This finishes the preliminary survey of the eastern face of Scawfell, during the perusal of which the reader is recommended to examine the diagram facing page 46.
THE BROAD STAND.--My first climb in the Lake District was up the Broad Stand. Dr. S. and I had planned a week’s walking tour over the Cumberland fells, guided by Baddeley and Jenkinson, and ignorant of the existence of any regular rock practice hereabouts. We walked up from Langdale one Sunday morning in heavy snow to the top of Rossett Ghyll, and then studied the guide book for information concerning the small tarn that lay a few feet beneath us. ‘Deep and clear, and good for bathing,’ we read; so we bathed. It was long ago, and neither of us has bathed during a snowstorm since. Our feet got benumbed standing on the snow while we were dressing ourselves, and we had much ado to restore circulation. Then as the day advanced and the air cleared a little, it seemed possible that we might find a way up Scawfell Pikes, which, we had read, was the highest point in England. With much ploughing through soft snow, loaded with heavy knapsacks, and supported by but one broken walking stick, we reached the topmost cairn in perfect safety and realised the height of that Easter ambition. Then it was that Dr. S. read aloud to me a thrilling description of the Mickledore chasm, which presented an almost impassable barrier between the Pikes and Scawfell, a terrific gap that only hardy cragsmen of the dales were able to traverse. The ice-cold bath on that Sabbath morn had done much to quench our spirit, but we had partially recovered ourselves, and a burning desire to scale the majestic peak opposite flamed up in each of us simultaneously, and drove us down towards the Pulpit rock that sentinels the Mickledore. The guide-book was not wanting in detail. There were three Ways of attacking Scawfell from Mickledore; first the Chimney, then Broad Stand, and then the Lord’s Rake. I believe we guessed the position of the chimney correctly, for after all there is something to show for the name; but we were hopelessly at sea with the other two. Dr. S. argued that Lord’s Rake sounded so much worse than Broad Stand that we were bound to go for it wherever it might be and however easy its aspect. Nobody at home would believe us if we described a Broad Stand as a vertical wall hundreds of feet in height, glistening with ice, and guarded above by overhanging boulders ready to pulverise the bold invader. On the other hand, the Lord’s Rake seemed remotely to suggest Jacob’s Ladder, and offered the imagination a goodly choice of adjective and epithet. Where, then, was the Lord’s Rake? We had little time to consider, and rapidly decided that the Broad Stand was away down in Eskdale on the left, and the Lord’s Rake straight up from Mickledore. Wherein we were wrong, as the previous pages may show the reader. Then we tried to get up the wall just where the Mickledore ridge strikes the cliff, but the cold soon drove us to seek some easier start lower on the left. Thus it was that fate took us to the actual Broad Stand, up which, inexperienced though we were, we could scarcely help finding the correct route. Place a man at the right starting point, and he will easily find the upward line of least resistance, though not so swiftly as he would trace out the downward line if he slipped.