylvia. "Yes. Twelve hundred feet of ice at an angle of fifty degrees." "And the bergschrund's just beneath." "Yes, you must not slip on the Col Dolent," said he, quietly. Sylvia was silent a little while. Then she said with a slight hesitation: "And you cross that pass to-day?" There was still more hesitation in Chayne's voice as he answered: "Well, no! You see, this is your first mountain. And you have only two guides." Sylvia looked at him seriously. "How many should I have taken for the Aiguille d'Argentière? Twelve?" Chayne smiled feebly. "Well, no," and his confusion increased. "Two, as a rule, are enough--unless--" "Unless the amateur is very clumsy," she added. "Thank you, Captain Chayne."