It is stated in one of the MS. note-books of the late Principal J. D. Forbes, that this depression, now called the Breuiljoch, was formerly _the_ pass between the Val Tournanche and Zermatt, and that it was abandoned for the Théodule in consequence of changes in the glaciers.(74) The authority for the statement was not given. I presume it was from local tradition, but I readily credit it; for, before the time that the glaciers had shrunk to so great an extent, the steep snow-slopes above mentioned, in all probability, did not exist; and, most likely, the glaciers led by very gentle gradients up to the summit; in which case the route would have formed the natural highway between the two places. It is far from impossible, if the glaciers continue to diminish at their present rapid rate,(75) that the Théodule itself, the easiest and the most frequented of all the higher Alpine passes, may, in the course of a few years, become somewhat difficult; and if this should be the case, the prosperity of Zermatt will probably suffer.(76) Carrel and I wandered out again in the afternoon, and went, first of all, to a favourite spot with tourists near the end of the Gorner glacier (or, properly speaking, the Boden glacier), to a little verdant flat—studded with _Euphrasia officinalis_—the delight of swarms of bees, who gather there the honey which afterwards appears at the _table d’hôte_. [Illustration: WATER-WORN ROCKS IN THE GORGE BELOW THE GORNER GLACIER.] On our right the glacier-torrent thundered down the valley through a gorge with precipitous sides, not easily approached; for the turf at the top was slippery, and the rocks had everywhere been rounded by the glacier,—which formerly extended far away. This gorge seems to have been made chiefly by the torrent, and to have been excavated subsequently to the retreat of the glacier. It seems so because not merely upon its walls are there the marks of running water, but even upon the rounded rocks at the top of its walls, at a height of seventy or eighty feet above the present level of the torrent, there are some of those queer concavities which rapid streams alone are known to produce on rocks. [Illustration: STRIATIONS PRODUCED BY GLACIER-ACTION (AT GRINDELWALD).]