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NA TURE 



\Oct. 27, 1887 



Observatory, was able to make successful exposures for 

 the corona with a small telescope. It was reported clear 

 during the whole eclipse at Choshi, a point on the eastern 

 coast near the southern limit of total obscuration, but 

 there were no observers or instruments there for scientific 

 work. It was reported cloudy throughout the whole 

 eclipse at Niigata ; while a party of observers who had 

 ambitiously climbed to the top of Nantaisan brought 

 down a record of nothing but clouds and fog. On the 

 whole, Japan appears to have been an uncanny spot to 

 lead an eclipse-track across. David P. Todd. 



s.s. Port Victor^ September 20. 



THE MARJALEN SEE. 



T AKELETS, in which the ice-crags of a glacier are 

 -L-' mirrored, in which miniature bergs may be seen to 

 float, are of occasional, though of rare, occurrence in the 

 Alps — as for example the Lac de Ste. Marguerite, at the 

 foot of the Ruilor glacier ; but the Marjalen See, so 

 far as I know, is unique of its kind. It is not formed at 

 the foot of a glacier, either by partial occupation of a 

 shallow basin worn by the ice-stream in its days of 

 greater strength, or by the pounding back of the glacier 

 torrent by an old terminal moraine ; but it is on one side 

 of a glacier, which makes a dam across an upland glen. 

 This barrier at times yields to the pressure of the 

 accumulated water sufficiently to allow of its escape 

 beneath the great ice-stream, and it is a recent incident 

 of the kind, noticed in the Times of September 2)0, which 

 has suggested the present article. 



The Great Aletsch glacier, as is well known, is the 

 largest ice-stream not only in the Oberland group, but 

 also in the Alpine chain. Its upper basin is fed by the 

 snows of an almost complete ring of grand peaks, the 

 most conspicuous of which, enumerated from west to 

 east, are the Aletschhorn, the Jungfrau, the Monch, and 

 the Viescherhorner. All these are considerably above 

 1 3,000 feet, and there are several others, less familiar to 

 the ordinary tourist, which either rise slightly above that 

 elevation, or are only a very few hundred feet below it. The 

 great eismeer thus formed passes out as a single stream 

 through a " gate in the hills," between the crags of the 

 Faulberg on the east and the base of the Dreieckhorn on 

 the west. This gap is rather more than a mile across, and 

 the glacier for several miles is not less, and is generally 

 rather more, than its breadth at this place. It flows at 

 first slightly to the east of south, then runs almost due south, 

 and finally sweeps gradually round to the south-west. 

 This deflexion is caused by the Eggischhorn, which rises 

 like a great pyramid full in face of the upper course of 

 the glacier to a height of 9649 feet above the sea, or 

 nearly 2000 feet above the surface of the ice. At this 

 spot the Marjalen See is situated, at a height of 7710 feet 

 above the sea, rather less than five miles below the 

 "gate," and rather more than that distance above the 

 end of the Aletsch glacier. This sweeps on along the 

 west flank of the Eggischhorn, until it terminates in the 

 grand gorge of the Massa, at no great distance from 

 the Bel Alp Hotel, a worthy rival in beauty of situation 

 to that on the Eggischhorn. 



The Marjalen See is thus formed : the range of the 

 Eggischhorn is continuous with that which makes the left 

 bank of the Aletsch glacier, and divides its compara- 

 tively unbroken surface from the narrower and more 

 shattered mass of the Viesch glacier. . But this range to 

 the north of the Eggischhorn is deeply notched, so that it is 

 possible to quit the Aletsch glacier and without ascending 

 to reach a depression, barely so high as the surface of the 

 ice, from which one looks down a steep slope on to the 

 surface of the Viesch glacier. From this depression a 

 shallow valley descends towards the west, and is barred 

 as mentioned above, by the great glacier of the Aletsch' 



Thus a lake is formed, fed by various streamlets from 

 the slopes on either side and by the melting of the glacier 

 ice. Though now the shrunken stream of the Aletsch 

 glacier does not diverge towards the lake, it was no doubt 

 formerly divided by the opposing mass of the Eggisch- 

 horn ; then one of its arms occupied the bed of the lake, 

 and after passing over the depression joined itself to the 

 Viesch glacier. Some geologists regard the basin of the 

 Marjalen See as wholly due to the excavatory action of 

 this offshoot of the Aletsch. To myself it appears to be 

 the upper part of a valley, produced in the ordinary way, 

 but subsequently modified in its outlines by the rasping 

 action of the glacier. 



At somewhat irregular intervals, but according to 

 popular belief once in seven years, the ice-dam yields 

 sufficiently to allow the pent-up waters to escape beneath 

 the glacier, when the contents of the lake are discharged 

 rapidly down the gorge of the Massa, and, after devas- 

 tating the fields below, are poured into the Rhone, near 

 Brieg. 



In the summer of 1858 I had the good fortune to see 

 the Marjalen See both full and empty. On my first visit 

 I found a lake full 300 yards across at the lower end, and 





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>.'rTE«/'VORH. ~- 



about three times as long. From the rocky margin on 

 either side the ice arched up in a low flattened curve I 

 until its edge at the highest point was about 60 feet ^ above ; 

 the level of the water. From this it rose in a vertical cliff of i 

 almost unbroken ice, of purest white, which was mirrored 

 in the still blue water below. Here and there miniature 

 icebergs were floating, in colour if possible yet purer than 

 the parent glacier, and above the water at the foot of 

 the cliff was a band of turquoise blue. This was produced; 

 by the fresh surface of the ice, for the cliff is under-cut by 

 the action of the water of the lake, and to this under- 

 cutting the bergs are no doubt partly due. 



Next evening I revisited the spot. To my surprise all 

 was changed : the lake had almost wholly disappeared ; 

 the glacier cliff which the day before had been doubled 

 by reflexion, was now doubled in reality. Below the 

 upper zone of white ice was now a zone of more than 



' Probably the height at the present time is not so great. Since 1S58 there 

 has been a considerable shrinking in the glaciers of the Alps. When ) 

 visited the Marjalen See in 1881, the greatest height of the cliff did not 

 appear to me to exceed 30 feet. In 1858 Prof. Ramsay found by measure 

 ment that the greatest height of the cliff above water was 60 feet, and tht 

 greatest depth of the lake at its foot 97 feet ("Peaks, Passes, and Glaciers,' 

 ist series, p. 461). 



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