MOOEE’S RUEAL NEW-YOEKER: AN AGRICULTURAL AND FAMILY JOURNAL, 
size are seen in the moraines (or accumula¬ 
tions of earth that line the edges of the gla¬ 
ciers of Switzerland,) of an entirely differ¬ 
ent formation from those of the valley, where 
these stupendous fields of ice exist—and 
which are conclusively proved to have been 
pushed along by the slow but steady pro¬ 
pulsion of the glaciers. 
The lecturer described in detail the to¬ 
pographical features of that country, the 
climate, the mode in which the glaciers are 
formed by the freezing of partially melted 
snow, the deep fissures or crevices, &c., 
which as a ten years resident and constant 
investigator of the glacial phenomena, he 
was enabled to do with great accuracy and 
minuteness. 
Professor A. here described the two prin¬ 
cipal mountain ranges of the country, the 
Jura and the Alps; the former elevated 
about 4,000 and the latter towering to the 
height of 11,000 to 13,000 feet above the 
waters of Lake Neufchatel, leaving an in¬ 
termediate valley of about GO miles in ex¬ 
tent a section of which is given in the an¬ 
nexed diagram: 
over the surface of the glacier and fiills in¬ 
to the fissure b, some 300 feet in depth. 
The Professor here remarked that these 
fissures so frequent and beautiful in the 
summer, are extremely dangerous in the 
winter, being frequently covered by a few 
feet thickness of loose snow, which com¬ 
pletely hides them from observation, expo¬ 
sing the traveler to the risk of certain de¬ 
struction should he inadvertently happen to 
cross their track. To this, however, the 
native guides have become accustomed, and 
their ready and practical eye detects at 
once a slight depression on the smooth and 
unbroken surface of the snow, as sketched 
below, a showing the depression of surface 
indicating the fissure beneath. 
careful investigation the facts as before rela¬ 
ted, viz., that the average progress is about 
250 feet per annum in the middle of the 
valley, while at the sides the progress was 
comparatively slow. 
Their methods of ascertaining these facts 
were as follows, viz: they commenced their 
survey of one of the glaciers extending 
over a valley of about 5,000 feet in width. 
The first operation was to plant in the ice a 
straight line of polos directly across this ice 
covered valley thus: 
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The Choral Advocate and Singing Class Jour¬ 
nal—I'idited by Darius K. Jones, New Y^ork.— 
Corresponding Editors, Lowell Mason and Geo. 
J. VVebu, Boston. 
We have received numbers one, two, and 
four of the Choral Advocate, have read 
them with care, and are well pleased with 
the character of the Journal. The de.sign of 
the editors in publishing this paper is to im¬ 
prove, elevate and advance Sacred Music. 
Singing in most Congregations is made an 
essential part of religious worship. All who 
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should qualify themselves for it. We would 
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so with tlie “spirit and the understanding.” 
Each number contains four pages of Music, 
a valuable appendage to the Journal. Pub¬ 
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Each number contains 16 octavo pages. 
Terms: fifty cents a year in advance. Ad¬ 
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A DESULTORY TALK WITH OUR READERS. 
We owe an apology to some of the read- 
ets of the “ Rural ” for having devoted so 
large a portion of the columns of the Edu- 
I cational Department to one subject, during 
I the last three months. Most readers are 
I fond of variety, espeeially in the columns of 
I; the weekly newspaper—and no subject pre- 
; sents a greater variety of topics for thought, 
I for reflection, for edification and for enter- 
J tainment, than education. Having given 
I' the friends and opponents of Free Schools, 
\. opportunity and time for the full and free 
I discussion of this subject, we propose here- 
| ; after, to present a greater quantity of Edu- 
T cational matter which shall be both theo- 
^ ^ ■ 
I retical and practical. All right practice has 
«■ for its foundation correct and sound theoiy 
I w'hich may be taught and understood with, 
j or without practice. There is much specu- 
,5 lating and theorizing on on all abstract sub- 
\ jects, that are as baseless as worthless. Be- 
‘ cause of this, many are disposed to discard 
theory altogether. This will not do—for 
I the evils attending such a course can fie 
I shown to be as great and even greater we 
; ■ think, than those attending the other. 
