The open sandy spaces such as are quite common by the side of the larger streams may be used with safety. There are no places where a spate will be so rapid as to endanger one, unless one choose, as a companion and I were once compelled to choose, a cave almost cut off by the water. The only places where it is essential that one should not camp, are the higher flats where wood is rare, and where the cold of the night is exceptionally severe. It is a choice to which one is often compelled, if one pushes on too long, after having miscalculated the fatigues and duration of the climb; but it is an error which one always regrets.

A further recommendation is, not to camp by the map. The map may look like that on p. 131, and one may say that one will follow up the stream at one’s leisure. The reality may turn out a series of ascending precipices, quite unassailable.

But it is a great temptation. A man may have known the Pyrenees and experienced time and again the error of trusting to a map for a camping site, but there is something so convincing about the print and the colours that after years of experience one may commit the same folly again. It was but this year that, trusting to the 1/100,000 map, I planned to camp at the place where the Cacouette falls into the main stream below Sainte Engrace. I did not know the spot; it seemed to come at a convenient hour in the ascent of the mountains: I should be there about 5 o’clock. There was wood marked, good water; it was on the lee side of the wind that was then blowing from the south. When I came to it the place was a sharp ledge of limestone higher than Cheddar cliffs, dotted here and there with trees and affording between the wall of rock and the water not three feet of ground. It was not to be approached from above; it could not be reached from below. A more impossible place for camping never was. I had the same experience some years ago on the Aston, though that was before I knew the Pyrenees well. There a place was chosen by my companion and myself for its mixture of wood and meadow upon the map, there were cabanes and apparently plenty of good water; it was so plain on the map, that one did not hurry to reach it before darkness; but when we got there it was a marsh; no cabane appeared until daylight, and there was even that very rare thing in the Pyrenees, doubtful water. As for the wood that should have dotted the pasture, it turned out to be tough little live bushes, and all green, that would neither cut nor burn.

There is one last and very grave danger of which I would warn the reader in connexion with travel on foot in the Pyrenees, with a map and even with a map and a compass. Without map or compass it is more than a danger, it is a sort of necessary misfortune perpetually attending men, and the gravity of it is proved by the fact that the local people who use neither compass nor map when they go into a district with which they are unacquainted, carefully ask the marks of the path and get themselves accompanied, if they can, by someone who knows the country-side. This danger may be called “Getting into the wrong valley.”

As one sits at home, one thinks of the scheme of mountain valleys too simply. One thinks of the stream as coming down through a ravine with its head waters appearing below a definite saddle or notch in the watershed. This stream, let us say, is flowing north. One sees on the further side another stream rising just on the other side of the notch and flowing on through a simple valley, going to the south. The crossing of the port between these valleys seems to depend upon no more than physical endurance and fine weather. One goes up one stream to the saddle, crosses the saddle, follows the other stream downhill, and so makes one’s passage from France to Spain.

There are many passes of this simplicity, but there are many more that, both between the lateral valleys and over the main range, present the danger of which I speak, and which consists in a complexity at a summit such that it is difficult in the extreme to know—even when one is certain one has gone up the right part of the hither slope—what one should do on the thither.

This danger of “getting into the wrong valley” cannot be seized without illustration, and in the following rough sketches I give examples of this.

In the first example is a bit of country such as one very often gets in these mountains with summits round about the 2600 metre line and the last valleys under the ports somewhat above the 2000. I have marked with hatching the contours below 2200 and in black the summits above 2600. The main watershed I have indicated by a dotted line.

When one is crossing a port of this type one sees before one from the summit a confused and gentle slope leading apparently to one obvious valley on the far side like the obvious valley out of which one has just ascended. It seems indifferent whether one should come down on to this by M or by N, to the left or to the right, yet the two valley floors to which each leads are quite separate and may lead one round to different river basins. How deceptive such a place is, the rough sketch appended may help the reader to grasp. It shows the kind of thing one sees from the summit of such a pass and how indifferent the choice appears between the ways by which one may descend.

This type of confusion exists sometimes in a still more dangerous form, as in the contour lines of sketch on next page.

A man arrived at the port P climbing up from the valley Q, which is deep and well defined, sees before him another valley R exactly in line with the last, also deep and also well defined. On either side of him, as he gets to the saddle, run high ridges perpendicular to the line of the two valleys. It seems common sense to take the watershed as running along these ridges and across the port, and if Q is the French valley, R will be the Spanish one. As a matter of fact the watershed may not run in this simple way at all, but (as indicated upon the sketch map) take a sharp turn to the right. R may be a French valley after all, and the proper way down into Spain may be over the gradual grassy slopes indicated by the arrow line. A man standing just at the port, and having a rocky ridge A and the rocky ridge B to his left and right, sees before him the obvious trench of the valley R and takes for granted that it is the Spanish valley, whereas his true way is across the vague grassy land towards S, and the watershed which he thinks runs from B on to A really turns round from B and runs on to the distant mountains before him.

