286 Dr Martens on the Glaciers of Spitsbergen. 



I. The following are ray proofs in support of the first of 

 these two propositions. 



1st, If we examine a plan of the bays of Spitzbergen, and 

 in particular those of Bell Sound and Magdalena Bay, drawn 

 up by the officers of the Recherche, we will perceive that the 

 vertical walls of the glaciers always form nearly straight lines 

 which transversely close up the bottom of the bays. Now, by 

 describing a curve concentric to that which would pass by the 

 summits of the mountains whose base is marked by the gla- 

 cier, we may trace the contour of the shore-line ; for in Spitz- 

 bergen there is no flat beach. We will thus see that the bot- 

 tom of the bays is rounded as in every other place. The ice- 

 wall which closes them up is the cord of the arc of a circle 

 formed by the rounded extremity of the bay, and the segment 

 of which is occupied by the lower part of the glacier. Thus 

 the seven glaciers fill small bays, and the mountains which se- 

 parate them are so many promontories. 



2d, I could never discover in the middle of the base of the 

 glacier's escai'pement the ground on which it should rest, 

 while the subjacent rock was quite visible at the extremities 

 of this base. Let it not be objected to this, that the sea 

 washed the foot of the mass ; for at ebb-tide an interval of 

 about a metre might be distinctly observed between the ice 

 and the surface of the water. 



3d, During our two visits to Bell Sound and Magdalena 

 Bay, we never saw the two glaciers break or gradually retire. 

 How could fragments of ice be continually falling into the sea, 

 if the glacier did not advance beyond the water-line ? This 

 continual demolition becomes an inexplicable matter, if we 

 suppose that the glacier terminates at the edge of the sea. 



Ath, These masses being unceasingly urged forward by those 

 which are above them, why do they stop just at the margin of 

 the water which opposes no obstacle to their progress ? 



hth, The considerable depths of the sea, varying from 32 

 to 123 metres, which we find near the wall of the glaciers, 

 prove that it is very far from the margin. 



II. It remains for me to shew, that the lower part of the 

 glaciers of Spitzbergen advances on the sea, and does not slide 

 along the bottom ; in a word, that it forms a segment of a cir- 