I/. What we w'ould have you avoid, is, the 
t danger of running into extremes in either 
[ . direction. What we would then say is, let 
\ ) theory and practice go hand in hand. 
i 
\ The friends of the new school law, e. o-. 
I; have labored to prove that the free school 
p theoiy is equitable, just, sound, constitu- 
\\ tional and practical; therefore right. The 
i ■ opponents of -the 
On their return the ensuing summer the 
poles or stakes had assumed the following 
position, those in the middle having advan¬ 
ced 220 feet while those on the borders had 
progressed on one side only seventeen feet 
and on the other twenty. On eaeh succes¬ 
sive year the measurement was accurately 
taken and the progress of the glaciers was 
as follows: the curved line marking the po¬ 
sition of the sticks or poles originally placed 
in a direct line, as at a, and b the position 
Over these extensive glaciers we discov-. 
er some of the wildest and most fantastic 
natural formations imaginable. Frequently 
t we find an immense 
bowlder resting on 
the top of a pillar of 
ice, and the behold¬ 
er is astonished at 
the singular sight of 
^ an immense rock at 
^ considerable ele¬ 
vation above the 
surface of the glacial formation supported 
by a single slender shaft of ice some ten or 
fifteen feet in height. 
This is easily explained by simply obser¬ 
ving that as the ice melts above or around 
one of these isolated bowlders lying origin¬ 
ally on or beneath the surface, the rock it¬ 
self protects the ice underneath it from 
melting, until in the process of years the 
surrounding ice becomes gradually melted 
away, leaving the bowlder in its former po¬ 
sition until the gradually diminishing sup¬ 
port fails, and it falls with a tremendoiLS 
crash again to the surface. 
Another feature of the glaciers is this, 
the rivulets beforq mentioned carry with 
them large masses of loam and sand, with 
which the snow and ice from the mountain 
sides frequently abounds, and by their con¬ 
stant accumulation and deposit in the fis¬ 
sures fill the opening with the earthy mat¬ 
ter, after which, in the same manner as be¬ 
fore described, the ice dissolves gradually 
around it’and leaves it in the form as rep¬ 
resented below, the dotted line represent- 
--ing the original sur- 
SuccESS IN Life. The Meclianic. By Mrs. L. C. 
T'uthill. New York: George P. Putnam. 1850. 
12 mo. pp. 171. 
This little volume contains brief and in¬ 
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of John Fitch the Steambba't Inventor, Ben¬ 
jamin Franklin the Printer, Eli Whitney 
the Inventor of the Cotton Gin, Robert Ful- 
ton, and others. All who are interested in 
the biography of Self-taught men will be 
pleased and edified with the reading of this 
book. For sale by Wm. Ailing, No 10 Ex¬ 
change street, Rochester. 
Jura 4,000 | Valley of Switzerland I Alps 13,000 
feet high. I GO iniles in extent. I feet high. 
The Professor here desired to correct a 
very comtnon error into which travelers 
were frequently betrayed, viz: that of cop¬ 
founding the snow viountains with the gla¬ 
ciers; the former being merely immense 
masses of loosely formed snow, while the 
latter, the glaciers proper, consisted of ice 
fields of immense size and depth formed in 
the valleys, sometimes to the thickness of 
500 to 600 feet. The following diagram 
illustrates, scctioftally, one of the glaciers 
between the lofty peaks of the Alpine 
range. 
the second year, c the third, d the fourth 
year, and so on through eight or ten year’s 
observation. 
