SOME GLACIAL WASH-PLAINS. 77 



" The view along the shore of the successive termina- 

 tions of the glacier was very fine. I had never before 

 seen a coast-line composed of cliffs and headlands of ice. 

 The bases of their cliffs rested on the sandy beach and 

 were only just washed by the waves at high water or dur- 

 ing gales of wind. The lateral moraines were of the 

 usual form, with sharp ridged crests and natural slopes 

 on either side. They formed lines of separation between 

 the contiguous glaciers. They were somewhat serpentine 

 in course, and two of them were seen to occur imme- 

 diately above points where the glaciers were separated by 

 masses of rock in situ, which masses showed out between 

 the ice cliffs on the shore and had the end of the moraines 

 resting on them. 



" A stretch of perfectly level black sand about half a 

 mile in width forms the head of the bay and intervenes 

 between the glaciers and a promontory of rocky rising 

 land stretching out northwards and westwards, and form- 

 ing the other side of the bay. It was on the smooth 

 sandy beach bounding this plain that we landed. The 

 surf was not heavy, but we had to drag the boat up at 

 once . . . The sandy plain stretches back from the 

 bay as a dreary waste to another curved beach at the head 

 of another inlet of the sea. Behind this inlet is an irreg- 

 ular rocky mountain mass formiiig the end of the island, 

 on which are two large glaciers ver}'^ steeply inclined, and 

 one of them terminating in a sheer ice-fall . . . The plain 

 is traversed by several streams of glacier water coming 

 from the southern glaciers. These streams are constantly 

 changing their course as the beach and plain are washed 

 about by the surf in heavy weather. At the time of our 

 visit, the main stream stretched across the entire width of 

 the plain and entered the sea at the extreme western verge 

 of the beach. We therefore had to ford it. 



