Report of the Researches of M. Agassiz. 297 



parallel fissures, which were remarkably numerous in the vici- 

 nity of the morains. The first explanation which occurred 

 was, that these fissures were crevices. Their shallowness, 

 however, their frequency, and the remarkable peculiarities 

 with which they were accompanied, rendered this explanation 

 by no means probable. In the year 1838, M. Guyot remarked 

 on the glacier of Gries remarkable alternations in the condi- 

 tion of the ice, alternations which seemed to correspond to 

 these parallel fissures, or rather to be only a modification of 

 them. He noticed a succession of laminae of different appear- 

 ance, which seemed vertically arranged, and some of which 

 were harder than others, so that they projected somewhat be- 

 yond the others. M. Guyot communicated these observations 

 verbally to the Geological Society of France, which met at 

 Porrentruy in the month of September 1838. The following 

 is an extract from his memoir. 



" Since the word stratum has escaped me, I must here point 

 out to future observers a fact upon whose explanation I will 

 not venture, seeing I have witnessed the phenomenon but 

 once. It occurred at the summit of the Gries, at the height 

 of about 7500 feet, a little beneath the line of the Firn, or high 

 neve, where the ice passes into the state of granular snow. 

 The glacier at this height exhibits a vast sea of ice, descend- 

 ing from the west in an almost imperceptible slope from sum- 

 mits which are not very salient in appearance ; it covers the 

 entire surface with a covering of uniform and indivisible ice, 

 more than half a league wide, traversing the mule-path which 

 leads from the high Valais, by the Vale d'Egine, into the 

 valley of Formazza, and to the Lago Maggiore. At the origin 

 of these two latter valleys, the ice, still half snowy, diverges 

 northward to form the beautiful glacier of Gries, properly 

 so called, and to the south to form the much smaller gla- 

 cier of Bettelmatten. In ascending to the origin of this 

 last, that I might more narrowly examine the nature, for- 

 mation, and deviation of the great transversal clefts, I ob- 

 served that the surface of the glacier under my feet was 

 quite covered with regular furrows from one to two inches in 

 breadth, hollowed out in a half snowy mass, and separated by 

 projecting lamince, composed of harder and more transparent 

 ice. It was here evident that the mass of the glacier was 



