EXISTING GLACIERS. 35 



there is no continuous covering of ice. In south Green- 

 land the continuous ice-sheet is reached about thirty miles 

 back from the shore. 



A summary of the results of Greenland exploration 

 was given by Dr. Kink in 1886, from which it appears 

 that since 1876 one thousand miles of the coast-line have 

 been carefully explored by entering every fiord and at- 

 tempting to reach the inland ice. According to this au- 

 thority — 



We are now able to demonstrate that a movement of 

 ice from the central regions of Greenland to the coast 

 continually goes on, and must be supposed to act upon 

 the ground over which it is pushed so as to detach and 

 transport fragments of it for such a distance. . . . The 

 plainest idea of the ice-formation here in question is given 

 by comparing it with an inundation. . . . Only the mar- 

 ginal parts show irregularity ; towards the interior the sur- 

 face grows more and more level and passes into a plain 

 very slightly rising in the same direction. It has been 

 proved that, ascending its extreme verge, where it has 

 spread like a lava-stream over the lower ground in front 

 of it, the irregularities are chiefly met with up to a height 

 of 2,000 feet, but the distance from the margin in which 

 the height is reached varies much. While under 684-° 

 north latitude it took twenty-four miles before this eleva- 

 tion was attained, in 72-J- the same height was arrived 

 at in half the distance. . . . 



A general movement of the whole mass from the cen- 

 tral regions towards the sea is still continued, but it con- 

 centrates its force to comparatively few points in the most 

 extraordinary degree. These points are represented by 

 the ice-fiords, through which the annual surplus ice is 

 carried off in the shape of bergs. ... In Danish Green- 

 land are found five of the first, four of the second, and 

 eight of the third (or least productive) class, besides a 

 number of inlets which only receive insignificant frag- 



