It was the first, protruding into the ocean, which he had had an opportunity of inspecting closely; and though small, compared with other similar formations, it had nevertheless all their principal characteristics. It presented to the sea a convex mural face, seventy feet in height and about two miles in length, its centre projecting into the water beyond the general line of the coast to the east and west of it. The surface rose abruptly to the height of about two hundred feet, and, sloping thence backward with a gentle inclination, seemed to be connected with an extensive _mer de glace_ above. Several fissures or crevasses, apparently of great depth, struck vertically through its body, and extended far up into its interior; and others, more shallow, which seemed to have been formed by the streams of melted snow that poured in cataracts down into the sea. Dr. Hayes remarks that he was impressed by its viscous appearance; but we have shown that a certain amount of viscosity naturally appertains to glacier ice. [Illustration: FORCING A PASSAGE THROUGH THE ICE.] Parallel with its convex face ran a succession of indistinctly marked lines, which gave it the aspect of a semi-fluid mass moving downward upon an inclined surface; and this idea was confirmed by its appearance about the rocks on either side. Over these it seemed to have flowed; and, fitting accurately into all their inequalities, it gave the effect of a huge moving mass of partially solidified matter suddenly congealed. * * * * * Of still greater interest is the same adventurous explorer’s description of the great Arctic _Mer de Glace_ which lies inland from Rensselaer Bay, in about lat. 79° N., and long. 68° W. Dr. Hayes and his party had set out on an expedition into the interior, and after passing through a really picturesque landscape, enriched with beds of moss and turf, patches of purple andromeda, and the trailing branches of the dwarf-willow, they emerged upon a broad plain or valley, in the heart of which reposed a frozen lake, about two miles in length by half a mile in width. They traversed its transparent surface. On either side of them rose rugged bluffs, that stretched off into long lines of hills, culminating in series in a broad-topped mountain-ridge, which, running away to right and left, was cut by a gap several miles wide that opened directly before them. Immediately in front was a low hill, around the base of which flowed on either side the branches of a stream whose course they had followed. Leaving the river-bed just above the lake, they climbed to the summit of this hillock; and there a sight burst upon them, grand and imposing beyond the power of words adequately to describe. From the rocky bed, only a few miles in advance, a sloping wall of pure whiteness rose to a broad level plain of ice, which, apparently without limits, stretched away toward the unknown east. It was the great _mer de glace_ of the Arctic continent.