ANTARCTIC GLACIOLOGY 337 



the most southerly visible peak by submerged ranges which cause 

 its surface to break in swirls and chasms of colossal size. Boring 

 has been suggested as a possible means of investigation of the interior 

 layers, but internal movement would render this method impracticable. 

 The sides of crevasses should afford to the more leisured parties of the 

 future information as to temperature and temperature gradients 

 within the ice. Its depth might be measured by the application of the 

 principles of echo-sounding, which are rapidly revolutionizing our 

 ideas as to the contour of the sea bottom. The loose nature of the 

 upper snow layers makes the problem a difficult one, but the ice of 

 the outlet glaciers may afford satisfactory ground for preliminary 

 experiments. 



Such work, however, and the equally necessary meteorological 

 investigations required to afford information about the alimentation 

 of the Antarctic ice involve the maintenance of inland winter stations. 

 Such a feat of organization has never been within the power of expedi- 

 tions whose scientific program has been subordinated to the more 

 spectacular geographical achievements upon the success of which 

 their financial prosperity ultimately depended. Now that the poles 

 have been discovered, polar exploration must wait upon the support 

 of more enlightened patrons valuing science for itself. Once such 

 patrons have been found, there should be no difficulty in vastly in- 

 creasing the scientific programs. Parties armed with modern equip- 

 ment and modern means of transport, attacking the problems from a 

 number of suitable bases on the periphery of the continent, should 

 rapidly accumulate facts inaccessible to their predecessors of the 

 expeditions of the period just past, scattered and sporadic as their 

 efforts have necessarily been. Indeed, one of the features of an 

 adequate scientific attack on the secrets of the polar regions should 

 be international cooperation on the grandest scale. The features 

 of the polar environment, and consequently the climate of polar 

 lands, vary from place to place and from year to year in the most 

 amazing manner. No generalizations can be made with safety unless 

 they can be based on facts collected at many stations throughout 

 several years at least. 



Alimentation and Ablation; The Glacial Anticyclone 



The amount of permanent addition to or loss from the ice of the 

 Antarctic Continent is conditioned, as in other snow-bound countries, 

 by the balance between the snowfall on the one hand and evaporation, 

 melting on the surface and movement of ice to lower levels, snow 

 drift carried by outward-moving winds, and melting of the termina- 

 tions of the glaciers on the other. These latter, in a special degree 

 in the Antarctic, reach sea level and push out floating masses of ice 



