The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-09-16
THE WORLDS GLACIERS.
They Cover a Larger Area Than Gen.
orally Supposed.


For the past 1--WE years physical
geographers have been giving a great
deal OF attention to the study OF gIa-
ciers. One question that has inter-
ested them very much is whether since
the beginning of the historic period the
glaciers OF the world have augmented
or diminished In area. No perfectly
definite Information with regard 70 this
question has been obtained. though
some general conclusions have been
reached. IL Is traditional in the Alps,
however. and some other regions that
valleys now occupied by glaciers were
/ formerly pasture lands. On the whole.
II Is certain that for several centuries
III quite recently there was a gradual
increase in the area of glaciation.
Glaciers everywhere are In a state OF
continual movement - they are con-
stantiy increasing in length or short
ening. Climatic variations are. of
course, the cause of these oscillations,
! though the influence Of climate upon
glacial movement is not yet fully I'M
derstood. When the laws governing
the movements of glaciers are well
known the science of meteorology will
be considerably further advanced than
IL is today.
There is good evidence to show that
IN the arctic regions In the eighteenth
century and in part OF the nineteenth
an important extension OF glaciers oc-
CURED. In Spitzbergen, for example,
harbors which whalers had often VS.
tied In the seventeenth and early in
the eighteenth centuries were filed
later with glaciers so that they could
no longer be used by shipping. The
advance of glaciers In Iceland is said
10 have covered places that had for
merly been the sites Of farms and
churches. Glaciers seem. within the
historic period. 10 have attained their
greatest extent about 1900. Since that
time few of them have grown to an
important degree. Many OF them have
! diminished in size and others have en-
tirely disappeared. This phenomenon
| has heen observed in all parts of the
! world.
Probably few persons imagine that
glaciers cover so large an area as they
do. The land surfaces which are today
buried under glacial snow and ice are
supposed 20 be about Ass, 600 square
miles in extent, or more than one and a
half times as large as the United
States. This enormous mass of ice is
distributed very unevenly over the
world, and nearly all of it is in the
polar regions. Outside of the perpet-
ually frozen north and south only
about 1880 square miles OF surface
are covered with glaciers.
IL will be interesting to remember
that there are two distinct types Of
glacial phenomena-the Alpine and the
polar. one OF the best examples of
the Alpine type OF glacier is seen in
the Mer de Glace at Chamounix. A
circle of peaks surrounds a depression
which is filed with compacted snow
and ice known as neve. This Is the
reservoir, the source of the glacier. IN
this depression the snow, either fall
ing from the heavens or brought by
winds and avalanches, accumulates to
a great depth, is transformed into
neve. and begins TO overflow down the
mountain side, a true glacier. 1t Is
thus seen that the characteristic fea-
ture OF the Alpine glaciers is that they
occupy depressions in relation TO the
surrounding topography.
On the other hand. the polar glacier.
instead of being formed in a depres-
sion, occupies a eliminating position
above everything else. 1t Is an enor-
nous cap or cupola rising above the
surrounding lands: 1t is the dominant
feature far and wide. Such, for exam
pie, is the great ice cap OF Greenland,
and it is thought probable that an
enormously thick sheet of ice may
cover a continental mass of land in
the antarctic regions and form the
largest sheet of ice in the world.