I do not propose to emphasise the various agonies of an early-morning start or to catalogue all that may be found for fumbling fingers to do; but one incident is worth recording. A second rucksack escaped us, slipping from the ledge where it was perched, and went bounding down the mountain. Its value, even Norton will agree, was greater than that of the first; it contained our provisions; our breakfast was inside it. From the moment of its elusion I gave it up for lost. What could stop its fatal career? What did stop it unless it were a miracle? Somehow or another it was hung up on a ledge 100 feet below. Morshead volunteered to go and get it. By slow degrees he dragged up the heavy load, and our precious stores were recovered intact. At 8 a.m. we were ready to start and roped up, Norton first, followed by myself, Morshead and Somervell. This bald statement of fact may suggest a misleading picture; the reader may imagine the four of us like runners at the start of a race, greyhounds straining at the leash, with nerves on the stretch and muscles aching for the moment when they can be suddenly tight in strong endeavour. It was not like that. I suppose we had all the same feelings in various degrees, and even our slight exertions about the camp had shown us something of our physical state. In spite of the occasional sleep of exhaustion it had been a long, restless night, scarcely less wearisome than the preceding day; we were tired no less than when we went to bed, and stiff from lying in cramped attitudes. I was clear about my own case. Struggling across with an awkward load from one tent to the other, I had been forced to put the question, Is it possible for me to go on? Judging from physical evidence, No; I hadn’t the power to lift my weight repeatedly step after step. And yet from experience I knew that I should go on for a time at all events; something would set the machinery going and somehow I should be able to keep it at work. And when the moment of starting came I felt some little stir of excitement. If we were not going to experience “the wild joy of living, the leaping from rock up to rock,” on the other hand this was not to be a sort of funeral procession. A certain keenness of anticipation is associated merely with tying on the rope. We tied it on now partly for convenience, so that no one would be obliged to carry it on his back, but no less for its moral effect: a roped party is more closely united; the separate wills of individuals are joined into a stronger common will. Our roping-up was the last act of preparation. We had “got ourselves ready,” lacing up our boots so as to be just tight enough but not too tight, disposing puttees so that they would not slip down, attending to one small thing or another about our clothing for warmth and comfort’s sake, possibly even tightening a buckle or doing up a button simply for neatness, and not forgetting to arrange the few