quantity of running water, and so much less ice than he had expected.  The shape of the glaciere is a rough circle, 60 feet in diameter; and the floor, which is solid ice, slopes gradually down to the farther end.  The immediate entrance is half-closed by a steep and very regular cone of snow, lying vertically under the small shaft we had seen in the rock above.  The snow which forms the cone descends in winter by this shaft; and the formation must have been going on for a considerable time, since the lower part of the cone has become solid ice, under the combined influences of pressure and of degel and regel.  I climbed up the side of this, by cutting steps in the lower part, and digging feet and hands deep into the snow higher up; and I found the length of the side to be 30 feet.  I had no means of determining the height of the cave, and a guess might not be of much value.

At first sight, the farther end of the cave was the most striking.  The water which comes from the melting snow down which we had passed in reaching the glaciere, had cut itself deep channels in the floor, and through these it coursed rapidly till it precipitated itself into a large pit or moulin in the ice, at the lowest point.  This pit, a will be seen by the section of the cave given on p. 174,[71] terminates the glaciere; and the rock-wall at the farther edge falls away into a sort of open fissure, down which magnificent cascades of ice stream emulously, clothing that side of the pit, which would otherwise be solid rock.  We cut a few steps about the upper edge of this moulin, to make all safe, and proceeded to let down a lighted candle, which descended safely for 36 feet, showing nothing but ice on all sides; it then came in contact with one of the falls of water, and the light was of course extinguished.  We next tied a stone to the string, and found that after 40 feet it struck on ice and turned inwards, under our feet, stopping finally at the end of 51 feet; but whether it was really the bottom of the pit that stopped it, or only some ledge or accidental impediment, we could not determine.  The diameter of this pit might be 3 yards, but we took no measure of it.

At the extreme right of the cave we found another pit, a yard and a half across, two-thirds of the circumference of which was formed by the plateau of ice on which we stood, and the remaining third by a fluting in the wall of rock.  The maire said that, two years ago, this hole was not visible, being concealed by a large ice-column which had since fallen in.  Here again I let down a lighted candle, with more hopes of getting it to the bottom, as no part of the cave drained into the pit.  The candle descended steadily, the flame showing no signs of atmospheric disturbance, and revealing the fact that the opposite side of the pit, viz. the rock, which alone was visible from our position, became more and more thickly covered with ice, of exquisite clearness, and varied