x.] ALPINE TRAVELS, \- 329 



entrance of the valley, but at last, ' on the faith/ as he 

 says, * of the universal report of the neighbourhood that 

 the weather was to be bad/ he passed on to Obergesteln, 

 and proceeded again to explore the glacier of the Rhone. 



Journal, August 25th. 



' I found the Rhone glacier much enlarged since I 

 visited it, and it now almost completely fills the 

 basin-shaped valley which contains it. I was much 

 k by the extreme purity of its ice, and the 

 freedom of its surface from stones, its lateral and 

 terminal moraines being, in consequence, extremely 

 trifling : but to this there is one exception, and a very 

 remarkable one. Stones begin to appear on the surface 

 at a considerable height on the terminal slope of the 

 glacier ! How came they there ? not a stone the size of 

 a fist can be seen on the surface further up, and on 

 examining a number of crevasses, I could not see any 

 engorged in the ice. The explanation seems to be that 

 these stones are introduced into the ice at the bottom of 

 the glacier by friction, and forced upwards by the action 

 of the frontal resistance, which produces the frontal dip 

 of the veined structure, until they are finally dispersed 

 on the melting of the ice. ... I then ascended to the 

 Grimsel hospice, where I was once more most kindly 

 received by my old host Zippach. 



1 Next day I started early for the glacier of the Lauter 

 . and ascended the middle of the glacier as far 

 as the Absrhwung. Opposite M. Dolfuss-Ausset's new 

 pavilion (which is very conveniently situated on a 

 grassy promontory called Trift) I saw the apparatus 

 for measuring tin- advance of the central portion of 

 the glacier. It consisted of a board fixed parallel 

 to the axis of the glacier by means of two stakes 

 whi- firmly planted in the moraine. There is a 



ited cross naill to the board, and the advance of 

 the glacier is measured by sending a man \\iili a 

 du;r \\lii.-li I,,- moves u directed ! Ja mad.- 



by blowing a horn. Tl.e in.-trmnent u>ed for 



