HEARD ISLAND. 219 



To the sea-shore this glacier presented a vertical wall of 

 ice, resting directly upon the black volcanic sand composing the 

 beach. In this wall was exposed a very instructive longi- 

 tudinal section of the glacier mass, in which the series of 

 curved bands produced by differential motion were most 

 plainly marked, and visible from the distance of the anchorage. 



The ice composing the wall or cliff was evidently being 

 constantly bulged outwards by internal pressure, and masses 

 were thus being split off to fall on the beach, and be melted, or 

 floated off by the tide. The ice splits off along the lines of the 

 longitudinal crevasses, and falls in slabs of the whole height of 

 the cliff; a freshly fallen slab, a longitudinal slice of the glacier, 

 was lying on the beach. 



The fallen ice floats off with the tide. Some stones, which 

 were dredged in 150 fathoms between Kerguelen's Land and 

 Heard Island, were believed by Mr. Buchanan to have been 

 recently dropped by floating ice from Heard Island. The 

 stones in question were as yet not penetrated by the water.* 



The other glaciers in sight cut the shore line at right angles, 

 and thus had no terminal moraines, the stones brought down by 

 them being washed away by the sea. 



The glaciers showed all the familiar phenomena of those of 

 Europe with exact similarity. There are here the same systems 

 of crevasses, more marked in some regions than others, and 

 dying out towards the termination of the glacier, where the 

 surface is smooth and generally rounded. The crevasses were 

 of the usual deep blue colour, and the ridges separating them of 

 the usual fantastic shapes. 



Above, the glaciers were covered with snow, which, as one 

 looked higher and higher, was seen to gradually obliterate the 

 crevasses, and assume the appearance of a neve. The extent 

 of glacier free from snow was very small ; the region in which 

 thawing can take place to any considerable extent being confined 

 to a range not far above sea level. 



Here and there were to be seen, on the surface of the glacier, 

 the usual deep vertical pipe-like holes full of water. These 

 were lined by concentric layers of ice, composed of prisms 

 * J. Y. Buchanan, " Proc. B. Soc." No. 170, 1876, p. 609. 



