THE HEART OF THE ANTARCTIC 



The interesting question here suggests itself, Is there 

 sufficient snowfall annually, on the area of the neve fields 

 drained by this glacier, to compensate for the ice which 

 is lost by ablation, or by being discharged as icebergs into 

 the sea? Until more data are available no accurate 

 quantitative answer can be given to this question. At 

 the same time it may be remarked that there is a tolerably 

 heavy snowfall along this part of the coast, and for a 

 distance of at least 50 miles inland. Portions of the 

 high plateau, at a greater distance inland from the shore 

 than 50 miles at present probably receive only a very 

 small snow supply. It may be doubted whether the 

 surface of this neve field far inland is not on the whole 

 being reduced in level through the snow being drifted off 

 it by the wind, or removed by the slow process of ablation. 



It is interesting to note that in front of the termination 

 of the Mount Nansen Glacier there is an immense old 

 moraine of the nature apparently of a medial moraine. 

 We could trace this for fully 23 miles in advance of the 

 present glacier snout. It follows that in comparatively 

 recent geological time the Mount Nansen Glacier has re- 

 treated by at least the amount quoted above. 



Piedmont Glaciers on Land. — ^A curious feature 

 observed along the greater part of the coast-line of 

 Victoria Land, from near Mount Discovery up to the 

 Drygalski Ice Barrier Tongue, is the development, on the 

 great coastal shelf, at an altitude of about 1000 ft. above 

 sea-level, of a massive covering of blue glacier ice. This, 

 in some cases, reaches the sea and breaks off to form bergs. 

 In other cases the sheets do not reach the sea, and, there- 

 fore, are probably on the wane. For the latter Ferrar 

 suggests the appropriate name of ice-slabs. 



Several theories might be advanced to account for 

 them. They may represent actual relics of the old Barrier 

 ice sheet, which once filled McMurdo Sound and Ross 



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