ix.] ALPINE TRAVELS, 1841. ij:9 



been passed over as superficial and unimportant was ob- 

 served by Forbes, and at once pointed out to the others 

 MS i\ phenomenon of the utmost significance and import- 

 ance. * It was fully three hours' good walking/ he writes 

 to Professor Jameson, ' on the ice or moraine, from the 

 lowrr extremity of the glacier to the huge block of stone 

 under whose friendly shelter we were to encamp ; and in 

 the course of this walk I noticed in some parts of the ice 

 an appearance which I cannot more accurately describe 

 than by calling it a "ribboned structure," formed by 

 thin and delicate blue and bluish-white bands or strata, 

 which appeared to traverse the ice in a vertical direction, 

 or rather which, by their apposition, formed the entire 

 mass of the ice. The direction of these bands was 

 parallel to the length of the glacier, and, of course, 

 being vertical, they cropped out at the surface; and 

 wherever that surface was intersected and smoothed by 

 superficial watercourses, their structure appeared with 

 the beauty and sharpness of a delicately-veined chalce- 

 dony. 1 was surprised, on remarking it to M. Agassiz 

 as a thing which must be familiar to him, to find that he 

 had not distinctly noticed it before ; at least, if he had, 

 that he had considered it as a superficial phenomenon, 

 wholly unconnected with the general structure of the 

 ice. But we had not completed our walk before my 

 suspicion that it was a permanent and deeply-seated 

 structure was fully confirmed. . . . We did not sleep 

 that night until we had traced it in all directions, even 

 above the site of our cabin, and quite from aide to 

 side across the spacious glacier of the Finster-Aar/ 



Next day they returned to the hospice, but on the 

 llth the whole party of eight went to the hut, where 

 slept 'a close fit!' 



e scene of their encampment lay among the grandest 

 an-! wildest scenery of the Bernese Oberland. The 

 two great glacier streams which have their origin in 

 the neighbourhood of the Finster Aarhoru and Schreck- 

 horn unite in their downward progress at a rocky pro- 

 montory, whirh bears the name of the Abswung, and 



