56 
ALASKA GLACIERS 
and may have marked the position of original moraine 
belts, and one of these happened to be cut across by a 
glacial stream, so as to be exhibited in section. In the 
photograph reproduced in plate vi the ice, which is here 
rather dark from suffused dirt, is seen to constitute the 
mass of the morainic ridge, being preserved from melt¬ 
ing by a relatively thin layer of fine drift. 
Russell, who saw and named the glacier in 1891, did not 
visit it, and merely records that it was non-tidal. His map 
makes no claim to precision and can not be used in a com¬ 
parative way to determine the history of change. Gan- 
nett’s map, pi. iv, and the various photographs here repro¬ 
duced, make a record which will be available for future 
comparison, but inference as to past changes can only be 
based on circumstantial evidence. That the recent history 
of the glacier has been one of recession can hardly be 
doubted. Not only do the kettle-holes testify to the stag¬ 
nation and burial of what was formerly its snout, but I 
found remnant ice masses above the gravel plain on both 
sides of the valley. These were protected from rapid 
waste by gravels that were originally parts of lateral 
moraines, but as water was constantly flowing from them 
their survival could not be indefinitely prolonged, and 
their origin can not have been remote. They were not 
seen more than a half mile from the ice front, but they 
lay considerably above the neighboring gravel plain, the 
extreme height at the north being estimated at 300 feet, 
and at the south somewhat greater. When the back of 
the glacier reached to these heights its front probably 
extended a mile farther down the valley. 
The walls of the valley are not clothed with vegetation, 
but a scattering growth of annual plants and a few dwarf 
willows have found foot-hold. The gravel plain through 
which the glacial streams meander, though seemingly 
affording conditions of soil and moisture congenial to 
