Travels in Alaska 



part of the ice-wall; the solid deep-blue masses from 

 the ends of the wall forming the large bergs rise from 

 the bottom of the glacier. 



Many lesser reports are heard at a distance of a 

 mile or more from the fall of pinnacles into crevasses 

 or from the opening of new crevasses. The berg dis- 

 charges are very irregular, from three to twenty-two 

 an hour. On one rising tide, six hours, there were sixty 

 bergs discharged, large enough to thunder and be 

 heard at distances of from three quarters to one and 

 a half miles; and on one succeeding falling tide, six 

 hours, sixty-nine were discharged. 



July z. We were awakened at four o'clock this 

 morning by the whistle of the steamer George W. 

 Elder. I went out on the moraine and waved my hand 

 in salute and was answered by a toot from the whistle. 

 Soon a party came ashore and asked if I was Pro- 

 fessor Muir. The leader, Professor Harry Fielding 

 Reid of Cleveland, Ohio, introduced himself and his 

 companion, Mr. Gushing, also of Cleveland, and six 

 or eight young students who had come well provided 

 with instruments to study the glacier. They landed 

 seven or eight tons of freight and pitched camp be- 

 side ours. I am delighted to have companions so con- 

 genial we have now a village. 



As I set out to climb the second mountain, three 

 thousand feet high, on the east side of the glacier, I 

 met many tourists returning from a walk on the 

 smooth east margin of the glacier, and had to answer 

 many questions. I had a hard climb, but wonderful 



[286] 