It must be remembered that on these summits all traces of a path as a rule disappear. What is worse, indications of a path may begin on the other side into the wrong valley and not into the right one.

A second type of this peril is that in which some feature upon the ridge which looks quite unimportant upon the one side turns out to be all-important upon the other. Thus a man coming from A in the map below, where the valleys are hatched and the highest summits are black, would have before him the plain ridge B-C. It is indifferent where he crosses it from that side, but on the far side he finds a confusion of falling valleys, and if he does not pick out the right one he may find himself in a few hours shut in by high walls which constrain him to a journey he never meant to make. He may have intended to follow valley (1), and so to reach food and shelter, he may find himself in valley (2) caught for the night far from men and with walls of 3000 feet between him and them.

Sometimes this confusion takes the form of one’s being led on to an obvious notch in the ridge before one: a notch lower than the general line of the ridge which (one thinks) cannot but be the port. When one has climbed to it, however, one finds that the valley one was seeking lies far to the right or to the left of such a notch, and that the gap which was so noticeable on the one side of the pass corresponded to nothing useful upon the further side.

There is a good example of this under the peak called Negras where an obvious notch which one thinks surely must be the way over to the Gallego, leads to nothing more useful than an enclosed Tarn under the precipices of the mountains.

A sketch of the aspect of this particular ridge will make the difficulty plain.

All the contours upon the Aragonese side invite one to the notch at N, yet the true way lies over the ridge between A and B, and the nearer to B the better is the descent upon the further side. Indeed at A it is perilous, at B it is a very gradual descent of easy grass.

The third type of mountain structure which may lead one into the wrong valley is what may be called “The Double Col.” It is damnably common and a good example of it will be found in the track I describe later on in this book when I speak of the short cut from the Ariège Valley into the Roussillon.

The accompanying sketch will explain the character of this sort of tangle, and it is most important that anyone unacquainted with these mountains and wishing to learn them should seize it thoroughly, for it is the worst of all the lures that get a man astray.

Observe carefully the numerous contours on the sketch map overleaf. They are numerous because it is necessary to show the minute details of such a case. I will suppose them to be about 50 feet apart. The traveller is coming up the valley marked V, the floor of which is marked in black upon the sketch, and the apex of which is, let us say, 6000 feet above the sea; he climbs the last little slope of 250 feet and reaches the col at C, which is 6250 feet above the sea. On this saddle he has upon either side of him precipitous slopes, which lead up to two summits of mountains upon the right and the left, the one towards A, the other towards B. Right in front of him opens another valley corresponding apparently to the valley V from which he has come, and which we will call W. The floor of this also is marked in black upon the sketch. It will be observed from the contour lines that the descent on to W is easy, though the walls bounding it on either side become increasingly precipitous as one proceeds.

Hidden from him by rising ground upon the right, as he stands at C, there is yet another valley, the floor of which is also given in black. This valley we will call Y, and it is this valley which leads the traveller towards his object; valley W only gets him deeper into the wilderness. Both valleys W and Y, are so precipitous that once engaged in either of them one is caught and compelled to pursue them for many miles. It is evident that on a very large scale map such as this, and with full contour lines giving every few feet of height, the traveller would make no error. Once at C he would go up to the right around the base of mountain B, rising continually until, somewhat under 6500 feet, he came to the second col, D, which would bring him down into valley Y.

But consider how this corner would look upon an ordinary small scale map!

The whole distance from the apex of valley V to the apex of valley Y is not half a mile. It would occupy little more than a quarter of an inch upon your French map. The general trend and nature of the valleys, which the traveller shut in by high mountains cannot grasp, would seem obvious upon such a map and he would take it for granted that he could make no error and that the passage marked from V to Y would be perfectly plain sailing. It would never occur to him that he could be trapped into the little ravine W leading nowhere and in no way connected with his journey.

The map would look something like this, perhaps, giving one a perfectly accurate general impression of the whole country-side, but quite useless for the critical point C-D, the difficulties of which nothing but numerous contours and a very large scale can possibly explain. The traveller consults the map, he sees the mountain group whose summits are A, H, and K, with their heights marked, he sees the other mountain group culminating at B with its height also marked, he see the main valley V up the road of which he has proceeded with the town in which he stopped and the river which he has been following. He sees the pass clearly marked at C-D, leading over to the further valley Y with its town, river, and road—and the journey seems to present no difficulties. It is only when he gets actually shut up in the hills at the heads of the valleys that he may begin to doubt or to be misled. On his map he could never believe that the little torrent W going right round out of his direction could take him in, or that he would get into its valley.

If you consider what he actually sees when he gets to the summit of the pass, you will appreciate yet more easily how his error will come about. He will see something like this, with an obvious way straight before him, and with nothing to tell him that he must go up a second col, two or three hundred feet above him to the right at D, if he is to get into the right valley.

