338 
TUU GEOLOGIST. 
neutralized by its boiiig converted into snow in t.lie region of tlie higher moun- 
tains and glaciers. The usual supplY iVoni tliis latter source is greatly dimi- 
nislied at such times, and though tlie small streams are swollen, the great 
torrents that issue from tlie glaciers are reduced to less than half their usual 
volume. But tlie case is very different when rain several degrees above the 
freezing point falls upon the great fields of ice and neve. The whole of it 
goes to sweU the glacier-streams, and, moreover, the entire of its surplus heat 
is consumed in melting the ice and snow with Avhich it comes in contact. 
After endeavouring to estimate the prodigious amomit of water that, under 
such circumstances, must be carried down witliiii a few hours into the principal 
valleys, I was not at all surprized when, a few days later, in ascending from 
Sallenches to Chamoum, I found bridge after bridge swept away — some of 
them seventy or eighty feet above the usual level of the water — and masses of 
stone and rubbish brought down, sutficient in one instance to bm-y a house and 
mill so completely, that only a small portion of the latter, and the roof of the 
building, remained projecting from the surface." 
Chapter eleven, by J. F. Hardy, although not one of the most scientific, is 
nevertheless one of the most delightful, for its easy llowing style, in the whole 
book ; and Mr. Bunbury's visit to the Col de la Jungfrau, alfords an example 
of what can be seen by those who have either not tlie " head" and daring, or 
are too mdolent and un-entei'prising to attack the higher and more formidable 
peaks. 
In the note appended to this chapter, the editor's suggestion that the plants 
which we find at great heights on small oases in the ice-region are the remains 
of a more abundant vegetation, wluch has dwindled to its present trifling pro- 
portions owing to the extension of the glaciers, is a novel and perhaps a 
valuable one. 
llefreshing, indeed, at the end of the book comes Professor Ramsey's con- 
tribution to the " Peaks, Passes, and Glaciers." 
There is an honest English bluntness of expression in his sentences which 
causes their trutlifuhiess to fall with force upon the apprehension. All that 
we have previously read in the book amounts to little more than a modernized 
version of enterprizing ascents, by which the accomplishments of bag-wigged 
De Sausure and his attendants, in wading through snow-fields, or scrambling 
over precipitous mountain-slopes and crags, have been excelled and exceeded. 
Professor Ramsay takes tlie mind back to times remote, when the lords of 
creation were the great earmvora that preyed on the gigantic mammoths and 
licrbivora who were then the chief inhabitants of the earth. He talks to us 
about tlic old glaciers of Switzerland and of North Wales. He makes us 
think about the age of the great frozen ice-masses by that one still sliding 
down the mountain sides of Switzerland ; and he shows us the great moraine- 
heaps of rocks and boulders stiU encumbering the mountain-vaUeys of Wales. 
He produces evidences in the marks on the precipitous cliffs of the AJps of the 
ancient greater depth and wider extent of the still veritable glaciers ; and he 
shows us in the mountainous regions of Wales, the rorhes rnoutonnees, the 
striations of the rocks, and the heaps of debris of British glaciers long since 
melted away. 
There are still those who would speak of geology in disparaging terms ; but 
the interest and point of this book is certainly concentered in this geological 
history of those mighty ice-mountams. Nor are these mere speculations ; they 
are, indeed, true inferences, substantially built upon accredited facts. 
The first part of his article opens boldly and to the point at once. "Every- 
one," says he, "familiar with the Alps is aware of fluctuation in tlie dimensions 
of the glaciers. It is recorded in the pages of Forbes, that since the year 1767, 
the glacier of La Brenva rose three hundred feet above its present level, and 
