GLACIO-AQUEOUS ACTION IN NORTH AMERICA. 181 



runs nearly north-northeast and south-southwest ; the top of the 

 ridge forming a very gradual slope southwesterly and northeast- 

 erly from the summit, which is about three thousand two hun- 

 dred feet above the sea. The character of the rock and the 

 direction of the range, clearly identify this mountain with the 

 White Mountain system of parallel ridges, although it is one 

 hundred and fifty miles south of the White Hills. The stratifi- 

 cation of this mountain is so obscure and irregular, that I do not 

 feel prepared to describe it. Nor is it of much importance in this 

 connection, to notice several dykes of trap and rose quartz, which 

 traverse the ridge in nearly an east and west direction. 



I ascended this mountain along its southwesterly slope, and 

 found stria? more or less, from the base to the summit ; but they 

 are generally obscure. In the valleys west of the mountain, they 

 run north ten degrees to fifteen degrees west, and south ten 

 degrees to fifteen degrees east, by the magnetic needle ; whose 

 variation is eight degrees west. On the top of the mountain they 

 run about north ten degrees west, and south ten degrees east. 

 But along the southwesterly slope, they run nearly northwest 

 and southeast. Hence the glacio-aqueous force appears to have 

 operated in a direction more nearly corresponding to the direction 

 of the mountain at its top and bottom, than on its flanks, — a 

 remarkable fact, which I have noticed in another place. 



As one ascends this mountain, he notices an extreme irregu- 

 larity of the rocky surface. In some places, especially towards 

 the summit, as is common upon most of our high mountains, the 

 frost has broken up and lifted from their original bed, large frag- 

 ments, which lie in more or less of confusion. But the more 

 common appearance is the rounded and curled rocks, analogous, 

 if I mistake not, to the roches moutonnees. I confess, however, 

 that if I had not read Agassiz' description of this phenomenon in 

 the Alps, I should have failed to discover it on this mountain. 

 But when I saw that it is the northwest side of the prominences 

 that are rounded, while the opposite side is angular and jagged ; 

 and when I perceived that if troughs occur among the projec- 

 tions, their course corresponds to that of the strias, I could not 

 doubt but the rounding and the troughs were the result of glacio- 



