Suffice it to say that [Everest] has the most steep ridges and appalling precipices that I have ever seen, and that all the talk of an easy snow slope is a myth.... My darling this is a thrilling business altogether, I can't tell you how it possesses me, and what a prospect it is. And the beauty of it all! George Leigh Mallory, in a letter to his wife, June 28, 1921