The whole hillside was a perfect wild
garden. Columbines, potentillas--yellow, bronze, and crimson--primulas,
anemones, gentian, arnica, and quantities of unknown blossoms gave us
ample excuse for lingering panting in the rarefied air, as we struggled
through brushwood first, and then over loose rocks and finally slopes of
shelving snow, before we found ourselves on the crest of the mountain,
shivering slightly in the raw, foggy air.
Our view was narrowed down to the bleak slopes of rock and snow that
immediately surrounded us, for our hope that we should get above the cloud
belt was not fulfilled, and beyond a dismal tarn, lying just below us, in
whose black waters forlorn little bergs of rotten snow floated, and a very
much circumscribed view of dull tops swathed in flying mist, we saw
nothing.
Had the sky been clear, I am told that the view would have been
magnificent, but I should think probably no better than that from
Killanmarg, as it is a mistake to suppose that a high, or at least too
high, elevation "lends enchantment." As a rule the view is finer when seen
half-way up a lofty mountain than that obtained from the summit.
We did not stay long upon the top of Apharwat discussing the best point of
view, because Cardew sagaciously remarked that if it grew much thicker he
wouldn't be answerable for finding the way down, and as I have a holy
horror of rambling about strange (and possibly precipitous) mountains in a
fog, we set about retracing our own footsteps in the snow until we
regained the ridge we had come up by.
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