Christian had told me that if I had the slightest tendency to _Schwindelkopf_, I must not go by the improvised route; but it proved that there were really no precipices at all, much less any of sufficient magnitude to turn an ordinary head dizzy.

He chose these rocks as the text for a long sermon on the necessity for great caution when we should arrive at the cave, telling of an Englishman who had tried to visit it two years before, and had cut his knee so badly with his guide's axe that he had to be carried down the mountain to Gonten, and thence to the steamer for Thun, in which town he lay for many weeks in the hands of the German doctor; this last assertion being by no means incredible.

Also, of a native who attempted the cave alone, and, making one false step near the top of a fall of ice, slipped down and down almost for ever, and finally landed with broken limbs on a floor of ice, where he was found, two days after, frozen stiff, but still alive.
It was not necessary to mount much, for we were almost as high as the mouth of the cave, according to Christian's belief, and our work consisted chiefly in passing along the face of the rock, round projecting buttresses and re-entering angles, till we reached that part of the mountain where we might expect to find our glaciere.

While we were thus engaged, two hoarse and ominous ravens took us under their charge, and accompanied us with unpleasant screams, which argued the proximity of food or nest.

We soon found that we had disturbed their meal, for we came to marks of blood, and saw that some animal had slipped on the rocks above, and landed on the ledge on which we were walking, bounding off again on to a shelf below, where the ravens had already torn the body to pieces.