288 



SCOTT'S LAST EXPEDITION 



(d) The Great Piedmont glacier between Granite Harbour 

 and New Harbour (77 20'). 



Each of these regions presented its own peculiar topography, 

 and the four were diverse enough to embody almost the whole 

 cycle of glacial erosion within their domain. 



(a) The Ferrar and Taylor 'Outlet' Glaciers and the Dry 

 Valley. These two glaciers are now connected by an ice col near 

 Knob Head Mountain, but were originally distinct parallel gla- 



]o}u ChoJ. in. <Defde. 

 Gnnmonwudth. Glacier 



Main, rhusiographic Features of the-A-pposed ValUys 

 the ferrar Co Taylor fyada^s bCaokfnqS. West) 



ciers draining the ice plateau. As one marches up the Ferrar 

 Glacier and notes its crevasses and ice falls, one wonders what 

 the rock floor is really like under the ice river. Just 5 miles to 

 the north is another glacier which furnishes the answer to this 

 question, for the Taylor Glacier now stops short 25 miles from 

 the sea, and in Dry Valley we see how all the other valleys will 

 appear when the ice age shall pass away from Antarctica. 



Starting from New Harbour at the mouth of Dry Valley, 

 the latter presents a typical catenary cross-section. A splendid 

 pair of walls with the characteristic slope of 33 defines the gla- 

 cier trough. There is no large terminal moraine near the sea, 

 which seems to denote a fairly uniform and perhaps rapid retro- 

 cession of the glacier. About 6 miles from the coast a narrow 

 defile appears on the north side, but the rounded valley floor rises 