These glaciers are generally, as before 
stated, covered and intermingled with im¬ 
mense quantities of loose rocks and bowlders 
detached originally from the rocky cliffs 
and sides of the mountains, which are forc¬ 
ed onward with these vast bodies of ice 
over the frequently irregular surface of the 
valleys containing more or less of similar 
rocks from the mountains, which may bo 
illustrated by the following diagram of a 
section of one of these valleys with the gla¬ 
cial formation entirely covering its surface. 
same system, have been 
: equally sanguine to show and demonstrate 
L; that the aforesaid theory is m-equital le, 
I > W'/i-just, wn-sound, wa-constitutional and im- 
I practicable; ergo, wrong. 
[ ; There is no subject, except the Christian 
I Religion, in wdiich mankind have so deep 
j and enduring an interest as that of mental 
I culture—right education. Right education, 
I, in fact, embraces everything that concerns 
man here, as a mortal being. His success 
as a farmer, as a mechanic, as a merchant, 
^ ■ depends no less upon his educational train¬ 
ing, than his success in the learned profes¬ 
sions. In fact every vocation of life is a pro- 
; fession whose success depends upon the fit¬ 
ness of him who engages in it. Does it re¬ 
quire less capacity, less culture, less knowl- 
{ edge or less moral worth, to prepare the 
^ soil and cause to grow a quantity of wheat 
sufficient to make a barrel of flour, than it 
does to traffic and speculate on that barrel 
of flour until it reaches the home of the 
consumer ? 
I The various callings of life require differ- 
( ent degrees of preparation and fitness. The 
,s failures and successes in these are the result 
of education—hence the responsibility that 
) rests upon parents. How earnestly then 
ought every parent to inquire of the wise 
and good. How shall I educate and train 
; this son,—this daughter of mine, or these 
sons and these daughters ? And yet a ma¬ 
jority of fathers seem to act as if it was of 
far less importance to educate their children 
than to attend to their pecuniary affairs.— 
And mothers, it would seem, in their efforts 
to deck and adorn the bodies of their daugh- 
■ ters, almost forget that they have minds. 
The publisher of the Rural New-York¬ 
er, felt when selecting the leading topics 
for the composition of a family newspaper 
for the rural population, that a little space 
devoted to the important subject of Educa- 
\ tion would be acceptable to most of the 
readers and patrons of the paper—that, 
however important the subjects of Agricul- 
^ ture and Horticulture, the one relative to 
: Homoculture would not be entirely without 
interest—at least, it would not be so to all. 
i ^ Having published nearly all the 
THE GLACIERS OF SWITZERLAND. 
The following lecture by Prof. Agassiz^ 
whose talents and scientific acquirements 
have justly conferred upon him an enviable 
and world-wide reputation, will, we think, 
prove highly interesting and instructive to 
many of our readers. It was delivered, 
some two years ago, before the' Brooklyn 
Institute, and first published, we believe, 
in the journal from which we now copy— 
the New York Farmer and Mechanic. To 
those who have read the able articles, on 
similar topics, recently contributed to the 
Rural New-Yorker by Rev. Dr. Dewev 
of this city, and other Geologists, we need 
not commend the lecture to an attentive 
perusal: 
Prof. A. commenced by briefly describing 
the geological formation of. Long Island, ite 
loose, irregular and unstratified sand beds, 
and particularly its numerous bowlders, 
which are found in great abundance and 
variety all over the Island and its surround¬ 
ing shores. He stated that'they were of all 
sizes, and in geological formation entirely 
different from that of the general character 
of the natural deposits of this region, or 
that farther South, being composed of gran¬ 
ite, gneiss, &c., &c., which exactly resemble 
the formations found in the northern part 
of this continent, from whence they were 
evidently at some very remote period intro¬ 
duced. The fact, he stated, had been ad¬ 
mitted, but the question has been asked, 
By what means these immense masses of 
rock had been transported so great a dis¬ 
tance, and what power was put in requisi¬ 
tion to effect it? 
