ABSTRACT
I met recently a mountain climber of considerable skill and first-rate intellect, in fact a man of international eminence in the world of learning, who somewhat surprised me by a theory to which, he said, his observations had led him. Mountains, he said, are made to be climbable: on rocks, foot-holds and handholds are found just at such distances as are necessary for a fullgrown man. He contended that, if men were twice the size they are, existing climbs would become too easy to be interesting, but few new ones would be possible, so that mountain climbing would no longer be interesting. Apparently he believed that, in the remote geological ages when rocks were formed, they were fashioned with a view to the pleasure of those few eccentrics who like to risk their lives by walking up precipices as if they were flies. It seemed to me that the mountain goat, the ibex and the chamois might have other views on this subject. If they had a parliament, they would congratulate each other on the clumsiness of this horrid creature Man, and would render thanks that his cunning is impeded by such a clumsy body. Where they skip, he crawls; where they bound freely, he clings to a rope. Their evidence of beneficence in nature would be the opposite of the mountain climber's, and yet every bit as convincing.
