Five Mile Beach weekly journal., 1914-02-06
AN ALPINE THRILL
Wild Slide Down the Snow Slope
of a Mountain Peak.
SWEPT INTO AN ICE FUNNEL.

Periious Experience of an Explorer
Who Was imprisoned a Whole Night
In a Treacherous crevasse In a Gla-
cier on the Brink of a Gaping chasm.
Some thrilling experiences once be-
fell Frederick Chamberlin while he
was exploring the Alps. In the Wide
World Magazine he writes of an ad-
venture that befell him ON the after
noon of a September day when he was
descending the snow slope of a noun
tain:
Suddenly | found myself in front of
a particularly nasty serac, or ice ridge.
that gave very little foothold. The
surface was not broken and crumbly.
but just smooth. treacherous ice. How
ever. | was not going to be daunted. SO
I wormed my way up and was about
TO descend the other side when with
out warning my feet shot from under
me. and started careering down the
slope at break neck speed.
"Down I slid. straight through a fun
mel shaped hole into a partly formed
crevasse. l brought up sharply against
a small bar of ice that only just pre-
vented me from continuing my head
long career into a gaping chasm below.
"For a few seconds | lay half stun.
ned: then / carefully got on my feet.
felt my body all over to see that 40
bones had been broken and looked
round for my Ice ak. but that had dis
appeared.
II saw a slight crack in the surface
OF one of the sides. and | tried to draw
myself up, but my fingers could not
get a firm hold In the slippery Ice. and
I was soon forced to give that up
Then tried lying fat on my back in
the funnel through which | had en-
tered my prison and. firmly planting
my knees against It's sloping roof. en-
deavored to work myself back. Here
too, | failed.
"Being by this time quite desperate.
] took out my little pocket knife to try
to cut steps in the slope. My still torn
fingers let the knife slip at the first
attempt. and. although l CROPPED about
for a long time. l failed to recover 1t.
"My last chance had gone with the
knife. The darkness creeping on and
enveloping everything. the dead 81
lence, the bitter cold, were all begin.
ming to take effect, and l groaned at
the prospect Of the long night in front
of me. | dared not lean too far back,
for that slender bar of Ice might give
way. l called out loudly at intervals.
but the sound was stifed by the over
hanging walls.
"SOon IL was pitch dark, and to while
away the time and keep my spirits up
/ loudly sang a popular American song
But soon my thoughts became gloomy
again. There was no sound but an eerie
drip, drip. down below, and sometimes
the grinding. tearing, booming collapse
of a whole serAc would set my nerves
~quivering. | shivered necessarily, for
l was wet through from constant con
tact with the ice, and the night seem
ed in~terminable.
when | was on the point of utter col
lapse the first gray daylight mercifully
began to filter into my prison. Now |
must make by last desperate attempt
to escape.
"As a %forlorn hope | looked about
again for my knife. My eyes caught a
CLINT on a fan shaped piece of ice, and
there, just over the dark chasm, where
prOvidentially 1t had fallen the night
before. | spied It. Determined not TO
lose 1t again, ! attached 1t to my wrist
by a piece of string and started dig
ging at the steep ice slope.
.Three and a half hours | shaved in
the ice cavern, and then was able to
crawl up, digging my toes in at every
step. till ] could draw myself up into
comparative safety on the ledge above.
l lay there. gasping, for a few seconds:
then, taking the greatest precautions
all the while. | passed between the re
naming %crevasses and at last descend
ed safely to the firm rocks"