Under ordinary conditions, vegetation fades in these mountains at the height of six thousand feet, but, in consequence of prevailing winds, and the sheltering influence of the mountain-walls, there is no uniformity in the limit of perpetual snow and ice. Where currents of warm air are very constant, glaciers do not occur at all, even where other circumstances are favorable to their formation. There are valleys in the Alps far above six thousand feet which have no glaciers, and where perpetual snow is seen only on their northern sides. These contrasts in temperature lead to the most wonderful contrasts in the aspect of the soil; summer and winter lie side by side, and bright flowers look out from the edge of snows that never melt. Where the warm winds prevail, there may be sheltered spots at a height of ten or eleven thousand feet, isolated nooks opening southward where the most exquisite flowers bloom in the midst of perpetual snow and ice; and occasionally I have seen a bright little flower with a cap of snow over it that seemed to be its shelter. The flowers give, indeed, a peculiar charm to these high Alpine regions. Occurring often in beds of the same kind, forming green, blue or yellow patches, they seem nestled close together in sheltered spots, or even in fissures and chasms of the rock, where they gather in dense quantities. Even in the sternest scenery of the Alps some sign of vegetation lingers; and I remember to have found a tuft of lichen growing on the only rock which pierced through the ice on the summit of the Jungfrau. The absolute solitude, the intense stillness of the upper Alps is most impressive; no cattle, no pasturage, no bird, nor any sound of life,—and, indeed, even if there were, the rarity of the air in these high regions is such that sound is hardly transmissible. The deep repose, the purity of aspect of every object, the snow, broken only by ridges of angular rocks, produce an effect no less beautiful than solemn. Sometimes, in the midst of the wide expanse, one comes upon a patch of the so-called red snow of the Alps. At a distance, one would say that such a spot marked some terrible scene of blood, but, as you come nearer, the hues are so tender and delicate, as they fade from deep red to rose, and so die into the pure colorless snow around, that the first impression is completely dispelled. This red snow is an organic growth, a plant springing up in such abundance that it colors extensive surfaces, just as the microscopic plants dye our pools with green in the spring. It is an Alga well known in the Arctics, where it forms wide fields in the summer. With the above facts before us concerning the materials of which glaciers are composed, we may now proceed to consider their structure more fully in connection with their movements and the effects they produce on the surfaces over which they extend. It has already been stated that the ice of the glaciers has not the same appearance everywhere, but differs according to the level at which it stands. In consequence of this we distinguish three very distinct regions in these frozen fields, the uppermost of which, upon the sides of the steepest and highest slopes of the mountain-ridges, consists chiefly of layers of snow piled one above another by the successive snowfalls of the colder seasons, and which would remain in uniform superposition but for the change to which they are subjected in consequence of a gradual downward movement, causing the mass to descend by slow degrees, while new accumulations in the higher regions annually replace the snow which has been thus removed to an inferior level. We shall consider hereafter the process by which this change of position is brought about. For the present it is sufficient to state that such a transfer, by which a balance is preserved in the distribution of the snow, takes place in all glaciers, so that, instead of increasing indefinitely in the upper regions, where on account of the extreme cold there is little melting, they permanently preserve about the same thickness, being yearly reduced by their downward motion in a proportion equal to their annual increase by fresh additions of snow. Indeed, these reservoirs of snow maintain themselves at the same level, much as a stream, into which many rivulets empty, remains within its usual limits in consequence of the drainage of the average supply. Of course, very heavy rains or sudden thaws at certain seasons or in particular years may cause an occasional overflow of such a stream; and irregularities of the same kind are observed during certain years or at different periods of the same year in the accumulations of snow, in consequence of which the successive strata may vary in thickness. But in ordinary times layers from six to eight feet deep are regularly added annually to the accumulation of snow in the higher regions,—not taking into account, of course, the heavy drifts heaped up in particular localities, but estimating the uniform average increase over wide fields. This snow is gradually transformed into more or less compact ice, passing through an intermediate condition analogous to the slosh of our roads, and in that condition chiefly occupies the upper part of the extensive troughs into which these masses descend from the loftier heights. This region is called the region of the névé. It is properly the birthplace of the glaciers, for it is here that the transformation of the snow into ice begins. The névé ice, though varying in the degree of its compactness and solidity, is always very porous and whitish in color, resembling somewhat frozen slosh, while lower down in the region of the glacier proper the ice is close, solid, transparent, and of a bluish tint.
