SNOW-WAVES AND SNOW-RIPPLES 153 



does not lie continuously throughout the winter, 

 it must be rarely that the drift on the lee side of 

 any large obstruction attains completion, the 

 amount of drifted snow not being as a rule 

 sufficient to fill the whole of the eddy-space, and 

 in all countries it is the incomplete snowdrift, 

 with its overhanging cornice, which attracts atten- 

 tion. Thus it was not until near the end of my 

 winter in Canada that I learnt what was the 

 completed form of a stationary snowdrift. 



Fig 14 



SnoAwdriTt on both sides of a fence, on the right 

 com pie ted. on the l«ft incomplete, from a photopraph, 



I drew the profile from my observations of 

 drifts on the lee of fences. I drew the plan, profile, 

 and cross -section of drifts caused by houses and 

 smaller buildings. I also drew the plan, profile, 

 and cross-section of the hollows kept open by wind 

 round tree -trunks in the loose snow of the woods 

 near Montreal. I also drew the profiles of trans- 

 verse travelling snow-waves, and the plan, profile, 

 and cross-section of the travelling crescentic snow- 

 waves, or snow-barchans. I was satisfied that 

 there was one kind of curve, which had a blunt 



