Glacier of Talefre, 141 



stood from the little portion of a map contained in Plate 

 II., fig. 2, on the same scale as my large map of the Mer 

 de Glace. The station marked W, near the foot of the 

 Aiguille du Moine, is a considerable block of granite, a few 

 yards to the left of the usual pathway ascending to the Jar- 

 din ; and my point of observation was permanently marked 

 (as usual) by a cross cut in the top of the stone, and 

 painted red with oil colour, and the letter W by its side. It 

 is not many minutes walk short of the spot where travellers 

 bound for the Jardin, usually enter on the glacier of Talefre. 

 Hence it will, I hope, be easily recovered. It is about 8700 

 feet above the sea. From it my mark on the Tacul (station 

 B of my map) could be distinctly seen with the telescope ; 

 and a transverse line across the glacier of Talefre, in which 

 marks were placed on the 24th July 1846, made an angle, 

 with the direction of B, equal to 98° 30'. The position of 

 this line of stations is shewn distinctly in the small map. 

 It will be seen that it was near the spot where the contraction 

 of the gorge and the icy stream was greatest, in fact, in the 

 throat of the funnel. The inclination or slope of the glacier 

 in the direction of its motion was inconsiderable, especially 

 near the centre and the southern side ; and the transverse 

 crevasses, which are here just beginning to be numerous, 

 are evidently owing to the extended influence of the steep 

 ice fall, which is not many hundred feet in advance of the 

 transverse line selected. The glacier of Talefre, higher up, 

 is remarkably compact and united ; the crevasses few and 

 inconsiderable, particularly on the northern side. The cre- 

 vasses, as they present themselves, are convex towards the 

 origin or basin of the glacier, and are here, as in other cases, 

 perpendicular to the veined structure so far as developed, and 

 which was quite correctly laid down in my map of 1842 ; 

 the structural bands converging towards the outlet like fila- 

 ments of water towards the contracted vein of a spout. The 

 curvature of the crevasses (seen in piano) appeared to me 

 to have a point of contrary flexure, as shewn in the drawing, 

 dividing them into two loops. 

 Three stations were selected, as shewn in the plan. The 



