HKB
and float on the surface. In the Siberian rivers, Weitz describes large stones as having been brought up from the river's bed in the same manner, and made to float.[286]
Glaciers.--In the temperate zone, the snow lies for months in winter on the summit of every high mountain, while in the arctic regions, a long summer's day of half a year's duration is insufficient to melt the snow, even on land just raised above the level of the sea. It is therefore not surprising, since the atmosphere becomes colder in proportion as we ascend in it, that there should be heights, even in tropical countries, where the snow never melts. The lowest limit to which the perpetual snow extends downwards, from the tops of mountains at the equator, is an elevation of not less than 16,000 feet above the sea; while in the Swiss Alps, in lat. 46 degrees N. it reaches as low as 8,500 feet above the same level, the loftier peaks of the Alpine chain being from 12,000 to 15,000 feet high. The frozen mass augmenting from year to year would add indefinitely to the altitude of alpine summits, were it not relieved by its descent through the larger and deeper valleys to regions far below the general snow-line. To these it slowly finds its way in the form of rivers of ice, called glaciers, the consolidation of which is produced by pressure, and by the congelation of water infiltered into the porous mass, which is always undergoing partial liquefaction, and receiving in summer occasional showers of rain on its surface. In a day of hot sunshine, or mild rain, innumerable rills of pure and sparkling water run in icy channels along the surface of the glaciers, which in the night shrink, and come to nothing. They are often precipitated in bold cascades into deep fissures in the ice, and contribute together with springs to form torrents, which flow in tunnels at the bottom of the glaciers for many a league, and at length issue at their extremities, from beneath beautiful caverns or arches. The waters of these streams are always densely charged with the finest mud, produced by the grinding of rock and sand under the weight of the moving mass. (See fig. 18.)
The length of the Swiss glaciers is sometimes twenty miles, their width in the middle portion, where they are broadest, occasionally two or three miles; their depth or thickness sometimes more than 600 feet. When they descend steep slopes, and precipices, or are forced through narrow gorges, the ice is broken up, and assumes the most fantastic and picturesque forms, with lofty peaks and pinnacles, projecting above the general level. These snow-white masses are often relieved by a dark background of pines, as in the valley of Chamouni; and are not only surrounded with abundance of the wild rhododendron in full flower, but encroach still lower into the region of cultivation, and trespass on fields where the tobacco-plant is flourishing by the side of the peasant's hut.