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THE JOURNAL OF GEOLOGY.

consequent upon the prevailing structure. This is shown principally by the fact that large glaciers, such as the Agassiz and Seward, follow lines of displacement; in several instances, cascades occur where glaciers cross faults.

THE PIEDMONT ICE SHEET.[1]

Area.—The Malaspina glacier extends with unbroken continuity from Yakutat bay 70 miles westward, and has an average breadth of between 20 and 25 miles. Its area is approximately 1,500 square miles; or intermediate in extent between the area of the State of Rhode Island and the area of the State of Delaware.

It is a vast, nearly horizontal plateau of ice. The general elevation of its surface at a distance of five or six miles from its outer border is about 1,500 feet. The central portion is free from moraines or dirt of any kind, but is rough and broken by thousands and tens of thousands of crevasses. Its surface, when not concealed by moraines, is broadly undulating, and recalls the appearance of the rolling prairie lands west of the Mississippi. From the higher swells on its surface one may see for many miles in all directions without observing a single object to break the monotony of the frozen plain. So fast is the glacier that, on looking down on it from elevations of two or three thousand feet above its surface, its limits are beyond the reach of vision.

Lobes.—The glacier consists of three principal lobes, each of which is practically the expansion of a large tributary ice stream. The largest has an eastward flow, toward Yakutat bay, and is supplied mainly by the Seward glacier. The next lobe to the west, is the expanded terminus of the Agassiz glacier; its current is toward the southwest. The third great lobe lies between the Chaix and Robinson hills, and its main supply of ice is from the Tyndall and Guyot glaciers. Its central current is south-

  1. This account of the Malaspina glacier has been compiled principally from the proof-sheets of a report by the writer on a second expedition to Mt. St. Elias in 1891, to appear in the Thirteenth Ann. Rep. of the U. S. Geological Survey.