THE ASCENT OF MOUNT MoKINLEY.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPEC'rATOR."]
SIR,—In your excellent review of Dr. Frederick A. Cook's "To the Top of the Continent" in the Spectator of October 17th I find this passage :— " The top [of Mount McKinley] was only reached by the two climbers sleeping out for several consecutive nights among the high snows. The performance seems to us tp set the conquest of Everest well within the domain of possibility. The Arctic character of the mountain puts its twenty thousand odd feet on the same plane as the twenty-nine thousand feet of the Himalayan peak, and if, as is probable, the actual climbing on the north side of Everest does not begin till over twenty thousand feet, the mountaineering difficulties of the Alaskan peak are actually the greater of the two."
It is with no wish to belittle Dr. Cook's splendid feat of endurance and pluck that I doubt the conclusion stated. If "the actual climbing on the north side of Everest does not begin till over twenty thousand feet," there yet remain nine thousand feet or less of difficulties to be undertaken in an ever-increasing strain upon the heart and lungs due to rarefied air. I may remind you that Fitzgerald never reached the top of Aconcagua in spite of the most lavish preparations, although the latter part of the way, which his Swiss guide did accom- plish, was little more than a gentle slope upwards. The elevation in that case, perhaps not yet quite accurately determined, is at least one vertical mile below Everest.
Indeed, the height of the Indian mountain approaches pretty near the limit of height to which balloonists can attain with no physical exertion to hasten respiration. No one will call Everest " unclimbable." That word was used over-often in the Alps. But surely it will only be climbed by the rarest combination of physique, preparation, and favouring circum-
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