climb. Related to the whole, the route can be understood better and committed to memory.

Much has been written by Scotsmen disparaging mountaineers and others from south of the border who come to Lochaber under the impression that Ben Nevis is merely nine hundred feet higher than Snowdon, or thirteen hundred feet higher than Scafell - with no regard for the implications of that extra height. No non-Scotsman, experienced in Scottish winter conditions, would quarrel with this, nevertheless it is obvious that nowadays there is an equal number of incompetent young Scots above the snow-line - understandably, for the number of Scots climbing on their own mountains every weekend will be greater, because they live so much nearer to them.

There is, indeed, less excuse for young Scotsmen than for other novices to be ignorant of their own snow conditions. The great publicity given to winter accidents there, the disapproval of Chief Constables, the admirable attempts by Scottish mountaineering clubs and other organisations to educate the masses, all these admonitions seldom carry far across the border.

How many young rock-climbers, English, Welsh, American, fresh from Trés Difficiles on Chamonix granite (or even Zermatt snow) know that the weather on Ben Nevis can be arctic?

This may be an exaggeration, but the interested may compare the log of an Arctic expedition with Twenty Years on Ben Nevis: the record that was kept by the men who manned the observatory on the summit between 1883 and 1904.

January and November were found to be the months for most gales, “the great majority of the severe gales, attaining a velocity of anything between 80 and 150 miles per hour, are from some point between south and east“.

In stormy weather the scientists had to rope up to make their observations. They were often blown over. Sometimes the anemometer was quite useless in the enormous pressure and could no longer record. The highest winds recorded were between 90 and 140 miles per hour. In such winds no one could venture outside and the windows were broken by chunks of flying ice.

Cornices overhung the gullies between fifteen and twenty-five feet. The depth of snow on the top varied between twelve and fourteen feet. The lowest temperature reading was 0.5 degrees Fahrenheit (31.5 degrees of frost). Considering everything else, this may not seem particularly low, but this is the Continue to page 3