But besides the differences in solidity and in external appearance, there are also many other important changes taking place in the ice of these different regions, to which we shall return presently. Such modifications arise chiefly from the pressure to which it is subjected in its downward progress, and to the alterations, in consequence of this displacement, in the relative position of the snow- and ice-beds, as well as to the influence exerted by the form of the valleys themselves, not only upon the external aspect of the glaciers, but upon their internal structure also. The surface of a glacier varies greatly in character in these different regions. The uniform even surfaces of the upper snow-fields gradually pass into a more undulating outline, the pure white fields become strewn with dust and sand in the lower levels, while broken bits of stone and larger fragments of rock collect upon them, which assume a regular arrangement, and produce a variety of features most startling and incomprehensible at first sight, but more easily understood when studied in connection with the whole series of glacial phenomena. They are then seen to be the consequence of the general movement of the glacier, and of certain effects which the course of the seasons, the action of the sun, the rain, the reflected heat from the sides of the valley, or the disintegration of its rocky walls, may produce upon the surface of the ice. In the next article we shall consider in detail all these phenomena, and trace them in their natural connection. Once familiar with these facts, it will not be difficult correctly to appreciate the movement of the glacier and the cause of its inequalities. We shall see, that, in consequence of the greater or less rapidity in the movement of certain portions of the mass, its centre progressing faster than its sides, and the upper, middle, and lower regions of the same glacier advancing at different rates, the strata which in the higher ranges of the snow-fields were evenly spread over wide expanses, become bent and folded to such a degree that the primitive stratification is nearly obliterated, while the internal mass of the ice has also assumed new features under these new circumstances. There is, indeed, as much difference between the newly formed beds of snow in the upper region and the condition of the ice at the lower end of a glacier as between a recent deposit of coral sand or a mud-bed in an estuary and the metamorphic limestone or clay slate twisted and broken as they are seen in the very chains of mountains from which the glaciers descend. A geologist, familiar with all the changes to which a bed of rock may be subjected from the time it was deposited in horizontal layers up to the time when it was raised by Plutonic agencies along the sides of a mountain-ridge, bent and distorted in a thousand directions, broken through the thickness of its mass, and traversed by innumerable fissures which are themselves filled with new materials, will best be able to understand how the stratification of snow may be modified by pressure and displacement so as finally to appear like a laminated mass full of cracks and crevices, in which the original stratification is recognized only by the practical student. I trust in my next article I shall be able to explain intelligibly to my readers even these extreme alterations in the condition of the primitive snow of the Alpine summits.
TWO SCENES FROM THE LIFE OF BLONDEL.
SCENE I.—Near a Castle in Germany.
'Twere no hard task, perchance, to win
The popular laurel for my song;
'Twere only to comply with sin,
And own the crown, though snatched by wrong:
Rather Truth's chaplet let me wear,
Though sharp as death its thorns may sting;
Loyal to Loyalty, I bear
No badge but of my rightful king.
Patient by town and tower I wait,
Or o'er the blustering moorland go;
I buy no praise at cheaper rate,
Or what faint hearts may fancy so:
For me, no joy in lady's bower,
Or hall, or tourney, will I sing,
Till the slow stars wheel round the hour
That crowns my hero and my king.
While all the land runs red with strife,
And wealth is won by peddler-crimes,
Let who will find content in life
And tinkle in unmanly rhymes:
I wait and seek; through dark and light,
Safe in my heart my hope I bring,
Till I once more my faith may plight
To him my whole soul owns her king.
When power is filched by drone and dolt,
And, with caught breath and flashing eye,
Her knuckles whitening round the bolt,
Vengeance leans eager from the sky,—
While this and that the people guess,
And to the skirts of praters cling,
Who court the crowd they should compress,—
I turn in scorn to seek my king.
Shut in what tower of darkling chance
Or dungeon of a narrow doom,
Dream'st thou of battle-axe and lance
That for the cross make crashing room?
Come! with strained eyes the battle waits
In the wild van thy mace's swing;
While doubters parley with their fates,
Make thou thine own and ours, my king!