This, he said, had been sometimes an¬ 
swered by supposing these vast bodies of 
rock to have been forced onward by the 
power of the current at a period when the 
great Northern Ocean swept over the whole 
continent, and with its mighty deluge pro¬ 
duced this singular arrangement This 
the learned lecturer proved to be incorrect, 
from the fact that all these formations oc¬ 
cur with great irregularity,—that they are 
unstratified, and marked in straight and 
nearly parallel lines and furrows, showing 
conclusively that they were never deposited 
by, or smoothed and rounded in a body of 
moving water and sand, as in that case the 
largest and more ponderous masses would 
be found at the North and the smaller at 
the South; and also that the heavier and 
less easily moved portions would find their 
place at the bottom and the smaller and 
lighter at the top, the contrary of which is, 
however, the case. Another theory that they 
were transported on icebergs across the Nor¬ 
thern Seas, he considered equally fallacious. 
In order, however, to account for this sin¬ 
gular phenomenon, the Professor introdu¬ 
ced the subject of the glacial theory, and 
endeavored to account for their presence 
here, by supposing that they had been 
brought hither at some remote period by 
glaciers which may have formed in the nor¬ 
thern portion of this continent, where exist, 
as before mentioned, rocks precisely of sim¬ 
ilar formation to those which are here seen. 
In support of this theory he adduced the 
well known fact that stones of immense 
l,I00/i! high. \ 500 ft. thick. \ 1,500/L high. 
The glaciers as they are formed and 
forced onward down the mpuntain declivi¬ 
ties and through the valleys, are covered 
with immense masses of bowlders, some of 
which are of astonishing magnitude, and 
which have been detached and carried 
down the precipitous sides of the moun¬ 
tains with th(^ Fnnw qb it molted, and vrliich 
during the day time in the summer are 
constantly moving over the inclined surface 
of these glaciei-s, rendering it exceedingly 
dangerous to attempt their exploration, ex¬ 
cept early in the morning before they be¬ 
come loosened by the warmth of the sun. 
These ice fields or glaciers generally ter¬ 
minate abruptly as in the following dia¬ 
gram, which represents a small portion of 
the glacier with its terminal slope, a repre¬ 
senting the mountain declivity, b the gla¬ 
cier 600 feet in thickness at the foot of the 
^ ^ the mass of accu¬ 
mulated sand above the surface partly im- 
hpddpfl in fUo orovloo of ico, and l> the Ico 
that remains still undissolved; this, howev¬ 
er, in the course of years also becomes 
melted and leaves the hillock or mound of 
sand thus, which is 
• V ’V of a geological char- 
acter entirely dif- 
ent from the soil of 
the valley where it is deposited. 
It has, however, been proven that this 
vast plain of ice does not melt equally over 
the extent of its surface, but the sides be¬ 
ing in contact with the rocks and cliffs of 
the mountains, the rocks being warmed du¬ 
ring the day above the surrounding temp¬ 
erature and retaining their heat during the 
evening and a part of the night, will con¬ 
tinue to dissolve the ice on the sides of the 
valley after it has ceased melting in the 
eentre, by which process it frequently as¬ 
sumes this form: 
This immense body of frozen snow and ice, 
sometimes to the depth of a thousand feet, 
moves forward in the manner described, 
from 100 to 250 feet per annum, pushing 
down with them from the mountains im¬ 
mense masses of rock to the distance of 
many miles into the valley. Several ages 
are of course required to accomplish this 
transit, but these rocks on the passage have 
been triturated or polished to a comparative 
smoothness, presenting the phenomena of 
bowlder stones, which are entirely different 
from the geological formations of the valleys 
where they have been found. 
