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Sierra Club Bulletin 



flowed in one unbroken current between Cathedral Peak and 

 the southeast shoulder of the Hoffmann range. 



NEVADA, OR SOUTH LYELL GLACIER 



The South Lyell Glacier was less influential than the last, 

 but longer and more symmetrical, and the only one of the Mer- 

 ced system whose sources extended directly to the main sum- 

 mits on the axis of the chain. Its numerous ice-wombs, now 

 mostly barren, range side by side in three distinct series at an 

 elevation above sea-level of from 10,000 to 12,000 feet. The 

 first series on the right side of the basin extends from the Mat- 

 terhorn to Cathedral Peak in a northwesterly direction a dis- 

 tance of about twelve miles. The second series extends in the 

 same direction along the left side of the basin in the summits of 

 the Merced group, and is about six miles in length. The third is 

 about nine miles long, and extends along the head of the basin 

 in a direction at right angles to that of the others, and unites 

 with them at their southeastern extremities. The three ranges 

 of summits in which these fountains are laid, and the long con- 

 tinuous ridge of Qouds Rest, enclose a rectangular basin, leav- 

 ing an outlet near the southwest corner opposite its principal 

 neve fountains, situated in the dark jagged peaks of the Lyell 

 group. The main central trunk, lavishly fed by these numerous 

 fountains, was from 1000 to 1400 feet in depth, from three- 

 fourths of a mile to a mile and a half in width, and about fif- 

 teen miles in length. It first flowed in a northwesterly direction 

 for a few miles, then curving toward the left, pursued a west- 

 erly course, and poured its shattered cascading currents down 

 into Yosemite between Half Dome and Mount Starr King. 



Could we have visited Yosemite toward the close of the gla- 

 cial period, we should have found its ice-cascades vastly more 

 glorious than their tiny water representatives of the present 

 hour. One of the most sublime of these was formed by that por- 

 tion of the South Lyell current which descended the broad, 

 rounded shoulder of Half Dome. The whole glacier resembled 

 an oak with a gnarled swelling base and wide-spreading branch- 

 es. Its banks, a few miles above Yosemite, were adorned with 

 groups of picturesque rocks of every conceivable form and 

 mode of combination, among which glided swift-descending af- 



