204 Wisconsin Academy oj /Sciences, Arts, and Letters. 



The range itself is of composite character, being made up of a 

 series of rudely parallel ridges, that unite, interlock, separate, 

 appear and disappear in an eccentric and intricate manner. 

 Several of these subordinate ridges are often clearly discernible. 

 It is usually between the component ridges, and occupying de- 

 pressions, evidently caused by their divergence, that most of the 

 larger lakes associated with the range are found. Ridges, running 

 across the trend of the range, as well as traverse spurs extending 

 out from it, are not uncommon features. The component ridges 

 are themselves exceedingly irregular in height and breadth, being 

 often much broken and interrupted. The united effect of all the 

 foregoing features is to give to the formation a strikingly irregular 

 and complicated aspect. 



This peculiar topography, however, finds a miniature represen- 

 tative in the terminal moraines of certain Alpine glaciers. Most 

 of the glaciers of Switzerland, at present, terminate in narrow 

 valleys, on very steep slopes, and leave their debris in the form of 

 lateral ridges, or a torrentially washed valley deposit. A portion 

 of ihem, however, in their recently advanced state, descended into 

 comparatively open valleys of gentle decline, and left typical, ter- 

 minal moraines, formed from the ground moraines of ihe glaciers, 

 and only slightly obscured by the medial and lateral morainic 

 products, which have little or no representative in the Quaternary 

 formations. The Rhone glacier has left three such ridges, sepa- 

 rated by a few rods interval, that are strikingly similar in topo- 

 graphical eccentricities to the formation under discussion, save in 

 their diminutive size. The two outer ones have been modified 

 by the action of the elements, and covered by grass and shrubs, 

 while the inner one remains still largely bare, and, as they have 

 been cut across by the outflowing glacial streams, they are exceed- 

 ingly instructive as to glacial action under these circumstances. 

 The inner one graduates in an interesting!: way into the wide- 

 spread ground morame, which occupies the interval between it and 

 the retreating glacier, where not swept by floods, and which pre- 

 sents a different surface contour, illustrative of Till topography. 

 The two Grrindelwald glaciers have left similar moraines ; those of 

 the upper one, being the more massive, and being driven closer to- 

 gether, present an almost perfect analogy to the Kettle ranges. 



