43S Probable infliience of 



masses ; a large portion of the ice would be dissolved or 

 broken up before being transported to a great distance from 

 its source. For, though smaller masses would be tossed about 

 by the winds and waves, and might be easily dashed to pieces 

 on the shore, a large portion of the foreign materials of the 

 glacier, being detached with the smaller masses of ice, would 

 be dropped within a comparatively short distance from the 

 glacier. 



An interesting phenomenon, connected with the fall of ice 

 in the glacial seas, is the formation of enormous waves by the 

 sudden displacement of large masses of water. Captain Low 

 informs me, in his letter, that the ice in the harbor where he 

 lay, was from three hundred to a thousand feet high ; and 

 that, whenever there was a heavy fall of ice, it made so much 

 swell that the ship would roll three or four streaks. Mr. 

 Fernald says that, in one of the bays of South Georgia, where 

 there was a large fixed iceberg or glacier, which he judged to 

 be four hundred feet high, they landed from the boat to search 

 the beaches for seal. The boat was hauled up on the beach, 

 her stern just touching the water, when a large piece fell from 

 the icebers: into the bav, and made such a sea as to throw the 

 boat sixteen feet upon the beach. The bay was at this place 

 a mile wide. This statement is corroborated by two other 

 individuals of the same party, who well remember the fact. 

 Mr. Darwin speaks of a great wave produced by the fall of 

 ice in Terra del Fuego, which he witnessed, and justly re- 

 marks that the waves formed bv the fall of ice must be a 

 powerful agent in rounding and sweeping together large frag- 

 ments of rocks, and likewise in wearing away projecting por- 

 tions. They must also be powerful agents in lifting up and 

 bearing away large icebergs already loosened, in breaking to 

 pieces the smaller bergs, in purging the larger icebergs from 

 the extraneous matters with which they may be loaded, and 

 in loosening and detaching fragments of rock — effects which 

 we shall hereafter see must often have been produced on ice, 

 at no great distance from their place of departure. 



