Section IV, ISSI. 



[ 89 ] 



Trans. Koy. Soc. Canada. 



X. — Glacial Erosion in Norway and in High Latitudes. 



By Pkof. J. W. Spencer, B.A.Sc, Ph.D., F.a.S. 



(CJommunicated by Dr. E. Bell, May 25, 1887.) ^ 



During the summer of 1886, it was my good fortune to visit the three largest snow- 

 fields in Norway, namely, the Folgefond, at the head of Hardangerfjord in southern 

 Norway, whose area is 108 square miles; the Jostedalsfoud, two degrees to the north, 

 beyond Sognefjord, whose area is §80 square miles, and the largest snowfield in Europe; 

 and the Svartisen, extending from just inside the arctic circle for forty-four miles north- 

 ward. All of these snowfield.s send down glaciers to within from 50 to 1,200 feet of the 

 sea. These snowfields are not basins like those in the Alps, but are mantles covering 

 the tops of plateaus from 3,000 to 5,000 feet or more above the tide, from which great 

 canons suddenly descend to the sea, and extend themselves as fjords, from 1,000 to 4,000 

 feet in depth. 



Many of the Norwegian glaciers are rapidly advancing. In their progress they do not 

 conform to the surfaces over which they pass, but are apt to arch over from rock to rock 

 and point to point, especially as they are descending the ice-falls. Thus are produced 

 great caverns into which the explorer can ofteu wind his way for long distances. 



Beneath the glaciers of Fondai, Tuusbergdal, and Buardal, in the northern, north- 

 central, and south-central snowfields of Norway, as well as under other glaciers, I 

 observed many stones enclosed in ice, resting upon the rocks, to whose surfaces — some- 



FiG. 1. — Section of Fondalsbrseen, a, bed rock; c, cavern under glacier b; d, loose stone; 



/, groove under tlie ice. 



' Also read before the New York Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, 



Aug., 1887. 



Sec. iv, 1887. 12. 



