of the Glaciers of the Alps. 109 



have observed. This glacier is partly fed by the snows of 

 the northern acclivity of Mont Cervin. Its surface is covered 

 with rocky debris ; its lateral and median moraines are very 

 large, and they mingle and expand in a fan-shape, so as com- 

 pletely to cover the glacier ; the ice disappears under this 

 mass of rubbish ; but these circumstances are favourable to a 

 rapid advance, and it penetrates far forward into the valley. 

 The advance was so great in 1848, that it laid waste a forest 

 of larches, overthrew and destroyed large trees, whose age 

 was estimated at 300 years, independently of a great num- 

 ber of dead larches which it pushed forward along with the 

 stones, blocks, and sands of the frontal moraine ; it surrounds, 

 on all sides, an islet of rocks from 35 to 40 metres in height, 

 on which three large larches, from 2-5 to 30 meti'es, are still 

 standing and vegetating. They stand on the rock like three 

 condemned sentinels ; the attacks of the cold are sensibly 

 felt, and although they are living, half of their branches are 

 already dead. 



It is evident that these larches have not taken root on the 

 rock since it became surrounded with ice ; a medium so cold 

 is not favourable to vegetation. On the other hand, if the 

 glacier carried before it trees 300 years of age, it follows 

 that, in this valley, the ice has been advancing for three cen- 

 turies. 



In this same valley of Zermatt, the glacier of Gorner, 

 which descends from Mont Rosa and the Lyskamm, ad- 

 vances in a way disastrous to the proprietors of lands situate 

 towards the front of the glacier. The meadows immediately 

 in contact with the moraine are ploughed up, the turf raised 

 in rolled masses a metre in diameter. Many of the habita- 

 tions in this locality are abandoned, and serve only as barns 

 for preserving fodder. It is a fact well known to the people 

 of the country, that, about fifty years ago, twenty barns, 

 stables, and inhabited houses, existed in a locality on the left 

 bank, which is now completely covered with ice. The house 

 nearest the moraine on this side, was distant 8 metres in 

 August last ; those who built the house did not suspect that 

 this formidable neighbour would approach so near. I like- 

 wise obscrve<l, among the materials of the frontal moraini' of 



