APPEARANCES "OF GLACIERS AND SNOW-FIELDS. 169 



the boulders and smaller stones have been deposited in the 

 fields in former times, and we could trace, by the marks 

 of the ice on the rocks, the course taken. But now stand- 

 ing before the Buer-brae-en, we could understand how 

 valleys had been dug out of the solid rock by that most 

 destructive form of water the glacier. The huge irresist- 

 ible mass was still advancing slowly, and had been doing so 

 for a long time. My guide said it had advanced more than 

 fifty feet since the previous year, driving everything before 

 it. All along the base of the ice was a transverse ridge of 

 earth in which fresh greensward and stones were mingled 

 together, which the glacier pushed forward as it glided 

 over the rocks. On the right was a huge mass of rock 

 which had been tern apart by the pressure of the advanc- 

 ing ice. The weight which had overcome this obstacle 

 must have been enormous, for the evidence of such ter- 

 rific force was before my eyes. Not even the solid moun- 

 tain walls, composed of the hardest of our rocks, could 

 arrest the forward march of the terrible glacier. This 

 block of granite, torn from the mountain side, was about 

 twenty feet long and fifteen broad. It had been broken 

 unevenly, and was still covered with moss. A part of it 

 was overlapped by the ice; and the upper stratum of the 

 glacier having a stronger current than the lower would 

 finally run over it, and hide it from view as the onward 

 march continued; and when the glacier again retired the 

 boulder would be deposited in some new resting place. 

 The glacier came down a steep gorge leaping three dis- 

 tinct ledges of rock, and it was crowded between solid 

 walls not more than 250 to 300 yards wide towards its 

 end. The moraines seen higher up on each side above 

 were engulphed further down into deep crevasses formed 

 by the pressure of the ice and ledges. On its left were 

 towering mountains; Mount Reina being 5,210 feet above 

 the sea, and the second highest point of the Folgefonn. 

 The ice was of a magnificent blue ; the cavern was small, 

 but extremely beautiful ; and its stream was far from being 

 as dirty as those of the glaciers of the Justedal. Lower 



