THE GLACIERS OF GREENLAND. 



83 



In 3 paper communicated to the "Alpine Journal" in 

 1870. I wrote in relation to this part of Greenland and the 

 country to its north and south: 



The great ice-covered interior plateau of Greenland can 

 be seen a long way off if the weather is clear. Its summit is 



Fig. 33. — Ikamiut Fjord, Greenland, showing hanging glaciers. Glaciers 

 the Fjord come to water's edge. 



it head of 



almost a dead level from north to south. But when one 

 comes nearer to the coast it is concealed by the hills which 

 are on its outskirts. The whole of the (outer) land on the 

 (west) Greenland coast is mountainous, and although the hills 

 scarcely ever, if ever, exceed a height of 8000 or 9000 feet, 

 they effectually conceal the inner or glacier-covered land* 

 This latter is at a distance from the coast varying from ten 

 to sixty or more miles, and, when it is reached, there is 

 an end to land — all is ice, as far as the eye can see. Great 

 as the mass of ice is which still envelops Greenland, there 

 were times when the land was even more completely cov- 

 ered up by it; indeed, there is good reason to suppose that 

 there was a time when every atom of the country was covered, 

 and that life was hardly possible for man. . . . With the 

 exception of places where the rocks are easy of disintegra- 