It is in cases of this sort that Schrader’s map is so useful—so far as it goes; but it only covers the quite central part of the Pyrenees, and the contours are 100 metres apart.

The particular ways in which one may get into the wrong valley are innumerable, but these three types which I have given include all the most common of them; and, of the three, the last which I have described in such detail is at once the most perilous and the most common.

While I am upon this subject of getting into the wrong valley on the downward side, I ought to mention the tricks which the map and one’s own judgment play upon one as one goes upwards.

Errors made as one follows the map up a ravine are nearly always due to making a false estimate of distance. The path may be lost for a considerable stretch, and the contours may at first be puzzling, but if one will trust to one’s map and to one’s compass one will never go far wrong, unless one misjudges distance, and it is on this account that in the directions I give below for particular places, I mean distance with what care I can.

Thus you may miss the path which branches off from the main path from the valley of the Cinqueta to go eastward over the Col de Gistian; but if you have made an accurate estimate of distance, and trust to the measurements given, you cannot fail to identify the stream up which that crossing lies.

Nothing can replace judgment, but there is a rule of thumb which is workable enough, and that is, save under conditions of extreme fatigue, that your kilometre on a mule path hardly ever takes you less than twelve minutes or more than fifteen. I except steep climbing of course, but steep climbing only comes at the port itself, or in quite unmistakable ravines and gorges, where you will not lose your way. Where you lose your way is in the Jasse, or in the bifurcation of main valleys, and there, as you plod up your mule path, you will, as I say, never take less than ten minutes over your kilometre (which is a centimetre upon your map)—and you ought always to have a little measure with you—nor will you ever take much more than twelve, save when you are quite knocked out and unable to calculate distance at all.

These limits will seem narrow to those who have not experienced such paths. But they are wide enough. You must of course note the times during which you choose to stop, and it is also true that if you make quite short halts for a moment or two, of which you take no record, you will quite put out your calculation; but twelve minutes to the kilometre is 3 miles an hour, fifteen is 2½ miles an hour, and if a man gets over a level mule track in the early morning carrying weight a little faster than the first pace, or on a steep part at evening a little slower than the second, yet the occasions when this rule of thumb fails are rare.

When your watch tells you that by the distance measured you should be approaching a bifurcation, or any other doubtful place, halt and decide.

If you do miss your way going upwards, or do take the wrong valley, if, in a word, you are lost (as I was badly four years ago, so that I have the right to speak of it), the first thing to remember is that the path, if you will take it downhill, will lead you at last to men. The rule about following running water is all very well in many mountains of the ranges, but it won’t do in the Pyrenees, for the running water very often goes under sharp limestone cliffs, and if you don’t find your way round or over them, you may spend more hours than are safe in looking for a way out. They form a very complete prison door, indeed, do these gorges.

The path, I say, if you follow it downhill, will save you, but if, when you find you are in the wrong valley, you attempt to recover your track by going up the lateral ridge, you always run a grave risk. It is by experiments of that sort that men die from exhaustion. It is true that one is not usually tempted to this extra effort. It is much easier to go on the way one is going, and to follow the path down, though one knows it is a wrong one, but there are occasions, especially late in the day, when one has all but conquered the main crest of the range, after perhaps one failure, and when one knows that one is lost, when the idea of one vigorous effort to get over while it is yet daylight is tempting. It is a fatal temptation.

When you have made up your mind that you are lost, or even when the map has told you so, pay no attention to anything else about you or within you, such as the guess that such-and-such a rock in front of one may hide such-and-such a village, or the hope that your strength will hold out for 12 or 15 hours without food, but at once behave like a person in grave danger, that is, calculate your chances of retreat, and think of that only, for I repeat, it is more easy to die from exhaustion than in any other way in these hills, and nearly all the people that perish in mountains perish from that cause.

When you have made up your mind that it is your business to find men again, and that you do not know how far men may be, first note your bread and wine and the rest, if any provision is left; next determine to reserve it until nightfall: eat it then, do not blunder on through the darkness (it is astonishing what very little distance one makes after sunset, and every half-hour of twilight makes it more difficult to camp)—sleep, and take the first half of the next day without food; you are reserving your very last rations until the noon of that day. For one can do a considerable distance without food if the effort is made in the early morning.

Never bathe under such conditions of fatigue, and towards the end, when you are exhausted, drink as sparingly as possible.

It is perhaps useless to give any hints about what a man should do when he is lost, because men get lost in mountains by hoping against hope and pushing on when common sense tells them to return. But I write down these hints for what they are worth. After my first bad lesson in the matter, I found them fairly useful. Remember, by the way, if you are lost and if there is no path apparent, that a cabane even in ruins somewhere in the landscape means a track visible or invisible, and that any rude crossing of the stream with stepping-stones or a log means the same thing. But you must not imagine that the presence or traces of animals will prove a guide, for even mules wander wild for miles on these mountains in places where a man can only go with difficulty and along random tracks leading nowhere.