From The Times: July 5, 1924
In a dispatch dated June 14 Colonel Norton says that no further attempt will be made on Mount Everest by the present expedition; none of the members is now fit for the enterprise: We leave here with heavy hearts. We failed to establish success, for who will ever know whether the lost climbers reached the summit before the accident which it may be assumed caused their death? The last point at which they were seen was less than 800ft from the top, a world’s “record” for climbing. But the price is out of all proportion to the results.
Much will be written by those at home of both Mallory and Irvine. I shall only say a few words on how we knew them here. Mallory was for three years the living soul of the offensive on Everest. I believe the thing was a personal matter with him, and was ultimately somewhat different from what it was to the rest of us. We always regarded him as an ideal mountaineer, light, limber, and active, gifted with tremendous pace up and down hill, and possessing all the balance and technical proficiency on rock, snow, and ice which only years of experience give. But the fire within made him really great, for it caused his spirit constantly to dominate his body to such an extent that, much as I have climbed with him, I can hardly picture his ever succumbing to exhaustion. As a man he was a very real friend to us all, a cultured, gentle spirit curiously contrasting with the restless, fiery energy he displayed in action. His loss is irreparable no less to his friends of the Everest expeditions than to the very much larger circle of those who loved him in England.
Irvine was described in an earlier dispatch by General Bruce as our “experiment,” for he was a mountaineer of limited experience and 12 years younger than our average age. But the experimental stage was a matter of hours rather than of days. Here was no untried boy, but one of the most valuable members of the new expedition and, what is more, one who could take his place modestly, but with absolute equality, with men of so much senior age. In no time his cheery camaraderie, unfailing good nature, and untiring mechanical ingenuity and resource made him invaluable. I do not know how we are going to get on without him.
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