It is the aim of persons making magnets, that each magnet should have but _two_ poles, at its two ends; it is, however, easy to develop in the same piece of steel several pairs or poles; and if the magnetization be irregular, this is sometimes done when we wish to avoid it. These irregular poles are called _consequent points_. Now I want my young reader to understand that it is not only because the rocks of the Goerner Grat and Riffelhorn contain iron, that they exhibit the action which I have described. They are not only magnetic, as common iron is, but, like the magnetized steel needle, they are magnetic and polar. And these poles are irregularly distributed like the "consequent points" to which I have referred, and this is the reason why I have used the term. [Sidenote: BEARINGS FROM THE RIFFELHORN. 1858.] Professor Forbes, as I have already stated, was the first to notice the effect of the Riffelhorn upon the magnetic needle, but he seems to have supposed that the entire mass of the mountain exercised "a local attraction" upon the needle; (upon which end he does not say). To enable future observers to allow for this attraction, he took the bearing of several of the surrounding mountains from the Riffelhorn; but it is very probable that had he changed his position a few inches, and perfectly certain had he changed it a few yards, he would have found a set of bearings totally different from those which he has recorded. The close proximity and irregular distribution of its consequent points would prevent the Riffelhorn from exerting any appreciable influence on _a distant needle_, as in this case the local poles would effectually neutralize each other. FOOTNOTES: [A] Now called, in the Federal map, the 'Grenz glacier.'--L. C. T. [B] I take this name from Studer's map. Sometimes, however, I have called it the "Breithorn glacier." (21.) [Sidenote: MONT CERVIN AS CLOUD-MAKER. 1858.]