340 



EARTH-PILLARS 



[Ch. XV. 



I have stated that some of the stones in the pillars are 

 glaciated, although the instances are rare, and I may add that 

 the red porphyry at several points in the district called Bitten, 

 where the earth-pillars occur, exhibits on its surface those 

 dome-shaped protuberances called ' roches moutonnees, 5 con- 

 firming the theory of the former presence of glaciers in this 

 district. The entire absence of shells, fluviatile or terres- 

 trial, or of bones or any organic remains in the old moraines 

 and pillars derived from them, supports the same view. But 

 it may be asked, why such remarkable columns are so seldom 

 met with, seeing that glacier moraines, ' till ' or boulder clays, 

 are almost universal throughout a large part of the Alps, 

 Scotland, Scandinavia, and North America. The fact is, 



* 



that incipient and imperfect columns may be seen in many 

 districts, but it happens that near Botzen the red porphyry 

 has given rise, by its disintegration, to dense masses of 

 mud of a peculiarly solid, homogeneous nature, weathering 

 with a vertical face, and having in perfection every other re- 

 quisite for making pillars, namely, first the absence of strati- 

 fication which, when present, usually implies the unequal 

 destructibility of different layers ; and secondly, the occur- 

 rence of numerous and often very large interspersed stones 



and blocks of rock. 



Earth-pillars in the Canton of Valais in Switzerland. — Among 

 many other examples of earth-pillars which I have seen in the 

 Alps, some of the finest occur in the canton of Valais in 

 Switzerland, though none of them form so striking a feature 

 in the scenery as those near Botzen. Those at Stalden, in the 

 valley of the Yisp-bach, are best known to tourists, and others 

 occur near Useigne, between Sion and Evolena on the Borgne, 

 another tributary of the Rhone, which, like the Visp, joins it 

 on its southern or left bank. 



The lower portions of both these valleys, like those of 

 the Tyrol, before mentioned, have first been filled with 

 moraine matter — in the case of the Borgne, 



more 



feet thick— and through the unstratified mass ravines have 

 been cut by the action of the river, while rain has been active 

 in widening their dimensions. In both cases the hardened 

 mud, drift, or moraine matter, derived chiefly from the decom- 



