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von Ruthner, then the Vice-President of the Austrian Alpine Club . From the account given of his attemptit is clear that he followed the same route as ourselves;our Italian in fact led us in his footsteps, up to thesaddle at the north-west base of the mountain. Hisfailure to get further was entirely owing to his guides,who, unused to such expeditions, and appalled by thesight of a broken and somewhat steep snow-slope, re-fused to proceed. The Italian , as our experience proved,was a poor creature, his second guide, Kuenz, though,as we are told, renowned as a keen chamois and bear-liunter, declared to Dr. von Ruthner ‘ that he had oncein his youth descended amongst the wild chasms of theglacier which pours steeply over into Val Cercen, andthat he would never do it again.’ This descent we sub-sequently found an admirable spot for a glissade!

Watching from our window the rain, which after adeceitful lull now fell again in torrents, we saw thescout, who was still on duty, in deep converse with afriend. In a few minutes the friend sauntered casuallyinto our room, and enquired our plans with an air ofindifference. I assured him that our intention was toclimb the Presanella, without thinking it necessary toadd—and find a way down the other side of it. Hisobject thus satisfactorily attained, the man soon left us,and no doubt imparted the valuable information to hisbrother officials, for their demeanour suddenly changed,and one of them told us that they should not object toour guide’s accompanying us to the Presanella. Weof course expressed ourselves duly thankful for their

Alpen arcs dem Jahre 1864, von Dr. Anton von Ruthner , published inPetermann’s Mittheilungen for 1865.