PARI' 1.] McMahon : Notes of a tour thronyh Ilaagnmy and Spiti. 
09 
glacier in the Lichu valley between the Spiti and tlie Kunzam pass. About four 
miles in a straight line from the top of the Kunzam, a spur from the Shilatakar 
peak runs down to the Lichu river, and an ancient glacier in its course down the 
valley must have ridden over it. The rocks there, at an elevation of 14,000 feet, 
arc thiidy laminated slates, the dip of which is pei'joondicular, and the strike of 
which points across the vallej'^ at right angles to M'hat must have been the course 
of the ancient glacier. The slates generally break up on the surface in thin 
flaky slices, but here and there long patches of the rock ai’C •luoutonne'e, polished 
and striated. The polishing is even now sufiiciently perfect to oblitoi’atc all 
traces of the lamination of the slates. The striro are well mai'ked; they are 
generally in a direction of the axis of the valley, though they often cross each 
other at inconsiderable angles. As evidence of former ice-action nothing would 
be more complete and perfect. The splinting friable slate on which this ice- 
action is recorded is the last sort of rock on which I should have expected to 
find it. 
Regai’ding the recession of glaeicrs, I note that the Big Shigri, as evidenced 
by its terminal moraine, has shrunk somewhat; but in the case of the' Pirad 
glacier, the next to the west of the Bara Shigri, the shrinking is very evident. 
The road passes within about quarter of a mile of this glacier, and from either 
side of it a large lateral moraine may be seen curving down the valley until it 
reaches the I’iver, three-quarters of a mile, or a mile, from the present end of the 
glacier. 
Again, the head of the valley, up which the road to the Hamta pass lies, is 
filled by a glacier that extends a little below the entrance to the pass. The old 
terminal moraine of this glacier may now be seen about one and a half miles 
lower down the valley, rising in steep banks some 50 or 60 feet above the talus, 
shot down from the sides of the valley. 
About a quarter of a mile below the Pirad glacier, on the side of one of the 
moraines, there is a huge block of the central gneiss, well rounded, jiolished and 
striated on all sides but one.^ The impression I derived from examining it was 
that it must have originally been a boss of rock projecting from the side or 
bottom of the glacier bed, and that it Avas ultimately torn aAvay from its parent 
rock and deposited Avhero it now rests. I did not measure the block, but it 
cannot be smaller than 50' X 50' X 50'. One side has been rujitured from the 
block, apparently by the action of frost on water filling a crack, and its pieces 
rest by its side. 
* ExclusiA’e of the side on which it rests, which, of course, cannot ho seen. 
