LA PEROUSE GLACIER 
43 
pushed up into the forest, forming a heap several yards 
in height, and stones and earth were mingled with trunks 
of trees and other vegetal debris. It was evident that the 
forest had recently extended somewhat down the slope 
toward the present position of the ice, and that a temporary 
enlargement of the ice field had crowded it back. This 
had occurred so recently that a younger growth of trees 
FIG. 25. LA PEROUSE GLACIER—CONTACT WITH FOREST IN 1 895. 
had not yet started on the morainic ridge. Some of the 
overthrown trunks still retained their bark, though it had 
fallen away from most. The wood of the trunks was 
still sound, but some branches an inch and more in diam¬ 
eter had become brittle, and leaves and smaller twigs had 
fallen off. With the local woodman’s knowledge of the 
rate of decay in an Alaska forest it would be possible to 
estimate closely the date of the advance. To my inex¬ 
pert judgment it appeared probable that it occurred within 
the last decade of the century. 
