Florence Crauford Grove

He led the first expedition to ascend the higher summit of Mount Elbrus and was at one time president of the Alpine Club.

Grove became an experienced alpinist in the late 1850s and joined the Alpine Club of London soon after it was formed in 1857, later serving as its president from 1884 to 1886.

An article on the founders of the Alpine Club in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography calls him a "gentleman traveller of independent means".

Grove's book is illustrated with six plates by Edward Whymper, from photographs by Horace Walker, and a folding map.

The title of the book is taken from William Shakespeare's play Richard II - O, who can hold a fire in his hand By thinking on the frosty Caucasus?