202 SPITSBERGEN chap, xiv 



moraine, and cross the smaller glacier some distance above 

 its snout. The moraine was of the loosest and most villainous 

 composition, being, in fact, nothing more nor less than 

 boulder-clay in process of formation. Reaching the left 

 side of the glacier, I had some difficulty in finding a place 

 where I could safely cross it, as the surface drainage, which 

 flowed to this side, had excavated a channel for itself along 

 the side of the ice. The channel where it was open was 

 too wide to be jumped, and there was nothing to land on, 

 on the other side, but a steep ice-wall ; where the channel 

 was roofed in, the snow was too treacherous to be trusted. 

 By following it up some distance, however, I was enabled 

 to cross. A similar difficulty had to be overcome in de- 

 scending the glacier on the other side. 



" On starting up the ridge I discovered that I had by 

 no means exhausted the dilapidated peaks on the island. 

 The arete was simply a pile of debris, but the size of the 

 fragments was astonishing. I could scarcely lift most of 

 them. They consisted of large slabs of yellow sandstone, 

 many two or three feet square and over an inch thick, piled in 

 a loose heap as though just tipped out of a cart. During the 

 whole ascent I never found any solid rock. If I endeavoured 

 to trace a fossiliferous fragment to its parent rock, by remov- 

 ing the loose slabs, I had eventually to give up the quest 

 in despair, fearing lest, if I continued to remove everything 

 that was loose, I should have no mountain left whereof to 

 chronicle the ascent. Indeed, the answer of the Irishman, 

 in reply to a tourist who had asked the height of a hill, that 

 it was 3000 feet to go up, and 1000 feet to come down, would 

 have applied well to Booming Peak. 



" Portions of the arete were covered with snow, and 

 afforded a welcome relief, though in places they were so 

 steep and hard as to require step-cutting. The ridge was 

 dull and tedious to climb, but afforded me the view I sought. 



