278 Revieivs — /. C. Russell on ML St. Elias. 



obtained, and a highly graphic description of these features is 

 given in the Eeport, which deserves the consideration of all 

 interested in glacial geology. 



Mount St. Elias, from the data obtained by Mr. Enssell, has an 

 elevation of about 18,100 feet. It is the highest peak of a mountain 

 range extending westwards from Yakutat Bay, which forms the 

 gathering ground of an immense glacier, known as the Malaspina 

 glacier. The front margin of this glacier is continuous for a 

 distance of 70 miles ; it covers the greater part of the area of 

 comparatively low ground, from 20 to 25 miles in width, which 

 extends from the base of the mountains southwards to the coast of 

 the Pacific. The entire area of the glacier is estimated at 1500 

 square miles. One main lobe of the glacier extends into the open 

 ocean and forms magnificent cliffs of ice, which are undermined by 

 the waves, so that large masses break off and give rise to numerous 

 icebergs. Other portions terminate before reaching the coast and 

 from their margins numerous streams issue, highly charged with 

 mud and gravel. The main body of the glacier forms a vast plateau 

 of ice, the surface of which, at about five or six miles from its 

 outer margin, has an elevation of approximately 1500 feet above 

 the sea ; the central portion is of clear white ice, free from moraine 

 and generally undulating. It is traversed by countless numbers of 

 crevasses. This clear central area is bounded on the south, that is, 

 in the direction of the flow of the glacier, by a broad dark band of 

 boulders and stones, known as the "barren moraine," and beyond 

 this belt is a forest-covered area, in some places four or five miles in 

 width. This forest region appears to have been covered by trees 

 for a long period of time ; they principally consist of spruces, some 

 reaching three feet in diameter; cotton-wood trees; alders from 20 

 to 30 feet in height, besides a considerable variety of shrubs and 

 bushes, and an undergrowth of rank ferns ; the whole forming a 

 mass of vegetation so dense as to be nearly impenetrable, and in 

 order to pass through it a trail had to be made with axes and 

 hatchets. But the most remarkable fact in connection with this 

 forest-belt is that the morainic material, on which the trees grow, 

 actually rests upon the glacial ice, and in some places this ice beneath 

 the forest-covered moraine is estimated to be not less than 1000 feet 

 in thickness. The area of the Malaspina glacier covered by forest 

 is probably between 20 and 25 square miles. The moraine sup- 

 porting the forest growth consists of boulders, earth and stones, 

 which cover the glacier to a depth of not more than 3 or 4 feet 

 as a rule. It only differs from the " barren moraine " in having a 

 greater proportion of finer material between the larger stones and 

 in the presence of a cei'tain amount of humus derived from the 

 vegetable growth. These forests only occur on those portions of 

 the glacier where the ice appears to be stagnant and without motion. 

 The occurrence of this forest-covered moraine resting on the surface 

 of the glacier tends to throw considerable light on the origin of the 

 ice-cliffs or " ground-ice formation " along the northern coasts of 

 Alaska, in which the solid ice is overlaid by a layer of clay con- 



