Untitled

THE A DAI KllDKII GROUP 135
partially masked from us as we traversed the siiowtields by lower
spurs.
Years passed without any further exploration of the Adai
Khokh Glaciers. It was not until 1884 that a traveller undertook,
with the help of the famous guide, Alexander Burgener, to chmb
the rocky pinnacle above the Mamison Pass, which had in 18G8
attracted our particular admiration.
M. de Dechy, the traveller in question, is a Hungarian gentle-
man. From his Russian connections and his mastery of the lan-
guage, he had exceptional advantages as an early explorer in
the Caucasus. He had, moi'eover, obtained in the Alps the
mountaineering qualification requisite for membership of the Alpine
Club, together with such photographic experience as enabled him
to produce technically excellent, as well as topographically inte-
resting, illustrations of Caucasian landscapes and people. In this
branch of Caucasian exploration he was the forerunner of Signor
Vittorio Sella, Mr. Donkin, Mi-. H. Woolley, and Mr. C. Dent, and
it is to him that we owe the initiation of the admirable and now
almost complete series of photographs of the Central Caucasus
executed by membei's of the Alpine Club. These photographs
assuredly deserve the praise given
Alpine work by Mr. Ruskin :— '
to some of Mr. Donkin's earlier
more beautiful than the
Anything
windows cannot be con-
photographs now in your printseller's
ceived. For geographical or
geological purposes they are worth
anything.' The scientific value of such work must be appreciated
by all who are genuinely interested in the exploration of moun-
tains, however low it may stand in the estimation of certain
foreign critics who seldom venture above the horse-level.
M. de Dcchy chose the Zea Glacier as his mode of
ajsproach.
He took photographs, explored the glacier, and climbed a peak at
the head of it, which he at the time believed to be the pyramidal
summit conspicuous from the Mamison Pass, which both he and
I had erroneously identified with the Adai Khokh of the five-verst
map, the highest triangulated point in the group. The weather
was broken, and clouds interfered with the explorer's examination
of the local orography ; but on the third day from St. Nikolai