Professor A. stated that the whole valley 
of Switzerland from the Alps to the Jura 
and even the highest portions of tlie latter 
are covered with these immense bowlders 
and rocks of all sizes, consisting of granite, 
gneiss, limestone, &c., whose geological char¬ 
acter resembles precisely that of the rocky 
peaks of the Alps, and no where else to be 
found in that portion of the country. From 
this he inferred that at some remote period 
the glaciers covered this entire valley to the 
depth of 4,000 feet, and all these, bowlders 
were by this means deposited by the pro¬ 
cess described. This may be illustrated by 
the following dirgram, a representing the 
Alps from 11,000 to 13,000 feet in height, 
b the glacial formation, and c the Jura range 
about 4,000 feet high, to which these bowl¬ 
rocky declivity and 300 at c, where it ter¬ 
minates. Tliis was demonstrated by actual 
measurement and careful observation, and 
will give a general idea of the glacial 
formation existing in the valleys. The ice 
forming these glaciers has not the appear¬ 
ance of common ice—is not stratified, but 
being the filtration of water through the 
snow masses of the mountain during the 
summer, intermingled with the snow itself, 
it forms a granulated mass of frozen water 
and snow, and by the continued repetition 
of this process the valleys are covered with 
a solid mass of ice, while the snow remains 
loose on the mountains. These immense 
bodies, or ice lakes, are forced forward by 
the accumulated force from the slope of 
the mountains over the face of the valley, 
until a slight descent occurs and then the 
inequality of surface from the more sudden 
depression, causes fissures or crevices in the 
mass as seen in the following sketch at a. 
Momitain. Ice. Mountain. 
This, the Professor said, had been fully 
demonstrated where the sides of the valley 
were equally exposed.totheraysof the sun, 
and in other cases where the valleys were 
so situated as to receive the sun on one side 
only, while the other was shadowed by 
mountains, he had always observed that the 
surface of the ice in the valley presented 
the following form; a representing the peak 
shadowing the valley, b the ice as the sur¬ 
face was acted upon by the sun’s rays, and 
c the sunny side of the valley showing the 
glacier nearly dissolved on that side. 
ders might easily have passed over the sur¬ 
face of this immense ice field and also be 
deposited by the melting of the ice over the 
entire surface of the now fertile valley of 
Switzerland. That the same causes do not 
now exist he attributed to the fact that the 
climate has materially changed, and also 
that of the whole north of Europe;—that 
the change is still progressing, and the en¬ 
tire northern portion of the continents both 
of Europe and America are participating 
in it. 
He concluded by saying that if time per¬ 
mitted he could amply demonstrate that an 
analagous process to the above had deposit¬ 
ed masses of the rocky formation of the 
north in this region, and that the whole sur¬ 
face of the western continent presents the 
same arrangement of bowlders, sand, Ac., 
both in the nature and formation of the Al¬ 
pine valleys, and must have been deposited 
during some remote period of past ages, in 
the same manner as those that cover the 
valleys of Switzerland. 
reasons 
for and against free schools, that history, 
observation, expeiience, fancy and imagina¬ 
tion can furnish, we propose to let this theme 
rest awhile—that is to say we do not pro¬ 
pose to fill our department with articles on 
this subject to the exclusion of other matter 
—not that we regret having given our cor¬ 
respondents time and opportunity for the 
free discussion of a matter of so much im¬ 
portance to the citizens of the State of New 
York, but because there are other import¬ 
ant subjects which demand our attention— 
and these will give variety to our depart- 
ment» and render it both more entertaining 
and edifying. 
Surface of the Valley. 
During the summer the action of the 
sun on the surface of these vast ice plains 
melts the parts most exposed to its rays, 
and forms rivulets of several hundred yards 
in extent; these rivulets on meeting one of 
these fissures, the water is precipitated over 
their crystal brink, forming the most beau¬ 
tiful cascades. Of these the Professor gave 
a glowing and animated description, in a 
style simple, impressive, and peculiarly 
happy. 
The waste of ice in the summer is very 
considerable, varying from 5 to 10 feet, ac¬ 
cording to the exposure of its surface to the 
sun’s rays. 
One of the striking and wonderful phe¬ 
nomena of the glaciers is their constantly 
progressive movement, which is annually 
from 180 to 250 feet. 
Although it has been a well known fact 
that these immense beds of ice were not 
stationaiy, it had never been known at what 
rate this movement was going forward un¬ 
til the lecturer, assisted by some of the best 
topographical engineers and most scientific 
men of Switzerland proved by their exper- 
ments and discoveries during ten years of 
In the above diagram a represents one 
of the above described rivulets as if passes 
