VON BUCH ON BEAR ISLAND. 51 



we may well inquire, whether here also, as in Westgothland, the ex- 

 tended foundation of hyperite has not preserved the strata from the 

 metamorphosing action of the granite. 



On the eastern side the almost perfectly horizontal surface of Bear 

 Island rises between two and three hundred feet above the sea. From 

 this point a good general view of the whole form of the island can 

 be obtained. It was clearly seen, that only two momitain-groups 

 on the south side rose higher. One, the more westerly, about 4|- 

 miles distant, remained concealed by mist. It is the one that in 

 Scoresby's view from the westward is so remarkably divided into three 

 cones. The eastern elevation, named Mount Misery in English charts, 

 because from its summit Bennet for many hours continued expecting 

 the instant destruction of the boat sent to bring him off the island, 

 consists of three declivities or steps, clearly distinguished from each 

 other. The lowest, covered with blocks fallen down from the beds 

 above, is about 300 feet high ; the second follows, only thirty feet 

 high, but running like a perpendicular wall along the mountain side. 

 A plain divides this acclivity from the highest step, which is intersected 

 by small flat irregular valleys. The whole scarcely rises to a thousand 

 feet. No snow lay on the hill, except in the valleys, where it had 

 been collected into great heaps by the wind. As the table-land of the 

 island was also free from snow, it is certain that the lower limit of 

 perpetual snow passes above the summit of Mount Misery, and conse- 

 quently at more than 1000 feet of elevation. M. Du Rocher, in his 

 valuable Considerations on the Snow-lme (Exped. au Nord, Geogra- 

 phic Physique, p. 51), places the lower limit in 550 feet; certainly 

 too low, for Mount Misery is extensive enough to form glaciers if its 

 summit rose above the snow-line. 



I think I may now well venture on this conclusion, deduced from 

 nature and experience, without needing to fear xmcalled for, verbose 

 and therefore unmeaning opposition, since the singular doctrines of 

 Venetz and Carpentier regarding the origin and progress of glaciers 

 are only heard in the far distance, and since the general conviction, 

 that Agassiz's unsuccessful attempt to live three summers on a glacier, 

 and all the care and labour expended there, have led to no other re- 

 sult, than to confirm still more the wise considerations and deductions 

 of Saussure, and to prove that the faculty of extended generalization, 

 which depends on few but sure observations, leads sooner and more 

 directly to the truth, than all the instruments we may heap together, 

 without using them with proper precautions. Even the echo, still 

 faintly repeated from the other side of the Atlantic, will in a short 

 time cease. When we question the maps of the Swiss Alps, the 

 mountains in Tyrol, the Norwegian glaciers, the few seen in the Py- 

 renees, the magnificent vicinity of the sources of the Ganges and 

 Jumna, — everywhere the same law appears, namely, '' That glaciers 

 only form on mountains that rise above the limits of perpetual snow, 

 and spread out in this region ; the origin of such glaciers must be 

 sought in depressions, — wide basins of snow. They never originate 

 on the open rocks far from large masses of snow. From these wide 

 pots of snow the icy mass proceeds down in deep valleys, perhaps 



