THE POEMS OF WATER IN CLOUDS, KIVERS, ETC. 43 



will diminish, and we shall find very few of them at 

 the other side. Note this for future use. The ice is at 

 first dirty ; but the dirt soon disappears, and you come 

 upon the clean crisp surface of the glacier. You have 

 already noticed that the clean ice is white, and that 

 from a distance it resembles snow rather than ice. This 

 is caused by the breaking up of the surface by the 

 solar heat. When you pound transparent rock-salt 

 into powder it is as white as table-salt, and it is the 

 minute Assuring of the surface of the glacier by the 

 sun's rays that causes it to appear white. Within the 

 glacier the ice is transparent. After an exhilarating 

 passage we get upon the opposite lateral moraine, and 

 ascend the steep slope from it to the Montanvert Inn. 



§ 13. The Mer de Glace and its Sources. Our First 

 Climb to the Cleft Station. 



113. Here the view before us is very grand. We 

 look across the glacier at the beautiful pyramid of the 

 Aiguille du Dru (shown in our frontispiece) ; and to tho 

 right at the Aiguille des Charmoz, with its sharp pin- 

 nacles bent as if they were ductile. Looking straight 

 up the glacier the view is bounded by the great crests 

 called La Grande Jorasse, nearly 14,000 feet high. 

 Our object now is to get into the very heart of the 

 mountains, and to pursue to its origin the wonderful 



fro/en river which we have just crossed. 

 5 



