ALPINE SCULPTUKE. 249 



the moraine at the terminal portion of the glacier 

 wider than above. 



The motion of the Morteratsch glacier, then, 

 diminishes as we descend. The maximum motion of 

 the third line is thirty inches in one hundred hours, or 

 seven inches a day a very slow motion ; and had we 

 run a line nearer to the end of the glacier, the motion 

 would have been slower still. At the end itself it is 

 nearly insensible. 1 Now I submit that this is not the 

 place to seek for the scooping power of a glacier. The 

 opinion appears to be prevalent that it is the snout of 

 a glacier that must act the part of ploughshare ; and it 

 is certainly an erroneous opinion. The scooping power 

 will exert itself most where the weight and the motion 

 are greatest. A glacier's snout often rests upon matter 

 which has been scooped from the glacier's bed higher 

 up. I therefore do not think that the inspection of 

 what the end of a glacier does or does not accomplish 

 can decide this question. 



The snout of a glacier is potent to remove anything 

 against which it can fairly abut ; and this power, not- 

 withstanding the slowness of the motion, manifests 

 itself at the end of the Morteratsch glacier. A hillock, 

 bearing pine-trees, was in front of the glacier when 

 Mr. Hirst and myself inspected its end ; and this 

 hillock is being bodily removed by the thrust of the 

 ice. Several of the trees are overturned ; and in a few 

 years, if the glacier continues its reputed advance, the 

 mound will certainly be ploughed away. 



The question of Alpine conformation stands, I 

 think, thus : We have, in the first place, great valleys, 



1 The snout of the Aletsch Glacier has a diurnal motion of less 

 than two inches, while a mile or so above the snout the velocity ia 

 eighteen inches. The spreading out of the moraine is here very 

 striking. 



