MOONLIGHT ON MUS-TAGH-ATA 367 
the sides. Towards them, and generally falling into them, 
ran a number of little streams of the clearest glacier-water. 
The largest was as much as 35^ inches broad and 9 deep, 
and had a temperature of 32° Fahr. (o°02 C.). The ice 
along its channel, in which the water ran noiselessly, was 
polished and gloriously blue. Otherwise the whole surface 
was excessively soft and rotten ; all the stones had sunk 
deeply into it, making gaping holes. The surface of the 
ice resembled a maze of upstanding needles or leaves, and 
we were able to walk on it without slipping, as easily as on 
snow. 
Getting on to the glacier was easy enough. But getting 
down again from the left side was a very different matter ; 
for the glacier was very much swollen, and the side abrupt 
and steep, forming a couple of high steps down to tei'ra 
firnia. We found innumerable small pools on the ice, a 
yard in diameter and about eight inches deep ; they were 
covered with a thin crust of ice even during the daytime, 
so that we got an occasional foot-bath. Here also we put 
in measuring-rods, to find out the rate at which the ice was 
moving. 
On August 14th we rode up along the left lateral 
moraine of the Terghen-bulak glacier, and then out on 
to the moraine which is carried on the back of the glacier. 
This we afterwards followed down to its face. The two 
lateral moraines were very large ; but only began in the 
lower part of the glacier’s course, where they appeared on 
the surface of the ice like small black wedges. Gradually 
however they became broader and broader, and finally, at 
the lower end of the glacier-tongue, formed a stupendous 
mass of stones and ddbris. 
The Terghen-bulak was hard at work. Rumbling and 
rattling sounds were heard continually. Large blocks of ice 
were precipitated with a deafening crash into the crevasses. 
New fissures appeared in all directions ; and swift streams, 
abounding with water, flowed between the ice and the 
lateral moraine. The latter was 400 yards in breadth at 
the lower part of the glacier, and was at first wonderfully 
level, and easy to travel over. Afterwards it rose consider- 
