PREFACE.
Fate decrees that the mountaineer should, sooner or later, fall a victim to the furor scribendi, and since it is useless for a mere mortal to contend with the gods, I have yielded to their behests. A fitting reward has been allotted me; though the delight of wandering among the great snow-fields, of climbing the jagged ridges, and of plunging down through the primeval forest of some Caucasian valley, cannot be rivalled by the rarest fabric built of memory, yet the piecing together of old incidents, the interweaving of the laughter and the fears, the desperate struggles and the wild triumph of old-won victories, has tinged many a winter evening with the gorgeous colouring of Alpine sunsets and has knitted more firmly the bonds of well-tried friendships; to some extent, even, it has brought me nearer to that reckless, lucky, tireless youth, when the grass slopes, and the stones, and the other ills of life, had not found the art of troubling.
I fear no contributions to science, or topography,
