XATUHAL PHILOSOPHY. 269 



phenomena. He also stated that another very important quality of ice was 

 brought forward by Faraday in 1850. It was that two pieces of moist ice 

 will consolidate into one on being laid in contact with one another, even in 

 hot weather. The theory he had just propounded, he said, afforded a clear 

 explanation of this fact as follows : The two pieces of ice, on being pressed 

 together at their point of contact, will at that place, in virtue of the pressure, 

 be in part liquefied and reduced in temperature, and the cold evolved in their 

 liquefaction will cause some of the liquid film intervening between the two 

 masses to freeze. It is thus evident, he added, that by continued pressure 

 fragmentary masses of ice may be moulded into a continuous mass ; and a 

 sufficient reason is afforded for the reunion, found to occur in glaciers, of the 

 fragments resulting from an ice cascade, and for the mending of the crevas- 

 ses or deep fissures which result occasionally from their motion along their 

 uneven beds. 



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