18-4 THE FORMS OF WATER IN 



the United States. From tlie Grimsel Pass I have 

 already pointed out to you the Gries glacier over- 

 spreading the mountains at the opposite side of the 

 valley of the Eh one. It was on this glacier that 

 M. Guyot made his observation. 



467. 'I saw/ he said, ' under my feet the surface of 

 the entire glacier covered with regular furrows, from 

 one to two inches wide, hollowed out in a half-snowy 

 mass, and separated by protruding plates of harder and 

 more transparent ice. It was evident that the glacier 

 here was composed of two kinds of ice, one that of the 

 furrows, snowy and more easily melted ; the other of 

 the plates, more perfect, crystalline, glassy, and resis- 

 tant; and that the unequal resistance which the two 

 kinds of ice presented to the atmosphere was the cause 

 of the ridges. 



468. ' After having followed them for several hun- 

 dred yards, I reached a crevasse twenty or thirty feet 

 wide, which, as it cut the plates and furrows at right 

 angles, exposed the interior of the glacier to a depth of 

 thirty or forty feet, and gave a beautiful transverse 

 section of the structure. As far as my eyes could reach, 

 I saw the mass of the glacier composed of layers of 

 snowy ice, each two of which were separated by one of 

 the hard plates of which I have spoken, the whole 

 forming a regularly laminated mass, which resembled 

 certain calcareous slates.' 



469. I have not failed to point out to you upon all 



