418 ELIOT BLACKWELDER 
about 110 miles. Majestic glaciers descend into it at several points 
on either side, contributing their load of detritus to its turbid current. 
Eventually it emerges from its canyon through the outermost or 
Brabazon range and spreads out in shifting channels over a broad, 
gravelly delta. At the time of our visit there were three main dis- 
tributaries at the head of the delta, which anastomose with each 
other to some extent below. An abandoned moraine of the Alsek 
Glacier checks the river temporarily as it leaves the canyon, and 
thus forms a small but deep lake at the elbow of the sharp bend. 
Icebergs of all sizes are constantly breaking off from the end of the 
glacier. Some lie stranded on the shelving shores of the lake, while 
others gradually drift into the current of the outlet and are thence 
whirled out upon the delta. All melt before reaching the Pacific. 
The coastal mountains of this part of Alaska are still, like Green- 
land, in their glacial period. All the principal valleys are clogged with 
ice, and only the smaller gulches are without glaciers. The glaciers 
vary in size from mere snow-fields which have a slight motion, to great 
plateaus of ice, scores of square miles in extent. The front of the 
Brabazon Range affords eight or nine glaciers of considerable size, in 
addition to the Alsek Glacier which lies to the west, and the numer- 
ous little cliff-glaciers which are found in the lateral ravines. Some 
of these larger lobes we observed only from a distance, but others 
were examined in some detail. 
We may now take up the consideration of the several glaciers 
individually, beginning where Russell and his successors left the work, 
and carrying the chain with varying detail as far as the Alsek. The 
first in order is the Beasley Glacier,’ a lobe which joins the sources 
of the Hidden Glacier across a snow-filled pass and thence descends 
southwestward on the east side of Russell Fiord. This we saw only 
from the mountain spur east of it. Its clear white surface is striped 
with two or more distinct moraines. Sloping gradually downward, 
it ends in a barren outwash-flat composed of gravel and bowlders. 
t This glacier is generally known to the people of Yakutat as the “‘ Fourth Glacier,” 
but as there is no logical starting-point in enumerating the glaciers by number in such 
a way as to make this the fourth, it seems advisable to give this large and conspicuous 
lobe a definite name. For this reason, it is proposed to call it the ‘‘ Beasley Glacier,”’ 
in recognition of the valuable services which have been rendered to every explorer, 
who has visited the Yakutat region since the eighties, by Mr. R. W. Beasley, of Yakutat. 
