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THE DISCOVERERS OF THE CAl'LASUS 15
1868, the year ot" my first visit, and again three years later, in 1871,
M. Ernest Favre, then a young Genevese geologist, a son of the wellknown
writer of the same name, travelled in the central range, and
on his return published a small volume and a geological map. M.
Favre did wonders in the time ami with the opportunities at his
disposal : his map was an immense addition to our knowledge ; his
geological and orographical
observations were most valuable. His
KOSHTAXTAU, FROM ABOUT I4,6oO FEET ON ULLPACZ BASHI
work remains the chief and most trustworthy source of information
on his special subject. But not being a mountaineer himself, and
having no ice-craft at his command, the glacier region necessarily
remained as much a mare clausuin to him as the Palajocrystic Sea
has px'oved to the British Navy. Consequently, he had to go for
his facts, or ideas regarding it, to the government map. Finding
this map accurate below the snow-level, he readily accepted it as
a true picture of the region above the snow-level, to which he had
not himself peneti'ated.
The next step followed almost as a matter