Once he got involved in a succession of crevasses which ran into each
other, so that he found himself at last walking on the edge of a wedge
of ice not a foot broad, with unfathomable abysses on either side. The
wedge terminated at last in a thin edge with a deep crevasse beyond. He
was about to retrace his steps--for the tenth time in that place--when
it struck him that if he could only reach the other side of the crevasse
on his right, he might gain a level patch of ice that appeared to
communicate with the sounder part of the glacier beyond. He paused and
drew his breath. It was not much of a leap. In ordinary circumstances
he could have bounded over it like a chamois, but he was weak now from
hunger and fatigue; besides which, the wedge on which he stood was
rotten, and might yield to his bound, while the opposite edge seemed
insecure and might fail him, like the mass that had proved fatal to Le
Croix.

He felt the venture to be desperate, but the way before him was yet very
long, and the day was declining. Screwing up his courage he sprang
over, and a powerful shudder shook his frame when he alighted safe on
the other side.

Farther down the glacier he came to a level stretch, and began to walk
with greater speed, neglecting for a little the precaution of driving
the end of his axe-handle into the snow in front at each step. The
result was, that he stepped suddenly on the snow that concealed a narrow
crevasse. It sank at once, sending something like a galvanic shock
through his frame. The shock effected what his tired muscles might have
failed to accomplish. It caused him to fling himself backward with
cat-like agility, and thus he escaped narrowly. It is needless to say
that thereafter he proceeded with a degree of care and caution that
might have done credit even to a trained mountaineer.

At last Lewis found it necessary to quit the glacier and scale the
mountains by way of a pass which led into the gorge from which he hoped
to reach the vale of Chamouni. He was in great perplexity here, for,
the aspect of the country being unfamiliar to his eye, he feared that he
must have lost his way. Nothing but decision, however, and prompt
action could serve him now. To have vacillated or retraced part of his
steps, would have involved his spending a second night among the icy
solitudes without shelter; and this he felt, fatigued and fasting as he
was, would have been quite beyond his powers of endurance