MALLORY'S PIPE

I've been reading Robert Graves' autobiography (lower photo) over the past couple of days and, for a moment, in a story about George Mallory (upper) - at that time one of Graves' masters at Charterhouse School - had a sense of literary déja vu. Mallory, you may recall, was the man who disappeared near the summit of Mount Everest in the mid 1920s. There are some (I am among them) who believe he and Irvine climbed the mountain and were lost on the way down. The consensus, however, is that because of the position of the bodies (or body - I can't remember whether both have been found)- they seemed to be ascending as death overtook them.

However, this is not, as they say, à propos. My sense of déja vu came from an earlier tale about George Mallory as a young man and I now remember I read it first in Newby's book, "A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush" before seeing it again, in Graves' book, this morning. Of course repetition doesn't necessarily make a thing true, but it's a good story:

"My friend George Mallory, for instance, who later disappeared close to the summit of Mount Everest, once did an inexplicable climb on Snowdon. He had left his pipe on a ledge, half-way down one of the Lliwedd precipices, and scrambled back by a short cut to retrieve it, then up again by the same route. No one saw what route he took, but when they came to examine it the next day for official record, they found an overhang nearly all the way. By a rule of the Climber's Club climbs are never named in honour of their inventors, but only describe natural features. An exception was made here.

"The climb was recorded as follows: Mallory's Pipe, a variation on Route 2; see adjoining map. This climb is totally impossible. It has been performed once, in failing light, by Mr G.H.L. Mallory."