It seemed only to get less and less traceable towards the centre of the mass of Mont Blanc; and, from the ridge of the Aiguille Bouchard itself, at the point _a_ in Plate 33, whence, looking south-west, the aiguilles can be seen in the most accurate profile obtainable throughout the valley of Chamouni, I noticed a very singular parallelism even on the south-east side of the Charmoz, _x y_ (Fig. 60), as if the continued influence of this cleavage were carried on from the Little Charmoz, _c_, _d_ (in which, seen on the opposite side, I had traced it as in Fig. 59), through the central mass of rock _r_. In this profile, M is the Mont Blanc itself; _m_, the Aiguille du Midi; P, Aiguille du Plan; _b_, Aiguille Blaitiere; C, Great Charmoz; _c_, Petit Charmoz; E, passage called de l'Etala. [Illustration: FIG. 59.] [Illustration: FIG. 60.] [72] Many geologists think they _are_ the true beds. They run across the gneissitic folia, and I hold with De Saussure, and consider them a cleavage. [73] I tried in vain to get along the ridge of the Bouchard to this junction, the edge of the precipice between _a_ and _b_ (Plate 33) being too broken; but the point corresponds so closely to that of the junction of the gneiss and protogine on the Charmoz ridge, that, adding the evidence of the distant contour, I have no doubt as to the general relations of the rocks. [74] De Saussure often refers to these as "assaissements." They occur, here and there, in the aiguilles themselves. [75] The aqueous curves and roundings on the nearer crest (La Cote) are peculiarly tender, because the gneiss of which it is composed is softer in grain than that of the Bouchard, and remains so even to the very top of the peak, _a_, in Fig. 61, where I found it mixed with a yellowish and somewhat sandy quartz rock, and generally much less protogenic than is usual at such elevations on other parts of the chain. [76] It is worth while noting here, in comparing Fig. 66 and Fig. 68, how entirely our judgment of some kinds of art depends upon knowledge, not on feeling. Any person unacquainted with hills would think Claude's right and Titian's ridiculous: but, after inquiring a little farther into the matter, we find Titian's a careless and intense expression of true knowledge, and Claude's a slow and plausible expression of total ignorance. It will be observed that Fig. 69 is one of the second order of crests, _d_, Fig. 48. The next instance given is of the first order of crests, _c_, in the same figure