208 AMONGST THE SOUTHERN ICE. 



posed of alternate layers of white opaque-looking, and blue, 

 more compact and transparent ice. vStaff-Surgeon E. L. Moss, 

 R.N., M.D., of the late Arctic Expedition, describes a similar 

 stratification as occurring in Arctic ice. He had opportunities 

 of examining the ice closely at leisure, and describes each 

 stratum as consisting of an upper white part merging into a 

 lower blue part, the colour depending on the greater or less 

 number and size of the air-cells in the ice.* 



Towards the lower part of the cliffs, the strata are seen to 

 be extremely fine and closely pressed, whilst they are thicker 

 with the blue lines wider apart, in proportion as they are traced 

 towards the summits of the cliffs. In the lower regions of the 

 cliffs, the strata are remarkably even and horizontal, whilst 

 towards the summit, where not subjected to pressure, slight 

 curvings are to be seen in them corresponding with the in- 

 equalities of the surface and drifting of the snow. 



In one berg there was in the strata at one spot, somewhat 

 the appearance of complex bedding, like that shown in yEolian 

 calcareous sand formations, such as those of Bermuda. t The 

 strata were often curved in places, but always in their main 

 line of run, horizontal, i.e., parallel to the original flat top of 

 the berg. 



The strata in the cliff at the level of the wash-line of a 

 rectangular berg 80 feet in height, were so thin 

 and closely packed that they looked almost like 

 the leaves of a huge book at a distance, for by 

 the lap of the waves the softer layers had been 

 to some extent dissolved out from between the 

 harder. 



In one berg where the face of the cliff was 



very flat and seen quite closely with a powerful 



glass, the fine blue bands were seen to be 



STRUCTURE OF groupcd, the groups being separated by bands 



ICE. in which no lines were visible, or where these 



a a Blue bands, werc obscurcd by the ice fracturing with a 



/'/Layers roughcr surface, not with a perfectly even 



without striae. , , • i i • , j i ^i u i 



and polished one, as existed where the bule 

 bands showed out. 



The cliff surfaces, where freshly fractured, show an irregular 

 jointing and cleavage of the entire mass, very like that shown 

 in a cliff of compact limestone. In one or two bergs I noticed 

 a fine cleavage lamination like that of slate or shale, the laminae 

 being parallel to the face of the cliff, and breaking up at their 



* " Observations on Arctic Sea Water and Ice." Proc. Roy. Sec, No. 

 189, 1878, p. 547. 

 t See p. lb. 



-V- ^'v- K 



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