THE GLACIERS OF GREENLAND. g 



We approached the front wall of the glacier with caution and 

 almost in silence, fearing lest any percussion might too hastily- 

 precipitate some of the tottering masses which were " calving " 

 their way to sea as bergs. Like the snowy avalanches of the 

 Alps, which are at times called to life by the clapping of the 

 hands, so must these ice masses of the north be left to their own 

 peaceful slumbers. Once overturned, there can be no forecasting 

 of the commotion that might follow. A turn or two may end 

 the scene, or it can be that it has hardly begun before the water 

 is churned into foam. 



Cutting our steps into the dome-shaped lateral margin of the 

 glacier, we soon gained the surface, upon which walking was 

 fairly easy and comfortable. An effort to reach the opposite side 

 was frustrated by the numerous crevasses which cut into the me- 

 dian portion of the ice, and about which we were obliged to wan- 

 der in a tortuous, zigzag line. Generally, however, we managed 

 to keep on a united body, or where the fissures were of but insig- 

 nificant width. For some distance the surface of the ice kept 

 disagreeably hummocky, but after passing a feeding glacier it 



UaXGINU liLAClEK OF IIeKitCIIEl's IsLAND. 



spread out in an almost horizontal glistening sheet, admirably 

 adapted for sledging purposes and of necessity for pedestrianism. 

 The crevasses b^oame less and less numerous, and ultimately 

 ceased altogether, so that a traverse could be made in any direc- 

 tion. A narrow, remarkably straight, and evenly defined medial 

 moraine, more in the nature of a dirt band, with angular blocks 

 scattered over it so like the " archaic " illustrations which figure 

 in the works of Forbes and Agassiz and in other old-fashioned 

 books of geology occupied the central axis, stretching off up- 

 ward to the limit of vision. As in all the other Greenland gla- 

 ciers which it was our pleasure to explore, there were no really 



