Page:Report of the Second Norwegian Arctic Expedition in the "Fram," 1898-1902 (volume 4).djvu/495

-2i OLAF HOLTEDAHL. [SEC. ARCT. EXP. FRAM "Although glacier tongue- ere observed in pretty nearly every part 1. 1" Filf-mere Land, and although the greater part of its surface is covered with ice and HIO, et we nowhere saw inland ice properly so called. Tin' glacialion is nowhere -nflicii ntly developed to hide the configuration of tin- surface under a mantle uf inland ice, hut is distrihnted in local fit-Id-, tin- boundaries of which are determined hy the topographical features. Klle.-mere Land proper con-i.-ls of a tolerably level high plain of Archaean formation, and here we find the largest single area of glaciation, and of course the nearest approach to inland ice. As a rule, its extremities reach down to the sea in the .shape of productive glacier tongues. Their dimensions and volume are too small to justify us in calling them ice- streams, and for as far as the eye is able to penetrate inland from the sea, individual peaks and eminences are seen to break through the accumulations of ice. These features are most pronounced from off Smith Island in Jones Sound, and to Cadogan and Baird inlet further north; so that in place of the continuous covering of ice for, in spite of these numerous protrusions, it does in a way preserve its continuity we have a number of independent in rrx. The largest w'tv'.s- at Hayes Sound are the Leffert-Alexandra glacier ton-nes and the glacier tongues of Hayes Sound itself; they fill all the permanent depressions, and on the east side, at any rate, thrust their principal arms down into the sea. On the west they terminate in valley glaciers or are stopped on the walls of the plateau. The glaciers of Hayes Sound proper, for instance, cover the heights which on the south separate Flakier Fjord from Bay's Fjord with an ice-cap which reaches down into the valley at only one point, hut there fills it entirely from side to side, and at the same lime dams back a lake, On the north of the pass similar glacial conditions prevail, a few arms reaching down to the sea in Princess Marie |!av and in <!anon Fjord. The large expanse of ice on Ellesmere Land approaches the sea on the south at only one locality, namely, near (lone Island, in a large productive glacier; west of that, along the same coast, the ice-covering retreat^ inland. It i.- only at the heads of the fjords, e.g. of South Cape Fjord and Boat Fjord 1 1 !aad-fjordl, that a few glacial arms descend as low as the sea-leel.' As a rule, yon have to advance some distance up the valleys which form the continuation of the fjord-trenches before you meet with them, as is the ca-e. for instance, in Fram Fjord, in Swine Fjord < ii -i-i -f|ordi, and in Harbour Fjord. In the western part of Jones Sound glaciation on the actual coast is confined to local glacier tongues of the See pi. V, iig. 2.